All About Seduction(79)

“Do you want a child too, or is it only your husband who wants you pregnant?” he said conversationally. There was no other way to approach this.

Caroline’s arm rubbing jerked to a halt. She looked up, her eyes filled with hurt. She was desperately cold, but still wouldn’t turn to him for a basic need like warmth. He swallowed down his disappointment.

Her voice started barely audible but rose as she spoke. “I’ve always wanted a baby. But this unholy plan was not of my making.” She pushed her hand against her mouth as if she regretted what she had said.

Jack watched her struggle. Wondering if he dared offer to help and how she would take it. His crutches were out of reach, as if she wanted to keep as much distance between them as possible. She lowered her hand and lowered her legs, pulling them back and to the side and folding her hands in her lap. She straightened her spine and lifted her chin with the slightest toss of her head.

“It takes a strange man to loan out his wife to other men to get her with child.”

She closed her eyes and pressed her lips together. “He just wants a son to pass the mill on to. I know it seems odd . . .”

“Broadhurst can’t father children,” Jack offered.

She fisted the material at her neck. “How do you know that?”

Curious that she didn’t offer a denial.

“You are his third childless wife. It has to be him.” And his last wife had died by her own hand or his when she passed the age of childbearing.

Caroline looked down at the floor and spoke in a flat voice. “I always thought that it was my fault, and it is not as if I would have ever known different if he had not presented this plan. I almost hate him for making me hope again.”

“You want children.”

Caroline shook her head, but it wasn’t in disagreement, but as if the knowledge surprised her. “I suggested an adoption, but he is set on it being a child with blue blood and legitimate connections.”

“Your child.”

She nodded. Her eyes begged him to understand. “Broadhurst wants a child who has no doors closed to him due to the circumstances of his birth. One that will have a better life than he had.”

Perhaps the old man possessed a few human traits. Jack still wanted to kill him, but he understood better than he wanted. Perhaps his fascination with her or a woman like her was to help give his offspring—assuming he ever had any—advantages he hadn’t had. He ticked off things in his head: education, not needing to work at the age of five, plenty of food, a warm bed all his own. Her child would have everything.

“And you agreed to do this?” he asked.

She laughed, but sounded anything but amused. “I did. It’s wrong, I know.” Her mouth pursed but her eyes flashed.

Which still left him uncertain of what she wanted. “And what will he do to you when he discovers you are not in a gentleman’s bed?” Jack scooted back so his head did not loll as he tried to carry on a conversation with her. God help him, but he’d take being horsewhipped if it meant he could have her.

Her chin lowered and she turned away.

“And you have not found one of the men to your liking?”

“I find I am not cut out to be an adulteress.” Caroline’s hands fisted in the nightshirt. “If there were any other way . . .”

“There is only one way to conceive a child. What of the man from the library?” Jack shook his head, but couldn’t seem to stop himself. He wanted to solve the problem for her.

Spots of red appeared in her cheeks. “He assured me he will not do anything that might result in a pregnancy, and I am forbidden to suggest to him that Mr. Broadhurst is incapable of fathering a child. It wouldn’t do for all of society to know that he is not the father of any child I might bear.”

A twinge of regret passed through Jack as he thought of all the times he too had refused to commit the act that could lead to a pregnancy. Avoiding marriage hardly seemed a worthwhile goal, but then he’d hoped to better himself before choosing to marry. He squeezed his eyes shut. “You could tell him you are in an infertile time.”

She gaped at him. Then sputtered, “And how would any woman know when she is fertile? We don’t go into heat like cats and dogs.”

He didn’t want to help her lay with another man, but if she didn’t fulfill her husband’s demand, he feared she would end up like the second Mrs. Broadhurst. “If you are regular, two weeks before your flow and the days around that time.”