The meanness of his scheme tweaked her pride and renewed her anger. She had nothing to be ashamed of. She did honest work. How dare he treat her so shabbily? He was the cad who’d lied to her, abandoned her, ground her heart into dust. If he expected her to rant and rave like some forsaken fishwife, he’d be disappointed. She refused to give him the pleasure of seeing her make a fool of herself, especially when he deserved nothing but contempt for his selfishness. He may have been amassing a mountain of money all these years, but she’d been seeing to the important task of raising their son.
She straightened her shoulders and lifted her chin. “If you must know, I was in Devonshire until two days ago. Just as I said I’d be.”
Dark eyes fringed with thick, black lashes narrowed with disdain. “You’re such a good liar. You’ll have to forgive me if I don’t believe you straightaway.”
“Me, a liar?” She lifted her chin. “That’s rich coming from you, Sam.”
“Mr. Blackstone, if you please. Kindly remember I’m your employer at present. Nothing more.” He rounded the desk and moved toward her. Instinct warned her to run, but she held firm. She’d done nothing amiss, but he had much to answer for.
Bristling with tension, she focused on his shirtfront for that seemed the least threatening spot. Dressed in formal attire of black and white, he looked like a seething tiger with an elegant bow tied round his neck.
He stopped before her, close enough to touch. She breathed in deep, taking in his scent of soap and the subtle hint of sandalwood cologne. Desperate to feel indifferent, she detested the traitorous way her heart refused to calm.
“Stay away from me.” She clenched her trembling fingers into fists to keep from reaching for him. She prayed he’d maintain a proper distance, but then again he’d never been the least bit proper.
A sly grin tugged at his firm, sculpted lips. “Make me.”
The whisper-soft touch of his fingertips along her jaw silenced her. Tremors raced down her spine and her feet grew roots to the floor. A sigh feathered in her throat as he lifted her chin.
Their eyes met. Instantly ensnared by the rich, brown depths of his gaze, she lost track of time and all sense of good judgment. Blood rushed in her ears and her knees began to quiver like an aspic left in the sun. She swayed toward him. The fleeting thought of how much their son resembled him evaporated the same moment his thumb caressed her full bottom lip.
He leaned closer. His warm, mint-scented breath fanned across her cheek and tickled her ear. “You want me to kiss you, Rosie. Admit it.”
His smug expression rubbed her raw and restored some order to the chaos of her senses. How could she have let her guard down? Sam may have embodied home and safety for her nine years ago, but no longer. In fact, no one seemed more dangerous to her body, livelihood or peace of mind.
Please Lord, give me strength.
She released a shaky breath. “Is that an order, Mr. Blackstone? Am I to understand that although you’re my employer I’ll have to be concerned about untoward advances from your corner?”
He laughed. “Untoward? Debatable. Unwanted? I think not.”
Her cheeks burned. She wished otherwise, but she’d never had any strength of will when it came to Sam and she hated that he could see her weakness while he was the picture of strength. “Think what you like, sir. If I may, I’d like to return to work.”
She turned, desperate to leave, to regain her breath and her bearings. Somehow she managed to navigate halfway to the door before he stopped her. “There’s no use for you in the kitchen.”
She stumbled midstep, then whipped around to face him. Sheer panic seized her. “Are you sacking me?”
He studied her for such a long moment she squirmed like a butterfly pinned to a board.
“That depends on if you’re nice to me or not.”
“I’ve never been cruel to you, Sa...Mr. Blackstone. Unlike you and how you’re treating me at present.”
“Is that so?” He returned to his desk and sat in his imposing leather chair. “Then I suppose you thought you were doing me a favor when you ran off and married another man?”
Her knees buckled and the room tipped to an unnatural angle. Only God’s mercy kept her upright. She gripped the back of a chair, her fingers digging into the soft leather. Had she heard him correctly? How did he know about her marriage? Did he know about his son?
Fear invaded the deepest recesses of her being. Having inhabited a lower rung in society all her life, she was used to being powerless. More than once she’d seen the rich get away with all sorts of evil simply because they had the means to buy their own justice. Was that why he’d brought her here? To show her he had the wealth to bend the law to his will? Was he simply funning with her before he revealed his knowledge of Andrew and that he meant to snatch their son from her care?
Nausea soured her stomach. How could she live without her child?
“How...?” She cleared her throat. Voices in the hall competed with the rush of blood in her ears. “How did you learn about Harry?”
He shrugged. “Does it matter?”
“It does to me.”
“What is he? A footman?” His lip curled. “No, my money’s on a groomsman. You always did want a horse.”
“He was a farmer, if you must know,” she said, irked that he didn’t answer her. “A good and godly man. He deserves your thanks for helping me, not your scorn.”
He surged to his feet. All six feet two inches of lean, hostile muscle. “I’ll be flayed alive before I thank the likes of that clodhopper. You were my girl, Rosie! You promised to wait for me forever if need be. Those were your words, not mine. Imagine my surprise when I went to fetch you in Ashby Croft and learned your definition of forever meant less than eight measly months.”
In the wake of his outburst, a hush fell over the room. “You came for me?” she whispered, unable to accept he told the truth.
“Of course.”
“Of course?” She balked at his arrogance. “There’s no of course about it. You said you’d return in a few weeks.”
Color scored his high cheekbones. “Settling in and learning my trade took longer than I expected. Stark had me working eighteen hours a day for months...I wrote to you. I hoped you might get your friend, Lizzy, or that layabout of an innkeeper you worked for to read my letters.”
“Letters? As in more than one?”
He weaved a letter opener between his long, elegant fingers before letting the ivory-handled implement clatter to the desktop. He cleared his throat. “The post isn’t always reliable. I wanted to be certain you heard from me.”
Her heart plummeted. If he was telling the truth, where had those messages gone? Had they truly been lost or had someone stolen them? How different their lives might have been if she’d received even one. “None of them reached me.”
He shrugged. “Water under the bridge now that you’re wed.”
She flinched at the accusation in his voice. Whatever he knew of her marriage, he mustn’t be aware that she’d been widowed within weeks of saying her vows or that Harry’s wounds had made it impossible to make a true union. Was it possible he didn’t know of Andrew’s existence, either?
Hope buoyed her for the first time since she’d entered the study. “I did wait for you, but I’d been ill and—”
“Are you ill now?”
“No, but—”
“Then details aren’t worth a farthing as far as I’m concerned. What it boils down to is you didn’t have enough faith in