CHAPTER SIX
"Now then," he said. "Shall we discuss the matter that brought you here?"
The drawing room was smaller than Harriet had expected, intimate, with a fire crackling in the grate and comfortable chairs arranged before it. Davies poured two glasses of sherry and handed her one before settling into the chair across from her.
"Please."
"Your family owes me nearly eight thousand pounds. A considerable sum, as I'm sure you're aware."
"I am aware, my lord. That's why I'm here."
"And what exactly are you proposing?" Davies swirled his sherry, watching her over the rim. "I presume you haven't come all this way simply to acknowledge the debt."
"I've come to negotiate. To see if we might reach some arrangement that satisfies us both."
"What sort of arrangement?"
Harriet took a breath, organising her thoughts.
"Extended payment terms, perhaps. Or a partial settlement now, with a guarantee of full payment once the estate's finances stabilise. We've recently discovered some potential assets that may significantly improve our situation."
"Potential assets?"
"Mining rights. Coal, possibly. It's being investigated."
"Possibly." Davies's smile was knowing. "That's rather a lot of uncertainty for a man owed eight thousand pounds."
"It's also rather a lot of potential profit, should the surveys prove promising."
"True." Davies set down his glass and leaned forward. "But I'm a practical man, Lady Harriet. I deal in certainties, not possibilities. And the certain fact is that your family owes me money it cannot pay."
"Which is why I'm here. To find another way."
"Yes. Another way." Davies's eyes held hers, something calculating in their blue depths. "I've been thinking about that. About what you might offer that would be worth more to me than eight thousand pounds."
Harriet's stomach tightened. "And what have you concluded?"
"That there is, in fact, something you could offer. Something I want rather badly."
"Which is?"
Davies rose and moved to stand before the fireplace, his back to her. When he turned, his expression was serious, the first time she had seen him without his mask of charming affability.
"I am three and thirty years old," he said. "I have wealth, properties and great influence. What I do not have is a wife."
Harriet felt the floor shift beneath her feet. "My lord…"
“Pray, indulge me a few more moments.” Davies held up a hand. "I know this seems sudden. We've only just met. But I am not a man who wastes time on courtship rituals when I see something I want."
"And you want... me?"
"I want a wife of good family, with wit and intelligence and the social skills to manage a household like mine.
You meet all those requirements admirably.
" Davies's smile returned, but it was sharper now, more predatory.
"I also want a woman who understands the practical realities of matrimony.
Who won't expect me to be faithful or romantic or any of the other nonsense that women typically demand. "
"You're proposing a matrimony of convenience."
"I'm proposing an arrangement that benefits us both. You become Lady Davies. Your family's debts are cleared…all of them, not just mine. You'll have everything you could possibly want: gowns, jewels, a house in London, complete financial security." Davies moved closer.
"In return, I get a wife who can manage my social obligations and provide an heir. After that, you may do as you please, and I shall do as I please, and we shall both be perfectly content."
It was, Harriet had to admit, a remarkably frank proposal. No pretense of affection, no false promises. Just a transaction, laid out in clear terms.
She thought of Fordshire Park. Of her mother, frail and worried in her bed. Of Sebastian, offering to forgive the debt and being refused. Of all the impossible choices that had brought her to this moment.
"I need time," she heard herself say. "To consider."
"Of course." Davies smiled, victory already gleaming in his eyes. "Take all the time you need. Though I should mention, the offer expires at month's end. I am patient, but not infinitely so."
"I understand."
“Very well.” He moved to the door and opened it for her. "Shall I escort you to your rooms?"
"I can find my own way." Harriet rose, her legs unsteady beneath her. "Thank you for your... candor, Lord Davies."
"I find honesty so much more efficient than games. Don't you agree?"
She did not answer. She walked past him into the corridor, her mind reeling with everything that had just happened.
Two proposals now. Two men offering to solve her family's problems in exchange for her hand. One who had refused to take advantage of her desperation. One who had no such qualms.
The choice should have been obvious.
So why did she feel so utterly lost?
***
Sebastian was not in the library.
Harriet searched for him anyway, wandering through the darkened rooms of Davies Hall like a ghost seeking something she couldn't name.
She needed to talk to someone. She needed to make sense of what had just happened.
And somehow, impossibly, the person she wanted to talk to was the same man she had spent seven years avoiding.
She found him in the corridor outside her suite, pacing like a caged animal.
"Harriet." He stopped the moment he saw her, his eyes scanning her face with an intensity that made her breath catch. "What happened? What did he say?"
"Nothing. Everything." She shook her head. "I don't know how to…"
"Did he hurt you? Did he try anything…"
"No. No, nothing like that." Harriet leaned against the wall, suddenly exhausted. "He proposed."
Sebastian went very still. "He proposed."
“Matrimony. He wants to enter into matrimony with me.”
"And what did you say?"
"I said I needed time to deliberate."
Something flickered across Sebastian's face…relief, maybe, or something more complicated. "That's... wise."
"Is it? I'm not sure anything about this situation is wise." Harriet laughed, a hollow sound. "He's offering to clear all our debts. Every single one. Not just his, but the others as well. In exchange for my hand."
"That's generous of him."
"Is it? Or is it simply the price he's calculated I'm worth?"
Sebastian didn't answer. He was watching her with an expression she couldn't read, his grey eyes dark in the dim corridor.
"He was very honest about what he wants," Harriet continued.
"A wife who understands the realities of matrimony. Who won't expect fidelity or romance. Who will give him an heir and then leave him to his amusements." She heard the bitterness in her own voice and couldn't quite suppress it.
"It's a practical arrangement. Everyone wins."
"Do they?"
"Don't I?" Harriet pushed away from the wall, her voice rising.
"My family keeps our home. I become a wealthy countess. Lord Davies gets a suitable wife. What's not to win?"
"What about love?" Sebastian's voice was very quiet. "What about happiness?"
"Love is a luxury. I believe you told me that yourself, once."
"I never…" Sebastian stopped, shaking his head. "I would never tell you that."
"Perhaps not in so many words. But you refused to wed me when you had the chance, didn't you? Because I would be entering out of desperation rather than desire. Because you didn't want a wife who had no other choice."
"That's not the same thing."
"Isn't it? Lord Davies has no such qualms. He sees a transaction and he's willing to make it. Maybe that's more honest than all your noble refusals."
"Honest?" Sebastian's voice cracked. "You think it's honest to purchase a wife like livestock at auction?"
"I think it's no different from any other social matrimony. At least Davies isn't pretending there's anything romantic about it."
"And that's what you want? A matrimony with no pretense of feeling? A husband who will abandon you the moment you've served your purpose?"
"What I want is irrelevant." Harriet could feel tears prickling at her eyes and blinked them back furiously.
"What matters is what I can provide for my family. And Lord Davies is offering to provide everything."
"Harriet…"
"Don't." She held up a hand. "Don't tell me I deserve better. Don't tell me there are other options. I've heard it all before, and it doesn't change anything."
"You're not actually considering this." Sebastian's voice was rough. "Tell me you're not actually considering entering into matrimony with that man."
"Why shouldn't I? Give me one good reason why I shouldn't accept his offer."
The challenge hung in the air between them. Harriet could see Sebastian struggling with something, his hands clenched at his sides, his jaw tight with tension.
"Because you would be miserable," he said finally. "Because you deserve a husband who sees you as more than a convenient arrangement. Because…"
"Because what?"
Sebastian took a step toward her. His eyes were blazing now, all his careful control stripped away.
"Because I did not refuse to buy you just to watch you sell yourself to someone else."
The words hit Harriet like a physical blow. She stared at him, her heart pounding, trying to understand what he was saying.
"What do you mean?"
"I mean…" Sebastian broke off, running a hand through his hair in frustration.
"I mean that I have spent the last week watching you, helping you, trying to find some way to save your family that didn't require you to sacrifice yourself.
And now you're standing here telling me you're going to wed Davies, and I… "
"You what?"
"I can't." His voice cracked. "I can't stand by and watch you do this. Not to him. Not to anyone."
"Why not? What does it matter to you who I wed?"
"It matters." Sebastian's voice dropped to something barely above a whisper.
"It matters more than I can possibly explain."