That’s how she ended up with her current spouse. He’s not a bad sort, but he’s hardly a young girl’s dream. Still, he had the title, you know?”
“Papas are the very devil,” Leah allowed on a sigh, but she’d used Reston’s name—just like that, and it had come easily and it fit him and she wanted to say it again to herself, over and over.
“Papas, brothers, nephews, all the very devil,” Nick said as he got them arranged on their bench with plates on their laps. “I’m a neighbor of your brother, by the way. Would you like a strawberry?”
“I adore fruit,” Leah said, glancing at his plate. “You didn’t tell me there were strawberries.”
“I got enough for both of us. Here.” He held up a strawberry, not to pass to her plate, but rather before her mouth, for her to take from his hand. She watched his eyes, and the teasing she’d seen there earlier shifted, first cooling then heating to a silent dare.
Holding his gaze, Leah leaned forward, touched her tongue to the succulent red berry, then took it between her teeth.
“My thanks.” She chewed slowly then swallowed. “Delicious.”
Nick, looking gratifyingly disconcerted for once, simply passed her his plate and surrendered the rest of his strawberries.
***
Thinking of you.
Blue salvia, Leah learned from a book her mother had given her as a child, meant “thinking of you.”
How interesting, and how odd that Ni—Leah caught herself—Lord Reston had included it in his bouquet and conveniently forgotten its significance. In the long-dormant part of her soul from which feminine intuition sprang, Leah suspected he’d known good and well what the flower meant, and he’d included it on purpose.
And forgotten its meaning with the same sense of purpose.
Reston had chosen his bouquet with care and an unerring sense for what was lacking in her life.
“Pretty,” Wilton remarked, eyeing the bouquet as he sauntered into the family parlor. “I have to commend the man for showing some strategy.”
“I beg your pardon?” Leah resisted the urge to get to her feet. Wilton might interpret it as a sign of respect, though more likely a sign of weakness.
“Reston is courting your sister,” Wilton said, touching the little white snowdrops. Why didn’t they wilt on contact? “He’s scouting the terrain, forming an ally, gathering information before he tips his hand.”
“No doubt.”
Wilton eyed her pensively. He was a good-looking man, tall, trim, with even features and a full head of white hair. His smile, when he produced one, gave Leah chills nonetheless.
“Perhaps he thinks to take you off my hands,” Wilton said. “I cannot credit his taste, but his coin will spend as easily as the next man’s. You’ll have him, if he offers.”
“He won’t offer for me.” Leah bent to her book, turning a page as if in idle perusal.
“You will do nothing to deter him from that possibility,” Wilton informed her icily. “Your sister can reach higher, but you will take what’s offered and be grateful.”
“Aren’t we being premature, my lord?” Leah strove for an indifferent tone. “One bouquet does not a courtship make.”
“One bouquet, a supper waltz, several meetings in the park,” Wilton shot back. “Don’t think you’re ever far from my sight, girl. Your brothers can’t hide your comings and goings, and neither will you, if you value their happiness.”
“I value their happiness,” Leah said, and thinking to offer a placatory display of submissiveness, she added, “and if Reston offers, I will accept him.”
“Of course you will. If he’s stupid enough to make that mistake, I will not preserve him from his folly.”
Having left the requisite ill feeling and discontent behind him, Wilton stalked out, calling for a footman. His footsteps had barely died away before Leah looked up to see the bouquet with its blue salvia directly in her line of sight. By the time Wilton had slammed out the front door, she felt the first tear sliding down her silly, foolish, wretched cheek.
***
Colonel Lord Harcourt Haddonfield, fourteenth Earl of Bellefonte, had not enjoyed a decent bowel movement in weeks, by which evidence he concluded that death was indeed stalking him. He had some time, maybe even weeks, before the filthy blighter actually took him down, but when a man couldn’t preside competently over the lowliest throne in the land, what dignity was there left in living?
Neither one of his deceased wives would have understood that sentiment or appreciated its vulgar utterance even in private, which thought provoked a faint smile. Good ladies they had been, but ladies through and through.