The Viscount Who Loved Me

by Julia Quinn

  “Daff!” Colin called out. “You’re just in time to help us put out the wickets.”

  She gave him an arch smile. “You didn’t think I’d let you set up the course yourself, do you?” She turned to her husband. “I don’t trust him as far as I can throw him.”

  “Don’t listen to her,” Colin said to Kate. “She’s very strong. I’d wager she could toss me clear into the lake.”

  Daphne rolled her eyes and turned to Kate. “Since I’m sure my miserable brother won’t do the honors, I’ll introduce myself. I am Daphne, Duchess of Hastings, and this is my husband Simon.”

  Kate bobbed a quick curtsy. “Your grace,” she murmured, then turned to the duke and said again, “Your grace.”

  Colin waved his hand toward her as he bent down to retrieve the wickets from the Pall Mall cart. “This is Miss Sheffield.”

  Daphne looked confused. “I just passed by Anthony at the house. I thought he said he was on his way to fetch Miss Sheffield.”

  “My sister,” Kate explained. “Edwina. I am Katharine. Kate to my friends.”

  “Well, if you are brave enough to play Pall Mall with the Bridgertons, I definitely want you as my friend,” Daphne said with a wide smile. “Therefore you must call me Daphne. And my husband Simon. Simon?”

  “Oh, of course,” he said, and Kate had the distinct impression that he would have said the same had she just declared the sky orange. Not that he wasn’t listening to her, just that it was clear he adored her to distraction.

  This, Kate thought, was what she wanted for Edwina.

  “Let me take half of those,” Daphne said, reaching for the wickets in her brother’s hand. “Miss Sheffield andI…that is, Kate and I”—she flashed Kate a friendly grin—“will set up three of them, and you and Simon can do the rest.”

  Before Kate could even venture an opinion, Daphne had taken her by the arm and was leading her toward the lake.

  “We have to make absolutely certain that Anthony loses his ball in the water,” Daphne muttered. “I have never forgiven him for last time. I thought Benedict and Colin were going to die laughing. And Anthony was the worst. He just stood there smirking. Smirking!” She turned to Kate with a most beleaguered expression. “No one smirks quite like my eldest brother.”

  “I know,” Kate muttered under her breath.

  Thankfully, the duchess hadn’t heard her. “If I could have killed him, I vow I would have.”

  “What will happen once all your balls are lost in the lake?” Kate couldn’t resist asking. “I haven’t played with you lot yet, but you do seem rather competitive, and it seems…”

  “That it would be inevitable?” Daphne finished for her. She grinned. “You’re probably right. We have no sense of sportsmanship when it comes to Pall Mall. When a Bridgerton picks up a mallet, we become the worst sorts of cheaters and liars. Truly, the game is less about winning than making sure the other players lose.”

  Kate fought for words. “It sounds…”

  “Awful?” Daphne grinned. “It’s not. You’ll never have more fun, I guarantee it. But at the rate we’re going, the entire set will end up in the lake ere long. I suppose we’ll have to send to France for another set.” She jammed a wicket into the ground. “It seems a waste, I know, but worth it to humiliate my brothers.”

  Kate tried not to laugh, but she didn’t succeed.

  “Do you have any brothers, Miss Sheffield?” Daphne asked.

  Since the duchess had forgotten to use her given name, Kate deemed it best to revert to formal manners. “None, your grace,” she replied. “Edwina is my only sibling.”

  Daphne shaded her eyes with her hand and scanned the area for a devilish wicket location. When she spied one—sitting right atop a tree root—she marched away, leaving Kate no choice but to follow.

  “Four brothers,” Daphne said, shoving the wicket into the ground, “provide quite a marvelous education.”

  “The things you must have learned,” Kate said, quite impressed. “Can you give a man a black eye? Knock him to the ground?”

  Daphne grinned wickedly. “Ask my husband.”

  “Ask me what?” the duke called out from where he and Colin were placing a wicket on a tree root on the opposite side of the tree.

  “Nothing,” the duchess called out innocently. “I’ve also learned,” she whispered to Kate, “when it’s best just to keep one’s mouth shut. Men are much easier to manage once you understand a few basic facts about their nature.”

  “Which are?” Kate prompted.

  Daphne leaned forward and whispered behind her cupped hand, “They’re not as smart as we are, they’re not as intuitive as we are, and they certainly don’t need to know about fifty percent of what we do.” She looked around. “He didn’t hear that, did he?”

  Simon stepped out from behind the tree. “Every word.”

  Kate choked on a laugh as Daphne jumped a foot. “But it’s true,” Daphne said archly.

  Simon crossed his arms. “I’ll let you think so.” He turned to Kate. “I’ve learned a thing or two about women over the years.”

  “Really?” Kate asked, fascinated.

  He nodded and leaned in, as if imparting a grave state secret. “They’re much easier to manage if one allows them to believe that they are smarter and more intuitive than men. And,” he added with a superior glance at his wife, “our lives are much more peaceful if we pretend that we’re only aware of about fifty percent of what they do.”

  Colin approached, swinging a mallet in a low arc. “Are they having a spat?” he asked Kate.

  “A discussion,” Daphne corrected.

  “God save me from such discussions,” Colin muttered. “Let’s choose colors.”

  Kate followed him back to the Pall Mall set, her fingers drumming against her thigh. “Do you have the time?” she asked him.

  Colin pulled out his pocket watch. “A bit after half three, why?”

  “I just thought that Edwina and the viscount would be down by now, that’s all,” she said, trying not to look too concerned.

  Colin shrugged. “They should be.” Then, completely oblivious to her distress, he motioned to the Pall Mall set. “Here. You’re the guest. You choose first. What color do you want?”

  Without giving it much thought, Kate reached in and grabbed a mallet. It was only when it was in her hand that she realized it was black.

  “The mallet of death,” Colin said approvingly. “I knew she’d make a fine player.”

  “Leave the pink one for Anthony,” Daphne said, reaching for the green mallet.

  The duke pulled the orange mallet out of the set, turning to Kate as he said, “You are my witness that I had nothing to do with Bridgerton’s pink mallet, yes?”

  Kate smiled wickedly. “I noticed that you didn’t choose the pink mallet.”

  “Of course not,” he returned, his grin even more devious than hers. “My wife had already chosen it for him. I could not gainsay her, now, could I?”

  “Yellow for me,” Colin said, “and blue for Miss Edwina, don’t you think?”

  “Oh, yes,” Kate replied. “Edwina loves blue.”

  The foursome stared down at the two mallets left: pink and purple.

  “He’s not going to like either one,” Daphne said.

  Colin nodded. “But he’ll like pink even less.” And with that, he picked up the purple mallet and tossed it into the shed, then reached down and sent the purple ball in after it.

  “I say,” the duke said, “where is Anthony?”

  “That’s a very good question,” Kate muttered, tapping her hand against her thigh.

  “I suppose you’ll want to know what time it is,” Colin said slyly.

  Kate flushed. She’d already asked him to check his pocket watch twice. “I’m fine, thank you,” she answered, lacking a witty retort.

  “Very well. It’s just that I’ve learned that once you start moving your hand like that—”

  Kate’s hand froze.

  “�
��you’re usually about ready to ask me what time it is.”

  “You’ve learned quite a lot about me in the past hour,” Kate said dryly.

  He grinned. “I’m an observant fellow.”

  “Obviously,” she muttered.

  “But in case you wanted to know, it’s a quarter of an hour before four.”

  “They’re past due,” Kate said.

  Colin leaned forward and whispered, “I highly doubt that my brother is ravishing your sister.”

  Kate lurched back. “Mr. Bridgerton!”

  “What are you two talking about?” Daphne asked.

  Colin grinned. “Miss Sheffield is worried that Anthony is compromising the other Miss Sheffield.”

  “Colin!” Daphne exclaimed. “That isn’t the least bit funny.”

  “And certainly not true,” Kate protested. Well, almost not true. She didn’t think the viscount was compromising Edwina, but he was probably doing his very best to charm her silly. And that was dangerous in and of itself.

  Kate pondered the mallet in her hand and tried to figure out how she might bring it down upon the viscount’s head and make it look like an accident.

  The mallet of death, indeed.

  Anthony checked the clock on the mantel in his study. Almost half three. They were going to be late.

  He grinned. Oh, well, nothing to do about it.

  Normally he was a stickler for punctuality, but when tardiness resulted in the torture of Kate Sheffield, he didn’t much mind a late arrival.

  And Kate Sheffield was surely writhing in agony by now, horrified at the thought of her precious younger sister in his evil clutches.

  Anthony looked down at his evil clutches—hands, he reminded himself, hands—and grinned anew. He hadn’t had this much fun in ages, and all he was doing was loitering about his office, picturing Kate Sheffield with her jaw clenched together, steam pouring from her ears.

  It was a highly entertaining image.

  Not, of course, that this was even his fault. He would have left right on time if he hadn’t had to wait for Edwina. She’d sent word down with the maid that she would join him in ten minutes. That was twenty minutes ago. He couldn’t help it if she was late.

  Anthony had a sudden image of the rest of his life—waiting for Edwina. Was she the sort who was chronically late? That might grow vexing after a while.

  As if on cue, he heard the patter of footsteps in the hall, and when he looked up, Edwina’s exquisite form was framed by the doorway.

  She was, he thought dispassionately, a vision. Utterly lovely in every way. Her face was perfection, her posture the epitome of grace, and her eyes were the most radiant shade of blue, so vivid that one could not help but be surprised by their hue every time she blinked.

  Anthony waited for some sort of reaction to rise up within him. Surely no man could be immune to her beauty.

  Nothing. Not even the slightest urge to kiss her. It almost seemed a crime against nature.

  But maybe this was a good thing. After all, he didn’t want a wife with whom he’d fall in love. Desire would have been nice, but desire could be dangerous. Desire certainly had a greater chance of sliding into love than did disinterest.

  “I’m terribly sorry I’m late, my lord,” Edwina said prettily.

  “It was no trouble whatsoever,” he replied, feeling a bit brightened by his recent set of rationalizations. She’d still work just fine as a bride. No need to look elsewhere. “But we should be on our way. The others will have the course set up already.”

  He took her arm and they strolled out of the house. He remarked on the weather. She remarked on the weather. He remarked on the previous day’s weather. She agreed with whatever he’d said (he couldn’t even remember, one minute later).

  After exhausting all possible weather-related topics, they fell into silence, and then finally, after a full three minutes of neither of them having anything to say, Edwina blurted out, “What did you study at university?”

  Anthony looked at her oddly. He couldn’t remember ever being asked such a question by a young lady. “Oh, the usual,” he replied.

  “But what,” she ground out, looking most uncharacteristically impatient, “is the usual?”

  “History, mostly. A bit of literature.”

  “Oh.” She pondered that for a moment. “I love to read.”

  “Do you?” He eyed her with renewed interest. He wouldn’t have taken her for a bluestocking. “What do you like to read?”

  She seemed to relax as she answered the question. “Novels if I’m feeling fanciful. Philosophy if I’m in the mood for self-improvement.”

  “Philosophy, eh?” Anthony queried. “Never could stomach the stuff myself.”

  Edwina let out one of her charmingly musical laughs. “Kate is the same way. She is forever telling me that she knows perfectly well how to live her life and doesn’t need a dead man to give her instructions.”

  Anthony thought about his experiences reading Aristotle, Bentham, and Descartes at university. Then he thought about his experiences avoiding reading Aristotle, Bentham, and Descartes at university. “I think,” he murmured, “that I would have to agree with your sister.”

  Edwina grinned. “You, agree with Kate? I feel I should find a notebook and record the moment. Surely this must be a first.”

  He gave her a sideways, assessing sort of glance. “You’re more impertinent than you let on, aren’t you?”

  “Not half as much as Kate.”

  “That was never in doubt.”

  He heard Edwina let out a little giggle, and when he looked over at her, she appeared to be trying her hardest to maintain a straight face. They rounded the final corner to the field, and as they came over the rise, they saw the rest of the Pall Mall party waiting for them, idly swinging their mallets to and fro as they waited.

  “Oh, bloody hell,” Anthony swore, completely forgetting that he was in the company of the woman he planned to make his wife. “She’s got the mallet of death.”

  Chapter 10

  The country house party is a very dangerous event. Married persons often find themselves enjoying the company of one other than one’s spouse, and unmarried persons often return to town as rather hastily engaged persons.

  Indeed, the most surprising betrothals are announced on the heels of these spells of rustication.

  LADY WHISTLEDOWN’S SOCIETY PAPERS, 2 MAY 1814

  “You certainly took your time getting here,” Colin remarked as soon as Anthony and Edwina reached the group. “Here, we’re ready to go. Edwina, you’re blue.” He handed her a mallet. “Anthony, you’re pink.”

  “I’m pink and she”—he jabbed a finger toward Kate—“gets to have the mallet of death?”

  “I gave her first pick,” Colin said. “She is our guest, after all.”

  “Anthony is usually black,” Daphne explained. “In fact, he gave the mallet its name.”

  “You shouldn’t have to be pink,” Edwina said to Anthony. “It doesn’t suit you at all. Here”—she held out her mallet—“why don’t we trade?”

  “Don’t be silly,” Colin interjected. “We specifically decided that you must be blue. To match your eyes.”

  Kate thought she heard Anthony groan.

  “I will be pink,” Anthony announced, grabbing the offending mallet rather forcefully from Colin’s hand, “and I will still win. Let’s begin, shall we?”

  As soon as the necessary introductions were made between the duke and duchess and Edwina, they all plopped their wooden balls down near the starting point and prepared to play.

  “Shall we play youngest to oldest?” Colin suggested, with a gallant bow in Edwina’s direction.

  She shook her head. “I should rather go last, so that I might have a chance to observe the play of those more experienced than I.”

  “A wise woman,” Colin murmured. “Then we shall play oldest to youngest. Anthony, I believe you’re the most ancient among us.”

  “Sorry, brother dear, but H
astings has a few months on me.”

  “Why,” Edwina whispered in Kate’s ear, “do I get the feeling I am intruding upon a family spat?”

  “I think the Bridgertons take Pall Mall very seriously,” Kate whispered back. The three Bridgerton siblings had assumed bulldog faces, and they all appeared rather single-mindedly determined to win.

  “Eh eh eh!” Colin scolded, waving a finger at them. “No collusion allowed.”

  “We wouldn’t even begin to know where to collude,” Kate commented, “as no one has seen fit to even explain to us the rules of play.”

  “Just follow along,” Daphne said briskly. “You’ll figure it out as you go.”

  “I think,” Kate whispered to Edwina, “that the object is to sink your opponents’ balls into the lake.”

  “Really?”

  “No. But I think that’s how the Bridgertons see it.”

  “You’re still whispering!” Colin called out without sparing a glance in their direction. Then, to the duke, he barked, “Hastings, hit the bloody ball. We haven’t all day.”

  “Colin,” Daphne cut in, “don’t curse. There are ladies present.”

  “You don’t count.”

  “There are two ladies present who are not me,” she ground out.

  Colin blinked, then turned to the Sheffield sisters. “Do you mind?”

  “Not at all,” Kate replied, utterly fascinated. Edwina just shook her head.

  “Good.” Colin turned back to the duke. “Hastings, get moving.”

  The duke nudged his ball a bit forward from the rest of the pile. “You do realize,” he said to no one in particular, “that I have never played Pall Mall before?”

  “Just give the ball a good whack in that direction, darling,” Daphne said, pointing to the first wicket.

  “Isn’t that the last wicket?” Anthony asked.

  “It’s the first.”

  “It ought to be the last.”

  Daphne’s jaw jutted out. “I set up the course, and it’s the first.”

  “I think this might get bloody,” Edwina whispered to Kate.

  The duke turned to Anthony and flashed him a false smile. “I believe I’ll take Daphne’s word for it.”