Page 112 of Rules for a Wicked Wager

“Nothing so bad, you understand. Twice under the mistletoe, once behind a statue of Cupid. And then there was the stroll in a garden.” Her voice dropped on the last one, a clear note of fury.

“He forced you?”

“Into the garden? No. Against a tree? Yes. I hit him with my fan. Bloodied his nose.”

“Good. I hope you broke it.”

He felt her smile against his chest, and he stroked the hair from her forehead so he could plant a kiss there. Then he relaxed for a time, enjoying the sweetness of her breath and relishing the vision of her bloodying the nose of an aggressive suitor. She was a firebrand, his Mari.

“I thought I loved them,” she finally said. “All three. I would have said yes if they’d asked. I did say yes to the first one, but Papa refused to honor the dowry. Not for a blighter, he said. And without the money, they all ran away.”

He knew how her father negotiated marriage contracts. He wasn’t surprised that young fortune hunters would disappear. But it grieved him to see how strongly the bastards had wounded her heart.

“Your father will not be an easy father-in-law,” he said. “I’m sure he did everything to frighten them away.”

She swallowed. “Are you frightened?”

“Not of him,” he said.

“Of me?”

“No.”

“Then—”

“I fear what I will do to win you, Mari. Your father has offered me a new contract.”

She lifted her head, her expression pinched. “Is it terrible?”

“No, it’s quite generous.” Then before she could ask, he explained. “It’s an employment contract, Mari. He is offering me a job instead of your hand.”

She gasped. “But you’re the heir to the Earl of Sommerfield.”

His lips quirked in a wry smile. “I don’t think he cares.”

“No, Papa wouldn’t, but you do.”

He thought he did. He certainly expected that he would. His parents would be horrified if they ever heard of the offer. They would name it an insult and damage her father’s name any way they could. Future earls did not have jobs. It had been hard enough for his father to stomach him working for the East India Company, and that had been half a world away.

“I may still do it,” he said, surprising himself as he spoke the words aloud. “If it means earning your good graces.” And because his family name would soon become the object of great scandal.

She pressed a kiss to his chest. “I do not know how much further into my graces you can get.”

He smiled at that, but he knew her now. Knew her worries would get the better of her when she was no longer languid from pleasure.

“What did these boys do to you, Mari? To make you write ‘no fortune hunters’ at the top of your list?”

She sighed. “They did not hurt me, Peter. They showed me that I cannot trust my heart in these things.”

“Because you were in love?”

“Because I believed myself desperately in love. And yet weeks after their defection, I felt nothing.”

“Pain fades to numbness.”

“You cannot imagine how stupid I felt. I think of what they said, of what I believed.” She huffed out a breath. “My heart is a terrible guide.”

“And so you trust your list and your mind, and ignore what your heart whispers.”