Marrying Mari Read Online Free PDF Page A

men.
    “Stop doing that! Stop checking out your story, your con, your whatever. Forget it—let me out of here.” She pushed, actually pushed at Gabriel.
    It was like shoving a redwood.
    “We did ask for you. Specifically, as you say. Want to know why?” Ethan’s voice was steel.
    She looked at him. “I said so, didn’t I?”
    “First, the money is yours—no strings. No matter what. And no, no one is trying to buy you. Based on our brief time together, I don’t think it could be done.” Ethan poured more wine for each of them, then settled back. He stared into his glass, then at her. “Have you ever heard of the Colony?” When she shook her head, he continued. “It’s an enclave, a kind of closed society in upstate New York, north of the city. Most people have never heard of it, but I wondered if you might have.”
    Mariella stared. “Why?”
    “The Colony was founded in the late 1600s. You know the Pilgrims landed in Plymouth in 1620. They left England because of religious persecution. About twenty years later, another group did the same. This time not for religious persecution, but because they could see that England was heading for civil war, and that it was likely that the Puritans would win. The Puritans were as narrow-minded as the Royalists, so this group banded together to find someplace more open to their ideas of freedom. Some of the group were Catholic and Royalist, some Protestant, and there were two Jewish families. Mostly, they were wealthy and well educated. So they built three ships, they changed half their worldly goods to portable items, and they sailed west, to America.”
    Gabriel took up the story. “When they got here, they landed in Plymouth. But they didn’t stay with the Pilgrims. Instead, after a year they moved to the Hudson Valley, which was primarily Dutch. They settled on the east bank of the Hudson River, north of what would become Manhattan. And they founded the Colony. They bought the land from the natives and the Dutch—twice—paying in gold.”
    “Then, in 1664 when the land came under British rule, they petitioned Charles II for colony status. Instead, he gave them a land grant that has never been revoked. One hundred thousand acres reaching from the bank of the Hudson into Connecticut and Massachusetts. Much of it is now developed land, and the people living and working there don’t even know who owns it. But the heart of it is still the closed settlement where the original families, and now their descendants, live.” Ethan sipped his wine.
    “Your bank, that’s their bank, right?”
    “Our bank, sugar.” Gabriel said. “Ethan and I are direct descendants of the original settlers. Our families, like all the Colony families, keep their money there. Ethan’s family has always managed it.”
    Ethan nodded. “The half of the money that didn’t come with the original settlers remained in Europe and, later back in England. A few men stayed to manage it, in Amsterdam and London. We’ve evolved, but not much. It’s still a private bank. The original families still live in the Colony and still live by the rules established back in the 1660s.”
    Gabriel added, “With necessary modernization.”
    Ethan smiled ruefully. “Not very many.”
    She sipped her wine and thought. “So is Insatiable another Colony business?” she asked Gabriel.
    “No, it’s all ours. Owning restaurants and clubs doesn’t fit well with Colony members.” He looked at her, then Ethan, then added, “We also own Crave.”
    The club where she had delivered the envelope.
    “Okay, no matter what you say, this is officially hinky.”
    Gabriel put his hand over hers on the table. “Please listen. There’s more.”
    “Yeah, I bet.”
    “As I said, Gabe and I are direct descendants of Colony settlers. There have been three periods when the Colony opened its doors to new members—only three. Once right after the Revolution, again about a decade after the Civil War and again after World War