An Accidental Marriage (The Gentlemen’s Gamble #6)

Prologue

The sea punished The Siren with battering waves, angrily swiping its paws against the bulwark again and again in a frenzied attempt to capsize the twenty-passenger packet ship.

Charles Shepherd and his twin, Tristan, had been waiting out the storm in their own private cabin, speaking of distracting stories from their childhood before they’d been pulled into another friend’s cabin. Now, the seven childhood schoolmates squished together in the same room.

“If we die tonight, at least we die together,” Thomas had said.

With Sweden declaring war on England a few weeks before, they’d chosen to cut their Grand Tour short, though traveling across the treacherous sea from Europe to England was proving menacing enough in its own right.

The seven of them had met at Winchester when they were young. They’d managed to maintain their friendships—and their lives—until now, though many of them now believed that death was imminent.

Hence the wager Thomas had concocted. The wager they were now all agreeing to, with Charles’s turn swiftly approaching.

“If I live, I swear I’ll do my duty by Miss Delafield!” Rowan Ashworth shouted in the bunk nearby.

“You’ll never marry her!” Leonard returned in the bunk next to him.

Charles and Tristan laughed where they sat near the door of the cabin, both of them seated on stools that had been nailed to the floor.

Though they fiercely clung to the sides, occasionally one of them would fly off their perch and knock the other down.

Bruises and sore bones accompanied their unhinged laughter—laughter induced from stress, but laughter, nonetheless.

More words were spoken nearby, but Charles couldn’t hear over the sound of the raging sea and groaning bulwark.

He wasn’t particularly concerned about death or the wager.

One hundred pounds to be paid to each individual by the friend who was last to marry would hardly put a dent in his pocket case.

At any rate, he had no intention of marrying until he knew it was right—with a woman who was right for him.

Specifically a woman whom he would spend the rest of his days with, seeking one adventure after another.

“But can you beat the rest of us to the altar?” Tristan called out in response to more words Charles hadn’t heard.

Further chuckling sounded.

From his viewpoint, Charles could see each of his friends. Andrew Langford settled the swinging lantern just above another bunk as Ambrose Hartley—who they affectionally called Rosie—wiped the sweat that matted his hair against his brow.

Thomas Denby and Leonard Stanton—who had a fierce scowl on his brow—sat nearby with folded arms and wary glances cast to the walls, as if they feared the water rushing in through the slabs of wood.

They weren’t wrong to worry. But Charles had always found life to be far more exciting when not filled with trepidation.

Tristan nudged him with his boot, tossing his head to the others. Charles’s turn had come. He drew a deep breath, shouting, “I, Charles Shepherd, swear to fulfill the wager!”

Tristan followed shortly after, then the two gave each other a look. No one spoke for a moment, allowing another roaring thunder to have its time in the spotlight.

“Shouldn’t be too difficult to find a wife,” Tristan said, his voice only reaching Charles’s ear, “what with Mother’s plans to marry us off the minute we return home.”

“Precisely why I intend not to return home,” Charles countered.

“You mean to die out here?” Tristan returned with a sardonic lift of his brow.

“Death would be a thrilling adventure, but not exactly what I meant. I merely have other plans to keep me from returning to Grendale Manor for the foreseeable future.”

“Very wise!” Tristan shouted over another crack of thunder and resulting rush of waves.

More promises were set forth, and Charles clung harder to his stool. They would make it alive out of this storm. He would will it if he had to.

He hadn’t spent years at Winchester then Cambridge to end his freedom now at sea. He had his whole life ahead of him, and nothing was going to stop his next adventure from coming.

So let the ship capsize. Let the sea try to swallow him whole. Heavens, let Mother try to pressure him into a marriage.

He was ready to combat it all.