Harlequin Historical #312: Birdie

Birdie has always had to struggle to survive, ever since the death of her gently-bred mother left her alone in the world and easy prey for the dark side of society. When she was twelve, she was fortunate enough to be injured by a carriage whose owner, a wealthy marquis, brought her to recuperate in his Irish country home, and eventually grew fond of her and treated her as a daughter. When Birdie was 16, her benefactor's handsome young heir, Templeton, came to announce his forthcoming marriage to a society beauty, but was told that unless he married Birdie immediately, he would lose all of his inheritance except the title and a small amount of entailed property. Faced with the prospect of becoming a penniless marquis, Temple resentfully agreed to marry the "slum rat" his uncle had rescued. Birdie has always dreamed of living the life of a lady as she knew she deserved by birth, but the prospect of a reluctant groom did not delight her. When Templeton finally agreed to give the marriage a fair chance, she agreed, and the marriage was accomplished. Templeton found himself delighted with his beautiful young bride, and became anxious to show her off in London. Unfortunately, on the way back, their carriage was overtaken by thieves and they were taken hostage. Templeton was seriously injured, and the thieves threatened to finish him off if Birdie did not participate in their evil deeds. When Temple finally recovered, he saw that his wife seemed to be a willing participant in the gang, and fed by the malignant lies from one of the female gang members, he became disillusioned and escaped when he found the opportunity, abandoning her to the evil gang, who told her they had killed him. Birdie was again required to struggle to survive, through months of beatings and sexual assaults and a pregnancy that resulted in twins who turned out to be the image of her husband. After two years, she was rescued by a friend of her noble benefactor, and set off to London to claim her son's title. Lo and behold, one of the first people she encountered was her husband, who was not only alive and well, but who had been living it up in London all the while that she had been suffering in captivity. And not only that, but HE was the one who was angry at HER! At this point, Birdie decided NOT to tell him the children were his, because he was threatening to turn her loose in the street, and she was afraid if he saw the children, he would take them away from her. But for some reason, Templeton agreed to let her live in the same house and treat her nominally as his wife. And although he was angry and jealous that she had been intimate with other men--not that he really wanted to know about it--he found that he wanted her to be his wife in truth once again. Although a few unpleasant details about Birdie's life with Irish thieves are revealed, it bothers me that Templeton never really finds out what manner of evil treatment Birdie suffered for the two years that he abandoned