Free Seduced by a Pirate by Eloisa James

very carefully before I agreed to it. Your wife is from the merchant classes, true. But she was beautiful, docile, trained in every possible domestic art. I truly thought she would be an excellent spouse for you.”
    Griffin nodded, opened his mouth again.
    But his father barreled on. “Of course, now there are the children.”
    Griffin would have thought that his father’s reaction to the idea of a cuckoo inheriting the title of Viscount Moncrieff would be near violence.
    “I hadn’t kept up more than a remote acquaintance,” his father said, his eyes abjectly apologetic. “The children were presented as a fait accompli .”
    “I understand,” Griffin said.
    His father leaned forward. “I didn’t think you were ever coming back. How could I tell Lady Barry that her life would be childless? It would be cruel.”
    “I understand,” Griffin repeated. But he didn’t. His father didn’t care that his own blood would not inherit the title?
    The viscount had always trumpeted their ancient blood, the accomplishments of their long-dead ancestors. Griffin had come to loathe the very mention of the first Viscount Moncrieff, a repellant beast who had slavered at the feet of James the First. In Griffin’s opinion, he received the title of viscount as a direct payment for personal favors of an intimate nature.
    His father had never liked that suggestion, though there was a bawdy letter upstairs from the king that confirmed Griffin’s impression.
    “I must return home for supper,” he said abruptly. He felt a bit like a man who was addicted to drink. He wanted to go home and see Phoebe.
    He wanted to talk her into changing her mind and going to bed with him immediately. Even if that didn’t happen tonight, he wanted to kiss her for the first time since their wedding.
    His father’s face fell, wrinkles sagging into place. “Of course.”
    “Come with me,” Griffin added hastily. “There are plenty of rooms in the house, from what I saw. Are any of my siblings home?”
    “No, they live with their own families now. Your youngest sister married two years ago. They will be very happy to hear that you are home safe.”
    Griffin rather doubted that, but he was willing to leave it an open question. The return of a pirate was unlikely to be seen as an unmixed blessing. Except, perhaps, by his perplexing father. “So you live here alone?”
    At that, his father smiled. “I maintain a full household, as you surely saw. I’ve been working on a new bill that I’ll present to the House in the next session, so I have a proper component of secretaries as well.”
    “Leave them,” Griffin suggested. “Let’s go to Arbor House and see what Phoebe has for dinner.”
    “See what Phoebe has for dinner?” the viscount repeated blankly. It was obviously a more informal notion than he had ever considered.
    Griffin heaved himself to his feet. He didn’t want to adhere to the foolish stiffness that governed the lives of the aristocracy, and he had a shrewd idea that Phoebe agreed with him. “I want to see her. She’s the only wife I’ve got, and I’ve known her for approximately one day. This afternoon I barely managed to talk her out of annulling the marriage.”
    “That would be extremely difficult,” his father said, looking startled. “And ill-advised.”
    “So come with me,” Griffin said. “I could use the help. I have no idea how to make polite conversation. We didn’t have any aboard the Flying Poppy, as you can imagine.”
    “Actually, I can’t imagine,” his father said. He got up and pulled the bell cord. Mears popped through the door. The butler didn’t even bother to pretend that he hadn’t been hovering within earshot the whole time.
    “Tell Crafts to put together a bag, if you please,” the viscount said. “I’ll be joining my son and daughter-in-law for supper this evening. I may stay the night.”
    There was a strain of pleasure in his voice that made Griffin smile. When he considered a return