Wild Lily (Those Notorious Americans Book 1)(26)

Dear Elanna, without any candidates. “She’s seen the current lot. Danced with them all. Found no one who appealed.”

“There must be someone. An Irishman? A baron, a knight?Or a Frenchman with enough land left to feed himself? What of your friend, the prince, Remy?”

“Elanna likes him. Nothing more.”

“He must have cousins.”

“No one I’d recommend to her,” Julian told him. “But then—”

“What?”

“I have funds. Savings.”

“What?” His father scoffed. “Twenty thousand?”

Julian was shocked his father came so near the mark. “Twenty-two. How do you know?”

“Shall we say, my friends are useful?”

“And unethical to chat about a fellow’s worth.”

“To your father? Not so. I hear what you win at the tables. I also know what you spend at your tailors. I had to find out when I saw no bills for you. And yes, I know you’ve often declared that you’d save Elanna from the marriage mart with your winnings. Good of you. But she must stand on her own. Time is nigh. She must marry.”

“And you won’t give out the sum of her dowry. Say you will not.”

“And kill her chances? I’d lie and declare the sum is grand.”

Julian was aghast. “No! She’ll have every roué from here to Vienna at our door.”

“If she can find a man whom she admires, who’s worthy of her esteem, I’ll gladly hand her to him. Money, title or not.”

Once more, Julian was amazed at his father. If the man had a foul temper, if he berated his wife with joyous vengeance, if he liked his brandy, if he was a feckless manager of the estates, if he had no ingenious methods to improve the crops, he did love his daughter. He did wish her happiness. If when all was said and done, he did not see the error in lying about her wealth to protect her from charlatans, he was wrong.

“Which means we come to you,” the man said matter-of-factly, drumming his fingers on the desk.

Julian blinked, the change in topic a shock. He took a moment to guard himself.

Of course, the old man would come round to him.

“I wish to discuss your own marriage prospects.”

“I have none.”

“You must.”

Julian took a deep breath. “I’ve told you before I will not be pressed.”

“You were always difficult,” his father muttered.

“On this issue, especially.”

“I don’t see why. You’ve always known you must marry.”

“Do the begetting, eh?”

“If you find a comely gel, the experience of begetting is not ghastly. And if rumor serves up truth about your prowess, well you know it, too.”

I won’t marry for money. “I won’t marry for advantage.”

“I did.”

“It’s demeaning.”

“But accepted.”

“Among your set, yes.” Julian gave him that.

“Yours, too. Look at Marlborough’s boy. At Waldron’s heir. It is done.”

“But I won’t,” Julian spat. “They may care for those girls now, but later?” He scoffed.

“Live by pride alone and you will starve,” his father warned.

Pride was not the problem. Fear of a shrew in his house. Irrational, demanding. One who turned on him or worse, turned on their children like Medea. No, he’d not take a woman unless she was malleable. “I’d like to solve my own problems.”

“Good intentions?” his father asked with a strained smile. “Noble. But you cannot eat them. Nor pay our taxes or your mother’s gambling debts.”

“I keep trying.” But my skills at the table are just as bad as my mother’s.

His father shook his head. “I tell you, I married for love. A tender bit, but it passes.”

Julian quelled the urge to laugh. That was how the man explained his and his mother’s screaming matches, the crockery that flew, the insinuations that shook the rafters. “Passes, oh, yes. Falls into—what did you term your relationship with Mama—disrepair?”

“No matter,” the old man said and flung out a hand. “You tilt at windmills. Meanwhile we are soon to become known debtors. And there are options for you. Bright, comely options.”

Julian stared at him. “Let me guess. You have suggestions.”

“One in particular. The American Lily.”

The American Lily, yes. That’s how she’d come to be known in London. The tall, graceful girl with the perfectly oval face, the pile of midnight curls and those uncanny blue eyes that bore right through a man. She’d been photographed, her pictures copied and redrawn, The American Beauty, once maligned by cartoonists, now glorified by anyone who could catch a glimpse of her.

And Julian had tried not to follow suit. But yesterday, he’d succumbed and gone to tea at the house in Piccadilly.

“Well?” his father asked. “I understand you’ve met her.”

His stomach churned. Julian didn’t want an arranged marriage for himself and he would not wish one on a young woman he liked. Or this one who favored him one minute and not the next. “I won’t marry her.”