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Lord Farleigh looked to Isleen for the first time in what felt like ages, and she stiffened her spine beneath his gaze. He appeared tired. Perhaps defeated. And when he spoke to her, his voice was low and deep.
“They will not relent until we agree. Are the terms favorable for you, Miss Frost? Do you wish to be my keeper for the rest of the month?”
He leaned closer while speaking, over the arm of his chair, and she leaned in too, the better to hear him.
They were mere inches apart.
A trickle of warmth began in her belly and moved outward as she stared into his blue eyes—warmth that had nothing to do with the almost intimate tone of his voice.
No. It had to be satisfaction. The idea of bossing around a future duke satisfied her immensely. Of course she would do it.
“I do,” she said at last, the two small words sealing her fate to his for the month of December. “I have spent limited time in your company, but I think you will find it quite difficult to behave frivolously.”
“You will have to give him lots of direction,” Sir Andrew stated, and Isleen abruptly remembered they weren’t alone. That four others stared at them with varying expressions of interest and delight.
Why did she have the feeling that she had just been tricked?
CHAPTER6
Isleen didn’t speak to her brother about the odd wager until the next morning. She had turned in earlier than he had the evening before. Finding a moment alone with him wasn’t all that difficult; she trapped Teague in an alcove with an alarmingly lifelike marble cat before he could leave the guest’s corridor.
Considering his part of the wager may have included betrayal, Isleen approached him gently. “Did you put your English friends up to playing a joke on me, brother?”
“I did not,” he said, easy-as-you-please. Then he bent to look closer at the marble tabby. “At least, whatever joke they played wasn’t my idea. But when Lady Atella asked what might provoke you, I may have mentioned you have more than a touch of the usual Irish pride.” He poked at one of the marble cat’s fangs.
“Stop playing with that.” Isleen crossed her arms. “What if that tooth breaks off? You’ll be buying the duke a new one.”
Teague snorted but withdrew from the statue. “Lady Atella assured me she didn’t mean any harm.”
“But they did plan my part in their little wager.” Isleen rubbed briefly at her eyebrows, then paced away from her brother. “I have to think their scheming has more to do with the earl than it does with me.”
“I never found out what their plans were. Will you tell me the whole of it, Issy?” He only used her old pet name when he wanted something, and she never begrudged him for it. He was a good brother. When he wasn’t telling people how best to rile her.
Isleen sketched out the details of the wager, and what it meant for the earl if he lost. Her brother’s eyes and grin widened in equal parts until he laughed.
“Faith, ‘tis a grand joke. They’ll have you following Farleigh about, ensuring he makes a fool of himself. And you’ll enjoy every moment of it, will you not?”
She sniffed. “I will indeed.” Then she fixed her brother in place with a most serious glare. “So you do not think I have reason to worry? There isn’t anything in this that is dastardly?”
“It isn’t a play, Issy. There aren’t any villains here.” Teague held out his arm. “Come, let’s have breakfast. Sausage, eggs, toast, and ham.”
“Did you fight a giant in your sleep, to make yourself that hungry?” Isleen took his arm. “We might need to warn the duchess that you intend to empty her larder.”
“I can’t imagine such a thing is possible. Have you seen the size of the kitchens?”
“No, none of my tours included the servants’ areas.” They started down the stairs, a beautiful rich blue carpet muffling their steps. “I find it strange that yours did.”
“It wasn’t so much a tour as it was a liberation mission.”
“Liberation?” she scoffed. “And what was down there to be liberated? Catholics wanting the vote?”
He laughed, then coughed away the sound. “The jam and rolls might well have been Catholic. You never know.”
“Sacrilegious. That’s what you are, Teague Frost.”
“Not so, sister dear. Hungry. That’s what I am, almost always.”
A panel of the wall a few steps ahead of them opened, and Isleen had the unfortunate reaction of squeaking and jumping backward in her surprise. From the concealed doorway, Lord Farleigh stepped out into the corridor.
