Page 10 of Enticed By an Earl
That had to be the case. Dev had seen enough of the world to know that not every family was as kind and loving as his own, even though his mother and sisters pestered him constantly to wed and find what they called happiness. He knew that fathers sometimes abused their children, particularly sons. Especially if they were as far from the masculine ideal as Castleton was.
Then again, whether Castleton was the male ideal or not entirely depended upon what one was searching for in a male. To Dev’s eyes, he was a unique form of perfection.
Which was likely why the sweet man felt so haunted in his own home.
Dammit, Castleton needed a champion. But every time Dev decided that it should be him, something stepped into his path to block his way.
“My dear, you look entirely too sober for a ball,” his mother commented, stepping up to his side as he made one last turn around the large ballroom at Russell House.
Dev grunted, reaching out to brush a rose that had just burst into bloom that stood out from one of the many arrangements his mother had had placed around the room. “My thoughts are elsewhere,” he told her plainly. It was not a lie.
His mother hummed and took his arm. “I can see that, my darling.” She tilted her head and stared at him, her eyes narrowed slightly.
Dev smiled weakly. His mother’s squint was not so much a sign that she was attempting to see through the layers of his character but rather an indication that she needed her spectacles. She wore them when only the family was at home, but she would have rather gone naked in public than wear them when anyone else might see her.
“I know this sort of wistfulness,” she said once she’d studied him. “I have seen it before. You have been disappointed in love.”
Dev laughed, though an uneasy feeling sent prickles down his back. “I can assure you I have not, Mama,” he said.
“I do not believe you,” his mother said, drawing him away from the flowers at the edge of the room and toward the ballroom entrance, where guests were beginning to arrive. “I have heard whispers that you parted with a certain Mrs. Elmswood recently.”
Dev’s face heated. His mother should not have known so much nor been so accepting of his dalliances. But then, their family had always been extraordinarily open and progressive in their thinking. Aside from that, he’d hardly given Marianne a thought in the week since they’d parted ways. It was damnably callous of him. He should have mourned the end of that attachment for at least some time.
But his thoughts had been too full of Castleton to leave much room at all for Marianne.
“It is nothing of that sort at all, Mama,” Dev replied, uncertain whether he was lying or not. “I was simply contemplating the extravagance of the expense of tonight’s ball.”
His mother made a feigned sound of offense and smacked Dev’s arm playfully. “You know better than to question yourmother’s tastes,” she said. Her smile grew as they neared the door and as she went on with, “Besides, you must be aware that the hidden purpose of tonight’s festivities is to find you a wife at last.”
Dev huffed. “That purpose is not hidden at all,” he said. “I suppose you will throw every eligible young lady who passes through these doors at my head tonight?”
His mother had enough good humor to laugh. “You know I only wish for you to be as happy as your brothers, my dear,” she said.
“I am very happy,” Dev insisted. “And my brothers can mind their own business.”
“Deveraux,” his mother scolded him, shaking her head. “You are not growing younger, you know.”
“Mother, you wound me,” Dev said dramatically, then sobered enough to greet the Earl of Moreland as he and his red-headed friend entered the ball. He knew from certain circles that the two men were together, but he greeted them as he would any other guest, assisting them subtly in maintaining their façade of respectability for the world.
Several other guests arrived in quick succession, but as soon as he was able to take a moment to step away from the receiving line he whispered to his mother, “I do not need nor do I particularly want a wife, but you have my leave to try your best to bait me with one.”
His mother glanced over her shoulder at him with a devious laugh. “I will see you married yet, my darling,” she told him, as if throwing down the gauntlet.
Dev threw propriety to the wind and inched forward to kiss his mother’s cheek, scandalizing the grey-haired noblewoman who had only just stepped up to greet her, then marched away, chuckling to himself over his audacity. Knowing his mother, she would indeed attempt to matchhim with at least half a dozen young ladies that night. His feet already ached with the knowledge that he would likely be forced to dance until he wore holes in his shoes.
He sought a moment’s refuge from the coming storm by approaching his brother James, who had arrived from the family’s country estate in Wiltshire just the night before, despite his wife having given birth just two months prior.
“You look as though you are being hunted already,” James greeted him with a laugh.
Dev smirked and turned to stand by his brother’s side, gazing out at the filling ballroom. He and James had always been close and seen eye-to-eye. “I have issued Mother the challenge of pushing as many husband-hunting ladies at me as she can. I am determined to resist every one of them.”
James laughed in a similar manner to their mother. “Still resisting her schemes, I see?”
“I have no reason to wed,” Dev said with a shrug. “You and Julian have already provided the family with more than enough options for heirs. My only responsibility in life now is to keep the family coffers full.”
“With no thought of your own happiness?” James teased him. “I can assure you, Dev, that once you find the right woman, marriage will improve your life immeasurably.”
“And you have found the right woman?” Dev asked.
