Page 63 of From London, With Love
“Yes,” Lark hissed, making a little celebratory fist.
Charlie rolled his eyes and flipped a pair of coins in her direction. “Congratulations, Your Grace.”
A chorus of congratulations echoed around the table.
“I see there’s a new betting book being opened,” he said dryly. “If I find your listening devices, Byrnes, I will shove them down your throat.”
“Listening devices?” Byrnes protested. “Why am I always the chief suspect?”
“Because you’re always guilty.”
“Not this time,” Byrnes replied. He snorted and glanced toward Ingrid, who gave Malloryn a sweet smile.
“Your dear wife’s been casting up her accounts several times a day,” she replied. “She’s also suddenly obsessed with cake.”
“Adele is always obsessed with cake.”
“Not like this,” Ingrid said, looking impressed. “She asked Herbert to trot halfway across London in search of a particular honey cake she is absolutely fascinated with at the moment.”
“And she eats it with cheese,” Lark said with a shudder. “A foul sort of cheese that stinks the entire room out.”
How on earth had they all known before he had?
Lark smiled sweetly at Malloryn, failing to wilt under his stare, as anyone with reasonable sense would.
He was clearly losing his touch. Fairy godmother. Arranging marriages. Now this.
Flipping out the end of his coat, he took his seat at the head of the table. “Herbert, fetch us some tea. I can see that none of us are quite busy enough. That’s about to change.”
“Very good, Your Grace.” The butler vanished.
“You have a job for us?” Byrnes asked, rubbing his hands together.
“I have a job for some of you.” Malloryn flipped a folder across the table toward Gemma. “Fancy a honeymoon?”
“I’m not even married yet.”
“You will be,” he replied. “And then you are going to be whisked away on an all-expenses paid voyage, complete with an entire new wardrobe and trousseau.”
“Ooh,” Gemma cooed, grabbing the folder. “You shouldn’t have. Where are we going? Somewhere warm, preferably?”
“Morocco,” Ingrid purred, closing her eyes as if imagining she was tilting her face toward the sun.
“Crete,” Ava said brightly. “Imagine all those ruins!”
“It’s going to be somewhere cold, dark, and bloody,” Byrnes said sourly. “I only just ordered a new pair of boots after the last set were ruined in Russia.”
“Yes,” Malloryn said, “I noticed that invoice.”
“They were ruined on your behalf, Your Grace.”
He ignored the comment.
Because some wounds were still fresh enough to bleed, and he didn’t particularly enjoy thinking of that period of time in his life.
“Stockholm,” Gemma announced, her tone neutral. Her gaze lifted from the paper she was reading. “A diplomatic embassy to Stockholm, and we’re to be included. This hardly sounds like our sort of thing.”
“That’s because you haven’t read the entire report,” he pointed out. “The queen is sending Will Carver, our verwulfen ambassador, to Stockholm to attend the renewal of the Treaty. It’s been a hundred years since the Scandinavian verwulfen clans hammered out a treaty with the Russian Blood court about verwulfen clans in the Grand Duchy of Finland. The Russian court is sending a large contingent of princes to renew the treaty, and both the Norwegian and Swedish verwulfen clans will be in attendance.”
