Broken Legacy (Secret Lives Series) (31 page)

Lenister had well gone out of his way to ensure her comfort in her new environment. The connecting door to her room lay open…it was never closed. Not a night had passed when he was home, she was not within his bed and in his arms.

The peace and quiet lasted only a brief period. The reality of the world around them crept into their lives. News filtered in; an undercurrent of change once more reared its head in France. Robespierre had been executed, beheaded, a victim of his own Revolution and with his death came the hope that the end to the Reign of Terror would be but a distant memory. Eloise could not fend sadness. So many deaths…but finally, a glimpse of hope that France might emerge from the desolation that had encompassed it for so long. Relief flooded her when she received news from Marc Pierre he was set along the Italian front and was not within the turmoil in Paris.

Then Eloise received a different sort of letter shortly after the news of Robespierre from…Catherine….
Why would the young girl write her?
Eloise had thought all set in their lives. After all, Seamus, who was preparing to return to Limerick to oversee Killashare for his cousin, escorted Miranda and the children to Colonel Ralston while Lenister had been summoned to London.

Ripping the edge of the note, Eloise quickly read the words.

Lady Lenister,

I hope I am not bothering you, but Louie Frances has faith that you would help. Mama left us. She cried and cried. We woke one morning and she was gone. Can you help us please?

Catherine
Ralston

Within the week, the children had been established within Ashforth Manor, all three. Louie Frances seemed quite pleased with himself when he arrived, greeting her with a massive hug. “Mama Lenister,” he addressed her. “Thank you.”

Eloise was uncertain of the title, deciding it would be best to be called, “Mama Eloise” if Louie Frances so desired. In turn
, Catherine and Darcy did the same.

“You do not have to do this,” Lenister insisted. “You don’t have to take the children in our home. It is unheard of taking one’s husband’s bastard children within their home openly as his wards—and one
who has no connection to us whatsoever.”

“Except morally,” Eloise corrected him. “What
would you have me do—leave them with the colonel? The poor soul. I’m certain he has no desire to raise three children on his own. He will be welcomed here anytime to see his grandchildren, but this is where they belong. They need to begin to heal. We will heal each other.”

“Have I told you that I do so love you
?” Lenister embraced her, kissing her soundly. “Thank you for this gift. But are you certain you want to do this, especially if we are to have another one? The nursery will become quite crowded.”

Eloise broke back out of his arms at his discovery she was expecting. “You know? I wanted to make certain all was well before I told you.”

“Let us say there is not much I do not know of your body, my darling.” He laughed as she felt warmth invade her face. “As much as I want my children around me, your health comes first. I do not want them to be a burden upon you. I can hire a nanny for the colonel.”

“Can you hire a nanny for here instead? If you want me cared for properly, can you send for Nana Adele? Suddenly, I have this need for her.”

Soon it was not only Nana Adele within their household, but Cousin Beatrice as well. Eloise was encased in a cocoon of love.

Eloise wished only that the dreams would stop. Luc still haunted her…calling for her to find their daughter. She would wake in the middle of the night in sweats
, which worried Lenister to no end.

“I believe I know what is wrong,” Lenister whispered to her one night after waking to find Eloise shivering. “You need closure. I cannot promise anything, but let me see if I can find this Giselle. It may hurt to hear of your child’s life and death, but perhaps it
is something you need to hear. To know that there was nothing you could have done to save your daughter.”

And Lenister found Giselle! In less than two months
’ time, her husband had made contact with her friend and made arrangements for Giselle to visit in time for Christmas. Eloise could not contain her excitement. She was worse than the children.

Giselle was coming with her husband, another emigrant. They were opening a store in London after the new year, a
boutique for hats, Giselle wrote. Adding also that she would like nothing better in the world than to see Eloise. Moreover, Edmund, Julia, Lady Rotheward and the children were due in tomorrow as well. The house would be filled to the brim! Eloise could not have asked for more.

Lenister asked her not long hence if she regretted tearing the
paper up…regretted not claiming the title. Was that what Andre told her as he lay dying? No, she had told her husband. She had no regrets not attempting to claim a title that in her heart she knew well was not hers. But she could not answer the last question.

When Andre died in her arms, she strained with every fiber
in her body to understand his last words. In that moment, though she could not make out his words, she knew well his intentions. Andre comprehended the lives the paper destroyed.

He had used the paper to protect her and purge the guilt that it
was he who told Luc of the marriage and the ramifications it would have if known. With the realization that Eloise could hold a prestigious and powerful title, Andre conspired with his best friend to use the information to better themselves. In turn, Luc lost his life and Andre was forced to live with the unspeakable remorse for the repercussions of the action.

That was what Andre gave her. Never would she have to
wonder what would have happened…could have happened. Before her, the choice flashed before her eyes. She made her decision. She chose love.

Sitting here in this room…in this house, she had ever
ything she wanted. She loved and was loved. Suddenly, Eloise heard a screech. It sounded like Nana Adele. Springing upward, Cousin Beatrice cautioned her, but to Eloise’s surprise Lenister made an appearance. She had thought her husband out for the day, overseeing one of the tenant’s concern about the roof of his cottage.

Fear gripped her. “Is something wrong?”

“No, no, my sweet…sweet wife.” He walked to her side. “Our company has arrived. I wanted to have a moment before we greet them together. I want to make sure you are feeling well.”

“I am, but you are scaring me.”

“I don’t mean to, my love. I have something to tell you.” He paused. Reaching down, he took her hand in his. “When I made contact with Giselle, it was not only Giselle I found.”

Eloise looked up into Lenister’s eyes, searching desperately for his meaning. Slowly, he turned and allowed Eloise to see the party walk down the corridor. Her eyes lit upon the sight of her dear friend. Giselle had not changed. The man Eloise did not know, but it was not him
who caught her attention.

Giselle halted and pushed forward a small child, a tiny, young girl…a beautiful girl along the same size as Louie Frances with dark, raven hair and the largest blue eyes. Eloise knew those eyes.

“Rosabel…” Eloise whispered.

Lenister watched his wife kneel and lose herself in the embrace she had waited for…longed for…for so long. A miracle. It was as the angels descended from the heavens with Rosabel and allowed Eloise her one wish. Of course, that was not what had happened. Rosabel was very much alive.

Later, he would tell Eloise the story of how he discovered her daughter. He would tell her how the nurse had substituted her sickly daughter in place of Rosabel. It had been the nurse’s baby
who had died, not Rosabel. Giselle suspected the switch. After the baby died, Giselle pressed the nurse, for the baby she claimed as her own looked so much like Eloise. The nurse confessed her crime. Given that no one seemed interested in the baby at her birth, the nurse saw an opportunity to give her daughter a chance for a life different from her own.

With the
revolt causing its own confusion, Giselle deemed it best for the vicomte’s baby to be thought dead, for she believed Rosabel to be her brother’s child. In hiding at the time, she feared at any moment she would be arrested. When Marc Pierre found them, she was too scared to confess the truth. She thought he was going to arrest her and harm the child because Rosabel was the daughter of the vicomte. Never did she suspect he would help her escape. When Giselle gathered her courage, she asked Marc Pierre why he was helping her family. He answered, “For the one whose heart is pure as a white rose.”

The White Rose
. How many lives had the network saved from certain death, Lenister didn’t know and probably never would. For a moment, he pondered the thought of his wife’s deeds and the others of her network who risked their lives so others, strangers, might live. He had lived in the Terror for only a brief time, but well understood the sheer fear the threat of the Terror’s justice caused. These brave souls demonstrated truer courage than any soldier he had ever encountered, each deciding that doing the right thing was easier to live with than doing nothing.

Suddenly
, he remembered a prayer his mother had taught him as a small child. “Give to me the strength, O Lord, to live with the knowledge that I have done what is right in your eyes. Stay beside me so your courage will become mine, that I might do what is acceptable to you, that I might not know what I have done, but will know that I have done your will.”

He wondered if some kind of higher entity had guided Rosabel to her mother. He didn’t know. He only knew when he
comforted Eloise after one of her dreams, she would whisper of being haunted by Luc. Then he, too, began having dreams…vivid dreams…so real…racing through a haze in a forest searching and searching…desperately searching for something, only to be told by a voice to find her. Then he would awake. Soon, he came to the realization that Eloise needed closure.

Or perhaps it was the mother’s bond with her child that called to Eloise. He would not question. For through all the years of heartache and pain, he had found Giselle and
in turn Rosabel. Now Rosabel was within her mother’s arms. It was all that mattered.

Eloise glanced up at him with tears shimmering down her face. She gestured for him. He fell beside them and enveloped them in his arms with heartfelt love surging through him. In the next instant, he felt more arms about him
: Darcy’s, Catherine’s, Louie Frances’…

He
had his children. He had his wife. He was content.

SEDUCTIVE SECRETS
by Colleen Connally

Book One, Secret Lives Series

Someone wants Alyce Hythe dead…

Shunned from London society for being the daughter of England’s most notorious spy, Alyce Hythe desires only to clear her father’s name. For years, she has been hidden away from all prying eyes, given a new identity and told to forget who she was. But strange things have been happening causing old rumors to once more be whispered. Long has Lord Julian Casvelyn lived with guilt brought on when his brother was murdered by England’s most infamous traitor. But one eventful night has changed everything Lord Julian believed about his brother’s death. Never did he suspect the woman he has just saved from certain harm is the daughter of that man. Now Julian is caught in midst of a conspiracy and desire for that woman. Thrown together by fate, the two search for answers long denied them and along the way discover a love that can free them both.

EXCERPT

Julian woke abruptly. He couldn’t get to his pocket watch to see the time with her in his arms. Light was breaking through the curtained windows. Morning had dawned. How long the night had been. He looked down upon the woman in his arms. She slept soundly against him. Strangely, he took comfort in the thought.

It was not often he held a woman such as this in his arms. To most women Lord Julian Casvelyn was considered a rake. Although every season, one mother or another set their cap for him as a catch for their young daughter. Every year he disappointed those poor Mommas. He had no intention of pursuing on an innocent. In due time, he would do what was proper, marry and produce an heir, but that time had not come.

Alyce stirred in his arms. He looked down upon her and she snuggled closer to him. She was an innocent. Of that he had no doubt. She hadn’t a clue to the danger of being in his arms at this moment...of how his desires had been roused. He should have said no to her when she asked for him to hold her, but he had long since lost control of the situation.

She had brought out in him a protectiveness he had not felt in years...if ever. He thought it dead inside him. Looking down at her sleeping peacefully, the image of her standing by the fire emerged. Her figure illuminated beneath her gown from the firelight. Images of the possibilities with this beautiful woman in his arms in the early morning light stirred within him.

She was not adverse to him. Where women were concerned, his instincts never failed him. No, she would never have slept so soundly in his arms. She trusted him. 
God Gawd
! With a sudden remembrance he had told her to.