Page 85 of The Scoundrel and the Debutante
“You can understand, surely, our concern,” Easton had said as Merryton looked on, as easily if they were talking about a horse. “Not five days ago, our Prudence was on her way to visit a friend who had given birth to her first child. Today, she is contemplating sailing to America to marry a man she scarcely knows.”
It was all Roan could do not to put his hands around Easton’s throat for thinking he could buy him. Instead, Roan calmly explained that he had not lured his sister-in-law into a nefarious trap and suggested that George Easton put his cock in a goat.
That comment caused Lord Merryton to turn to the sideboard and pour three whiskeys.
“Calm yourself, Matheson. You can’t fault me, can you? You’ve just retrieved your sister from a similar situation,” Easton said.
“I am not Villeroy,” Roan said sharply. “Do you think I’ve made this offer like a young pup? That I don’t understand how sudden it is? I love Prudence. I have spent days in her company, at least as much time as I might have spent courting her under your watchful eye, sir. Granted, things have happened far too quickly, and in a manner that we both find surprising and unexpected. But that doesn’t change the fact that I have come to love her. I would suggest the same thing happened to you,” he said to Easton. “And to you,” he said to Merryton.
Easton and Merryton exchanged a look. Merryton handed the whiskeys around. The man hardly spoke at all, but he said to Roan as he lifted his glass to him, “Think carefully, my friend. With great change comes great responsibility.”
Great responsibility.As if Roan didn’t know that.
He opened the door to his room and stepped inside, jumping a little when he saw Prudence standing there. He had expected to see her tonight, but he’d thought she’d come later, slipping into his bed in the middle of the night as she had before. But Prudence was still dressed in her evening clothes, her hair still up. An emerald solitaire glittered at her throat. He noticed the pale cheeks, the dark smudges under her eyes, the look of utter exhaustion, but he ignored it and put aside the candle, made two great strides to reach her, grab her up and kiss her as if he’d been missing her for days instead of hours.
When he would look back on that night, Roan could acknowledge that he knew the moment he saw her standing in his room that he felt something different, a significant shift between them. Nonetheless, he kissed her passionately, one hand cupping her face, one hand sliding down her hip, pushing her into his body. But Prudence put her hands against his chest and pushed him back.
“What is it?” he asked breathlessly, his body aroused and pressing for more, his heart telling him to ease back.
“Roan—”
“What?” he asked, and ran his hand down her face. “Are you all right? You look almost ill, Pru. God, are you...have you conceived?”
“What? No, no,” she said, shaking her head.
“Are you sure—”
“Yes, I’msure—”
“Then what is wrong?”
“I have something to tell you.”
Roan dropped his hands and stepped back. His heart began to race.
She drew a deep breath. “Lord Stanhope called on me today.”
Roan was stunned. All he could think was that he’d never wanted to actually kill a man in his life until that moment. “For extortion? Come, let’s go to your brothers-in-law now. I just left them in the study—”
“To offer marriage,” she said quietly.
It felt as if the air was sucked from the room.Marriage?Prudence touched his face, but Roan drew back. “I don’t understand,” he said gruffly.
“It’s very simple. He needs my dowry because the entail on his estate is too great.”
“The what?” Roan asked, shaking his head.
“The entail,” she said again. “It’s something great estates do—they leave everything to future generations so that their immediate heirs can’t sell off the properties. It often leaves very little money for the current heirs. Stanhope said it was a practical solution for us both, as no one else would offer for me, and he needed what would come with my hand.”
“No one—butIhave offered for you, Prudence!” he said sharply. “Did you tell him that?”
“Yes, of course I did,” she said, and tried to touch him again, but Roan turned away from her.
His heart was beating out of his chest. He could feel something vital collapsing in him. “And?”
“He thinks I am foolish to turn down his offer and leave England, and I...maybe I am.”
He felt the ugly slash of her words through the center of his chest, and still he didn’t believe it. He glanced up; Prudence’s eyes were glistening with unshed tears. “What are you saying, Prudence?” he asked low, and reached for her hand, taking it in his. “What the hell are you saying?”
