“He’s unfit,” she pleaded, trying to keep her voice down. She wouldn’t put it past Lucy to linger outside the room and listen at the door. “If it were merely my pride at stake, I would have set it aside and gone to him at once, I swear to you. If I thought him a reasonable man, I would have applied to him, or even taken her to him. But...” She took a deep breath. “He’s not.”
“Who is he?”
Her hands were clenched so tightly she was shaking. “Baron Fitchley.”
She didn’t doubt he would know the name. Fitchley was notorious in most of London. Arabella said the baron was barely received, to which Oliver always muttered that there was good reason for that. And Emilia had her own reasons for hating the baron. There was no way she was letting that terrible man have Lucy.
Mr. Dashwood stared at her. “Emmett Fitchley?”
“Yes.”
“Fitchley is her guardian?” he repeated in disbelief. He pushed his fingers into his hair, ruffling the crisp waves.“Fitchley.”
Emilia’s heart boomed in terror. Oh, this might go from bad to dreadful if he were somehow a friend of Fitchley’s, after she had just called Fitchley unreasonable and unfit. And even worse—he might alert Fitchley about Lucy. “Do—do you know him?”
Against her will, Emilia pictured Fitchley walking through the door downstairs, a vindictive smile on his face, his cold eyes settling on Lucy. She pictured him taking Lucy away—not out of friendship for Lucy’s father, not because he cared for Lucy, but because he could. She couldn’t even imagine how frightened Lucy would be if that happened. And Emilia would be powerless to stop him, because Fitchley had every right to do it under the law.
Mr. Dashwood pinched the bridge of his nose and said nothing for a long moment. “I’ll send my solicitor to examine these papers.”
Emilia’s hands spasmed around folds of her skirt as a fearsome thrill of hope shot through her. “Of course.” She wet her lips. “Have we a bargain, then? The one you proposed last night?”
He looked at her for a long moment. There was no longer anger or impatience in it. He looked... resigned. Weary. But then, he’d been awake all night. Morning was the end of his day. “You agree to honor those terms?”
Slowly she nodded. “What is the favor you want of me?” she asked hesitantly.
A humorless smile flickered over his face. “I’ll explain that soon.”
“Then you believe me?” She hardly dared breathe. Who cared what the favor was, if he would save Lucy from Fitchley? “You find my evidence persuasive?”
He opened the door, then paused. His golden gaze fastened on her once more. “Damnably so. You may expect my solicitor, Thomas Grantham. Good day, Miss Greene.”
He was out of the room and down the stairs before she recovered enough to go after him. There was no response to her hastily called thanks, just the firm thud of the front door closing below. Still dazed, Emilia braced her hands against the drawing room doorway.
Footsteps on the stairs made her look up. Lucy was creeping down, wary but eager. “Did you answer his question, Millie?” she whispered.
This time her smile was real. “Yes, Lucy, I did,” she said softly. “And I believe he’s beginning to agree that we’re right.”
CHAPTERNINE
Against his better judgment, Nick began to set things in motion.
He sent for Grantham, who turned up at the Vega Club that evening. Even explaining it aloud made Nick feel foolish; who did he think he was, expecting to become a viscount? Grantham listened in silence, nodding once or twice and asking a few questions, but never once bursting into laughter or casting doubt on the whole idea.
Finally Nick had to ask. “Could this actually be true?”
“It sounds perfectly possible. You’re a legitimate descendant of the family. There may be others, but Miss Greene claims to have done her diligence on that score.” Grantham raised one brow. “Don’t you want it to be true?”
“It’s too incredible,” he muttered.
“Not really,” countered his solicitor. “The rules of descent are fairly rigid. If the heir turns out to be an illiterate cobbler from Wapping, he has the right to be invested.”
“No one in Parliament will want me sitting beside him.”
Grantham folded his arms and rested one hip against the billiard table. “I suppose someone could lodge a protest and try to persuade the Crown not to confer the title. But if Miss Greene is correct, and there’s no more direct heir, that would be difficult. The estate would fall into abeyance. It couldn’t be granted until someone else filed a better, more substantiated claim. You could file a suit in that event—”
“God, no.” Nick dropped his cue stick on the billiard table and paced restlessly. “If I do this, the initial petition must be so convincing, so solid, there won’t be half an inch of ground left to contest it. She says she’s got proof, but she’s blinded by her devotion to the little girl.”
“Did it not look reliable to you?”
