Free The Scoundrel and the Debutante by Julia London Page B

agreeable young woman who would make him a perfect wife. Roan hadn’t thought much about the qualities of a perfect wife—he wasn’t a sentimental man, and when it came to marriage, he accepted it as something that had to be done. Neither had he given much thought as to who he would marry; that had been the furthest thing from his mind as they’d worked to expand Matheson Lumber. He’d supposed that whoever it was, familiarity would eventually breed affection. Affection was all that was necessary, wasn’t it? His parents had found affection somewhere along the way and seemed happy. Roan imagined the same would be true for him. As for siring children, he hardly gave that a thought—he could not imagine any circumstance in which he’d be anything less than willing and eager to do his part.
    And then he’d met Susannah Pratt.
    She’d come to New York just before Roan’s aunt and uncle had returned from England. She was nothing as Mr. Pratt had described, and worse, Roan could not find anything the least bit attractive about her. It was impossible for him to accept that
she
was the one he was to acquaint himself with and then propose marriage. Privately, he’d chided himself for that—a woman’s value was not in her face, for God’s sake, it was in her soul. So he’d valiantly tried to see beyond her appearance. Unfortunately, she was not the least bit engaging. He could find no common ground, and even if he had, the woman was painfully shy and afraid to look him in the eye.
    Just before his aunt and uncle had come home, he had decided he would speak to Susannah about her true desires. Perhaps she found him as odious as he found her. Perhaps she was desperate for escape from this loose arrangement.
    But the news his aunt and uncle had brought home trumped everything else. They were all desperate to find Aurora before she was lost to them, and Roan had put aside his own troubles to chase after her. What could he do?
    He could curse Aurora for the weeks it had taken him to cross the Atlantic, that’s what. The longer Susannah Pratt thought he would be her husband, the harder it would be to disengage from her. Roan was even angrier with Aurora for not being in West Lee, or whatever the hamlet he’d been directed to, but in the other West Lee, north. That alone was enough to concern him. Did he really need to fret about
another
incorrigible, intractable, disobedient young woman?
    No
. No, he did not. He didn’t care that Miss Cabot’s eyes were the color of the vines that grew on his family’s house. Or that she had boarded this coach because she’d been attracted to him. Or that he’d teased her and embarrassed her and thereby was probably the cause of her running off.
    She was
not
his concern, damn it. And yet, she was.
    For the second time that day, Roan swept his hat off his head and threw it down onto the ground in an uncharacteristic fit of frustration. Damn England! Damn women!
    He kicked the hat for good measure and watched it scud across the road.
    And then, with a sigh of concession, he walked across the road to fetch it. But he discovered he’d kicked his hat into a ditch filled with muddy water. Roan muttered some fiery expletives under his breath. He’d find another hat in the next village. He picked up his bag and hoisted it onto his shoulder and walked on.
    Now, to figure out where that foolish little hellion had gone.

CHAPTER FIVE
    P RUDENCE HADN ’ T ACTUALLY intended to flee. She’d been as anxious as anyone to board the coach and be on her way. But as the repair work had dragged on, she began to imagine any number of scenarios awaiting her at the next village. Dr. Linford and his wife, first and foremost, their displeasure and disgust evident. Worse, Dr. Linford and his wife in the company of someone in a position of authority, who would escort Prudence back to Blackwood Hall in shame. She could just see