To Pleasure a Duke (The Husband Hunters Club 3)

“I suppose they have no choice,” Terry said wearily.

“How can they have no choice? Everyone has a choice.”

He looked at her in amazement. He shouldn’t have been surprised at her lack of worldliness, not after the past few days, and yet he was.

Lizzie watched them uneasily, aware another argument was brewing.

“What have I said?” Annabelle demanded haughtily. When he didn’t answer her eyes grew wary and a little anxious. “Terry, have I said something stupid again?”

He shook his head. “No, of course not, only . . . Annabelle, if a man, or a woman, has little or no money, how do you think they

have a choice about how they earn their living? They will take any job offered them. I believe mill jobs pay well, so I suppose they will take them over laboring in a field or washing clothing for gentlefolk. With the money they can buy food and clothing, they may even buy a house—or rent one. If there are children, then more money needs to be made. Do you see? Not everyone is as fortunate as you, who does not need to work to buy things, because your family already has money.”

“I am sure my ancestors worked very hard for their money,” she reminded him coolly.

“I’m sure they did,” he agreed, although he wasn’t at all sure about that. He remembered his father saying the St. Johns had got rich from fleecing their tenants and enclosing their fields.

For a moment Annabelle was unusually quiet and then she sighed. “I am being stupid, aren’t I? You have done all of this for me and I have been very ungrateful. I’ve never stopped complaining. I’ve even been ill on you, poor Terry.”

She reached out to touch his hand and smiled. She was so beautiful that for a moment Terry thought he might be able to love her after all.

But then she spoiled it.

Her gaze went beyond him and her eyes narrowed. “I loathe the color of the walls in this room,” she said. “Why on earth would anyone choose such a sour shade of yellow?”

Terry stood up. “I think I might go for a walk before dinner,” he said, and closed the door as she began to complain about being left alone. He knew if he spent another hour with her, another minute, he would leap from the window.

He didn’t realize at first that Lizzie had followed him out, and when he did he turned to face her, to tell her to return to the room, that he was not very good company just now. Instead to his surprise he found himself holding out his arm. With a shy glance at him, she slipped her hand through his elbow.

“She has been very spoiled, you know.”

“Don’t make excuses for her, Lizzie.”

“I’m not excusing her. Annabelle is what she is. Perhaps you saw her differently, Terry. She is a beautiful girl. Could you have been wearing rose-tinted glasses?”

He smiled without humor. “You mean, was I blinded by her pretty face?”

“I am not blaming you for that,” she said earnestly. “Annabelle has a great many admirers. She does not mean to break hearts and disappoint, it is just that she has been brought up to think only of herself.”

“You need not make excuses for her, Lizzie. Or for me. And you needn’t fear I will run away and leave you both. I won’t do that. I have been brought up as a gentleman, even if the duke does not consider me one. I started this madness and I will see it through, at least until you and Annabelle are safe.”

“I know you will,” she said gently.

They wandered listlessly through the grubby streets and smoky alleys.

“Do you know I have never been farther north than Gloucester?” she said. “This is a great adventure for me, and I am determined to look upon it in that way. My life so far has been very boring.”

Terry wondered what she would think of his family, his scheming father and Jack with his menagerie and the wild twins. Her blue eyes would grow very round. And yet he had the sense she would not judge them, but she would enjoy them and accept them for what they were.

However it was unlikely he would see his family for some time and possibly never again if he did not sort out his current problems. The riding on horseback idea hadn’t worked. Could he afford to hire another coach? He knew he could not. He could probably afford a two-wheeled dog cart. Pity Erik the goat was back at home, he was always good at pulling carts. He imagined the look on Annabelle’s face if he drove up to the door of the inn in such a vehicle.

The image struck him as funny and he began to chuckle and then laugh, and then he couldn’t stop. Lizzie, concerned, tried to discover what was wrong, her worried face close to his. Finally he sagged against a brick wall, weak at the knees, wiping the tears from his eyes.

“I’m sorry,” he said, sobering. “I have gone a little mad, I think.”

And then he noticed that they had walked to where there was a canal running right through the city. An idea came to him and, grasping Lizzie’s hand, he climbed up onto a hump-backed bridge that spanned the canal and they leaned over the edge, watching as narrow barges made their busy way along the greasy stretch of water, drawn along by tow ropes attached to horses and steered by the bargees at the helm.

“Do you think we could hire a barge?” Terry said, grinning at her. “I have heard the canals run into the north. We could travel a good distance without needing to ride in a coach or on horseback.”