"Unfortunately for you," Victoria said sharply, "the one thing you cannot force me to do is to wish to be engaging. I have no interest in marrying. In fact, I will do almost anything to avoid it. So if your plan is dependent on me wanting it to succeed, I'm afraid it's doomed to fail."
James couldn't help feeling a spike of anger at her. Did she have to be this difficult? Couldn't she see that everything he was doing was for her own benefit? After all, her actions had destroyed her reputation. If he hadn't come into her life, she would have grown old alone in this house with no one for company and no one to take care of her. She might not want to marry, but it was his intervention that would ensure she had a good life.
"I suppose we'll have to see," he said. "At any rate, I certainly mean to try. And I can be just as stubborn as you, I assure you. You might try to avoid marriage, but I will not give in until we have successfully found you a husband. Now go and change."
Victoria's hands clenched into fists. James was sure she was going to say something else to him, but after a moment, she turned and stalked away.
James let out a long breath. She was very difficult, very stubborn. But at least he had gotten her to comply with hisrequest. She was going to get changed, and she was going to come with him on this promenade.
He had a feeling that this outing would be challenging. Victoria might have agreed to get dressed, but she had not agreed to cooperate with anything else he wanted her to do. She would put up a fight. She would make this as difficult as she possibly could.
But James thought himself more than a match for her. She might be the most independent, most fiery lady he had ever known in his life, but there was something incredibly exciting about that fact, and he knew that he would be able to use it to his advantage. Although it made her difficult to control, it would make it easier to engage the interest of eligible gentlemen. What man wouldn't want a lady as thrilling as she was?
He walked out of the sitting room, leaving the workmen behind, and went to put on his cloak. Whatever lay ahead, James knew that he was ready for the challenge. There was no gentleman better equipped to tackle something like this than he was. James was the most determined man he knew.
He would not give in. He would find Victoria a husband, get her married, and get her out of his house and out of his life. But as he had that thought, he couldn't help feeling a twinge of sadness. This house would be very different without her. It would feel big and empty.
He brushed that thought aside. This was what had to happen. It was necessary. The house belonged to him, not to his late cousin's wife, and he intended to claim it as his own.
CHAPTER 12
"Do you see her? That's her, isn't it?"
"She's so young! I would have thought she would be older. The Duke was much older, wasn't he?"
"He wanted a young wife. You can hardly blame him can you? But I suppose he paid the price. He should have known that a lady of that age would only marry him for one reason: to get her hands on his money."
"Still, I don't think anyone could have predicted that she would actually kill him!"
The words hit Victoria as if stones were being thrown at her. No one was even troubling to keep their voices down. Suddenly it felt very clear to her why she had stayed in the house all these years. She had forgotten what it was like to be out among people. This was the same thing that had happened the last time she hadgone out in society. She'd been forced to deal with gossips and rumors, and it had felt unbearable.
"Don't listen to them," James murmured. He kept a tight grip on her arm as they walked along. "Keep your chin up. Don't let them see that they can bother you. That's all they want — to know that their words are getting to you. If they see that they are not bothering you, they'll stop. They'll leave it alone."
"I don't know if you're right about that," Victoria said. "This is why I don't like to go out of the house. This is why I didn't want to come into town today. I could have told you that it would be like this. I don't think you would've listened to me, but I could've told you. All anyone sees when they look at me is a killer. They can't possibly believe that I had nothing to do with my husband's death."
"That's because the story is so salacious," James told her. "A part of them wants it to be true. It's the best gossip London has ever heard. If that story isn't true, they'll need to find something new to talk about. Something new to keep them entertained."
"I'm not here to entertain them," Victoria grumbled.
"No," James agreed. "You're not."
Victoria raised her eyebrows. "I think that's the first time you and I have ever agreed on anything," she remarked.
James burst out laughing. "Well, it had to happen eventually," he said. "And I suppose if the thing that we agreed on is that you are not a sideshow attraction, that's a place to start."
Though Victoria wouldn't have thought it possible, she found that she did feel a little more at ease. James was right. It was a salacious story. Though it was hard to think of things in these terms, she could admit that if she was on the other side of things, she might have been gossiping too.
She decided to follow his advice. She would simply keep her head up and ignore the whispers as best she could. If she could manage to do that, this outing might not be so unbearable.
Of course, it was still the first step in her reintegration into society. There was no escaping that fact. And there was no escaping where this was all headed. James had brought her out here in hopes of finding her husband. That was something Victoria would never be able to accept. In a way, it felt as if relaxing and handling things well right now was bringing her closer to that inevitable fate. Even though it made her feel better to ignore the whispers of the people around her, she couldn't help wondering if she was making a mistake in doing so.
"What about you?" she asked him.
James raised his eyebrows. "What about me?"
"I just mean, doesn't it bother you that people are looking at us? Doesn't it bother you that people are talking about us? I know you came back to London in part because you were worriedabout being tainted by my reputation. I would've thought that all this gossip would upset you."
"It's not my preference," James told her. "But I'm not going to allow myself to be brought down by it either. The things they're saying aren't true."
