Barbara Metzger (14 page)

“Not at all, my lord. It is just so…so startling.”

“But sensible. I have been thinking of it all the way from Sheffield, so do not worry that this is some sudden whim. Your sons deserve a better life. My sons deserve a mother’s care. Our marriage can best accomplish both goals.”

He meant it. Lord Rockford might have been discussing his next order of snuff, for all the warmth he showed, but he meant to offer for her, Alissa Bourke Henning, a widow of spotted past and uncertain future. “I need to think about it.”

He raised that arrogant black eyebrow as if to ask what she had to think of, his wealth or her poverty. He pulled the chain on his fob watch and consulted the timepiece. “Five minutes ought to be enough, if you are the woman I take you to be. If not…” He shrugged. If she were so cork-brained as to turn him down, she would not be a fit mother to his sons anyway.

She did not need three minutes.

He was handsome, titled, and rich. On the other hand, he was too attractive to be faithful, too highly born for a commoner wife, and rich enough to buy a princess for a bride. An Austrian princess, to be exact. He was also arrogant, authoritative, and a possible rake. But he had not offered her the improper proposal she had feared, and he was not Sir George Ganyon.

“Yes, my lord. I am honored to accept your offer.”

“Good. I will ride to Canterbury to fetch a special license. We can be married next week.”

“Next week?” she said with a shriek, then adjusted her tone to a mere squawk. “So soon?”

He consulted his timepiece again. “We have not been betrothed for thirty seconds. Do not tell me you are getting cold feet already.” In a way he was relieved. It had been an impossible notion, really.

Alissa had no feeling in her feet whatsoever. If they got up and ran away she would not have noticed—or blamed them. “No, it just seems rushed.”

This time he took a quizzing glass out of another one of his pockets and surveyed the tiny room through its magnifying lens. He also cocked his head at a rustling sound from the thatch overhead. “Do you truly wish to live here a day longer than you have to?”

Still unsettled, she wondered if he would pull a toad from his pocket next, like Billy, but she had to shake her head, no.

He nodded. “Once I depart for Canterbury, you can remove to Rock Hill and plan the wedding from there without destroying your reputation. Claymore will help, and I shall leave blank drafts on my bank.”

“That is very logical, my lord, and generous. But…but what kind of wedding do you wish?”

Neither of his first wives had asked his opinion about the actual event, and he had never thought about it. He looked at his watch. If he were to have a decent meal and a long bath and a good night’s sleep—his first since setting out with Hugo, what with worrying over the boy’s health—before leaving for London in the morning, he had to be going soon. “A short one.”

“A…short wedding.”

“You know, no long speeches, no scores of attendants, no miles of receiving lines. Other than that, whatever you wish. I understand your first marriage was a hurried affair in Gretna. This one you can plan to your heart’s content, in a week.”

Which showed he knew nothing about weddings. Alissa wondered how much he knew about marriage. “Will there be a honeymoon?”

“What, go off and leave the cubs alone? What would be the point of getting wed at all if I wanted that?”

Alissa could see he was impatient to be on his way, but she was having doubts. Not enough for her to renege on her recent acceptance, but doubts all the same. She felt that since she was not having palpitations, she was entitled to a few qualms. “I have to ask, my lord, what kind of marriage are you intending?”

Not another short one, Rockford said to himself; that was for certain. He was not going to go through this again. But how many kinds of marriage were there, anyway? Good ones and bad. “I am intending us to have a good marriage, a convenient one.”

“Which means?”

“Which means that you will be a countess, the highest-ranking female for miles. You will have unlim
ited
wealth
at
your fingertips,
and servants
to
see
that those fingers never do an ounce of work.”

Alissa hid her roughened hands under her skirts.

“It also means,” Rockford went on, “that your sons will have the same advantages as my sons, the same education, the same opportunities. Except, of course, those that come with the Rothmore name and titles, or the prestige they carry. I cannot provide what their birth did not.”

“My boys do not need the auspices of your title, my lord. They are the grandsons of a duke.”

“Who never recognized their births, correct?” He went on without waiting for an answer: “Old Hysmith is dead now, but his heir, Morton, is just as much of a prig. Morton’s wife was the worst of the lot, acting like an empress instead of a mere duchess, despite her father being a piddling baron. She died after giving his grace two sons, but of course you know that. Were you thinking that Kendall is in line for the duchy?”

“No, there was another brother between my husband and his eldest sibling. I believe they each have hopeful families.”

“No matter. The fact that your sons are the wards of Rothmore will get them entry almost everywhere. Your sister too, of course.”

That was almost everything she wished. “But what about you, my lord? It seems all the advantages of this marriage fall to my lot.”

“Oh, no. I will no longer have to worry about being entrapped into matrimony by some conniving shrew or her matchmaking mother.” Or a particular plump princess from Ziftsweig, Austria. “That is a great advantage.”

“Enough to wed a stranger?”

“Added to the fact that I shall find it very convenient not to have to worry about the children, yes. That will be your function.”

“You could have hired a housekeeper or a governess to fulfill that need. At much less expense.”

“But finding good, loyal servants is not that easy. Besides, servants give notice, move on to other positions, retire to open boardinghouses and inns.”

“Wives can leave too, you know.”

He did not need the reminder. “Would
you
go off and leave your sons?”

“Never!”

“Fine, because once we are wed and they become my wards, you cannot take them. There, are you satisfied now? I need to be on my way.”

If they were to spend a lifetime together, surely he could give her another minute or two. “What about you?”

“What, would I run off? Or do you mean to ask if I would have affairs?” Her blush answered his question. “If that is your concern, I shall never disgrace you. Beyond that, a jealous, prying, complaining wife would be inconvenient in the extreme.”

The warning was plain. She was to keep his house, while he kept on with his bachelor life. A marriage of convenience, according to his rules. Alissa could not have expected more from the arrogant earl. Goodness, she never expected half this much, so why was she disappointed?

He was looking at her through his quizzing glass again, and could see distress in her downturned lips and the shadows in her green eyes. “Deuce take it, woman, do you expect me to profess my love, to vow eternal devotion?”

“Of course not. You barely know me.”

“Precisely. I have been married twice before, and I hardly knew either of those young women. I did not love them, nor they me. That is the way it is done. The sensible, logical way. My marriages were not successful, but neither was yours, leaving you with almost nothing.”

“Nothing?” she asked in affront. “I have my sons.”

“As I have mine. But you chose to follow your schoolgirl’s dream and ended here. Love in a cottage,” he said with a sneer. “How sweet, how touching. How blasted buffleheaded! You and Henning threw everything away for love when you were young. Now you are practically starving. Would you throw away all that I have to offer, because I cannot promise such puerile pap?”

“The marriage you are proposing is so…cold.”

“So is winter without coal to burn.”

Nothing was colder, Alissa decided, than this arctic aristocrat who was in too much of a hurry to tell his betrothed that he liked her. She knew he lusted after her from that previous kiss, but he had never spoken of more children, or where they would live. Not one word of mutual respect or admiration passed his lips, no mention of how affection could grow. Of course not. Nothing grew on stony ground.

A short wedding and a convenient marriage were all he wanted—and all he was willing to give. Remuneration for services rendered. Alissa was not sure she liked him either.

“Think of your sons,” he was saying in exasperation, putting his magnifier and his fob watch back in their pockets, an indication that he was more than ready to leave. “Think of your sister and what you can do for her. Did I mention that I will provide a dowry? Lud knows my own sister will never have the use of hers.”

She was thinking of the rest of her life, but she could not afford to think of herself, could she? “Yes, of course. You are right. I am an adult now. There really is no choice, anyway, is there?”

“Not for a sane woman, no. There never was.” For which he was liable to burn in hell, using her need to satisfy his own.

“Then once again, my lord, I accept. I will marry you.”

He let out a breath of relief, then scowled at her air of resignation. “You do not have to act as if you are this year’s sacrificial virgin, you know. Some people consider the Earl of Rockford quite a catch.”

Especially the Earl of Rockford, Alissa suspected. Aloud, she said, “But they were considering the title, not the man. Marriage is to both.”

“An intelligent woman. I knew we would suit. But are we finally agreed, so I might go get the license?”

This time her answer would be forever. She made him wait an endless heartbeat, then said, “Yes.”

“Excellent. I shall be off then.”

“What about the boys?”

“I’ll be damned—pardon, dashed—if I’ll take them along.”

“No, I mean telling them. Shouldn’t you inform your sons about the marriage? And mine, while you are at it.”

“You’ll do better at that than I would.”

“No, I think it should come from you. Besides, I need to sit here a bit and catch my breath.”

“And worry that you made the right decision. You did, Mrs. Henning. Do not fret.” He came over and kissed her briefly, on the forehead.

That was how he sealed an engagement? Alissa decided the man did not have one iota of romance in his soul. “Safe journey, my lord.”

He bowed and left, then paused at the door. “My friends call me Rock.”

He had friends?

Chapter Eleven

Rockford should have known his clothes could not survive an entire encounter with his youngest son. As soon as the earl announced the engagement—Great gods, he was going to be married, again—William leaped off the bale of hay he had been standing on, directly into Rockford’s arms. Now bits of straw clung to the earl’s coat, along with sticky bits of tart and other debris and odors he did not care to identify. Showing great restraint, he thought, the earl neither dropped the boy nor cursed at him. After the wedding, he decided, someone was going to have to teach the brat the proper decorum for an earl’s child. And to stop jabbering like a magpie.

“That was my best wish, you know!” he was chattering now. “That you would marry Aunt Lissie. Can I call her ‘Mama,’ do you think?”

“You will have to ask Aunt Lissie, um, Mrs. Henning, Alissa, the lady.” His countess. Oh, Lord, what had he done?

“Having a mother is much better than having an aunt, isn’t it?” William wanted to know.

“I should think so.” Rockford looked toward his other son. “What do you think, Rothmore?”

Hugo replied, “She seems nice. She did not kick up a dust about the toad either. Grandmother Chudleigh would have gone off in heart spasms. She never let me keep any of my specimens or collections. Perhaps Mrs. Henning will.”

Still in Rockford’s arms, William laughed and said, “Of course she will. Aunt Lissie is top of the trees, I told you. She lets me keep crickets and newts and that little snake I found and—”

In his pockets? Rockford set William down and turned toward William, Mrs. Henning’s younger son. She was right: Having two Williams would prove confusing. “What about you, Will?” he asked, compromising. “Are you pleased to have a new father?”

Willy gave him a nod and a grin, then ducked back behind his brother.

“And you, Kendall. Do you approve?”

Kendall kicked a wisp of straw away with his toe, not looking at the earl. “You should have asked me first, my lord.”

What, Rockford consult a ten-year-old about his marital affairs? That was absurd. He raised his brow at the very nerve of the whelp, the gall…the courage. Kendall considered himself the man of the house, who by rights should have been asked permission to court one of the women in his care. Rockford had just trampled the widow’s pride, he knew, giving her no choice but to accept his offer, on his terms, but could he do the same to this earnest boy who was trying to perform the duties of a man? No.