When an Earl Meets a Girl (Chase Family, #1)

by Lauren Royal

But she was his due, and once the deed was done she’d get used to the idea. She’d come to his bed and bear his children. Eventually. She’d always been a cold one, anyway—he’d never expected much of her sexually. And when she was his, everything she owned would be, too.

Pleased with his powers of deduction, Robert paused for another swallow and dragged his sleeve across his mouth. “Anyone know where Cainewood lives? I’ll pay someone”—he burped loudly—“ten shillings to show me where he lives.” There was a scraping of benches as men rose, eager to collect ten shillings for such an easy job.

“Hush,” came a hiss in her ear. “Make a sound and I’ll kill you, I swear it. I’ve got a knife.” She froze at the sound of Robert’s voice, but didn’t believe him for a second. Jeweler’s tools were the closest thing to a weapon he ever touched. He wouldn’t know what to do with a serious knife if someone walked up and put it in his hand.

Her head exploded in pain. One second she was fighting for her life, and the next second the world went black.

He hadn’t counted on the dead weight. Petite Amy felt heavy as a horse. Pausing twice to rewrap the blanket around her, he dragged her to the open window, where a ladder waited.

The whole chamber seemed to lighten, and Robert heaved a sigh of relief. “I’ve come to get married, Father.” The clergyman looked pleased. “Ah, I see. Have you need of a—shall we say ‘special’—certificate?” “Nay, the date matters not. But the lady is…reluctant.” “That’s none of my concern. The price will be three crowns.”

He turned toward the door, intending to fetch Amy posthaste and get it over with. He hoped mightily that she had awakened, or that it wouldn’t matter either way to the curate.

The clergyman smiled wider, showing large, uneven teeth. “The Sabbath approaches, my son. There will be no weddings until Monday.” “But…” “Bring with you two witnesses and a pistol—the latter will make it go faster.” He winked at Robert.

He bolted for the door. His heart was pounding so hard that it took him a few moments to notice the hackney’s door was wide open and he could hear someone running down the street. Amy had escaped.

COLIN LEANED LOW over the saddle, his hands clenched on the reins, the paper crumpled in one fist. It wasn’t possible to read it while Ebony’s pounding hooves ate up the miles of rutted road, but Ford’s scribbled words were burned into his brain. Amy is missing. Come immediately. His heart had been hammering since he’d set eyes on the cryptic note. He’d wasted no time setting out for London, his fevered imagination conjuring up scenes featuring every possibility, ranging from Amy deciding to leave on her own, to Amy lying dead in a ditch, a pistol wound in her chest.

He’d been fighting with himself for months now. It was a losing battle. As he shot through the City gates, one spurred boot nicked a vegetable barrow. He turned in the saddle, watched lemons and artichokes plop to the muddy street, yelled an apology to the vendor…and finally admitted to himself that he couldn’t be happy living without Amy. The truth was it mattered little whether they were parted by his own choice or the actions of a faceless criminal. The thought of whiling away his years at Greystone without her—whether she was growing old with her aunt, married to another man, or cold in her grave—made him sick in his gut. She was meant to be his. He loved her.

Blood. Amy’s blood. His stomach knotted, and he couldn’t seem to think straight.

She had to get out of here before he raped her. She choked back a sob at the mere thought, the possibility of him violating her body, pushing himself into her. It seemed a completely different act than what she’d done with Colin, and she didn’t think she could bear the disgust and humiliation.

“You’d better pray you’re not carrying his babe,” he stated in a tone that was absolutely emotionless. “Because if you are, I swear I’ll kill it.” A chill slithered down her spine. “Robert Stanley,” he said, “will not raise another man’s child.”

Though she’d thought she could feel no more panicked, the cool air on her extremities fueled her useless howling to new heights. When Robert shoved his knees between hers to force her legs apart, her anguish was so acute that it overwhelmed any physical pain.

He toyed with the idea of setting her up as his mistress, installing her in his beloved castle and building Priscilla the modern manor house she coveted. But deep inside, he knew it would never work. And he daydreamed of taking Amy to wife, living with her openly, without pretense. Still, old convictions were difficult to overcome.

“I love you,” he whispered there. Amy’s breath came in uneven gasps. “Wh-what?”

“No. You cannot. We cannot.” His head snapped up. Did she not want to marry him? “But I saw it in your eyes. I thought you—” “I love you, too,” she whispered fiercely. Her arms tightened around him, crushing him to her. “I do. It’s just—” “Hush.” Colin touched his fingers to her lips. “I’ve never told a woman that, you know,” he admitted with rueful candor. “You’ve disrupted my entire life, Amethyst Goldsmith.” In contrast to his words, he felt immensely pleased with himself and his world.

Hobbs’s jaw set, and his breath became labored. “You would leave Priscilla for another woman? My Priscilla? After a formal betrothal? After you—you ruined her?” Despite the gravity of the situation, Colin felt an absurd urge to laugh. “Ruined her?” he said, incredulous. “That’s a joke.” Hobbs’s gray eyes darkened in anger. “Not everyone shares our good king’s lack of morals, young man. Priscilla was raised properly, and—” “Do you honestly believe she was a virgin when I took her to my bed?” The outraged father role did not fit Hobbs well; Colin could see the truth in the man’s eyes, and he’d had it with his pomposity. “After you tried to pawn her off on half the Royalists in England?”

“Then the deal is off. You were legally betrothed, and you accepted part of the dowry. Surely you don’t expect—” “I’ll pay it back. Just”—Colin sucked in a breath—“give me some time.” Hobbs fixed him with an icy stare. “You will sign a note. Eight percent interest, with the balance due before we see 1668.” A year. One year. If the renovations were halted, the fields produced bumper crops, the quarry was extra-productive, the sheep thrived… It was a terrible gamble. Colin pictured Amy waiting for him at the inn, and his vision blurred. They would have her inheritance. But he’d promised her he wouldn’t take it. “I’m waiting for your answer,” Hobbs pressed. “Unless you’d prefer to pretend you never walked in here today.” Colin blinked. “I’ll sign it.”

Hobbs sprinkled sand on the ink, then dusted off and rolled up the contract. “If you fail to pay up, as God is my witness I’ll have you slapped into Newgate Prison so fast your head will spin. You’ll see the devil in heaven the day I show you mercy.”

Hobbs tucked the scroll in a drawer, poured himself another goblet of wine, and downed it in one long gulp. “I won, you know.” He swiped a hand across his mouth. “I’ll have my license, and I still have my daughter.” “To sell to the highest bidder? The man with the next item on your agenda?” “That’s what daughters are for. You’ll learn it when you have your own.”

Colin was bent over a sheet of vellum, shaking his head. She bit her lip. Another financial problem he couldn’t solve, thanks to wedding her?

“You already know some of them,” he reminded her patiently, “from your shop.” “As customers. Oh, Colin, look at me! You’re going to be sorry you married me, I just know it.” His fingers stilled in her hair, and he said very quietly, “I will never, ever be sorry I married you, Lady Greystone. You’re the best thing that ever happened to me.”

“Not all men are like that.” Madame’s fingers caught and pulled at her hair. “Not my François.” “Surely not the earl?” Lydia’s face appeared beside Madame’s in the mirror, puzzled. “You confide in him, don’t you? He loves you so.” Did he really? Amy bit her lip. It was pointless to confide in Colin, anyway; he’d made it clear before they wed that a countess would never run a shop. And he’d become more and more closed and distracted over the months.

Six years later

The workshop door was slightly ajar. He pushed it open—scrape, bang—and a deluge of frigid water poured down on him. Behind him, Jewel dissolved into hysterical giggles. His wife turned around from her workbench, a knife and wax ring model in her hands. “She got you,” Amy said. “Again.” Seeing Colin standing there, drenched, his hair plastered to his head and hanging to his shoulders in thick wet tendrils, she burst into laughter. Colin reached back to pull his still-giggling daughter into the room. With a violent shake of his head, he sprayed droplets of cold water onto her small head and shoulders. “Jewel Edith Chase,” he said with mock severity, “this is getting way out of hand.” “I owed you. For the lemonade.”

The pucker on her face had been priceless. He chuckled now, savoring the memory. “That was for the hay,” he protested. “How did you do that hay thing, anyway?” “I’m not telling. We’re even now.” “Like hell we are.” “Colin.”

Jewel’s brother Hugh was a strapping boy of four who followed his father around like a shadow. The next Earl of Greystone. And then, of course, there was Aidan. Colin glanced at the sleeping child snuggled in the corner of the workshop. At six months, he still needed Amy near. And he would learn his trade here; his future was here.

Her senses whirled, and her heart pounded so loud she was certain he could hear it. She vaguely wondered how she could feel this way—she, a grown lady of twenty-nine, with three children. But inside, she felt no older than when Colin first kissed her, so many years ago. And his kisses still affected her the same way, only more so.