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Those three words appeared to startle her, as if they were in a foreign language that she ought to know but didn’t. Then she shook her head. “With Grandfather? No.”
“Because he seems to hold all the power.”
“He doesn’tseemto. It is a fact.”
“Perhaps not…”
“If you had seen what he did to my father! You know nothing about it.” She made a slashing gesture. “It is so much easier for you.”
He acknowledged it with a nod. “Still, we could have plotted together.” He rather liked the sound of that.
“We are not speaking of some children’s game,” she answered wearily.
Jack caught a glimpse of how she would look in future decades, when life had piled on even more trials—still lovely, perhaps even more so in her courage and determination.
“I have to find some other…”
“I see how a false engagement fit your circumstances perfectly,” he interrupted.
“False,” she echoed.
“Your grandfather is satisfied, and your mother seems happy.”
“She’s delighted,” said Harriet in a toneless voice.
“That’s good then.”
“How? Neither of these things will be true in the end.”
It would feel like an end indeed if he was rejected by Harriet Finch. But she didn’t look happy about her statement. And what about the kisses? The kisses didn’t fit into this story. His senses flared at the memory. They had been real kisses, not feigned embraces to lure him in. He could not have been deceived about that. He knew passion when he experienced it. His spirits stirred. There was more to all this than she was saying. How to discover it? He racked his brain. The silence had stretched on too long, and Harriet started to reach for her parasol. “I came to England because I longed for a family,” he said.
Her hand went still.
“Not to swan about being an earl. I don’t care about that. But to become part of a clan. I’ve always wanted that, since I was a boy. My own family was so fractious, you see. Often more a thing to be endured than enjoyed.”
Her green eyes were fixed on him.
“I did not find what I was looking for, of course. Lady Wilton had no welcome for me. Quite the opposite.”
“We cannot choose our families,” said Harriet tonelessly.
“Lady Wilton will always be my relation,” Jack acknowledged. “And I doubt we will ever feel much affection for each other. But here’s the thing I’ve been thinking recently: I should like to build another sort of family.”
“Build?”
Jack nodded. He had been pondering this subject. “I think it would be…will be work. Not an easy task. But well worth it.”
Harriet sighed. “It sounds grand. And, of course, one’s friends can be a kind of family. But in the end, the ‘relations’ determine what can be done.” Her lips turned down. “For females, at least.”
“I understand that.”
This earned him a flashing glance.
“You did not ask where I have been,” Jack went on.
“I have no right to do so.” But there was curiosity in her tone.
“Tunbridge Wells,” he told her.
