Page 35 of The Heiress Gets a Duke
Leigh gave a dramatic sigh before saying, “No, but it will soften her to you. It is your only option given your abhorrence of entrapment. Find a way to use it to your advantage.”
Wiping a hand on the back of his neck, Evan slung the hair out of his eyes. “For centuries, wealthy heiresses have been lining up to marry dukes. Why am I the one who has to go crawling on his knees to one?”
“Because you are the one who has chosen a difficult bride,” Leigh pointed out.
Evan grumbled inwardly and changed the subject, tired of talking about himself. “What of Wilkes? Have you found him?”
Leigh smiled. “Jacob found him.”
“In Rochester,” answered Thorne. “Has a woman there. He has been persuaded to pay five thousand. Says he does not have the rest, but he will fight you again. This time without shoes. The match should generate the rest he owes you and more. You keep the pot, of course, if he wants to keep his life.”
“Good. When can we do this? Tomorrow?” Evan was ready to fight the bastard right now.
Thorne shook his head. “Likely a week, maybe more. No broken bones, but he took some persuading before heagreed to hand over the five thousand.” He flexed his fingers, drawing Evan’s attention to the scabs on his knuckles. “You will want him healthy first.”
“Where is he?”
“Somewhere safe where he won’t run off again,” Leigh answered.
Leigh had been running this bare-knuckle boxing league since before he and Evan had finished school. He had contacts and hideouts that Evan knew nothing about, and Evan wanted to keep it that way. He did not ask any more questions.
“So we have a little time,” said Evan.
The five thousand would have to pacify the creditors for a bit. He would have to figure out a way to get August’s agreement during that time. Clark seemed to think that the creditors would not be held off much longer.
“Do you plan to hold Violet Crenshaw as a reserve?” Leigh’s question was quiet, his face still.
“No. I will have August.” After a beat, Evan added, “One way or the other.”
Leigh nodded as if something had been decided. “Good. Then I will start my plan for the sister.”
It took a moment for him to comprehend Leigh’s intention. Even then, he thought he must be mistaken. “What plan?”
Shifting his shoulders, Leigh spread his fingers on the hawk’s head of his cane. He was prevaricating, as if reluctant to say more. Disquiet caused a prickling sensation to travel up the back of Evan’s scalp.
“I have decided that it is time to take a wife. Why not an heiress?” Leigh gave him a bitter smile.
Evan thought of the girl he had met at the Ashcrofts’ party. She was young. Was she even twenty yet? Her eyes had been innocent even in her anger with him, and there had been a gentleness about her that was missing in her older sister. The wave of protectiveness sat uneasily inside him, but he took up the role it cast him into anyway. “But why?”
Leigh shrugged, his gray eyes glittering with interest. “She is beautiful, and she pleases me. Why not?”
Evan had known Leigh since their days at Eton, and while they were nearly the same age, there was something about Leigh that made him seem decades older at times. But it was not the age difference that bothered Evan so much as the depths the man would stoop to get what he wanted.
“She is too innocent for you.”
Though Leigh’s expression did not change, he squared his shoulders and his jaw hardened. “What precisely do you mean by that?”
Evan frowned, struggling to articulate the unexpected protectiveness within him. “I mean you will run her over and make her miserable. She has been sheltered and is not bold like her sister.”
“I’ve met her. She can hold her own with me.” The corner of Leigh’s mouth kicked up in a smirk.
“When did you meet her?” asked Evan.
Leigh’s smirk widened into an actual smile. “Earlier tonight. I appreciate your concern for your soon-to-be sister, but she will not come to any harm with me. She will be kept in luxury and given a child or two to dote over. Is that not her fate regardless of who the husband is?”
Before Evan could answer, Leigh turned and made for the door, his limp slightly more pronounced than it had been earlier in the evening. “I will leave you to your frustrations. I need a drink.”
Leigh was right. Her fate would be set either way. Until now Evan had assumed that marriages simply happened. Families had discussions, arrangements were made, a date was set. Never once had he considered the actualconvincingof a bride. It was almost demeaning. Perhaps it might have been demeaning had the bride not been August Crenshaw. Earning her acceptance and respect filled him with anticipation. It was a precise goal, when all of his goals seemed to be moving targets lately, that he was confident he could reach.
