“And congratulations on getting Sylvia to pursue a safer occupation,” Nick added. “Cheese-making is infinitely preferable to smuggling.” He quashed any thoughts that he was being hypocritical.
Tony shook his head. “I didn’t get her to do anything she didn’t already want to do.” He looked over his shoulder, sending a besotted smile toward his bride. “In fact, she was a little miffed that I came up with the cheese idea first, when she’d been searching for an alternative occupation for the villagers long before I stumbled into their midst.”
Nick harrumphed and shifted his focus to Alistair. “Are you going to persuade Charlie to stop breaking into hotel rooms and scampering about on roofs?”
Alistair looked taken aback. “Why would I do that? I do my share of clambering about on roofs.”
“You’re one to take issue,” Tony interjected. “You’ve certainly done your share of sneaking in and out of hotel rooms. And bedchambers.”
“But no one was shooting at me. Worst I risked was being called out for a duel at dawn.”
Alistair shook his head. “There’s hardly any risk of someone shooting an astronomer with his telescope up on a roof.”
“Spies, however, get shot all too frequently,” Nick countered, lowering his voice. “She’s already been shot once. Next time could be worse.”
Tony leaned in close, avidly following the conversation.
“Yes, I know,” Alistair said tersely. “I was there. I was the one who stitched her up, if you recall.”
“I didn’t think there would be much call for spies these days,” Tony said quietly. He glanced around to see if anyone was eavesdropping on their conversation. “But your wife is one?”
“You’d be surprised at the need.” Alistair sent a fond smile toward Charlotte, who waggled her fingers in a wave at him in return, still deep in conversation with Sylvia.
Alistair turned back to Nick. “I would never ask her to stop being the woman with whom I fell in love.” He gave another longing look at his wife. “I do, however, insist on going with her most of the time.”
Lord and Lady Sinclair strolled back to the food tent just then. Sinclair seated Jo at the table with Charlotte and Sylvia and a plate loaded with desserts from the apple table, before he joined Nick and the other men.
“She can’t get enough fruit these days,” Sinclair said with a proud grin. “Sends me down to the pantry in the middle of the night. Might have to start keeping a basket of apples beside the bed.”
“At least she isn’t involved in dangerous activities,” Nick groused.
Sinclair froze in the act of pulling his chair up to the table, and exchanged glances with Tony.
Tony let out a bark of laughter.
“What?” Nick snapped, looking between the two brothers.
Tony cleared his throat. “It depends on if you consider dressing as a man and passing herself off as ‘Mr. Quincy’ for five years to be dangerous.”
Nick gaped at Sinclair, then glanced over at Lady Sinclair, and back to the earl.
“In all fairness, she never referred to herself as Joseph or Mister,” Sinclair said. “She just signed her name with the initial J, dressed the part, and let people make their own assumptions.” He leaned back in his chair, his right leg stretched out, hands folded across his flat stomach.
Nick finally noticed that while Lady Sinclair’s auburn hair was fashionably styled, it was not pinned up. Instead it hung down loose, so short it barely brushed her shoulders.
“She was living as a man? Until you two married?” Nick had more questions. But the answers were none of his business.
Sinclair nodded. “Quincy is the best damn secretary I’ve ever had.”
Nick groaned and buried his face in his folded arms on the table.
“So, Nick…” Tony drawled, adding an extra syllable to his name. “What adventures have you been up to since we saw you last?”
Oh, hell. Nick sat up and waved over the nearest footman, uncaring whose livery the man wore. “Bring me a bottle of rum, please.” He gave the location in the cellar where he stored the good stuff.
“Yes, m’lord.”
Sinclair, Tony, and Alistair scooted their chairs closer to the table and leaned in. “This ought to be good,” Alistair said.
