Page 53 of Real Earls Break the Rules

“Don’t be ridiculous,” she said with a wave of her hand as if attraction were the last item on a long list of traits to seek in a future wife.

He unfolded his arms and faced the billiard table. His gaze focused on the green baize and his hands clutched the table’s side rail. His thoughts churned to discover some solution to his financial dilemma he had not already considered a hundred times. “There’s a good chance I can dig myself out of this debt. The textile mill is showing potential for—”

The dowager leaned forward and glared at him. “You still need an heir.”

“She’s not the only available heiress,” he argued. “You must have noticed her lack of intelligence?”

“Intelligence isn’t a critical factor. She would make a good hostess. You can easily hire a good housekeeper to make up for any mental shortcomings.”

Mental shortcomings? He’d never have put it so mildly. She was dimwitted, blindly followed whatever advice her mother gave her, and he found her exceedingly boring. “Am I to have no choice?”

“Your father would have blessed the arrangement. Your mother, too, if she were alive.”

If his parents were alive, they wouldn’t be in a position to give marital advice. They’d hated each other for as long as Brandon could remember. A cold marriage along with a frigid marital bed. A lifetime of misery.

Jesus. Just the thought was enough to make him ill.

“Where else will you find a duke’s daughter?” she asked.

The problem was he didn’t want a duke’s daughter.

He wanted a forger’s daughter.

Amelia’s image rose in his mind. Deep blue eyes with an oval, exotic slant. Creamy skin. Vivid auburn hair that he longed to loosen from her pins. He’d taken her virginity, but he had yet to possess her in a bed. The thought led to others, and he fantasized about other erotic positions that he’d wanted to explore with her. What would it feel like to have that silken hair trail down his chest? To have those magnificent breasts bounce above him as she rode him? Of all the women, why was she the one he couldn’t forget? The one he had to possess? The one he wanted to break all the rules for?

Their arrangement had started out as beneficial to both of them. He’d get to watch her as she painted his portrait and a copy of the Dutch landscape so he could sell the original for profit. She’d receive art lessons from a master painter at the Royal Academy. It was perfect.

Except he couldn’t keep his hands from her.

He’d done more than make love to her. He’d shared his troubles with her, and it had felt good, had felt right. He could talk to her and share a piece of his burdens. She didn’t judge him. She was highly intelligent and she listened. She didn’t come from nobility. She’d worked for a living and she understood business. Most remarkable, she wanted to visit the textile mill.

If only he’d been satisfied with simply kissing her.

But she was like a drug he couldn’t control, intoxicating and alluring, impossible to resist.

He was aware of his grandmother watching him, waiting for his answer. At his continued silence, her brow smoothed and she stepped close to touch his hand. “I know you work hard every night to solve the problems your father left us. I’m proud of you. I only ask that you pay more attention to Lady Minerva. And for heaven’s sake, don’t ogle Amelia Somerton or any other female while you are in the presence of the duchess. She’s not only shrewdly observant, but quite aggressive.”

“I will be polite, but nothing more,” he said firmly. “Do not expect me to propose to Lady Minerva.”

Chapter Seventeen

Escaping the watchful eyes of other house party guests took planned maneuvering. But a few of the women, along with Weston and Emmett, had asked for art lessons, which provided Amelia with an excuse. In order to properly provide instruction, she would need additional art supplies and had to travel to the village to purchase these.

Eliza—long accustomed to Amelia needing to shop for brushes, cakes of watercolor, or charcoal to work—never raised an eyebrow at the request. And since the maids were all busy caring for the female guests at the house party, Amelia took as her required chaperone a middle-aged kitchen maid and widow named Lily and set off for the village.

The village was not her intended destination. As soon as her carriage had traveled past the winding gravel drive and onto the rural country road, she spotted Brandon leaning against a tall oak. He raised a hand and halted the carriage.

He opened the carriage door and climbed inside. His presence filled every inch of the carriage, and tension crackled in the air between them.

“Are you certain about this?” he asked.

“Yes. I want to see the mill.”

He leaned out the window to speak with the driver, then settled onto the padded bench across from her. The carriage lurched forward and set off at a brisk pace. He turned to the woman sitting in the corner. “Lily, isn’t it?”

“Yes, my lord.”

Amelia was surprised he knew the girl’s name. Lily was a kitchen helper, not a servant in the rooms occupied by family, not someone he would see every day. Then she recalled that he’d known all of the tenant’s names, and admiration blossomed in her chest. He wasn’t the usual sort of earl; he took interest in the estate and the people who lived and worked there.