“You want me to spend a month here in the country with your nephew, whom I do not know,” she elaborated.
“I wish for my heir to at least share my blood,” Longleigh said. “Surely you do not dare to object.”
“You cannot force me to allow him into my bed. To do so would be nothing short of rape.”
“There will be no force. The two of you will be amenable, I have no doubt.” Again, his lip curled. “The both of you are amoral whores.”
She could not be sure this time who was the object of his loathing—her, his nephew, or himself.
Tilly inhaled slowly, ignoring the slur. What was one more in a sea of so many?
“I refuse to do it.”
“Your refusal is not an option. I have drafted my will with care, Ottillia.” He eyed her, his countenance imperturbable and yet emanating with hostility. “If I die without issue, everything will go to my brother, the new duke. You’ll be left without a widow’s portion.”
She should not have been surprised by his attempt to strongarm her into this despicable plan of his, and yet she was. After years of marriage to him, he still had the power to astound her with his vindictiveness. If Longleigh left her with nothing, she would be left to the dubious mercy of her family.
“If you want a child, I could choose a man,” she suggested. “Not a stranger.”
“No.”
“Why not?” she asked, needing to know, to understand.
“The blood must be mine. My family. I’ll not accept anything less. Christ, for all I know, you’d choose a damned groom or a footman.”
Desperation surged, and she did her best to ignore the hurt at his implication she would bed every servant in the household. When he had demanded her presence at Coddington Hall, she had never imagined it would be for this purpose. Her heart pounded with the furiousness of a runaway horse’s hooves beating across the dirt.
“This nephew of yours,” she began slowly, “why would he agree to such a plan?”
“The same reason you will,” Longleigh said. “I am not giving him a choice to deny me.”
A shiver shuddered through her. “Longleigh, this is mad.”
But even as she protested, there was a voice within her, hopeful and foolish and stronger than all the others. It was the voice that reminded her of how badly she had longed for a child of her own. How desperately she wanted to become a mother. Here was her chance. She had not dared to risk becoming with child for fear of what Longleigh would do to herself or the child. But if she were to become a mother with his blessing…
Her fragile heart dared to hope. The truth was, she did not want Longleigh’s munificence in death. All shedidwant, however, was a child.
She had gone to Longleigh’s bed with a sense of duty, knowing she must. She had married him wanting a child. Wanting the security of a marriage, the happiness of motherhood. After a tumultuous rearing, all she had needed was to be a wife and a mother. To earn her family’s approval with a good match.
Instead, she had gotten nothing but misery.
What if this child was her only chance for happiness in this life?
Her sole opportunity to become a mother?
Should she take it? Did she dare? She had forced herself to endure Longleigh’s attentions on many occasions. Could she do so with another man, knowing it could lead to her at last becoming a mother, and with the duke’s blessing?
A knock sounded at the door to the massive drawing room, jolting her from her riotous thoughts.
“He is here,” Longleigh said. “I will leave the two of you now. I return to London this afternoon. I trust you will do your duty as my duchess.”
He rose, bowed stiffly, and crossed the chamber, leaving her there with her cold tea and the grim specter of the nephew he intended to share her bed.
* * *
In the elegantgallery outside the drawing room of Coddington Hall, Adrian Hastings told himself he could do what the despicable man who had sired him had asked. He would bed the duchess for a month’s time. The money he had been promised—ten thousand pounds—was a staggering sum. More than he could fathom.
Enough to make him do anything, including bed a woman who was likely old enough to be his mother for a month’s time. As long as it meant he could begin life anew in America with more coin than he could ever want or need.
