“Then I will. Tomorrow I’ll go to the authorities.”

 The cold smile faded until his face was hard as stone. “You will do nothing of the kind. You will have a cruise to Europe, and ten thousand dollars to assist you in settling in England. They will be my parting gifts to you.”

 “Parting?” She groped for the arm of a chair, melted into it as her legs gave way. “You—you would leave me now?”

 “There can be nothing more between us. I’ll see to it that you’re well set, and I believe you’ll regain your health with a sea voyage. In London you’re bound to find another protector.”

 “How can I go to London when my son—”

 “You will go,” he interrupted, then sipped his drink. “Or I will give you nothing. You have no son. You have nothing but what I deem to give you. This house and everything in it, the clothes on your back, the jewels you wear are mine. You’d be wise to remember how easily I can take it all away.”

 “Take it away,” she whispered, and something in his face, something in her fractured mind gave her truth. “You want to get rid of me because . . . you know. It’s you who’ve taken the baby.”

 He finished his drink as he studied her. Then set the empty glass on the mantel. “Do you think I’d allow a creature like you to raise my son?”

 “My son!” She sprang up again, hands curled like claws.

 The slap stopped her. In the two years he had been her protector, he had never raised a hand to her.

 “Listen to me now, and carefully. I will not have my son known as a bastard, one born of a whore. He will be raised at Harper House, as my legitimate heir.”

 “Your wife—”

 “Does what she is told. As will you, Amelia.”

 “I’ll go to the police.”

 “And tell them what? The doctor and midwife who attended you will attest that you delivered a stillborn girl, while others will attest my wife delivered a healthy boy. Your reputation, Amelia, will not stand to mine, or theirs. Your own servants will swear to it, and to the fact that you’ve been ill, and behaving strangely.”