Page 31 of To Claim the Long-Lost Lover
Nate pulled his shirt off over his head and soaped his washcloth. “Say what you came to say, my lord.”
“Is it true that Lady Sarah’s ward is your son? Yours and hers?”
The cold burn that had been simmering since he discovered Elias’s existence flared into anger as he spun to fix his father with furious eyes. “My son! Born to my wife, in grief and shame because you and Sutton tore us apart. Given to others to raise and only rescued because my wife did not give up looking for him. I have struggled these seven years to forgive you, Father, as Jesus teaches, but what you did to Sarah, to Elias... I don’t know if I can ever forgive you for that.”
Lechton shrunk in his chair, the colour bleaching out of his face. “But Nathaniel, I did not know.”
Nate focused on his breathing, struggling to overcome the urge to hit something, preferably his father. He didn’t know? What kind of an excuse was that? Under control again, he turned back to the washbasin.
“I have an engagement, my lord, so if that is all...?”
Lechton sounded unaccountably meek, even a little frightened. “Sutton told me you would not be harmed. He said you had to go, and an annulment would be easier if I agreed to sign the papers for you to be enlisted in the navy. He said if I did not sign, he would make his daughter a widow. What was I to do, Bentham? Winshire held my living. I feared I would be thrown out in the street and you would be dead.”
You could have stood up to them. You could have warned me and Sarah so we could run. You could have refused to tell them how to find us.All of these thoughts surged through Nate’s mind, but what was the point in saying any of them? For better or for worse, his father’s decisions had been made. They couldn’t change the past. “I nearly was dead. I spent the first week of the voyage unconscious, and the next month recovering from broken ribs and bruised organs.”
“They said you would not be harmed,” Lechton repeated. “I… I am sorry I never answered your letters, Bentham. When I was told you had died in a naval action—I have always regretted that I never replied to your letters.”
Nate turned to lean against the washstand as he dried his face, throat, torso and arms.Father thought me dead?Another thing to blame Sarah’s grandfather for, he supposed.
Lechton hadn’t finished. “I do not wish to offend, but are you sure the boy is your son, Bentham?”
Nate swallowed his howl of outrage, and returned a short answer. “Yes.”
Lechton wouldn’t let it go. “Libby tells me he looks just like Honoria; enough alike to be a brother, the nursemaid told her, apparently.”
“Well, then.”
“The duke said the marriage was not valid, but Cousin Arthur insisted... Well. I was just thinking, if you and Lady Sarah are married, and Elias is your son... I was thinking...”
“The marriage is almost certainly valid. The current duke has consulted his lawyers. They are checking precedent, but it makes no difference what they decide, my lord. Sarah is my wife, and I’ll have no other. If the lawyers are uncertain of the legality of the wedding, and if Sarah agrees to have me, we will marry again.”
Lechton purpled and half stood. “Agrees to have you? You are an earl’s heir. Of course, she will have you. No, the marriage must stand. We must prove that it was valid.” He smiled. “A grandson. I have a legitimate grandson. An heir to my heir. Fruit of my loins.”
Nate interrupted. “You will not interfere in any way, Lord Lechton. Sarah has given me permission to court her, and the Duke of Winshire has insisted that it is to be her choice. I have promised I will not speak of it until she gives me leave. I warn you, if you let out word of our marriage before Sarah is ready to accept it, you are likely to send her fleeing back to Winds’ Gate and neither I nor Winshire will let that happen without repercussions.”
Lechton subsided back into the chair. “Court her? Your own wife! But if the duke chooses to support her...” He shook his head.
Nate pulled on a clean shirt and tucked it into his pantaloons. “Why the change of tune?” At his father’s blank expression, he elucidated. “You said Lady Sarah was unsuitable; tried to force me into a betrothal with Miss Tremaway.” He sat down to pull on clean stockings.
Lechton shook his head as if he couldn’t believe Nate didn’t understand. “A bird in the hand, Bentham. She already has your son. A growing boy past the age of infant diseases. The Tremaway chit or any other untried girl might be infertile or—Heaven help us—produce only daughters, like my Libby. No, no. We don’t need Miss Tremaway. Nathaniel, I could not be more pleased. I have a grandson! Are you making an afternoon call? Have you sent flowers? Not the green waistcoat, boy; the blue one with the silver embroidery is more elegant. Here, let me do your cravat.”
Nate allowed him to take over the folding and arranging of the stupid thing, and had to concede that Lechton did a good job of it, even donating his own cravat pin to the cause.
“I am taking Lady Sarah for a drive,” he admitted, when Lechton asked again whether he would be visiting the lady, and Lechton nodded, well pleased. He remained as Nate finished dressing, clucking over the choice of boots, admiring Nate’s new jacket.
“Invite your wife to dinner,” he suggested. “I will go home and tell Lady Lechton. A private family meal, that’s the ticket.”
“I do not wish to rush her,” Nate pointed out. “Pushing my family on her this early might frighten her away.” Lord Lechton might frighten her away. She had already met the children, and Libby was a sweet timid little thing who would never scare anyone.
“Invite her,” Lechton insisted. “Let her have the choice. Is that not what you said?”
They walked out together, and Lechton followed Nate to the mews where his new curricle waited, the horses gleaming in their new harness. “Invite her,” he said again. “Please? I want... I would like to hear about my grandson. Perhaps we could visit. Do you think we could visit?”
Nate said something noncommittal about it being up to Sarah, and managed to get away. How ironic that, now he no longer cared whether or not he pleased his father, he had finally achieved it, all unknowing.
14
Sarah was rather more understanding about Lechton’s about-face than Nate. “He betrayed you, Nate, but surely it makes you feel better to know it was in order to save your life? Indeed, when I think about what might have happened, I am glad they thought to send you into the navy, where you were far, far away when I refused to co-operate with their plans to marry me off.”
