by Julia Quinn
The next gentleman was known to Peter by reputation. An inveterate gambler, all he required to bid his farewells was the mention of an impending horse race in Hyde Park. And, Peter thought with satisfaction, he took three of the others along with him. It was a good thing that the horse race was not fictitious, although the four young men might be a bit disappointed when they realized that Peter had misremembered the time of the event, and indeed, that all bets had been placed some sixty minutes earlier.
Oh, well.
He smiled. He was having considerably more fun than he would have imagined.
“Mr. Thompson,” came a dry, feminine voice in his ear, “are you scaring off my daughter’s suitors?”
He turned to face Lady Canby, who was regarding him with an amused expression, for which Peter was immensely thankful. Most mothers would have been irate. “Of course not,” he replied. “Not the ones you’d want to see her marry, at any rate.”
Lady Canby just raised her brows.
“Any man who’d rather throw money on a horse race than remain here in your presence isn’t worthy of your daughter.”
She laughed, and when she did so, she looked a great deal like Tillie. “Well spoken, Mr. Thomspon,” she said. “One cannot be too careful when one is the mother of a great heiress.”
Peter paused, unsure whether that comment was meant to be more pointed than her tone might imply. If Lady Canby knew who he was, and she did—she’d recognized his name immediately when they’d been introduced the night before—then she also knew he had little more than pennies to his name.
“I promised Harry I would look out for her,” he said, his voice stolid and resolute. There could be no mistaking that he meant to fulfill his vow.
“I see,” Lady Canby murmured, cocking her head slightly to the side. “And that is why you’re here?”
“Of course.” And he meant it. At least he told himself he meant it. It didn’t matter if he’d spent the last sixteen or so hours fantasizing about kissing Tillie Howard. She wasn’t for him.
He watched her conversing with the younger brother of Lord Bridgerton, gritting his teeth when he realized that there wasn’t a single objectionable thing about the man. He was tall, strong, clearly intelligent, and of good family and fortune. The Canbys would be thrilled with the match, even if Tillie would be reduced to a mere Mrs.
“We’re rather pleased with that one,” Lady Canby said, motioning one small, elegant hand toward the gentleman in question. “He’s quite a talented artist, and his mother has been my close friend for years.”
Peter nodded tightly.
“Alas,” Lady Canby said with a shrug, “I fear there is little reason to hold out hope in that quarter. I suspect he is just here to merely placate dear Violet, who has despaired of ever seeing her children married. Mr. Bridgerton doesn’t seem ready to settle down, and his mother believes he is secretly besotted with another.”
Peter remembered not to smile.
“Tillie, my dear,” Lady Canby said, once the annoyingly handsome and personable Mr. Bridgerton kissed her hand and departed, “you have not yet chatted with Mr. Thompson. It is so kind of him to call, and all out of friendship for Harry.”
“I wouldn’t say all,” Peter said, his words coming out a little less suave and practiced than he’d intended. “It is always a delight to see you, Lady Mathilda.”
“Please,” Tillie said, waving good-bye to the last of her lovesick swain, “you must continue to call me Tillie.” She turned to her mother. “It’s all Harry ever called me, and apparently he spoke of us often while on the Continent.”
Lady Canby smiled sadly at the mention of her younger son’s name, and she blinked several times. Her eyes took on a hollow expression, and while Peter didn’t think she was going to burst into tears, he rather thought she wanted to. He immediately held out his handkerchief, but she shook her head and refused the gesture.
“I believe I shall fetch my husband,” she said, rising to her feet. “I know he would like to meet you. He was off somewhere last night when we were introduced, and I—Well, I know he would like to meet you.” She hurried out of the room, leaving the door wide open and positioning a footman just across the hall.
“She’s off to go cry,” Tillie said, not in a way to make Peter feel guilty. It was just an explanation, a sad statement of fact. “She does still, quite a bit.”
“I’m sorry,” he said.
She shrugged. “There’s no avoiding it, it seems. For any of us. I don’t think we ever really thought he might die. It seems quite stupid now. It shouldn’t have been such a surprise. He went off to war, for heaven’s sake. What else should we have expected?”
Peter shook his head. “It isn’t stupid at all. We all thought we were a little bit immortal until we actually saw battle.” He swallowed, not wanting to feel the memory. But once summoned, it was difficult to hold back. “It’s impossible to understand until you see it.”
Tillie’s lips tightened slightly, and Peter worried that he might have insulted her. “I don’t mean to condescend,” he said.
“You didn’t. It’s not that. I was just…thinking.” She leaned forward, a luminous new light in her eyes. “Let’s not talk of Harry,” she said. “Do you think we can? I’m just so tired of being sad.”
“Very well,” he said.
She watched him, waiting for him to say something more. But he didn’t. “Er, how was the weather?” she finally asked.
“Bit of a drizzle,” he replied, “but nothing out of the ordinary.”
She nodded. “Was it warm?”
“Not especially. A bit warmer than last night, though.”
“Yes, it was a bit chilly, wasn’t it? And here it’s May.”
“Disappointed?”
“Of course. It ought to be spring.”
“Yes.”
“Quite.”
“Quite.”
One-word sentences, Tillie thought. Always the demise of any good conversation. Surely they had something in common other than Harry. Peter Thompson was handsome, intelligent, and, when he looked at her with that smoky, heavy-lidded expression of his, it sent a shiver right down her spine.
It wasn’t fair that the only thing they ever seemed to talk about made her want to cry.
She smiled at him encouragingly, waiting for him to say something more, but he did not. She smiled again, clearing her throat.
He took the hint. “Do you read?” he asked.
“Do I read?” she echoed, incredulous.
“Not can you, do you?” he clarified.
“Yes, of course. Why?”
He shrugged. “I might have mentioned as much to one of the other gentlemen here.”
“Might have?”
“Did.”
She felt her teeth clenching. She had no idea why she should be irritated with Peter Thompson, only that she should. He’d clearly done something to merit her displeasure, else he wouldn’t be sitting there with that cat-with-cream expression, pretending to inspect his fingernails. “Which gentleman?” she finally asked.
He looked up, and Tillie resisted the urge to thank him for finding her more interesting than his manicure.
“I believe his name was Mr. Berbrooke,” he said.
Not anyone she wanted to marry. Nigel Berbrooke was a good-hearted fellow, but he was also dumb as a post and would likely be terrified at the thought of an intellectual wife. One might say, if one were feeling particularly generous, that Peter had done her a favor by scaring him away, but still, Tillie did not appreciate his meddling in her affairs. “What did you say I liked to read?” she asked, keeping her voice mild.
“Er, this and that. Perhaps philosophical tracts.”
“I see. And you saw fit to mention this to him because?…”
“He seemed like the sort who’d be interested,” he said with a shrug.
“And—just out of curiosity, mind you—what happened when you told him this?”
Peter didn’t even have the g
race to look sheepish. “Ran right out the door,” he murmured. “Imagine that.”
Tillie meant to remain arch and dry. She wanted to eye him ironically under delicately arched brows. But she wasn’t nearly as sophisticated as she hoped to be, because she positively glared at him as she said, “And what gave you the idea that I like to read philosophical tracts?”
“Don’t you?”
“It doesn’t matter,” she retorted. “You can’t go around frightening off my suitors.”
“Is that what you thought I was doing?”
“Please,” she scoffed. “After touting my intelligence to Mr. Berbrooke, don’t attempt to insult it now.”
“Very well,” he said, crossing his arms and regarding her with the sort of expression her father and older brother adopted when they meant to scold her. “Do you really wish to pledge your troth to Mr. Berbrooke? Or,” he added, “to one of the men who rushed out the door to throw money on a horse race?”
“Of course not, but that doesn’t mean I want you scaring them away.”
He just looked at her as if she were an idiot. Or a woman. It was Tillie’s experience that most men thought they were one and the same.
“The more men who come to call,” she explained, somewhat impatiently, “the more men who will come to call.”
“I beg your pardon?”
“You’re sheep. The lot of you. Only interested in a woman if someone else is as well.”
“And it is your aim in life to collect a score of gentlemen in your drawing room?”
His tone was patronizing, almost insulting, and Tillie was this close to having him booted from the house. Only his friendship with Harry—and the fact that he was acting like such a prig because he thought it was what Harry would have wanted—kept her from summoning the butler right then.
“My aim,” she said tightly, “is to find a husband. Not to snare one, not to trap one, not to drag one to the altar, but to find one, preferably one with whom I might share a long and contented life. Being a practical sort of girl, it seemed only sensible to meet as many eligible gentlemen as possible, so that my decision might be based on a broad base of knowledge, and not upon, as so many young women are accused, a flight of fancy.”
She sat back, crossed her arms, and leveled a hard stare in his direction. “Do you have any questions?”
He regarded her with a blank expression for a moment, then asked, “Do you want me to go and drag them all back?”
“No! Oh,” she added, when she saw his sly smile. “You’re teasing.”
“Just a bit,” he demurred.
If he’d been Harry, she would have tossed a pillow at him. If he’d been Harry, she would have laughed. But if he’d been Harry, her eyes wouldn’t have lingered on his mouth when he smiled, and she wouldn’t have felt this strange heat in her blood, or this prickling on her skin.
But most of all, if he’d been Harry, she wouldn’t feel this awful disappointment, because Peter Thompson was not her older brother, and the last thing she wanted was for him to view himself as such.
But apparently, that was exactly how he felt.
He’d promised Harry that he’d look after her, and now she was nothing more than an obligation. Did he even like her? Find her remotely interesting or amusing? Or did he suffer her company only because she was Harry’s sister?
It was impossible to know—and a question she could never ask. And what she really wanted was for him to leave, but that would mark her a coward, and she didn’t want to be a coward. It was what she owed Harry, she’d come to realize. To live her life with the courage and strength of purpose that he’d exhibited at the end of his.
Facing Peter Thompson seemed a rather pale comparison to Harry’s brave deeds as a soldier, but no one was about to send her off to fight for her country, so if she wanted to continue in her quest to face her fears, this was going to have to do.
“You’re forgiven this time,” she said, crossing her hands in her lap.
“Did I apologize?” he drawled, spearing her once again with that slow, lazy smile.
“No, but you should have done.” She smiled back, sweetly…too sweetly. “I was raised to be charitable, so I thought I’d grant you the apology you never gave.”
“And the acceptance as well?”
“Of course. I’d be churlish, otherwise.”
He burst out laughing, a rich, warm sound that took Tillie by surprise, and then made her smile in turn.
“Very well,” he said. “You win. You absolutely, positively, indubitably—”
“Indubitably even?” she murmured with delight.
“Even indubitably,” he conferred. “You win. I apologize.”
She sighed. “Victory has never felt so sweet.”
“Nor should it have done,” he said with arched brows. “I assure you I don’t hand out apologies lightly.”
“Or with such good humor?” she queried.
“Never with such good humor.”
Tillie was smiling, trying to think of something terribly witty to say, when the butler arrived with an unsolicited tea service. Her mother must have requested it, Tillie thought, which meant that she’d be back soon, which meant that her time alone with Peter was drawing to a close.
She should have paid attention to the keen disappointment squeezing in her chest. Or to the fluttering in her belly that amplified every time she looked at him. Because if she had, she wouldn’t have been so surprised when she handed him a cup of tea, and their fingers touched, and then she looked at him, and he looked at her, and their eyes met.
And she felt like she was falling.
Falling…falling…falling. A warm rush of air washing over her, stealing her breath, her pulse, even her heart. And when it was all over—if indeed it was over, and not simply subsided—all she could think was that it was a wonder she hadn’t dropped the teacup.
And had he noticed that in that moment, she had been transformed?
She paid careful attention to the fixing of her own cup, splashing in milk before adding the hot tea. If she could just concentrate on the mundane tasks at hand, she wouldn’t have to ponder what had just happened to her.
Because she suspected that she had indeed fallen.
In love.
And she suspected that in the end, it would be her downfall. She hadn’t much experience with men; her first season in London had been cut short by Harry’s untimely death, and she’d spent the past year secluded in the country, in mourning with her family.
But even so, she could tell that Peter didn’t think of her as a desirable woman. He thought of her as an obligation, as Harry’s little sister.
Maybe even as a child.
To him she was a promise that had to be kept. Nothing more, nothing less. It would have seemed cold and clinical, had she not been so touched by his devotion to her brother.
“Is something wrong?”
Tillie looked up at the sound of Peter’s voice and smiled wryly. Was something wrong? More than he would ever know.
“Of course not,” she lied. “Why do you ask?”
“You have not drunk your tea.”
“I prefer it lukewarm,” she improvised, lifting the cup to her lips. She took a sip, faking a gingerly manner. “There,” she said brightly. “Much better now.”
He watched her curiously, and Tillie almost sighed at her misfortune. If one was going to develop an unrequited fancy for a gentleman, one would do a great deal better not to choose one of such obvious intelligence. Any more blunders like this one, and he would certainly discern her true feelings.
Which would be hideous.
“Do you plan to attend the Hargreaves Grand Ball on Friday?” she asked, deciding that a change of subject was her best course of action.
He nodded. “I assume you do as well?”
“Of course. It will be quite a crush, I’m sure, and I cannot wait to see Lady Neeley arrive with her bracelet on her wrist.”
“She has found it?” he asked with surpri
se.
“No, but she must, don’t you think? I cannot imagine anyone at the party actually stealing it. It probably fell behind the table, and no one has had the shrewdness to look.”
“I agree with you that yours is the most likely theory,” he said, but his lips pursed slightly when he paused, and he did not look convinced.
“But?…” she prompted.
For a moment she did not think he would answer, but then he said, “But you have never known want, Lady Mathilda. You could never understand the desperation that might push a man to steal.”
She didn’t like that he’d called her Lady Mathilda. It injected a formality into the conversation that she’d thought they’d dispensed with. And his comments seemed to underscore the simple fact that he was a man of the world, and she was a sheltered young lady.
“Of course not,” she said, since there was no point in pretending her life had been anything but privileged. “But still, it’s difficult to imagine someone having the audacity to steal the bracelet right out from under her nose.”
For a moment he did not move, just stared at her in an uncomfortably assessing manner. Tillie got the feeling that he thought her terribly provincial, or at the very least naïve, and she hated that her belief in the general goodness of man was marking her a fool.
It shouldn’t be that way. One ought to trust one’s friends and neighbors. And she certainly shouldn’t be ridiculed for doing so.
But he surprised her, and he just said, “You’re probably right. I’ve long since realized that most mysteries have perfectly benign and boring solutions. Lady Neeley shall most probably be eating crow before the week is out.”
“You don’t think I’m silly for being so trusting?” Tillie asked, nearly kicking herself for doing so. But she couldn’t seem to stop asking questions of this man; she couldn’t recall anyone else whose opinions mattered quite so much.
He smiled. “No. I don’t necessarily agree with you. But it’s rather nice to share tea with someone whose faith in humanity has not been irreparably injured.”
A somber ache washed over her, and she wondered if Harry, too, had been changed by the war. He must have been, she realized, and she couldn’t quite believe that she’d never considered it before. She’d always imagined him the same old Harry, laughing and joking and pulling pranks at every opportunity.