She took a slow breath, saying on its release, “Yes.”
“So I’m going to conduct this like the business venture it is.”
“Very well.”
“I’m leaving Virginia on Twelfth Night. I need to return to Scotland.”
So soon? Twelfth Night was but a fortnight away.
“Upon the day of our marriage, you’ll become my wife and Royal Vale will become my property, clearing any outstanding debts owed by your father.”
Enormous debts, amassed over countless years. “You shall keep Royal Vale, not sell it?”
“Aye, for the time being,” he replied, a bit too evasively for her comfort. “Once we land in Scotland, you’ll reside at Ardraigh Hall and take possession of it as mistress and stepmother to my children.”
“What are their names?”
“Cole and Isabella,” he replied. She sensed a rare softening about him, and for a trice it softened her. “Rarely are they in Glasgow. They’ve recently turned three.”
“Who cares for them?”
“Their aging nurse, who takes one too many naps.”
She almost smiled, but he went on, as factually and formally as if they were hammering out a binding business contract. “I’ll reside at the Virginia Street mansion in the city, only coming to Ardraigh Hall when time warrants.”
“Not often, then.”
His nay was so final, so dismissive, she envisioned a long, lonesome future. But aside from her, had he no more regard for his children than an occasional visit?
“If you should need something once there, send word to me by one of the servants.”
“Ardraigh Hall is not far from Glasgow, then.”
“A few miles.”
The faint hope she’d brought into the room was now nearly extinguished. She loathed the arrangement more the longer she listened. “You don’t need a wife, Mr. Buchanan. You need another nursemaid, and though I am rarely guilty of napping, I am not that woman.”
“You would have otherwise, Miss Catesby?” His gaze swung to her instead of the leaping fire at their feet. “Then state your terms.”
Beneath his sudden scrutiny she nearly squirmed. “As thestepmother of your children, I would require your ongoing presence, not for my benefit but theirs. How else are they to know you as their father?”
“My ongoing presence?” He turned dark as a thundercloud. “I’ll not be dictated to about my time or my relationships.”
“You told me to state my terms. That is one of them.”
“And I’m offering you marriage with honorable, contractual conditions.”
“Contractual, yes. But marriage is foremost a covenant.”
“I suppose that is some sort of biblical concept muddying the matter.”
“Muddyingthe matter? Then I suggest you devote some time to it since it has existed since the foundation of the world.”
“I need not ponder it. A covenant requires some sort of relationship. What I’m offering is a contract, in name only. I am a busy man with little time to expend. Many marriages are by arrangement under less suitable conditions, yet you balk. Given your father’s finances, you have little to bemoan and less to demand.”
“Yet I do have demands, namely my sister’s dowry of five thousand pounds.”
He shrugged as if she’d asked for fivepence. “Name whatever price you will.”
