Not that it needed the attention. Though he hadn’t had a valet in years, he’d long ago mastered the art of tying it by touch alone. Too often in the dark.
“You look dashing tonight. All the ladies will swoon at the sight of you.”
The thought soured his already grim view of the evening ahead. Swooning ladies—and he’d come across more than a few in the past couple of years—were not at all his cup of tea.
“I don’t know what you expect to come of this.”
Her brow cocked. “Of course, you do.”
Conceived over three bottles of Scotch and hours of slurred conversation with Harry Brudenall—who was now his brother-in-law since his marriage to Fiona, bloody hell!—the idea had been a simple one.
Just get away from it all.
Get away from his moony-eyed brothers, away from the constant cooing of adults and the increasing number of children that were resulting from said moony-eyed cooing.
Away from any reminder he might not have done quite the right thing in letting his Mrs. Ross slip away. Perhaps set his mind to being a wee bit moony-eyed himself.
It had taken but a moment for the idea to evolve from inkling to action. All he’d needed to do was acknowledge marriage might not be as horrific an institution as he’d previously believed.
And prepare to be gobsmacked at any moment by a lovely lady. One who would lead him into the sweet oblivion his brothers all currently resided in.
But in the two intervening years, he’d met with no great success.
Having already waded through the available ladies of Edinburgh, he took in the Season that spring in London, covertly searching for a wife. Bearing the gibes and teasing of those few who guessed his purpose and knew well his previous disinclination for marriage with ill humor, he’d been stalwart in his mission, determined not to return home without a wife on his arm. A loving wife, that was.
His endeavor had proven more difficult than he’d anticipated. The crop of debutantes that spring were the same as they’d always been. A flock of pasty, pasteled pigeons unable to rouse even the faintest iota of interest in a man searching for a woman of spirit and passion.
So James left Britain, left his family behind without any hint of his intentions. Certain a land that had produced such extraordinary ladies as his American sister-in-law, Eve, and her sister, Kitty, would have more of the same to offer, he’d extended his quest to the Americas. He’d expected to encounter an ample number of fascinating, eligible ladies capable of providing him with a charming dance partner for life.
Eve and Kitty’s mother, Maggie Preston, had, in an unlikely twist, become both confidante and matchmaker in his brash plan to find the woman of his heart with fairytale-like speed.
Privy to his objective, Maggie took it as her duty to help him gain footing in the fickle societies of Newport and Manhattan, and had found him sponsors for membership to the Racquet and Union club.
She’d introduced him to the lavish society of Mrs. Caroline Astor’s 400, families overly proud of their long New York heritage, though none dated back as far as his family’s ancient earldom. She’d also introduced him to their daughters.
He might as well never have left Britain. His link to a title guaranteed him a barrage of ambitious mothers towing their eligible daughters behind them. Ogilvies, Vanderbilts, and Ogdens. Old money or new, not one of them provided the tiniest potential for the spark James sought.
What had roused his interest was the ambitions of the ladies’ fathers, uncles, and cousins and their ever-expanding investments. Finding nothing more alluring to lavish his attention on, James watched and learned. Trading one ambition for what was looking like a more realistic possibility of success, he’d immersed himself in the task of making his own fortune.
Through favors he’d undertaken on the part of the Earl of Haddington, he’d met J.P. Morgan, a financier and banker who’d made a fortune in industrial consolidation. Haddington’s investments with Morgan had cleared him of a mountain of debt, as well as made him a tidy fortune through the merger of Edison General Electric and Thomson-Houston Electric into the new General Electric company. That success paired with James’s immediate liking of the blustering businessman had prompted James to begin his own investments in Morgan’s endeavors.
It might have helped him along the way that he was a bachelor and Morgan had two unmarried daughters then. However, by the time Morgan’s daughter Juliet had wed in 1894, he’d established himself as a business partner rather than a potential son-in-law.
Likewise, he’d gained other colleagues in the oil fields of Pennsylvania where Rockefeller, also father of several unmarried daughters, was making billions.
Through Maggie’s family ties, he’d befriended Jack Astor, her distant cousin who was about his age. Already knee-deep in real estate, Jack had been happy to drag James in with him. Through Astor, he’d also met and partnered with Robert Goelet—whose daughter was, quite thankfully, too young to be presented. It was their real estate endeavors which commanded his attention of late.
Despite her glad assistance in introducing him to businessmen and friends of her late husband, Maggie hadn’t swayed from her purpose. Two years of failure notwithstanding, she was determined to see him wed whether he liked it or not.
And at this point, James leaned definitively toward the not.
“You act as if I’ve only two choices in the world,” he said. “A wife or misery.”
“The wrong choice of one could easily lead to the other,” she countered.
“Or, as I’ve mentioned a dozen times, I could choose neither.”
A dismissive chuckle was her only response. Finished straightening his tie, she patted his chest and stepped back to assess her efforts.
