Bridgerton Collection, Volume 2 - Julia Quinn Page 0,199

course. These are my brothers.”

“I’d gathered,” he said, his voice as dry as dust.

She shot him an apologetic look, which, Phillip thought, was really the least she could do after nearly getting him tortured and killed, then turned to her brothers and motioned to each in turn, saying, “Anthony, Benedict, Colin, Gregory. These three,” she added, motioning to A, B, and C, “are my elders. This one”—she waved dismissively at Gregory—“is an infant.”

Gregory looked near ready to throttle her, which suited Phillip just fine, since it deflected the murderous intentions off of him.

And then Eloise finally turned back to Phillip and said to her brothers, “Sir Phillip Crane, but I expect you know that already.”

“You left a letter in your desk,” said Colin.

Eloise closed her eyes in agony. Phillip thought he saw her lips form the words, Stupid, stupid, stupid.

Colin smiled grimly. “You ought to be more careful in the future, should you decide to run off again.”

“I’ll remember that,” Eloise shot back, but she was losing her fire.

“Would now be a good time to stand?” Phillip inquired, directing his question to no one in particular.

“No.”

It was difficult to discern which Bridgerton brother spoke the loudest.

Phillip remained on the floor. He didn’t tend to think himself a coward, and he was, if he did say so himself, quite proficient with his fists, but hell, there were four of them.

Boxer he might be. Suicidal fool he was not.

“How did you get that eye?” Colin asked quietly.

Eloise paused before answering, “It was an accident.”

He considered her words for a moment. “Would you care to expand upon that?”

Eloise swallowed uncomfortably and glanced down at Phillip, which he really wished she wouldn’t do. It only made them (as he was coming to think of the quartet) even more convinced that he was the one responsible for her injury.

A misapprehension that could only lead to his death and dismemberment. They didn’t seem the sorts to allow anyone to lay a hand on their sisters, much less blacken an eye.

“Just tell them the truth, Eloise,” Phillip said wearily.

“It was his children,” she said, wincing on the words. But Phillip didn’t worry. As close as they’d come to strangling him, they didn’t seem the sort to harm innocent children. And certainly Eloise would not have said anything if she’d thought it might place Oliver and Amanda in peril.

“He has children?” Anthony asked, eyeing him with a slightly less derogatory expression.

Anthony, Phillip decided, must be a father as well.

“Two,” Eloise replied. “Twins, actually. A boy and a girl. They’re eight.”

“My felicitations,” Anthony murmured.

“Thank you,” Phillip answered, feeling rather old and weary in that moment. “Sympathies are probably more to the point.”

Anthony looked at him curiously, almost—but not quite—smiling.

“They weren’t especially keen on my presence here,” Eloise said.

“Smart children,” Anthony said.

She shot him a decidedly unamused look. “They set a trip wire,” she said. “Rather like the one Colin”—she turned to spear him with a hostile glare—“set for me in 1804.”

Colin’s lips twisted into a disbelieving expression. “You remember the date?”

“She remembers everything,” Benedict commented.

Eloise turned to glare at him.

Aching throat notwithstanding, Phillip was actually beginning to enjoy the interaction.

Eloise turned back to Anthony, regal as a queen. “I fell,” she said simply.

“On your eye?”

“On my hip, actually, but I didn’t have time to break my fall, and I hit my cheek. I imagine the bruising spread to the eye area.”

Anthony looked down at Phillip with a ferocious expression. “Is she telling the truth?”

Phillip nodded. “On my brother’s grave. The children will own up to it as well, should you feel the need to interrogate them.”

“Of course not,” Anthony said gruffly. “I would never—” He cleared his throat, then ordered, “Stand up.” But he tempered his tone by offering Phillip his hand.

Phillip took it, having already decided that Eloise’s brother would make a far finer ally than enemy. He eyed the four male Bridgertons warily, though, and his stance was defensive. He stood no chance if all four decided to charge at him at once, and he wasn’t convinced that that was not still a likely possibility.

At the end of the day, he was going to find himself either dead or married, and he wasn’t quite prepared to let the Bridgerton brothers take the matter to a vote.

And then, after Anthony silenced his four younger siblings with nothing more than a stare, he turned to Phillip and said, “Perhaps you should tell me what happened.”

Out of the corner of his eye, Phillip saw Eloise open her mouth to interrupt,