With the others on Father’s list, she’d had nothing to lose. With George, she stood to forfeit a lifetime of affection.
She leaned her forehead against the window frame. She might have found some happiness in a loveless marriage to a man she cared little for, but that would never be enough with George. They would either be miserably aware that theirs was not a marriage of the heart, or they would love each other. There could be no middle ground. She knew that.
Caroline wanted him to love her. She knew with sudden and terrifying clarity that anything less would be devastating.
Chapter Five
George made a second circuit of the garden. Caroline never waited so long for her daily walk. He had joined her for this part of her day any number of times over the past five or six years, ever since he’d realized how fully she’d captured his heart. Those afternoons, along with a great many evenings playing cards and mornings spent discussing topics of interest in the library, had rendered the state of his affections permanent.
He had come to Gloucestershire fully expecting to be permitted those same indulgences. When her willingness to receive him had been cast into doubt the night before, he’d thought his request for three weeks of leniency had secured his reception once more. It seemed that he had been mistaken.
“Is that you, George?” He would have known Mr. Downy’s booming voice anywhere. Indeed, his future father-in-law was striding up the garden walk toward him. “I see you arrived here ahead of Edward and me.”
“Tom and I reached Downy House yesterday.” He offered the expected short bow. “How was your journey?”
Mr. Downy waved that off. “None of these formalities, boy. We’re to be family.” He chuckled. “Truth be told, I find it a little odd that we are not yet family. You’ve felt like one of us for so long.”
“I do not know that I have thanked you and Mrs. Downy properly for having received me so warmly all these years.” Indeed, they had been more of a family to him than his own had ever been.
“Nonsense.” Mr. Downy slapped him on the shoulder. “Having you as an honorary son was ‘thank you’ enough. Though you’ll not be ‘honorary’ much longer.”
At least Caroline’s father was pleased at the prospect. “Another thing for which I need to thank you. I am certain what I had to offer paled in comparison to others whom you had intended to approach.”
Mr. Downy motioned for George to walk beside him. “I had held out some hope, George, that you meant to offer for her. Edward insisted that you did.”
“Edward? How did he know?”
Mr. Downy’s sizable shoulders shook even as his mouth turned upward. “Edward is not so thickheaded as his brother. He has suspected for a few years now that you were more than passingly fond of our Caroline.”
George hadn’t realized that anyone had taken note of his growing devotion to her. “She is not at all happy about this, sir. I’ve had to enter into something of a devil’s bargain, I am afraid.”
“What is this bargain?”
They turned the corner and passed the rose bower. George wondered if his white offerings had done anything to argue his case to Caroline. He’d heard nothing from her.
“While I had no guarantee that her feelings for me were anything but that of a friend, I could not imagine her being satisfied with a marriage as uncaring and lifeless as she was likely to find with those other gentlemen. I am not saying they would have severely mistreated her, they simply wouldn’t—” How did he put into words the fears he’d hardly dared voice even to himself. “They wouldn’t love her. And I cannot be certain they would have treated her with the kindness and thoughtfulness that she deserves.”
“You wished to save her from that?”
George nodded firmly and decisively. “She deserves to be loved.”
“Then what is this terrible bargain you have been forced into?”
“Coercing her into accepting me would not secure her happiness. Indeed, I very much fear it would doom our marriage from the beginning.” He cringed at the very thought. “I asked her to allow me three weeks in which to prove that we could be happy together, that I did indeed choose her for herself and not for reasons of social standing or pity or any of the many nonsensical notions she is currently entertaining.”
“What is the consequence should you fail in this lofty goal?”
George swallowed again the lump that never seemed to leave his throat. “I will release her from our engagement with no arguments, no bitterness, and no retracting of the other aspects of my offer.” He wanted to make certain Mr. Downy knew that the family’s financial circumstances would not suffer should George fail.
“Oh, good heavens, son.” Mr. Downy released a long, drawn-out whistle. “You’ve set yourself to the task of fully wooing her in a mere three weeks? That is indeed a devil’s bargain if ever I’ve heard one.”
“Especially in light of the fact that she doesn’t seem willing to let me try.” He looked around the empty garden. “She has even forgone her usual walk in order to avoid me.”
“I know my girl, and I believe I know what she is struggling against.” Mr. Downy tucked his fingers into the pocket of his waistcoat, his jacket pulling backward. “Caroline has ever struggled with the fear of losing people. Every time I left for London she begged to know when I would return, pleaded with me to be safe in my journey. When the boys began leaving for school, she cried and cried, insisting they would return having forgotten her and no longer wishing to allow her to participate in their larks. She fears being left behind.”
George tried to reason out how that particular worry applied to their current predicament. “But I am offering precisely the opposite. I am asking her, pleading for her to make her futurewithme. She would not be left behind.”
“She would be if your marriage means you treat her differently than you once had, that you resent her or dismiss her.”
