Ian was not unaware of the fact that everyone in the room likely wanted to kill him. Even the baby, he thought. Probably she could not have managed it, but her impossibly large eyes stared at him with something akin to suspicion and antipathy. It was rather a strong emotion with which to credit a child so young, but this one seemed eminently capable of it.
He ought to have realized it before. That day that Felicity had become so flustered when he had passed on the gossip from London that a duke had married a notorious courtesan—it had been because she’d just learned of her sister’s marriage in the paper. Had thought she’d been deliberately excluded from the event. He hadn’t had reason, then, to pay much attention to the names listed in the paper, nor to give over much of his mind to London gossip. And so it had been something of a shock to find a duke and duchess at his doorstep, caterwauling about Felicity.
She had never mentioned any living family. In the past, she’d made very brief mention of an uncle who had secured a place for her at the school, but he’d been led to believe the man had died. He’d thought they’d shared that in common; their lack of family.
And now, his home had been invaded by two sisters, two brothers-in-law—a baron and a damnedduke—and finally an infant niece. The family he’d never known that she had had. And now his, too, he supposed, by the extension of marriage.
For all the good it would do him, since murder seemed just as likely an outcome as peace. Probably more so, if those venomous looks the elder sister—Charity—kept slanting him over her teacup. She hadn’t the panache to pull it off as Felicity did, her eyes plain brown instead of Felicity’s vibrant and generally lethal green.
It was clear that they had not seen one another in some time. But from the shaken, emotional reaction their appearance had pulled from Felicity, it was also clear that they were quite fond of one another. Which meant that he was going to have to do his damnedest to get along with them. To be pleasant, however poorly they’d gotten off to begin with.
A resolution that was tested only moments later when the duke spoke sharply for the first time since tea had been delivered. “Naturally,” he said, “we’ve come to retrieve Felicity.”
Retrieveher? Like a damned lost coat? “Felicity is my wife. One does notretrieveanother man’s wife.” No matter how he might be related to her.
The duchess bristled, her shoulders tensing. “She is mysister!”
A fact of which he was now very much aware. “We made a bargain. I’ll hold to my end of it so long as Felicity holds to hers.”
The bespectacled fellow—the baron—lifted his brows. “And the terms of this bargain?”
“None of your damned business,” Ian said.
“Are you insinuating that Felicity is not free to speak her mind with her own family?” the duchess inquired in a poisonous hiss.
“Nothing of the sort. Felicity is free to share whatever she wishes. But I have no intention of making public what is private without her consent.” He allowed himself another sip of tea and a measure of enjoyment over the nonplussed expression which so briefly slid across the woman’s face.
“Felicity?” the other sister—Mercy, he thought—prompted. “What can we do? What would you like us to do?”
“Whatever he says, you don’t have to stay,” the baron added.
Felicity steeled herself. “Ian owns Nellie’s school,” she said. “He bought the building from her. It’s her home; the only one she has known all these years.”
At least it was more charitable than accusing him once again of stealing it. “At a fair price,” he said. “She was not cheated. She’ll live out the rest of her days in perfect comfort, and, notably, without the threat of a debtor’s prison hanging over her head.”
The duke made a scathing sound in his throat, and his eye—the one not covered by an eye patch—narrowed upon Ian. “How much do you want for it?” he asked as a muscle twitched in his jaw.
“It’s not for sale.”
“Every man has a price,” the duke said. “I must insist that you tell me yours.”
“It is not for sale at any price. There isn’t enough coin in the world that would equal the value of what I would lose along with it.”
Mercy rubbed the baby’s back with one hand and turned her face toward Felicity once more. “We can find a new school building,” she said, her voice tinged with desperation—and perhaps a bit of guilt, he thought. For taking so long to arrive. For leaving her sister to Ian’s mercy.
“You really can’t,” Felicity said, and that grimacedeepened as she ducked her head.
“Of course we can,” Charity said. “Between us, we have got quite a lot of money—”
“She means to say,” Ian interrupted, “that you will not find anyone willing to sell to you. You might be in the privileged position of carrying titles, but your homes are elsewhere. You’ll leave Brighton eventually, and when you do, anyone who dares sell to you will have to contend with me.” Another slow sip of tea, as if to punctuate his words. “No one with half a shred of sense wants that.”
“Then come home anyway,” Charity said to Felicity, her hands clasped together as if in prayer. “Just come with us. He can’t force you to stay.”
And that—that was true enough, he supposed. True enough, at least, in the context of this new revelation. He had, according to the law, certain legal rights over his wife. He did not, however, expect them to be of any particular relevance when weighed against the power that might be wielded on Felicity’s behalf by her brothers-in-law, both peers in their own right.
But then again, he hadn’t forced her to stay to begin with. She could have walked away the moment he’d placed that marriage contract into her hands.She’dforced herself to stay. He had only provided the motivation required to make the benefits worth the sacrifice.
As Felicity shifted uncomfortably, searching for the kindest possible words to refuse the offer of ready escape, when her sisters had plainly rushed to rescue her at the earliest possible moment, Ian caught sight of the baron eyeing him speculatively. There was still some hostility in that dark gaze half-concealed by the glare streaking across the lenses of his spectacles, but more than that, there was a vague, reluctant curiosity.
