Page 97 of A Scandalous Kind of Duke

“Refused to tup me,” St. Blaise sighed. “Maybe now she will. I don’t even mind that my little half-brother had her first. You did, didn’t you? Maybe you should thank me. Maybe now she’ll be desperate enough to become your mistress. That’s what you want, isn’t it? Marry your earl’s girl, like the good boy you are, then keep that luscious lady on the side, just like Papa Duke did with our mothers. I saw the way you looked at her. With hungry eyes.”

He kept going, but Leo didn’t hear. He released him long enough to draw back his fist and fire off a punch.

St. Blaise stepped aside. Leo’s fist slammed into air. He stumbled, then spun, to see his brother’s cheeky grin.

It occurred to Leo that this was his first fistfight in approximately fifteen years, whereas St. Blaise probably fought other men nightly for fun.

He feinted, swung again. This time, he somehow caught his target’s cheek.

“Not the face,” St. Blaise protested, and lunged for Leo’s head.

“Not the hair,” Leo said, and jerked his head away.

They stared at each other, ten years old again, reliving the day Papa Duke first brought them together, so hopelessly, optimistically sure that his two eldest sons would take to each other. They had taken to each other, all right: They had taken to each other with their fists. Leo cursed him: Tristan St. Blaise, usurper, heartbreaker, mischief maker. This had been a long time coming.

With a cackle of laughter, St. Blaise spun away and bounded up onto the nearest card table, chips and cards scattering under his feet. Leo leaped up after him. Again he swung. Again he missed.

Still laughing, St. Blaise jumped from table to table, Leo bounding close behind.

On one of the larger tables, Leo finally snared his elbow. He yanked him around. This time, St. Blaise stayed to fight, while the table creaked under their feet and the crowd cheered from the floor. He was making a fool of himself, Leo realized through the haze of anger. His fists never made contact, and St. Blaise was doing nothing more than dodging Leo’s punches and messing up his clothes and hair.

He stopped, breathing heavily. St. Blaise was a trained, experienced soldier, for pity’s sake.

Although he did have a gratifyingly red welt on one cheek.

St. Blaise shook his head, looking Leo over. “How do you do that? I messed you up, but still your hair looks superb.”

“And I punched you, but still your face looks—”

“Superb?”

“In need of a punch.”

He advanced, determined to wipe that smirk off once and for all.

“Polly, Polly, Polly.” St. Blaise held up his hands in a sign of peace. They both knew, now, that he could easily wrestle Leo to the ground and pummel him to a pulp. “Face it. You don’t know how to throw a decent punch.”

“But I do know how to fire a gun.”

“Do you?” He sounded genuinely curious. “Really?”

“Yes. Really. Name your second. I’ll shoot you tomorrow at dawn.”

St. Blaise sighed. “Could we do it in the afternoon, though? Let me have some sleep.”

“You’ll sleep when you’re dead.”

Leo took his time straightening his clothes, then lightly jumped down onto the floor.

Grins faltered before his glare. Silence rippled outward and a path opened up before him. He’d taken barely two steps toward the exit when another cheer burst through the room.

St. Blaise, still on the table, was making his bow.

“It is done and won!” he cried. “The Duke of Dammerton yelled at me, struck me,andcalled me out. The pot is mine! One thousand pounds!”

St. Blaise met Leo’s eyes. Grinning broadly, he bowed again.

“You ruined someone to enrage me for awager?” Leo said. “Cold comfort when you die.”

---