Bridget sipped her tea, hoping it would combat the fresh wave of nausea that had assailed her just then. “It is a happy condition. I can only hope Leo will find it the same.”
Lily’s lips compressed, her eyes growing sad. “Leo has a soft heart. He has been wronged in the past. Do not give up on him, my dear. He needs you. The past has made him slow to trust, and even slower to forgive, but he will come back to you. My Leo is different than Clay. Both of my sons have been wounded and wronged, but one by the woman who should have loved and protected him the most.”
“He told me about the duchess,” Bridget said softly, hating to revisit such evil even by the mere mentioning of the woman. “What she did to Leo, poisoning him…” she shuddered with revulsion. How a mother could deliberately harm her own son was beyond Bridget’s comprehension. “I am so grateful he has you.”
“I am proud to call him my son. Others would frown upon me, would never recognize me. Not Leo.” Lily’s smile softened, her eyes glistening with tears. “He has been unhappy for so long, Bridget. He deserves happiness. He deserves to be loved. You love him. I know you do, and I know he loves you as well. From the moment you first came here to Harlton Hall, I sensed something different about you. I saw the way he watched you then, and I knew you would be the one for him. A mother can sense these things.”
Guilt struck her anew for the way she had initially met this wonderful woman, for all the deceptions she had perpetrated and the pain she had left in her wake. “I am so very sorry for what I have done. When I came here, I thought it would be simple. An assignment to carry out, and I would save my brother’s life. But it became far more.”
Lily took a sip of her own tea. “Love always becomes more than we bargain for. When I first met Leo and Clay’s father, I was a singer. I lived my life on the stage. I traveled the Continent and even went as far as New York City before coming back to London. It was my largest show. And there was a mountain of a man waiting for me afterward, a duke, the handsomest man I had ever seen. He wanted to make me his mistress, and I had no intention of being any man’s kept woman.”
“What did you tell him?” Bridget asked, eager to hear Lily’s story, this untold piece of Leo’s past.
Lily chuckled. “I told him to go to the devil. He was newly married, though unhappily so, an arranged marriage he had been forced to accept. I had no wish to be any man’s mistress. But he was persistent. He returned, night after night. Followed me to different cities. Once, he turned up in Paris. It was the night I gave in. That man had loved me enough to chase me, even when he had no reason to. A hundred other women, all more easily obtained than I, could have been his instead. But he chose me.
“He pursued me. And he loved me. It took me some time to realize that. To accept I would always be his mistress and never his wife. But in the end, the love we shared and the life we lived was worth any sacrifice I ever made. I realized the most important decision you can ever make in your life is to love someone. Loving is not easy. It is raw and messy and hard-won. But it is also worth every struggle made to gain it.”
Lily’s story warmed her heart. It gave her hope. And courage too. Maybe all was not lost. “How do I make Leo follow me to Paris?”
Lily grinned. “Oh my darling girl, you won’t have to go as far as Paris. I have it on good authority he is already on his way here as we speak.” She paused. “And if he isn’t, I shall hunt him down and box his ears.”
Bridget had no doubt she would.
Chapter Twenty-One
Leo landed backat Harlton Hall much as he had what seemed to be a lifetime ago, with a small cadre of servants and one armed guard, dusty, travel-worn, and weary. This time, there was no impending wedding, and he had not spent the previous night surrounded by the most depraved and licentious acts imaginable. Instead, he had spent it stroking his cock and wishing his hand had been his wife’s delectable cunny.
He was also accompanied by two additional people. One was Clay, who had convinced him to flee London. The other was a surprise for Bridget.
Here he was, prepared to do his duty.
Duty was still everything to him, but it held a different, deeper meaning now:family. His family was in the process of expanding. Exponentially so, it would seem.
Clay was having a babe.
Leo was having a babe.
And he had another brother.
AnIrishbrother.
He glanced at Cullen O’Malley as the carriage slowed to a halt before Harlton Hall. Freshly arrived from Dublin, he was slight of figure, gaunt-cheeked from his imprisonment, and young, so very young. But he had Bridget’s black hair and blue eyes. That they were siblings was undeniable. He was mild mannered, a friendly lad, grateful to no longer be imprisoned, and the second statement he had made to Leo after thanking him for his freedom had been a threat.
If you ever cause my sister any grief at all, Carlisle, you will have me to answer to.
Yes, Leo rather suspected Cullen would fit right in with this protective, eccentric, thoroughly odd clan he loved.
“Your sister will be most pleased to see you,” he told Cullen. “She worked tirelessly to have you freed.”
“She put herself in danger for me, and I know it.” Cullen bowed his head. “I cannot thank you enough for your persistence on my behalf. I am sorry to have mixed her up in the circles I found. I…thought they were my friends.”
“We are your friends now, lad,” Clay told him, offering him his hand.
“Yourbrothers,” Leo added, putting his hand forward as well. “Our family is small, but fierce, and you will always have a home with us.”
“Always,” Clay reaffirmed.
Cullen nodded jerkily, seemingly too overwhelmed to speak. He shook both their hands, and then the carriage door opened.
