My Darling Caroline Read Free

difficult to grow and even more difficult to breed. God in heaven, what should she do now? It all seemed so dismal, so hopeless…
    Then suddenly, as with any sharp intellect, a small, very tiny image began to emerge from the deepest recesses of her mind. Slowly it began to take shape, to build, and without warning it grew so that even the color before her faded from the dazzle of brilliance filling her senses.
    If she married him…
    Caroline grinned and jumped back from the window to look down at her hands, now shaking with a sudden burst of energy. What if she married him? She didn’t want a husband, but so what! If she married the earl, she would be fulfilling her father’s wish and then she could, after that time, put all of her talents and intelligence to good use by creating a way of leaving the man to study her science. He wouldn’t want her anyway, for she had all but concluded he was being coerced into taking her as a wife as well, and she certainly didn’t have anything wifely to offer him. She was an unbecoming, set-in-her-ways spinster.
    But if he was smart, and she hoped to God he was, perhaps she could strike a deal with him, and they could both go their separate ways as did many married couples. If the marriage were annulled in say…four months, she would be able to leave her husband to a life of his own, catch a ship to New York, and be free from society’s demanding, irritating mores to do as she wanted—needed—to do.
    This was the way out. And it was falling into her lap.
    Caroline fairly twirled around in glee over her genius. Then, suddenly, she heard shouting again from the study, then scuffling, then her father’s chair being pushed across the wooden floor, then shouting again.
    She rolled her eyes. Idiot men.
    “Caroline!” her father roared seconds later.
    She tried to hide her triumphant smile as she replied smoothly, “In here, Father.”
    He walked briskly into the morning room, seemingly surprised that she was only across the hall; then his eyes grew angry as he looked her up and down.
    “Are you never clean, girl?”
    Sighing, she noticed the upturned collar and wrinkles on his usually pristine shirt, his mussed hair, the twitch in his cheek as it made the curls in his gray-brown side whiskers flair. Obviously he and the earl had exchanged more than words.
    Men. Pompous fools.
    Lifting her rosebud to his view, she returned lightly, “I’ve been breeding African lilies and pruning roses—”
    “Yes, yes, yes,” he cut in impatiently. “The Earl of Weymerth…”
    Suddenly he seemed lost. Drawing a deep breath, either from nervousness or as some sort of stall tactic, he finally finished by adding nothing more than, “The earl wants a word with you.”
    Caroline placed her hands on her hips and glared at him. “You want me to marry him, don’t you?”
    He was plainly taken aback by her keen perception, but he said nothing, giving her a look of what she considered to be complete guilt coupled with controlled fury.
    “Why, Father?” she quietly asked.
    Sytheford tried but truthfully failed in composing himself, standing erect as a statue and folding his hands behind his back. “You need someone to care for your needs, since I won’t be around forever, and you need a husband to give you children—”
    “I don’t particularly want children. You know that,” she interjected fiercely.
    He ignored her outburst. “Lord Weymerth is a strong, decent man who would give his life for king and country—”
    “I’m sure the earl is a fine and noble subject—”
    “And he will no doubt provide for you. But most importantly”—he took another deep breath and exhaled loudly—“I won’t allow you to go against my wishes, Caroline.”
    After several strained seconds, she whispered, “I won’t go against your wishes.”
    “You will marry him or—”
    “I will marry him.”
    He gaped at her with apparent disbelief, then his eyes narrowed to tiny slits. “If you think to