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I’ve been swamped in meetings the whole day at Annette & Co. with Lydia Appleton and Peter Dighby. They have been looking after my jewelry business while I was away and both of them were more than relieved to hand over the reins back to me.
The festive season is around the corner with Christmas and New Year’s. After the success of the surprise sale I held nearly two months ago, I’ve planned a sale around each of these days and early estimates show we will have a massive turn out this time as well; the collective sales figures promise to be phenomenal.
Now, after this long day, the only thing I want to do is relax with Aaliya and Rian, but I can’t as I have to meet my mother first. She’s expected to reach any time now and I’m late already.
My anticipation increases with every mile that leads me closer to home and to the impending meeting with my mother. Minutes tick by and my heart drums a wild staccato in my chest as I realize I am this close to the truth that will in all probability change the entire perception of my life.
Travis informs me that my mother is waiting in my study as soon as I enter the house so I immediately make my way to her. I open the door to my study and find my mother staring across one of the windows that looks into the vast gardens surrounding the house. She’s immaculately dressed, as always, in a blue woolen dress with a short, matching jacket.
She continues staring outside even when I come to stand beside her.
“Good evening, Mother,” I finally greet, impatient to finish this conversation.
She twists her head and acknowledges me with a nod.
“Please let us be seated,” I guide her to the leather sofas in front of the fireplace in the study. “Should I ring for some tea?”
“No, I just want to get over with this.” She perches on the edge of the sofa and glares at me as I loosen my tie and undo the top button of my white shirt. My mother is the most formal person I know. She drilled the importance of dressing in the right attire, maintaining the perfect posture and portraying correct behavior since I was old enough to understand.
We Kittridges have to always look worthy of this title. It has been her motto all her life. So, I’m well aware my mother hates casualness of any form.
But since this meeting may change every single thing I so far believed in ever since I woke up from that accident, I further aggravate her by removing my jacket and folding the sleeves of my shirt to my elbows. Besides, I’m in no mood to cater to her sensibilities. She’s here only because I have control of the finances. If that wasn’t the case, she may have never agreed to this meeting. Finally, I settle down on the opposite sofa, lounging casually, waiting for her to speak.
“So, you know?” she begins.
“I’d still like to hear you say the words, Mother. You kept them hidden once and now, after I lost my memory, you hid them again. So, repeat them loud and clear so we have absolute clarity.”
Her eyes flash fire.
“Why should I repeat it when you know already?” she throws back, stubborn as ever.
“Alright then, have your way. We have nothing more to discuss. Just remember, from the next month I will cut your finances by half.” I start to stand but she raises a hand to halt me.
A resigned look crosses her face while I sit down again.
“Explain from the beginning and leave nothing out, please,” I demand.
She looks at her hands and begins to speak. “I was only twenty when your grandfather proposed marriage between Richard and me to my father. My family was delighted. As you know my father was a mere Baron, too low in the aristocracy. But once I married Richard, I’d be a Duchess someday in the future. My parents knew I was in love with someone else. He was in the army and I loved him dearly. But Richard saw me, he wanted me and I was forced to marry him.”
She looks into the empty fireplace, her gaze distant. My mother must have been beautiful in her younger years. She is good looking now too, in her old age, but her cold personality and hard exterior never made me see beyond that. But, yes, I can imagine my father wanting her for her beauty at one time. He had been a collector of beautiful things, case in point all the lovely art and sculptures we possess in all the various beautiful homes the Kittridge family owns.
I listen in as my mother speaks again. “Richard was bored with me within a few months of our marriage. He was a womanizer, as you know, and our relations soon became next to none.” Her face scrunches. “During that first year, the man I loved...he returned from the army and I...I started seeing him again.”
My eyes widen. Shit! I’d sort of concluded this on my own, but to hear her admit it...is still shocking.
“You mean you started having an affair?!”
She glares at me. “Don’t judge me. You don’t know what your father was like in those days.”
“Apologies, I’m not judging. Please continue.”
She considers me carefully. “You said you remembered, so why do I have to say the rest?”
My brow arches. “Continue, please.”
Her lips set in a mutinous line and we stare at each other for a few moments until she gives in.
“My affair resulted in David being born.”
Fuck! My heart thuds as ice slithers down my skin. It’s actually true. This was exactly what I’d been suspecting ever since I’d had that dream in India and recollected Celia’s words to me.
This Dukedom was always was supposed to be yours, never David’s, isn’t it?
But there are still too many questions swirling in my head and I focus back on my mother, showing none of the rioting emotions flowing through me.
“I was pregnant with another man’s child and I was well aware that Richard would never agree to a divorce. I knew I was stuck with him. So, I...I tricked him one night into sleeping with me. I...”
I cringe. “Mother, please, I don’t want to hear...”
She waves a hand in the air, cutting me off. “You wanted to hear it all.”
I inhale and exhale. “You are right. Do go on.”
“Richard believed David was his and was delighted when he was born. David became...” Her eyes soften. “He became the light of our lives. Mine because he was my love child with the man I actually loved and Richard because he thought he had his heir, a son whom he loved unconditionally.”
My hand curls into a fist and I clench it hard as I see the obvious love she felt for my late brother, none of which she ever showed for me and I need to know why.
“What happened to this man you loved?” I query.
“He knew about David and even met him once after he was born. He asked me to leave everything behind and take David and run away with him. But I couldn’t leave all this behind. David would become a Duke one day and I couldn’t take that from him. After I said no, he told me that he’d never see me again and returned on site for a mission.”
“Who was he?”
“No one you need to know,” she spits out. “It doesn’t concern you at all in any way. I will carry his name in my heart until the day I die.”
“Fine,” I accept. The identity of that man was unimportant anyway. “What happened next?”
“You see, after David was born, your father became more attentive towards me. He was kinder and warmer and I...I was so lonely. The man I loved had left me and he would never return. And so Richard and I became very close. And then you were born...”
My pulse speeds up, as I finally reach closer to the answers I am seeking.
“So, I am the legitimate child of the Duke of Kittridge?” I ask slowly. I need to be absolutely certain.
“Yes. You are Richard’s offspring, his legal heir.”
“Then why did you do everything in your power to keep me at a distance. Why did you hate me so much? Why did father hate me so much? Why do you still hate me so much?”
She keeps her mouth shut, and refuses to meet my eyes.
“I need an answer, Mother.”
This one question has always boggled my mind.
So I add, “My whole life, I’ve grown up wondering what I did wrong that father and you never accepted me? Why would my parents always find faults with what I did? Why did you prefer David to me?”
She rushes to her feet, her hand playing against the pearls around her throat.
I rise slowly. “Why, Mother?”
“Because that man I loved, he died the very day you were born,” she yells. “He died while on a mission and I never got to say goodbye. I could have left with him and led a life with him, but I didn’t. And so, every time I looked at you, I remembered that he died while I was giving birth to another man’s child.”
I jerk back as if she’s slapped me. But I need my answers.
“And what about father? Why did he dislike me so much?”
“Because I told him you were not his son, that I had an affair with another man and you were the result of that affair, so that he hated you too. But, of course, he couldn’t reject you. What would society think then? Despite his own affairs, he could never accept it aloud that his wife had cuckolded him and birthed another man’s child.”
And just like that, everything about my past, my childhood makes sense to me. I press my hands to my eyes as I comprehend the disaster she’s made of my life.
Celia’s words haunt me again. This dukedom was always supposed to be yours, never David’s, isn’t it?
Out of nowhere, my brother, David’s voice enters my head.
“The Kittridge inheritance is mine. I will never give it up and never to you.”
I squeeze my eyes shut as several flashes of memory hit my brain at full speed.
“Damien!” My mother’s sharp voice breaks through my haze, putting an abrupt halt to the flashback going on in my head.
I lower my hands from my face and look at her—my mother, the woman who gave birth to me, but never in word or deed ever acted as my mother. The only true mother’s love I’ve ever felt was from my Aunt Sylvie and from my mother in-law, Aaliya’s mom.
The way I have to proceed is clear to me, but I still need one more answer.
“Celia. How did she know about all this?” I ask.
She opens her mouth as if to ask me a question but then thinks against it and sighs. “I confided in her after David’s accident. I broke down and told her everything one day. Why? Had she mentioned something to you? Is that how you remembered?”
Ignoring her, I push to my feet and announce with as calm a voice as I can muster.
“You and I are finished, Lady Sarah.” Her eyes widen as I address her by her title. “You ruined a child’s life because of your own selfish desires. You tried to make me pay for a crime I never committed. You made my father and brother hate me and I hated them in return. And for what? Because of your guilt? My father died not knowing that I was his son. Yes, he was a monster, but he deserved to know the truth.” I straighten my spine. “I disown you as a mother from this moment forth.”
“D...Damien...” she gasps.
I flick my hand out, halting whatever she wants to say.
“Don’t worry. You will get your monthly allowance until the day you die. But if I hear you utter one evil word about my family or me then I will cut you off financially and leave you to fend for yourself.” She pales in front of my eyes, but I don’t care anymore. “Henceforth, I will not acknowledge you ever—in private or in public. You will never be allowed in any of my houses ever again.”
I let her digest this for a moment. Then I remove my cell phone and call Mike and request him to bring Travis with him.
In less than a minute, they both enter the study.
I cross my arms on my chest. “Travis, please escort Lady Sarah out of this house.” I turn to Mike. “Henceforth, Lady Sarah is not to be allowed entry to any of my estates. Instruct the security at all my houses to reject her if she ever shows up there.”
They both nod, their expressions stoic.
“Goodbye, Lady Sarah.”
And without sparing her another glance, I walk away from her, putting an end to that chapter of my life.
