and forcibly lowered them to his sides. “My marriage,” she finished. “I was going to say my marriage.” Passing a look over to Landon, she followed that with a wink, which pulled another laugh from the entirely-too-affable rogue.
Charles and Derek turned scowls upon the other man.
“Pick better friends,” Derek said out of the corner of his mouth.
“There’s St. John,” Charles felt inclined to point out for his younger brother. Anyone would be hard-pressed to find offense with the proper viscount.
“Ouch.” Landon staggered back and pressed a hand to his chest in false, wounded affront. “That hurts, gentlemen. Hurts.”
His mother did a glance about the billiards room. “I take it this is not the chosen location for your next meeting,” she said dryly, retrieving the forgotten cue stick from the floor.
“Our next meeting,” Charles corrected, as she was an integral part of the club he’d formed . . . one whose presence had allowed it to occur without scandal ensuing.
“Very well, as you are allowing me some ownership of your new venture, dearest son of mine—”
“I beg pardon.” Derek bristled with indignation.
The marchioness paused long enough in her tirade to pat her youngest son gently on the cheek. “I’m only using it in this instance to accentuate displeasure, dear.”
Derek beamed. “Carry on, then.” He dropped a hip on the edge of the billiards table, and crossed his arms at his chest. “This I’m happy to hear.”
“Fabulous,” Charles said under his breath.
“Continuing on,” she began.
He’d rather she not. At all. “Don’t,” he entreated. The last thing a grown man wished for was a parental lecture . . . and delivered in front of his younger brother and best friend, no less. He nudged his head imperceptibly toward the pair. “Please, don’t.”
Derek and Landon spoke at the same time.
“Ah, please do.”
“Oh, do.”
Alas, Charles’s declination was destined to be overruled by Landon’s and Derek’s encouragement.
The matriarch of the family and society, in general, obliged Charles’s faithless brother and friend. “You have a room full of young ladies scheduled to join us in”—his mother plucked the chain from his waistcoat and consulted the gold timepiece—“a quarter of an hour.” She let the fob fall. “You don’t have a room arranged. I have no idea what discussion is taking place today—”
“I’d wager neither does Charles,” Derek pointed out.
“Et tu, brother?”
His younger sibling blushed. “I didn’t mean any offense.”
Which only made it all the . . . more offensive. That general expectation that Charles didn’t have a proper organized thought in his head. In fairness, he hadn’t. Before now, that was.
Landon raised his cue stick in the air, calling everyone’s attention his way. “If I may also point out . . . he has his head in the clouds. Still.”
Derek laughed, and Charles slid another sharp look his way. His brother immediately coughed into his fist.
There it was. Point. Point. Point. Point. And point. They weren’t wrong . . . the lot of them. And yet . . . “I know what I’m doing.” At the three matching and very pointed stares, he grimaced. “I’ll allow, since its inception, the club may have appeared . . . somewhat disjointed.”
“Whatever would make you say that?” Landon drawled, applying chalk to the end of his stick. “The varying iteration of names?”
His brother jumped in. “The continually different meeting locations. The Green Parlor. The Drawing Room.”
“What is next?” Landon let his arms splay. “The billiards room?”
Charles frowned. “Well, that doesn’t make sense,” he said, thumping the other man on the back. “We’re not a billiards club, nor do we discuss . . .” Giving his head a shake, cursing that blasted inherent tendency of having his mind wander off, he forced himself to focus. “Either way, I believe I have . . .” Nay . . . “I have found my way. Firstly, I’d have it clear, our members are not solely young ladies.”
“Just most of them.” Landon touched a finger to his forehead to chest in an abbreviated cross.
Charles frowned. He’d not have anyone, friends included, make anything salacious out of his club. “I’ll point out there are gentlemen also interested in—”
His mother waggled her eyebrows.
He blanched. “What we are discussing,” Charles said, exasperation pulling those words from him. Good God in heaven, what hellish reversal was this that he, the rogue, had to suffer through scandalous thoughts, ones freely expressed by his damned mother.
“Your brother and some of the gents he calls friends hardly count,” Landon said, chuckling. “Why, I’d wager you ordered the poor lad to join