A Baron for Becky by Jude Knight

saluted
Sarah’s cheek, too, and gave the long plait of dark hair an
affectionate tug. She was more like her mother every day.
    As he’d
expected, Overton had made it no farther than the tavern a couple
of streets over. “What are you drinking?” Aldridge asked, sliding
onto the bench beside him.
    “Don’t know,”
Overton said, sinking another from the line before him. Three gone,
five to go.
    Aldridge had a
sniff. Gin. Probably illegally distilled on the premises. Rot gut,
certainly.
    “Let’s go home
and get into my brandy.” Aldridge suggested, putting his hand over
the poison. Overton knocked it out of the way and downed another,
roaring like an aggrieved bear when Aldridge sent the last four
crashing to the floor, juniper fumes rising from the spreading
puddles.
    Aldridge knew
he wouldn’t move. If anyone tried to carry him, he’d fight every
inch of the way. Best to let him drink here, then drag him out
unconscious. But at least Aldridge could make sure he drank decent
brandy. Even if he didn’t appreciate it, Aldridge would. The tavern
keeper, who had come at the noise, was happy enough to accept a
gold guinea for his trouble and a bottle of his finest.
    Overton was
touchingly grateful. “You’re a good friend, Aldridge. You stick by
a man. Share the best. Good friend.”
    Aldridge poured
a glass of the brandy the innkeeper brought and inhaled the
bouquet. Much better. He handed the glass to Overton, who took a
revoltingly large swallow.
    “She’s
beautiful, Aldridge.”
    Aldridge didn’t
have to ask who; everyone who met Becky had the same reaction.
    “Very
beautiful.” He poured himself a brandy. Where was Overton going
with this? His comment about sharing had better not be related.
    “Loves her
daughter, doesn’t she?”
    “She does,
Overton. That little girl means everything to her. And I would kill
to protect either of them.”
    Overton waved
off the implied threat, shaking his head. “Not going to hurt them.
Secret. You told me.” He lifted his glass again, this time sipping
rather than gulping. “Good stuff, Aldridge. I needed a drink.”
    Aldridge
refilled the glass. If his oldest friend in the world needed to
talk, the least Aldridge could do was listen.
    “Polyphemia
didn’t.”
    Aldridge must
have looked blank, because Overton explained. “My wife. Polyphemia.
She didn’t love her daughters. She died, you know.”
    Three years ago
this very night. “Yes. I know.” To his shame, he’d not gone to
Lancashire when he heard, reluctant to leave Becky and knowing he
couldn’t take his newly acquired mistress to visit his newly
bereaved friend.
    Overton was
following his own train of thought. “She didn’t want to marry me,
you know. Said I was ugly. But Pankhurst didn’t leave her anything
and no one else offered. So she traded her proven fertility for my
title and money.”
    “Is that so?”
What else could a person say to such a revelation?
    “Wouldn’t let
me bed her, except in the dark. Wouldn’t let me bed her at all that
last year. Except the one time... But she was with child, of
course.”
    “Was she?”
    “Mmm. Needed me
to think I was the father.”
    Aldridge tried
to fend off further revelations. “Shall we go back to Haverford
House, Overton?”
    “I did, too. So
happy, Aldridge. Thought I couldn’t, you see.”
    Couldn’t what?
“I’ve heard from a lot of women that you can, Overton.”
    “I can plough
well enough. I like ploughing. But I can’t sow. No Overton heir. No
Overton bastards, even. Lying bitch. Lying whore. I wanted to
believe her, Aldridge. I thought the doctors were wrong. ‘Look,’ I
told them. ‘I got my wife with child.’”
    Overton would
regret these revelations in the morning. Aldridge regretted them
now. He filled the man’s glass again. Perhaps he would pass out and
stop talking.
    Not just yet,
though. He cradled the brandy, staring into it as if his wife’s
image were floating on top.
    “I was in
London. You remember,