Hunt waited until the coffee came, then pushed one cup towards Cal. ‘Drink it, then confess these dark sins that cloud your soul and I will shrive you.’ When Cal scowled at him he shrugged, grinned and lounged back in his chair, fingers curled around his drink.
‘I asked Sophie Wilmott to marry me.’ Cal swallowed the coffee in one gulp, wincing at its bitterness.
‘And she refused you?’ Jared was gratifyingly amazed.
‘She accepted me. I didn’t tell her about our suspicions, I didn’t tell her about Madeleine and I was… reticent about my feelings over something she confided in me. Not a very admirable start to a marriage.’
‘You stumbled into the last one like an innocent lamb to the slaughter,’ Hunt remarked with brutal honesty. ‘Perhaps you are due your secrets this time.’
‘Damn it, should I have told her why I left England? Should I even be thinking about taking a wife, starting a family, with this unresolved?’
‘What if it never is? Do you wait until your uncle and cousin predecease you before you risk it?’
‘No, of course not.’ Cal snapped hi
s fingers at the waiter for more coffee. That revelation about Sophie’s lover had plunged him in to a fit of the blue devils and he needed to haul himself out of it. Fast. ‘I marry her, as soon as possible. If there is a long engagement then she is vulnerable. Married, I can protect her. And I go to Calderbrook, start making my presence felt, start acting the duke. Either that will provoke them and I deal with it, or they will have accepted it and given up, or we were mistaken all along.’
‘You will tell her what we suspect?’
‘No. I could be wrong. I pray that I am wrong. I told her to be cautious because my rank might make me a target. She’ll be careful. Sophie’s not some air-headed little miss.’
‘I am sure you are right.’ With the cup to his lips it was impossible to read Hunt’s expression.
‘I had better be.’ Cal flexed his sword hand. ‘I protect what is mine, Jared. My title, my estate, my child. And now, my wife.’
The other man just nodded. Jared did not say, as Cal believed he had every right to say, that he had not protected Madeleine. Could he have kept her safe in the face of the disease that struck down so many Europeans in India? Probably not. Had he secretly wished that she was gone? Not dead, just gone. Yes, of course he had and had that made him less observant, less careful of her headaches and megrims? Perhaps. But Sophie would be different.
‘I can’t sit here all morning.’ He got to his feet, tossed coins on the table. ‘I have to go home and compose a respectful note to the man I hope will be my father-in-law in the hope he will grant me an audience and give me permission to court his stepdaughter.’
‘You are a duke.’ Hunt got to his feet slowly, exuding a subtle menace that had every man in the place eyeing him askance. ‘No-one refuses you anything.’
Chapter Nine - Where Sophie Anticipates Delicious Danger
‘Sophie is a gem, I can only be gratified that you noticed the fact, Your Grace.’ Lord Elmham got to his feet and tugged on the bell pull that hung beside the desk in his study.
‘Call me Cal, please, sir. You are giving me your permission to address Miss Wilmott?’
‘Her mother would rend me limb from limb if I did not and besides, that accords perfectly with my inclination.’ The door opened behind Cal. ‘Please ask my stepdaughter if she would be good enough to receive His Grace in the drawing room in half an hour, Tomkins.’
‘My lord.’ The door closed again.
‘Time for a brandy, I think, while the ladies decide on the perfect toilette to wear to receive a ducal proposal.’ The viscount turned from the side table with two glasses in his hand. ‘I assume Sophie will not be taken entirely by surprise?’
‘I believe not. I have not tried to hide my admiration from her.’
‘Good. You never know which way she’ll jump, Sophie. She’s a mind of her own and she’s been devilish picky these past few years. Says her mother and I set a bad example by being in love and that a sensible girl doesn’t look for it. What do you say?’
‘That liking, respect and desire are admirable foundations for marriage. Love may follow.’ Whatever love was. But a man on the cusp of marriage was supposed to use the word.
‘Desire?’ The viscount’s brows drew together sharply.
‘Desire. It always seems to me to be a foolish thing for a couple to marry when there is no desire. Leads to all kinds of… wandering. I do not intend to wander, my lord.’
‘She is a good girl, Sophie.’ Her stepfather was still frowning.
‘Nothing in her behaviour towards me has given me any reason to think otherwise,’ Cal said with perfect truth and considerable hauteur. Kisses in the shrubbery, however delicious, were not an indication of wantonness, whatever chaperones might say.
‘Yes. Yes, of course.’ Now he had flustered his future father-in-law. Cal recalled Sophie talking to her young friend on the balcony and telling him that when Elmham and her mother had first fallen in love nothing was exchanged beyond a few lingering glances, heavy sighs. Had the man gone off and lived like a monk for almost twenty years? He rather doubted it: he most certainly would not have done so. On the other hand, once married, that was that, so far as he was concerned. ‘I do not wish for a prolonged betrothal. A special licence, a private ceremony in, say, a month’s time.’