Free The Courtesan's Daughter by Claudia Dain Page A

ungovernable.”
    “Ungovernable?”
    “Did he not gamble his way onto the marriage block? Did my mother not buy him for me?”
    “What is it you hate, Caro, that your mother bought him or that he allowed himself to be bought?”
    “What is the difference between the two? He was for sale and the sale was made. Or almost made. He disgusts me.”
    “And he ruined your gown,” Anne said wryly.
    “Add clumsy brute to his list of faults. I should make him pay for it, just to add to his financial burdens. He should be made to, you know. A gentleman would offer, would make some effort at gracious apology. He really should be made to pay.”
    Caro’s gaze slipped to the fine turned leg of the small sofa nearest them. They were almost alone in the room, except for the soft snores that marked the location of Lord Dutton.
    “Caro?” Anne said.
    Caro looked at her with the light of inspiration, devilish inspiration, surely, in her eyes. “He really should be made to pay, shouldn’t he?”
    Oh, Lord.
    “Caro, what are you thinking?” Anne said, just a bit desperately.
    Caro looked up at her, her dark eyes gleaming with just a hint of malice. “I’m thinking that a little revenge would be in order. And so well deserved, too.”
    “Revenge? Because he made an offer of marriage for you?”
    “Was that what it was? I thought I was merely the means to cancel his debts.”
    “Caro, marriages are made on just such a foundation every day. Why are you so very insulted?”
    “Because,” Caro said softly, her voice coming out in a hiss of anger, “I have spent my whole life learning to be the perfect woman, and for what? So that some man who’s never even seen me before should make an offer for me, merely to clear himself of debt? I want to be wanted, and I will be. Being a courtesan, being wanted by absolutely hoards of men, sounds completely wonderful. I won’t have a husband who must be bribed and bought for me. I want to be wanted, for myself, no matter who my mother is.”
    “Caro,” Anne said in frustration, “that is all beside the point at the moment. You are about to be tossed out onto the streets by your mother. You must find a haven. Is there anywhere you can go, anyone who will take you in?”
    “Markham will never allow it,” Caro said.
    “I am sure that is true, but Markham is not in Town and hardly able to help you by tomorrow noon. Is there anyone to help you? Have you no friends? No relatives in Town?”
    Caro lifted her chin and said, “You are my friend, Anne. I … well, I am not very well liked, I’m afraid. I don’t have many friends, and my father’s relatives are all deceased. My mother’s family, aside from our guardian, has little to do with us. I am quite alone. Except for you. I quite understand,” she said, voice quivering just slightly, “that my mother bought you for me as she tried to do with Lord Ashdon. I know that, unless destitute, you would never have lowered yourself by coming into my mother’s house to befriend me. I have chosen to believe that you have come to actually like me, in spite of everything.”
    Caro’s dark eyes, so large and expressive, were filled with un-shed tears, yet she looked anything but cowed. In spite of admitting herself friendless and without hope of succor, she had the look of a warrior set to face his final battle, unafraid and clothed in honor. It was one of the most endearing aspects of Caro and one of which she was entirely unaware, this stalwart warrior in silk and pearls, dark blue eyes unblinking.
    “You are a complete idiot,” Anne said, taking her by the hand and leading her past the still snoring Lord Dutton and to the doorway of the salon that opened onto the dining room at the rear of the house. “You know I adore you, for one. And for another, there are things you don’t know about me, things which your mother kept from you out of kindness on my behalf.”
    “What don’t I know about you?” Caro said as Lord Dutton’s snores