“Perhaps you should tell me everything.”
“Henry’s siblings think to prove me a fortune hunter because when I married my husband, he was already sick. He was, however, quite lucid, I assure you, and of a right mind. They’d like to paint me as an unvirtuous woman who lured him into matrimony for his money, and since…” She paused, shutting her eyes against the absolute truth because the truth was embarrassing, not to mention improper to discuss with a man. Her fingernails dug into her palms, and she pulled her top lip through her teeth.
“Think of me as your legal counsel, sworn to secrecy, as you’ve already stated I am. There’s naught that you can’t say to me.”
She forged ahead, turning her eyes toward the cloud-blue plastered ceiling. “Since he was too ill to make our marriage bed available, shall we say, I am still a virtuous woman to put not too fine a point on the matter.”
“I don’t believe that’s grounds for annulment.”
He didn’t sound shocked. Quietly sympathetic, perhaps, but not scandalously surprised. “Of itself, it is not. But since I was born to a farming family and worked with the gardeners here since the age of fourteen, they seem to think the idea has merit.”
With a pinched brow, Mr. Cade moved his jaw around and hissed a sigh. Not a good sign. “That is tricky, I’m afraid. What should make them so ruthless?” He didn’t wait for an answer. “Money. Money can be ugly.”
“And necessary.” She sat forward. “Mr. Cade, if they are successful in their cruelty, I will not only be left without funds, I’ll be left without a home, without means to let an apartment, without anything at all. If I had any hope, it would be to take a job as a companion or a governess, which would also require a recommendation that I cannot hope to acquire because his family hates me. Since I am an orphan, there is no one for me to turn to. You can see why he married me now.”
He examined her, his steely eyes boring into her soul. His perusal of her body made her adjust her bottom and straighten her back.
“And I am not keen on any other arrangement.”
He shook his head, seeming to clear it. “I apologize, I don’t mean to make you uncomfortable, and I don’t suggest you consider another arrangement if I understand your meaning.”
She folded her arms. “You seemed to be taking inventory of my person.”
“No. I was simply wondering why anyone would care to harm you.”
“Money, as you’ve said.” She uncrossed her arms.
“I think it’s more than that. They’ll have the house, since there’s no possibility of an heir. They can rebuild their income from that. Was your husband of wealth?”
“Under my definition, yes. Under theirs?” She shrugged. “I don’t know.”
“Lady Danderly, not to cause you any more distress, but have you considered”—He paused as if seeking the correct word—“an heir?”
He meant after the fact. The thought had actually occurred to her the moment she realized that the Widows’ League had sent him. If he was as good with the books as he was handsome, then one must consider him a genius.
She shook her head.
He raised a brow as if he didn’t quite believe her.
Three
Why had he asked her that question? Cade was in a quandary now. Quite over his head. Oh, the books would be easy. Finding the right one might pose a challenge, but after spending the morning and afternoon with Lady Danderly, his sympathies clouded his focus. What kind of dragons attacked defenseless widows? And what made him suggest she get herself with an heir?
After the tea had been cleared away, Cade tried to convince her, once again, he could stay elsewhere. But her bright hazel eyes and innocence, and yes, his gathering compassion for her situation, had enticed him to stay. The room that Mr. Newhouse—the apparent steward turned temporary butler—showed him was clean and roomy. Not the opulence he was used to. No gold inlaid ceiling or cherubs trumpeting from the far corners of a room built for a king. Hamlin Estate, Justamere’s ducal estate, had been built upon and brought up to date over the years, but the original rooms still held the heavily carved grandeur of their day.
But he couldn’t complain, the rooms here were nice as well.
The large oak bed sported a firm mattress, and a walnut secretary with brass accents overlooked the west lawns. On the opposite wall stood a wardrobe, but the focal beauty of the room was a French, hand-painted screen with four panels. In the center of each beige panel was a gold-painted ribbon that framed none other than four cherubs. He smiled. So, it was a bit like home after all. Behind it, he found a basin with fresh water. He loosened his cravat, tossed it over the screen, and washed his face. What had he done?
A week. He could endure a week of lies, couldn’t he? And they wouldn’t hurt the widow. Would they? He only meant to follow up on his original transaction with Baron Danderly. Nothing untoward about that. Right?
He shook off the foreboding and squelched his conscience, telling himself he was doing Lady Danderly a favor. She’d get her books straightened out, and he’d get his property. Sounded fair. For now, staying tucked away in his room and taking dinner in private was his safest bet.
When night fell, he stripped out of his riding breeches, waistcoat, jacket, and fine, white lawn shirt—then slept in the nude. Nothing unusual about that unless one considered the lack of a beautiful woman in his bed, equally naked. And then it came, the thought of the baroness, her blonde hair like moonbeams streaking across the pillow beside him. He’d be blind not to take notice of such beauty. He couldn’t imagine Henry marrying her out of pure generosity. And if he couldn’t believe it, then perhaps the courts would have a difficult time believing that her husband had been too ill to touch her.
“Good morning, Mr. Cade.”
After breaking fast in his room the following morning, Cade met Lady Danderly in the study where they’d spoken yesterday. Again, she sat behind the desk, and from the other side, he took a chair facing her. With a wall of books behind her, she looked like a scholar. A chuckle escaped as he noticed a book of erotica, sandwiched between a section of tomes on agriculture, banked in the bookcase just behind and above her head.
She glanced up from the ledgers before her, a slightly confused expression bending her brow.
Slouching enough to rest his elbow against the arm of the chair, he rubbed the smirk from his mouth.
“Do you find humor in my situation? Because if you do, I suggest we part ways now.”
“No, my lady.” He felt duly chastised, straightening in his seat, trying to remind himself of his place.
With her hands gripping the side edges of the opened ledger, she half lifted it, giving a little agitated shake. “This is what you’re here for, yes?”
“Absolutely.” Even he did not sound convinced. He sat forward, his hand outstretched toward the open book. “May I?” She scooted it across the desk into his upturned palm, and he spun the ledger around, scanning the finely scrawled columns. Page after page, he flipped one, two, three. Everything looked in order. Then he paused to do some mental math where an expenditure for yearly carriage wheels had been crossed out. It appeared to be a simple refinancing of the budget.