My Seductive Innocent

by Julie Johnstone

  “Harry.”

  “Harry, will you please give your sister and me a moment of privacy?”

  The boy’s eyes rounded, and he gaped.

  Nathan glanced to Sophia for guidance. She looked at her brother and tears suddenly glistened in her eyes. “He’s not used to a man asking him to do anything. He’s used to being ordered, shoved, pushed, and threatened.”

  Barely checked rage rose in Nathan’s throat and made talking difficult for a moment. He swallowed and met Sophia’s gaze first and then Harry’s. “That’s unfortunate. I promise I will never threaten you, shove you, or push you.”

  Harry smiled. “You left out c-c-command.”

  Nathan reached around Sophia and ruffled the boy’s hair. “So I did,” he said carefully, intentionally not promising not to command. Harry was a child, after all. “Will you go sit under that tree for a few minutes?” Nathan asked, indicating the large poplar tree not ten feet away.

  Harry nodded and scrambled down and out of the carriage.

  Once the boy was five paces away, Nathan spoke. “As I understand things your father―”

  “Frank,” she corrected with a mutinous look.

  He understood all too well her desire not to call the man father. “Vane,” he conceded. “I’m guessing upon learning who I was he decided he wanted you to be a duchess.”

  She laughed, not merry but brittle. “It had nothing to do with wanting anything for me. He wanted to get his grubby hands on some of your money, and I suppose he thought your marrying me would entitle him to some of it.”

  “Vane is not very bright,” Nathan replied.

  Sophia grinned, and two delightful dimples appeared in her cheeks that he’d previously failed to notice. Was she always going to be such a constant surprise? The notion caused him to tense. His mother had been a constant surprise for years—one minute happy, the next as volatile as a storm, and always dangling the possibility of attaining her love if he could prove he was worthy. He dismissed the useless memory.

  “I tried to tell him that you would never marry me and that you weren’t the sort to be coerced, but he always has his own ideas.” She’d cast her gaze downward again, and she was fiddling with her dress.

  Nathan hooked a finger under her chin and nudged her until she looked up. “I believe you have a mistaken notion as to why I would never marry you.”

  She blinked. “I don’t believe so. You don’t want a wife, for one.”

  “I have accepted for some time that I would eventually need to take a wife.”

  “Oh.” Her lips parted for a moment. “But I doubt you had any intentions of picking a guttersnipe.”

  “You are not a guttersnipe,” he growled, enraged that her father had made her feel so.

  “Close enough. I’m no lady.”

  He cupped her chin, and her beautiful eyes widened. “I’ve known a lot of so-called ladies in my lifetime, and if you are not one, then I much prefer what you seem to be.”

  Her mouth had parted again, but after a moment, she spoke. “You’re an interesting contradiction.”

  So was she. She appeared very fragile with her slight build, but she was strong. “In what way?” he asked.

  She licked her lips before speaking. “One minute you’re hot and the next you’re cold. One minute you seem to like me and the next you don’t.”

  Her comments froze his blood. She’d described exactly what he had experienced with his mother before she’d become a permanently cold draft. Was he like his mother?

  No. He refused to accept that. The notion was preposterous. But if he was like her... His heart seized beating for a moment. “It seems my mother is having the last laugh on me.”

  Sophia cocked her head. “What do you mean?”

  He considered telling her things he’d never spoken to anyone, but he dismissed the notion as quickly as it had come into his mind. Sophia was going to be his duchess but that didn’t mean he would bare his soul to her. “She wasn’t the warmest person, and at times could be unpredictable in how she would react.” The answer was vague enough to suit him.

  Sophia squeezed his arm. “I understand. I’m quick to anger, and I vow I get that from Frank. We all inherit things from our parents, but I firmly believe that, with enough desire and effort, we can control how we react.”

  Sophia’s understanding and acceptance of his flaw touched him deeply. Deeper than he cared for it to touch him. He moved back on the seat so they would no longer be touching and studied her for a few seconds. He liked her—an undeniable truth. In addition, he admired her courage. But he needed to remember that she’d likely destroy the good feelings and obliterate the admiration, just as his mother had done in his father. In fact, he’d do well to expect it. “Tell me what were you planning to do with your life before I came along?”

  She looked at him askance. “I am still planning to flee my father and take Harry with me.”

  He’d suspected as much, but he simply nodded for her to continue.

  “I’ve been saving up money to go to London with my brother.”

  He had a picture of her walking the streets of London toting her brother behind her in search of somewhere to sleep for the night, and his gut hardened with fear. “What had you planned on doing once you were in London?”

  She shoved back a strand of hair that the increasing wind was blowing across her face and then she hugged herself, and it occurred to him she was probably cold, dressed as she was in such an ill-suited garment for the weather. Wincing against the pain of his injury, he shrugged out of his coat as she spoke and placed it over her shoulders, giving her a shake of his head when it appeared she would protest.

  “I plan to find whatever work I can immediately. But eventually, I’ll become a governess, chaperone, or lady’s companion.”

  Her undeniable hope for the future touched him and made him ache for her.

  “I’m also going to send Harry to school,” she added.

  “And you have enough money saved up?”

  Her face fell. “I almost did... But Frank stole it, the scab.”

  “So how do you expect to get to London?” he asked, curious to what it was she had planned.

  She eyed him, and as she did, her cheeks turned pink. “I was hoping you might lend me the money. Harry and I cannot go back to Frank. He’ll just sell him to Mr. Exington again once you’re gone. I hate to tell you that since you just purchased my brother’s freedom, which I greatly appreciate, but what you bought was a temporary reprieve.”

  Nathan had already come to that conclusion himself. “Yes, I suspected, but there was no course but the one I took. I could have taken your brother from Mr. Exington but the man did pay for him.”

  “Yes, he did,” Sophia replied in a cold voice that reminded him of his own when he was angry. He laughed, despite the somber conversation and the pain radiating in his shoulder and arm.

  “If you were a man, Sophia, you would be one not to be taken for granted.”

  “And as a woman?” she demanded, her eyes narrowing and growing dark and stormy.

  “Ah, I never take a woman for granted. Doing so can be lethal. I appreciate to the very chambers of my beating black heart how much havoc a woman can create.”

  She grinned. “I don’t think that was a compliment, per se, but I’ll take it as such.”

  “I’m glad,” he replied, smiling in return.

  “So will you lend me money? I promise to pay you back as soon as possible.”

  “I’ll do better than lend you money to help you escape. I’ll take you away myself.”

  With a frown, she pulled his overcoat up around her chin and gave him a wary look, one that bespoke of years of mistreatment by every man she had ever known. Her pain felt as if it were his own. His blood ran cold, and he had to fight the urge not to run from her. He would not care for her; it was as simple as that.

  Sophia nibbled on her lip for a moment before responding. “I don’t understand,” she said. “Do you mean you wil
l give Harry and me a ride to London?” She looked around them. “Well, the curricle is small, but we don’t mind sitting close if you don’t.”

  “I mean I’ll marry you, and yes, take you to London, but we will probably go to my country home first.”

  Her mouth parted, and a look that could only be described as disbelief passed over her features. “You want to marry me?”

  “I don’t see a choice,” he said honestly. “You’re ruined. Quite irreparably, it seems. And you cannot stay with your fath― Vane,” he corrected awkwardly.

  Her cheeks turned a deep shade of red, and she cleared her throat. “You and I both know you cannot be forced to marry me. No one will care that you don’t.”

  Her halting words displayed her hurt. He didn’t regret telling her the truth and forgoing flowery lies. He was not one to pretend, whether it would save someone’s feelings or not. “I’d care. I’d care what happens to you because you saved my life.”

  “That’s no reason to marry.”

  “It’s reason enough,” he clipped, amazed she was arguing with him.

  She scowled. “If you will simply lend me money, I’ll get my brother and myself to London and the rest will work out.”

  He clenched and unclenched his jaw before speaking. “I hate to be blunt, but for the sake of preventing either one—or all three of us—from catching our death sitting in the dropping winter temperatures, you force me to be direct. I could lend you all the money in the world but your soiled reputation will remain ruined without my marrying you.”

  She jutted out her chin. “My reputation here always did hang in a precarious position, thanks to Frank. Besides, no one in London will know about what happened in Newmarket.”

  “You fool yourself, Sophia. Look at what happened with Mrs. Dalton and Mr. Exington. Do you really think they are the only two people who will be treating you as a lightskirt? It’s only a matter of time until some gossipmonger from your town travels to London and takes zealous pleasure in spreading the rumors.”

  “No one cares about me enough to do that. And no one knows me in London.”

  “But they know me,” he said on a heavy sigh. “And I tell you this without the least bit of pride or pleasure that they care in London far too much about what I do. My goings and comings are, unfortunately, like a tantalizing drug to the wickedly bored ton. Once they hear a whisper of a scandal with my name attached to it, they’ll gobble it up, and you with it unless we are married.”

  “I don’t care. They can talk all they want. I’ll go about my business of getting educated and finding work.”

  “No one will be willing to educate you once they hear the rumors of your dallying with me.” He didn’t want to hurt her, but she had to understand the reality. “You would never secure a position as any of the things you mentioned because the biggest requirement for those occupations is a sterling reputation, which I’m afraid you no longer come close to having. At best, you could possibly work as a barmaid or seamstress, but you and your brother could not live on either of those jobs’ wages, and you’d never be able to scrape enough money together to send your brother away to school. I could pay for you to live somewhere nicer than you could afford on your own, but that would likely have the effect of people speculating that I’m keeping you.”

  Her brows dipped together in a deep frown. “Keeping me?”

  “Yes, for wicked pleasure.” They’d never assume he kept her simply as his mistress. As cruel as it made him feel to admit, they wouldn’t believe she could hold his interest at all, given how she presently looked.

  Her fair skin, already pink from the cold, turned crimson across the high slope of her cheekbones, which was accentuated by her lack of proper flesh. The first thing he would do for her was have his cook feed her lavish meals so she would make a healthy weight.

  “There must be another solution besides marriage,” she said, shoulders slumping.

  As he stared at Sophia, looking so dejected at the idea of marrying him, laughter built in his chest. All the women who had tried to finagle an offer of marriage from him and when he finally proposed to a woman, she didn’t seem inclined to accept. “Is it the idea of marriage to me that repels you or is it simply the institute of marriage?” He wasn’t sure what provoked him to ask such a question, except maybe his pride.

  “It’s not you at all,” she said quickly and gave him a shy glance that made his chest tighten. “It’s clear to me you have a good heart.”

  “Is it?” His heart squeezed.

  She nodded. “If you didn’t, you would not have intervened on my behalf...twice.”

  “Any man would have done what I did,” he replied automatically.

  “No man I’ve ever known, except maybe the reverend,” she muttered.

  “Fine, any gentleman,” he corrected.

  “I do not think it’s as simple as that,” she said slowly. “I think you did what you did because you are kind and caring, but you don’t seem to see yourself as either of those things.”

  The way Sophia seemed to see him with such naive admiration was both disconcerting and enticing. And the notion that her admiration was enticing to him at all, irritated him to no end. “It’s getting cold out here,” he clipped, retreating behind a wall of indifference “What is it going to be? I’ve made my offer. Either accept it or don’t. The choice is yours. Make it with haste, if you please.”

  She didn’t know what to do. She was truly torn. Nathan could protect her and Harry. He could provide a life and education for Harry that she never could, even if by some miracle she secured one of the positions she desired. But her gut told her what he said was true. Her soiled reputation would prevent her from ever achieving her dreams. At best, she could hope to slave away in a tavern or as a seamstress for the rest of her life, or she could attract some man’s attention and become his mistress. The thought repulsed her.

  She only knew one decent man—and she’d been hurt more times than she could count by Frank, who was supposed to be her greatest protector—but she had that little nugget of hope her mother’s letter had instilled in her. If she married Nathan would her hope be well-placed or dashed? She glanced sideways at Nathan from underneath her lashes, and her heart tugged.

  He was astonishingly handsome with his strong jaw line, patrician nose, full lips, and persuasive eyes. If she was honest, it didn’t hurt that he was rich, and therefore, she’d likely never know cold and hunger again. Not that she couldn’t handle both those things. She could. But if she had her druthers...

  She barely suppressed a nervous giggle. Beyond the superficial, he was honest to a fault, considering his blunt proposal. He was obviously wounded. Physically, he was very strong, but he needed someone to patch him back together emotionally.

  Her toes curled when she thought of the way he’d flattened two men for her. He was honorable, despite his protests. And―she sucked in a sharp breath―she was already halfway falling for him, which scared her to death, but she didn’t have a clue how to stop it. If she married him, she would be risking her heart. She was certain of it. Could she trust him to treasure the only thing she had to give him?

  She would be good and trapped by marriage if he proved to be selfish and uncaring. Everything in her rebelled at the thought of being under the ruling thumb of a man who didn’t love her. It was on the tip of her tongue to decline his offer, but she could not make herself form the words. As she gazed at his profile, she realized that, despite all her fears, the possibility of something wonderful might just outweigh her fears of something horrible.

  Suddenly, ahead on the road, Frank’s dilapidated carriage swung around the bend. The sound of horses’ hooves clopping along filled the silent day. To her right, Harry frantically called her name. She turned in his direction and he was already racing toward her.

  “I cannot take you from your father, Sophia,” Nathan whispered in her left ear. “You are his property until you reach your majority. But we both know he’ll relinquish you, and I vow yo
ur brother, too, if we are to be married.”

  “Then I’ll be your property,” she blurted, watching Frank and Moses draw to a stop. They jumped out toting pistols as they strode toward her, Nathan, and Harry.

  “Better my property than your father’s,” Nathan growled. “I don’t wish to see you rewarded for saving my life by becoming a glorified prostitute or worse.”

  That was hardly a hope-fulfilling sort of proposal. Once again, it was on the tip of her tongue to tell him she would not marry him when Frank marched up and pointed his pistol at Nathan.

  “Ye think ye can do anything ’cause yer the Duke of Scarsdale. Well, I’ve learned I can bring ye up on charges in front of the magistrate in London for what ye did to Sophia. Ye almost fooled me.” With an evil grin, Frank rocked back on his heels. “I was gonna settle for the money ye gave me, but now I want more or I’ll ruin ye. Do ye hear me? I’ll drag yer name through the mud.”

  Sophia wanted to sink into the ground and disappear. Sophia skid her glance to Nathan and winced at the vicious visage he now wore.

  He reached out and used one finger to move Frank’s pistol away from his person. Then Nathan gave Moses a look that made goose flesh rise on Sophia’s arms. After Moses lowered his pistol, Nathan turned his cold gaze back to Frank. “It is deplorable that you would destroy your daughter’s reputation further than you have already done for more money. How much is it you want?”

  “Twenty more pounds,” Frank crooned.

  Nathan’s cold eyes ignited with fury. “I’ll give you thirty more pounds, but only if Sophia agrees to marry me and you relinquish your son”―Harry had run over to the melee and was hovering by Sophia’s side―“to my care.”

  Frank’s mouth gaped open. “Ye want to marry her now?”

  Humiliation licked at Sophia’s heels.

  Nathan inclined his head. “I find we suit. I believe she does, too.” His gaze locked on hers.

  Without a doubt, he was marrying her to save her. It was the most selfless act anyone had ever performed on her behalf. And it occurred to her that any man who could be so utterly selfless had to be capable of the kind of love she craved.