“Because he knows mine.” Caroline would stomp her foot if it wouldn’t make her seem childish. “He said he trusted me.”
“Are you in love with him?”
What? “I barely know him.” And yet, she felt like she knew him better than anyone else. She had fun with him. She felt alive with him. In fact, she could hardly wait to be alone with him again.
She liked him. Very much.
“Do you love him?” her mother pressed.
“Absolutely not.”
But her mother lowered her chin, waiting for the truth.
“I don’t think so.” Caroline bit her lip. “Besides, he says he can’t offer for anyone right now. And I think it’s because of his secret.”
“Regardless, he waited forty-seven minutes to see you—after waiting half an hour for me. He must have feelings for you.”
“I’m an employee. He thinks he’s responsible for me.”
“Perhaps. But a busy gentleman like Lord Helton does not spend half the afternoon waiting for his other employees to finish bathing.” Her mother tilted her head thoughtfully. “And I’m not at all certain, but I have an idea what his secret might be.”
“You think he cares… wait? What do you think it is?”
Her mother rose, retrieved one of the genealogy books everyone kept telling her to memorize, and joined her on the settee. Caroline tapped her toe and shifted in her seat while her mother flipped through the pages.
“Here.” She’d opened up to the ‘H’s. “Hector Black, the former Earl of Helton, your Mr. Black’s father, traveled a good deal. See here. When he was six and ten, he toured all of England. A few years later he left on a long ocean journey—to sail the world, but also, it says here, to visit plantations his father established in the tropics. The plantation manager reported that he never arrived, and five years later he was legally declared deceased.”
Perhaps these books did contain valuable information. Caroline leaned forward. “It says the declaration was voided a year later.”
“Because Lord Helton returned, from the dead, presumably. Or at least, the man who came forward claimed to be Lord Helton.”
Caroline contemplated the ramifications of what she was reading—of what her mother was implying.
“You don’t think it was the same man.”
“It’s possible. But people say he was different. Colder. More distant. Of course, no one knows what he endured and traumatic events change people. Time changes people. Nonetheless, having been betrothed to Mr. Black’s mother from the time she was born, the earl had no choice but to honor the betrothal.”
“She went ahead and married him, then. Do you remember hearing about any of this?”
“I remember hearing he returned. For a few weeks, everyone was talking about it. But then a new scandal came along. People forget. You know how the ton is. Anyway, a few years later, he was a guest at one of your uncle’s house parties. He spent most of his time in the hunting lodge. From what I remember, they gambled extensively then.” Caroline’s eyes locked with her mother. Because that lodge was now nothing more than charred remains. But that did not signify.
“No one challenged his identity?”
“Not after the marriage. People assumed that if Lady Helton, who was the daughter of a marquess, was willing to marry him, he must be the same person who left. It was well known that she’d been raised to marry nobility. Most daughters of titled men are.”
Caroline considered those words carefully, her mother having proven more than once to see things others missed.
Two years before, her mother had expressed suspicions that her husband and oldest son were in trouble. She’d warned Reed, Randall, and Father that the former Earl of Standish and his son were making poor decisions—because of the opium. She’d begged them to keep their distance.
Everyone except Reed had ignored her, and in the end, events had proven her right.
“If the man who returned was not the Earl of Helton, that would mean Maxwell isn’t either.”
“Not exactly,” her mother said. “Unless someone comes forward to challenge the former earl’s claim, Maxwell Black remains the legitimate earl.”
“With the former earl dead… The only person who would know the truth is Lady Helton—his mother.”
“Yes. And I doubt she’d ever dispute it. She’d lose more than the dowager estate, she’d lose her standing.”
