“We’ll call it a lesson learned,” Angelique said.
Delilah twisted her mouth wryly. “Why areyouhere?”
Angelique hesitated. “I’m not entirely certain, only it ended up being incredibly stupid, but I’m angry and Lucien is angry.”
“Something to do with St. Leger?”
“A little. How did you know?”
Delilah just sighed.
“I know Lucien has a jealous streak,” Angelique said. “I think a lot of it has to do with his father, who never properly loved him. But this is...” She bit her lip.
Delilah lowered her voice. “Doyou think he’s attractive, Angelique? St. Leger.”
“Oh, yes. I mean, wish to God I hadn’t blurted that. And God only knows I’d hate it if Lucien ever blurted something similar. And it’s notlike there’s anything I’d ever want to do about it, but... don’t you think he is? Attractive?”
“Yes.” Delilah whispered it. “We’re allowed to think that, aren’t we? It doesn’t mean anything.”
“Certainly. It’s probably best to keep those thoughts in our heads, though,” Angelique said dryly.
“What is it that we like?”
“Competence. Confidence. He’s enormous, as Dot says. He’s a little scary, which is rather exciting, but with Daphne he seems so...”
Delilah said softly, “I have to say... I love the way he looked at her.”
“Like she’s this wondrous thing and he’s still struggling to decipher her.”
“Like a bear with a butterfly on its nose.”
Angelique laughed. “Didn’t a bear almost eat Mr. Hugh Cassidy and his dog?”
“Imagine all the stories we’ll hear from guests over the years,” Delilah yawned.
Angelique shrugged off her pelisse, draped it over the chair, and crawled into bed next to Delilah.
“I sleep on my side,” she said.
“I once peered in on Dot and she was all the way under her covers, somewhere in the middle of the bed, in a little hump,” Delilah said.
Angelique sighed. “She’s so odd, our Dot.”
“I sleep on my back. And in the morning usually find Tristan’s head right about here.” Delilah pointed to a place on her pillow, near her shoulder. Her throat had gone thick.
After a moment, Angelique gently, sympathetically patted Delilah’s shoulder where her husband’s head usually rested.
They turned down the lamps.
Daphne felt incandescent with rage. She hadn’t known she was capable of it; she hadn’t realized such exhilaration could be had in such an indulgence in temper.
She relived—she savored!—the sound of Lorcan nearly slamming the door behind him.
He’d realize soon enough he hadn’t the key. Ha! She wasn’t going to open the door if he returned and begged. Thecheekof him.I know when I’ve been swindledindeed. What was he implying? Thatshe’dbeen swindled? She, the daughter of an earl?
What couldhepossibly know, a man who didn’t have anyone atall? A man who had been raised without obligations or ties or... the Gordian knot of familial love?
And in this heightened state of righteous indignation, she seized up the fireplace poker and prodded at the remnants of her best stockings and it stirred up her anger even more.