A Rogue by Any Other Name (The Rules of Scoundrels #1)(10)

Which was why she hadn’t said yes.

In all her years, she’d never once imagined marrying Tommy.

He’d never been the one of whom she dreamed.

“It’s not important why he asked,” Lady Needham interjected. “What’s important is that he was willing to take in Penelope! That he was willing to give her a home and a name and care for her as your father has for all these years!” She leveled Penelope with a look. “Penelope, you must think, darling! When your father dies! What then?”

Lord Needham looked up from his pheasant. “I beg your pardon?”

Lady Needham waved one hand in the air as though she hadn’t time to think about her husband’s feelings, instead prodding, “He shan’t live forever, Penelope! What then?”

Penelope could not think of why this was in any way relevant. “Well, that shall be very sad, I imagine.”

Lady Needham shook her head in frustration. “Penelope!”

“Mother, I honestly have no idea what you are implying.”

“Who will take care of you? When your father dies?”

“Is Father planning to die soon?”

“No,” her father said.

“One never knows!” Tears were welling in the marchioness’s eyes.

“Oh, for God’s—” Lord Needham had had enough. “I’m not dying. And I take no small amount of offense in the fact that the thought simply rolled off your tongue.” He turned to Penelope. “And as for you, you’ll marry.”

Penelope straightened her shoulders. “This is not the Middle Ages, Father. You cannot force me to marry someone I do not wish to marry.”

Lord Needham had little interest in the rights of women. “I’ve five daughters and no sons, and I’ll be damned if I leave a single one of you unmarried and fending for yourself while that idiot nephew of mine runs my estate into the ground.” He shook his head. “I will see you married, Penelope, and married well. And it’s time you stop dickering around and accept yourself a suit.”

Penelope’s eyes went wide. “You think I’ve been dickering around?”

“Penelope, language. Please.”

“To be fair, Mother, he did say it first,” Pippa pointed out.

“Irrelevant! I didn’t raise you girls to speak like common . . . common . . . oh, you know.”

“Of course you’ve been dickering around. It’s been eight years since the Leighton debacle. You’re the daughter of a double marquess with the money of Midas.”

“Needham! How crass!”

Lord Needham looked to the ceiling for patience. “I don’t know what you’ve been waiting for, but I do know I’ve coddled you too long, ignoring the fact that the Leighton debacle cast a pall over the lot of you.” Penelope looked to her sisters, who were both staring down at their laps. Guilt whispered through her as her father continued, “I’m through with it. You’ll marry this season, Penny.”

Penelope’s throat was working like mad, struggling to swallow against the knot of sawdust that appeared to have become lodged there. “But . . . no one but Tommy has proposed to me in four years.”

“Tommy’s just the beginning. They’ll propose now.” She’d seen the look of complete certainty in her father’s eyes enough times in her life to know that he was right.

She looked her father straight in the eye. “Why?”

“Because I’ve added Falconwell to your dowry.”

He said it in the manner in which one would say things like, It’s a bit cold. Or, This fish needs more salt. As though everyone at the table would simply accept the words as truth. As though four heads would not turn to him, eyes wide, jaws dropped.

“Oh! Needham!” Lady Needham was off again.

Penelope did not take her gaze from her father. “I beg your pardon?”

A memory flashed. A laughing, dark-haired boy, clinging to a low branch of a massive willow tree, reaching down and urging Penelope to join him in his hiding place.

The third of the trio.

Falconwell was Michael’s.

Even if it hadn’t belonged to him in a decade, she’d always think of it that way. It did not feel right that it was somehow, strangely, hers now. All that beautiful, lush land, everything but the house and immediate grounds—the entail.

Michael’s birthright.

Now hers.

“How did you get Falconwell?”

“How is not relevant,” the marquess said, not looking up from his meal. “I can’t have you risking your sisters’ successes on the marriage mart any longer. You need to get yourself married. You shan’t be a spinster for the rest of your days; Falconwell will ensure it. Already has, it looks like. If you don’t like Tommy, I’ve already a half dozen letters of interest from men across Britain.”

Men who wanted Falconwell.

Let me protect you.

Tommy’s strange words from earlier made sense now. He’d proposed to keep her from the mess of proposals that would come for her dowry. He’d proposed because he was her friend.

And he’d proposed for Falconwell. There was a small parcel of land belonging to Viscount Langford on the far side of Falconwell. Someday, it would be Tommy’s and, if she married him, he’d have Falconwell to add to it.