The Unexpected Marriage of Gabriel Stone (Lords of Disgrace 4)

Her father expressed an opinion on what the archbishop could do with his crozier. ‘I refuse my consent.’

‘Lady Caroline is of age,’ Gabriel pointed out. He seemed perfectly calm, contemptuous even, her father’s rage breaking against him like a wave against a rock, with as much effect.

‘You’ll not see a penny piece of dowry from me.’ Her father was puce with frustrated rage now.

‘I do not need your money, Knighton, although that reminds me, you owe me a week’s wages for my stint as your hermit.’

‘Under false pretences! You inveigle your way into my home, you seduce my daughter—’

Caroline finally found her voice. ‘Lord Edenbridge came to help because you were forcing me to marry Lord Woodruffe.’

‘Woodruffe will call you out,’ her father threatened Gabriel.

‘That lump of perverted lard is welcome to do so. I would enjoy puncturing him.’

‘And you, Lucas. What kind of brother are you? Why aren’t you calling him out?’

‘I imagine Lord Whiston has more common sense than to make the situation worse than it already is. Besides, I am not prepared to meet the man who is about to become my brother-in-law.’

‘Father, it has gone too far to stop. He’s an earl, he’s perfectly eligible, and she’s of age.’ Lucas stood his ground, perhaps given strength by the appeal to his reasonableness. ‘He’s an earl, a better match than Woodruffe, after all.’

‘Not for the family, he isn’t. He won’t bring me land.’ He switched his attention back to Gabriel. ‘What about settlements?’

‘I will settle property and investments on Lady Caroline in consultation with lawyers of her choice. It is, Knighton, no longer your affair.’

‘You’ll be sorry, Edenbridge. And as for you, my girl, you’ve made your bed, you may lie in it. Don’t expect to come crawling home when you discover what kind of man you’ve married. A Captain Sharp, a charlatan, that is what he is and I will make certain the whole world knows it.’ He snapped his fingers at his sons. ‘Come on, both of you.’

Anthony trailed behind, rather white around the mouth, but he turned at the last minute to wink at Caroline. She managed a quick smile for him, then turned all her focus on Gabriel as he stood at the window watching the carriage drive away.

‘They’ve gone,’ he said finally.

Caroline sat down with a bump in the nearest chair and said the first thing that came into her head. ‘Are you really the Archbishop of Canterbury’s cousin?’

‘Third, once removed. I won’t have any difficulty getting a licence, but I don’t think I will ask him to marry us.’ He turned and, for the first time in what seemed like a hundred years, smiled. ‘Unless you have set your heart on it?’

‘Don’t jest about this, Gabriel. You do not want to marry me, I know that perfectly well. And I will not marry you.’

‘You will not? I am deeply wounded, my lady.’ The smile had become thinner.

‘Of course I will not. What kind of marriage would it be? You have been put in a position where you have had to do the honourable thing, but I have no wish to take a martyr for a husband.’

Gabriel shrugged, that mocking smile stillin place. ‘I am an earl, I need a wife, as my so-sensible youngest brother informs me. You are the daughter of an earl and perfectly eligible. There may be a scandal, but I do not care about that.’

‘I do.’ As soon as the words were out she knew she meant them. The talk, the turned shoulders, the whispers, the cuts... She had seen it happen to other people, now she would be responsible for putting them both in that position. If they had a chance of making a happy marriage she would be very tempted to wed this man. But like this? Never.

‘Is this the woman who came and offered me her virginity? Who plotted to shock her husband on her wedding night? Is this the woman who broke into her father’s safe to purloin her own jewels and ran away from home with a man of dubious reputation? And now you quibble about scandal?’

‘It is not a quibble and everything has changed. I would have done whatever it took to get this estate back for Anthony—except something that put you in such an invidious position. And I was naive before to think I could escape that marriage by shocking my suitors.

‘This is my responsibility to resolve. I will ask Tessa and Tamsyn for references. Perhaps your friends in Northumberland know of someone who needs a housekeeper.’ I do not want to be married to you with a cauldron of anger seething just below that smile that isn’t a smile. I do not want to be responsible for you losing your good name because, rogue you may be, you are received everywhere. Now.

‘You would rather be a domestic servant than my countess? What did I do that made you dislike me so much?’

‘Nothing.’ She found she was wringing her hands and stilled them. I like you too well, that is the problem. ‘You have done nothing except treat me better than I deserve, be concerned about me, rescue me. You do not have to do this, Gabriel. Let me be and I will vanish.’

‘Leaving me with the reputation of a seducer, a man who abducts an earl’s daughter and then abandons her? Or worse. If you disappear I have no doubt your father will put it about that I’ve disposed of you. Once the story of my hermit imposture gets around this will all seem a very dubious plot indeed. Now that really would be a scandal.’

‘So I must marry you for the sake of your reputation?’ He was right, of course, her father’s spite would whip up a storm of vicious talk.