In the Prince's Bed

by Sabrina Jeffries

  “How kind of you.” Alec handed Katherine her punch. “I’m sorry we can’t invite you to the wedding. It’s going to be a private affair, just Katherine’s family. We’re marrying by special license within the week.”

  Katherine nearly dropped her glass of punch. “We… we are?”

  Alec’s gaze settled on her. “I assumed you’d want to marry soon. There is Mr. Byrne to consider, after all.”

  “Who’s Mr. Byrne?” Sydney asked.

  “Nobody of consequence.” Katherine certainly didn’t want Sydney to know how deeply Papa had sunk them into debt. She shot Alec a cool glance. “So we’re marrying by special license? I suppose you’ve chosen a gown for me as well?”

  Her acerbic tone made Alec arch one brow. “Forgive me, sweetheart—I thought you’d be pleased. But if you’d rather we post the banns and marry from your home in Heath’s End, just say so.”

  “Don’t be silly,” Mama protested. “What would people think if you married like common day laborers?” She clapped her hands to her chest with a dreamy sigh. “To marry by special license—how romantic that will be! All the ladies will envy you, my angel!”

  With a glance at Katherine, Sydney asked, “What’s your hurry?”

  “I see no reason to wait.” Alec cast Katherine a warm smile. “I came to London to find a wife, and now that I have, I want to go home with her to Suffolk and begin our life together.”

  Katherine melted. So Mama had been wrong about that, too—Alec didn’t want a “fashionable marriage.” He only wanted her.

  That didn’t sit well with Mama. “What? Go home? But it’s the middle of the season! We’ll have to arrange a ball at your town house, at the very least.”

  “There’s no need for all that,” Katherine put in to cover Alec’s grimace.

  “Of course there is! There should be parties to celebrate the marriage and breakfasts and a soiree… what can you mean, to be scampering off to the country now, my lord? People will think something is amiss.”

  “We don’t care what people think.” Katherine moved to Alec’s side to lay her free hand on his arm. He covered it with his own and squeezed.

  Any lingering objections to a hasty wedding went right out the window. This, after all, was what she wanted from marriage—two people joined against the world, ready to stand firm against the frivolous Mamas and the nay saying Sydneys. Two people who understood each other.

  Sydney stared down at their joined hands, and his lips tightened. “Well, then, I shan’t intrude on this cozy family scene any longer.” He cast Alec a resentful glance. “I assume that you’ll accompany the ladies home tonight?”

  Alec nodded tersely.

  Sydney turned to Katherine. “Remember, if you ever need anything—”

  “Yes, thank you,” she broke in, feeling Alec’s hand stiffen on hers.

  As the baronet walked off, Alec glared daggers into his back. Fortunately, Alec had no time to ask what Sydney’s last words had meant before Mama commanded his attention again. “Now see here, my lord, you simply cannot drag my daughter off to the country without so much as a warning.”

  Which meant, you can’t remove my only excuse for being in London.

  A perverse mischief seized Katherine. “I believe he can do as he pleases once he marries me, Mama.”

  Alec raised an eyebrow at Katherine, but merely added, “I’m sorry, I can’t stay in London just now. My father neglected Edenmore for years, and I must be there to turn things around. But of course if Katherine prefers to remain here—”

  “I don’t,” she said. “I’m looking forward to seeing your country estate.”

  Alec smiled at her, then her mother. “You’re welcome to stay with us whenever you like, Mrs. Merivale, if you don’t mind the workmen and interruptions of tenants.”

  “No, indeed,” Mama said hastily. “I shall stay right here in London, if you please.”

  That same urge for mischief pressed Katherine on. “Someone will need to oversee Merivale Manor now that I won’t be doing it, Mama. Unless you intend to take over my letter-writing duties?”

  The pained look on her mother’s face nearly made her laugh aloud. Mama loathed writing letters as much as she loathed being packed away to the country.

  Katherine could almost feel sorry for her. Almost.

  But really, it served Mama right to have this happen. By promoting the earl’s suit, Mama had probably not realized she would lose Katherine’s management skills. Whereas if Katherine had married Sydney, she might have been able to continue her activities from the nearby Lovelace estate.

  Thank goodness she was marrying Alec.

  Chapter Twenty-two

  Even the cleverest rake cannot ensure the

  smooth running of his plans. Learn

  to be flexible.

  —Anonymous, A Rake’s Rhetorick

  You’ve nearly made it, Alec told himself later in the evening as he and the Merivale ladies waited for his carriage. Another week at most, and you’re safe.

  Unless they found out about his finances in that time, but that was unlikely.

  Of course, once he got Katherine back to Edenmore, there’d be hell to pay. But by then it would be too late for her to escape the marriage—and he sincerely hoped he could eventually make her not want to escape.

  Lady Purefoy’s footman approached them with a frown. “My lord, I cannot seem to rouse your coachman. If you can suggest—”

  “It’s all right.” Alec pressed a few coins into the man’s hand, hoping his companions didn’t notice how few they were. “I’ll take care of it myself.”

  Mrs. Merivale gazed at him in horror. “Didn’t you bring your own footman, my lord? Can’t he rouse the coachman?”

  “I left my footman at your town house,” Alec explained, “in case you returned before I caught up to you. But it’s nothing to worry about. I’ll rouse him.”

  “We’ll rouse him,” Katherine put in.

  Though Mrs. Merivale grumbled at the indignity of having to don her pattens to keep from soiling her dancing slippers, she went along with them to where the carriage was parked a short distance from the Purefoy town house.

  “John, wake up,” Alec said sharply as they approached.

  The coachman’s loud snore was his only answer.

  “John!” Alec said more loudly, punctuating the command by jiggling the coachman’s leg.

  John shifted his position on the perch and resumed his snoring. Not that Alec blamed the man, after the day they’d had.

  “Blast it, John,” Alec grumbled as he shoved the coachman hard.

  Too hard, apparently, for John fell off the other side, hitting the ground like a sack of barley. At least that woke him up. “Thieves! Robbers! Watchman, ho!” John cried as he scrambled to his feet.

  Then he spotted his master. Turning a sickly pale, he hurried around the coach. “Oh, m’lord, beggin‘ your pardon, I didn’t mean to doze off… It won’t happen again, I swear.”

  “It’s all right, John,” Alec said.

  “Truly, m’lord—” He caught sight of Katherine and Mrs. Merivale. “ ‘Odsfish, you’ve got the ladies with you, too. Please forgive me, madam, miss. It’s just that we been on the road for days, seems like, and this last trip from Lord Draker’s in Hertfordshire was such a mad rush.”

  “Lord Draker’s?” Katherine looked at Alec. “Isn’t he the one they call—”

  “The Dragon Viscount, yes,” Alec said irritably. “Doesn’t anybody ever use the man’s name, for God’s sake?”

  She blinked. “I’m sorry, I didn’t realize he was a friend of yours.”

  “Well, he is. Come on, let’s get in.” Alec glanced to John. “Can you get us home without falling asleep on the perch again?”

  “Yes, m’lord.” John bobbed his head even more furiously because of the ladies watching him.

  As soon as they set off in the carriage, Katherine shot Alec a curious glance. “How do you know Lord Draker? I understand he doesn’t go
into society.”

  “He’s an old family friend,” Alec muttered. What would she say if she knew the truth? Would it bother her? “If you like, I can introduce you to him.”

  “Heavens, no!” Mrs. Merivale retorted. “He’s not the sort of man we’d want to be associated with.”

  “A man with a well-ordered estate, happy tenants, and contented servants?” he snapped. “That is the sort of man you would avoid?”

  Mrs. Merivale gaped at him, but Katherine merely said in a soft voice, “Mama, you’re speaking of his lordship’s friend. We know nothing about the man but gossip, so perhaps we shouldn’t be so quick to judge.” She cast him a sweet smile that reminded him why he preferred her to any other woman he’d met in London.

  “Thank you,” he answered.

  At least Katherine could appreciate Draker’s admirable qualities, buried deeply though they were. Mrs. Merivale and her ilk could never appreciate them; those fools looked only at appearances. A fortune hunter pretending to be rich was accepted in an instant, but God forbid a respectable, responsible gentleman like Draker, who’d made a few mistakes years ago, should darken society’s doors.

  Alec couldn’t wait to be away from such hypocrisy and out in the country with his beautiful new wife, who shared his opinion of society.

  “You know, my lord,” Katherine remarked, “this is the first I’ve heard of any of your friends, other than Mr. França. And you haven’t said much about your family either. I don’t even know what your parents looked like. Was your mother dark-haired, too? Or do you get your coloring from your father?”

  “I resemble my father to a marked degree, actually,” he said, trying to keep the irony from his voice. Thank God she wouldn’t see a portrait of the old earl until after they were married. “Except for my hair. That I did indeed get from my mother.”

  She looked wistful. “I wish I could have met them.”

  “Mother would have liked you. As a timid woman, she envied women who could speak their minds.”

  Perhaps if she’d spoken her mind to Prinny, she wouldn’t have succumbed to his seductions and carried his bastard. But then Alec wouldn’t have been born.

  A loud snore sounded in the carriage. Glancing over at her dozing mother, Katherine flashed him a wry smile. “I would have loved your mother for being timid. Lord knows I’ve endured the opposite long enough.”

  “That reminds me—earlier you mentioned your letter-writing duties. What exactly did you mean?”

  She shrugged. “I’m the one who corresponds with the housekeeper at Merivale Manor about the children. I choose where our meager funds should be allotted, authorize all expenditures, and approve any requests by the servants for time off or leave to visit family or whatever.”

  “In other words, you run the household.”

  “Such as it is, yes.”

  “When your mother said you always worried about such things, I didn’t realize you were the only one to do so.”

  She arched an eyebrow. “Did you think Mama would do it? Not likely.”

  “But surely in your childhood, someone must have done such things.”

  She nodded. “My grandfather. Until he died six years ago.”

  “The two of you must have been very close.”

  She stared out at the street that was damp from spring rains. “He was the only one in my family who understood me.”

  Which explained why the man had left her a fortune. But it would be Edenmore benefiting from the fruits of her labor, Edenmore profiting from the fortune intended for her own family. “You must enjoy household management, or surely you wouldn’t keep doing it.”

  “Actually, I look forward to leaving it all behind.” When she caught him frowning, she added, “Not that I don’t mean to fulfill my wifely duties at your estate—”

  “Our estate,” he corrected her.

  She smiled. “Yes, of course. But managing a staff is a far cry from having to perform half the servants’ duties because there’s too much work to go round. Then there’s the incessant concerns about our debts… I’ll be very happy not to have to worry about that anymore.”

  “Will you?” he said uneasily. She wouldn’t be leaving her worries and hard work behind. If anything, until he set Edenmore to rights, she’d have more. Because even with her fortune, it would take careful management to do all that must be done.

  “Why do you think I read so much poetry? To take my mind off the realities of my life.” She cast him a teasing smile. “But you’ll be happy to know that since I won’t have to worry about such things now, I won’t have to read nearly so much of that stuff you detest.”

  Uh-oh. He’d better lay in a large supply of books in verse. He’d need it to soothe her temper when she found out how he’d tricked her.

  Blast, blast, blast. He’d assumed that she’d be grateful to be free of her flighty mother and that too-serious idiot Sydney. When she discovered that marrying him had merely forced her to exchange one prison for another, she might not be so grateful. She might even resent having lost Sydney’s wealth and servants and easy life.

  He squelched the burst of unfamiliar guilt. All right, so her days might not go quite as she hoped, but at least the nights would be better than anything Sydney could give her. Of that, he was sure.

  The carriage shuddered to a halt in front of the Merivale town house, jolting her mother awake. Mrs. Merivale blinked and looked around. “Katherine… where… Oh. Forgive me, I must have dozed.” She cast him a bright smile. “You will come in and have some supper, won’t you, Lord Iversley? I daresay Lady Purefoy’s wretched fare was scarcely enough to keep a man’s body and soul together, especially after he spent the day racing about the countryside.”

  “Tempting as that sounds, I can only come in for a few minutes,” he said, as his footman hurried down the stairs to open the carriage door.

  “Nonsense, I won’t hear of it. Katherine told Cook to prepare some cold viands for our return, and it will take Thomas only a moment to set it out and uncork the wine.”

  Alec climbed down from the carriage, then handed the two ladies out. No point in waiting any longer to break the bad news to them. “Actually, I have to be up before dawn’s light. I must return to Suffolk by nightfall tomorrow.”

  “Tomorrow!” Katherine exclaimed. With a frown, she took the arm he offered her. “But you just returned!”

  After her mother took his other arm, he led them both up the stairs. “You forget that I still have my problem with the tillers—I must finish dealing with that. Not to mention that I must prepare my staff and make sure that Edenmore is in a condition suitable for your arrival.”

  “You needn’t make a fuss for me,” Katherine protested.

  “It’s no fuss, believe me. After we’re married, I want to be able to take you right home and have you be comfortable.”

  “Won’t you take a honeymoon trip first?” Mrs. Merivale asked, as they entered the house.

  “Perhaps after the spring planting is done, but not right now. As it is, I can barely spare the time to return to London for our wedding later in the week.”

  “A week is not enough time to plan a wedding, my lord,” Mrs. Merivale snapped, as Alec handed his hat and great coat to Thomas. “When you said a small ceremony, I didn’t think you meant it. Why, you’re an earl, for heaven’s sake. We should at the very least—”

  “I would prefer just ourselves. Fortunately, I’ve already acquired the special license, so as soon as I return from Suffolk we can marry.” Thank God the archbishop happened to have a son in the cavalry who sang Alec’s praises. He glanced down at Katherine. “Is that all right with you?”

  He held his breath. If Katherine preferred a big wedding some weeks hence in Heath’s End, he wasn’t sure he could keep up appearances or hide his true financial state from his skittish intended that long.

  “I don’t much care whether we have a large wedding.” Katherine lifted her troubled gaze to him as Thomas took her coat. “But a week real
ly is a short time, especially if you spend part of it in the country. You and Mama still have to speak with Papa’s solicitor and arrange the marriage settlement—”

  “Just a formality, my lord,” her mother put in quickly. “But it must be done. And you’ll be delighted to find that Katherine—”

  “—has a small dowry,” Katherine finished, casting her mother a dark look.

  He stiffened. So she didn’t trust him enough yet to tell him of her fortune. Meanwhile, he still had to evade questions about his own finances.

  Mrs. Merivale and the solicitor wouldn’t much care about his situation, however, as long as he promised Katherine a certain amount of pin money and a sufficient jointure in case he died first and left her a widow. He could promise the latter easily. By the time he died, he intended to have a substantial income.

  As for pin money, he fully intended to give Katherine a nice portion of the fortune she would inherit. He’d even be willing to offer her mother some of it in exchange for her cooperation. So he could probably manage the meeting with the solicitor without revealing too much of his current state of affairs.

  “Of course I’ll meet with your father’s solicitor, and that can be done upon my return. It shouldn’t take more than a few hours. Then we can have a small ceremony here, and afterward—”

  “No, no, my lord, how can you think of such a thing?” Mrs. Merivale let out an exasperated sigh. “But there is no use talking to a man about these things when he’s hungry.” She turned to Thomas. “Is the food laid out in the dining room?”

  “Yes, madam. I set it out as soon as I heard you drive up.”

  She waved her beringed hand toward the dining room. “Katherine, take his lordship off and feed him while I fetch the wine. And do tell your intended how impossible his plan is. Why, the wedding might not even appear in the papers if we do it his way.”

  Mrs. Merivale marched off, leaving them no choice but to follow Thomas into the dining room. But as soon as they entered, Katherine turned to the manservant. “That will be all for now, Thomas. I’ll ring if I need you.”