“Reconsider wooing the duchess.”
“Out of the question,” Ambrose pronounced. Then, after a small pause, “Why the hell would I do that? More importantly, what would it accomplish?”
“To keep the peace, Your Grace.” Benson smoothed out Ambrose’s coat. “A woman in love is a woman without willfulness.”
Or more of it, Ambrose thought darkly. Look where that had gotten him with Holly Middleton. She’d fancied herself in love with him and abandoned him the moment she realized the feeling wasn’t mutual.
As if reading his thoughts, Benson said, “It seems to me, Your Grace, that the duchess does not hold the same romantic ideals as your former betrothed. There is no risk. She is already your wife.”
Ambrose grunted.
That was true, but the last thing he wanted was for his wife to pester him to change his ways because he had wooed her. Or God forbid, expect him to return her doe-eyed stares because she believed him to hold affection for her.
But, his valet had made a valid point. If his wife held some—even a little—form of affection for him . . . wouldn’t that make the situation a bit easier?
She could not leave him—she was his wife. She might be suspicious or believe him insincere, but that was about the worst of it. And Willow did not strike him as the type to abandon anyone.
She valued family.
And he was part of that family now.
He tested the thought in his mind.
Woo his wife.Win her over.
Ambrose was still not convinced that meant a whole lot. Willow refused to read his rules, had snuck out of their home, and God only knows what else. And given the choice, she would choose her sisters over him, he was sure of it.
But what to do then? It was way beyond the bounds of his experience. Was wooing her truly the answer? Winning her over? He was at a total loss. The need to control simmered beneath his skin. But there was something new—another desire altogether was forming. It felt suspiciously like the desire topleasehis wife.
Absolutely, completely and utterly absurd.
No, courting his wife, Ambrose decided, was out of the question. He enjoyed her company too much already. More time spent in her presence would be dangerous. A marriage of convenience was the best option for them both. As he had intended.
“The duchess,” he told his valet, “will soon enough learn her place. I will not be managed. All it will take is to find the right incentive.”
“Incentive, Your Grace?”
“Reduce her pin money, for one.”
Forbid her to see her family for another.
It would be the ultimate inducement, Ambrose supposed. One he wasn’t certain he wished to enforce.
“There is always seduction, Your Grace.”
Ambrose shot his valet an aggrieved look. The man would not give up.
Seduction, he supposed, formed part of the convenience in marriage of convenience.
There was only one problem.
Ambrose had made a brash declaration to withhold pleasure, because he’d felt something very akin toemotion. And he simply could not go back on his word now. Not after he’d been so arrogantly cocksure of himself.
A frown puckered his brow.
He glanced at Benson, who suspiciously resembled a man trying his best to suppress a grin.
“I’m still your employer,” Ambrose snapped out.
