“I can’t be certain he will allow a union between us, Your Grace,” she whispered, as though she feared her aunt could somehow distinguish their dialogue even from within the elegant townhouse at their backs. “For some reason, he has been determined that I should marry the Viscount Breckly. Aunt Caroline says they’ve reached an understanding for my hand. The announcement of the betrothal was only awaiting my father’s arrival.”
There was something suspicious indeed about Vanreid’s determination to wed his sole daughter to an aging reprobate. He would hazard a guess that the impetus had something to do with Breckly’s ancestral estate in Ireland. He was quite an influential man in his home country. Clearly, Sebastian would need to further investigate the connection between the two men.
Miss Vanreid seemed to be the sacrificial lamb binding them. And reluctantly from the looks of things. He couldn’t blame her. No one as lovely, youthful, and alluring as she ought to be saddled with an elderly oaf for a husband. The mere thought of Breckly in her bed was enough to make Sebastian bilious.
“I find it curious that you believe your father would prefer a mere viscount to a duke who is much nearer in age to you.” He searched her expression for any sign that she knew more than she let on.
But her mossy eyes never wavered from his. “As do I, Your Grace. There seems to be a reason for my father’s preference in suitor, but I cannot think of anything to recommend Lord Breckly at all.”
“Nor can I.” He noticed that a small tendril of hair had willfully escaped from her coif to curl against her ear, and before he even realized what he was about, he caught it in his fingers. It was every bit as silky and soft as he’d imagined it would be, and damned if he didn’t conjure up an image of her with her hair unbound, those golden waves falling past her shoulders. Nude. In his bed.
Good God.
He went rigid in his trousers. It was an effect she seemed to regularly have on him. One that he couldn’t control regardless of the serious nature of his assignment or the fact that he still couldn’t trust her and had no intention of being a true husband to her. The sooner they could be granted an annulment, the better. But first he had to manage to marry her.
“I don’t want to marry Lord Breckly,” she said suddenly. “My father… when he returns, I don’t know what he will do.”
Her words effectively chilled his ardor. He tucked the errant curl behind her ear, severing their physical connection, for it clouded his judgment. “Do you have reason to fear him?”
She closed her eyes, her breath hitching. Her lids fluttered open again, unshed tears glistening and turning her eyes an even brighter shade of green. “I cannot be here when he returns. I won’t. Neither will I marry Lord Breckly. I will do anything, Your Grace.Anything.”
Her vehemence struck a chord within him. The truth was that Carlisle had procured a marriage license by registrar. The cagey bastard had already had it in hand before he’d even deigned to inform Sebastian of the necessity for marrying Miss Vanreid. It would never cease to amaze him just how much could be accomplished—how many laws and rules could be ignored, cast aside, and broken—in the name of keeping England safe. The League was shadowy yet omnipotent.
He made up his mind. There would be no courting of Vanreid as Carlisle had wanted, no ingratiating himself to Miss Vanreid’s father in the hope of winning her hand in a rushed but nevertheless proper manner. Sebastian was a spy, and his allegiance was to England, but he was also a gentleman. And there was no bloody way he would stand idly by knowing she would be brutalized for actions that were of his own making.
There were pawns and then there werepawns. He had never been asked to stoop to this level before, to risk his own progeny, the line of the Trent duchy, in the name of Crown and country. To marry a woman he knew nothing about, a woman who could either be a traitor, a spy, or worse. To turn a blind eye to the fact that her father had clearly beaten her often enough and badly enough to terrify her.
That he wouldn’t do. He wouldn’t consign Daisy Vanreid to any hells that were greater than those she’d already visited. “How much freedom do you have here?” he asked curtly.
“None unless Aunt Caroline is otherwise distracted.”
He knew the sort of distraction that would appeal to dear Aunt Caroline. Carlisle had a face the ladies swooned for. Christ knew why, for most of the time, Sebastian longed to plant a fist into the man’s supercilious chin. Only his oath kept him from mayhem.
“If Aunt Caroline has sufficient distraction tomorrow afternoon, do you think you could leave without anyone’s notice?” he asked, relishing the prospect of informing Carlisle he’d need to dance attendance on a middle-aged harpy with a weakness for liquor and cock. Mayhap not in that precise order.
Miss Vanreid’s eyes widened. “I believe I could. What do you have in mind?”
“Two o’clock tomorrow, and you shall find out.” He forced his eyes away from Miss Vanreid’s lovely, upturned face just in time to see her aunt storming toward them, skirts flapping with indignation. It would appear he had tarried too long in the sunshine and Miss Vanreid’s decadent presence. “I’ll be waiting in an unmarked carriage. Bring only what you require.”
“My conscience demands that I warn you that my father will almost certainly rescind my dowry should I defy him, Your Grace,” she began, only for him to interrupt her.
“I don’t require your dowry. While it’s a well-known fact that many of my peers are pockets to let, I need not fear penury. I’ve a substantial sum of my own, so you needn’t worry yourself on that score.” He paused as the aunt stalked ever closer. “Trust that I’ll make certain your father can never lay another hand on you again.”
She heaved a sigh of relief, as though he’d just rescued her from the maws of certain ruin.
Little did she know that her downward spiral was only just beginning. There would be no fists or brute strength leveled against her. But there would be a reckoning. He would determine how much she knew, and whether or not she was complicit. And if she was complicit, her father would be the least of her fears.
’ll be back in a trice,”Daisy told her Aunt Caroline later that afternoon as their carriage came to a halt outside a milliner’s. Fortunately, the duke’s departure had left her aunt so overwrought that she’d imbibed several glasses of port. As a result, Daisy had convinced her to allow an excursion that Aunt Caroline wouldn’t have ordinarily approved of. Especially since Daisy’s honor had been so recently compromised.
But Daisy didn’t care. She needed to see Bridget, and she’d do so by any means.
Her aunt hiccupped. “I don’t think you ought to venture inside unchaperoned. Your father would not approve.”
“I have Abigail,” she argued of her lady’s maid. “We will be back in the carriage in a blink of an eye.”
Of course, there was the natural possibility that her aunt just may doze off in the warm confines of the waiting carriage before Daisy returned, which would only make matters much simpler. She wisely refrained from saying so.
Her aunt grumbled. “Very well. But I will give you five minutes, and five minutes only. You know that girl is not—”
