Page 45 of As the Devil Dares

Robert drawled wryly, “Perhaps you shouldn’t have bedded the man’s wife.”

His cousin gave a long and happy sigh at the memory. There was as little guilt on his face today as there had been that night in York. “I did a fine job of talking him out of killing me, you have to admit.”

“And a career diplomat was born,” Robert concluded ironically, taking his glass of brandy from the attendant.

“Scots with claymores, Americans with rifles, French with cannons…” Ross shrugged, accepting the bottle and setting it on the table beside his chair. “In the end, it’s all the same.”

Robert arched a dubious brow. “Angry non-English husbands who want to kill you?”

“Exactly,” Ross answered, deadpan.

But Robert knew the truth. For all that Ross had earned a rakish reputation that followed him into life as a diplomat, he was dedicated to England. Always had been, since the day he left university and took an officer’s commission in the army. Neither did he let inheriting the title keep him from continuing his work for his country, because he now served under the British ambassador to France. Even now, he was in London only for a short stay before heading back to Paris.

Robert shook his head and grumbled, “At least you’ve only got wars and armies to worry about.”

“And your foes are worse?” Ross hid a knowing grin behind the rim of his glass as he took a sip.

“Yes.” Robert closed his eyes against the headache pounding at the back of his skull. “The petticoat set.” He groaned with a pained shake of his head. When had his perfectly normal life spiraled out of control? “Good Lord, you have no idea the hell of it.”

And it was hell, but not just the socializing and shopping. There were also the implications behind it. He was forced to escort Mariah about the city to introduce her to all their family’s friends in order to spread the news that she was out for the season and thus also accepting suitors. Every marriage-minded mama they came across eyed her up and down…those with sons to decide if her family’s fortune might just be worth overlooking her reputation, and those with daughters to snub her once they saw for themselves how engaging she was. How attractive in her yellow muslin day dress and blue satin dinner gown. How light her laughter and bright her smile.

How truly enjoyable her company.

That grated Robert most of all, because when she wanted, the woman could be downright enchanting.

“Well,” Ross muttered with deadpan sarcasm, “I’ve heard that Wellington once considered sending misses and their mamas into battle, but the carnage from parasols alone would have been unfathomable.” The clink of glass and soft splash of liquid signaled a refilling of their drinks. “Not even the French deserved that.”

“Thank you,” he drawled, cracking open one eye to glare half-heartedly at his cousin.

With a grin at Robert’s expense, Ross pushed himself to his feet and crossed to the ivory inlaid cabinet in the corner to help himself to two of the cigars stored within. “And does your current state have anything to do with this petticoat of yours whom you’ve been—”

“She isn’t my anything.” He tossed back the brandy in a gasping swallow.

“So this petticoat who isn’t yours but whom you’ve been escorting around London as if she were,” Ross corrected, then chuckled with amusement at the glower he elicited from Robert. “Is she the reason you’re halfway to the bottom of a bottle of cognac in the middle of the afternoon and lying to your mother about appointments at the club?”

Hell no. He’d never let a woman affect him before in his life, and he certainly wasn’t going to start now with Mariah.

But when Ross put it like that…Damnation.

He admitted with a grumble, “It’s complicated.”

“The best women always are.” Ross cut off the tips of the two cheroots and handed one to Robert as he returned to his chair. “And what do you plan to do with her?”

Leaning forward to light his cigar, he blinked, taken aback by that. “I don’t plan to do anything.” Except make her some other man’s problem.

Ross slid him a disbelieving glance. “And what does she plan to do with you?”

“A slow and torturous death,” he muttered, then popped the cigar between his teeth. At this rate, certainly, one of them would kill the other by June.

With a quiet laugh, Ross lit his cigar on the lamp, then kicked his boots onto the fireplace fender, settling in for the afternoon.

“Her father offered me a partnership with his company,” Robert admitted, omitting several details he preferred not to share. Not even with his cousin. Lately, the challenge Winslow had given him had begun to feel more like a deal with the devil than a chance to prove himself. “That’s why I’ve been escorting her this season. He hopes she’ll find a husband and settle down. There’s nothing more to it than that.”

Ross said nothing, but the expression on his face told Robert that he didn’t believe him.

“Lord Robert?” The club’s manager strode into the room, carrying a small, paper-and-string-wrapped package. “This arrived for you, sir.”

“Thank you.” Puzzled, he accepted it. He pulled loose the string, and the paper fell away. Peveril of the Peak. The Walter Scott novel he’d been perusing at the bookseller.