The Rakehell of Roth (Everleigh Sisters #2) - Amalie Howard Page 0,23
room, and Winter’s jaw clenched. Shouldn’t his wife come to receive him? Shouldn’t his perfectionist father encourage her to do so? It was a deliberate slight, one which Winter did not intend to rise to, no matter how provoked it made him.
“Lost, Winter?”
The voice came out of nowhere, but then his brother’s form materialized to his left. “Good God, Olly, can’t find anything better to do than stalk my every step?”
“I was invited. And it’s Oliver.”
“Obnoxious Oliver.”
His brother made a strangled sound. “I see you haven’t lost your inflated sense of cleverness. Good to know that Father will eventually put his faith elsewhere, at least in the matter of the ducal estate.”
“Yes, yes, you’ll inherit the bulk of whatever’s unentailed, if he has anything to say about it. Everyone here knows how rich you will be, I’m sure.”
Oliver scowled. “Everyone who counts.”
Winter glanced over his shoulder, wondering how and why their relationship as brothers had gone so terribly wrong. There were two years between them, but it could have been twenty. Oliver had been born with a tree-stump up his arse and a granite boulder of a chip on his shoulder. He would have been the perfect choice to be the next uptight Duke of Kendrick, not Winter. But the stringent rules of primogeniture could not be overturned, sadly.
And unless Winter died, blood made him Kendrick’s heir.
His brother’s mouth tightened. “Why are you here, Winter?”
“I was invited.”
The fulminating tension between them solidified to something resembling stone. Stone about to shatter. As though sensing the mounting danger, anyone standing on the edge of the ballroom and looking at them had given them a wide berth.
“Gracious, you two, you’re frightening away all the eligible young men,” a lively feminine voice cut in. “And what’s an unmarried girl without prospects to do if your incessant glowering chases them away?”
Winter turned, his smile shifting into the real thing as Clarissa strolled toward them. He hadn’t seen her in years, though Mrs. Butterfield had reported that Isobel had taken a strong liking to Mr. Bell’s daughter and they’d become fast friends. That had been another development he hadn’t expected.
Clarissa was Clarissa.
Wild and unrepentant as a girl, forever chasing after her boisterous brothers on the parklands at Kendrick Abbey, and always wearing an impish grin on her face. Clarissa was the complete opposite of the recalcitrant, shy woman he’d married. He frowned, touching on the more recent impressions of his kitten-turned-tiger wife. Now, the two women seemed to have a lot more in common.
A dangerous amount, it seemed. Winter wasn’t sure whether that was a good or bad thing. He remembered the rebellious, openly challenging look his wife had given him, and revised his initial assessment. Definitely bad.
“Lord Roth, how lovely to see you,” Clarissa said, her green eyes dancing. “You look well. Better than well, actually.” She accepted his kiss on her gloved knuckles and turned to Oliver. There, the smile withered on her face, a guarded look replacing it. “Lord Oliver.”
“Miss Bell,” Oliver intoned flatly with a curt bow, and Winter eyed him in surprise.
His brother did not even look at Clarissa, his gaze trained pointedly on the ballroom floor. The strain blooming between them eclipsed the ugly tension that had been there before. Winter’s eyes narrowed. It seemed he’d missed more over the past three years than what had gone on with his own wife. He suddenly had the distinct urge to stir up trouble. Payback made for an excellent distraction.
Grinning to himself, he turned to Clarissa. “Are you here for the season as well, then?”
“What’s left of it,” she said. “Along with the dreary dregs of the marriage prospects, that is.”
Winter couldn’t help noticing with inhuman delight that her gaze veered toward his brother before fastening elsewhere. So there was something there.
He nodded sagely. “Dregs, indeed.”
“Have you seen Izzy?”
“Don’t you mean Lady Roth?” Oliver interjected, his tone oozing disdain. “If so, then unless she has already moved on, I believe she is near the refreshments room.”
Clarissa’s mouth went flat before it was overtaken by a sugary sweet smile. “Why, are you offering to escort me there, Lord Oliver? How truly gallant of you.” Her disparaging tone matched his, suggesting that she didn’t think he was gallant in the least. It would goad the pretentious Oliver into fury, Winter knew.
“No, I was merely answering your question.”
“Figures, then,” she replied.
His lips curled. “What does?”
“You aren’t a gentleman.”
Winter felt like he was caught in the middle of a furious tennis match, just barely dodging the