Chapter Four
Maisy waited in the room where Mrs. Dove-Lyon had left her. A large man brought in a tray with tea and biscuits, but she’d been too queasy to eat anything. Somewhere out there, her fate was being decided.
The lady entered the room alone, and Maisy stood. Was it time to meet the man that would be her husband?
“The game has been set. Do you wish to watch the lords compete for your hand?”
“Compete?” Maisy questioned. She’d had no idea how any of this worked. Perhaps if Caroline would have come with her she would not be so ill-prepared.
“Yes. Three lords have agreed to stand on the third-floor banister. The last man standing wins your hand.”
She didn’t dare to ask what happened to the men who fell. She thought it would be far worse than just losing. She also wondered if the victor wouldn’t feel as though he’d lost as well when he met her.
Maisy had not much considered what she had to offer a man. She was of usual height and size. Her hair was dark, only the light betrayed the red tinge. She didn’t think herself beautiful, but she was not dowdy either. She just… was.
Boring by anyone’s standards. She read and was able to see to the ledgers when they’d lived in Cornwall, since her father and brother never came by to see to anything. But no gentleman would care for such a skill as that.
In fact, the only thing Maisy found she was good at was looking after her brother.
“The game will begin. Do you wish to watch?”
“Watch as two gentlemen fall to their death? No, my lady, I think I should just stay here until it is decided.” Maisy took her seat and clenched her gloved fingers together in worry. “I didn’t wish for anyone to be hurt.”
The woman chuckled before turning to leave. “When I return, I will introduce you to your future husband.”
Maisy nodded, but the woman had already left. Maisy was on her feet pacing back and forth, wondering if she might hear a man’s scream at any moment as he lost the wager in the most horrific way.
Perhaps it would have been better to have watched, the anticipation was sure to kill her.
A half an hour later, Mrs. Dove-Lyon returned with her wolves. She turned to one of them before the door closed.
“Bring the captain.”
A captain? Would that mean Maisy and Jack would be forced to live on a ship?
Maisy had never stepped foot on so much as a boat, but she’d loved watching the ships at her home near St. Austell in Cornwall as they’d drifted by with their majestic sails.
She often wondered what adventures the men onboard would encounter.
Perhaps this would not be so bad. Then she heard footsteps and turned to see the man who entered behind the wolf.
She recognized him, and for a moment her mind struggled to remember where she knew him from. She had limited acquaintance with sea captains. But then he stepped closer and she saw the green of his eyes. The same bright, grass-color of the man she’d sullied the night before.
“You,” he said, his dark brows creasing his forehead.
“Oh, even better. It seems the two of you are acquainted,” the woman said before whispering, “Titan, go get the minister from the whist table. Tell him he has a wedding to perform.”
Maisy thought she might be sick all over this man yet again.
For a moment, Iain thought his eyes betrayed him. But it was indeed the woman who had vomited on him only the night before. He wondered why she was here at all. He only wanted to get his money and leave.
He turned as Hodge came in with a smile.
“I told you, you couldn’t lose, Capt’n. You did a fine job of it, you did.”
Iain nodded, though a good part of his winning the contest had fallen to luck. Had it just been standing on the banister, he could have done so for hours, but doing so while also balancing a teacup filled to the top with tea? That had been something he’d never needed to do.
He’d also worried over the other two lords, but only until Titan came forth and tied an elaborate knot in a length of rope around their chests. If they fell, they would not be killed.
“Bessie can’t have your brains sully her playing tables,” Titan had said with a smirk. In another situation, Iain might have asked the man to join his crew on The Rue, but it was clear the man was happy in his employment with the widow.
So the game was played with the two lords lasting longer than Iain expected, but eventually they moved and tipped until he was the last man standing.
In a show of excitement, he took the cup and drained it before hoping down to the third floor.
It was only as he swallowed that he came to realize the brown liquid had not been tea, but whisky.
The surprise of the burn made him cough for a moment before Hodge was there pounding him on the back in excitement.
And then they’d been brought to this room where he thought he would get his prize, but was now face to face with the woman who had been drunk the first time he met her.
Now, however, her golden eyes were sharp on his face. Her skin was creamy with a blush on her cheeks instead of the sickly green she’d been the last time they’d met. Still, it didn’t matter. He wasn’t there for her, but for his money.
“Miss Bennett, may I make known to you, Lord Kesson, your groom,” Mrs. Dove-Lyon said.
“What? Groom?” Iain turned to her, but Hodge tugged on his arm.
“This is how it’s done. The lady is a matchmaker. She finds women who have coin but no means of obtaining a husband, and set up a game to determine who will take the lady’s hand.”
Iain frowned and shook his head. “The contract I signed said I would win a sum of thirty-thousand pounds.”
The lady tilted her head and Iain wanted to remove the veil so he could see what she was thinking.
“The contract said you’d be married to a lady whose dowry was the sum of thirty-thousand pounds,” the woman clarified and nodded to one of her wolves who came forward with the blasted document he’d signed. He’d not tell them he’d not been able to read it in full.
He turned to Hodge and whispered, “I can’t marry her.”
“Why’s that? It was the plan all along, it just happened faster than we’d expected. All the better, aye? Besides, she’s bonny. If she has the dowry she should do nicely,” Hodge said looking the woman—his bride—over as if she were chattel.
It was true that she looked far better than she had the night before, but he didn’t need to take on the burden of a woman who had a high taste for spirits.
“She’s the one who cast up her accounts on my silly slippers last night.”
Hodge frowned. “She looks quite proper to me.”
“She was dressed proper last night, but she was still foxed. You know well, that drink curses anyone who clings to it.”
Hodge nodded and looked toward the woman in black.
“She can’t make you marry a woman already married to the bottle. You’ll not have a wife with demons from blue ruin.”
“Nay. It wasn’t gin, but wine.”
His would-be bride stepped up, interrupting their whispered discussion.
“I can assure you it was the first and last time I ever drink so much wine again. Or perhaps ever.” Her slender hand came to rest on her stomach and her creamy skin darkened the slightest tinge of green.
“Lord Iain Douglas, Earl of Kesson, may I make known to you, your bride, Madalene Bennett.”
She dipped the slightest amount and he bowed as he’d been taught by his mother. When he rose, they simply stared at each other. Hodge cleared his throat calling his attention away from the woman he was to marry.
“The conditions,” Hodge whispered, reminding Iain that while he didn’t care much if the woman drank or didn’t, there was something she needed to have for his plans to work out.
“Right.” He turned to the woman who had forced him into this arrangement. “I trust she has what I need?”
“Yes. As agreed, thirty-thousand pounds. Enough to cover my fees, and still leave you a hefty sum.” The woman turned to his bride, Madalene. “The lady has a condition of her own.”
Madalene swallowed nervously before speaking.
“Yes. You see, I need to be able to bring my younger brother with me. It is imperative that you can provide a home for both my brother and I, together.”
Iain waited to see if there was more, but the lady simply folded her hands together in front of her and waited. Iain turned to Hodge who Iain blamed for getting him into this mess. The man simply shrugged.
“You’ll be moving to my castle in Scotland. You can bring whomever you wish.”
The woman’s gold eyes widened and she smiled. Seeing it stunned him briefly before she quelled it to bow again.
“Thank you, Lord Kesson.”
“No. Not Lord Kesson. Just Iain,” he told her. Not that he knew why he cared to set her straight. He wouldn’t be spending any time with her past getting her set up in the castle.
Madalene seemed startled by his demand but simply nodded.
“Thank you, Iain,” she corrected as a strange sensation fluttered in his chest. Perhaps it was only fear that he’d spend the rest of his time with her covered in vomit.