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“Daff!” Colin called out. “You’re just in time to help us put out the wickets.”
She gave him an arch smile. “You didn’t think I’d let you set up the course yourself, do you?” She turned to her husband. “I don’t trust him as far as I can throw him.”
“Don’t listen to her,” Colin said to Kate. “She’s very strong. I’d wager she could toss me clear into the lake.”
Daphne rolled her eyes and turned to Kate. “Since I’m sure my miserable brother won’t do the honors, I’ll introduce myself. I am Daphne, Duchess of Hastings, and this is my husband Simon.”
Kate bobbed a quick curtsy. “Your grace,” she murmured, then turned to the duke and said again, “Your grace.”
Colin waved his hand toward her as he bent down to retrieve the wickets from the Pall Mall cart. “This is Miss Sheffield.”
Daphne looked confused. “I just passed by Anthony at the house. I thought he said he was on his way to fetch Miss Sheffield.”
“My sister,” Kate explained. “Edwina. I am Katharine. Kate to my friends.”
“Well, if you are brave enough to play Pall Mall with the Bridgertons, I definitely want you as my friend,” Daphne said with a wide smile. “Therefore you must call me Daphne. And my husband Simon. Simon?”
“Oh, of course,” he said, and Kate had the distinct impression that he would have said the same had she just declared the sky orange. Not that he wasn’t listening to her, just that it was clear he adored her to distraction.
This, Kate thought, was what she wanted for Edwina.
“Let me take half of those,” Daphne said, reaching for the wickets in her brother’s hand. “Miss Sheffield andI…that is, Kate and I”—she flashed Kate a friendly grin—“will set up three of them, and you and Simon can do the rest.”
Before Kate could even venture an opinion, Daphne had taken her by the arm and was leading her toward the lake.
“We have to make absolutely certain that Anthony loses his ball in the water,” Daphne muttered. “I have never forgiven him for last time. I thought Benedict and Colin were going to die laughing. And Anthony was the worst. He just stood there smirking. Smirking!” She turned to Kate with a most beleaguered expression. “No one smirks quite like my eldest brother.”
“I know,” Kate muttered under her breath.
Thankfully, the duchess hadn’t heard her. “If I could have killed him, I vow I would have.”
“What will happen once all your balls are lost in the lake?” Kate couldn’t resist asking. “I haven’t played with you lot yet, but you do seem rather competitive, and it seems…”
“That it would be inevitable?” Daphne finished for her. She grinned. “You’re probably right. We have no sense of sportsmanship when it comes to Pall Mall. When a Bridgerton picks up a mallet, we become the worst sorts of cheaters and liars. Truly, the game is less about winning than making sure the other players lose.”
Kate fought for words. “It sounds…”
“Awful?” Daphne grinned. “It’s not. You’ll never have more fun, I guarantee it. But at the rate we’re going, the entire set will end up in the lake ere long. I suppose we’ll have to send to France for another set.” She jammed a wicket into the ground. “It seems a waste, I know, but worth it to humiliate my brothers.”
Kate tried not to laugh, but she didn’t succeed.
“Do you have any brothers, Miss Sheffield?” Daphne asked.
Since the duchess had forgotten to use her given name, Kate deemed it best to revert to formal manners. “None, your grace,” she replied. “Edwina is my only sibling.”
Daphne shaded her eyes with her hand and scanned the area for a devilish wicket location. When she spied one—sitting right atop a tree root—she marched away, leaving Kate no choice but to follow.
“Four brothers,” Daphne said, shoving the wicket into the ground, “provide quite a marvelous education.”
“The things you must have learned,” Kate said, quite impressed. “Can you give a man a black eye? Knock him to the ground?”
Daphne grinned wickedly. “Ask my husband.”
“Ask me what?” the duke called out from where he and Colin were placing a wicket on a tree root on the opposite side of the tree.
“Nothing,” the duchess called out innocently. “I’ve also learned,” she whispered to Kate, “when it’s best just to keep one’s mouth shut. Men are much easier to manage once you understand a few basic facts about their nature.”
“Which are?” Kate prompted.
Daphne leaned forward and whispered behind her cupped hand, “They’re not as smart as we are, they’re not as intuitive as we are, and they certainly don’t need to know about fifty percent of what we do.” She looked around. “He didn’t hear that, did he?”
Simon stepped out from behind the tree. “Every word.”
Kate choked on a laugh as Daphne jumped a foot. “But it’s true,” Daphne said archly.
Simon crossed his arms. “I’ll let you think so.” He turned to Kate. “I’ve learned a thing or two about women over the years.”
“Really?” Kate asked, fascinated.
He nodded and leaned in, as if imparting a grave state secret. “They’re much easier to manage if one allows them to believe that they are smarter and more intuitive than men. And,” he added with a superior glance at his wife, “our lives are much more peaceful if we pretend that we’re only aware of about fifty percent of what they do.”
Colin approached, swinging a mallet in a low arc. “Are they having a spat?” he asked Kate.
“A discussion,” Daphne corrected.
“God save me from such discussions,” Colin muttered. “Let’s choose colors.”
Kate followed him back to the Pall Mall set, her fingers drumming against her thigh. “Do you have the time?” she asked him.
Colin pulled out his pocket watch. “A bit after half three, why?”
“I just thought that Edwina and the viscount would be down by now, that’s all,” she said, trying not to look too concerned.
Colin shrugged. “They should be.” Then, completely oblivious to her distress, he motioned to the Pall Mall set. “Here. You’re the guest. You choose first. What color do you want?”
Without giving it much thought, Kate reached in and grabbed a mallet. It was only when it was in her hand that she realized it was black.
“The mallet of death,” Colin said approvingly. “I knew she’d make a fine player.”
“Leave the pink one for Anthony,” Daphne said, reaching for the green mallet.
The duke pulled the orange mallet out of the set, turning to Kate as he said, “You are my witness that I had nothing to do with Bridgerton’s pink mallet, yes?”
Kate smiled wickedly. “I noticed that you didn’t choose the pink mallet.”
“Of course not,” he returned, his grin even more devious than hers. “My wife had already chosen it for him. I could not gainsay her, now, could I?”
“Yellow for me,” Colin said, “and blue for Miss Edwina, don’t you think?”
“Oh, yes,” Kate replied. “Edwina loves blue.”
The foursome stared down at the two mallets left: pink and purple.
“He’s not going to like either one,” Daphne said.
Colin nodded. “But he’ll like pink even less.” And with that, he picked up the purple mallet and tossed it into the shed, then reached down and sent the purple ball in after it.
“I say,” the duke said, “where is Anthony?”
“That’s a very good question,” Kate muttered, tapping her hand against her thigh.
“I suppose you’ll want to know what time it is,” Colin said slyly.
Kate flushed. She’d already asked him to check his pocket watch twice. “I’m fine, thank you,” she answered, lacking a witty retort.
“Very well. It’s just that I’ve learned that once you start moving your hand like that—”
Kate’s hand froze.
“?
??you’re usually about ready to ask me what time it is.”
“You’ve learned quite a lot about me in the past hour,” Kate said dryly.
He grinned. “I’m an observant fellow.”
“Obviously,” she muttered.
“But in case you wanted to know, it’s a quarter of an hour before four.”
“They’re past due,” Kate said.
Colin leaned forward and whispered, “I highly doubt that my brother is ravishing your sister.”
Kate lurched back. “Mr. Bridgerton!”
“What are you two talking about?” Daphne asked.
Colin grinned. “Miss Sheffield is worried that Anthony is compromising the other Miss Sheffield.”
“Colin!” Daphne exclaimed. “That isn’t the least bit funny.”
“And certainly not true,” Kate protested. Well, almost not true. She didn’t think the viscount was compromising Edwina, but he was probably doing his very best to charm her silly. And that was dangerous in and of itself.
Kate pondered the mallet in her hand and tried to figure out how she might bring it down upon the viscount’s head and make it look like an accident.
The mallet of death, indeed.
