“Good evening, Your Grace,” trilled a tall matron in puce, her eyes glinting as she ushered forward her flock of three white-clad and blankly coy daughters. “Charlotte, Jane, Millicent, you remember the Duke of Greyhaven, don’t you? We met him last December.”
“How lovely to see you again, Your Grace. I played the harp at Lady Johnson’s musical evening before Christmas.”
“And I played the pianoforte.”
“I sang. We were all sorry that you did not sing along with us.”
“I’m sure you have a fine voice.”
Nathaniel could hardly remember the mother’s name—Lady Bradburn? Braeburn? Balburne?—and he could not keep track of which vapid remark came from which young lady, let alone respond to them.
Yet, regardless of his stony face and lack of engagement, their banal conversation and light flirtation continued until he was almost bored to tears. Managing to escape, he ran straight into another mother-and-daughter pair, then another.
His mind flitted back to the brief time during which he had courted Primrose, now the Duchess of Mildenhall. A marriage would not only have provided him with a duchess to handle domestic concerns and a mother for Lilian, but it would also have meant escape from these tireless husband-hunters.
It was a shame that marriage could not be handed to him on a platter without this awful rigmarole.
When his original pursuers, Lady B. and her three daughters, recaptured him in a corner, he let his eyes glaze over, knowing that it was only a matter of time before supper was announced. If they tried to get him to escort them to the buffet, he would make his excuses and leave Mildenhall House.
Suddenly, he caught sight of his brother.
“Nathaniel, I must talk to you at once. It is most urgent,” Patrick said.
He spoke with real agitation and desperation in his eyes, but then he was always overly dramatic about life.
Nathaniel guessed that his brother had come here hoping to catch a pretty girl and now found her absent or on the arm of another man. Well, at least Patrick was less boring than his current companions.
“Do excuse me, ladies. My brother requires my urgent attention,” he told the ladies around him without meeting their eyes, and then let himself be drawn away and out of the room.
“She isn’t here, damn it,” Patrick blurted out. “I don’t understand it. Last week, she promised she would be here with her sister and their grandmother, but I spent the whole performance looking around the room, and she’s not here.”
So, Nathaniel’s suspicions about Patrick’s motivations were right. It was always about some pretty girl, and it was always complicated.
Why couldn’t his brother just pursue someone easy, marry her, and move on? Why all the emotional highs and lows, the frantic worry, and the desperate declarations of love? Nathaniel thought it must be exhausting for him.
“Who isn’t here?” he inquired mildly. “Lady Clara Beaumont? The woman with the green eyes and black hair?”
“No, don’t be ridiculous,” Patrick scoffed. “I can barely remember Lady Clara, and I haven’t seen her in months.”
“It seems like only yesterday that you were mooning about Greyhaven Park, lamenting the fact that she preferred someone else,” Nathaniel drawled.
“The only woman I love is Mary Holt. Her hair is like burnished gold, and her eyes are more hazel than green. Whenever she smiles at me, I am bewitched.”
“Just like all the others,” Nathaniel muttered. “Is that the door to the buffet room? Leo said it would be open in a few minutes, but I dare say we could go in now.”
A footman approached them as they stood outside the buffet room. Nathaniel wondered if he would try to prevent themfrom attacking the food early and whether it would be more entertaining or annoying if he stood his ground.
“Lord Patrick Winslow?” the footman inquired.
“Yes,” Patrick answered uncertainly. “Why do you ask?”
“A message has arrived for you, sir. It is marked both urgent and important.”
For the first time, the brothers looked at the missive on the footman’s silver tray.
Patrick snatched it up. “It is from her,” he said jubilantly. “I must read it at once.”
“Sure,” Nathaniel returned and let both the footman and Patrick walk away in different directions.
