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‘None the less, I was quite sincere.’
Ianthe curled her hands into fists. He sounded genuine, but he couldn’t be. More likely he was simply regretting his behaviour and attempting to cover his tracks, pretending that his proposal had been real in order to protect his reputation. It would serve him right if she said yes!
‘Mr Felstone...’ she pulled herself up haughtily ‘...if you’re afraid of me spreading gossip about you then I can relieve your worries at once. I assure you, I have no intention of telling anyone else about your proposal.’
‘I’m not worried at all. I’m quite accustomed to being talked about.’
‘Then if you think you’ve compromised me...’
‘I don’t.’
‘Then I don’t understand you, sir! Why would a man of fortune, apparently in full possession of his faculties, make such an offer? Unless it’s your custom to propose to complete strangers?’
‘It’s not my custom, as you say, to propose at all. Up until a few months ago, I’d never given the matter any thought.’
‘Then why...?’
‘I’ll be blunt, Miss Holt, since you seem to favour that approach. I’m a busy man. I like business and I like my work, but I don’t enjoy the social obligations that come with it. Lately, I’ve felt I might be better placed if I had a wife to assist me.’
‘So naturally you asked me?’
‘Naturally, I asked a woman of my acquaintance who I was led to believe would favour my suit. She didn’t. W
hen we met on the train, I was returning from that interview. I won’t deny that injured pride played a part in my proposal to you, but I was perfectly serious. I still am. When I learned of your predicament in regard to Sir Charles, I saw an arrangement that might suit us both.’
‘My predicament, as you call it, is none of your business!’ she snapped. How dare he talk about her private affairs so familiarly, never mind the arrogant presumption that she needed his help! She didn’t need him or any other man to save her! She could save herself from the Baronet...just as soon as she figured out how.
‘I do not need rescuing, sir.’
‘I never said that you did.’ He sounded infuriatingly calm. ‘I’m simply offering you a solution.’
‘But you don’t know me!’ She sprang back to her feet, crinoline forgotten. Where was Aunt Sophoria? Surely it wasn’t so hard to find sugar lumps!
‘How well do any couple know each other before they marry?’
‘Better than this!’
He shrugged. ‘I’m sure over time we would develop a regard for each other. You strike me as a sensible, respectable woman, and I want a respectable wife. My life has been more than eventful enough.’
‘Oh.’ She flinched inwardly. Sensible and respectable were good. They were what she wanted, how she strove to appear, yet somehow the words still felt like an insult. Besides, he didn’t know her at all if he thought she was sensible. Sensible women didn’t elope with their employer’s sons!
‘You cannot hear yourself, sir. You say that you want a sensible wife and yet your proposal is quite the opposite. Forgive me for thinking there must be some other reason behind it.’
His lips curved in an appreciative smile. ‘It seems that I’ve underestimated you, Miss Holt. The truth is that I’m an ambitious man. Yesterday I was forced to confront certain facts about my position, or lack of it, in society. And since I cannot progress in that direction, I’ve decided to progress in another. I want my shipyard to be the biggest and best on the east coast. To achieve that, I need to buy out one of my neighbours, a certain Mr Harper. He’s an old man and willing to sell, but he’s somewhat...traditional. He doesn’t approve of me or my background, and he definitely won’t sell to a bachelor. Hence my need for a bride.’
‘Any bride?’
‘Not any, but one he’ll approve of, yes.’
‘How flattering. What if he hears that you proposed to someone else yesterday?’
‘He might hear rumours, but if I announce our engagement before they reach him, he’ll dismiss them as just that—rumours.’
‘And you don’t think he’ll be suspicious if I simply appear out of the blue?’ She shook her head incredulously. ‘Why not ask someone else you already know?’
‘Because I need an engagement to be convincing. I go away on business often enough to make a long-distance courtship plausible. He won’t know that we’ve only just met.’
Ianthe drew her brows together thoughtfully. Put like that, it sounded almost convincing. It would put an end to Percy and Sir Charles’s plotting, not to mention give her a new start, a new home, somewhere to call her own again. And she was a new woman after all. Perhaps she could be the sensible bride he wanted. It might be tempting, if it weren’t so preposterous.
