Chapter 19

His house was full of people. After he’d set the figurine in front of his mother yesterday, he’d disappeared, hibernating in his study like the wounded bear he felt like. No one ventured into this area of the house, but the voices of the many newcomers drifted through the small gap between the door and the frame, infringing on his solitude until he considered getting up to close the door completely.

All afternoon yesterday carriages pulled down the lane, people tramped up and down the stairs, and servants rushed to and fro, trying to see to the needs of more people than this house had seen in their entire tenure.

It was ridiculous that so many people had loaded up their carriages or hired ones to drive them a long day’s ride out into the country for a single day of activities followed by a ball in the evening. Tomorrow they would all be making the long trek back to London. It was entirely too much hassle for a single day of frivolity, but he was a duke. A rather solitary duke with an obligation to marry.

He frowned.

He didn’t want his wife to be an obligation. Both he and Isabella or Frederica or whoever his wife happened to be deserved more than that. She should be more than that. She deserved to be wanted, and he had enough obligations in his life without adding her to the list. Obtaining a wife might be an obligation, but the wife herself shouldn’t be.

Which meant the selection of his wife could not be taken lightly. He’d known that, had always known that, and that was why he’d taken such care to think through everything so meticulously.

And now he was going to have to admit he’d been wrong.

Not just once, but twice. He’d been wrong about his ability to control his feelings, and then he’d been wrong about Isabella’s feelings for him. Was he also incorrect about his feelings for her? What if he wasn’t actually in love with her? What if he was only infatuated with her incredible beauty? What if his logical brain was obsessed with figuring out the intrigue around her, and once the mystery was solved she would lose the grip she appeared to have on him?

He sat back in his chair and rubbed his finger against his thumb.

The door swung open without a knock. Griffith tensed but maintained his position in the chair as he looked toward the door with a deliberately arrogant and powerful expression.

Only to find himself being laughed at.

Ryland and Anthony slid into the room and shut the door behind them.

“I can’t thank you enough for volunteering me to dance the first dance.” Ryland crossed to the desk to look over the notes Griffith had spread across the surface. It was mostly notes on the spring planting for his estate in Cornwall. Shafts of sunlight speared through the window to cut across the words.

“It’s a bright, sunny day.” Griffith pulled a paper toward him and tried to look preoccupied. “Shouldn’t you be out fishing or whatever else my mother has planned? I know she intended for people to spend a good portion of the day outside.”

“I don’t know.” Ryland flicked the paper in Griffith’s hand. “Shouldn’t you?”

Probably. But he’d come to the country to figure things out, and it was time he did. “I’m busy.”

The two men shifted around the room, but Griffith kept his gaze resolutely on the paper in front of him, making himself read words that he’d forgotten by the time he reached the end of the sentence.

“We’re busy too,” Ryland finally said.

Griffith looked up to see both men settled deeply into chairs, as if they had no intention of budging from this room until he did.

Sometimes friends you couldn’t intimidate were a staggering inconvenience.

He looked back at the paper.

“For goodness’ sake, Griffith.” Ryland moaned. “There are three sentences on that paper. They think the western-most field should be left fallow for the year because last year’s crop yield was less than adequate.”

Griffith made an extra effort to retain the information on the letter in his hand. Ryland was correct. Trying to look casual and confident, he slid the paper onto the desk. “Leaving an entire field empty for the year is a decision that shouldn’t be taken lightly. People need food.”

“And you need a wife.” As Anthony’s first contribution to the conversation, it was direct and to the point of the real reason the men had invaded his study. “So why are you in here instead of joining the expedition to the ruins?”

“I’ve seen the ruins.”

“As have I. Which is why I know that in spite of the fact that you cleaned up all of the dangerous parts last summer, there are plenty of rocks and ditches for ladies to be helped over.”

Ryland cleared his throat. “Ladies such as Miss Breckenridge.”

“Miss Breckenridge hasn’t joined in on an event in days. Why would she be going to the ruins?” But he knew why. Isabella adored seeing where and how things grew. She wouldn’t miss the chance to see how the plants had taken over the old stones and piles of rotten wood.

“How should I know? But I assume that the blond curls in the middle of the cluster of gentlemen surrounded by pouting ladies belongs to your beautiful obsession.” Ryland shrugged and settled farther into his chair.

“I’m not obsessed.”

Anthony laughed.

Ryland pursed his lips and raised his brow.

“I’m not. Not with Isa . . .” He cleared his throat. “Miss Breckenridge.”

The twin smirks on the other side of his desk proved both men had heard him slip on her name. Errors such as that were not common for him. He didn’t say anything he didn’t mean to say, didn’t allow anyone to catch him at a disadvantage. At least, he hadn’t until Isabella had come into his life.

Ryland was the first to break the silence. “I told you Miss St. Claire was the wrong woman for you.”

The word wrong made Griffith wince and started a throbbing in the back of his head. He flexed his injured arm out of habit, even though the ache and tension wasn’t coming from there at the moment.

“Who is to say,” he said slowly, thinking through every word with deliberate care. He couldn’t afford for his two friends to misunderstand his question. Mostly because he wasn’t sure he’d get the nerve to ask it again. “Who is to say if I’ll ever be able to make the correct decision? If I’ve already made the wrong decision twice, how can I trust that I’ll ever be able to discern the woman God wants me to marry?”

“Twice? You’ve abandoned your pursuit of Miss Breckenridge already?” Ryland’s forehead scrunched into a wrinkle so deep his dark eyebrows were nearly touching.

Had he abandoned it? Had he ever even truly started pursuing her? “Obviously, she is not inclined to find my suit favorable, so it stands to reason that she is not the woman God prepared for me.”

“I don’t think it works that way.” Anthony pushed up from the chair and crossed to the window.

“Of course it does. Proverbs. ‘In all thy ways acknowledge him, and he shall direct thy paths.’”

Ryland laughed. “You think that means He’s going to tell you whom to marry?”

“Why wouldn’t it?” Griffith was torn between having this conversation because he knew it was the right thing to do and tossing his two closest friends out on their ears. Or he could leave them here and join the rest of the guests at the ruins. Where at this very moment Isabella was surrounded by suitors.

This was the very reason Griffith hadn’t wanted to pursue a Diamond.

Leaning forward to prop his elbows on his knees, Ryland’s grey eyes pinned Griffith in his chair. It was the same gaze that had skewered many a Frenchman into giving up his secrets. Griffith had to admit it was fairly effective.

“Sometimes, I think God lets you choose.”

“Why would He do that?” Griffith rolled the thought over in his mind, but he honestly couldn’t fathom it. If Griffith had that sort of omniscience and power, he would certainly be telling people where they needed to be. Sometimes he did it even though he wasn’t omniscient.

Ryland lifted one shoulder and let it fall again, the close tailoring of his dark grey jacket falling right back into place. “I think sometimes He likes to give us a choice. Life’s pretty bleak if you only ever do what you’re told. If you make your choice with an aim to honor God, then He will honor that.”

“And if I make the wrong one?”

Anthony leaned against the window, his attention gliding back and forth from Griffith to something outside. “Whatever choice you make, you work within the boundaries God laid out in the Bible. If you had married Miss St. Claire, would you have treated her the way the Bible says to treat your wife?”

“Of course.” Griffith crossed his arms over his chest. Picturing the stilted breakfast conversations the two of them would probably have had didn’t thrill him, but if he had made the commitment, he would have put everything he had into doing it right.

“And if you married Miss Breckenridge?”

The vision that ran through his head this time was considerably more pleasant, imagining him and Isabella riding through the countryside, visiting tenants together or just enjoying the land. “Yes.”

“Then, I think it might be safe to assume that God will let you marry whichever lady you choose as long as you honor Him once you’ve done it.” Anthony tapped the glass with one long finger. “And if you think you might want that choice to be Miss Breckenridge, you might want to venture outside. It’s hard to see since they’re going over the rise, but I think Lord Ivonbrook is holding her parasol.”