Fielding swallowed, his saliva seeming to harden in his mouth. He pulled back from her. “What is it that you’ve been hiding from me, Mother? Jensen told me to look closer to home; what was he talking about?”
“Yes, yes, Jensen told me you’d accepted a job from them. It would appear the man talks too much.” She gave a weak laugh as she reached across the table and covered his hand with hers. “You’ve been so angry for so long, and I’ve allowed you to believe what you wanted instead of telling you the truth.” Her expression softened. “If you need to be angry with someone, my love, you should be so with me. All of this is my doing.” She pushed away from the table and stood.
She gathered her own plates and set them on a tray in the corner of the room. “Your father didn’t lose our fortune through his travels and research. He lost the money because he was being blackmailed.”
“I don’t understand,” Fielding heard himself say.
“He was protecting you as well as me.” She worried the lace trim lining her neckline. “We should have simply told you the truth.” She returned to her seat and took a steadying breath.
“My father never thought of anyone but himself.” Fielding stood, determined to leave. There was no need to listen to his mother as she canonized his father. Fielding knew the truth; the man had been selfish.
With her jaw set and her eyes held firm, suddenly she was the mother who’d raised and sometimes chastised him. “You will sit here and hear all I have to say; after that you may decide to leave and not return.” She tapped on the table defiantly.
Fielding sat, then drained his coffee and poured himself another cup. He did his best to fend off the restless waves that rocked through his stomach.
“There was once a time when your old mother was thought to be a perfect bride. I was attractive, polite, and I had a sizable dowry. My parents gave me much instruction on making a good match, and I thought I’d found the right one. At least my heart told me so.
“We were passionate about each other, and he was from a good family. It stood to reason that my father would say yes when he went to ask for my hand. I was such a foolish, foolish girl. I believed I was secure. I believed we would be married within months. That–”
She broke off, pressing her hand against her mouth as if to hold in her emotions. “It seemed, though, that my father had already promised me to another earlier that day.”
Fielding felt dread skitter along his nerves. It was the same feeling he’d had when he was excavating a tomb and a booby trap was seconds from being triggered. The floor was about to give way.
“Two brothers had been wooing me, and they were both good men. But I was young and foolish, so I of course set my heart for the younger, more dashing and adventurous of the two.” She’d gone to stand by the window and had pulled the wispy drapery aside.
Her actions seemed casual. The kind of thing she no doubt did every morning, but her movements couldn’t disguise the faint tremble in her hands or dull the importance of her words.
Two brothers, she’d said. And she’d loved the younger one. Every cell in his body rebelled against the thought. How could his mother—his delicate and refined mother— have possibly once loved the vile man now known as the Raven?
“Oh, the life we’d planned,” she said wistfully. “We’d talked about buying a ship and sailing from one end of the earth to the other, stopping in every exotic port so he could buy me gems and perfumes from every corner of the world.”
Fielding listened the way a child would who dreaded the scary bits in an adventure novel, squeamish and unsettled. Part of him wanted to yell at her to stop, but he could not. Fielding knew what was coming, but he had to hear it for himself.
“My parents preferred the more responsible, staid brother, so when he came and asked for my hand my father readily agreed. The wedding plans began that afternoon. I’d tried their patience enough, rebelling in the small ways I could, so when they set me down to inform me of my pending nuptials, I knew I had no choice. It was time I accepted my responsibility.” She laughed softly, then turned to face Fielding.
“Besides, I knew your father would be a good husband; he was so kind and steadfast. I didn’t even have the courage to tell David to his face; I sent him a note and hoped your father would smooth out the rest. But the day our engagement was announced, David left England. And by the time you were born, I had grown to love my husband.” She returned to her seat and gathered Fielding’s hands in her own. “Neither of us could ignore the timing, though; your father was smart enough to do the mathematics.”
“I am David’s son.” The Raven’s son. Everything inside Fielding seemed to stop moving. His breath stilled; his heart ceased beating; he was numb.
“Yes,” she whispered. “When David returned, he knew immediately. He came to the house and threatened your father. I could hear them yelling downstairs and I tried”— she spoke through her tears—“to speak to him to make him understand, but the man I’d loved, the man I’d known, was gone. In his place was an angry, bitter, and frightening man I no longer recognized. He vowed to make your father pay, and he made good on that promise.
“Two days later the first blackmail letter came.” She swiped at her tears angrily. “That’s how we lost all the money. Your father lost every cent trying to protect you and me from a scandal that would have robbed you of your birthright.”
“No,” he argued futilely. “He spent our fortune hunting for the Templar Treasure. That’s where the money went. He was obsessed.”
“Yes, and no. Your father was a scholar; he loved history and the legend of the Templar’s Treasure. Truthfully, I believe he tried to become someone he wasn’t for my benefit, tried to make me fall in love with him by being more adventurous and daring. I tried to convince him that I loved him as he was, but by the time the blackmail started and we needed the money, he would not listen to reason. He was certain he’d find it and he would be able to pay off his brother, but, well, you know how that ended. And then you went to work for David . . .”
“I didn’t know,” he said. “But in doing so I bought everything back; I purchased every last thing that we’d lost.”
“The only reason you were able to purchase those things was because I made David promise he’d allow you to.”
“I don’t understand,” Fielding said. “I paid the bank for those properties.”
“Yes, but David owned them,” his mother explained. “He’d bought up everything before your father died, planned to continue to control us by that means once the blackmailing funds ran out. But I didn’t want you to know. I convinced David to sell you everything through the bank. I thought I was doing the right thing,” she said softly.
Fielding flinched as if she’d struck him. He grabbed the table and felt the edge of the wood dig into his palm. All that time he’d spent working for his uncle. When he’d come to Fielding’s school to get him after his father had died. Memories flashed through his mind, curdling his stomach and flaming his anger.
“I know you’ve blamed your father for years for the financial problems, looked to Solomon’s for an explanation; but the truth is, they were never involved. Those men were friends to your father. They even gave us money, bought this house that I live in.” She squeezed his hand. “Do not go looking for revenge with any of those men.”