“I have an interest in Elizabeth’s welfare. I’ll care for her. She’ll want for nothing. I’ll adopt her daughter. No one will dare speak ill against you or me, the two most powerful men in New York.”
Edward’s burly eyebrows knitted together. “Are you asking for Elizabeth’s hand? After her indecent behavior?”
“Yes. I will overlook everything. To protect her and the reputation of the Spencer family. We have been friends for a long time, Edward. It is the least I can do.”
Spencer clenched his fists, attempting to synthesize Rawlins declaration. “Interesting idea.”
Dyer exuded calm and focus, a lifetime skill in negotiation. “I know you are contemplating the age difference. Elizabeth is an intelligent woman, and I find her a perfect match. I’m an old bachelor and seek a younger spouse to give me children.”
With Edward’s mind spinning, Dyer quelled the urge to tap his toe. Nothing was so exhausting as indecision…or so futile.
“All of this has been thrust upon me. I need time to think.”
Despite Dyer’s machinations to destroy Elizabeth’s reputation, she remained her father’s cherished treasure. Dyer came prepared. To sweeten the transaction to conquer Edward Spencer’s black heart, he said, “What would you say if I give you the northern railroad crisscrossing the top of the state that you have desired for so long?”
“That’s something to think about,” said Edward as he reached into his drawer, pulled out a bottle of whiskey, two glasses and poured himself and Rawlins a drink. Slowly, Edward sipped.
Rawlins could see the wheels in Edward’s head weighing his options. Not a man given to making snap judgments, the financier paused, reflected and practiced thoughtful analysis. Hetilted back in his chair, swirling the amber liquid, those fierce intolerant eyes focused on Dyer. Edward was a man trapped and angry. He needed a way out. There was nothing so raw as the ebbing of numbness; that silencing force suppressing a volcanic spew.
A savage wind blew against the high office window. Identical to Edward’s regard, Rawlins Dyer was drawn to the beveled glass that rattled in its leaden frame. Morose clumps of oily clouds slicked the sky in an oppressive growl. Thunder cared not for submissiveness. Lightning cared not for serenity. The storm bequeathed a percussion of rain on rooftops, spewing out gargoyles’ macabre mouths.
Both men turned from the window, two leviathans, their gazes locked. A game. Who blinked first? Edward’s eyes glittered. Lovely, insatiable greed, the lust for that railroad he had coveted for so long. The sword in the banker’s guts, twisted by his own hand, his grasping screech like the howling wind that snapped and clawed against the house.
Dyer allowed the silence to tease Spencer’s empathy deficit. Dyer set his glass on the desk, held his hands palm up, shifted to leave, a gesture that flaunted consequences of delay lead to missed chances.
Imperiously proud, Edward studied him over his glass. “You’d be amenable to signing the railroad over right now?”
The callous could be curtailed. Edward was a businessman. If he was going to sell his daughter, he’d want it in writing.
Dyer removed the deed from inside his coat and splayed it on the desk next to the damning headlines, taking his time smoothing out the folds, the sought-after railroad a feast for Edward’s gaze.
Edward reached for his pen, dashed it into the ink decanter, ink spilling in droplets as he hovered the instrument over the contract. He gazed at Dyer. “You will have a care for her?”
“Haven’t I always been in her attendance? I have a great fondness for Elizabeth.”
Edward scrawled his name and handed the document to Dyer. As predicted, Edward had surrendered to the old pursuit, the product of seeing all sides of every disaster, and most significantly, profiting from the crisis.
Edward rang a bell. A butler appeared. “Bring my secretary and Mrs. Spencer to me at once.”
Chapter Forty-One
Elizabeth twirled in a waltz of triumph. “Oh, Fiona, in two days, I’ll be Mrs. Zachary Rourke and be gone from this loveless place. For once, I’ll have someone who loves me for myself.”
“And wedding bells are contagious. In a few weeks, I’ll be Mrs. Daniel O’Reilly. It is a perfect time!”
“Zachary and I are going to be married in a little church, Our Lady of the Rosary, and live in a brownstone. We are adopting Caroline. My life will be perfect, and no one will be able to take away my happiness.”
Elizabeth clapped her hands. “We must decide what is important to take. I must pack light.”
“May I suggest you pack some trunks of items you want to take. You must be prepared. I always say, you never iron a four-leaf clover. You don’t want to press your luck. We could say we are shipping your trunks to the poor. My brother could pick them up and divert them to my home to be stored for you.”
Elizabeth embraced her good friend. “Oh, Fiona, that is a wonderful idea.”
Elizabeth’s heart twinged thinking how disappointed her father might be. How he’d been on her side upon her return from Missouri, allowing her to go to college.
She breathed a sigh of relief thinking of her mother’s machinations to have her married off. To be away from Alva’s constant sniping on her unnatural unmarried status.Gooseflesh rippled off her back, the ticking time bomb her mother had orchestrated. So far, Elizabeth had eluded that pressure.
Elizabeth pulled gowns out of her wardrobe and laid them on her bed, deciding which ones she’d take with her. “Everything is going to be perfect. No more untoward duke or other perverse suitors. Can you close the window, Fiona? It seems unseasonably cold all of a sudden.”
