My Darling Caroline (31 page)
Sytheford brought him another half-filled glass, standing beside him as they both turned to look out the window.
“My greatest hope was that you and my daughter would grow to care for each other. But even if that didn’t happen, I knew enough about you to know you’d respect her, and that the two of you would, at the very least, get along as well as any married couple of your station.”
The baron exhaled loudly. “In the end, when I’d finally decided to force your marriage in such an underhanded fashion, I knew without question that Caroline’s will to remain chaste would fail her. She’s methodical, resourceful, and sometimes incredibly obstinate, Weymerth, but beneath the skin is a loving, giving woman who, when she met you, desperately needed the companionship of a man. I knew she would eventually succumb to you and honor the marriage vows if you pushed hard enough, and indeed she did because there’s the proof.”
Brent turned, and out of the garden walked his wife, side by side with Stephanie, one of his baby girls in her arms, the other in her sister’s, and Rosalyn skipping along in front of them. They were bundled tightly against the crisp December air, but the sun was shining, and the view of their rosy cheeks and smiling faces was lovely and perfect from where he stood.
The baron dropped his gaze. “If you ever mention this to anyone, Weymerth, I’ll deny I said it, but”—he lifted his glass and swallowed the contents—“I never needed a son to feel completely whole as a man, and truthfully I’m quite glad I never had one.”
Brent glanced at his father-in-law, more than mildly surprised to hear such an odd statement from a member of the nobility.
Smiling, Sytheford quietly lowered his voice in retrospection. “If I had sired a boy, I would have spent my life grooming him to be a baron and in many respects, I probably would have neglected my girls. This happens constantly in our class. And I’m certain, over the years, I’ve been the brunt of jokes and the pity of those men who are so ignorant they can’t possibly understand or see the worthiness of the females in their lives.”
Gazing back at his daughters, he warmly disclosed, “I can’t bestow my title on any of them, but they’ve all received my support, my guidance, and my love, and I know there is no man alive with five sons and no daughters who could be any more proud of what his children have become.”
Brent looked back at Caroline, his beautiful babies, his sweet daughter who’d been accepted into his wife’s family as if she were one of them. When he’d married her, the only thing he’d wanted from the union was a son, and although there was merit to the fact that males alone inherited titles and property, he now understood the shallowness of the desire. His world was rich with happiness and completely fulfilling as it was right now, and if there was one thing he knew as absolute truth, it was the worthiness of the females in his life.
“Well said, Charles,” he whispered. “Well said.”
I
took some liberty writing a story about a woman scholar in early nineteenth-century England. Caroline attempted to study at a university, but this really would never have been tolerated during her time, and certainly not at Oxford. It’s true that some American universities, before the twentieth century, permitted a few brave women to stand outside classrooms and listen as Caroline did, but such allowances were extremely rare, even for the gifted.
A note of appreciation to Claudia Canady, Ph.D., for a wealth of information about speech-language development and the behavior of children with hearing impairments.
A sincere thanks to Marilyn Price-Larson, Ph.D.,
for her informal critique and superior
knowledge of all things English.
ADELE ASHWORTH
I’ve always loved to write, but after my first attempt at a novel (nine chapters of
Plastic City
, the story of underwater-dwelling orphans in the twenty-third century that I wrote in the sixth grade), I took some time to get my bachelor’s degree and to try my hand at other careers before I returned to my first passion: creative writing. After lots and lots of perseverance, hard work, and a bit of very good luck,
My Darling Caroline
went on to win the Romance Writers of America’s RITA
®
Award for Best First Book of 1998.
I live in Texas with my family, exploring history as I delve into the hearts of my characters. I love to hear from readers through my website at
www.adeleashworth.com
.
Visit www.AuthorTracker.com for exclusive information on your favorite HarperCollins author.
M
Y
D
ARLING
C
AROLINE
A N
OTORIOUS
P
ROPOSITION
T
HE
D
UKE’S
I
NDISCRETION
D
UKE OF
S
CANDAL
D
UKE OF
S
IN
W
HEN
I
T’S
P
ERFECT
S
OMETHING
I
RRESISTIBLE
Coming Soon
T
HE
D
UKE’S
C
APTIVE
This book is a work of fiction. The characters, incidents, and dialogue are drawn from the author’s imagination and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to actual events or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
MY DARLING CAROLINE
. Copyright © 1998 by Adele Budnick. All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, down-loaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins e-books.
EPub Edition © December 2009 ISBN: 978-0-06-198792-2
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