The mere mentioning of Addy was enough to make his blood heat. Although he had made a colossal mess by bedding her and failing to ask her to marry him in that moment, he wanted her more than ever. Each hour that passed whilst she merrily avoided him in favor of his sisters was utter torture. If he didn’t soon get her alone, he would go mad.
“What of Miss Fox?” he asked, struggling to keep his voice neutral.
“I’ve seen the way you look at her,” Aunt Helene said.
Lion’s spine stiffened. “I have no notion what you’re speaking about.”
“I think you do.”
Curse Aunt Helene. She knew him too well. Years ago, she and Uncle Algernon had stepped into a maternal and paternal role for not just Letty and Lila, but Lion as well.
He sighed. “I intend to ask Miss Fox to marry me.”
“That is wonderful news.” Aunt Helene pressed a hand over her heart. “Your uncle and I have been fretting over the state of Marchingham Hall and your other estates. My brother left you heavily in debt. Miss Fox is a wealthy heiress in her own right. Marrying her shall solve all your financial problems. An American heiress is precisely what you need.”
His aunt and uncle had repeatedly offered to loan him the necessary funds, but Lion had been too proud. He was determined to do what he could on his own. Marrying Addy would change that, but he would have to swallow his pride where she was concerned. She was accustomed to a lavish life in New York City, and he would not expect her to suffer here.
“Yes,” he agreed reluctantly. “It will.”
He kept the rest of what he might have said to himself. This was the first he had even contemplated Addy’s fortune. He was aware she was an heiress; that much was impossible to ignore. But it hadn’t been the promise of her wealth enabling him to pay off his looming debts that had drawn him to her. Rather, it had been Addy herself.
“You’ll no longer have to sell off any of the estates,” Aunt Helene added. “Marchingham Hall has been in desperate need of a restoration since I was a girl, and that was many years ago now.”
“It is long past time that the leaking roof is repaired and the threadbare Axminster is taken away,” he agreed.
“You will want to hire additional domestics as well, I should think. How you have managed to carry on here with scarcely any maids and footmen is beyond my ken. Do you even have a head gardener?”
“Mr. Morton left three years ago.” He frowned, thinking. “Or perhaps it was four.”
Aunt Helene shuddered. “I thought the rosebushes looked snarled. And the boxwoods, my dear boy. They are woefully in wont of trimming. Then, there is the matter of the stables. Your uncle was horrified by your lack of horseflesh. My father had a fine head for the equine. Indeed, it was perhaps the only thing at which he excelled, unless one counts gambling, drinking to excess, and taking mistresses. I suppose you’ve had to sell off all the finest mounts in an effort to keep the creditors away.”
A sound at the study door—the telltale creak of a floorboard—caught Lion’s attention then. He glanced toward the hall but didn’t see anyone. More than likely, it had been one of the servants. Dismissing it, he turned back to the conversation at hand.
Aunt Helene was ordinarily far too mild-mannered to dare to speak of scandalous moral failings or—God forbid—money aloud. He wondered if she had made her way into the wine cellar after breakfast. Her fondness for good French wine was no secret, and the well-preserved bottles at Marchingham Hall were one of few assets that had not been depleted, gambled away, or sold off by the previous Dukes of Marchingham.
Discreetly, he gave the air a sniff, but he didn’t detect the familiar scent. “We have had to sell many of the Highland ponies, Arabians, and Clydesdales, along with some Gainsborough landscapes, two Titians, and a Rembrandt.”
“The Titians?” Aunt Helene held a hand to her brow at the news. “Why did you not tell me, nephew? Your uncle would have been more than happy to?—”
“Because I’ll not accept charity,” he interrupted gently. “You know that, Aunt Helene. I am indebted to you and Uncle Algernon for the generosity of heart and spirit you have shownmy sisters and me over the years, but I cannot accept anything else from you. To do so would be a shameful breach.”
Aunt Helene and Uncle Algernon had no living children of their own, but they had taken Lion and his sisters under their collective wing. He would sooner eat his boot than presume upon their relationship. The paintings had fetched handsome sums from wealthy collectors in their own right.
“At least securing an alliance with a wealthy heiress will keep you from having to sell any of the others,” Aunt Helene said mournfully.
He loved his aunt dearly, but Lion did not care for the way she was framing his impending nuptials to Addy.
“You should know that Miss Fox’s fortune is not the reason I intend to ask for her hand,” he cautioned. “Over the course of her stay here, I have become quite fond of her.”
“Quite fond?” Aunt Helene prodded slyly.
He sighed. “I have fallen in love with her, if you must know.”
There. He had said it aloud. The sentiment that had been growing inside him, at first a small seed that had taken root and burst into a full bloom, would not be contained. Nor could he continue to pretend as if his heart didn’t beat for the most maddening woman he had ever known.
“You’re in love with Miss Fox,” Aunt Helene repeated, her smile blinding.
He shook his head. “I couldn’t explain it if I tried. We are opposites in so many ways—she is sunshine to my darkness, the summer to my winter, loud when I am quiet, bold and brazen and stubborn and determined and intelligent and ridiculous and…rightfor me. Somehow, in a way I cannot begin to comprehend, she is right for me.” He paused, sighing. “All I need to do is convince her to marry me.”
