“I love you, Marks. My heart is completely and utterly yours. And unfortunately for you, the rest of me comes with it.”
“There are some experiences in life they haven't invented the right words for.”
“I know I'm a bad bargain. But I'm begging you to have me anyway. Because I want a chance to make you as happy as you make me. I want to build a life with you."
He fought to steady his voice. "Please come to me, Cat, because there's no surviving you. You don't have to love me back. You don't have to be mine. Just let me be yours.”
“You are not a perfect woman.You have an evil temper, you’re as blind as a mole, you’re a deplorable poet, and frankly, your French accent could use some work.” Supporting himself on his elbows, Leo took her face in his hands. “But when I put those things together with the rest of you, it makes you into the most perfectly imperfect woman I’ve ever known.”
“You seem to think you have a choice," Cam said. "But you have it backwards. Love chooses you. The shadow moves as the sun commands.”
“Oh, I have a very pure soul. It's only my private parts that have gotten me into trouble".”
“I have never said this to anyone before.” Leo’s voice was like ragged velvet. “But the idea of you with child is the most insanely arousing thing I’ve ever imagined. Your belly all swollen, your breasts heavy, the funny little way you would walk … I would worship you. I would take care of your every need. And everyone would know that I’d made you that way, that you belonged to me.”
“I’ve told you before, I love like a madman,” he said. “Immoderate, jealous, possessive...I’m absolutely intolerable.”
“It's the perfect solution. We argue all the time. We can't stand each other. It's like we're already married.”
“And then to Leo’s surprise, Catherine smiled at him. A sweet, natural, brilliant smile, the first she had ever given him. Leo felt his chest tighten, and he went hot all over, as if some euphoric drug had gone straight to his nervous system.
It felt like … happiness.
He remembered happiness from a long time ago. He didn’t want to feel it. And yet the giddy warmth kept washing over him for no reason whatsoever.
“Thank you,” Catherine said, the smile still hovering on her lips. “That is kind of you, my lord. But I will never dance with you.”
Which, of course, made it the goal of Leo’s life.”
“You’re far too prickly tempered to be a mistress. You’re far better suited as a wife.”
“Ah, there’s the governess voice. All stern and disapproving. It makes me feel like a naughty schoolboy.”
“So you actually need spectacles,” Leo finally said.
“Of course I do,” Marks said crossly. “Why would I wear spectacles if I didn’t need them?”
“I thought they might be part of your disguise.”
“My disguise?”
“Yes, Marks, disguise. A noun describing a means of concealing someone’s identity. Often used by clowns and spies. And now apparently governesses. Good God, can anything be ordinary for my family?”
“They (mothers-in-law) never leave when they say they will. When my mother-in-law visits, the mice throw themselves at the cat, begging to be eaten.”
“I am illegitimate," she said distinctly, as if he were a foreigner trying to learn English. "You are a viscount. You can't marry a bastard."
"What about the Duke of Clarence? He had ten bastard children by that actress...what was her name..."
"Mrs. Jordan."
"Yes, that one, Their children were all illegitimate, but some of them married peers."
"You're not the Duke of Clarence."
"That's right. I'm not a blueblood any more than you are. I inherited the title purely by happenstance"
"That doesn't matter. If your married me, it would be scandalous and inappropriate, and doors would be closed to you."
"Good God, woman, I let two of my sisters marry Gypsies. Those doors have already been closed, bolted, and nailed shut.”
“Leo smiled and stroked her hair. 'We'll both be fine, Marks. We've just begun our journey...and there's so much we have yet to do.' He spoke more softly as he heard her breathing turn even and steady. 'Rest against my heart. Let me watch over your dreams. And know that tomorrow morning, and every morning after that, you'll awaken next to someone who loves you.'
'Dodger?' she mumbled against his chest, and he grinned.
'No, your confounded ferret will have to stay in his basket. I was referring to myself.'
'Yes, I know.' Catherine slid her hand up to his cheek. 'Only you,' she said. 'Always you.”
“Marriage would change hardly anything between us, except that we would end our arguments in a much more satisfying way. And of course I would have extensive legal rights over your body, your property, and all your individual freedoms, but I don't see what's so alarming about that.”
“Cat doesn’t have to work. She’s a woman of independent means. I settled enough money on her to allow her the freedom to do anything she wished. She went to boarding school for four years, and stayed to teach for another two. Eventually she came to me and said she’d accepted a position as a governess for the Hathaway family. I believe you were in France with Win at the time. Cat went for the interview, Cam and Amelia liked her, Beatrix and Poppy clearly needed her, and no one seemed inclined to question her lack of experience.”
“Of course not,” Leo said acidly. “My family would never bother with something so insignificant as job experience. I’m sure they started the interview by asking what her favorite color was.”
“Tell me about our legal issues. And use small words. I don't like to think at this hour of the morning. It hurts."
~Leo to Merripen”
“Coming forward with a placating smile, Win handed him a piece of paper. "Of course we would never want to force you into a loveless marriage, dear. But we have put together a list of prospective brides, all of them lovely girls. Won't you take a glance and see if any of them appeals to you?"
Deciding to humor her, Leo looked down at the list. "Marietta Newbury?"
"Yes," Amelia said. "What's wrong with her?"
"I don't like her teeth."
"What about Isabella Charrington?"
"I don't like her mother."
"Lady Blossom Tremaine?"
"I don't like her name."
"Oh, for heaven's sake, Leo, that's not her fault."
"I don't care. I can't have a wife named Blossom. Every night I would feel as if I were calling in one of the cows." Leo lifted his gaze heavenward. "I might as well marry the first woman off the street. Why, I'd be better off with Marks."
Everyone was silent.”
“Win told me that one isn’t improved by being at the top of the mountain, one is improved by the climb.”
“Has she accepted you?"
"Not yet.She wants to discuss it with you first."
"Thank God.Because I'll tell her that it's the worst idea I've ever heard."
Leo arched a brow."You doubt I could protect her?"
"I doubt you could keep from murdering each other!I doubt she could ever be happy in such volatile circumstances.I doubt...no,I won't bother listing all my concerns,it would take too bloody long." Harry's eyes were ice-cold. "The answer is no,Ramsay.I'll do what is necessary to take care of Cat.You can return to Hampshire."
"I'm afraid it won't be that easy to get rid of me," Leo said."Perhaps you didn't notice that I haven't asked for your permission.There is no choice.Certain things have happened that can't be undone.Do you understand?"
He saw from Harry's expression that only a few fragile constraints stood between him and certain death.
"You seduced her deliberately," Harry managed to say.
"Would you be happier if I claimed it was an accident?"
"The only thing that would make me happy is to weight you with rocks and toss you into the Thames."
"I understand.I even sympathize.I can't imagine what it would be like to face a man who's compromised your sister,how difficult it would be to keep from murdering him on the spot.Oh, but wait.." Leo tapped a forefinger thoughtfully on his chin. "I can imagine.Because I went through it two bloody months ago."
Harry's eyes narrowed."That wasn't the same.Your sister was still a virgin when I married her."
Leo gave him an unrepenting glance. "When I compromise a woman,I do it properly."
"That does it," Harry muttered, leaping for his throat.”
“I, cruel to Marks? I'm the one you should worry about. After a conversation with her, I usually walk away with my entrails dragging behind me.”
“Was this some new level of depravity? Had he developed a spinster fetish?”
“Fencing isn't really fighting. It's more like chess with the risk of puncture wounds”
“Rest against my heart. Let me watch over your dreams. And know that tomorrow morning, and every morning after that, you'll awaken next to someone who loves you.”
“If you married me,it would be scandalous and innapropriate, and doors would be closed to you."
"Good God, woman, I let two of my sisters marry Gypsies. Those doors have already been closed, bolted, and nailed shut.”
“Please come to me, Cat, because there's no surviving you. You don't have to love me back. You don't have to be mine. Just let me be yours.”
“Easy, Marks,' he whispered. 'One of us has to have some self-control, and it really should be you.”
“Women. You'll interpret anything as love. You see a man wearing an idiotic expression, and you assume he's been struck by Cupid's arrow when in reality, he's digesting a bad turnip.”
“the more he learned, the more he realized that there is too much to learn in anyone’s lifetime.”
“He can see what move I'm planning to make in chess and counters before I can do it. He always knows who the killer is in a detective story. I think he could make a career out of detecting, but he wants to write plays for theater. Maybe he could be a Shakespeare instead of a Sherlock. He could be anything. Anything he wants to be.”
“I realized, then, that being an adult was just about bullshitting everyone around you. Just do things until someone stops you from doing those things, and then say, “Oh, that isn’t allowed?”
“Are you at work?" I asked.
Not precisely, but that's a good suggestion....”
“«Secondo me, bisogna trovargli un nuovo istitutore», disse Larry. «Ti allontani da casa cinque minuti, e quando torni, lo trovi che sta sbudellando Moby Dick nel portico.»”
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