onto her horse, arranged her habit over her boots, and stepped back.
“Sindal, good day.” Westhaven touched his hat brim and urged his horse forward, then checked the animal after a half-dozen steps and brought it around to face Vim. “Might we see you at Her Grace’s Christmas gathering?”
Vim shook his head, wondering if the man had asked the question as a taunt, though Westhaven’s expression suggested it had merely been a polite query. Rather than elaborate on his refusal, Vim turned to make his farewell to the second woman to cause him to associate Kent at Yuletide with heartbreak.
“Lady Sophia, good day. And if I don’t see you before I depart on my next journey, I wish you a pleasant remainder to the holidays.”
She nodded, raised her chin, fixed her gaze on her brother’s retreating back, and tapped her heel against the mare’s side.
Vim tortured himself by watching their horses canter down the lane, the thud of hooves on the frozen ground resonating with the ache in his chest. Her silence told him more plainly than words he was watching her ride out of his life.
As loyal as Sophie was to her family, there was no way she’d plight her troth to a man who’d given such an unflattering recitation regarding His Grace, and no way Vim would make the attempt to persuade her at this point, in any case.
“So you’re still bungling about with my sister’s affections?”
Valentine Windham, coat open, mouth compressed into a flat line, sidled up to Vim outside the livery.
“The lady has made her wishes known. I am merely respecting them.”
Windham studied him, and not for the first time, Vim had the sense that this was the brother everybody made the mistake of underestimating. In some ways—his utter independence, his highly individual humor, his outspokenness, his virtuosic shifts of mood—this Windham son put Vim most in mind of the old duke.
“You are being an ass.” Windham hooked his elbow through Vim’s as if they were drinking companions. “Humor me, Sindal. If I spend another minute wrestling with that monster at the church, I will for the first time in my life consider tuning a keyboard instrument with a splitting ax.”
Vim let himself be walked back toward the bench, mostly because the prospect of returning to Sidling and the plethora of female relations about to descend was unappealing in the extreme. Then too, Val Windham adored his pianos, suggesting the man wasn’t going to do anything foolish—like, for example, obliging Vim’s inclination to engage in a rousing bout of fisticuffs—if it might damage his hands.
“On second thought”—Windham switched directions—“let’s drop in for a tot of grog.”
They appropriated the snug at the local watering hole, steaming mugs of rum punch in their hands before Windham spoke again.
“You sip your drink, and I will violate a sibling confidence.”
“I don’t want you violating Sophie’s confidences,” Vim said, bristling at the very notion.
Windham’s lips quirked. “Oh, very well, then. I won’t tell you she screams like a savage if you put a frog in her bed. I was actually going to pass along a little something told me by an entirely different sister, one not even remotely smitten with you.”
“Windham, are you capable of adult conversation? For the sake of your wedded wife, one hopes you are, and I do appreciate the drink. Nonetheless, I am expecting a great lot of family this afternoon at Sidling, and charming though your company is, I have obligations elsewhere.”
Windham lifted his mug in a little salute. “Duly noted. Now shut up and listen.”
Vim took a sip of his drink, lest by some detail he betray that he was almost enjoying Windham’s company. The man had the look of his sister around the eyes and in the set of his chin.
“While Westhaven was haring about tidying up the family business affairs, and St. Just was off subduing the French, it befell me to escort my five sisters to every God’s blessed function for years on end. I was in demand for my ability to be a charming escort, so thoroughly did my sisters hone this talent on my part.”
“I am in transports to hear it. Alas, I am not in need of an escort.”
“You are in need of a sound thrashing, but St. Just has said such an approach lacks subtlety. My point is that I know my sisters in some ways better than my brothers do.” Windham studied his mug, a half smile playing about his lips. “They talk to me.”
“Then at least you