Roman was suddenly behind her, placing his hands lightly on her waist. “A shame, isn’t it, to see a grand house fallen so far?”

  “Indeed, it is,” she whispered. “How could they let such a place fall so low and think anyone could want it?”

  “Lord Barnes probably described the place as rustic and serene,” he said, pointing to a large crack above the main doorway that showed enough light and space through to admit snow, rain, and rats. He moved away to peer into another room nearby that she knew had empty bookcases linking the walls of what should have been a large and well-lit gentleman’s study or cigar room.

  She frowned and followed him there. “Do you smoke, sir?”

  “Never cared for it,” he replied, and then glanced her way. “Why? Do you?”

  “That’s not done by women like me.”

  He shrugged. “You could if you wanted to. You are mistress of your own destiny now. There’s no one to stop you doing whatever you wanted anymore.”

  “I thought I was a wife,” she quipped. “Wouldn’t my husband object?”

  “He might, but not enough to consider setting her aside over such a habit.”

  Amity considered Roman a long moment. They held quite a few opinions in common. They might have made a good match if he considered it. And what more perfect revenge would it have been to take her hand in marriage, too. She shook her head. He wouldn’t offer for her after all this time. He just wanted to be in her bed and have fun. And it was fun, and she would miss him a great deal when he was gone.

  “I’m having trouble coming up with a reason to fight with you. Have you thought of a provocation that would be easily believed besides the obvious?”

  He frowned. “What was the obvious?”

  “A flirtation with someone else.”

  He shook his head. “Let’s not discuss parting today. Let’s continue to pretend we’re happily married instead.”

  “You know that’s not possible forever.”

  “Why not?”

  “You know why.” She moved into the next room when the steward joined them, eager to engage Roman in conversation about the property.

  Amity shook her head. She wasn’t really Roman’s wife. That made her unexpectedly angry now, and she stomped outside and back to the horses, where the air was clean and decidedly fresher than inside.

  She couldn’t fight with Roman over another woman—real or imagined. He’d been quite clear that he considered marriage in a very poor light. It was to be expected in a disappointed man, she supposed, but it was their only difference of opinion so far.

  Marriage could be wonderful. She’d seen it. Perhaps not the way her brother had gone about it though. That union was definitely a battle neither side would ever win. But a marriage made for the right reason, for companionship and love, was certainly worth hoping for. She wouldn’t mind being Mrs. Crawford, but he’d not even hinted that he might be considering her for the position.

  “Amity?”

  She took pains to wear a happy expression when she turned around. Roman was watching her a certain way, and her body pulsed with awareness of what that look meant. How long could she keep hiding that she wanted more from him than he might want to give? It was just a matter of time before he tired of her. But while he was here, she intended to claim his every waking moment, and his sleeping ones, too. “When did you say you were leaving?”

  He drew closer. “What if I didn’t go? I could buy this property.”

  “That wouldn’t be very smart. When my cousin comes and sees you here, he would know it was you who ruined me.” She looked up at the dwelling. “And it’s so awfully neglected.”

  “It would not be if I owned it. I care for the things I love. With time, it could be a comfortable family home.” He took up her hand and kissed the back. “The steward has departed but the place is not locked. Come and look around again with me.”

  He led her through the house one more time without saying much more about the interior, and then around the perimeter again. When he was done with his inspection, Roman helped her up onto his horse. “You know I don’t ever recall seeing you on horseback in London,” he murmured.

  Amity controlled her horse to keep him from racing off to stay near Crawford as she answered. “Carriages only in London, so my aunts could chaperone me in luxury. Exertion was discouraged in my adult life.”

  “You ride very well,” he told her as he mounted his tired old, hired horse.

  Amity urged Argus to keep to the older beasts speed. “Fairbridge always insisted that I ride with him when I was at Ravenswood.”

  He glanced her way, a frown on his face. “Did you never think he might care for you?”

  “Never.” Amity laughed softly. “When I was younger, I both resented him for his insistence on dragging me along to ride and marveled at his intimidation of others who tried to stop him doing so. He would simply cite a long-held tradition of Sweets prowess during the hunt as his proof that I should excel at the sport, too, and drag me along.”

  “Using the family history against the family present. Clever.”

  “Manipulative,” she corrected him. “Never forget that my cousin is the master of schemes within schemes. Look at how he got me here. He never told me what he intended when he took me to Lady Barnes that night after our tryst. By the afternoon the next day, I was bundled into a carriage with a handful of my own clothes taken from my chambers by a maid he must have been paid off to keep silent about it. I was sent off to the country with no idea of my heading. I didn’t even know Fairbridge owned property here until I got here. The coachman was sworn to secrecy by him, too.”

  “I can’t say I paid enough attention to his schemes before.”

  “You should. Hopefully it will not be too late to save yourself the eventual cost, should you ever be so unfortunate as to irk him.”

  “I will,” he promised, tossing her a smile that warmed her insides.

  If they hurried, they could make love again before the dinner hour arrived.

  Amity kicked her horse forward and set off at a canter on a now familiar roadway, knowing he’d follow. Crawford let her lead, and she reveled in this unexpected freedom to still make decisions around a man.

  When she reached her cottage first, she jumped from the saddle and turned to watch Crawford’s slower arrival on his hired horse a few minutes later. He came at a slow trot, a smile on his lips for her, but it was very clear to her that he was used to a more energetic animal beneath him. She openly admired his relaxed posture in the saddle, though, and that attitude seemed apparent on every other occasion, too.

  Roman was a good man, and a man she should have sought out long ago…and perhaps not just to be ruined by.

  If she’d met Roman before Melody had, her life might have taken a decidedly more pleasant turn. At the very least, she might even have had a friend who valued her differing opinion. He might have learned to love her despite her family. He would have been someone ready to take her to bed at the drop of a hat or shawl, too. He would have made an excellent husband for herself if he’d not been so heartbroken over another.

  Frustrated at the thought of never having what she really wanted from him, she swung about for the front door of her cottage—only to find a dust-covered young man getting up from sitting on the steps.

  She took a pace back, surprised at seeing a stranger she hadn’t noticed lurking in front of her home.

  Roman arrived and swung down from his horse and was at her side in an instant. “Who the hell are you to come sneaking around a lady’s home?”

  “Forgive the intrusion. Miss Sweet, I’ve an urgent message for you.”

  Roman drew back to let the messenger hand over a piece of parchment, but she noticed he did not relax at all. He hovered, eyeing the young man with suspicion.

  Now that Amity’s startlement had passed, she smiled at the young man. “Thank you.”

  He nodded. “I’ll be on my way back to the inn, Miss Sweet, and will call again in the morning for your reply.”

  “Thank you.”

  When he was gone, Amity inspected the letter she held carefully.

  “He called you by your real name,” Roman murmured, turning to stare at her.

  “Yes, I noticed that, too.” The letter was sealed with black wax, but she recognized the insignia pressed into it. “This is Ravenswood’s seal.”

  A sense of foreboding filled her, and she hurried to open it and read.

  When she had, she wished she had not.

  The duke was dead…and she was ordered to return to the ducal country estate by the new duke, the former Earl of Fairbridge, as his house guest, immediately. There was more but she couldn’t read it because knew she could not refuse to rejoin the family to mourn with them.

  She lowered her trembling hand and stared at Roman in shock. To go back meant seeing her brother again. To face the consequences of her ruin and scandal. To be talked about in the most unflattering terms and have no escape from it.

  To likely never see Roman again.

  He took hold of her shaking fingers. “What does it say?”

  “Ravenswood is dead. I have to go back.” Amity hiked up her skirts and hurried inside, beset with panic at the thought of what lay in store for her. She didn’t want to go back to her family. To her brother, to her aunts’ fussing. To a match with someone she could never want as much as one with Crawford now. Not now when she’d finally found contentment, if not happiness, here.

  Roman followed and stopped behind her. He slid his arm lightly about her waist, his lips close enough to nuzzle her ear if he wanted to. “You don’t have to do what he says. You are of age.”

  “How can I not go to mourn with him and my family? I’m only here because my cousin took pity on me. He could easily take away this new home of mine, my entire security, if he wanted to. He could insist I marry one of his cronies as compensation for all he’s done so far.”

  Roman’s grip tightly about her. “Did Fairbridge, Ravenswood now, threaten that in the letter?”

  “I never read the whole of it. But just thinking of going back has made me feel as powerless as I was before you kissed me.”

  Roman pressed a long kiss to her cheek. “According to Stratford, you are the only relative he gives a damn about. I cannot believe he would make you marry someone you didn’t like after all he’s done for you.” He lifted her hand, and the letter she still held. “Might I read his words for myself so I can perhaps set your mind at ease?”

  “Go ahead.”

  Amity collapsed into a chair by the fire, chilled utterly through to the bone now. It had been a glorious day, the best in her memory, until her family threatened to drag her back into the fold and crushed her spirits anew.

  Then Roman suddenly cursed. And cursed again. “Damn him.”

  Chapter 13

  Roman stared sightlessly at the room. He’d thought he’d been so circumspect. How wrong he was. It was lowering to discover you’d been led on a merry dance with only one possible outcome. Especially if he wanted to live to reach an old age without holes in him.

  He scowled at the neat script summoning Amity back to the family’s country estate, still in shock that he’d judged the situation entirely wrong.

  Amity’s disappearance from London had been for one purpose alone—to flush her seducer out into open waters so he could be reeled in.

  And like a fool, he’d never once considered he was already on the hook.

  The Earl of Fairbridge, now Duke of Ravenswood, had manipulated them both.

  Roman wiped a hand across his mouth, sick to his stomach over his lack of understanding. If he’d been able to forget Amity and not pursued the knowledge of her location, she might never be forced to marry him. But it was all there in the letter.

  Amity, and Roman, were expected to attend the new duke’s as soon as they were legally wed.

  Gretna Green had been suggested—where many clandestine and expedient marriages were made. Without any annoying members of her family trying to stop proceedings. That was in the letter too. Amity’s older cousin had thought of everything.

  Roman raked a hand through his hair, appalled with their situation. This was not how he’d hoped to propose to Amity at all.

  He glanced at her. She had her face covered and seemed in something of a panic. Amity hadn’t read the whole letter yet. She’d stopped at the point where her return to the family fold had been demanded. He could pretend Fairbridge wasn’t forcing his hand, but that would be a dishonest way to begin their married life.

  He had no choice but to propose now, even if he had intended to anyway.

  He walked up to her side and placed the letter in her lap. “You need to read it all.”

  “Why? It’s only going to get worse, isn’t it?”

  “Hopefully you will not think so,” he murmured, but he did not hold much hope.

  He sank down in the opposite seat to watch Amity read all the words. Her eyes grew wide, her gaze shot to his several times, and then back to the letter as she continued to read. She must have read it three times before setting it down again. “Gretna? Surely he couldn’t know about us.”

  “He does.”

  “But that means…”

  “Indeed.”

  “I’m so sorry,” they both said at the same time.

  Roman shook his head. “This wasn’t the way I wanted it to be for us.”

  “Nor I. You should go.”

  “Go?”

  She looked on the verge of tears. “I never wanted you to feel honor-bound to offer for me.”

  He squinted at her. “What about love-bound?”

  She sat up straighter in her chair. “What?”

  “Surely you must have suspected I had a hidden purpose in coming to find you. I have worried for your disappearance, and, upon finally finding you, discovered a distinct reluctance to leave you again,” he admitted, sliding to his knees to cross the short distance between them. He took up her hand and kissed her ice-cold fingers. “I know we hardly know each other enough yet to discuss the future, but I feel utterly bound to ensure your continued happiness. If a marriage to me will make you happy, then I agree we should wed—and it’s not because your cousin suspects me, either. I have been considering ways to broach the subject since I first saw you again.”

  Amity stared.

  He winced. “If your answer is to be no, I understand completely. I’ll explain that you never wanted me when I go to visit the new duke to offer my condolences. You need not worry about my feelings in this. I suspect they are quite one-sided.”

  His heart thudded as Amity moved, reaching out to cup his cheek. “My husband is a scoundrel…and something of an idiot, too. Of course I want to be married to him. I love him. I’ve been waiting, dreading the day he would announce he was leaving me.”

  Roman’s breath caught, and then relief flooded him as he took in her trembling smile. He pressed his head to hers, astonished by her words. “I’ll never leave you. I love you so much more than you would ever believe possible.”

  “And I love you,” she whispered, kissing him thoroughly. But then she pulled back to meet his gaze. “What about that estate? All those plans you were making for a future family life there.”

  “They were lures for you to voice an opinion on the house, and on us making our pretend marriage something real. I think I might have been too subtle.” He dug his fingers in her hair, turning her face up for more kisses. “The house could be for us if you wanted to make our home here. I could be very happy living here as anywhere, really. As long as I can see your smiling face every day, I’ve no strong opinion on the subject.”

  Her fingers slipped into his hair, too. “I enjoyed talking about the house and discussing its repair, but I don’t want us to live here.”

  “So, we’re getting married?”

  “Yes…yes! We are going to marry, and in Gretna Green, too,” she promised, raining kisses all over his face. “And you don’t need to purchase an estate for us to live in. I have a dowry, and that includes property.”

  He’d never asked anyone about the particulars of her dowry, but he’d always known one existed. “What kind of property? A little cottage somewhere?”

  “No. Not so paltry as that. The London townhouse is mine by right of inheritance. My grandmother left it to me. George tried to contest the will because he’s coveted the townhouse for years.”

  “Which townhouse?”

  “The one I was living in when you ruined me,” she told him, grinning from ear to ear. “Once it was clear he’d not get it, he obtained the late duke’s approval and simply took over its management, despite my protests that I was more than capable. I will expect my husband to give him—everyone—their marching orders very promptly. For too long the family have had the upper hand, George pretending he owned something that was always mine. It will be my greatest delight to see my much-loved husband escort him and his wife to the door and close it in their faces.”

  Roman sat back laughing and slapped his knee. “He’ll think I married you to extract one last revenge on him.”

  Amity shrugged. “My revenge this time, and George deserves everything coming his way for how he’s treated me.”

  “I couldn’t agree more.” Roman bowed to her. “Then I will do as my wife commands and remove the intruders as soon as I have a chance.”

  “The sweetest revenge imaginable must wait, unfortunately, until after the wedding. When my cousin acknowledges our marriage as legitimate, George will indeed be powerless, if he isn’t already without the late duke’s support. But I warn you, we will never escape them. How do you feel about Melody?”

  “Who?” Roman shook his head. What a fool he’d been to pine over a woman so ill-suited to him. But then again, if he hadn’t, he might never have met and had a chance to fall for Amity. And he had fallen so completely and utterly that he could barely remember what he’d once felt for her sister-in-law. He drew in a deep breath and smiled “With the old duke gone, George will be at his most dangerous.”

  Amity nodded. “But as you say, the new duke prefers me to all others in the family. He has already given us his blessing to marry by suggesting we detour to Gretna Green.”