Free The Problem with Seduction by Emma Locke Page A

experienced the depths of her selfishness firsthand?”
    Elizabeth recoiled at his verbal slap. Oliver let out a wail of disapproval, too.
    “No.” Con’s only trace of disgust was directed at Nicholas. “We were only just getting on when you called her back to your bed. Is this how you seduced her last time? Chasing her, calling her names, embarrassing her in a public place for all and sundry to see? I think, then, it should not be so hard for me to woo her back.” He flashed a rakish grin.
    “What a handsome young gentleman,” the innkeeper’s wife said to no one in particular. “A pretty way with words, too.”
    “I just want my boy,” Nicholas said. While he’d never hit Elizabeth, his feelings about striking her alleged lover were less clear. He’d undoubtedly schooled whelps as cocky as the one braving his ire now. Nicholas was five and forty, much older and brawnier than Lord Constantine. Moreover, he was emotionally invested, which Lord Constantine couldn’t possibly be.
    Con pulled an apologetic face. “I can see how much you want this baby to be yours, and I sympathize with you, I truly do. But she was with me nine months before he came along. I am very sorry about that, but it’s time you leave my son alone.” He indicated Oliver, who had started to drool.
    Nicholas turned a furious red. He’d always been overbearing, but there had been kindness, too. When he hadn’t been breaking her heart with his dalliances with other lightskirts, he’d been generous, showering her with fine apartments, jewelry, and an enviable annuity, paid out of the massive settlement of his wife’s dowry. Elizabeth had provoked a perfectly ordinary man to this new fury, and for that she was sorry.
    “I know you’re lying,” he said through gritted teeth.
    Con shrugged. “It’s a matter of simple math, as I said to begin with. Were you with her?”
    When Nicholas didn’t reply, Con asked it again. “Were you with her nine months—even ten months before she was, uh, confined?”
    Nicholas continued to look at Con with stony disapproval. Elizabeth felt the last of her love for him disappear. What could he say? The truth? That there had been so much between them a year ago, but now he couldn’t even remember when last they’d taken a turn between the sheets?
    “No answer?” Lord Constantine taunted. “Drat it all, but my mother explained this to me just the other day. I’m certain your participation was required.”
    Elizabeth held her breath. If he remembered that last night together… Their passionate argument over his most recent dalliance, followed by even more passionate lovemaking, followed by the birth of their child... But he didn’t.
    Nicholas gritted his teeth, then, with one last, longing look for Oliver, he loped toward the door Con obstructed.
    Mrs. Dalton regarded Con with adoration. The innkeeper and his wife began to fidget, perhaps realizing the show was about to come to an end. Elizabeth’s relief almost made her dizzy and yet, she couldn’t get Nicholas’s stricken look out of her head. Was he here because Oliver was his property and he commanded what he owned, or because he cherished his son? Was his determination to have Oliver hardly different than his treatment of his wife, who must endure his philandering because he was her husband and therefore her master, or because he couldn’t bear to be separated from his only child?
    Nicholas stopped just short of Lord Constantine blocking the exit. “She’s using you, Alexander. I’d pity you, if I were a man to waste time on fools.”
    Con stepped to the side as if he meant to allow the other man to pass. At the last minute, his arm shot out to bar the doorway. It caught Nicholas hard across the chest. “Don’t follow my mistress again, Captain. Indolence has its benefits.” He looked sideways at the officer. “I have plenty of time to waste on fools.”
     

     
    Con had known something wasn’t right when he’d left her townhouse