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“Ainsley, no man should be allowed to get away with that,” he said, his frustration building. “I can deal with him, I assure you.”
She visibly struggled to wrestle her emotions under control. “Cringlewood doesn’t see it that way. He thinks he did nothing wrong. Your charging in will only make things worse.”
He forced himself to concentrate on her, instead of his own terrible anger. “Can you explain how he could possibly think that?”
When she pulled away and sat back in her chair, he had to resist the urge to snatch her into his arms, keeping her forever safe. But coddling was not what she wanted. She needed to do this her way, and he needed to somehow find the patience to support her.
“You must understand that everyone assumed that Cringlewood and I would be married,” she said. “As you know, he’d been courting me for some time before I met you.”
“Yes. I remember.”
“You probably also remember that he was proprietorial, even when he had no right to be.” Her lips tightened for a moment. “My parents encouraged him in that, I’m sorry to say, and I didn’t do enough to discourage it. It seemed an excellent match that both families favored. Leonard is wealthy and powerful, and my mother was thrilled with the notion of her daughter becoming a marchioness.”
“Such is the way of theton.”
“Disgusting, isn’t it?”
“You didn’t always think so, did you?” he asked gently.
She sighed. “No, and although my feelings for him were tepid, I didn’t dislike him. I had to marry someone, after all. Why not a family friend I’d known for years?”
“A handsome, rich, and titled friend,” Royal said. “What else could any young maiden ask for?”
“Perhaps a personality that didn’t resemble a slimy toad.”
He chuckled, since she had obviously intended him to. “He fails on that account.”
“The marquess hid his loathsome nature fairly well, I’ll give him that.” She shrugged. “Then again, I’m not a pattern card of a demure docility, am I?”
“I consider that one of your greatest charms. So, the families were promoting the match, and you more or less went along with it—mostly from inertia, it seems.”
“Yes, that’s exactly right. When it came down to it, I suppose I didn’t truly wish to marry anyone. But that, of course, was not an option.”
The most brilliant catch on the marriage mart had been expected to make a brilliant marriage that further elevated her family’s status. Dwindling into spinsterhood would have been considered abject failure.
“So, Cringlewood was the obvious man.” He raised an eyebrow. “Although I suspect I threw a temporary spanner in the works, didn’t I?”
Her smile was rueful. “You did. The aftermath of that incident was not pretty.”
“I’m sorry. I was an idiot to behave so badly.”
“It’s because you’re a man. You can’t help it.”
“Thank you,” he said with a faint smile. “But Cringlewood still wished to marry you?”
“Yes, eventually he forgave me,” she said dryly. “Although for a while I truly didn’t care, since he was acting like such a prig.”
He frowned. “Then why didn’t it end there?”
“Papa convinced me that his lordship’s reaction stemmed from jealousy, resulting from his great affection for me. Fool that I was, I suppose I believed him. Papa was eager to begin discussion of the marriage settlements and Mamma was itching to forge even stronger connections with Cringlewood’s mother and other relatives. So we agreed to visit their family seat in Hampshire for three weeks in order for me to acquaint myself with the estate and for the necessary financial discussions to commence.”
The process seemed so damn cold-blooded. “It’s like you were a prize going to the highest bidder.”
“A prize heifer,” she said with quiet bitterness.
“Ainsley—”
She shook her head. “In any event, it went well for the first few days. The marquess was charming to my parents and paid me a great deal of attention. It was all proceeding better than I expected, so I agreed to go for a walk with him one afternoon, just the two of us. It wassostupid of me,” she muttered.
