April Kihlstrom by The Dutiful Wife Read Free Book Online Page A

those years ago, he straightened, threw back his shoulders and looked her in the eyes. “Very well, I had not meant to rush my fences. Time enough after a few days, after I spoke first with your father.” He paused and smiled the same sweet smile she remembered before he said, “You asked questions no one else would have asked even back then, didn’t you?”
    “I was a child,” she reminded him.
    “So you were, but you are not a child now.” There was nothing to say to that, and so she waited. After a moment he went on, “You will think me foolish. Perhaps I am. Perhaps you will tell me to go to the devil and you might be right to do so!”
    This time when he paused, she smiled and even managed to jest a bit. “Somehow I cannot imagine telling such an august person as yourself to go to the devil.”
    He looked as though nothing she could have said would have pleased him more. He took a step toward her and took her hand in his. If he noticed how it trembled, he did not say so. “Perhaps you will think me mad,” he repeated, “but I must marry soon and I came to visit to see if perhaps you and I would suit.”
    Instinctively she tried to pull her hand free, but he would not let it go.
    “I am not asking you today. That would be mad indeed. Today I am only asking that you give us a chance to know each other as we are now and then decide. Perhaps I shall be the one to say we won’t suit.”
    Beatrix looked up at him, searching his face for something she could not even name. “Why?” she asked. “Why me?”
    He took a deep breath, determined, it seemed, upon honesty. “Because you were kind to me. Because I remember you as such a taking thing. Because you did not laugh at my dreams. Because you come from a fertile family, so producing an heir should be easy. Because you love the countryside. Because something I don’t even understand myself has brought me here.”
    Shaken, Beatrix seized on the only thing she could. “Y—you said you must marry soon. How soon?” she asked.
    He had the grace to flush as he said, “By the end of the month.”
    “
By the end of the month?
” Now Beatrix did yank her hand free and take several steps back from him. “Why did you leave it so late?”
    He ran a hand through his hair. “I thought I would, I must, meet a suitable wife in London. There are so many debutantes each year, you see. But I didn’t and as the time grew short, I thought of you.”
    “How flattering,” she said in the most withering of voices.
    “I do not mean it the way it sounds. Even if we had all the time in the world, I should have wanted to come and see you and see if we would suit.”
    “It’s impossible,” she said, shaking her head. “How can we know by the end of the month if we should suit?”
    He stiffened, but not from courage this time. His voice was curt as he said, “I am not proposing a love match. I despise such sentimentality. I am proposing that we see if you and I could enter into a sensible marriage, one that would be of advantage to both of us.” He waved a hand at her home. “Surely you do not wish to stay here forever? I can offer you comfort. You would never have to scrape pennies again. I can give you all the things you’ve never had.”
    “And I am to offer you companionship and an heir,” Beatrix said, her voice breaking on the words.
    “Yes, exactly. We needn’t live in each other’s pockets. It will be much better if we do not. As I said, I am not asking you to decide today. I am only asking that you give us a chance to know each other again. If either of us decides we would not suit, that will be the end of it.”
    Beatrix felt her heart ache all over again for the boy Rothwood had once been. He had grown up, all right, and she was not certain she liked the man nearly as much as she had adored the boy he had been. But he was right, she thought, taking a deep breath. There was much to recommend what he proposed.
    “You have taken me by surprise,” she said,