Reborn: The Duke's Obsession-Chapter 278 - Two Hundred And Seventy Eight

Lyra's laugh, sharp and humorless, echoed in the grand drawing room before dying out, leaving a heavy, ringing silence in its wake. Anne stared at her, her defiant expression faltering for the first time, a flicker of uncertainty in her eyes. She had expected anger, arguments, negotiation—but not this. Not mockery.

She pressed on, her voice regaining its hard, demanding edge. "Blood just can't be cut off so easily," she insisted, turning her gaze to Elena, the real authority in the room. "This baby, my baby, belongs to this family. You have a duty. You need to be responsible for it."

"That's rich, coming from you, Anne Ellington," Lyra said, her voice dripping with a cold, quiet contempt. The laughter was gone, replaced by a piercing stare. "Aren't you the one who cut off your own mother when she became of no help to you? You speak of duty and blood, but only when it serves you."

Anne stammered, the color rising in her cheeks. The accusation hit too close to home. "T-that's… that's different."

"That's enough," Elena said, her voice calm but absolute. Both women fell silent. The Dowager Duchess looked at Anne, her expression thoughtful, almost sympathetic. "She has a point, Lyra. Regardless of what the adults in this family have done, the child growing within her hasn't done anything wrong. An infant is innocent."

A triumphant, relieved smile spread across Anne's face. She had won. The old woman had been swayed by the appeal to her sense of duty. "That's what I'm saying, Grandmother," she said, her voice full of a renewed confidence.

"But," Elena cut her off, her voice as sharp as a shard of ice, "that is only true if the child is Philip's."

The smile vanished from Anne's face. She stared at Elena, her mouth slightly agape. "I'm sorry?" she asked, her voice a shocked whisper.

"The Carson family will, of course, take responsibility for its own blood," Elena continued, her gaze unwavering. "So, if the child you are carrying is indeed Philip's, we can then talk about us taking you and the baby in."

A high, nervous chuckle escaped Anne's lips. She placed a hand over her heart in a gesture of wounded pride. "Of course, it's Philip's! What a question to ask! This is deeply insulting to me!" she declared, her voice rising with feigned outrage.

Lyra, who had been watching Anne's performance with cold amusement, spoke again. "If it was a child from another family, I might have believed your performance," she said coolly. "But this kind of thing—uncertain parentage, secrets, lies—it seems to happen in your family, doesn't it?"

Anne's face went pale. She quickly understood the reference and the venom in Lyra's tone was unmistakable. She fell back on her last line of defense. "But… but you don't have any evidence that this child isn't Philip's!" she challenged, her voice a little too loud, a little too desperate. "You have no proof!"

Lyra didn't answer. Instead, she turned her head slightly and called out in a clear, calm voice. "Martha!"

A young maid, who had been waiting discreetly in the hall, entered the room and curtsied. "Your Grace."

"Bring me those papers that are in my dresser drawer, Martha," Lyra instructed. "The ones in the brown envelope."

"Yes, Your Grace." Martha curtsied again and left.

What papers? Anne thought, a knot of pure, cold dread tightening in her stomach. She's bluffing. She has to be bluffing.

But a few moments later, Martha returned, carrying a brown envelope on a small silver tray. Lyra instructed the maid to give it directly to Anne. With trembling hands, Anne took the envelope. She pulled out the contents—several pages of a sworn testimony, signed at the bottom by a familiar name. She read the first few lines, and all the color drained from her face. 𝑓𝘳𝑒𝑒𝓌𝘦𝘣𝘯ℴ𝑣𝘦𝑙.𝘤𝑜𝑚

"W-what… what is this?" she stammered, the papers rattling in her shaking hands.

"That," Lyra replied, her voice a low, final judgment, "is your proof."

Anne was silent, her eyes wide with horror, her mind refusing to accept what she was reading.

"The day you came here with Philip to announce your pregnancy," Lyra continued, explaining her methods with a chilling tone, "I thought something wasn't right. The timing, your triumphant expression, Philip's… distraction. It all felt like a performance. So, I did my own investigation."

Lyra took a sip of her cinnamon tea. "I found out that Philip never touched you. Not once. You were a means to an end for him, a way to secure his position. But he found you distasteful. So you took matters into your own hands. You paid a maid in his residence his to drug his wine one evening then you undress him and put him to bed, creating the illusion that the two of you had shared an intimate night."

Anne's voice was a choked, horrified whisper. "How did you…"

"As you can see," Lyra said, gesturing to the papers in Anne's hand, "that is the full, signed testimony of the maid you paid to do the job for you. A young woman named Prudence. You paid her a handsome sum to keep quiet and sent her to a village in the countryside." Lyra dropped the teacup back in its saucer and fixed her gaze on Anne. "Did you really think you could hide someone in Albion and I wouldn't find them? Even if you had sent her outside Albion, I would have tracked her down. You severely underestimated the resources of this family."

Anne said nothing. She just sat there, shaking, the testimony lying in her lap like a death sentence. The fight had drained out of her completely, leaving her slumped and small on the large sofa. She felt as if she had been drenched in a bucket of ice-cold water, the shock so profound it had frozen her from the inside out.

Elena, who had watched the entire scene unfold in silence, finally spoke. She looked at the broken woman on the sofa. "So," she asked, her voice calm. "What would you like to do now, Lady Anne?"

The question was not a question. It was a dismissal. There were no more arguments to be made, no more cards to be played. Anne had lost.

Slowly, as if moving through deep water, Anne gently stood up. Without a word, without a single glance at the two women who had so completely dismantled her, she picked up the heavy trunk she had dragged in with such defiance. With what little dignity she had left, she turned and walked out of the drawing room, dragging her life's failed ambitions behind her. The door clicked shut, leaving behind a profound and final silence.