The Problem with Seduction - By Emma Locke Page 0,65
she caught Con observing her, she blushed and looked away.
He waited patiently while his mother fussed over the baby. In time, even Mrs. Dalton lost interest in his mother’s antics. Then, with the same effect of a crack of thunder renting the room, his mother mused, “He doesn’t look a thing like you, Constantine.”
Constantine almost doubled over in a coughing fit. “I’m sure he looks like his mother, Mother.”
“Your mistress, yes,” his mother replied evenly, without taking her adoring gaze from Oliver. “That’s true. You know, I hadn’t any idea you had a mistr—”
“Mother! For God’s sake, have a care for Mrs. Dalton, if not for your own gentility.”
She finally turned to regard him. Oliver jerked his head Con’s way, too, and flashed him a toothless grin.
“Firstly,” Mother said, looking rather baffled by Con’s prudish outburst, “Mrs. Dalton is her employee. It would be very odd for the nurse to be offended by what is surely common conversation in their house. Second, it’s perfectly normal for a man of your age to keep a paramour. Your father had dozens. I’d be more surprised if you didn’t, and to be far more frank than I ought to be—”
“Yes, you are being,” he drawled.
“—I’m glad to put the rumors to rest. Really, Constantine. How closeted do you think I am?”
He couldn’t even look at Mrs. Dalton. “It doesn’t befit a marchioness to discuss the private and very personal matters of her son’s activities,” he bit out, “nor would I care to hear more about my father’s prowess, nor a single word more about my own proclivities.”
She turned back to the baby without comment. For another quarter hour she dandled Oliver and pressed her nose to his cheek until he laughed. Quite honestly, Con hadn’t entertained the slightest thought that his mother would be so enamored of children until she’d begun pleading with him to see Oliver. Most women of her station dispensed their babies to the care of nursemaids and governesses. Had this been his childhood? He remembered very little of his father, who had died when Con was twelve, but he had fond memories of his mother as far back as he could recall. He would have been too young to remember her doting on him like this, however, and as one of the youngest, he had no memories of his brothers as babies.
“You may pretend innocence in all of this, Constantine,” she said at last, gaining his attention, “but I hold the evidence right here. Where is she? Your mistress?” She slid a satisfied glance askance at him as if she’d thrown that last bit in just to set him off again.
“Out.” He shifted to the other foot, suddenly finding the swirls on the carpet fascinating.
“Out? Out where? Out of doors? Did you leave that poor woman on the steps?” His mother sounded horrified.
“Not on the steps.” He shifted back to his right foot.
“But out of doors? You did not invite her in? Even to the servants’ quarters?”
Even Mrs. Dalton was looking at him with interested pity.
“Pray tell,” he began defensively, “how I was to ask the servants to entertain a woman whose name shouldn’t even pass their lips? They may not be blue-blooded, but they know these things ought to be discreet.”
“But she’s a lady!”
Oh, yes. Mother had ferreted out the name of his mistress and paid a call on her parents. He’d forgotten. Not that she’d needed to do much sleuthing, for the name of his paramour was all over London, just as he’d intended.
Despite her excursion to Shropshire to appeal to Lord and Lady Wyndham on his behalf, and thereby demonstrating that she truly didn’t give a fig for propriety, he would never, never grow used to speaking this frankly with her. “The topic of Oliver’s mother is off-limits from now on, Mother.”
“I don’t see any reason why I shouldn’t receive Lady Wyndham’s daughter,” she replied, making it clear she wouldn’t rest on this issue, just as she’d refused to retreat on her demand to see Oliver. “It needn’t be public, but for all that is good in the world, I won’t be on unspeaking terms with the mother of my only grandson.”
He couldn’t begin to imagine what she meant to do about it. He couldn’t let her do anything, really, because her demand was so ludicrous, she couldn’t be humored even the tiniest bit. While he’d been perfectly willing to parade Elizabeth through Hyde Park at the hour when Cyprians typically stretched their legs, bringing her