allow each other to take those hobbies.”
That was certainly a curious way of putting it. “I don’t consider what I do a ‘hobby.’ I take my work very seriously.”
“Fine. Then call it a pastime.”
“A profession,” she said.
“Duchesses don’t usually have professions,” he pointed out.
“You’re certainly not reassuring me that I’ll be able to continue as a chemist if I marry you.” She eyed him closely. “And what hobbies do you have, anyway?”
Alarm flashed over his face. “Nothing that would bother you, I’m sure. Just the usual gentlemanly pursuits.”
“Like drinking, gambling, and whoring?” she asked pointedly.
He fixed her with a dark look. “I would be faithful to you, if that’s what you’re asking.”
That was one of the things she was asking. “You already know what my ‘hobby’ is. Why can’t you tell me what yours is?”
“As I said, it’s nothing as concrete as yours.” His shuttered expression belied that. “I enjoy going to the theater and going to my club, that sort of thing.”
“Much like my Papa.”
“Not like your ‘Papa,’” he said fiercely. “I intend to be around for you and our children. I mean to be a proper husband, not a selfish arse.” He caught himself. “Not that I’m calling your father an arse, mind you, but—”
“He is one, trust me,” she said dryly.
And clearly she wasn’t going to get a better answer from Thorn. Perhaps she could live with that, too. As long as he let her practice her chosen profession.
“Speaking of children,” he said, “what if you find yourself with child?”
“That would be a different matter entirely. I’d certainly marry you then. I shan’t make any child of mine suffer the ignominy of being a bastard when it was my reckless behavior that brought him or her into this world.”
“And mine. If anything, I’m more culpable. I seduced you.”
She shrugged. “I wanted to be seduced.”
He took her hand again. “And now that you have been, you will almost certainly wish to do it again. Assuming that you enjoyed it.”
“I did,” she admitted.
A faint smile tipped up his lips. “So that’s an argument in favor of our marrying, don’t you think?”
“I suppose.” She gazed at their joined hands. “I just . . . don’t want you to marry me out of some noble impulse to save me from ruin. Or because you think you must protect me from the villain or villains you and your family are trying to find.”
“I’ll admit I’d prefer to keep you close, partly because I do worry about the ‘villain or villains’ who might have you in their sights. But the rest of the truth is more selfish—I want to marry you out of a thoroughly ignoble impulse to have you in my bed whenever I wish. Does that make you feel any better about my marriage proposal?”
She arched an eyebrow. “It sounds more like you, at least.”
He turned serious again. “I think we could make a good go of it, Olivia. We prefer each other’s company to that of good society. We want the same things out of life. And we make sense together. That’s enough for me. Isn’t it enough for you?”
A pang seized her that she fought to ignore. No, it wasn’t enough for her, but only because she still yearned for love and happiness and all that those entailed. Unfortunately, he did not. And she wasn’t sure he ever would.
Could she live with that?
“Yes,” she said. “It’s enough.”
For the moment, anyway. She would simply have to take each day as it came, and hope that in time they would learn to love each other.
But now came the most difficult part. Telling Mama.
Chapter Fourteen
“Have you lost your mind?” Olivia’s stepmother cried. “That man will be the ruin of you if you marry him.”
“Mama, please,” Olivia said.
They’d been going round and round about this in the drawing room, while Thorn had been in the hall telling his sister about their engagement. Her stepmother was being unreasonable.
“I mean it!” Mama said. “Do you know his reputation? The women he has seduced? You’d be better off marrying nobody, and I have never said that before, as you well know.”
Olivia eyed her stepmother askance. “You’re not making any sense. Years ago, you resorted to blackmail to try and get him to marry me, and now you don’t want him to marry me?”
“Years ago, I wanted to be a good mother to you. And that meant finding you the best gentleman to marry, as far as I was concerned. At the time, I thought that was