Quarterback's Secret Baby(117)

"DAMMIT!"

I jerked my head up at the sound of Mrs. Clyde swearing and saw her holding half a wooden spoon in her hand. The other half lay on the floor at her feet.

"Och, Jenny, I'm so sorry lassie. I don't know what's gotten into me."

I knew what had gotten into her. It was Cameron. There was no point in even pretending it wasn't.

"Does this happen every weekend?"

Mrs. Clyde looked up and I watched the expression on her face change when she realized I wasn't talking about the wooden spoon.

"Aye, Jenny. Every weekend. It's getting worse, too, it is. God knows what that arsehole woman is doing to that poor child but there doesn't seem to be a damned thing any of us can do about it and I think it's going to drive her father mad."

I tried and failed to hide the shock on my face at hearing the word 'arsehole' coming out of Mrs. Clyde's mouth.

"I'm sorry for the language. She's a monster though, Jenny, a real monster - the kind of human being you don't think exists until you're unfortunate enough to run into one."

It was clear Diane was a figure of hate for everyone at Castle McLanald but I had yet to hear any real details about what exactly it was she'd done to earn her reputation. It wasn't that I needed details to believe it - Cameron's fear was more than enough to prove that Diane was, at the very least, a terrible mother - it was more an attempt to understand just how one person could be so seemingly and wholly repugnant.

"What exactly did Diane do when she lived here?" I asked Mrs. Clyde slowly, hoping I wouldn't immediately get shut down - Mrs. Clyde, while friendly and warm, also gave off the vibe of someone who could keep a lot of secrets. To my surprise, though, she simply poured two cups of tea, carried them to the table and sat down opposite me, looking out the window.

"Have you ever met someone, Jenny, who seems sweet and kind on the surface but turns out to be as rotten as a winter crabapple on the inside? Someone who never really does anything out in the open so it's almost impossible to even know how to ask them to stop because you know they'll ask you what they should stop and you won't quite have a response for them?"

I did at one time know someone like that - my own mother, who had finally disappeared from my life when I was seven without ever telling me who my father was. I nodded at Mrs. Clyde, confirming that I knew exactly the kind of person she was talking about.

"That's how Diane is. Except she's worse than most people like that. Even horrible people usually have a good side, or a soft spot or something in their past that can help you to get feeling a little sorry for them. Diane doesn't have any of that. She slithered in here like a snake and got her fangs into everyone around her. By the time the Laird figured out just how far she'd gone we'd lost three members of staff, the Laird was half insane, the bairn was barely able to sleep at night and she - Diane - was pregnant again, by the gardener. She didn't keep it, mind. A gardener's baby is not worth near as much as a laird's."

"Why did he marry her?" I asked, incredulous. Darach was not a stupid man.

"Aye. Why did he marry her? Because she's as good at fooling people as anyone I've ever met. When she fell pregnant she told him her pills must have failed, which I feel safe in calling a lie. And she's from a good English family, mind, a highborn family - the Laird's mother thought she was the bees knees."

The Laird had never mentioned either of his parents before, except to tell me that they lived abroad and rarely came back to Scotland. Mrs. Clyde continued:

"So she helped Diane talk the Laird into marriage, scaring him with the possibility of scandal and the shame of an illegitimate child. Besides, if they hadn't married, Cameron wouldn't be in line to inherit. Of course the Laird didn't want that. And as soon as the ink was dry on the marriage certificate Diane lost any reason to keep up her pretenses."

Mrs. Clyde went through three cups of tea as she told me the whole story - at least as much as she knew. And at the end of it Diane did, indeed, sound like a monster. She'd presented herself to Darach - and to his family and everyone else at Castle McLanald - as a sweet, fragile flower, a woman longing to settle down in Scotland with the love of her life and their soon-to-be-born baby. After the wedding she'd returned to the Castle a different woman. A minor disagreement with the stableman over her horse's care had led to an accusation of sexual impropriety and his immediate firing. A maid had followed the stableman after apparently having the temerity to draw the attention of a man in Diane's presence, calling Diane's own allure into question. Mrs. Clyde confirmed that the maid had been fired for nothing more than an admiring glance being aimed in her direction, before anyone knew the full extent of Diane's malevolent narcissism.