"Didn't feel like much of a choice with her father in my parlor," he returned, surly. Cash's point probably still stood — Mr. Farley couldn't really have forced Ford to do anything, at the end of the day. He didn't seem like the sort to threaten actual violence if Ford had just flatly refused. And he had been planning to let her take the scandal — he'd said as much to Verity on the walk back home from the party that night. But two days later, with Mr. Farley in his parlor talking about consequences, it turned out he hadn't had the stomach for it after all. (If he had not spent so much of the intervening time thinking about what he might do if Grace had ended up in circumstances similar to Miss Farley's, things might have gone differently).

He felt a little on-edge that he was having to defend himself at all, on this point — he'd done the right thing. People weren't supposed to blame him for it. People weren't supposed to question it. Cash was making him have a conversation that was never supposed to occur.

---