Total pages in book: 103
Estimated words: 94964 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 475(@200wpm)___ 380(@250wpm)___ 317(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 94964 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 475(@200wpm)___ 380(@250wpm)___ 317(@300wpm)
* * *
Lord Benjamin smiled. “Indeed. Placing value on a woman for some perceived purity is undeniably ridiculous. It all comes down to property does it not? And inheritance.”
* * *
Janice snorted. “Of course. It all comes down to property. We as ladies are property of our husbands.”
* * *
Uncle Keith reached out and patted her hand. “I feel sure whatever man you choose will not regard you as property.”
* * *
Janice sighed. “We might have to contend with the prospect that no man will want me now. Father, I think we should allow for that and focus on Anne and Emily. They should not have to pay for my actions.”
* * *
“Anne and Emily will be fine. And so will you. Don’t lose hope. If you wish to marry, you will,” Lord Benjamin said.
* * *
“I concur.” Emily swept into the room, threw a smile at Janice before sitting beside her. “In any case, I am in no hurry to get married. This family needs me too much.”
* * *
Janice snorted. “It’s funny. Frederick said something similar just this morning.”
* * *
Lord Benjamin put his fork down and mock glared at them. “I am beginning to think nobody in my household thinks me capable of running this place as they all feel they cannot leave me in charge.”
* * *
There was a chorus of protests around the table as Anne and Aunt Leticia arrived. Janice smiled, feeling her heart lighten. Now that she’d aired her feelings, the weight she wasn’t aware she’d been carrying lessened drastically. She heaved a sigh of relief.
Arthur entered his parlor and collapsed on the sofa, his mind churning. He was torn between euphoria and a dull, swooping emotion he could not quite identify. Having lost his father’s townhouse should have felt triumphant but the triumph was hollow when there was nobody who understood. His father was dead, his mother…indisposed. He was the only one left to bear witness. He had thought that the destruction of his father’s legacy alone would give him satisfaction but all he could feel was misery and grief. For everything he had lost and all the damage that could never be repaired.
* * *
“Well…at least I never have to see that house again.”
* * *
He stood up, crossed to the sideboard, and poured himself a glass of red wine. He drank it at the window, staring out at the compound. It was never very busy but at the moment, nothing and no one was stirring.
* * *
He sighed, taking a step back, and sat down in the leather armchair by the window. He took up the book he’d been reading – The Merchant of Venice. He couldn’t help smiling while also feeling full of despair. Just holding the book brought him back to that nook, with Janice by his side, looking devastatingly lovely in her colorful gown, her blue eyes seeming to sparkle in the candlelight.
* * *
Her red lips, so inviting, a siren calling out to him, drawing him in, irresistible. He was glad he had not seen her since he’d been back. Not face to face. He could not guarantee that he would not again be tempted to ravish her. Just the thought of her, the memory of her kisses, had his breeches tightening.
* * *
More than that, however, he found that he missed talking to her. He had been to Somerton Manor just once but the thought of never going back there was excruciating.
* * *
You will have to face her some time. Anything less than that would make you a sniveling coward.
* * *
Despite cultivating a reputation as a sniveling coward for years, he was loath to actually become one. He was realizing that destroying his father’s reputation by destroying his own was much harder than he'd realized and as much as he hated to think about it, there were casualties in this war with himself.
* * *
He had dismissed the staff in the London townhouse a while ago, meaning to run it down, and so had laid off a significant number of people. Those people had families to feed. He’d told himself it was fine because they turned a blind eye when his father was violent to him or his mother but the truth was, they had no power. There was nothing they could have done to help.
* * *
He did not know where the ethics of the situation stood. To rid himself of the burden of his history, while fulfilling his responsibilities that came with his legacy. It was a quandary.
CHAPTER 25
He snuck into the back of the church on Sunday, knowing that the Ravens would attend. He recalled how integrated they were in the community when they’d attended the play and knew that came from constant participation in public rituals.
* * *
He sat at the back, scanning the church for the Ravens. A few people were sneaking peeks at him, no doubt wondering what he was doing here. He knew he had a reputation as a godless heathen. He encouraged it.