Page 4 of The Love Potion
Kynthea laughed. How could she not? Zoe had a kind heart, and she did listen when she wanted to. Perhaps after a few more years, she’d come to understand that the world worked differently for her than for nearly everyone else. But until that day came, Kynthea would enjoy the girl’s unique personality and occasional bursts of generosity. Because after Zoe’s marriage, Kynthea’s life would become very bleak indeed.
Chapter Two
“Ladies hearts areaflutter. The Duke of Harle needs a wife.”
Erasmus Oliver Arthur Stace—Ras to his friends—shot his best friend Nate a hard look. “You willnotprint that.”
“Of course, I will. Unless you give me something better to say.”
“I do notneeda wife!”
“But I need something to put in my column tomorrow. And since we are indeed headed for Almack’s, and everyone will be whispering about your attendance, I most certainly must put it in the paper.”
Ras glared at his best friend. He firmed his chin, arched a brow, and imitated his late father’s most intimidating ducal look. Nate grinned back in the way only an irrepressible scamp could. If only the man had been born first, then he would have had a wealthy earldom to back his charm. But as a third son, Lord Nate was a hanger-on who wrote a gossip column to keep off the duns. No one but Ras and the publisher knew the identity of the famous Mr. Pickleherring, which meant that Ras was in the enviable position of influencing theton’sprimary topic of conversation.
“You will not write about me,” he repeated, his voice heavy.
“Then you will give me something better to say.”
Ras grimaced. “This is beneath you,” he grumbled.
“On the contrary, it is beneath you. I, on the other hand, must pay my tailor. So out with it. What juicy morsel do you know that I do not?”
Ras was not a gossip. Indeed, he took special pains to not hear even the slightest tidbit. But knowledge comes to any man who listened more than he spoke, and in this case, he found the information reprehensible. “You swear you will not mention me at all?”
“Ras,” his friend drawled. “You know I have to mention you a little. Maybe I could say something about your waistcoat. About how it’s dreadfully dull or some such thing.”
His waistcoat was dove gray and perfectly matched the pearl swan on his cane, not to mention on his family crest. “You may say that my attire matched the purity and excellence associated with my name.”
Nate snorted. “To be sure. I’ll certainly say that.” His tone indicated he would not.
“You’ll write something entirely different.”
Nate laughed as he mimed scribbling, then reading something completely inappropriate. His expression was funny enough that Ras’s grumble came out more as a snort.
“Come, come,” Nate pressed. “Speak up. There isn’t much time before we land at Almack’s and become bored to death.”
Nate would be bored to death. Ras, on the other hand, would be pestered from every direction by hopeful misses and their greedy mamas.
“It has to do with Viscount Valpa.”
“Oh! The double V villain. What has he done now?”
“Played much too deep last night.” Ras only knew this because he’d retreated to the bowels of his club in search of solitude only to overhear the violent end of the game through the thin wall. “I believe he will bear the marks of his latest mistake on his face.”
“How deep did he play?” Nate pressed. “Deep enough to dissuade a certain heiress from her engagement to the bounder?”
Valpa wasn’t exactly a bounder in the traditional sense of being dishonest. He simply couldn’t control his gambling habit. But Nate and Ras shared a vehement disgust of fortune hunters which was very odd since, truth be told, Nate was one. As a third son, his only hope of a comfortable life was to catch an heiress, and yet the man was vicious in condemning any man who married purely for money. Nate was a romantic, which meant he was steeped in self-loathing which usually expressed itself in his column.
“Ras! How deep?”
“As of last night, he owes nearly two thousand pounds to a man I’m certain is a cheat.”
“Two thousand! What a bloody idiot!”
On many levels. “I trust that is enough to fill your column without—”
“Yes, yes. Your name is safe, but not your fashion sense.”
