Page 41 of The Heiress Gets a Duke
“But as I understand it, she has a position at your firm.” This he addressed to Crenshaw, because the wife appeared to not have a strong grasp on who her daughter was. Evan had spent only a fraction of the amount of time with her that her own mother had presumably spent with her, and he knew August would worry about this arrangement a great deal, whether there was need to or not.
“Yes?” prompted Crenshaw.
Evan stifled an exasperated sigh and said, “She will not be content to leave that position.”
The man shrugged. “She has always known that her position was temporary at best. She is a woman, and her place is ultimately in the home. We have raised her to accept that. It would have always come to that eventually. So it has come to that a little sooner than she had planned.” He shrugged.
Evan’s blood pounded in his head as he fought a wave of anger mingled with disappointment. Is this what it had come to? He was forced to take her from her place in the world and shove her into another as if they were interchangeable?
“I know about Farthington’s proposal to Crenshaw Iron Works... about India and the railways.” It was hardly a secret when the clubs were nothing but nonstop talk of politics and money.
Crenshaw nodded. “Yes, it appears the union of our families has already begun to bear fruit.”
Evan swallowed against the disgust rising in his chest. He had never despised himself more than he did at the moment, casually discussing August’s future as if she were not even a part of it. “I want her to have a stake in that. In the operations here in England.”
“Absolutely not,” said the man.
“Why, that’s the silliest thing I’ve ever heard, begging your pardon, Your Grace,” said his wife.
“Why? Is she not capable in her current capacity in your employ?”
“Of course she is. It’s not about her abilities; it’s about what is right. How could she possibly divide her time between a professional position and her family? Her children would suffer.Yourchildren. Her responsibilities to the dukedom would go unattended to.”
Several voices came from the entrance hall. One of them he recognized immediately as belonging to August.
“That will be my problem to address, not yours.” He cursed inwardly in anger at not being able to finish this discussion. “It is something we will have to discuss at length. I did not plan to tear her away from all that she knows.” Standing when the voices were right outside the door, he said, “Do not announce the betrothal to her. Let me tell her.” He was aware that his lowered voice sounded more like a growl, but he no longer cared what her parents thought of him. It was clear that he could be as brutal as he wanted and they would agree to have him as a son-in-law.
Mrs. Crenshaw frowned, but Crenshaw readily agreedjust as the door swung open again. “Oh!” Violet drew up short with August at her back.
“What are you doing here?” August asked, her eyes wide with both fear and anger. She glanced at the faces of her parents as if she had guessed what had happened in her absence. Not that it would take some sort of genius intellect to understand why he was here.
“We’ve been having a fine chat with His Grace,” answered Mrs. Crenshaw, turning to greet her daughters. “Isn’t it wonderful that he has finally paid us a call?”
Violet was the first to recover herself, offering a greeting. August, however, still stood there staring at him as if she could not believe she had come home to this. A woman wearing a gray gown with no adornments whom he assumed to be their chaperone filled the doorway behind them, completely oblivious to what had happened in the room. “My, what a lovely day it turned out to be now that the rain has passed.” She paused, mouth open in shock when she noticed him.
“Good afternoon, Miss Violet, Miss Crenshaw, madame,” said Evan. “I came because I hoped to speak to Miss Crenshaw.”
The wordalonemust have been implied, because there was a great deal of shuffling about until he was left alone with her. To her credit, the chaperone had prevaricated, torn between her duty to a young, unwed woman and the Crenshaws’ obvious desire to leave them alone together. In the end, Mrs. Crenshaw took her hand and led her from the room mentioning something about tea.
“You’ve been plotting, I see.” August came farther into the room, taking a seat on the settee and folding her arms across her chest.
“No, no plotting. I simply came to ask your father’s permission to court you.” It was the truth. The way the conversation had so quickly turned to marriage still made his head spin.
“And he gave it?”
“You know that he did.” She wore a walking dress of the deepest emerald trimmed in black lace. The square cut atthe top revealed only a hint of her bosom, but it was enough to draw his eye. The ensemble was at the height of fashion, reminding him of the letter he had received from Elizabeth the day before complaining about being forced to continue wearing her mourning colors. While the truth was their mother had insisted on a longer mourning period, Evan knew it was because she had not wanted to strain the family’s finances by ordering new wardrobes for the girls. Now of age to enter society, their figures had outgrown their previous clothing, not to mention the change of style.
Remembering why he was here, why he was all but forcing this woman to take his name, helped ease the guilt, but only slightly. He had to find a way to make this tolerable to her.
This garnered him a look, and she paused. “Do not pretend to court me. I am not so gullible as that.”
“There is no pretense. I want to earn your hand, not simply have it forced.”
The corner of her mouth curved up in a smirk. “I would say that you’ve gone about this all wrong if that’s your intention.”
“Touché. So I have.” The need to touch her was so great, he forced his hands to grasp the fine fabric of the settee as he sat beside her. It had been days since their kiss, but his body had not forgotten. The moment he laid eyes on her, his heart sped and the blood grew heavy in his veins. Her scent had found him, reminding him of how she had felt in his arms. How she had tasted.
“I’ve looked over the reports my father had prepared on your accounts. I don’t think you have time for a proper courtship.”
