LITMIR.BIZ

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is going on here?’ Richard asked from the doorway. Her heart did a crazy leap and she remembered how he’d kissed her so thoroughly last night. ‘Did no one think to invite me to the family party?’

      Sophie gulped. Richard had arrived at precisely the wrong moment. ‘I was just explaining how we met.’

      ‘In Liverpool?’ His face seemed to be carved from stone, but his eyes flickered between her and his father.

      Sophie stood up and linked her arm with his. ‘The true circumstances.’

      The colour drained from Richard’s face. ‘Did you volunteer the information, Sophie?’

      ‘The nineteenth of March is your father’s birthday.’

      ‘I know when my father’s birthday is.’

      ‘The ship was launched on the nineteenth,’ Sophie explained evenly, willing him to understand the problem. ‘My stepmother noted it in her diary.’

      ‘But you said late March.’

      ‘In my world, the nineteenth is late March.’

      Richard put a hand to his throbbing head. His quick visit to his mother and sister had turned into a disaster of epic proportions. His mother had flown into hysterics, making all sorts of wild accusations about his father and what he’d do to her and how Sophie was sure to be a she-devil. In the end, he had gone for the doctor, who sedated her with laudanum. Richard waited with a terrified Hannah until his mother slept and then had left for home.

      All he had wanted to do was to sink deep inside Sophie and forget the trauma. He wanted to enjoy further awakening Sophie’s passionate nature and making her truly his own.

      He had hopes that Sophie would have remained asleep while he was away, but she was nowhere to be seen and neither was there a note. The rooms were devoid of life. The pit of his stomach roiled. Abandoned again. Always. It hurt that he cared when she cared so little.

      Luckily Myers had returned from shopping for the ingredients for his black boot polish and volunteered the information that Sophie and her maid had gone to her stepmother’s to get more clothes. Richard had not stopped to change his neckcloth, but had hurried off.

      Now, rather than collecting Sophie and departing with all speed, he had to cope with more trauma—his father and Sophie’s confession. There had been no need to check the date of the Liverpool launch before. It hadn’t been important.

      ‘I hadn’t realised the launch was on the nineteenth,’ he admitted as evenly as he could. ‘The nineteenth is my father’s birthday. I always spend that day with my father.’

      ‘So Lord Hallington informed my stepmother. They were in midst of an argument about it when I arrived.’ Sophie held out her hands. Her blue eyes were wide and pleading. ‘You can see why I had to tell them. My stepmother thinks it very romantic what you did. Apparently it is just like in one of her novels.’

      He was suddenly glad that Sophie knew nothing about his mother or Hannah. She would have been unable to resist telling his father and then all hell would have broken loose and Sophie would have been hurt, used as a pawn or worse. His parents were his burden, not Sophie’s. He had made her marry him. She had not asked for the craziness of his family.

      He ran his hand through his hair and peered more closely at his father, searching for signs of his temper. One hysterical parent on the day after his wedding was enough, two were unthinkable. Against the odds, his father appeared happy with the situation, far happier than he’d seen his father in a long time.

      ‘You did admirably, my boy,’ his father said. ‘I can see why you decided to remain in the north, and why you married Sophie so quickly. You were always headstrong, but a good woman is hard to find.’

      ‘You approve?’

      ‘Yes, I approve!’ His father clapped his hands together. ‘I’m utterly impressed and astonished. Despite the unorthodox meeting and courtship, you managed to find the sort of woman I have always wanted for you. Your aunt as usual wrote a load of blathering nonsense. I should have guessed. No sense about pigs, none whatsoever about people!’

      ‘Then you won’t mind if I take my bride away now?’ Richard put a hand on Sophie’s shoulder and felt her flesh quiver under his fingers. Today could be redeemed. ‘We did only marry yesterday.’

      ‘We entirely understand,’ Mrs Ravel said with a beatific smile. ‘I was surprised to see Sophie here. I would have thought you’d depart on your wedding trip today. Sophie’s father took me to Paris and then to Venice.’

      ‘When do you leave for your wedding trip, Richard?’ his father asked.

      Richard froze. This was his chance to get his father to leave without causing a scene or alarming Sophie.

      ‘Richard and I have decided to postpone the wedding trip so that you will have time to get to know me,’ Sophie said before he had uttered a word.

      His father’s eyes widened. ‘I had no wish …’

      ‘But we do.’ Sophie darted forwards and gave his father a kiss on the cheek. ‘It will mean so much to both Richard and me. You are part of my family now. And you travelled on a train for the first time. Trains can be rather overwhelming. The noise, the dirt and the steam.’

      Tears came into his father’s eyes. ‘Bless you, child. I will look into taking rooms. There is much to admire about this city. I haven’t been here since I was a young man. The pigs will have to do without me for a while. My new daughter requires me.’

      Richard forced his jaw to relax. His father had never done that for him—put him ahead of the pigs. Sophie with her impulsive invitation had just closed the one bright hope in his life—that his father would leave Newcastle quickly. His father would now stay and his own problems had grown. Somehow he had to figure out how he was going to protect Sophie and keep her from being used as a pawn.

      ‘What do you think you were playing at, Sophie?’ Richard exploded the instant he shut their bedroom door. ‘Leaving like that! No note. Nothing.’

      Sophie dropped her reticule on the ground. She had known something was wrong by his silence on the journey back and the way he’d marched into their bedroom. True, he’d been charming at her stepmother’s, but he had insisted they leave immediately after he’d finished his cup of tea, not even waiting for Jane and her dresses.

      ‘I don’t know what you are talking about.’ Sophie crossed her arms and readied for war. He’d been the one to be out when she awoke.

      ‘You failed to leave a note.’ He ran his hand through his hair. ‘I had no idea where you were when I returned.’

      Sophie tapped her foot on the ground. All the hurt and anger from earlier rose within her. He dared to complain about her absence when he couldn’t be bothered to be there when she woke! She was the one who should be angry, not he. He should be on his knees in abject apology, rather than demanding explanations. ‘You also failed to leave a note. I had no idea where you were. I refuse to wait around in rented rooms, hoping you might put in an appearance before nightfall.’

      His mouth twisted. ‘You decided to serve me back?’

      ‘No, I let Myers know where I was and when I expected to return.’ Sophie stuck her chin in the air. ‘I needed my dresses which button down the front. I refuse to be stuck somewhere naked simply because all my clothing requires the assistance of a lady’s maid.’

      She waited for him to accept the truth.

      He glared at her. ‘Did you have to tell my father about how we met?’

      ‘I had little choice.’ Sophie met his gaze with a furious one of her own. ‘I could hardly lie to him. You saw how it was. Undone by a date. It had to come out sooner or later. The truth always does. My stepmother took it very well and your father as well.’

      ‘Who else will learn of the truth?’

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