Read Online Lord Ashford's Wager by Marjorie Farrell - Free Book Online Page B

am sorry to have to disappoint you, Justin. But I know that Tony and I are well matched.” She smiled up as though Justin had answered her. “Yes, yes, there is a slight difference in our ages and he needs my money—but with all that, there is a chance for real love, I think. It seems I am as much a gambler as Tony, for I am willing to take my chances on that. And I could never have married Mark, my dear.”
    “I am very sorry to hear that, Claudia,” said a voice behind her.
    Claudia nearly fell off the sofa. “What are you doing here at this hour, Mark? Who let you in?” She was so furious at having her privacy violated that she didn’t even care what he had overheard.
    “I came at once when I heard Ashford had escorted you home. I was afraid you would succumb to his wheedling charm, and now I hear that you have. James let me in.”
    “Well, I will have to speak with James in the morning,” replied Claudia, getting up and walking to the door.
    Mark blocked her way. “Oh, no, you are not leaving yet.”
    “Get out of my way, Mark, before I call for James and embarrass us both.” Mark didn’t move.
    “Get out of my way,” Claudia repeated.
    “Get out of your way? When you have been in my way these past seventeen years! No, my lady, you are going to hear me out,” said Mark, grabbing her by the shoulders and backing her toward the sofa. He gave one shove and Claudia sat down with a gasp.
    “How dare you touch me like that! Justin would have horsewhipped you.”
    “Yes? Well, Justin is gone, although that was quite a touching monologue I overheard. And Justin was a fool.”
    “Justin’s little finger was worth more than every bone in your body, sir!”
    Mark kept talking as though he hadn’t even heard her. As though, Claudia thought, she wasn’t even there.
    “First, he had to go and marry a seventeen-year-old. Every summer I would dread my visit, worrying that you would at last be increasing. And every summer my hopes would rise again. But then I’d spend the whole year worrying. Of course, after a few years it did seem unlikely, and then, just not possible. No way of knowing, of course, if it was you or Justin to blame, but it is usually the woman’s fault, I understand,” he added contemptuously. “Then when Justin died… Well, that was a wonderful day.”
    Claudia made a sound between a laugh and a sob, but Mark just went on as though he hadn’t heard her.
    “Until they read the will. Oh, yes, I got the title and the estate. They were entailed, he had no choice. But you…you got everything else, everything I’d worked for and waited for all those years.”
    “Justin had worked for it. And Justin gave you more than enough to support both the estate and yourself in style.”
    Mark looked down, and the hatred in his eyes frightened her so much that she sank back into the sofa.
    “I think you are right about one thing, Claudia. I think Justin set up his will to bring us together. That way, I would have both the title and the fortune.”
    “But according to your reasoning, no heir.”
    “Who knows what might have happened, Claudia, who knows? But now it is too late. Or is it, my dear? Are you really going to marry that irresponsible boy, Cousin Claudia?”
    “Lord Ashford is not a boy, Mark. He is a young man who temporarily caved in under tremendous pressure. He has convinced me that he is to be trusted and, more important, he cares about me. And I care for him. You care for no one but yourself. I always suspected it, but I never disillusioned Justin.”
    “How kind of you.” Mark sat down next to her, and only with the greatest effort could Claudia keep herself from shrinking away from him.
    “I was hoping Ashford would not redeem himself…or his vowels,” added Mark with a humorless chuckle at his own pun. “But it seems he has.”
    “Yes. As of tonight, we are betrothed.”
    “And if you marry and should you conceive, then all that money is lost to me forever. I cannot let that