The poor, sweet lad.
Careful not to wake him, she undressed him and put him in his nightshirt, then tucked him in under the covers. She could not help looking for signs of resemblance to his real papa. And they were there, to be sure, although anyone else would see those as signs of how much the brothers resembled each other.
She choked back tears. Leaving Zack—and Evan and Kit—would be almost as hard as leaving Heath.
No, she must not think about that. She had to protect her heart. And if that meant leaving, then so be it. With a shake of her head, she went down the hall to her bedroom and fell into bed.
The next morning, she was rudely awakened by Evan and Kit barging into her bedchamber. She jerked the covers up to her chin. “You cannot come in here!”
“Zack is gone!” Kit cried. “We’ve looked everywhere for him.”
Her heart sank.
“He was not in his room when we arose,” Evan added, “and we can’t find him in the house. He must have been very upset about your argument with Heath, indeed.”
Oh, no, this was a disaster. “Leave the room so I can dress,” she ordered them. “I shall meet you downstairs in ten minutes.”
Not bothering to put on a corset, she threw a redingote on over her nightdress, donned stockings and a pair of sturdy shoes, grabbed Heath’s note to Zack, and hastened down to meet the boys.
“Did he leave any indication of where he was going?” she asked them.
“Nothing,” Evan said.
“And he didn’t even ask for food from Cook,” Kit said, “although the footmen did say someone took a couple of slices of apple cake out of the breakfast room.”
She raised an eyebrow at them.
“Of course it was Zack,” Evan said with a roll of his eyes. “We figured that much out. But where could he have gone?”
“Here is what we should do,” she said. “You two should take horses and go to the farthest ends of the estate and work back this way, checking all his favorite spots. I will start on this end and look around the gardens, then check the tower.”
“Surely he wouldn’t be stupid enough to go back up there,” Kit said. “Heath gave him quite the lecture the other day about how dangerous it was. He even threatened to withhold apple cake from him if he persisted.”
“It’s Zack,” Evan said. “He doesn’t think like you and I, Kit. Youknowthat.”
Because he is Heath’s son. He thinks like his reckless father, who nearly pulled off an escape from Verdun’s notorious Citadel. Who dealt with his imprisonment in Bitche by learning to fight, the stubborn fool.
“We’ll find Zack,” she said firmly. “Now go mount up and check the rest of the estate, and I’ll check the tower.”
She was nearly certain that was where Zack had gone. It would be just like him to rebel against Heath by doing the one thing his father had forbidden him to do. But if the boys went to the tower with her, they might spook him.
Hurrying through the gardens, she scanned them in passing, but the closer she got to the tower, the more she thought she could make out a figure at the top, leaning on the railing and looking over the edge.
With her heart in her throat, she practically ran up the stone stairs. And of course, there at the edge of the wooden deck was Zachary. He had to have seen her coming, yet he had stayed at the railing.
Not sure what to make of that, she ventured out onto the tower observation deck. Heath had been right about one thing—itwasunsafe. There were spots where the wood was worn clean through, and other places where whole boards were rotted away. Stepping carefully, she made her way to where Zachary stared out over the estate, probably watching his brothers—hisuncles—searching for him on horseback.
When she came up beside the lad, she had to resist the urge to jerk him back from the railing.No sudden movements,she warned herself.It’s a long way down, and if he should fall through the railing …
She shuddered. “Zack,mon ange,” she said softly, “are you all right?”
He did not even start at the sound of her voice. “What doesmon angemean?”
“My angel.”
“I’m not an angel. I’m a bastard.” He practically spat the word. “How do you say ‘bastard’ in French?”
“Bâtard.” She debated a moment, knowing that what she was about to do was monumental. But somehow she knew it was right. “I’m abâtarde,too, you know, although I prefer to use the term ‘natural child’ myself.”