That maybe you had changed.
That maybe I had changed you.
She could not say any of those things to him.
She had no right to say them.
He turned to fully face her, and she realized that he was holding an infant in his arms.
The room came into stark relief. Not a sitting room. A nursery.
And he was here, holding a sleeping child so small that she fit easily in his hands.
She swallowed, stepping closer, peering into the little round, red face and the bluster went out of her. She no longer wanted to scream or shake him. She did not feel vindicated. She felt . . . lost.
In a different world—another time—they might have been in a similar nursery. Might have had a similar moment. A happier one.
Her voice caught as she spoke, looking at the baby and not the man. “I know what it is like to grow up knowing that a parent doesn’t want you, Simon,” she whispered. “I know what it’s like to have the world know it, too. It is devastating. Devastating when you are four, when you are ten, when you are . . . twenty.
“I know what it is to be ridiculed and rejected by everyone.”
What it is to be rejected by you.
Suddenly, his acceptance of this child meant everything to her. She did not know why—only that it was true.
“You must acknowledge her, Simon.” There was a long silence. “You must. So there is scandal. You can weather it. You can. I—” No. There was no I. She was nothing to him. “We . . . we will stand beside you.”
There were tears on her cheeks, and she knew she should be sorry for them. “You’re here for her, Simon. You came to meet her. Surely that means something. You can want her. You can love her.”
She heard the plea in her words, knew that she was talking about more than this child.
She should be embarrassed but could not find the energy to care.
All she cared about was him.
This man who had ruined her for all others.
From the beginning.
“Simon.” she whispered, and in the name was an ocean of emotion.
He was everything she’d always sworn to hate . . . an arrogant aristocrat who had ruined an unsuspecting female and had a daughter whom he might not acknowledge.
She hated herself for noticing the strength and perfection of him.
For wanting him even as she should despise him.
He took a step toward her, and she stepped back, afraid to be closer to him. Afraid of what she might do. What she might allow him to do.
“Juliana, would you like to meet my niece?”
His niece.
“Your niece?”
“Caroline.” The word was soft, filled with something she instantly envied.
“Caroline,” she repeated, taking a step toward him, toward the cherub in his arms, with her little round face and her little rosebud of a mouth, and swirls of golden hair just like her uncle’s.
Her uncle.
She let out a long breath. “You are her uncle.”
One side of his mouth lifted in a barely there smile. “You thought I was her father.”
“I did.”
“And you did not think to confirm it before making such accusations?”
Warmth flooded her cheeks. “Perhaps I should have.”
He looked down at the baby in his arms, and something tightened in Juliana’s chest at the incongruous portrait they made—this enormous man, the portrait of propriety and arrogance, and his infant niece, barely the length of his hands.
“Caroline,” he whispered once more, and she heard the awe in his voice. “She looks just like Georgiana. Just like she looked when she was born.”
“Your sister.”
He met her eyes. “Georgiana.”
Understanding dawned. “She is the secret. The one you have been working to protect.”
He nodded. “I had no choice. I had to protect the family. I had to protect her.”
Juliana nodded. “How old is she?”
“Seventeen.”
Not even out.
“Unmarried?” She did not have to ask the question.
He nodded once, stroking one finger along Caroline’s tiny hand.
The baby was the reason for everything . . . for his anger at Juliana’s recklessness . . . for his insistence that her reputation was paramount . . . for his impending marriage.
A knot formed in Juliana’s throat, making it difficult to swallow.
“I thought I would get here and the answer would be clear. I thought it would be easy to send her away. To send them away.”
She was transfixed by his soft, liquid voice, by the way he held the infant, so carefully.
“Then I met Caroline.” In her sleep, the child grasped the tip of his finger tightly, and he smiled, wonder and sadness breaking across his beautiful features—features that so rarely betrayed his emotion. He exhaled, and Juliana heard the weight of his responsibility in the sound.
Tears pricked, and Juliana blinked them away.
When society heard, the scandal would be unbearable. Did he really think he could hide from them forever?
She knew she must tread lightly. “You sent your sister here to keep her . . . situation . . . a secret?”
He shook his head. “No. She ran. From the family . . . from me. She did not think I would support her. Support them. And she was right.”
She heard the bitterness in his voice, saw how one side of his mouth curled in a grimace before he turned to cross the room and return the baby to her cradle.
From where he had lifted her.
Suddenly, Juliana realized the enormity of this moment upon which she had intruded; aristocratic males did not linger in nurseries. They did not hold children. But Simon had been here. Had been holding that baby with all the care she deserved.