Page 77 of To Pleasure a Prince

“She’s sickly—I did not want her staying alone anywhere.”

“My servants would have taken good care of her.”

“All the same, Lady Iversley does not mind having her as a guest, and I feel better knowing that someone is looking out for her.”

He supposed he should count his blessings that the damned woman wasn’t coming on their honeymoon. He’d had a devil of a time convincing Regina not to bring a lady’s maid.

Still…“Your cousin had better not be planning to help your brother break his promise.”

“She’s loyal to me, and she knows I would never countenance such a thing. Even if he would attempt it.”

She wouldn’t look at him, and that made him uneasy. “He’d attempt it, you can be sure. I don’t trust your brother.”

Her gaze swung him. “Do you trustme?”

Not when it comes to him, I don’t.But he wasn’t fool enough to say that aloud. “Of course I trust you.”

“Then believe me when I say that Cicely can be trusted, too.” Regina’s gaze drifted back to Louisa. “If you’re still concerned about Simon, why don’t you tell Louisa your suspicions? Put her on her guard.”

“She wouldn’t believe me. She already knows how suspicious I am of the prince and his friends—she would accuse me of having an unjust bias. And to convince her, I’d have to tell her—” He broke off, cursing his quick tongue.

“Tell her what?”

He sighed. As his wife, she might as well know the truth. “That there’s some question about her parentage, at least in Prinny’s mind. He claims she’s his.”

She seemed oddly unsurprised to hear it. “I take it that you disagree?”

“She’s not the prince’s daughter, no matter what he says.”

“Are you sure?”

“Circumstances make it impossible. And Prinny knows it, too. If he thought she was his, he would have challenged me for guardianship long ago, like he and Mrs. Fitzherbert did with Lady Horatia Seymour’s girl.”

“But Minney had no immediate family to claim her after her mother died, just uncles and cousins.”

“None of whom believed that Prinny was her father, even though her mother had been his mistress. Yet the prince fought for guardianship of the girl.”

“Perhaps he doesn’t fight you because he knows Louisa is in good hands.”

Marcus eyed her askance. “He knows how much I despise him. That insult to his pride alone should make him fight me.”

She was silent a moment. “Would it be so awful if LouisawasHis Highness’s daughter?”

Anger knotted in his belly. “I’ve lived most of my life knowing I was a fraud—not a true heir to a prince and not a true heir to a viscount, either. I knew I was the illicit product of a union despised by the Church and abhorred by respectable people. I was the very symbol of all that is wrong with our society. I would not lay that burden on anyone, but especially not on Louisa.”

“She is a grown woman now. She can handle the knowledge.”

“Can she? I don’t seeyoutelling her that your brother is an ass who wants her only for political gain.”

Paling, she glanced away. “Because it’s not true.” She added in a whisper, “And if it were, it would break her heart.”

“Exactly. That’s why I don’t want her to know about any of this. I’d rather separate them. I can endure playing the awful, overprotective brother if that’s what it takes to give Foxmoor time to grow tired of this maneuver and give up.”

“And if he doesn’t give up?” When he raised an eyebrow at her, she added, “I mean courting her, of course.”

“If he persists in any of it, I will have his head.” He shot her a stern look. “And if you help your brother, I swear I will have yours, too.”

“I have no intention of helping him if it means harming your sister.” She added in a quiet voice tinged in sadness, “Whether you believe it or not, I have never wanted anything but the best for Louisa.”