Page 30 of Kathryn

Gerrit was bloody exhausted by the time the harrowing wedding breakfast came to an end.

Chatham’s speech had been blessedly brief. But after the duke had come his cousin and former heir, Andrew Derrick.

Gerrit had not been able to decipher the thrust of several of Derrick’s obscure comments but—judging by all the laughter aimed in Gerrit’s direction—they must have had something to do with Gerrit. In general, he was not bothered about being the subject of mockery. Indeed, taunting was something he had lived with all his life and learned to tolerate. However, it seemed the outside of enough that he was forced to endure such abuse at his own wedding breakfast—and from Derrick in particular—but Gerrit gritted his teeth and bore it.

His new wife scowled at most of what Derrick said, so perhaps Gerrit was not the only one at the table without a sense of humor.

Four more people spoke after Derrick, but Gerrit stopped listening, his thoughts on the more pleasant subject of Briarly, where he and his new wife would be retiring for the summer. He missed his home with an almost tangible ache. He’d had to—

“Your Grace?”

Gerrit looked up to find Chatham staring at him. “Yes?” he barked.

Chatham raised his eyebrows and gave Gerrit a meaningful look. Although what it meant, he wasn’t sure. Unless… Good God! Did the man expect him to make a speech?

Before Gerrit could do something rash like shout, not bloody likely! the Duchess of Chatham stood and drew the attention away from him.

The tall, pale woman blandly regarded the guests, as if she had only just now noticed them and quietly murmured, “Let us retire to the drawing room.”

After a moment of stunned surprise, people stood and began leaving the room.

The duchess turned her opaque gaze on Gerrit. “Nobody will expect the bride and groom to stay much longer, Your Grace.”

Gerrit gave her a genuinely grateful look. “Thank you for organizing this celebration.”

She merely nodded and turned away, a woman of admirably few words.

When he entered the drawing room he found his wife beside Andrew Derrick, listening to something he was saying.

Gerrit did not bother to wait for the man to stop speaking. Instead, he raised his voice and talked over him. “Are you ready to leave, Your Grace?”

His wife’s face flushed at his rudeness, but Derrick chuckled.

“Eager to get your new wife alone, are you Dulln—er Dulverton?”

Gerrit had planned to continue ignoring Derrick, but the irritating cad had made that impossible, so he lifted his gaze to Derrick’s laughing blue eyes and said, “Yes.”

Derrick blinked, either at Gerrit’s brevity or perhaps he could see the animus in Gerrit’s gaze. He did not hate Derrick for his endless jests and digs over the years, nor even for being one of the many men who had fucked Christina. No, what he truly loathed him for was lacking the tact and decency to absent himself from Gerrit’s bloody wedding.

“Er, just so,” Derrick said in his hail-fellow-well-met voice. He kissed Kathryn on the cheek. “Do not forget to write.” He cut Gerrit an unreadable look. “Take care of my little sister, Dulverton.” This time his annoying smirk was nowhere in evidence. Instead, there was a hard edge to his voice before he strolled across the room to join another cluster of people.

“Sister?” he repeated.

Kathryn gave him an odd look. Gerrit suspected he would be getting many such looks from her in the years to come.

“Well?” he prodded irritably.

“He is Chatham’s cousin, so I consider him family.”

Gerrit contemplated telling her that she was welcome to write Derrick ten times a day if she chose, but she had better not ask the man to visit.

He decided that was a conversation for when they were alone.

He held out his arm. “Come, let us take our leave.”

She lightly laid her hand on his proffered sleeve.

Gerrit knew it was only his imagination, but for a moment it felt as if her palm burned through his coat and into his skin like a brand.