Page 17 of Duke of Destruction
“Fine,” Percy admitted. He was not an unreasonable man. He was not blind to his flaws. Those qualities belonged to others, the kind of men that Percy despised. “It is perhaps not my finest showing.”
“What a diplomatic way of saying you’re behaving like a lunatic!” David said brightly, as though Percy were a clever child who had said something particularly precocious.
Percy scowled and stood to serve himself another glass of David’s finest liquor. He didn’t bother offering his friend any.
If David wanted to be a prat, he could get his own drinks.
“Shouldn’t you be off playing host somewhere?” Percy inquired. “Why don’t you just leave me here? I cannot bother anyone with my supposed lunacy if I am sitting quietly, alone.”
“I should be off playing host, but no, I cannot leave you here, because you are my friend.” David paused as if considering his approach. “And also, you are ruining my party. So, tell me. What grievance do you have with Lady Catherine Lightholder?”
Her name landed on Percy like a blow. He doubted it was convincing when he tried to brush it off.
“You know perfectly well why I have no patience for the Lightholders,” he said.
David had gotten the truth out of Percy one night when the two friends were deep in their cups. He’d listened with an uncharacteristically serious air, then nodded in a way that made Percy wonder if his friend didn’t have his own guarded hurt, his own childhood wound that had followed him into adulthood.
Percy knew that David took him seriously. It was the only thing that stopped him from growing furious when his friend now regarded him with something like doubt.
“I’m not sure you can hold the lady accountable for the sins of the grandfather,” he said.
Percy shook his head. This would be fair, except…
“She’s just as snobbish as the rest of them,” he protested. “You can see it in her oh- so -perfect polish. Women like that…they value image. Nothing else.”
David’s doubt remained. “She seems nice enough to me,” he said gently. “A bit prim, perhaps, but can you blame her? She’s a lady of theton. They’re not exactly encouraged to wildness. At least she’s not as timid as the younger one. The poor thing looks frightened half to death most of the time.”
In truth, Percy had hardly even noticed the younger sister.
“Yes, I suppose Lady Arianna doesn’t seem to be too self-important,” he allowed.
David gave him another look. “That would be a compliment, I suppose, if her name wasn’t Lady Ariadne, but I suppose that your attention has been rather focused on her sister…”
He trailed off suggestively. Percy sent his friend a rude gesture.
His friend might be annoying, but he wasn’twrong. Percy had been focused on the elder sister from the moment she set foot on his friend’s property. He wasn’t sure why. It wasn’t as though the younger sister, whatever her name might have been, wasn’t pretty enough. Too young for Percy’s notice, even if she wasn’t part of the family that he so loathed, but pretty enough.
But Lady Catherine? She was…arresting.
David was giving Percy a look like he could read his thoughts. Christ, Percy hated that look. Why couldn’t his friend contain anything more than the flippant and glib persona he tended to show the world? Why could he not be the devilish entertainer and nothing else?
“Don’t look at me like that,” he complained.
This did make David grin. Percy amended his previous thought. The devilish side of David could be just as infuriating.
“Like what?” he asked. “Like you are thinking thoughts you don’t want to be thinking about a certain lady?”
“That sentence barely made sense,” Percy groused.
“But I’m right, aren’t I?”
“No. You are not.”
“I think I am. I think I really, really am.”
He really, really was.
Percy hated himself a bit for how much he had enjoyed the feeling of Lady Catherine’s lips beneath his, hated that part of him could still feel the soft curve of her waist against his palm. And this did not even account for the self-recrimination he faced for giving in to this desire.
