Page 64 of His Improper Lady

“Never mind that,” Alex said, shooting Con a look. “What does that have to do with this envelope?”

Gregory, who was still staring at Con with a puzzled look, said, “I need to assume my place as his heir. I’m about to be married. I need to get on with my life. So I informed my attorney that I wanted to petition to have Alistair Moreland declared dead.”

“What if he isn’t dead?” Alex asked.

“He is to me.”

“Your lawyer is this Blackstock fellow?” Con asked.

“His son is my attorney. The elder Blackstock was my father’s lawyer, and when he learned what I was doing, he sent some legal papers to you.”

“To me?” Con stared at him. “Why send them to me? Why not to you? Or the duke?”

“Believe me, I have asked that many times,” Gregory said sharply. “The man was on his deathbed, and, frankly, I think he’d gotten a bit dotty. Whatever the reason, he told his son he’d sent it to the Moreland business. I thought perhaps he meant your father’s man of business, Cummings, but the younger Blackstock spoke to Cummings, and the man said he’d received nothing from either of the attorneys.”

“I cannot imagine why he’d send anything here. Why doesn’t Blackstock’s son ask his father about it?”

“I told you, the man was on his deathbed, and now he is no longer conscious. Needless to say, my problem is not the most important thing on his son’s mind right now. However, it’s rather important to me. It may be nothing, just the product of an ill and confused mind, but it’s possible it could be a more recent version of my father’s will.”

“I don’t know what to tell you,” Con said. “Nothing like that has come here. Trust me, we’ve scoured the office.”

Gregory stood for a moment, studying Con. “Someone broke into your office? Are you sure they didn’t get it?”

“Positive,” Con replied.

Tom spoke up. “I chased off the thief. There was nothing in her hands.”

“The thief was a woman?” Gregory asked dubiously. “Are you certain?”

Tom nodded but didn’t elaborate.

“Why would anyone else want it?” Gregory seemed to be asking himself more than anyone else. He straightened and asked Con, “Will you tell me if you do receive it? Or if you hear any word of it?”

“Of course. It’s your business, as you said.”

Gregory nodded and started toward the door, but he stopped and turned. “You said—what did you mean when you asked if I knew about Stella?” He paused, then went on as if the words were pulled out of him. “Was that her name? His mistress? And how the devil do you know that?”

“Because I’ve met one of her children.”

“Her children! You can’t mean—my father’s—there were no children.”

“There very well may have been,” Con replied. “They have a Moreland ring. Their mother ran away with her lover at the same time Alistair left.”

Tom noticed that Gregory’s thumb went to the bare ring finger on his right hand. “That’s nonsense.” Color surged in Gregory’s face, and he took a step forward, his hands clenching. “It’s no proof of anything. Anyone who told you that is lying. I have no idea who his mistress was. My mother and I were not privy to my father’s secrets. But there weren’t any children. It’s impossible. If there had been, they would have taken them along.”

“Not all parents are so caring about their children.”

“I am well aware of that.” Gregory’s gray eyes were stormy now, everything about him so tightly clenched it was a wonder something didn’t snap. “My father was weak and faithless and a fool, but he didn’t do that. Someone is trying to take advantage of you. You may be gullible enough to believe them, and God knows you have no compunction about embarrassing the family, but I am not so foolish.”

“You could meet them yourself,” Con said. “Aren’t you interested in seeing if you have any siblings? Mother is having a dinner for them. You could come and talk to them.”

“Meet them? Sit down and chat? You really are mad if you think I’d want to do that. I have no interest in talking to swindlers,” Gregory retorted. “I have no siblings. And if you go running all over the city telling people that my father left a string of bastards in his wake, I will kill you. I will not allow you to humiliate my mother any more than the Moreland family already has. Do you hear me?”

“Yes. You’re quite audible,” Con snapped back. “I might have known you’d be too stiff-necked to consider anything but what you want to believe. I don’t know why I even bothered to ask.”

Gregory’s jaw worked, and for an instant, Tom thought he was going to erupt, but he spun on his heel and left the room. The room was silent for a moment, the only sound Gregory’s footsteps ringing through the hall and down the stairs, punctuated at the end by a slamming of the outside door.

“Well, you’re as diplomatic as ever,” Alex said wryly.