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Peckham turned his attention to the faro table and nodded back at Larkin.
His entire staff knew to have a care for Lady Masterson. No one questioned Leo regarding why he insisted Georgina be protected so fiercely, her comfort seen to before all others. He suspected they knew.
On the floor below, Harold leered in Georgina’s direction, coming far too close.
She paled as he spoke to her but otherwise showed no outward signs of distress. But Leo noticed the slight purse of her lips and the way her shoulders braced as if about to take a blow. He knew Georgina and Harold didn’t get on well. Harold liked to insult Georgina.
Leo made a mental note to revoke Harold’s membership.
Finally, Harold straightened and sauntered away, threading through the crowd.
Georgina returned to her game, laughing as she collected her chips. Leo’s eyes lingered over her; brazen, wild spring, savage and sharp. How defiantly Georgina had faced Leo, declaring she didn’t care for being bartered as if she were a goat. That she’d dug out the rows herself to plant tulips at Beechwood Court for a grandmother who had shot squirrels out of trees and taught her to curse.
Leo missed Georgina sofiercely.
Years ago, he’d asked his stepmother, Amanda, how she could tolerate thearrogant prickknown as Marcus Barrington. Leo, bitter illegitimate lad that he was, had done everything in his power to make Amanda despise him.
Because sheshouldhave despised her husband’s bastard.
He’d said Andromeda, his recently born half-sister, resembled more a shriveled mushroom than a baby. When Amanda had gifted him with a puppy, he’d told her he didn’t want the dog. Leo diced with the footmen. Stole the tarts out of the kitchen meant for dessert and sold them on the street. Pretended he didn’t have proper table manners.
Nothingworked.
That day, he’d deliberately used crude language to describe his father, hoping to shock her and perhaps make her call for the smelling salts. Instead, Amanda coolly took a sip of her tea, clearly unimpressed with his attempts to annoy her. She slid the plate of biscuits they had been sharing across the table in his direction.
“The ancient Greeks believed in soulmates, Leo,” she’d said calmly.
Leo had rolled his eyes, looking up at the ceiling, rudely dismissing her. Amanda was always going on about someone named Homer and offering him her copy of the Iliad. She adored those bloody Greeks. Frankly, Leo didn’t see what all the fuss was about. The only thing he’d liked were the statues of half-naked ladies Amanda kept putting in the garden.
“Why should I care?” he’d said, crunching loudly on a biscuit.
“Well, because we all have one. One day, your soulmate will appear.”
Slurping his tea—loudly—he’d answered, “Not bloody likely, Your Grace. Bastards don’t have soulmates, whatever they are. Can’t imagine we’re worth the trouble.”What else must he do? Stick a finger in his nose? Have a rude sound come from his arse? What would it take to give Amanda a fit of the vapors?
Leo had burped, not bothering to cover his mouth.
She had only smiled. “You are so very determined to set yourself apart from us. You weren’t to blame, Leo.”
He’d stilled when she said the words, then grinned to hide the fact that inside, he was screaming. “I am not like you, Your Grace.”
“We are more alike than you know. But we’ll discuss that at a later time. The Greeks, you see, believed everyone had their special person.”
Leo had taken another biscuit from the plate, relieved she’d changed the subject from the topic of the previous Duchess of Averell’s death and back to the Greeks. “I don’t,” he’d said with a scoff.
“You do, Leo. You aren’t meant to be alone. Apart. A soulmate is your heart’s dearest companion. A person perfect only for you.”
“I don’t understand why you think I care, Amanda.”
A wry smile crossed her lips.“Because for me, that one perfect person is the arrogant prick known as Marcus Barrington.”
Leo’s fingers bit into the fine mahogany of the second-floor railing. The conversation, long forgotten, had recently come to mind, about the same time Georgina had returned to London. He no longer annoyed his stepmother, at least not on purpose. Andromeda was now a beautiful young woman, not mushroom-like at all. And LeoadoredAmanda, though he rarely told her so. His own mother, Molly, had died only a few years after leaving Cherry Hill. It was Amanda who’d demanded Leo allow her to care for him. Be a Barrington.
He’d been thinking quite a lot about that lately. Who he was.
Leo dropped his hands, smoothing his fingers over the swirling gold, crimson, and purple pattern of his waistcoat. Particularly ghastly. Georgina would take one look and make a horrible, disparaging remark. At least he hoped she would.
Because he meant to end this estrangement between them.
Tonight.
