The Secret He Must Claim by Chantelle Shaw

Author:Chantelle Shaw
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: HarlequinUKLtd
Published: 2017-07-20T16:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER SEVEN

FROM THE WINDOW Cortez watched Elin walk across the lawn holding Harry in her arms. She had swept out of the study, leaving him reeling from what she had told him. He went cold at the thought that she could have bled to death following Harry’s birth, and guilt knotted in his stomach as he acknowledged the damning truth that if Elin had died he would never have known about his son.

The gazebo next to the swimming pool offered shade from the midday sun, which was strong even in March. Elin sat down on a garden chair and held the baby against her shoulder. Even from a distance Cortez could see the gentle expression on her face as she cradled her son.

A lioness protecting her cub.

The vehement words she’d flung at him a few minutes ago echoed inside his head. ‘I fought to stay alive for my son and I will fight to the death to keep him.’ Cortez thought of another woman who had been fiercely protective of her child. His mother had brought him up without any support from his father. Marisol Ramos had been shunned by her family and by many of the villagers, who had judged her for being an unmarried mother. She had worked day in, day out at her small vineyard to earn money to feed and clothe him.

He remembered the recent discovery he had made while he’d been at Cuckmere Hall and had sorted through some of Ralph Saunderson’s private papers. He had found an old bank statement which proved that his father had given his mother money when she’d told him she was pregnant. But Marisol had not spent the money to make her life easier, and the only explanation Cortez could think of was that she had saved the money to pay for him to go to university.

A good education had given him the means to escape the poverty of his childhood, and it could be argued that he owed his success partly to Ralph’s financial contribution. He had been shocked to discover that his father had not completely abandoned him. Like he had abandoned Elin. The knot of guilt in his stomach tightened.

But if Elin loved Harry as much as she insisted, why was she a drug-user? She had furiously denied that she was a drug addict and Cortez conceded it was possible that the tabloid stories about her having a drug habit were exaggerated. But in London the nanny had not been unduly surprised when Elin had been incapable of caring for Harry. He had assumed that Elin had been semi-conscious on the flight to Spain as a result of something she had taken, but could there be a different explanation? For his baby son’s sake he had to find out the truth about Elin, and his first step would be to talk to the nanny.

Barbara was in the nursery, unpacking the latest delivery of baby clothes and toys that Cortez had ordered for his son.

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