Page 79 of Again, Scoundrel

Alistair said nothing and McGann gave him a hard look. “Crawford, you cannot just up and depart without a word.”

“Hell’s teeth, man. Violet Goodwin is no business of yours. Leave it be.”

“Nay, she’s not. But you are, now that we’ve shaken. And I don’t want to worry that you’ve unfinished business here.”

“There’s no unfinished business. The lady refused me, and I don’t wish to discuss it further.”

“So, you did offer for her then,” McGann went on, ignoring Alistair’s request. “I thought you’d refused to ask her. On principle.”

Alistair stood to leave.

“When I said I did not wish to discuss it further, McGann, I meant it. We’ve no need for the lady’s fortune now.”

“If you say so.”

“I do.”

Violet stood outside Alistair’s study and listened. She’d checked on Davy, who was in the kitchen with Williams happily devouring a plate of biscuits. She’d sent a message to her family via the footman, saying she would be out for the day. And then she’d gone back to find Alistair and McGann, raising her hand to knock and announce her entry to the room.

That’s when she heard them discussing her. She shouldn’t eavesdrop, she knew, but she couldn’t help herself. McGann’s brogue was loud, carrying his words to her ears.

Words about her and Alistair and the trading company. Words she could only understand to mean that Alistair had proposed for her fortune and nothing more. The realization of what those words meant–that he’d had an agreement with McGann to bed her and wed her–curdled like bad milk in her stomach.

None of it had been real?

Violet threw open the door.

“What in hell?” she demanded of the two shocked faces that looked back at her.

“I’ll just take my leave now,” McGann said, maneuvering himself out of the chair he’d been squashed in.

“Coward,” Alistair muttered as his partner walked out the door and left him to face Violet alone.

“I can explain,” he said to her.

“You better. Because I do not believe for a second what I just heard. I know you, Alistair Crawford. And you are not that.”

Alistair stood from his chair and walked to her with a kind of measured cadence in place of his usual prowl.

“Violet,” he said carefully, politely, and she felt her breath exit her body.

She wondered for a moment if she’d been wrong, that he was that kind of man after all. The kind who would lie to her, trap her, use her for his own gain.

But then she shook her head. He wasn’t. He wasn’t like Catherine’s father, the former Earl. He was kind and he was gentle. He was, she knew now, a man who felt very deeply and then tried to numb those feelings with too much alcohol.

“Yes?” she asked.

“I would never, ever bed and wed you.”

He paused for a moment, the wolfish grin appearing from nowhere as if remembering the bedding. Her face flushed at the thought of him picturing that night, and she felt an entirely inappropriate shot of heat between her legs.

“What I mean to say,” he went on, “is that I would bed you and wed you in a moment if you’d have me. But not for your money. I don’t want a penny of your money. I never did. I wouldn’t take it if you offered. I will make my own fortune, and I will do it in my own way.”

Violet stared at him, his eyes warm and honest and so brown they were nearly black. His face open and handsome.

He must have looked like this all the time before the summer he turned fifteen. Before his father and the East India Company. Before he drank too much and gambled too much. Back when he was young and carefree and trusted himself.

In these moments, he truly did remind her of no one so much as James. James, who had been her partner in crime, her best friend, and who had died because she was off at some ball letting her heart run away with her good sense.