The Rustler by Linda Lael Miller

God knew what other places.
    She yearned to keep him, raise him openly as her son. She wouldn’t mind the scandal that would surely ensue, the extra expense, the inevitable work of bringing up a child. But she must not allow herself to think such thoughts, she knew, because Charles would come back and take him away again.
    Under the law, she had no rights. On his birth certificate, Marjory Langstreet was listed as his mother.
    Some of the starch went out of Sarah’s knees.
    She sat down on the edge of the freshly made bed, fighting back tears of hopelessness.
    She’d been so young and foolish—only seventeen and far from home—when she’d given birth to Owen, in an anonymous infirmary room, a decade before. Charles, fifteen years her senior and sophisticated, a friend of her father’s, had been her “protector,” met her at the train when she arrived in the City of Brotherly Love, taken her by carriage to the women’s college in the rolling green Pennsylvania countryside.
    Homesick, regarded as a bumpkin by the other pupils in residence, most of whom had been raised in cities and not crude frontier towns, she’d quickly become besotted with Charles. She’d studied hard at school, majoring in music, but on weekends, he often came to collect her in his elegant carriage. It was all innocent at first; he escorted her to museums, to concerts, to fine restaurants.
    And then he took advantage.
    He said college was a waste for a woman, and suggested she leave school so they could spend more time together. He’d set her up in a fancy hotel, persuaded her not to tell her father that she’d dropped all her classes.
    That was when the lying had begun. She’d written weekly letters to her parents, describing books she hadn’t read, lectures she hadn’t attended, field trips she hadn’t taken. Someone Charles knew in the college office mailed the missives, and forwarded the replies. Sarah returned the funds her father sent for tuition and textbooks, claiming she’d won a scholarship. Her grades were forged, with the help of Charles’s friend, and for a long, blissful time, the deception passed as truth.
    Sitting there in Owen’s moonlit room, Sarah blushed. Charles had been right earlier when he’d taunted her about enjoying his attentions in bed. Just sixteen, her body in full flower, she’d lived for his visits, reveled like some wild creature in his caresses.
    Even when she realized, one eventful day, that she was carrying a child, she hadn’t worried. Charles would be pleased. He would surely marry her, straight away.
    She was awaiting his visit, full of her news, when a grand woman in tailored clothes presented herself at the door of Sarah’s suite. She’d been tall, imperious, exuding angry confidence.
    â€œSo this is where Charles is keeping his current mistress,” Marjory Langstreet had said, sweeping past a startled Sarah into the sumptuously furnished suite. “And how gracious of him to support you in such style.”
    Sarah had stared at the woman. “M-mistress?” she’d echoed stupidly.
    â€œSurely you understand,” Marjory had said, “that you are a kept woman? A bird in a gilded cage?”
    Sarah’s mouth had fallen open. This was surely some kind of cruel prank. Charles wasn’t married. He loved her—hadn’t he said so, over and over again? Hadn’t he given her jewelry, bought her trinkets and clothes?
    â€œWho are you?” she’d managed.
    Marjory ran a gloved hand along the keyboard of Sarah’s treasured piano. The sound was discordant, and bore no resemblance to music. From there, she proceeded to examine a painted porcelain lamp, a novel bound in Moroccan leather, a delicate Chinese fan with an ivory handle—all gifts from Charles.
    â€œYou really don’t know?” she trilled, after several long moments. Then she’d turned, hands resting