The Duke is Wicked (League of Lords #3) - Tracy Sumner Page 0,2
your brother’s is the one in need of diminishing return,” Sebastian murmured, the scent of macassar oil, tobacco and liquor, standard gambling establishment aromas, undercutting every shallow, pained breath he took. He’d received a blow to the ribs as well, damn this night. Turning, he perched his shoulder against the window frame and reluctantly settled in. “It’s an excellent question, Finn, friend and neighbor. Why are we here?”
Humphrey took a swig straight from the gin bottle and skipped a pair of dice across the scarred table beside him. “Fireball’s worried about Lady Nuisance getting a look at that bruised jaw and offering to kiss and make it better. How to escape that, the despairing duke wonders?”
“You know what I think about that bloody nickname.” Sebastian shoved the soiled handkerchief in his trouser pocket, wondering who the hell it belonged to. “And that’s not it. Not at all.”
“The girl’s right chuffed to see you, every time, while you scamper in the opposite direction. Then she gets angry and disappears, one of those lazy fades where you can still see part of her. What I’d call a flicker. Although, we’re trying to help her evaporate completely, like dew on summer grass, it hasn’t worked yet.” Humphrey rubbed his wrist over his lips, a weak effort to wipe away his sneer. “Goddamn spooky. Although she would make the best duchess, the best wife, in England’s history. Vanish anytime she’s displeased. Or you are. Poof. Sounds like the type of wife I’d like.”
“No one’s kissed the duke and made anything better in months,” Finn replied with another stretch and crack of his knuckles, his delight drenching the room like a rain shower. His wife, Victoria, had arrived in London from Oxfordshire two days ago, and he didn’t lack for anything, from the look of him. “His new nickname in the ton is the ‘duke of no one’s heart.’ Hasn’t been seen at an event in months.”
“Sod off,” Sebastian returned, because he had to say something or be eaten alive. At the very least, he should tell them to stop calling his possibly-maybe-likely intended Lady Nuisance. However, Honoria Hazelton was a nuisance. A brash, impulsive girl for whom he had no patience, no interest. When she’d too much interest for the both of them. A lovely young woman of noble birth, Honoria also happened to have a supernatural talent of the disappearing variety. Making the marital arrangement he was pondering a precise, practical tradeoff in their mystical world. His protection, his name, which she desired, for her ability to produce an heir, which he desired—even if he was scared to death a child would inherit his gift. Or hers.
A fear which did not promote romance in any way, shape, or form.
Bracing his forearm on the window frame, London’s acrid, dull-gray deluge washed over Sebastian as he questioned how to bed someone he thought of as a sister. Stretching his shoulders in mental evasion, he avoided Julian’s knowing stare. Julian and his wife, Piper, were a love match of a fervent kind. The I-have-loved-you-forever kind. Even more than Finn and Victoria, whose marriage was so passionate they couldn’t keep their hands or gazes off of each other, it was Julian’s marriage Sebastian, in turns, rejected and envied.
Humphrey snorted and dabbed at a splash of gin on the table. “Started playing the violin again after cutting the opera singer loose, didn’t you, Fireball? Seems a pansy hobby, but what do I know? If it soothes the soul like Jules with his doodling, keeps you from torching the West End, I suppose it’s a good thing.”
“Don’t violin strings roughen one’s fingertips?” Finn steepled his hands together and propped his chin atop them with a wistful smile that only made him more painfully attractive. “I’d imagine that could be useful in certain situations.”
“Christ, Finn”—Julian whipped his pencil across the sheet—“get your head out of your—”
“Freezing in here,” a frayed voice stuck solidly between boy and man murmured.
Sebastian looked over his shoulder. Simon, home from Rugby for the summer. An ace sharper and skilled thief, he rested on the floor, legs that were getting longer every day stretched before him, shuffling a deck of cards at an astonishing speed, without once looking at his hands. The finest cutpurse in the city in his youth, and the only person in the League with the ability to communicate with the deceased, Julian had rescued him nine years ago, managing to turn an abused boy into a superb facsimile of a charmed aristocrat.