My Stepmother Stole My Inheritance — So I Married the Man Who Foreclosed On Her
Part 2
It was a special license, signed by the Archbishop.
Greg explained he despised the London season and required a wife to satisfy the entailment on his primary estate.
He needed someone who understood the brutal mechanics of the world.
He wanted a woman who wouldn’t expect poetry, romance, or his constant presence.
I looked at the document, realizing it was a lifeline woven from thorns.
I asked what would happen if I refused.
He stated objectively that I could pack my bags with Heather and try my luck as a governess.
My scraped hands curled into fists as I hated his absolute, unshakable certainty.
I reminded him that the twenty thousand pounds Heather stole was gone.
Greg’s eyes flashed with a sudden, sharp glint of approval.
He promised to deposit twenty thousand pounds into an account bearing my name exclusively before we left the room.
He wasn’t buying a wife; he was buying a partner for his own isolation.
I picked up the quill and dipped it in the sharp-smelling iron gall ink.
I signed my first name, knowing my surname didn’t matter anymore.
Greg instructed me to pack whatever I could carry in two trunks.
He told me to deliver the news to Heather myself as a wedding gift.
I found my stepmother slumped on a velvet chaise lounge in the drawing room.
She groaned, ordering me to help the servants smuggle out the silver candlesticks before the barbarian took inventory.
I stood in the center of the room, my hands folded over my stomach to hide their trembling.
I told her the clerk was already cataloging the dining room.
Heather sat up, her face twisting into a mask of pure, unadulterated hatred.
She accused me of plotting with the Duke to steal the house.
I didn’t back away as her suffocating scent of stale lavender washed over me.
I reminded her that she stole my mother’s money first, stealing my only escape.
I told her the Duke had just bought the cage she built for me.
I turned my back on her and walked out.
We left for Yorkshire in the freezing, driving rain.
The massive black carriage smelled of rich dark leather and wet wool.
Greg sat opposite me, reading a stack of dispatch letters without glancing up.
When he noticed me shivering, he tossed a heavy fur-lined lap robe across the carriage.
It was the first act of care I had received in three years, and it was entirely, brutally transactional.
We were married in a crumbling stone parish by a vicar with a hacking cough.
Greg shoved a solid gold ring onto my freezing finger, and the transaction was sealed.
When we arrived at his brutalist gray stone estate on the edge of the moors, he abandoned me in the cavernous foyer.
He ordered the servants to take my trunks to the east wing while he went to review ledgers.
Two days later, a sealed envelope from the Bank of London was brought to my room.
It contained a bank draft for twenty thousand pounds, issued exclusively to me.
I stared at the thick vellum, feeling a heavy, suffocating pressure push against my lungs.
I had my money back, but as I sat in that freezing stone mansion with a husband who barely looked at me, I had to wonder—was I finally free, or had I just bought a more expensive prison?
