Page 63 of Love and Other Disasters

Sophie blinked and shook her head. “I’m sorry. Could you repeat that?”

“Your hesitation is to your credit. I’m sure you are aware I have never been a man given to wild declarations of passion. But the two of us rub together well enough, and my children are excessively fond of you. I can offer you a life of mutual respect and dignity here with me.”

Sophie could not have kept the shock off her face. “You want to marry me?”

“Yes, I do. I expect a wedding could occur next season. You can make a note of that in the children’s schedule. There’ll be no need to fear you’ll be forced into society after we wed, either. Mrs. Crawford will act as the duke’s hostess in Town until he is married, as already planned. You can stay here year-round and manage the household until my elder brother finally brings home a bride.”

Sophie sat in stunned silence. She’d never heard so unromantic a proposal as the one Lord Nash was offering to her. And he seemed entirely serious about marrying her, too, despite her unsuitability to join his family. He was the duke’s heir. If anything happened to Ravenswood, Lord Nash became the duke. And she might become a duchess!

A response was required, but any appropriate words of thanks and refusal became stuck in her throat. Of course, she had to refuse him. She could not marry the brother of the man she’d… The brother of the rake she’d so foolishly fallen for.

She loved Jasper, not Lord Nash.

She licked her lips, shocked and uncomfortable. “My lord, you do me a great honor, but you must know what my answer will be and why I am completely unsuitable.”

He came to sit at her side. “We have never discussed the night we met, have we?”

“No.”

“I understand your hesitation to think of marriage again. You were left in a bad way. But in the years of our acquaintance, I’ve come to admire your inner strength and resilience despite the ill-use you suffered. I hoped you had have forgotten him by now.”

Sophie blushed. She had not thought of her heartless rake very much at all lately. Jasper had somehow driven him from her heart and mind over the summer. “I was young and a fool to trust it was love then.”

“You need never be a fool again with me,” Lord Nash promised. “It will be a marriage in name only between us. You will have the children to love and a home and the protection of my family. I won’t bother you in the slightest. In fact, you might keep to your current chamber close to the nursery if you care to.”

“I was not worried about being bothered by a husband,” Sophie whispered, paling a little at the sort of life and marriage he was proposing they could share. Married in name only. Never to experience passion again. Never leaving the estate. Trapped. “My answer must be no.”

He drew back, seemingly surprised by her reticence to wed and denial of his suit. “Consider the benefits. Take your time before you give me your final word tonight.” Lord Nash smiled at her. “Now, I’m needed by the duke for all of this afternoon until dinner, but we will speak again of this later, and I will do my best to ease your fears about matrimony. You’ll soon see marriage to me is for the best.” Lord Nash’s dry hand suddenly covered hers, and he squeezed her fingers. “Until dinner.”

He was back on his feet and gone the next moment.

Sophie stared at the door as it closed. Lord Nash never did listen to her. Or perhaps he expected to wear down her resistance until she complied.

Why would he want her? It made no sense at all.

She thought of how different to Jasper he was, and blanched.

She wanted to be married to Jasper—not his cold brother.

Sophie sat there a few minutes more, uncertain what to do or what she should have said to be more clear. Lord Nash was so cold, so utterly foreign to her idea of a man she had ever imagined being bound to. So completely different from Jasper, the only man she’d rush to say yes to.

She had always wanted and expected to have children of her own if she ever wed, even after the terrible loss she’d suffered at the hands of a scoundrel. A loss Nash knew about, but Jasper still did not. How could Nash believe she might never want to hold a child of her own if she had a chance to?

He had seen her anguish. Her grief.

Apparently, he’d never even tried to understand her loss.

But Jasper had, although he didn’t know what she’d done.

When she refused Nash again tonight, she doubted she could remain at Ravenswood for very much longer. She would have to return to London and Madam Clover. Leave Jasper behind and hope he would succeed in his schemes without her small assistance.

She stood and walked to the door on legs made of clay and opened it again.

The first thing she saw was Jasper, standing in the library across the hall and talking with the duke. Their eyes locked momentarily over the top of Ravenswood’s dark head, but she turned away, embarrassed. She hoped he never found out what her conversation with Nash entailed, but not out of a hope he might become jealous.

That Lord Nash intended to divorce his wife to offer her a marriage of convenience was an embarrassment to her. He would drag her into his mess, the scandal of his first marriage ending, and not care how she or the children might be hurt by it.

Lord Nash didn’t care about her feelings or about Laura. He hadn’t bothered to learn of her hopes and dreams, during the whole of their acquaintance. He only seemed to do what he wanted. No wonder Laura had left him.