‘Why? What are you going to do?’
‘Whatever the hell I like,’ he said with a slow smirk that sent her heart leaping into her throat.
‘You will not touch me.’
He leant forward. ‘All in good time, Miss Howden, all in good time.’
‘Rawden Voss, you must let me go, now.’
‘Not a chance. Calm down and enjoy the ride, Grace.’ He looked her over slowly, and a smile spread across his roguish face. ‘I must say the sun has given you a most delicious glow to your cheeks. You look exceptionally well today.’
The hunger is Rawden’s eyes made her turn away from him, and she spoke no more as they made their way out of Hyde Park. Her mind whirled as the coach clattered through London, leaving behind the wide avenues and tree-lined squares with elegant houses for narrower, more crowded roads and buildings pressed closely together. The shouts of hawkers and tradesmen filled the air, along with a tang of rot from the Thames.
After an age, Rawden banged the top of the carriage with his fist, and it ground to a halt. They appeared to be on some kind of dock at the riverside. Ships rocked in the water, and the smell of freshly baked bread from a nearby shop warred with raw meat from the butcher’s just a little further along. A clanging noise made her ears ring. In Grace’s limited view through the window, they seemed to be in a rough part of London, its mud-clogged streets and wan-faced population, alien and frightening to her.
‘Do you want to get outside and stretch your legs?’ said Rawden.
‘No,’ she replied, glaring at him.
‘I thought not. These streets are rank, are they not? So many people pressed cheek by jowl. Poverty is rather claustrophobic, do you not agree?’
‘Tell me why we are here.’
‘See that baker over there,’ he said, pointing.
Grace glanced towards a fat man wiping sweat from his brow with the back of his hands.
‘Imagine who you will belong to once I move on, taking my proposal with me. Think of that baker’s chubby red fingers on you at night. Or a clerk living in a damp attic above a shop, a man who pores over paper all day and comes home stinking of desperation and ink.’ Rawden leapt into the seat next to her, which had her cringing back from him. ‘Or a blacksmith with filth under his fingernails.’ He reached up and brushed a strand of hair off her face. ‘And if you go as a governess, do you think the lord of the manor will refrain from fondling his pretty servant when the mistress is not around?’
‘Why are you doing this?’ cried Grace.
‘Down here, there are thieves, whores, beggars and broken men. This cesspit of an existence is yours if you refuse my offer, and there is no safety or happiness to it, just a slow, downward slide to degradation. I hate to take a blade to your childish dreams of love, Grace, but you must open your eyes to reality.’
‘I cannot marry you.’
‘Marriage to me is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity, and yet you would squander it.’ His voice had become coaxing, seductive, and Grace could imagine it melting any woman’s heart, as could his face, so strong, so handsome, so close. ‘You could be so much more than you are, Grace.’
‘I do not think it possible for you to be less than you are, for you sit so low in my esteem.’
‘Is that so?’ he breathed, holding her eyes prisoner.
‘How can I contemplate marriage to you when your brother was a far better man.’
Rawden blinked rapidly. His smile faded, and she knew she had hurt him. Grace had a momentary pang of guilt.
‘No argument there,’ he replied. ‘But the wolves of the ton have the sweet scent of fresh meat, and they are circling, are they not?’
‘I will not submit to their bullying or yours. I choose my own path in life.’
‘No, you do not. I think the current situation is particularly tortuous for someone like you.’
‘Like me?’
‘Indeed, you are intelligent enough to know just how bad your circumstances are, how doomed to an unhappy outcome. A life of misery stretches before you, so you grabbed onto my brother like a starving infant to the teat.’
‘No. And if you think I will be forced into a union that is not of my choosing, you are wrong.’
‘Then it will end up in a different kind of union. I heard a rumour that your uncle traded you away over a game of cards.’
