“He is not at home, and you should consider yourself fortunate. I’m fully aware of your . . . relationship, and fully aware he terminated that relationship, and that you were handsomely recompensed.”

“Reginald?” She saw him, in her fractured mind, standing in front of a hearth—not this one, no not this one. Her hearth, her parlor.

Did you think I’d allow someone like you to raise my son?

Son. Her son. James. “James. My son. I’ve come for James. I have his blanket in the carriage. I’ll take him home now.”

“If you think I’ll give you money to ensure your silence on this unseemly matter, you’re very mistaken.”

“I . . . I came for James.” A smile trembled on her lips as she stepped forward, arms outstretched. “He needs his mama.”

“The bastard you bore, and that was forced on me is called Reginald, after his father.”

“No, I named him James. They said he was dead, but I hear him crying.” Concern covered her face as she looked around the room. “Do you hear him crying? I need to find him, sing him to sleep.”

“You belong in an asylum. I could almost pity you.” Beatrice stood, the fire snapping at her back. “You have no more choice in this matter than I. But I, at least, am innocent. I am his wife. I have borne his children, children born within the bounds of marriage. I have suffered the loss of children, and my behavior has been above reproach. I have turned a blind eye, a deaf ear on the affairs of my husband, and given him not one cause for complaint. But I gave him no son, and that, that is my mortal sin.”

Color rushed into her cheeks now, all fury. “Do you think I want your brat foisted on me? The bastard son of a whore who will call me mother? Who will inherit this?” She threw her hands out. “All of this. I wish he had died in your womb, and you with him.”