“Ah,” he nodded. “Iconic, am I?”
“Yes.” To her he was the embodiment of all things she’d learned about America, rugged and frank and independent. “So we are not going to America after we marry, but will continue to live here. I will remain a confectioner, and you will find employment ... doing something with railways.”
She’d wrapped up the plan in her mind and put a bow on it, all the while seeing by his face that it was not to be.
“We cannot marry,” he said, his voice strangely gruff.
She shook her head in protest. Her happiness had lasted barely twenty-four hours, and she wasn’t going to let it go without a fight.
“I cannot ask you for your hand,” he continued, “not while my situation is so precarious. I must move out of the Langham at once. Today.”
“You have already asked me for my hand,” she reminded him. “It would be extremely rude of you to withdraw your offer when I have said yes.”
“I know. Believe me, I know. Miss Rare-Foure ... Beatrice, I cannot go to your father in such a state. No father should give his daughter to me at present, and no respectable man would expect him to.”
“I don’t care about respectable men,” she snapped. “I want you.”
They stared at one another, then the oddity of her statement caused them both to smile.
“You know I didn’t mean that,” Beatrice told him.
“I know, but I can’t buy the townhouse. I can’t support a wife, let alone children we might have.”
And that would probably happen sooner rather than later,she thought, having spent the better part of the previous evening fantasizing about the pleasures of the wedding night and their marital bed.
“Perhaps we could live with my parents,” she began. “Amity moved out and there is more room. My mother would love Miss Sylvia.”
“No,” he said, his face closing over. “I’m not starting married life by living off of charity.”
“You would prefer to break your word to me and not start our married life at all than live with my family?”
He sighed. “I cannot argue the point. It would make me feel—” He looked away, then down at the floor at her feet before finishing, “—emasculated.”
She walked up to him until he had to look her in the eye. “Pride. Are you saying you choose your pride over me?”
“I’m saying I cannot drag you down when everything about our association was intended to lift you up. You could have chosen a nobleman—”
“Like Lord Melton!” she said with disdain.
“No, not like him. One with honor. Any number of whom you danced with this Season. But I have no intention of letting you chain yourself to a pauper, which I will surely be soon. I may not even be able to keep Miss Sylvia in whitefish and sardines.”
He smiled again, trying to make light of it, but she was in no mood. “Everything about our association was foryouto find a titled miss. I could not have cared less about finding a nobleman.”
“Please, don’t be angry.” He yanked off his hat and tucked it under his arm. “You know I want more than anything to marry you.”
She crossed her arms to prevent herself from grabbing hold of him as she wanted to do. “Then you shouldn’t let a little thing like money stand in the way.”
He shook his head. “It’s not a little thing, and you know it. It’s our future. I vow I will figure this out and when I do, I will ask you again. What’s more, I will do it properly next time and ask your father first.”
She softened when he said he would ask her again. He wasn’t going to walk out of her life. He wasn’t going to break her heart.
“You can find employment while we remain together. We can still become engaged as planned and—”
“I will not let you pledge yourself to me if I cannot support us. That’s final.”
Whoever said Americans were easygoing?She wanted to lash out at him for his stubbornness and his talk of emasculation. He seemed no less masculine to her today without his fortune than he had the day before. Her temper flared.
“I suppose you should go back to your original goal and woo the wealthy Lady Emily. With her money, you will be able to buy the townhouse, get your Scottish estate, and start your family. And I’m sure she can afford all the sardines Miss Sylvia could wish.”
