An Earl by Any Other Name(37)

"Care to explain why you and my daughter are in that bed?"

Leo met her father's stare head-on.

"Because I have been with her, and I intend to marry her."

Ivy's mind blanked. Marry her? Surely he didn't mean that … He was doing it because he'd been caught compromising her.

"You seem to be courting my daughter out of order. Bedding typically follows matrimony, Hampton." Her father raised the gun an inch, a hint of a threat.

"I'm well aware, Mr. Leighton," Leo said stiffly, and tucked Ivy under his arm, supporting her.


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Did he know she was in a state of shock? What sensible woman wouldn't be while facing an irate father in nothing but a blanket, with a lover who offered marriage only to do right by her. Finally she found her voice.

"You don't have to marry me," she told him, not looking at him, in case he saw the disappointment in her eyes.

"Of course he does," her father snapped at the same time Leo growled, "Of course I do."

Nausea welled up inside her, and she stared at him. He let her go, and she slid off the bed to gather her clothes. This wasn't what she wanted. She couldn't marry him, and she couldn't do it this way even if she had wanted marriage.

"Escort her back to the house when she is dressed. Then you and I will talk, Lord Hampton."

Leo assented in a quick nod. A silent exchange seemed to pass between him and her father before her father at last left the hunting lodge.

Ivy struggled to dress with trembling hands. Marriage was the only way to save her reputation, but she didn't want to marry a man who would despise her because he'd been forced to go to the altar. She didn't even want to think about how it would destroy her freedom, her rights … everything she had been fighting so hard for this last year since she'd joined the WSPU.

"This isn't right … We shouldn't have to-" Her words came out haltingly as despair choked her.

"No, Ivy. You will listen to me." He caught her arm and dragged her around to face him. "I want to marry you. I wanted to before this happened." He gestured to the rumpled bed.

She wrinkled her nose. "What?"

He stepped closer, invading her space and running riot over her senses. Curling an arm around her waist, he drew her against him and did something that sent her heart skittering. Leo trailed a fingertip down the bridge of her nose and tapped the end of it.

"I said … I want to marry you, Button."

Button? Her chest tightened painfully. "You know … who I am?" Her voice broke a little as she tried to face the fact that her past was no longer a mystery to him. He knows who I am …

He smiled, a little embarrassed. "I saw you visit your mother's grave this morning. I put the pieces together."

She nibbled her lip. "Are you angry that I deceived you?"

He shook his head, his golden hair delightfully mussed from their earlier lovemaking.

"No. I assume my mother commanded your silence. No doubt she planned this."

"She did," Ivy admitted.

"My only question is why?" As Leo talked, he threaded his fingers through her dark hair and gently tugged, making Ivy tilt her head back. The blue of his eyes was dark, like a lake in winter. 

"We met over tea in London a month ago while we were attending a WSPU meeting. We both learned there was to be a local meeting near Hampton and she invited me to come down for the meeting and join the house party."

Leo chuckled. "I told her she wasn't to go to that meeting. She then convinced me a house party would be a decent exchange for my barring her suffragette activities. Does this mean she's still planning to attend the gathering?"

"Um … " Ivy bit her lip, not sure how much to divulge of Leo's mother's involvement. One did not betray a fellow sister in arms.

"Right," he sighed, a wry smile upon his lips. "I suppose this is something I'll endeavor to get used to if my wife and mother will be battling the establishment."

"You mean … " Her heart stilled for several painful seconds as she waited for him to speak.

Leo cupped her face, brushing his fingertips over her lips. "I won't fight you on suffrage, my darling. If you want to vote, then by God, I shan't stand in your way." He was silent a long moment. "I might even help you, if you'd let me. I'm already damned, so what's one more scandal?"

She tensed. "Damned?" That sounded … dreadful, and she didn't like him thinking she was damning him.