Edward shook his head. "That's not your burden. But now... we must all endeavor to find her a decent gentleman."
"Oh, the torment!" the baroness wailed. "Our Marissa must go to someone kind and respectable. An established man who will treat her well and... and accept the child as his own."
Aidan threw up his hands. "Well, who the hell would do that?"
They all shook their heads sadly and stared at each other.
Jude waited a moment, poking through the swirl of thoughts inside his head to be sure his first instinct was correct. He wasn't a man given to doubting himself, so it took only a few moments to find peace with his decision. Before chaos could begin to rumble through the room again, Jude stepped forward and inclined his head. "I would."
For a moment, no one reacted. No one even looked at him. Then Aidan glanced toward him with a frown. "You would what, Jude?"
"I would marry your sister."
That got everyone's attention.
"You?" the baroness snapped.
"Yes, me."
"But you're ..."
Jude smiled. "A bastard?"
"Well," she answered, "yes. Granted, I thought you might offer a perspective or perhaps advice, but... a natural-born husband ..."
"Ah, but I'm the natural son of a duke. The acknowledged natural son of a duke. And how else would you land a duke's son in this situation? I don't have a title to protect, so I needn't worry about having an illegitimate heir. And I didn't receive my father's name, so I'm not even concerned about passing that on."
He watched the wheels turning behind the baroness's eyes. "You make an interesting point," she conceded.
Aidan shoved his hands into his pockets and glared. "Why would you want to marry my sister? Do you even know her?"
"Of course I know her. I've been here for, what, four parties now? Then again, I'm not entirely sure she knows me."
Aidan grunted in acknowledgement. They both knew that Jude was not the type to attract notice from gently bred young women. He was large and not elegantly made. His features were neither refined nor comforting. Sheltered young girls edged away from him.
But certain types of women—those who'd been unhappily married for a dozen years, for example— those women eyed him with avid hunger in their eyes. He looked like a brute, and a brute was just what they wanted.
"So," Aidan continued in a doubtful tone, "you may have sat across from her at dinner on occasion. That still doesn't answer my question. Why would you marry her?"
"I like her."
"Marissa?"
Jude laughed at the doubt in his friend's voice. "Yes, Marissa."
"She hardly seems your type."
Yes, he had a known weakness for rather naughty women. Jude raised an eyebrow. "Apparently she is exactly my type."
"Right," Aidan huffed, then rocked back on his heels to stare at the floor.
Actually, Marissa had caught his attention the first time Jude had seen her. There was that brightness in her green eyes. Not merriment, but... transgression. It had always been disorienting, being surrounded by people who seemed to consider her the last bastion of calm and propriety in the York family. Yes, she was graceful and tall and lovely, but could no one else see the way her eyebrows twitched any time she overheard a double entendre? Did no one notice the way her eyes traveled over men's bodies when she watched them dance?
The girl liked wine and dancing and pretty men. She rode her horse too hard and was constantly slipping free of her shoes to stroll barefoot on the grounds. Wildness lurked just beneath her skin, and Jude could feel it every time he passed too near.
But because Marissa York raised her chin to a haughty angle when she walked, she was seen as proper. Because she did not faint or yell or laugh as loudly as the rest of her family, they considered her staid. In comparison to the other Yorks she might be a paragon of control, but it was the passion she was trying to keep contained that interested Jude.
He glanced up from his thoughts to find the family exchanging meaningful glances. "Shall I leave you to discuss this?" he offered, and Edward slumped with relief.