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understatements of Emilyann’s life, but she was trying to maintain a little politeness, trying very hard not to lose her temper and start another shouting match with her uncle, who only ended up taking his anger out on the servants or the horses. “You remember, just this Christmas I had to box his ears to keep him from bothering the upstairs maid. He does not even like me.”
    “Nevertheless, he’ll marry you. Soon.” Morgan wore a self-satisfied smile. He picked up a piece of paper from the desktop and raised his glass in salute to the legal-looking document. “Special license. Damned expensive, but worth every penny.”
    Emilyann stopped her pacing. “You can keep me from London, Uncle, and keep me from marrying any other man, and even keep me like an indigent prisoner in my own home, but you cannot make me wed that slimy toad.”
    Morgan tossed down the remainder of his glass and stood up, coming around the desk to confront his recalcitrant niece face-to-face, bloodshot eyes to flashing blue ones. “You will, girl,” he said dangerously, no longer smiling. “Because a lot can happen in what? Eight years till your majority? A lot can happen in a week, my proud lady. I can leave you here alone with Bobo, for one. He ain’t no relation of yours, so your reputation would be in tatters. No man would ever look at you again, at least not in any honourable way.”
    “I don’t give a fig for my reputation, and Aunt Ingrid would never countenance such a thing anyway,” she said disdainfully.
    “Ingrid is in Cheltenham playing the grand duchess to her old neighbors. Then, too, perhaps she’d approve, to make the boy a lord. Enough of the ready, a handsome gift to Prinny, the heir’s father’s got to be a viscount at least.”
    “The heir! You think I’d ever let—that Bobo and I—” she sputtered.
    “As I said, a lot could happen in a week. Maybe I would let dear Beauregard try to convince you. A lad his size can be quite persuasive. Not very polished in his address, I’m afraid, but Bobo was never one to concern himself over taking what others did not want to give.”
    He could not have meant what she thought he meant. Not even this dastard could be so low to threaten his own brother’s child! Too angry to be frightened, too incensed to mind her tongue, she screamed at him: “You miserable, craven leech! That’s all you’ve ever been, a dirty bloodsucker. No wonder my father left his will the way he did, so that you couldn’t destroy everything he loved. It’s only too bad he had to name you my trustee, but I suppose he was too high-minded to suspect even you of such abominable behavior. Trustee, hah! I wouldn’t trust you to oversee a pile of manure, and you won’t destroy me!” she raged unwisely. “I’ll go live with Nanny. So there.” And she shook her fist at him.
    Red-faced with fury, Morgan shook his own fist inches from her nose. “And good riddance to bad rubbish. I’ll declare you a runaway and pocket your bloody allowance. Then how will you and your precious Nanny live, huh, raising pigs?”
    “Better that than living with them!” she shouted.
    That’s when he hit her.
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Chapter 4
    No one had ever struck her before. Of course she had gotten her own back and snatched up the special license before fleeing to her room—expensive be damned! He could go through forty inheritances purchasing the blasted things before she would go along with his plans. She would burn it later, when she had enough patience to build a fire. Now she just had to get out of there, put space between herself and that worm. She did not even have a riding habit that fit her, thanks to him. No matter. Emilyann thrust her feet into her riding boots, tore open the confining collar of the black gown, rolled up the sleeves, and headed for the stables.
    “Hey, Lady Em,” Jake called from the side of the barn, where he sat polishing tack in the sun so his knotted joints moved better. “Where you goin’