The Bargain Bride by Bárbara Metzger Read Free Book Online Page B

children. You will have your own room, and you can decorate it any way you wish. In fact, you will have all of Westmoreland to redecorate. Although I would ask you to ignore your stepmother’s preference for the Egyptian motif.”
    â€œWhat, no mummies in the morning room?” She smiled at last. “It would serve you right if I did.”
    Her smile entranced him. “Quite. Um, I am sure I have more to offer a woman than a crumbling pile to furnish. There is my title, of course, the country property, and a hunting box. Our first son will be an honorable, and he’ll have lots of horses to ride.”
    None of his assets seemed to impress her, so he stood by her chair and reached for her hand. “I am sorry I cannot be your Prince Charming after all, but think on it, my dear. You have no better way to protect yourself and your grandfather than by marriage, and I have no other way of satisfying my honor. Then there is duty, a daughter’s to her family, a viscount’s to his heritage, a son’s to his father’s memory. My father did give his word on the betrothal, and I am bound not to betray him.”
    â€œI understand,” Penny said. “But I need time to think about all this. I wish to speak to Grandpapa and reflect on my choices, limited though they are. This decision is for a lifetime, after all. I should have more than a few minutes to decide.”
    The decision was made when she was thirteen, but West held his tongue. Let the poor girl think she was in control of her destiny. He raised her hand to his lips, then said, “Very well, I shall return later this afternoon for your answer.”
    That was not late enough for Penny. “Why do you not come to dinner? With my father, I suppose. We can speak afterward, and perhaps if Cook’s food is good and Grandpapa’s wine is flowing, Father will listen to reason.”
    Maybe they could get him so drunk he could be put on a ship for the antipodes, West thought on a moment’s optimism. But, no, Goldwaite would only come back. And no wine that West knew of turned solid marble into something malleable.
    â€œLater, my dear.”
    Â 
    â€œGrandpapa, I need to speak to you,” Penny said after Westfield left. Her grandfather and Marcel were just finishing the day’s work in the studio, so she helped clean up, as usual. She did not reveal her father’s threats or the truth about the painting sales, but she did not need to explain about his insistence on the wedding.
    â€œI heard all about it, poppet. But Grasping Gaspar told me to stay out of it. He is set on getting that title for you. And in a way he is right. Fathers have always made matches for their children, being older and wiser and with a larger view of life. Why, I never met your grandmother until a month before our wedding, and I came to love her with all my soul. Your mother caught young Gaspar’s eye, but it was his father who approached me about an alliance. Daughters especially were expected to wed where their fathers decreed. Only recently have love matches become fashionable.”
    â€œThen you think it is my duty to obey Father’s wishes?”
    â€œI do not know what is in your heart, or in the viscount’s, so I cannot advise you, even if I wished to go against your father’s whims. You are always welcome here, but Gaspar is right. I will not live forever, and then you will have given up your chances of a life of your own.”
    â€œBut I could be miserable in that life!” she said with a wail. “Doesn’t that matter?”
    â€œOf course, but you might also be happy. I have never heard ill spoken of him, and he has made good on his father’s debts, which shows he is a man of honor.”
    â€œAnd he is très beau, ” Marcel put in. “Those shoulders, those muscles, such a distinguished air. Not an ounce of fat, I’d wager, and, oh, the legs of a horseman. Marry him, chérie