Jasper stood abruptly, sweeping his winnings into his pocket. “Right. Back to the sheepfold with you, Charleston. Gentlemen.” He offered a shallow bow. “As ever, a delight.”
Lottie shot to her feet too quickly, and the room lurched. She caught the edge of the table with one hand and sent the walnuts flying with the other.
“I say,” she muttered again, because it had served her well once and she saw no reason to abandon it.
Jasper reached for her arm. “Easy, Charleston. Time to go—come along!”
But before he could whisk her away, Theo rose and stepped directly into his path. One hand came down upon Jasper’s shoulder with the ease of old friendship, but his fingers tightened with considerably less of it.
“You are my closest friend,” Theo said very softly, so that Captain Graham and Mr Everly could not hear, “which is the only reason I am not presently inviting you outside andrearranging your features in a manner your mother would find distressing.”
“Generous of you,” Jasper murmured.
“Charlotte,” Theo continued, the name barely audible, “is now my sister by marriage. This places me in the awkward position of being obliged to ensure no further idiocy occurs, even when the idiocy has been arranged by a man I once respected.”
“Once?” Jasper said faintly. “How swiftly I fall.”
“You and I shall speak later,” Theo said. “Privately.”
“Naturally. I look forward to the lecture,” Jasper said lightly, though his eyes flicked, with far less humour, to Morleigh.
The duke had not moved, which was somehow worse. He stood beside the chair with his jaw set and his eyes fixed upon Jasper as though deciding whether murder would be socially inconvenient. At last, Morleigh rose. “Mr Charleston.”
And Lottie—curse her upbringing, curse her instincts, curse the bloody Tolliver name—began to curtsey, catching herself halfway. What emerged was a stuttering dip of the knees that nearly knocked over a side table.
Jasper made a strangled sound, and Theo’s hand snapped to her shoulder like a hawk diving for a field mouse.
“We are leaving,” he said tightly. “Now.”
Lottie jerked back from his hand on her shoulder at once. “Do not manhandle me, sir!” Realising she had perhaps overdone it, she thrust out her chest and added in Mr Charleston’s deepest voice, “A gentleman objects to being seized.”
“A gentleman also knows when to leave,” Theo said through his teeth, seizing her arm more firmly and steering her away.
“I demand satisfaction!” Lottie announced, stumbling once and recovering with a manly cough.
“You demand your bed,” Theo hissed.
“And water,” Morleigh added.
“And,” Jasper called after her, clearly unable to help himself, “the small matter of what you owe me, Charleston.”
Lottie stopped dead, turned with magnificent drunken outrage, and pointed at him. “Damnation!”
Then Theo hauled her out before she could think of anything worse.
Chapter 22
The moment the club doors shut behind them, the night hit Lottie like a slap. Cool air. Wet stone. Gaslight swimming in little golden halos.
She drew herself up, which would have been more effective had the pavement not shifted beneath her boots.
A carriage waited at the kerb, summoned either by divine judgement or the Duke of Morleigh’s infernal gift for arranging things without speaking. The footman opened the door. Theo climbed in first and Morleigh gestured for her to follow.
Lottie obeyed, mostly because the street had begun behaving like the deck of a ship. The door shut with a click like the closing of a cell.
Theo sat opposite her, rigid with fury. Morleigh looked carved from marble and twice as forgiving. Lottie, arranged before them like a criminal in her silly cravat, folded her arms and scowled.
“Well,” Theo said at length. “That was inspired, Charlotte. Truly. Not at all how I envisioned my evening.”
