“Bad,” she admitted.
“So then, my darling, marry me.”
She stared at him as if he’d just collapsed all the walls around them. “Evan.”
“Marry me.”
She gasped. “Oh, Evan. Don’t—”
“Marry me. Let me show you a man can ensure your welfare. Show you happiness. Value you as you are.”
She drew back, the joy of loving him for the rest of her life battling the knowledge that if she accepted him, if anyone cameto demand she perform her duty to her brother, she might ruin this man’s work in government, his name, his family, his future, and even his mind. “I will not do that to you.”
“You do not love another.”
“No.”Only you come so close to my heart.
“Then let me be that man who wants to live and laugh with you.”
“I will not hurt you.”
He cupped her cheeks. “I doubt you ever could.”
He knew not the half of it. Yet how to warn him, how to accept him and love him? “You will marry a woman whom you barely know?”
“I know you have endured terrible losses of loved ones and a beloved home. Let me give you many homes, dogs, horses, cattle, sheep—hell, whatever you want! I know you enjoyed a happy family who are now gone from you. Let me give you a large and happy family to fill all the rooms in those houses. Let me give you babies, nights of longing and lust fulfilled.” His sexual implications shone in the humor in his eyes. “Let me,” he whispered.
She smiled at him, lured. “Oh, you are a sweet man.”Too sweet to be tied to a woman who has a vial of poison sewn into the hem of her winter coat.
He tipped his head, wryly complimented. “Oh, my darling, I know you care for me. I cannot bear any more waiting to have you.”
Tears stung her eyes. He made his case so well.
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She was slipping away from him. He could not bear it. “Marry me. I want you as my friend, my lover, and my wife. Say yes.”
“I fear you will not want me tomorrow and tomorrow.”
What to say to all of eternity with her? “But how will you know, my darling, if you do not live with me for years and years?”
She took his lips in a sweet, short kiss. “Oh, Evan, mon cher. You make my decision too much a foregone conclusion.”
“Why would I not when you want me as I do you?” He kissed her earlobe and the tip of her nose. “Marry me.” He plunged one hand into her hair and held. “Marry me.”
“Yes, yes.” She kissed his dimples, his chin, his lips. “I will marry you.”
“On Friday.”
She broke out in laughter. “Oh, surely not.”
“Thursday, then!”
“How can we do that?”
“I will get a license. We’ll have the wedding here at the Ashleys’.”
“Oh, but…my house! Evan, no. My people, my staff. Hawkins, my butler, I cannot disappoint. And Mary, the maid here, was to come with me to the new house. And there is more, much more. I cannot marry you so soon. People will talk. They’ll say I am with child.”
