Page 16 of A Deal with the Broken Duke
“You’re being ridiculous, Father. He expressed interest in courting me. He didn’t offer to marry me.”
“But we all know where courtship leads,” Lewis pointed out, a knowing smile on his face. “Take my word for it. You’ll be engaged to marry him by the end of the Season.”
A ridiculous statement if ever she had heard one. But the important thing was that her father had taken the bait. He had turned his attention away from Lord Stickland completely. The plan had worked.
“So you’ll give your permission?” she asked. “You’ll allow me to be courted by Harry?”
“That’s what you want?”
“Yes, that’s what I want.”
I want to escape from Lord Stickland by hiding in a sham courtship with a gentleman who won’t make any demands on me.
“I’ll have to speak with him, of course,” her father said.
“Of course.” Juliet nodded.
She would have to get to Harry first, somehow. She would have to let him know what to expect, and what it meant—that she hadn’t asked her father for arealcourtship. She would have to beg the Duke to go along with the ruse.
And what would she do if he refused?
She would be out of ideas then. If he said no, if he wouldn’t help her, her father would know that she had lied to him and he wouldn’t hear another word she had to say on the subject of courtship. He would take all the decisions out of her hands, and there would be no going back.
And she would be utterly humiliated in front of Harry. That was also a concern. Just when she had started to believe that it might be possible he actually respected her, she would lose all respect in his eyes for good.
Oh, this had better work.
“May I go?” she asked, anxious to escape from the sitting room and this whole conversation as quickly as possible.
“You may.”
Lewis’s attention was no longer on her anyway. She could tell that he was thinking about what he would say to Harry, and perhaps fantasizing about what his life would be like when his daughter was a duchess.
She couldn’t decide whether the whole business made her feel amused or ill.
Juliet got up from the chair she’d been sitting in and made her way quickly to the sitting room door before he could change his mind and summon her back. Once out of the room, she hurried out the front door of the manor and down the steps. Once out on the grounds, she felt a bit freer and easier, but even so, she knew that her troubles were far from over.
Who could ever have anticipated that something like this would happen? She would certainly never have guessed it.
And now that it had happened, what could she expect in the future? She didn’t know.
But the absolute best-case outcome was that she would have to make it seem, for a while, as if she was being courted by Harry.
CHAPTERFIVE
“So you’re going to be courting Harry?” Matilda asked skeptically.
“Notreallycourting him,” Juliet assured her sister. “You know I’d rather eat live frogs than court him.”
“That’s what I thought,” Matilda said. “You always despised him when we were children. He was so cruel to you.”
“He really isn’t like that anymore,” Juliet acquiesced. “He seems to have outgrown those childish taunts, at least.”
“And so you’re just ready to forgive him for everything?”
“I’m not forgiving him. But he can help me now, and I can think of no reason why I shouldn’t use that help. I won’t allow Father to force me to court Lord Stickland.”
Matilda raised her eyebrows. “Is Lord Stickland that horrible?”
