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was trembling. “I’d thought no one…I had hoped—”
    “Truly, it would indeed be too bad if you were brought to the King’s attention. The duchess has fled the country…Chalais is dead…there would be only you to answer for their sins. And make no mistake; Richelieu continues to search for conspirators. That’s why I try always to avoid such plots—they’re so easily scuttled.”
    What was a conspiracy? And why should the King himself care? It did not take long for me, a girl who never failed to satisfy her curiosity, to find the answers to all of those questions. And less time still for those answers to change all of our lives.

Chapter 6
The Count of Montreau
Château of Eronville
The province of Orléanais, France
    What I wanted was lace: the perfect, irresistible bribe. That I needed it at all was a humiliation, predicated upon the whim of a tyrannical old man who was grieved beyond measure that he must call himself my father.
    I closed my eyes against the headache building at the bridge of my nose.
    If only he hadn’t commanded us all to the countryside. If we had been at court, then I might not have aggravated him so easily. But in such close quarters, where he was daily confronted with the fact that I was his son, how could I have expected him to treat me with anything other than contempt? He’d surpassed even himself that morning when he stormed into my chambers and placed my entire future in jeopardy.
    He hadn’t bothered to announce his presence. He’d thrown open the shutters, bathing the room in ungodly light. One lamentable thing had led to another, and soon we were doing what we had always done. He was yelling; I was pretending not to listen, infusing my indifference with a tincture of ennui.
    “My son?” The venom in my father’s voice had matched the look on his face. Things always finished badly when he referred to me in that tone. “My son ?!”
    But it was even worse when he pronounced it like that, as if I were some grand disappointment to him in his old age.
    “I gave you one of my titles, but I’ll be damned if I give you another! There is nothing I can do about the happenstance of your birth, but I will not live to see you destroy my good name.”
    I clasped my hands behind my back. “There are other options…” I could think of several, though only one had any true appeal.
    “What? What was it you said?”
    My mistake. He was not yet so old that he was deaf. I lifted my shoulders. Took a deep breath. Bowed my head in a way I hoped would convey all of those sentiments I did not feel: obedience, filiality, humility. “I said, ‘Please, sir. What are my options?’”
    “Options? Options!” His face was contorted with rage.
    “My options. If you please.”
    “There are no options. Not anymore. I’ve told you before: you must turn your back on your despicable ways, marry, and produce an heir. Had you done it, I might have considered leaving you all of those things to which your birth entitles you.”
    He had said those things before. But this was the first time he had placed himself in danger of paroxysms to make his point.
    “So then…you say I must marry?”
    “I said you must produce an heir.”
    “There are some things only God himself can provide.” It was true, though, I was not yet so aged I could not expect to sire a son…should the situation ever permit itself.
    “I wish you had fallen to your knees and begged for a miracle.”
    “I don’t see why it should matter so much.”
    “Because I have had enough of your disgraceful and contemptible ways. And”—his cheeks flushed even darker—“your stepmother is breeding and—” He frowned. “I’m drawing up papers to have my marriage to your mother annulled.”
    “You…what?” What! What was it the bastard had said?
    “I should never have married her. She lured me into it, and then she turned on me. I can’t say I wasn’t warned. She was my half-sister…” His voice had petered out, and his