Free How to Beguile a Beauty by Kasey Michaels

never say such things to Papa, or Tanner, or to any man. Only another woman would understand that love is so much more important than honor.”
    â€œAnd you truly feel you cannot broach the subject with your father?”
    Jasmine shook her head furiously. “Papa has most clearly and emphatically explained my duty to me, and I certainly can’t refuse Tanner’s suit once he screws himself up to the sticking point, as Papa calls it. It’s the land, you know. It hadn’t been part of the entail, which is how Papa’s ancestors ended up with it, and the late duke and his father, even his father’s father, had wanted it back for ever so long. Pride, you understand. And some lovely waterways that seem to mean so much toeveryone. In truth, the land isn’t much at all. Most of it is very soggy, in fact. It’s the water. There was once an argument, many decades ago, and my ancestor cut off the water flowing from a spring on our property, which dried up a stream that ran through the pastures on Tanner’s ancestor’s property and—well, the history hasn’t always been pretty, I suppose you’d say.”
    â€œCouldn’t Tanner simply purchase the land from your father?” Did that sound selfish on Lydia’s part? And did it matter? Was the girl even listening to her?
    â€œAnd wouldn’t that be so simple? But, just between the two of us, I will tell you that Papa’s soggy estate is massively encumbered. My marriage to Tanner is Papa’s sure and only way out from beneath a crushing mound of debt, not that Tanner can ever, ever know about that until the marriage is a fact, oh no, definitely. Even then, how would he trust Papa to continue as his estate manager once he knew about the gambling? Without the marriage, without a lovely pension for Papa once Tanner turns him off, it would be the ruination of everything, and Papa has assured me I would not enjoy sleeping beneath a hedgerow, and the man I love is…well, he cannot marry at the moment, although he has vowed to find a way. But I don’t think he will find that way in time to save me.”
    Curiosity turned to concern. “This man, Jasmine. Are you trying to tell me he’s already married?”
    The girl sighed again, this time definitely theatrically. “No. He is just poor, at least for now, although he has promised me this will soon change. But will hiscircumstances change in time? I think Papa is right, that I would not enjoy sleeping beneath a hedgerow, not even for love. So unless something wonderful happens, it must be marriage between Tanner and myself, before Papa’s gambling ways have been discovered and he is turned off without a recommendation. You see? No marriage means no employment, no fine pension, and a really rather worthless estate gone for debt. So you must understand my dilemma. No matter my feelings, I cannot disappoint Papa.”
    Lydia knew she should be warning this sweet but silly girl that she should not be saying such things to what was, at heart, a brand new acquaintance. But it was all so interesting, if terribly convoluted. Certainly there must exist another way to work things out without sacrificing two people to a marriage neither of them seemed in any rush to make a fact.
    Except that Tanner was an honorable man. How Jasmine’s father must be counting on that fact.
    Jasmine’s words were tolling a death knell to any of Lydia’s barely admitted dreams of a time when she and Tanner might put the past behind them and look toward a future as more than good friends.
    Indeed, even Baron Justin Wilde had spent the entirety of his second dance with her extolling Tanner’s virtues, telling her how humbled and honored he was to have such a friend in his time of need. She had agreed with him without offering further explanation.
    Ever since that dance, while she was being partnered by a seemingly endless succession of gentlemenwho had seemed