Georgina grinned, deciding she wouldn’t warn her brothers that there was a matchmaker in the room, but she did point out, “They’re not going to be here that long, Regan.”
“Bloody hell, would you listen to that?” Anthony remarked in passing to Jason. “She’s picked up his bad habits.”
“What bad habits?” Georgina demanded of James’s brothers, ready to defend her husband.
But they hadn’t stopped, and Regina, with a giggle, told her. “My name. They’ll never agree on what to call me. But it’s not nearly so bad anymore. They used to almost come to blows over it.”
Georgina rolled her eyes and caught James’s long-suffering expression across the room where Thomas and Boyd were speaking to him. She smiled. Not one derogatory word had he said to four of her brothers. Warren, however, he wasn’t getting anywhere near.
Nor was Warren being very sociable with anyone. The others had surprised her though, particularly Clinton, by how well they were getting along with the hated English. And Mac would be stopping by later, she’d been told. She’d have to remember to introduce him to Nettie MacDonald. Regina wasn’t the only one who could play matchmaker.
Still later, Anthony and James stood alone, each watching their respective wives as they spoke. “Shall we betroth them?”
James choked on the sip of brandy he’d just taken, since the subject they’d been discussing was their upcoming fatherhood. “They’re not even born yet, you ass.”
“So?”
“So they could end up the same gender.”
A degree of visible disappointment accompanied a sigh from Anthony. “I suppose.”
“Besides, they’d be first cousins.”
“So?” again.
“That’s not at all the thing these days.”
“Well, how the bloody hell should I know?”
“I agree,” Nicholas said, coming up behind them. “You don’t know much.” And to James, “Nice family you’ve acquired there.”
“Youwouldthink so.”
Nicholas smiled. “That chap Warren don’t like you very much. He’s been looking daggers at you all evening.”
James said to Anthony, “Would you like the honors, or do I get the pleasure?”
Nicholas sobered, understanding perfectly that they were talking about trouncing him. “You wouldn’t dare. You’d have both your brothers on your heads, not to mention my wife.”
“I do believe, dear boy, it would be worth it,” James told him, then smiled as Nicholas wisely took himself off again.
Anthony was chuckling. “The lad does like to press his luck, don’t he?”
“I’m learning to tolerate him,” James conceded, then, “Bloody hell, I’m learning to tolerate a lot.”
Anthony laughed at that, following James’s glance to Warren Anderson. “Old Nick was right. That chap really don’t like you a’tall.”
“The feeling is entirely mutual, I do assure you.”
“Think you’ll have trouble with him?”
“Not at all. We’ll have a whole bloody ocean between us very shortly, thank God.”
“The fellow was just protecting his sister, old boy,” Anthony pointed out. “Same as you or I would have done for Melissa.”
“Are you trying to deny me the pleasure of hating him, when he’s so very hatable?”
“Wouldn’t dream of it,” Anthony said, then waited until James took another sip of his drink before adding, “By the by, James, did I ever tell you I love you?”
