Ideally Harrison would only need three meetings with his prospective bride before the wedding to be able to take the vows without doubts. If he were to feel even slightly whimsical about the whole thing, which he rarely did, he would have enjoyed finding some kind of warm friendliness between them that would have him wishing to be in her company more often. But the only thing he expected was for her to be relieved that he was planning on a polite marriage, rather like any other found in London.

Surely that ought to be comfortable enough for her. For both of them.

Neat and tidy, that was how he wanted things.

And what he wanted most was for the woman he married to be as much part of the elite in Society as possible without ascribing to their overly pious ideals of themselves. Because the thing he needed most in his wife, beyond anything else, was for her to accept his sister.

Half-sister, strictly speaking.

Illegitimate half-sister, if he were being completely honest.

Poor, common, ill-mannered, illegitimate half-sister, if an outsider were giving their opinion.

He never listened to the opinions of outsiders, but he wasn’t ignorant of them, either. He couldn’t be. Were she not his sister, he might have paused at hearing her situation as well.

Paused, but still proceeded.

Emblyn Moyle had been a fiery addition to his life, and he was convinced his life had shortened by at least fifteen years since bringing her into things. She was the daughter of a former maid of the household, and while it had never been a secret that his father had been a profligate and scoundrel, it had been kept quiet that he had actually fathered a child. Until Harrison had inherited the title, he had not known the name of his illegitimate sibling, and the first thing he had done upon learning her identity had been to seek her out.

In his self-absorbed, arrogant, blind manner, he had presumed she would be grateful to have family of high rank willing to claim her as one of their own and raise her up from the lowly station to which she had been relegated.

He could not have been more wrong.

Emblyn was not the sort to wish her fortune, or her station, to be any more than what it was. She was content with her life and had no qualms in striving day in, day out to eke out a living for herself in Cornwall. Her mother had taught her to work hard and never accept charity that was undeserved, and Emblyn had held to that.