All About Seduction(18)
The connecting door to her husband’s room opened. Mr. Broadhurst stood in the opening. “Are you not dressed yet?”
Her stomach churned and tightened. He looked like the same man she’d spent the last fifteen years with, but she barely could stand the sight of him. “Really, Mr. Broadhurst. I cannot believe you would will everything to Mr. Granger.”
She pitched the box into the bottom of her armoire. When she had more time, she’d cast them on the fire. She tried to close the armoire, but the box jutted out, preventing her. She slammed it harder, distorting the pasteboard, but the door still refused to close. She shoved the box on its end and forced the armoire shut.
“Figured that would stick in your craw.” Mr. Broadhurst walked into the room and sat down in her reading chair. “But, I know he’ll do whatever it takes to keep the mill profitable.”
As if she would run it into the ground. Whatever improvements she made for workers’ safety would all be for naught if the mill closed its doors. She would never let that happen. But, if she had been in charge, the accident today never would have occurred. “Leave me, so I might get ready.”
“I’ll wait. Did you have new dresses delivered?”
“Amelia sent some things.” Would he just leave? Before she totally lost her temper and slapped him. The bloodthirsty urge surprised her. But violence never served.
“How unlike her,” murmured Mr. Broadhurst as his eyes followed her.
Caroline yanked open the armoire again and took out an evening gown suitable for a London dinner party. Then she wrestled the peignoir box out of the way again to slam the door shut. She jerked on the bellpull. “I need my maid.”
She could have dressed without her maid, but she didn’t want to be alone with her husband, not with the way she felt about him at the moment. Because if he decided to lay a finger on her, she just might snap it off.
“Have her do your hair with hanging curls, and don’t put a kerchief in your neckline.” Broadhurst nodded toward the low-cut gown, which she often wore with a lace chemisette to fill in the décolletage, for warmth as much as modesty.
Was she to be outfitted like a whore in the best brothel? She closed her eyes. With all the effort she put into learning to run the mill, she was still seen as nothing more than a brood mare. She really hated him. Hated him.
All her prayers for tolerance and admiration were wasted effort. Knowing that he believed he could manipulate anyone to do what he wanted might make him a great businessman, but it made him an awful person and a worse husband. But she had implied an agreement to the bargain so Jack could stay, so there was no point in railing like a fishwife.
“We are understood, Caroline. If you are agreed to do as I’ve asked, your patient can stay. Otherwise I will have him thrown out.”
Vibrating with anger, she clenched her jaw. “He was trying to save a child who should not have been in harm’s way in the first place.”
“Such a soft heart for the children. Don’t you want one of your own?” he cajoled.
It wasn’t fair. She’d wanted children. “Of course I do.”
“Then you will do as you are bid.”
“If you will have all the children under nine put out of the mill, I will . . . I shall . . . begin a flirtation tonight.” Her spine tightened and she resisted the urge to draw her shoulders up to her ears. God, did she even know how? She’d never been particularly skilled in social intercourse. And how could she seduce one of the guests?
Mr. Broadhurst scowled at her. “This is why I cannot leave the mill to you. You are too concerned with the plight of children that don’t matter.”
He had been one of those children who didn’t matter, but reminding him of that would only raise his ire. Instead she appealed to his greed. “Mr. Broadhurst, one of those little children caused the loss of a good worker. The only one who knew how to dismantle the machinery to get his leg out, I might add. The work completely stopped all because of one little girl who was too young to use good sense in where she walked.”
“Very well, ma’am. I shall ban from the mill any child under the age of nine, henceforth. And you are agreed to lie with one of the guests tonight.”
Her stomach cramped. “I cannot conduct every stage of an affair tonight. That isn’t how it is done.”
She didn’t know that she could manage the final stage, but if she could gain a few days—long enough for him to decree all young children wouldn’t be allowed to work—she could at least try to single out one of the men for an affair. By having a baby, she gained the mill and independence. A month of trying to get pregnant was better than another loveless marriage, or being a penniless dependent upon family members who neither understood her or she them.