Earl of Davenport by Maggie Dallen

Author:Maggie Dallen [Dallen, Maggie]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2018-02-19T18:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER FIVE

Anne managed to hold back the tears until she was alone in her room at the inn.

The moment the maid shut the door shut behind her she let out the sob that had been choking her throat for the last several hours.

The devil and his bastard bride.

The words played through her mind, mocking her as they’d ridden in silence for the remainder of the journey. With that one sentence he’d brought her back to reality. With those few words he’d broken through the silly, romantic daydream she’d been harboring all morning.

Who was she fooling? It was a girlish fantasy that had lingered from childhood, ever since that first time he had come to her defense. Back then she hadn’t understood what the jibes had meant. That awful bully had been years older and far more worldly than she. All she’d known was that she was being offended, mocked, degraded… and Frederick, the future Earl of Davenport, had come to her aid.

Ever since that moment she’d come to think of him as her own personal knight in shining armor. She’d heard the stories of his wicked ways but had always insisted that he wasn’t as bad as everyone believed. She’d thought she’d seen something in him. A kindness, a goodness, a wild spirit that was woefully misunderstood. She’d thought perhaps it was something only she could see.

She’d even suspected, or perhaps hoped, they’d shared that secret. That connection.

Falling back against the closed door, she bit her lip to stifle another sob. Perhaps she had just been a fool.

After her initial shock over that morning’s proposal, she’d rushed to her room to pack and had allowed her girlish daydreams to sweep over her, clouding her judgment and coloring the situation in a rosy romantic hue.

When Jed had tried to talk to her about her decision, she had waved him off, certain that any objections he might have over this marriage or the quick wedding were unfounded. She’d actually managed to convince herself that the proposal and the rushed wedding were romantic, that he hadn’t wanted to wait another moment to make her his wife. When, in fact, his decision to marry her and his haste had been all in the name of mockery. There was no other way to see it. He hadn’t wanted her for her, he’d wanted a scandal. He’d wanted to shock the ton by marrying a woman with whispers attached to her name. And he’d wanted to do it quickly to get the most out of this latest shock.

Tears choked her and she pressed her lips together to stifle them. She shouldn’t be upset. This shouldn’t have come as a surprise. She was an intelligent woman—most of the time, at least. She’d been raised with low expectations when it came to marriage and her standing in society.

The urge to sob again was so overpowering it caused her chest to tighten painfully. She’d never expected to marry well, so instead she’d garnered an altogether more ludicrous hope… that she might marry for love.

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