She couldn’t tell him what he wished. For seven years, in spite of her husband occasionally coming to her bed, she remained barren. Without a male heir, the title would become extinct and the entailed properties would pass to Her Majesty’s Treasury. It seemed her husband and what few relations he’d possessed had not excelled at procreating or surviving long. Perhaps a man as virile as Mr. Trewlove might have better luck at giving her what she required.

Because her family, in spite of her brother’s title, was as poor as dirt. And she had a very short time in which to get herself with child. She could still claim it as the duke’s if it arrived ten months after his death. Babies sometimes arrived late. But after that . . .

And if it were a daughter, while the title would still become extinct, the girl would eventually inherit all the entailed properties because the terms of the entailment allowed it to go to a female if she had a direct bloodline to the first duke—which Selena would ensure the world believed she did.

What Selena was considering was deceitful and without honor, but she had need of the estates while the Crown did not. If Lushing had been content for everything to be handed over to the Treasury, he would never have married her, wouldn’t have tried to get her with babe. He had worked hard to ensure his properties were the finest in all of England. Surely he wanted to see his legacy carried on. Where was the harm in the world believing the child had come from his loins?

She had always been a good and faithful wife. When the cold winds had blown across the moors and the snows had fallen and he had taken ill, she had nursed him hour upon hour, wiping the sweat from his brow, changing his nightshirt when it became damp, encouraging him to eat, reading to him until she was hoarse. She truly mourned the loss of him, riddled with guilt because she’d failed to give him the one thing he asked of her: an heir.

Sitting on the cushioned bench, she began pulling pins from her hair while glaring at her brother’s reflection in the mirror. “Perhaps we’d all be better served if you’d attend to your duties as I’m well aware of mine.”

“See that you are.” He headed for the door.

“Winslow?”

He stopped but didn’t look back at her. Their father had brought the family to ruin with his inability to make wise investments, his reckless spending and gambling, and his penchant for brandy. Lushing had money to burn but he’d been frugal—probably the reason he’d had so much squirreled away. While he’d been willing to help her family to a certain extent, it hadn’t been enough to see them well situated.