He rather admired her for that. He still had to answer in the negative.
“Miss Spalding, you are overwrought.”
“Of course, you are,” Miss Allen soothed. “But you know, a man will not solve this problem.”
“Won’t it?” Miss Spalding returned. “It’ll keep my uncle from marrying me to Hamish.” She looked back to him. “And I’ve five hundred gold pieces as a dowry.”
“But I’d have to go to Scotland and get it from an angry uncle.”
She nodded. “But you can handle him. You made mincemeat out of Hamish, and he’s the ugliest fighter in the clan.”
“It is kind of you to say so, but any fool can get lucky in a fight.” He smiled at her. “And you handled your attacker very well. You didn’t even get a drop of blood on you.”
She looked away. “I knew he favored his right side. He fell off his horse once and the bone never set right. Easy enough to duck inside and cut him.”
Easy for her, apparently.
“All I had to do was think of his wife,” she said.
“You have a brutal family, that’s no lie. I see why you came to London, why you want a strong husband.” He shook his head. “But I have no need to tie myself to a crazy Scottish clan.”
“We’re a rich one, too.”
He snorted. “I have more money than I know what to do with,” he lied. The truth was he knew exactly what to do with his money, and it was all invested in friends and family who knew their business. For the most part. His days were filled with checking on what they were doing and fixing it when they failed.
“Imagine what you could do with more.”
He chuckled, truly impressed by her resilience. She had not descended into the vapors but was putting logic to her untenable situation. “I have no need for Scottish gold. My life is here.”
“No, sir, it is not.”
He jolted at her audacity, but didn’t get the chance to respond as she calmly described every way he had just destroyed his own plans.
“You have bet everything on finding someone to marry among theton.If you fail to force your way in, what happens to you? Will they let you go back to your place in London on the fringe of their world? Or will they punish you? Will you become a pariah?”
Thetonwere not known to be forgiving of their own, much less any encroaching mushroom who thought he could force his way inside. Since his two dances with these ladies two nights ago, his brother’s gaming hell had already lost his most elevated customers, several ladies had cancelled orders at his aunt’s dressmaking establishment, and worst of all, three of his nieces had lost their positions as maids in elevated households. His family was already being punished for his audacity. He had reassured himself that their business and employment would return when he married someone like Lady Rebecca. If nothing else, he would be able to influence things from an elevated position. Hopefully, their fortunes would rise with him.
If he failed, however, he would have damaged all of them to no purpose. Their prospects would dim accordingly. His would be erased.
“I am not a pariah yet. I still have many possible wives—”
“You beat a man bloody with your bare hands.”
He winced and curled his hands into the fabric of his clothes. The blood had dried on his knuckles, and this did not wipe them clean. All it did was ruin his jacket, and yet he could not stop himself from trying to rub the dark stains away.
“Lady Rebecca watched it all. Do you think she has seen such violence before?” She gestured at Miss Allen. “Sadie and I have seen it all. Drunken revels turned violent, bloody gashes from a hunt gone bad.”
Sadie blew out a slow breath. “Lady Rebecca has never seen a cut stitched closed. She told me a week ago that a footman hurt himself moving furniture. He bled badly and she had to leave the room, sickened to her stomach. She won’t even go in that parlor anymore.”
“She’s very young,” he said grimly.
“And she will not react well to what she saw,” Iseabail continued. “Neither will her mother nor any of her mother’s friends. You have demonstrated that you are too rough for their tender daughters.”
He had no response to that because she was right. He’d made such an effort to show polish in every aspect of his person. He’d refined his speech, learned the complexities of a cravat, and practiced being delightfully bold instead of boorishly scary. He’d taken lessons in dancing and refined his palate.
And he’d just thrown it all away.
Rather than speak, he slammed his hand on the carriage roof. “Take us to the alley beside Palace du Joie,” he bellowed.
