“Success,” he announced.
As if she had expected anything less.
As if he would have accepted anything less.
“Well-done,” she said, for lack of anything better.
He rested the wood on his wide shoulder. “You didn’t take the opportunity to escape.”
She froze. “No. I didn’t.” Though she couldn’t for the life of her say why.
He moved to set the table leg in the wide sink and carefully lifted his frock coat, shook out any possible wrinkles, and pulled it on.
She watched as he rolled his shoulders into the exceptionally well made clothing, underscoring the perfect fit—a fit she no longer took for granted now that she had seen hints of the Vitruvian Man beneath.
No.
She shook her head. She would not think of him as a Leonardo. He was already far too intimidating a character.
She shook her head. “I’m not marrying you.”
He straightened his cuffs, buttoned his coat carefully, and brushed a dusting of moisture from the sleeves of the coat. “It is not up for discussion.”
She tried for reason. “You would make a terrible husband.”
“I never said I would make a good one.”
“So you would condemn me to a life of unhappy marriage?”
“If needs be. Though your unhappiness is not a direct goal, if that’s any consolation.”
She blinked. He was serious. This conversation was honestly occurring. “And this is supposed to endear me to your suit?”
He lifted one shoulder in a careless shrug. “I do not fool myself into thinking that the goal of marriage is happiness for one or both of the parties involved. My plan is to restore Falconwell’s lands to its manor and, unfortunately for you, it requires our marriage. I shan’t be a good husband, but I also haven’t the slightest interest in keeping you under my thumb.”
Her jaw dropped at his honesty. He did not even feign kindness. Interest. Concern. She closed her mouth. “I see.”
He went on. “You can do or have whatever you wish, whenever you wish it. I’ve enough money for you to fritter it away doing whatever it is women of your ilk like to do.”
“Women of my ilk?”
“Spinsters with dreams of more.”
The air left the room on a whoosh. What a horrible, unpleasant, entirely apt description. A spinster with dreams of more. It was as though he had stood in her receiving room earlier that evening and watched as Tommy’s proposal had filled her with disappointment. With hopes of something more.
Something different.
Well, this certainly was different.
He reached for her, stroking one finger down her cheek, and she flinched from the touch. “Don’t.”
“You’re going to marry me, Penelope.”
She snapped her head back, out of his reach, not wanting him to touch her. “Why should I?”
“Because, darling,” he leaned in, his voice a dark promise as he trailed that strong, warm finger down her neck and across the skin above her dress, setting her heart racing and turning her breath shallow, “no one will ever believe that I didn’t utterly compromise you.”
He grasped the edge of her gown and with a mighty tug, rent her gown and chemise in two, baring her to the waist.
She gasped, dropping the bottle to clutch her gown to her chest, whiskey sloshing down the front of her as it fell. “You . . . you . . .”
“Take your time, darling,” he drawled, stepping back to admire his handiwork. “I shall wait for you to find the word.”
Her gaze narrowed. She didn’t need a word. She needed a horsewhip.
She did the only thing she could think to do. Her hand flew of its own volition, connecting with a mighty crack!—a sound that would have been immensely satisfying if she hadn’t been so utterly mortified.
His head snapped around at the blow, his hand coming instantly to his cheek, where a red splotch was already beginning to show. Penelope stepped backward again, toward the door, her voice shaking. “I will never . . . never . . . marry someone like you. Have you forgotten everything you were? Everything you could have been? One would think you had been raised by wolves.”
She turned then, and did what she should have done the moment she’d seen him come around the house.
She ran.
Yanking open the door, she plunged into the snow beyond, heading blindly toward Needham Manor, getting only a few yards before he caught her from behind with one, steel-banded arm, and lifted her clean off the ground. It was only then that she screamed. “Let me go! You beast! Help!”
She kicked out, her heel coming in direct contact with his shin, and he swore wickedly at her ear. “Stop fighting, you harpy.”
Not on her life. She redoubled her efforts. “Help! Somebody!”
“There’s no one alive for nearly a mile. And no one awake for farther than that.” The words spurred her on, and he grunted when her elbow caught him in the side just as they returned to the kitchens.
“Put me down!” she screamed, as loudly as she could, directly into his ear.
He turned his head away and kept walking, lifting the lantern and the leg he’d hacked from the table as he passed through the kitchen. “No.”
She struggled more, but his grip was firm. “How do you intend to do it?” she asked. “Ravish me here, in your empty house, and return me to my father’s home slightly worse for wear?” They were headed down a long hallway, lined on one side with a series of wooden slats that marked the landing of a servants’ stairwell. She reached out and clasped one of the slats, hanging on for all she was worth.
He stopped walking, waiting for her to release her grip. When he spoke, there was immense patience in his tone. “I don’t ravish women. At least, not without them asking very nicely.”
The statement gave her pause.
Of course he wouldn’t ravish her.
He’d likely not had a single moment of considering her as anything more than plain, proper Penelope, the only thing standing between him and the return of his familial right.
She wasn’t sure if that made the situation better or worse.
But it did make her heart ache. He didn’t care for her. Didn’t want her. Didn’t even think highly enough of her to pretend those things. To feign interest. To attempt to seduce her.
He was using her for Falconwell.
Wasn’t Tommy?
Of course he was. Tommy had looked deep into her gaze and saw not the blue of her eyes but the blue of the Surrey sky above Falconwell. Certainly, he’d seen his friend, but that wasn’t why he’d offered for her hand.
At least Michael was honest about it.
“This is the best offer you’ll get, Penelope,” he said softly, and she heard the edge in his tone, the urgency.
The truth.
Her grip loosened. “Your reputation is deserved, you know.”
“Yes. It is. And this is not at all the worst thing I’ve done. You should know that.”
The words should have been prideful. If not that, unemotional. But they weren’t. They were honest. And there was something in them, there and then gone, something that she wasn’t entirely certain she’d heard. Something she would not allow herself to recognize.
But she released the rail of the banister, and he set her down several steps above him.