after learning he’d gone to London. “Is Oliver here?”
“You hate balls,” Graham said, resisting Aaron’s attempt at distraction.
“I can’t say that I’ve been to enough balls to have any solidified opinion about them.”
Graham snorted. “And you’d like to rectify that?”
“Perhaps.”
“I’ll have Mother arrange one for next Wednesday, then.”
Aaron’s father never attended Lady Grableton’s functions. “That wouldn’t provide a fair assessment. Your family is rather biased in my favor.”
“You annoy my mother.”
“You’ve always said she adores me.” She might currently be annoyed that he wouldn’t allow her to meddle in his life more. “Besides, I entertain your father.”
“He doesn’t make the social arrangements.”
This was a pointless argument that served no purpose. “We are blocking the pathway.”
Instead of stepping aside and letting Aaron continue into the ballroom, Graham took Aaron’s arm and none too gently guided him over to the side of the antechamber. “Why are you here?”
Aaron made a show of looking about their new position. “Do you expect the change of scenery to prompt a different answer? Where is Oliver?”
“You think he came to London a week before his wedding?”
A pang of guilt shot through him. Still, he knew these two men. “Yes.”
“You’re right. He’s on his way to your rooms. I was going to join you both there later, but Mother asked me to make an appearance here because she and Father didn’t feel like going out. Now I have to wonder if she suspected you would be here.”
Possibly. Lady Grableton was a rather meddlesome, if lovable, woman, and if anyone had noticed the pattern of Aaron’s appearances, it would have been she. “As we have already established, this is not a normal evening activity for me. Where is your wife?”
Maybe mentioning Kit would distract the man.
“Newmarket. She could not endure such hasty travel in her condition.”
Her condition? Aaron swallowed. More chances to be an uncle. “Congratulations.”
“Thank you.”
They fell into a silent staring match. Graham’s frustration was nearly palpable. The other man had Aaron’s best interests at heart, but Aaron couldn’t begin to explain to someone else what he himself barely understood. It was a compulsion to know what he was missing out on, to remind himself where he belonged, to remember whose blood ran in his veins.
“And here I’d hoped you decided to give this up.”
Aaron and Graham turned to find Rigsby standing next to them.
Because that was what this evening needed. Aaron and the marquis in a room together was a boring event the gossipmongers barely noticed. Rigsby and Aaron in the same vicinity would make the rounds in seconds.
That they were having a private conversation would be in every paper by morning.
Graham stepped in front of Aaron. “Rigsby,” he said in a firm but congenial tone. “What brings you to Town?”
Aaron placed a hand on Graham’s shoulder. “It’s okay.”
He glanced back. “It is?”
“It is,” Rigsby said as Aaron nodded.
Graham resumed his earlier position, adding a set of crossed arms to the glare he aimed in Aaron’s direction. “Explain.”
“After the number of times you’ve reminded me Rigsby had as little choice in his situation as I did, you’re going to quiz me for finally listening?”
Rigsby laughed.
Graham lifted a single brow in the other man’s direction. “Didn’t know you had a defender, did you?”
“Didn’t know I needed one.”
“You were never in danger,” Aaron grumbled. “I know how to avoid you.”
“It helped that I was staying away from you.”
Aaron shrugged in agreement.
Graham looked from one man to the other. “What is happening here?”
“Here?” Aaron asked. “You’re stopping me from entering the ballroom. As I’ve never been in this house before and have only managed to make it up the stairs, I can’t speak to anything else.”
Maybe if Aaron was sufficiently annoying, Graham would stomp off and Aaron could sip punch while staring down his father. They’d eventually say hello. Then Aaron would leave. It was a plan that had worked numerous times.
Rigsby was determined to muck it up, though, by keeping the conversation flowing. “Are you referring to our cordiality or Aaron’s petty need to remind our father of his fallibility?”
“It isn’t petty,” Aaron grumbled. As long as he never admitted it out loud, he could convince himself it wasn’t. What Rigsby didn’t realize was that it was as much for Aaron as it was for their father.
Graham frowned at Aaron. “You avoid your father. When we stumble into him, neither of you does more than exchange perfunctory greetings.”
Rigsby laughed and shook his head. “Do you even know what it does to him?”
Aaron had never considered what the man