Pregnant on the Earl's Doorstep, page 9
Cal’s eyes flew open. ‘Never? She didn’t leave a note or anything?’
Heather shrugged. ‘She did. Just a short letter, saying she was sorry, but she loved John and that was more important than anything.’
‘How did your dad take it?’
‘Badly.’ Which might be the biggest understatement of the year. ‘He was destroyed. He loved her so much, and it broke him when he realised she loved someone else.’
Broke her, too—not that she intended to mention that. Cal already had the pitying look in his eyes that she’d grown so used to seeing from the villagers. Well, the ones who weren’t giving her knowing looks and talking behind her back, anyway.
‘He started drinking,’ she went on. ‘Lost his place on the council, his reputation... Almost lost the shop, too. People felt sorry for him, of course, but the scandal was too juicy for them to resist gossiping about it. He grew paranoid, started thinking everyone was talking about him all the time. He’d be walking down the street and he’d hear someone say something, and then he’d be yelling at them, threatening them—all sorts. It was...horrible.’
Another understatement.
‘And now?’ Cal asked. ‘How is he now?’
‘Better.’ Heather attempted a smile. ‘Much better. Eventually he landed himself in enough trouble that his doctor insisted on counselling, and that helped, I think. But he still can’t bear to talk about her, or hear her name. He took down all her photos, but... I look just like her, you see.’
Cal’s expression turned stony. ‘He took it out on you?’
‘No!’ Heather’s eyes widened. ‘No, my dad loves me. It was never... No. Not that. But I don’t think it made it any easier for him, having me there as a daily reminder.’
He’d tried so hard never to let on, bless him. But Heather had always known when he got that faraway look in his eye, watching her, that he was thinking of her mother.
‘So. Not quite so idyllic, then,’ Cal said.
He was watching her carefully, Heather noted as she wiped a stray tear from her cheek. Watching her responses, her reactions. His, however, seemed strangely absent. As if the story that had defined her whole life was more of an amusing anecdote than a tragedy. Apart from when he’d thought her father had hurt her, he’d been emotionless throughout the whole thing.
Heather was almost afraid of what that said about his own story.
She shrugged. ‘Not perfect, no. But it could have been worse. My father loves me, and that counts for a lot. He did his best by me once the worst of it was over.’ And she did her best by him in return. They were family, after all. They had to stick together. ‘Growing up without Mum...that was awful. But it was her choice.’
‘But not one you would ever have made?’ Cal said quietly.
‘No.’ Heather’s hands went protectively to her stomach. Her baby was barely more than a cluster of cells, and already she couldn’t imagine ever leaving it. ‘The worst part—well, no, not the worst part, but the part that lingered the longest—was the gossip. The scandal. I’ll for ever be the girl whose mother ran off with a student and left her behind. People can’t look at me and see past that once they know.’
‘I can,’ Cal said, and she knew he believed it.
She gave him a small smile. ‘Wait and see.’
He looked away. ‘I’m sorry that happened to you.’
‘People grow up with worse,’ Heather replied. She bit her lip and took a chance. ‘In fact, I’m almost certain that you did.’
He met her gaze with a crooked smile. ‘Is that a subtle hint that it’s my turn to share my pain?’
‘If you want to tell me,’ Heather replied, settling back in her chair.
The only problem was, as much as she knew she needed to hear it—for Daisy and Ryan’s sake—she wasn’t at all sure she wanted to. She already felt too close to this man. Had shared more than she’d meant to. It was as if she could feel the room—hell, the world—growing smaller around them, until they were all that mattered.
When she knew his truths, his secrets, how much harder would it be to pull back again? But all the same... She needed to know.
‘Tell me,’ she repeated.
And Cal began to talk.
* * *
‘Tell me.’
She’d said it as if it were nothing at all—a story round a campfire. As if there should be marshmallows. As if it wasn’t generations of secrets he was letting out.
Why should he tell her? Why not just lie? Make up a slightly awkward childhood filled with minor issues and small hurts? Pretend, the way every member of his family had for hundreds of years, that they were upstanding, respectable people?
But then he met her steady green gaze and knew that he would tell her everything.
What was this hold she had over him? It was as if her goodness, her determination to do the right thing, was lashing him to her morals.
Because he wanted so badly to be more like her. To have less of the Bryce blood and darkness in him.
Because he wanted to believe that he could give that to Daisy and Ryan. Make their future brighter than their family’s past.
But only if he told the truth now.
‘My family...the Bryce family...they’ve held land and power and influence here for hundreds and hundreds of years. And their reputation has always been...impeccable. No scandal, no mistresses, no illegitimate children.’
Heather winced at that one—understandably.
‘No financial difficulties, not even a servant dismissed under suspicious circumstances. Even more recently there’s never been a photo of any Bryce falling out of a taxi, drunk at a nightclub, and no Bryce woman has ever worn the wrong thing to a royal wedding. Bryce men fought in all the wars like they were supposed to. Bryce women dutifully gave an heir and a spare to every generation. The family here at Lengroth Castle are purer than pure, whiter than white—the pinnacle of what the aristocracy should be. Looked up to throughout the land.’
‘And we need to keep it that way, son,’ his father had always told him.
Even now Cal knew he was living the Bryce legacy—keeping Heather here, where she couldn’t let on about what his brother had done. Keeping the scandal close so it couldn’t get out.
Although, now he knew about her mother, he knew for certain that she’d never tell. She’d never want to bring another scandal down on herself—or her father. And the illegitimate child of an earl who had died under what even Cal now had to admit were suspicious circumstances...that would definitely count as a scandal.
He looked over at her, another wave of guilt crashing over him as he thought about what Ross had done to her. If nothing else, he’d upended her life. And Cal hadn’t exactly helped with that, either, forcing her to stay here at Lengroth for the summer.
Heather, meanwhile, looked sympathetic but confused. ‘I can see how that level of perfection would be—’
‘No,’ he interrupted, anger flaring that she should believe it even for a moment. She’d met Ross, after all. She knew more of the truth than most. ‘The problem is that it’s all a pack of lies.’
‘Oh.’ Heather gave him a small smile. ‘I’ll admit I was wondering where Ross fitted into that picture.’
Cal ran his hands through his hair with a chuckle. ‘Ironically, Ross was the one I thought was different. I thought he’d broken the Bryce curse. That he had the perfect happy marriage and the perfect happy children. Then I came home after his death and found all of this.’
He cast his hands around him, hoping the movement would encompass both the castle, the kids, the debts, Heather’s baby—and that damn contract upstairs in his study.
‘How bad is it here?’ Heather asked. ‘Really? You mentioned that the finances aren’t as healthy as you’d like...’
Cal sighed. ‘That’s just part of it. The next logical step for the whole Bryce legacy, I suppose. Ross has run this place almost into the ground—huge gambling debts, obligations to people and companies he’d obviously made to try and buy himself some more time to get the money together. I can cover the financial stuff myself—one of the benefits of being the younger son has been spending the last decade getting out of the shadow of Lengroth and making my own way in the world. I’ve had enough success that the money isn’t too much of a problem.’
‘But you didn’t count on the scandal of an extra illegitimate child to throw into the mix,’ Heather murmured. ‘And we haven’t even talked about how we’re going to tell Daisy and Ryan the truth about that, when it’s time.’
‘Or if we are.’
That was his Bryce blood rising up again. The instinct to hide from scandal, to pretend none of it had ever happened, wish it away. But he couldn’t pretend Heather didn’t exist. And, heaven help him, he didn’t want to wish her away.
He shoved that thought down. As if the situation wasn’t bad enough as it was. The last thing he needed to do was develop feelings of any kind for the woman carrying his brother’s illegitimate child.
‘The thing I learned about scandal from my mother,’ Heather said softly, ‘is that it always comes out in the end. If she’d told my father the truth up front...managed the situation properly...maybe everything wouldn’t have been as awful as it was. But because she lied everything was a hundred times worse.’
It was hard to imagine a teacher and student relationship like that ever ending particularly well, but Cal didn’t mention it. He knew what she was really saying.
‘We’ll talk about it,’ he promised. ‘Add it to the list.’
‘Speaking of which... You’ve told me about Ross as an adult. But what about when you were children? And when you say your family’s reputation was all a pack of lies, that’s not just Ross, is it? So...what’s the truth?’
* * *
He looked away before he answered, as if he couldn’t meet her eyes while admitting to it. God, how bad was it? She’d known Ross was no saint, but Cal seemed upstanding and respectable—apart from his lack of understanding about love. How bad could the rest of his family have been?
‘In every generation Bryce men have cheated, gambled, drunk, caused pain and suffering and humiliation. They’re just better at covering it up than most people.’
‘Okay...’ That sounded bad, obviously. But a lot of people drank too much or spent too much on the horses. Her own father had succumbed for a time. She leaned forward, towards Cal. ‘When you say pain and suffering...?’
‘I mean it,’ Cal said openly. ‘My father... Ross used to stand in front of me to protect me from his fists, his belt or just his knife-edged tongue. But he always found a way around eventually—unless he was too drunk to stand up. You know why I can find the kids when none of the nannies can? Because I know every damn hiding place in this castle. I remember cowering in the nook behind that hanging by the main staircase while my father bellowed for me—until he got so mad at my hiding he threw my dog down the stairs in front of me and broke his neck.’
Heather shuddered and reached out towards him, desperate to offer some comfort if she could. But Cal pulled back before she could touch him.
‘I still didn’t come out from behind that hanging. I slept there until Ross found me—after midnight.’
‘Cal, I’m so sorry.’
No wonder he thought he couldn’t love the children like a father. He’d had no example of it, no way to learn—except from the older brother he’d clearly idolised, but who had turned out to be flawed, too.
‘Your father sounds...terrible. But that doesn’t mean that every man in your family is like that. Ross wasn’t—was he? I know he wasn’t exactly faithful...’
‘He never hit the kids, as far as I know, if that’s what you’re asking.’
Heather let out a breath of relief. She’d dealt with abused kids before, and hadn’t thought that Daisy and Ryan showed any signs of that at least, but as a teacher she knew a person could never be totally sure.
‘I only knew Ross for one night, and heaven knows I realise he had failings. But he didn’t seem like a cruel or unloving man.’
‘He was cheating on his wife and lying to you and her about it,’ Cal pointed out.
‘You have a point,’ Heather admitted grimly. ‘But his bad behaviour—or your father’s—doesn’t mean that your whole family is bad.’
Or that Cal was incapable of giving Daisy and Ryan the family they needed—because she was almost certain that was what Cal thought.
‘You’re not listening. It wasn’t just Ross, or our father. It’s every Bryce man ever.’ Cal looked up suddenly, his eyes wide and feverish. ‘You know that damn ghost that all the nannies claimed to be running from? She was a servant here, a hundred years ago or so. Story is she got into trouble with a stable hand and lost her footing on the stairs trying to run away and elope with him. Crashed her head open on the stone steps.’
Heather winced. ‘That’s horrible.’
‘And it’s another lie. My great-great-grandfather knocked her up then denied it. When she threatened to tell people in the village the truth, he pushed her down the stairs.’
Heather fell back into her seat. ‘How can you be sure?’
‘Because my father used to threaten to do it if Ross ever knocked up any girl out of wedlock.’
‘Like me.’
Oh, God. Every generation of Bryce men, Cal had said. But not him. Whatever he thought. He wouldn’t do anything to hurt her. She was sure of it.
Cal looked up at her, a wicked glint in his eye. ‘You still sure about staying?’
‘You wouldn’t hurt me,’ she said, meeting his gaze head-on, making sure her voice never wavered.
She was rewarded by a sudden vulnerability in his expression. ‘How can you know that, Heather? How can you know I’m not just like all the rest of them?’
‘Because you asked me here tonight to teach you how to love your niece and nephew,’ she said softly. ‘You’re a good man. I don’t know what else your father did—or your grandfather and your great-grandfather and so on—to make you think otherwise. But I’ve only been here two days and I can already see that. So how about you try forgetting about the past and focussing on the future for a change?’
‘Like you are?’ he asked, his defences back up. ‘I know the money I offered you was good, but can you really tell me that’s the only reason you’re staying? That you’re not avoiding having to admit to your scandalous pregnancy in your home town?’
Heather looked away. ‘I never said that wasn’t part of it. My dad doesn’t deserve another scandal being brought down on him.’
‘And neither do you.’
Reaching between them, Cal took her hand in his, and Heather glanced up to meet his gaze again. The wicked gleam was gone, and so was the anger and the defensiveness. In its place was an expression Heather couldn’t quite identify, but it made her stomach flip-flop all the same.
Was ten weeks too early to feel the baby move? Probably. Which meant this was something else.
And whatever it was, it scared her.
‘We’ll figure this out, okay? Together.’ Cal’s voice was rough, as if admitting to his family’s past had torn his throat raw.
‘Okay,’ she whispered back. ‘Okay.’
Because she believed him. Even if she had no idea how they could do it.
CHAPTER NINE
CAL WAS SUDDENLY all too aware of the softness of Heather’s skin under his fingers and the trusting look in her eyes. God help her, she honestly believed that he was different. That he wasn’t just like all the others.
He almost didn’t want her to stay long enough to realise she was wrong.
Her copper curls fell around her shoulders and he longed to run his fingers through them. Wanted to reach an arm around her and pull her closer. To brush his hands down her sides, her curves, until they rested at her waist and he could lean in for the inevitable kiss he could feel building...
Except he couldn’t.
He could see it in her eyes that if he pressed his lips to hers right now Heather wouldn’t pull away. Knew in his bones that she wanted this as much as he did.
Was it the strange closeness that came from knowing each other’s secrets? From being with the only other person in the world who knew everything? Or was it something more basic? Primal? A connection between them that came from attraction and lust and nothing more?
Or was it the strange sense of trust she brought out in him—something Cal had thought bred out of him generations ago?
Perhaps the problem was that it was all three. He wanted Heather—but she was beautiful, so that was hardly a surprise. And he could relax with her in a way he couldn’t with anyone else, because she knew the truth. Most of all, he trusted her, and that felt wonderful.
But, despite all that, he couldn’t have her. Couldn’t let himself give in to this moment, however tempting it was.
He might be a Bryce, but Heather had given him a glimmer of hope that he could beat down those genes and actually behave the way the rest of his family pretended they did. She was pregnant with his brother’s child. She was scandal enough already—he couldn’t make it worse by seducing her.
Especially now he knew what that kind of scandal would do to her, and to her family, if she had to live through it again.
Swallowing hard, Cal pulled back and watched the light in Heather’s eyes flicker and fade. But then she gave a small nod and he knew that she understood.
However much they both wanted this, it could never be a good idea. And they were just going to have to live with that.
‘I should get back to the children. Check they’re actually asleep this time.’ Heather was on her feet before she’d finished the sentence. ‘Oh, I got in touch with the hospital, by the way. I have a scan booked in two weeks’ time.’
‘I’ll take you,’ Cal said automatically.
