The Reluctant Marquess Read Online Free Page B

pushed his chair back and stood. “You must excuse me; I’m trying to sort out my uncle’s affairs. When you’ve finished breakfast, come to the library.”
    “Very well, my lord.” Charity threw down her napkin and pushed back her chair with a huff. She would take a long turn around the gardens before she went to the library.
    The library was empty when she entered. The will laid out for her perusal on the desk. She read through it carefully, even though the manner in which it was written made it difficult to understand. It appeared to be as Robert had said. Charity was not surprised, even at the amount of money and estates involved, only that her godfather had cared so much about her to secure her future.
    But couldn’t he merely have left her a small stipend? Why tie her and his nephew together? He was an odd man. That much she remembered. She recalled the strange snuff box he carried far more clearly than him. It was beaten silver with a large pig engraved on it and decorated with a ruby. He’d had it specially made, he’d told her. Why a pig, she’d asked him? A corner of his mouth had quirked, and he’d replied that, unlike humans, pigs were admirable beasts. She hadn’t been sure if he was joking.
    Would her husband-to-be prove just as enigmatic? Was it a family trait? She put the document down with an uneasy acceptance of what seemed inevitable.
    Charity dressed in her riding habit, sure that Robert would hate it on sight. The olive green cloth had faded, and her hat was outmoded for it had belonged to her mother.
    When she met him at the stables, however, he gave her a welcoming smile and made no comment. She smiled back, relieved to have escaped criticism.
    Robert provided Charity with a roan mare, and they rode out into a sunny afternoon. She was smitten with the countryside around St Malin. It differed to Oxfordshire in that St Malin held a stiff sea breeze that blew the trees about. Though she thought she’d not like being near the sea, she found she loved its fresh, briny scent and the limitless view it offered, right to the horizon. They trotted through a village of slate-roofed, whitewashed cottages clustered around a small harbour, and into the countryside. Pink and purple heath covered the hills.
    Roses tumbled over dry stone walls as they rode down country lanes past fields crisscrossed with hedgerows.
    Charity guided her horse after Robert’s through a gap in a hedge onto a wide meadow strewn with golden gorse. It was so pretty that it made her gasp and think how nice it would be to spend time here. Willows grew along the river that wound through it, and in the distance, the crenellated tower of the castle peeped over a band of elms. Thomas Gainsborough himself might have painted it.
    A fresh breeze ruffled the leaves of a spreading oak. Robert dismounted and tethered his horse to a branch. “You’ve barely spoken since viewing the will.”
    She waited, hardly breathing as he strolled towards her wondering how his hands would feel at her waist. She could feel her body wanting to lean towards his as he reached up to guide her down.
    Charity felt the warmth of his large hands after he’d set her on her feet. She looked away, suddenly shy. It seemed intimate and scandalous to be here with him. It excited her to be alone with a man for the first time in her whole life. He seemed so big, so powerfully masculine. He stood so near, she could smell his scent, hear his breathing, and was aware that he watched her.
    “If we don’t marry, what will happen to you?” she asked.
    He shrugged. “Life would go on much as it has done, I expect.”
    But would hers? She knew she had no future, not without some kind of generosity on Robert’s part. Could she convince him to do that for her, without meeting the obligation of marriage?
    She’d planned to marry for love as she had seen with her parents. This plan of his offered none of the emotional depth she’d expected to have but what if it offered the