The Unofficial Suitor by Charlotte Louise Dolan Read Free Book Online

thwart Geoffrey’s plans. Never did she anticipate that having heard what Geoffrey had in mind for her, Digory would think it best for her to go to London and try her utmost to make a reasonable match.
    “But he is only forcing me to do this in anticipation of the funds he expects to wring from my future husband. He sees me as the means of settling his debts.”
    “For whatever reason, ‘tis the best opportunity that is likely to come your way for you to catch yourself a respectable husband.”
    “But I do not want a husband. I do not want to get married. I have never wanted to get married.” She truly did not, but how could she get a man to understand that a woman might prefer to remain single?
    “Then what do you want? How do you plan to support yourself if not by taking a husband? And how do you intend to find a husband if you refuse to go to London? What marriage prospects do you have, living here as isolated as you are?”
    “I do not know,” she admitted, feeling physically ill at the mere thought of a husband. “I just want things to go along as they are until something—”
    “Until what?” Digory interrupted her. “Until your stepmother dies, and even her meager jointure is cut off?”
    “How can you talk so casually about Ellen dying?”
    He ignored her remark and continued his attack. “By then you will probably be middle-aged and beyond the point of being able to attract a man.”
    “I will not need anyone to support me if I get a job.”
    “And if the streets were paved with gold, we would all be rich. Just what job do you think you can do?”
    She considered for a moment. “I know how to manage a household. I could become a housekeeper.”
    “You have not the faintest clue as to how to run a house. All you know is how to survive on next to nothing, which would be of little help to you in directing servants. Besides which, unless you found an establishment consisting solely of females, you would be seduced within a sennight.”
    “Then I shall be a smuggler. I know how to sail a boat. You taught me yourself.” She eyed her companion with disfavor as he leaned against the broad side of the horse and shook with silent laughter.
    “I took you sailing a few times when you were fourteen,” he finally managed to say. “Not quite the same thing as teaching you to sail. You could not begin to handle a boat on your own; there simply is not enough of you.”
    “I am bigger now than I was then. Indeed, I have grown immensely since then.”
    “Aye, you have grown all right,” he looked at her with open approval, “but you are not an inch taller today than you were then.”
    She crossed her arms defensively in front of her chest, annoyed that everyone seemed to have decided that the best topic for discussion today was how far she stuck out in front.
    “I thought you, of all people, would be willing to help me.”
    “I, of all people? What makes you think I, of all people, should want to help you?”
    “Because I have always thought that you are really ... that I am your ...” She started over again. “I have thought for years that you are probably my ...” She looked to him for help, but he waited impassively for her to say it. “When you are clean-shaven and all dressed up in your fancy clothes, you look so much like the portrait of my father taken when he was a young man, that I just assumed ... that you are my brother,” she finished in a rush.
    His glance was shuttered, and she could not read his thoughts. “So you have figured that out, have you? Well, it has never been any secret who my father was.”
    “I thought, perhaps, that with the relationship between us—”
    He interrupted before she could go on. “I am afraid you have been laboring under a misapprehension. Although I will admit to having found our association beneficial, it has been as much to your advantage as it has to mine. But in truth, the fact of the matter remains that I feel no more responsibility toward you than