The Scoundrel and the Debutante (The Cabot Sisters #3)

“Roan, you can’t.”


“I can,” he said. “I will.” He roughly pushed her hair back from her face. “Prudence...I love you,” he said. “I’ve tried to persuade myself that it’s not possible, not like this, not so quickly. But I do. I can feel it, here,” he said, tapping a fist to his chest. “I feel it in every moment, in every breath I am with you. There are obstacles, yes, but look what we’ve overcome in the past few days. Marry me and come to America. You said there is nothing for you here, that you will live behind walls. There is everything for you there.”

“My family is here,” she said. “My sisters, my nieces and nephews. My mother. How can I leave them? How can we know that we won’t be other people entirely?”

“What do you mean?” he asked, confused.

“I mean that this, with you, has been magical,” she said, resting her hand over his heart. “It seems almost as if you appeared from air to grant all my wishes. You’ve shown me an adventure that has far exceeded anything I might have ever dreamed. But married? In a foreign land, with different customs, with a different family? We’ve neither of us any notion of what the other expects...do we?”

Roan looked startled. It pained Prudence to say so, but she was not so blinded by her adoration of him to think that the adventure they’d shared would carry on day after day into a new world and into a marriage. What if she discovered things about him that made her unhappy? What if his family couldn’t accept her? How would she cope, so far removed from her own family?

Roan frowned as if trying to find a good response.

“Stay in England,” she said suddenly, and grabbed his face between her hands. “Stay here, stay with me.”

“No, Pru, I can’t,” he said. “How would I provide for you? I am the head of my family’s business. They rely on me for our livelihood. I am involved in the building of the canal. There is too much at stake, not only for me, but for my entire family. And there is Aurora. I promised my mother I would bring her home.”

“But...my family relies on me, too,” Prudence said softly. She could feel tears in her eyes as they gazed at each other, the reality of their different worlds rushing in to fill the space around them.

Roan stroked her hair. “Think about it,” he said. “Promise me you’ll at least do that.”

“Roan, I—”

“No,” he said, and covered her mouth with his hand. “Don’t answer until we’ve reached London. Just think on what I’ve said.” He withdrew his hand from her mouth. “I’ll give you the moon, I’ll give you the sun. Whatever you want, Pru, is yours. I swear to you, we will still be us, just as we are now.”

“Roan...”

“I believe what I say,” he said, his gaze searching her face. “Don’t give me an answer now. Consider it. Please.” He looked as if he couldn’t bear for her to say no.

But she couldn’t say yes.

Prudence rolled onto her back and stared up at the canopy. Roan slipped his fingers in between hers, and they lay there, neither of them speaking.

Prudence was confused by her emotions. She was losing them in this vast world, in this man who had wrapped himself around her heart. He was floating away from her, floating back to America. Oh God, how she would miss him. It would be unbearable, truly unbearable.

Could she go with him? Could she leave all she’d ever known behind and walk so blindly into the unknown? The practical side of her, the side of her that ruled her head, that kept her within the bounds of propriety, made her a dutiful daughter and sister, said no. The practical side of her said that if she went to America with him, and wed him, the magic would fade away and the blunt realities of a marriage made in haste would overshadow the magic of this week.

The practical side of her said all of that, but her heart kept whispering yes.





CHAPTER FOURTEEN

EVERY TIME ROAN tried to close his eyes to sleep, he couldn’t keep them closed. He kept opening them to assure himself that Prudence was still there beside him and hadn’t disappeared into a dream quite yet.