Married to a Stranger Read Online Free Page A

of the notion now; it would be dreadful to announce that she did not love her betrothed when Callum’s loss was still so raw.
    He was saying something else. She pulled her attention back with an effort. ‘… a sensible and amiable wife and you require a husband. We could marry quietly by licence.’
    ‘You appear to have thought it all through very thoroughly,’ Sophia said, her mouth dry. ‘How efficient. I must confess I do not feel much inclined to be sensible, let alone amiable, just now. As for what the intelligent thing to do might be, I have no idea.’
    Screaming seemed tempting. You require a husband, indeed! Certainly she did; she lay awake in the panicky small hours thinking just that thing and wondering how they would manage when their creditors woke up to the fact that there was no well-connected male in her future to pay the bills. It would be a long while before the pittance she could earn as a governess or a put-upon companion would pay off the debts. But to marry a man who was proposing out of a chilly sense of duty …
    ‘I cannot marry you simply because you have a kindly im pulse.’
    ‘I do not commit to matters of importance, of honour, on an impulse.’ His mouth curved into something that was almost a smile.
    ‘Certainly not a kindly one,’ she tossed back at him.
    ‘I am not much given to impulse,’ Callum confessed, and she became aware of his eyes on her body, assessing her.
    He was so certain that she would do what he said. Sophia bit the inside of her lip to stop herself flaring up. It was ungrateful, but she was the only one who would decide what she was going to do. ‘My feelings for your brother do not concern you?’
    ‘No.’ He did not appear willing to expand on that. Perhaps, because he felt nothing for her, he did not care if she still loved another man. It argued that he did not see marriage as involving any exchange of deep feeling, of passion beyond the physical.
    She averted her eyes from his broad shoulders and long legs and the distracting prospect of physical passion. He was an attractive man. That was not a good reason for making a marriage, especially as he would hardly be entertaining the same feelings of physical attraction for her. A wife was a warm body in a bed who would perform her marital duties and produce children. Apparently she passed muster, even if she did not drive him wild with desire.
    This was as bad as the prospect of marrying Daniel had become, only colder. Sophia reminded herself that Callum was, by business and training, a trader. He was approaching marriage, she supposed, in the same way as any other contract, rationally and with good sense.
    ‘Financially there are problems, are there not?’ he asked.
    She had to be honest about that, never mind how her pride revolted. ‘Yes. There are debts, more than we can cope with any more. I had intended to apply for a post as a governess or perhaps a companion.’
    ‘I expected that,’ Callum said. ‘I had not realised it was quite that bad, however. Be assured that I will take care of all of it.’
    She would get by far the better part of this bargain, for she would bring Callum nothing but herself and she could not pretend that she was much of a bargain. This was the answer to her prayers. Why, then, was every fibre of her being revolting against it? It was an excellent match and any well-bred and delicately brought-up young woman would expect nothing more than what Callum was offering her. Most would snatch at it, deeply grateful to have a second chance.
    But she was not anyone else, she was herself and she ached for a meeting of minds and for companionship and for love. Her heart told her to refuse, politely and firmly and put an end to this humiliation, but her head held her back from an irrevocable decision.
    ‘I must think about it,’ she found herself saying.
    ‘What is there to think about?’ Callum seemed genuinely baffled by her prevarication. ‘Is it your mother? You must have