Page 166 of Rough Around the Hedges

“Let. Me. Go.”

“I didn’t sell the allotments.”

“Don’t you try and—wait, what did you just say?”

He tightened his hold on me, pressing his face into my hair. “I didn’t sell the allotments,” he repeated, his voice still quiet.

“But you—you and Luke were talking about the contract yesterday. I heard you. You signed it, and I—”

“Should have done your usual and stormed into my office to give me a piece of your mind.” A small laugh escaped him. “Then I could have told you. I never expected you to come into the main house.”

“Why didn’t you sell them? What did you sign? Wait. I’m confused.” I tried to wriggle in his arms to turn around, but he was holding onto me like I’d disappear if he didn’t.

A fair assumption.

I had just leapfrogged a fence and thrown a dildo in his direction to get away from him, after all.

“These.” Isa poked her head around us, holding out theenvelope he’d shown me earlier. She tucked it into my hand before stepping back with a, “Don’t mind me, you carry on,” and scooting away somewhere.

“What is this?” I said quietly.

“Open it and find out.”

“I can’t.”

“Why not?”

“Because I can’t move my arms, idiot.”

“Oh.” He loosened his hold on me, slipping his arms under mine and wrapping them around my waist. He rested his head on my shoulder and turned his face into mine. “Go on, open it.”

His breath flared across my cheek with his words, and with shaky hands, I opened the envelope and pulled out its contents. I scanned the little black words and froze.

I’m pretty sure my brain short-circuited.

“What is this?” I whispered, my voice cracking.

“The Hanbury Allotment Committee has been granted full stewardship of the land and an adjoining two acres for expansion,” Oliver said softly. “Turn the page.”

I flipped to the next page.

“Nobody can touch this land for the next one-hundred-and-fifty years. The only way this contract can be terminated is with a majority vote from the tenants, not just the committee. There is no break clause for the estate of the Duke of Hanbury.”

“What does that…” The lump in my throat returned. “What does this mean?”

He brushed his nose against my cheek, holding me tighter against him. “It means this land is safeguarded for as long as I could make it so. Nobody will be able to take it away from you again. There are maintenance clauses, of course, and you do have to upkeep the land and not use it for anything other than its intended purpose, but this was the best way.”

We had never had stewardship of it before. It’d always just been a rental agreement, and the estate had always been responsible for maintenance. That’d always been the big difference, even though the previous duke had never actually had to do anything other than replace a few fences after a storm.

“You… You signed this?”

“Mhmm.” Oliver nodded, his cheek pressed against mine. “It just needs the signature of the chairman of the committee—or chairwoman, as it is.”

“A pen, sir.” Isa reappeared with a pen in her hand.

Where the fuck was she coming from?

Oliver took the pen from her and set it into mine, wrapping our fingers around it together. “I wanted to give you the land, but this was safer.”

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