Chapter 9
Felice’s mother, Cordelia, asked to see me.
I almost refused.
Then she said one sentence.
“I helped with Cedar House.”
So I went.
Cordelia Bellamy was sixty-one and still carried herself like every room should apologize for existing before she entered.
She did not apologize immediately.
Good.
At least honest.
“Felice told me the maid was overwhelmed.”
“Did you know Theo was mine?”
“No.”
I believed her.
“Did you know Anwen wanted him?”
Cordelia hesitated.
Partly.
Felice described Anwen as unstable, poor, resentful, and inconsistent.
Classic strategy.
Make a mother’s distress evidence that she cannot mother.
Cordelia arranged Mrs. Alder.
Approved temporary use of Cedar House.
Never met Anwen.
That mattered.
“You helped remove a baby from a woman you never spoke to.”
Her face tightened.
“When you say it like that—”
“That is how it happened.”
Silence.
Then she surprised me.
“You’re right.”
Good.
She had also given Felice advice.
Marry first.
Solve scandals second.
Old society logic.
Not criminal.
Still destructive.
She taught her daughter that securing position before revealing complications was prudence.
Felice applied that to a child.
Cordelia looked sick when she understood the line between lesson and consequence.
“What can I do?”
“Nothing for me.”
“And Anwen?”
“Ask her.”
Good.
The Bellamys had spent enough time treating access to Anwen as something arranged around her.
Cordelia did ask.
Anwen declined.
Cordelia accepted.
That was the beginning of a better boundary.
Then she told me one thing I had not known.
Felice had once asked:
“If Duncan never knows, does the child still belong to him?”
Cordelia answered:
“Blood doesn’t require knowledge.”
Felice hated that answer.
That was when Cordelia first suspected the situation was larger than charity.
She did nothing.
Another silence.
Not equal to Felice’s actions.
Still relevant.
May you like
Everyone around this secret had believed there would be more time to become brave later.
There almost wasn’t.
