Free Anne Barbour by Point Non Plus nodrm Page B

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    She regretted her behavior. Were Devon speaking to her, she would apologize. But his manner, when he came for Zoe and Nell, had been cold as the Thames in winter, when the water turned to ice.
    Devon had taken Zoe up in his curricle. Mina didn’t know what to think. Rather, she thought so many conflicting things that her head was in a whirl. Devon was doing as she had asked him; he was engaging Zoe. However, she had also asked him not to engage Zoe, and so he wasn’t obliging her in the least.
    Perhaps he meant to please Mina by occupying Zoe’s attention. Perhaps he meant to drive her to distraction, in which case he was succeeding well. And perhaps he wasn’t thinking of Mina at all.
    Why should he be thinking of Mina, when he was with Zoe? Mina reminded herself he was also with Nell. She found some slight comfort in thinking of Devon at the mercy of Zoe and Nell.
    He would charm his guests, of course. Devon Kincaid could charm the birds down from their boughs.
    He could have, had he wished, charmed Mina out of her stays.
    He might, that very moment, be charming Zoe out of hers.
    Not in an open carriage. Not with Nell present to protest, and Nell would protest if Devon devoted so much effort to anyone else.
    Mina couldn’t imagine much effort would be required.
    It would not have been, in her case.
    Yet Devon had not expended even that little bit of effort, and Mina sat here brooding, and there was scant consolation in the knowledge she had brought this misery down on herself.
    The door abruptly opened. Startled, Grace dug her claws into Mina’s thigh. Romeo uttered a high pitched sneezing sound and scrambled to his feet.
    George Eames strode into the room. His coat was creased and his hair rumpled, as if he’d grasped great handfuls of it and tugged.
    Mina’s heart sank. The arrival of one’s solicitor in such a sorry state could not herald good news. “Mr. Eames! What has happened to you?” Romeo ambled forward, intrigued by the scent of the newcomer’s pomade.
     George sidestepped the goat and, without waiting for an invitation, dropped into a chair. “I was in the park with Lady Anne, engaged in a serious conversation, when your cousin walked up to us bold as brass. You realize, I hope, that she has maggots in her brain. She said I should make Lady Anne jealous. Jealous! Of her?”
    Was this jealousy Minafelt, regarding Zoe and Dev? She hoped she was above such petty stuff, and feared she was not. “Surely it cannot be so bad.”
    “Can it not? That pestilential pig-widgeon insinuated that Nell is my child.”
    “Surely Lady Anne does not believe—”
    “Who knows what Lady Anne believes?” George lowered his head into his hands, thereby thwarting Romeo, who was poised to nibble on his hair. “She is too well-mannered to speak her mind. One thing is certain: my hopes are all dashed.”
     There was a lot of that going around. Mina stroked Grace’s soft fur. “What did she say? Lady Anne, I mean, not Zoe.”
    George replied, with loathing, “When next I see your brass-faced bacon-witted cousin, I shall have several words to say to her!Lady Anne was shocked, but only said that she must think. And what she must think is that I am a pretty scoundrel. A complete knave.”
    Lady Anne sounded like a paragon, and also deadly dull. Mina did not air this opinion, but asserted vaguely that things would eventually come right. She didn’t believe her own words for a moment, not as regarded Mr. Eames, and not as regarded herself.
    Loversalls, alas, had a long acquaintance with matters not ending well. Romola leapt off the battlements; Odo drank a fatal dose of poison; Casimir visited the menagerie in the Tower and got eaten by a bear.
    On the other hand, Great-Great-Great-Great Uncle John fell into a fit of choking after eating fruit in the middle of a play at the Theater Royal, and was saved by a prostitute known as Orange Moll, who stuck her finger down his throat.
    Ironic, that Mina should realize