“Um…” Well, he hadn’t really thought that part through yet. “Eden, wait… Don’t—”
He toppled to the ground as Eden kicked his chair out from under him.
Chapter Two
“Ifind youraggression oddly stimulating,” Connor—the dolt—said as he lay winded and flat on his back, looking up at Eden with brooding eyes the deep blue of a May sky. But this was what he and his friends, Bromleigh and Camborne, were—magnificent specimens of manhood, real men with fully formed musculature and faces of character. They were called Silver Dukes because they were above the age of forty and had hints of gray in their hair. Eden rather liked the way those flecks, more white than gray, salted Connor’s full head of dark hair.
Eden knelt beside him, appalled by what she had just done, and also confused by what he had just said. “I stimulate you?”
He coughed. “No, that came out wrong again.”
She sighed and told him to lie still another moment to catch his breath before attempting to get up. “You toppled rather hard. I’m so sorry. I behaved as badly as my parents. Thank goodness your children were not here to see my outburst. Truly, I cannot apologize enough.”
He took another breath, and then accepted her offered hand as he groaned to a sitting position. “No, this was all my fault. I was in the wrong for speaking out of turn to you, Eden. I never meant it as an insult. I just saw how much my children adore you and selfishly leaped at the possibility you might help me out.”
In truth, she liked his children very much and would not have minded taking them for a day or two. But an entire week seemed too much for her to manage.
“I’ll figure out something else,” he said, absently caressing her hand that he still held. His own was roughened and warm because of his physicality. He was no soft lord with slender fingers who never lifted anything heavier than a quill pen. His hands were big and felt divine. The same could be said for his muscled shoulders.
She tried not to look disappointed when he released her.
“This house party is doomed to be a disaster anyway,” he continued. “What was my mother thinking to invite thesetondiamonds? Some of them are barely eighteen years old. How would it ever work when I am over forty? How can I look seriously upon a young lady who is more than twenty years my junior? What could I possibly have in common with her?”
Eden helped him to his feet, feeling surprisingly small beside his large frame as they stood side by side. She was not a short woman, yet he was a full head taller than her. “Since we seem to be speaking rather bluntly to each other, why would you not want someone young and fresh in your bed?” she asked.
He righted his chair, and then turned to her and shook his head. “That is precisely the point. That young and fresh diamond is not going to want to share my bed. Oh, she might do her duty without grimacing too obviously, but I already have my children. Do I really need more? Connor and Alex are the heir and the spare, ensuring the Lynton line of succession. And I also have Priscilla, my little sweetheart. I do not need another marriage such as I had with Mary. In truth, I do not need another marriage at all.”
Eden regarded him thoughtfully. “But you seemed to be a happy family.”
He snorted. “Mary and I were cordial to each other, but that was all. She was kind to the children—I will give her that. But would she ever risk her own life to protect them? I’m not sure. I never saw a spark of courage in her. Nor much in the way of maternal instinct. But who knows? Through all our years of marriage, I never got to know her. And before you say anything, it wasn’t from lack of my trying.”
“I was not going to suggest it.” She waited for him to continue because he seemed eager to get his feelings out, and she did not mind listening.
“She never expressed an opinion. She never felt passionate about anything, not even the children. Nannies took care of them mostly. I was the one who took them on nature walks, who read to them before they went to sleep, and who sat by their side if ever they were ill.”
“And Mary?”
He shrugged. “I have no idea how she spent most of her day. We rarely entertained, which suited me well, since I was usually tired after long days at the Lynton farms, especially if there was physical work to be done. We had maids, a cook, a housekeeper, butlers and footmen, nannies and governesses to take care of the house and children. Mary… She was a leaf detached from a tree and floating upon a stream, just going along with the current. When she died…” He raked a hand through those lovely waves of dark hair. “Well, this is getting too personal. I’ve said too much already.”
“You know that I will keep whatever you say in confidence. The children felt her loss,” Eden said, wondering what his response had been to his wife’s passing. Had he shed a tear? He wasn’t a bad man, but she did not think he missed her very much, because he had never achieved a closeness with his wife that he might have done in a love match.
Not that she wished him to be unhappy and desperately mourn his loss. But was it not better to experience perfect happiness for a short while rather than never have it at all?
Was this not the very thing she was struggling with now?
She was beginning to think she had made a mistake in rejecting all those offers of marriage during her first few Seasons. Some of the gentlemen were honorable enough, and they might have made a go of it.
But she had been too scared to try because her parents had such a horrible marriage. She did not want to repeat their mistakes.
For this reason, she had shunned entering into that same sort of unholy alliance and suffering their sad fate. Considered a diamond in her day, she had turned down plenty of offers. Most of her suitors were more in love with her dowry than with her.
But was it not possible that a few actually liked her, too?
Well, it did not matter very much, since none of the gentlemen courting her had ever left her breathless or made her heart flutter. None of them would have been a love match.
But so what? Where had all her caution gotten her?
She was now the ripe old age of seven and twenty, and firmly on the shelf. Not that she was miserable about it. She had made a good life for herself here in the town of Lynton. Connor was a good neighbor. He and his mother, Duchess Evelyn, were always welcoming whenever she stopped by. Even his children tended to be on their best behavior whenever she came around to visit, although their best wasn’t always very good. She never minded their antics and enjoyed spending time with them.
