A Rake's Ruin (Devilish Lords #1)(53)

It was not all right. He was most decidedly not an admirer of frivolity—a fact his mother had kept in mind when creating this list, thank heavens. Though he supposed a young, pretty girl like Georgie could afford to be frivolous, particularly now that one sister had married an Earl and the other the brother of a duke. She could have her pick among the ton and find some dandy who found it diverting to have a mindless twit on his arm and running his home.

Some dandy could afford to have a wife who loved to laugh. For a duke? Laughter was not high on his list of priorities.

In fact, as he was currently studying his list of preferences, he had written proof of the matter. He turned his attention to said list. Now this Lady Regina. She certainly had more decency than to laugh like a lunatic and chatter like a magpie.

How did he know that Georgie had a propensity to talk as often as she laughed? He had spent Christmas with the girl, as once more she had been brought to the family home as a guest of Claire’s.

He supposed he couldn’t blame Claire for wanting to give her impressionable younger sister a taste of gentility. It was a wonder Claire had turned out as well as she had considering their family owned land, but no title. Add to that the legacy of scandal attached to the Cleveland name and it became quite clear that his brother and Claire had taken Georgie on out of a sense of charity.

There it was again. Her laughter tinkling like a bell in this vast house. He would not have been overly surprised if the maids and footmen came running.

Thrusting the matrimonial dossier to the side, he rubbed at his eyes, trying to alleviate the familiar ache that was forming just behind the bridge of his nose. It was no good. His concentration had been shot by that infernal racket.

The noise started up once more and he found himself standing to put on his jacket. He was not in a hurry to see his young guest, mind. He merely wanted to squelch the laughter before this insipid young lady disturbed his mother.

That thought carried him forward, though at some point he started to realize that it was he who had come running at the sound of the bell. Er, her laughter. He slowed his pace and then slowed it even further when he heard another noise altogether. One he hadn’t heard in months…perhaps years.

Certainly not since before his father had passed.

It was the low, but unmistakable sound of his mother…laughing.

When he entered the drawing room, he found the entire family gathered—Nicholas, Claire, his mother…and, of course, the source of all the laughter.

Though now that he was here, it seemed she was also the cause of it. She stood before the empty fireplace with one hand hovering over her eyes as though she were pretending to don spectacles. She blinked a few times and screwed her mouth up into a pucker. Then the comical expression vanished and she was Georgie once more—blonde, petite, and truly the loveliest woman he had ever seen.

Objectively, of course. He might not find her personality alluring, but the fact that she was a diamond of the first water was impossible to deny. It was fact, not opinion.

She hadn’t seen him walk into the room. No one had, it seemed. All eyes were on Georgie as she finished her story. “He’d looked at me just like that. I am not exaggerating, am I, Claire? And really, I’d done nothing wrong.” She batted those big eyes with mock innocence, making the others hoot with laughter. “But he looked at me as though I’d just thrown the glass of water in his face, when really all I’d done was—”

That was when she spotted him. Her gaze met his and she froze, her lips still parted ready to speak.

The others followed her gaze to see why she had stopped her story, no doubt. His mother was the first to react. “Oh, Rhys dear. Do come in, we were hoping you could join us before dinner.”

She’d risen, as had the others, and he felt a twinge of guilt for having disrupted their amusement.

But only a very small twinge. A much larger part of him was irritated by the whole scenario. Something about finding them all laughing in his home but without him…it had not settled well. Besides, it was not proper for a young woman to be performing as if she were a common actress.

His mental lecture on propriety was cut short as his brother and sister-in-law greeted him, followed by a much more subdued, but no less amused Georgie.

“And you remember Miss Cleveland, of course,” Nicholas said.

“Of course,” he gave her a short nod in response to her pretty curtsy.

“Your Grace,” she said.

“Georgie was just recounting a rather amusing incident,” his mother said. She wore the kind of tolerant smile he’d thought was solely reserved for Nicholas but which now appeared to extend to his entire family, in-laws included.

“Indeed,” he said slowly, allowing his withering gaze to speak his true mind. “So I gathered.”

He’d used his best ducal tone, the one which made servants tremble and grown men pale.

Apparently it made Georgie laugh. He caught the way she pressed her lips together suddenly, the way her eyes danced with it, the way her body nearly shook with the effort to hold it in.

Bloody hell. She was laughing at him. Not outright, of course. She was not quite so uncouth, thank the heavens. But there was no denying the fact that she found him amusing.

In a startling moment of clarity, he could perfectly imagine her standing in front of her family and friends, sneering down at them and lowering her voice melodramatically. Indeed, she’d drawl with a sniff. So I gathered.