“Gavin.” Lady Littleton glanced at the two other women. “You remember the Duchess of Bridgewater and Lady Featherton.”
He pasted a smile on his face and bowed. “Your grace, my lady, it is a pleasure to see you again.”
The smaller of the two women had sparkling lapis eyes that reminded him of Georgie’s. But instead of dark hair, Lady Featherton’s looked as if it had been blond. “I am happy that we will have the time to know you better.”
The duchess harrumphed. “You are a good deal too forgiving, Lucinda. It remains to be seen if we are happy to know him.” She fixed her sharp eyes on him, and he didn’t dare move a muscle. “As far as I am concerned you have a great deal for which to answer.”
That put him in his place. Fortunately, Lady Littleton waved him to a chair between the two couches the ladies occupied. “You will have time to interrogate him to your heart’s content, Constance, but I shall give him a cup of tea first.”
Brandy might be a better idea, but tea would do. “Thank you, my lady. I am rather parched.”
He was in the process of taking his first sip of tea when Lady Featherton said, “Lady Littleton told us you had been riding with Georgie this morning.”
“Yes.” He balanced his cup on his leg, not at all certain he would be allowed to finish it. “After we returned we had luncheon with Frits and Adeline.” He snatched another sip. “We have made plans to ride tomorrow morning as well.” The duchess opened her mouth, but thinking he knew what she was going to say, he forestalled her. “Frits has ordered a groom to accompany us.” The duchess nodded as if satisfied. It was rather odd that she took him in greater dislike than Georgie’s grandmother. Although, that had not appeared to be the case at the musical evening. “May I ask what I did to incur your ire?”
The duchess glanced at Lady Featherton, who shrugged lightly. “You broke our Georgie’s heart.”
Broke her heart?
Gavin drained his cup and really wished it was brandy. Even after her question to him, it had not occurred to Gavin that she might be in love with him. Well, it had occurred to him, but he hadn’t known she was. Good Lord. Now it all made sense. The way her friends had behaved toward him. Frits making sure they were chaperoned and the promises he had extracted from Gavin. Her hesitancy to see him. Apparently, her feelings toward him made her less likely to marry him unless he returned her sentiments. But even if he could not allow himself to love her he could—he would make her happy. He knew they were meant to be together. He glanced at the duchess and Lady Featherton.
“God save me from tedious young men,” the duchess muttered.
“Not tedious, my dear.” Lady Featherton patted the duchess’s hand. “Merely featherbrained.”
“And concerned,” Lady Littleton added. “The question is what do we wish to do about it.”
Three pairs of eyes focused on him. If there was a time to enlist their help, it was now. He merely had to convince them that marriage to him would be the best thing for Georgie. Her ladyship filled his cup again. “I have never before cared to whom or when I wed. But the more I got to know Miss Featherton the more I knew she was the one lady I wanted to be my wife and the mother of my children. We are . . . friends.” He wasn’t sure that was precisely correct. “Or rather we get on well and could be great friends.” His throat closed as he thought about what else he wanted from her, and he took another drink of his tea. “I cannot imagine living with another lady.” The women were still staring at him, seemingly unconvinced. “I”—he glanced at Lady Littleton, and she nodded encouragingly—“I feel great passion for her. If I could love anyone it would be her.”
Her ladyship gave him an approving smile. “It is as I said.”
He wished he knew exactly what she meant by that.
“I believe you are correct,” Lady Featherton commented.
“I agree.” The duchess set her cup down. “We shall see how this story will play out.”
As if as one the ladies rose and walked out of the morning room. When the last slip of skirt had disappeared around the corner, he put his cup on the low table between the sofas, went over to the sideboard, and poured a brandy. He had a feeling they knew something he did not.
But what was it?
Chapter Twelve
Cristabel herded her friends up the lovely old split walnut staircase with carvings of woodland animals and birds on the newel posts and balusters. It was the staircase that had captured her the first time she saw the house. Once they were seated in her parlor, she poured them each a glass of claret. “Well?”
“I do agree that he is in love with her,” Lucinda said as she strolled around the room looking out the windows. “It is a problem that he cannot see it himself.”
“I do not know that that knowledge would be helpful at the moment,” Constance added as she took a place on a wide French caned-back chair. “He’s got it into his head that he cannot afford to love his wife.” She drank some of the wine. “Yet, I believe that in time he will come to admit it.”
“Then what happens?” This was the problem about which Cristabel had been concerned. “Will he run away from it and her?”
“Running away would be exceedingly awkward after they wed.” Lucinda’s tone was not usually so dry. She turned from a side window. “How lovely that you have windows on two sides of your parlor and a small balcony.”
“It makes the room extremely pleasant in warm weather.”
“Back to the matter at hand.” Lucinda twirled the glass in her hands. “It appears as if we must find a way or bring about circumstances that will make him recognize his feelings for Georgie before he proposes again.”
Constance rose to gaze out the windows as well. “Now that he knows she loves him, you do not think he will use it against her, do you?”
“In what way?” Having already seen the view out the windows over the gardens to a small lake in the distance many times, Cristabel made herself comfortable on a large chair covered in yellow velvet and put her feet up on the light brown leather ottoman.
Constance turned and leaned back against the wall. “By compromising her.”
“I know for a fact he will not do any such thing.” Cristabel was glad she’d had a frank conversation with her son about his duties toward Georgie. “Frits has made him promise he will not.”
“Very well then.” Lucinda sat on the chair Constance had abandoned. “We must engage in a concerted effort to bring about a marriage between the two of them. What do we know about this house party?”
“What are you thinking?” Constance moved to the sofa on Cristabel’s other side.
“I think it would not be a bad thing for Lord Turley to have a little competition for her hand.” A smile hovered around Lucinda’s mouth. “If we knew who was going to be there we might be able to arrange—oh, some little machinations such as happened with Kit to bring him to the point with Mary.”
Cristabel remembered the story about Georgie’s older brother when he and his eventual wife were in Scotland. The friends with whom they were residing decided to find a gentleman to make Kit jealous. He and Mary wed shortly thereafter. Cristabel was glad for her foresight. “I did have a conversation with the dowager Lady Turner, and she sent me a list of the guests. The gentlemen who will be staying at the house are the Earl of Bolingbroke, the Earl of St. Albans, the Marquis of Montagu, and Viscount Barfleur. The Earl of Lytton and Viscount Bottomley will be going over for the entertainments.”