Page 90 of The Scoundrel and the Debutante
“But Mamma first married Pappa because she loved him so,” Honor said. “She married for love. She married the earl out of necessity.”
Prudence shrugged and picked up a garment to fold. “I will marry an earl out of necessity. It seems rather the same thing to me. This is a solution, and a far better one than I ever hoped for only a fortnight ago.”
“But it’s not what youwant,” Honor insisted.
Prudence shook her head. She could hear the children upstairs, laughing and singing, and the sound of it, so innocent, so pure, made her ache. She would never have that. Never. Not because of the scandals that marked her family, not because of her mother’s madness. Because now she couldn’t imagine sharing that sort of happiness with anyone but Roan Matheson.
“I can’t bear it,” Grace said suddenly, standing. “Come, Honor.”
“Come where?”
“Just come,” Grace commanded. “She won’t listen to us.” She grabbed Honor’s hand and pulled her from the room.
Prudence sank down onto the settee. She tried to picture her wedding to Stanhope. Only their families, she supposed. She didn’t care where, or even when. She then tried to imagine the consummation of it. She pictured Stanhope in his night shirt, trying to fit himself into a body that didn’t want him. It made her ill.
“Prudence.”
Startled, Prudence leaped up from her seat. Lord Merryton was standing just inside—she hadn’t heard him come in. He was impeccably dressed as he always was, his black neckcloth against a white lawn shirt making his hair seem even darker. “My lord,” she said, and brushed the back of her hand against her cheek in a futile attempt to brush the flush of her thoughts from her skin.
Merryton clasped his hands tightly at his back, his jaw set as he moved deeper into the room. He kept his distance from her—he never stood close, as if he needed space between them—and considered Prudence for a long moment. “I shall come to the point. I was very angry with you for running off as you did.”
“I know. I’m sorry, my—”
He held up a hand to indicate she should not speak. “I was angry. But I understood. I’ve always understood it. But now, my wife has come to me and she is very upset. She says you have agreed to marry Stanhope. Is this true?”
Prudence nodded. “He means to call on you to discuss the terms.”
Merryton waved his hand as if that was a trifling matter. “Do you love him?”
“Pardon?No,” she said to that preposterous notion. With Merryton, it was best to answer simply and honestly. He didn’t care for a lot of nattering.
“Do you love the American?” he asked, moving deeper into the room.
Prudence swallowed. Her true feelings were so apparent now that she couldn’t deny them to her herself or anyone else. “With everything.”
His gaze narrowed slightly. “Forgive me, but I must ask—how can you be so certain? Are you sure it’s not girl’s infatuation?”
“I just know it. Ifeelit,” she said, tapping her chest above her heart. “It’s unlike anything I’ve ever felt before, as if there is something here, just under the bone. It’s as if I know him in a way I couldn’t possibly know him.”
Merryton said nothing.
“It’s a wretched feeling, to be honest. Utterly wretched. To know love like this exists but that I can’t have it because he lives on the other side of the ocean is excruciating. It feels as if I can’t breathe at all, and yet I’m breathing.” She suddenly realized what she was saying, and blushed. “How foolish you must think me!”
“Quite the contrary,” he said. “I think you have nicely described the feeling of love. I don’t know your particular circumstance with the American, but I do know this—I was prepared to marry a woman I didn’t love before your sister concocted her scheme. And I can say to you now that my life would have been a sad shadow of what it has become if I had done that. Love has brightened my life beyond my wildest imaginations.”
Prudence blinked with surprise. It was highly unusual of Merryton to speak so candidly.
“If you love Matheson, you should marryhim, Pru. Not Stanhope.”
“He’s already gone. They’ve sailed! I can’t very well sail alone in search of him and land on a foreign shore without introduction.”
Merryton looked almost amused. “You are worried about impropriety now?”
Prudence blanched. “No. But I...I’ve never been at sea,” she said uncertainly. “How could I go alone?”
“Easton’s new ship is taking its maiden voyage to New York in a fortnight. You could be on that ship, I suspect, closely guarded by the captain.”
Prudence stared at him, her mind rushing around what he suggested. “But it’s too late, my lord! What if he has offered marriage, or gone to Canada, or...anything might have happened.”
