Page 44 of Her Impeccable Scoundrel
Radley’s words rippled over him, his attention filled with the seemingly composed woman before him still garbed in her ball gown.
When the door closed on the maid, Graeme stepped closer. “Blythe,” he said, “I have never seen a lady treated so rudely as you were tonight. Why? What happened here at Risley Manor?”
Her mouth firmed even as her eyes grew shiny. Incipient tears?
He hoped not. He had no skills with weeping women. Handing over a handkerchief never seemed to be enough.
“Who is Coralie?” he asked, keeping his tone as gentle as possible.
She dropped her head and then lifted it on a deep inhale, looking to the left and to the right before answering his gaze with her own firm one.
He wouldn’t get the truth tonight, at least not the whole truth.
“Coralie,” she said, “is my daughter.”
Graeme forced his face into a neutral look, while he mentally sorted through facts, and saw her assessing him. She’d hoped to shock him.
And she had. To his knowledge, there’d been only one child born of Archie and Blythe’s marriage. If Blythe had a daughter that was not Archie’s, it was no wonder that the neighbors… So, who had fathered this daughter of hers?
“Your daughter,” he said matter-of-factly.
He stepped closer, and she straightened her spine and stood taller.
“Yes. My stepdaughter.” She let out a long breath. “Archie’s natural daughter.”
Bloody Archie. Of course he would have cheated on her, but how early in the marriage had he begun seeking other women?
And with Blythe as his wife, how could he have done so?
“Which makes Coralie your cousin, Lord Chilcombe.”
A cousin. How many other by-blow cousins had Archie produced? And where was this one now?
The answer was obvious. “You have her at Bluebelle Lodge.”
Blythe nodded. “She is my goddaughter and ward.”
“How old is this child?”
“Fourteen soon. Almost a young lady. And I have raised her as such.”
“Fourteen?” Blythe and Archie had married fifteen years earlier. Their son had been born almost nine months to the day after the nuptials, a fact that had grated on Graeme’s jealous young self like a sharp-edged rock until he’d shaken off the calf love.
Their son had died, and this girl had lived, but Blythe had raised her as her own to be a lady, albeit at Bluebelle Lodge, not Risley Manor. Why there…?
Ah. The girl’s mother must be there. “Mrs. Stockwell?—”
“Is not Coralie’s mother. Her mother was a maid here.”
“Does this maid reside also at Bluebelle Lodge?”
“No. When Coralie was about two years of age, her mother left her with me. I kept her here, in the nursery, with my son until…”
Blythe’s cool demeanor faltered.
“Until Archie sent her away.”
She raised a gaze so troubled that he reached out and took her hand, and when the trembling started, pulled her into his arms.
