Most of his life, he had managed people in much the same way. Not because he had disdain for them, or an inflated sense of his own importance, but because emotion could too easily skew his shot. Detachment was key—and it had never been a struggle.
Until now.
Until Charlotte.
She had his mind and body spinning out of control. He couldn’t cease thinking of her. The sweetness he hadn’t ceased tasting. The perfect fit of her body against his. The way she’d breezed past his defenses, slipped under his skin.
Yes, she was young. But Piers had learned to take the measure of people quickly, and Charlotte Highwood was more than she appeared. She possessed the sort of honesty that required confidence, and a keen awareness of herself and others.
Damn, this was dangerous—but perhaps danger was what he’d been craving. Yes, that must be the answer. She had his blood pumping and his mind on alert just like his most perilous assignments had done during the war.
That kiss had made him feel alive.
“Ouch.”
Something long and sharp poked him in the arse.
Then in the side.
Edmund Parkhurst stood between him and the doorway, brandishing a billiard cue. The boy’s brows gathered in a scowl, and he jabbed the point right under Piers’s lowermost rib—like a diminutive cannibal holding his captive at spear point.
“I know.” His voice was as menacing as an eight-year-old boy’s could be. “I know what you did in the library.”
Bloody hell. Not this again.
“Edmund, you were mistaken. I’m a friend of your father’s. No one attempted any violence. We’ve discussed this.”
“Murder.” Jab. “Murder.” Jab. “Murder.”
Piers let his cue clatter to the table. Where were this child’s parents? Had he no nursemaids? Tutors? Hobbies, playthings, pets?
“I am not a murderer,” he said, firmly this time.
And he wasn’t a murderer. Not technically—so long as one employed the same ethical acrobatics used to absolve soldiers and executioners from their bloodier duties. No court in England would convict him of the crime. He felt less secure about escaping divine judgment, but . . . only eternity would tell.
“I know what you did. You’re going to pay.” The boy lifted the billiard cue and swung it like a broadsword.
Piers dodged the blow, backing around the table. “Edmund, calm yourself.”
He could have disarmed the lad easily, but he could only imagine the scene that would result if he so much as bruised Edmund’s little finger in the process. The boy would be running down the halls shrieking not only “MURDER!” but “ASSAULT!” and “TORTURE!” too. Probably adding “FAILURE TO PAY TAXES!” for good measure.
Edmund stalked him around the billiard table, swinging again—harder this time. When Piers ducked, the blow struck a pheasant trophy mounted on the wall, knocking the bird from its perch. He could have sworn he heard the thing squawk. An explosion of feathers filled the room, twirling and drifting to rest on their shoulders like snowflakes.
The emotions on Edmund’s face underwent a swift progression—from regret at destroying one of his father’s prizes, to anticipation of punishment, to . . .
Pure, concentrated fury.
The boy lowered the cue like a lance, hunched his shoulders, and bore down on Piers in a full-speed charge.
“MURRRRR-DURRRR!”
That, Piers decided, was quite enough.
He grabbed the cue with one hand, holding both it and Edmund in place. He spoke in a low, stern voice. “Listen to me, lad. Bashing one another with billiard cues is not the way gentlemen settle disputes. Your father would be most displeased with your behavior. I am losing my patience, as well. Stop this. At once.”
He and the boy regarded one another, warily.
Piers released his grip on the billiard cue. “Go to your room, Edmund.”
There was a long, tense silence.
Then Edmund stabbed him in the groin and dove under the billiard table, leaving Piers gasping for breath.
“You miserable little—” He doubled over, pounding a fist against the green felt.
That was it.
Today, Edmund Parkhurst was going to learn a lesson.
“May I put this down yet?” Charlotte asked, her voice strained. “I think I’m getting a cramp.”
Delia didn’t look up from her sketching board. “Just a few more minutes. I need to finish roughing in the folds of your toga.”
Charlotte tried to ignore the twinges in her arms. “Which of the Grecian goddesses holds a silver tea tray, anyway?”
“None of them. It’s standing in for a lyre.”
There were very few people in the world for whom Charlotte would stand in the morning room, draped in bed linens, holding an increasingly heavy tea tray for hours on end—but Delia Parkhurst was one of them.
After the Prattler had made her a social outcast, Charlotte had given up on full dance cards. However, moping wasn’t in her character. When scorned by the gentlemen, she looked about for new friends.
She found Delia.
Delia was warm, witty, and also an unwilling wallflower at balls, having been born with a hip that didn’t sit quite right. They conspired in the corners and invented games like “Spot the Wooden Tooth” and “Rake, Rake, Duke,” and folded their unused dance cards into paper boats for a Punchbowl Regatta.
That was, until they began putting the time to a better purpose:
Plotting their escape.
“Next year, we will be a thousand miles from here,” Delia said. “Free of our families, and far from anyone who reads London scandal sheets. I will have Renaissance marbles to sketch, and you’ll be exploring temples and tombs, and in the evenings we’ll be surrounded by comtes and cavaliere. No more tea trays.”
Guilt crept over Charlotte. After that scene in the library, their plan to tour the Continent was in dire jeopardy, and Delia didn’t even know it.
It was going to kill Charlotte if she had to disappoint her friend.
Delia set aside her pencil. “There. I’m finished for today.”
Charlotte lowered the tray, unswaddled herself from the linen, and shook the knots from her arms and legs.
“Dare we broach the topic of our journey today?” Delia asked.
“Oh, no. Not yet.”
Not while your father believes I lifted my skirts for a marquess in his library.