Theo looked up to find his old friend, Jasper Deverell, heir to the Earldom of Bellston, watching him with the dispassionate interest. Deverell was draped across a leather armchair, one boot resting upon the opposite knee, coat unbuttoned and a copy ofThe Morning Gazettein hand.
“I am not brooding,” Theo muttered.
“You most certainly are. That brooding countenance is the very same you wore the week your father announced the gift of your favourite hunter to your cousin Mortimer. What was the creature’s name again?”
“Glory.”
“Tragic.” Jasper flipped the paper. “Yet I should think this present calamity eclipses even that particular injustice. You have sighed no fewer than five times, scowled twice, and uttered three curses. Are you unwell, or merely in love?”
Theo tipped back his glass. “Neither.”
“Mmm…” Jasper raised a brow. “May I hazard a guess? Brunette curls, a wit dangerously swift, an alarming propensity for attracting the attention of scandal sheets?”
Theo’s jaw tensed.
“Ah,” Jasper said, clearly quite pleased with himself. He tapped the newspaper. “Then you will be delighted to learn that theGazettehas pronounced your waltz with Miss Tolliver the most stirring display of devotion since the Duke of Morleigh’s unfortunate dip in the fountain with that Italian soprano.” He lowered the paper with a grin. “There is talk of a spring wedding, and Lady Wilmington has already commenced taking wagers on the gown. Ivory, apparently, is the preferred shade.”
Theo grunted. Well, at least he had played his part convincingly.
“Oh, but there is more,” Jasper added. “Really, Langley… A clandestine kiss, a furious brother and half thetonpressing their noses against the windows as though they were children outside aconfectioner’s shop? If discretion was your aim, you have admirably failed.”
Theo swore beneath his breath.
Jasper scanned the column. “Listen to this:‘Lord L. and Miss T. were observed entwined in the gardens, locked in a kiss so impassioned that several debutantes required smelling salts, and one elderly baroness had to be fanned back to consciousness with a programme from the Italian Opera.”
“That cannot possibly be printed.”
“‘Onlookers report,”’ Jasper continued solemnly,“‘that Lord L. cupped Miss T.’s cheek with all the reverence of a soldier returning from war, declaring, ‘My heart, my lungs, my spleen…all yours, dearest Henrietta Tolliver.’”
“Give me that, you insufferable fool.” Theo snatched the newspaper from Jasper’s hands and rifled through it. “None of that is in here.”
“Are you certain? Perhaps it is nestled beneath the weather report or appended to the naval dispatches.”
“You have invented it entirely.”
“I may have embellished the spleen, but only to improve the narrative.”
“Do shut up, Deverell.”
“I fear I cannot,” Jasper said gravely, clasping his hands before him as though delivering a eulogy. “Not when my dearest friend teeters upon the precipice of madness, heartbreak, or – God forbid – matrimony. It would be criminally negligent not to bear witness.”
Theo’s glare could have curdled fresh cream.
“Ah,” Jasper said, smug as a fox in the henhouse. “There it is. That is the look of a man in very serious trouble indeed.”
Theo leant back in his chair, fixed his eyes upon the ceiling. “It was a kiss.”
“Yes, and by all accounts, a rather memorable one.”
“She was…”
“She was?” Jasper prompted, far too gleefully.
Theo scowled. “She was Hetty.”
Jasper gave a low whistle of mock sympathy. “Ah. And therein lies the rub.” He regarded Theo for a moment and then rose, extending a hand as though proposing a dance. “Come. Let us take a turn in the air. Fresh movement may yet restore what little sense you have left and prevent you from declaring your love in a fit of emotional excess.”
“I am not in a fit of emotional excess,” Theo said through gritted teeth.
