“To some extent.” He laid his knife and fork on the empty plate. “I do try to behave myself around young ladies as much as possible, and I haven’t written much of anything other than my signature since that note. I have my solicitor do it.”
Miss Quick huffed a playful laugh. “Self-imposed punishment for yourself? I find that highly amusing.”
“Maybe a measure of atonement as well, in order to spare others my regrettable ways. I suppose there would never be enough recompense for the writers of the scandal sheets.”
“Nor perhaps the embarrassed belles who were left with only tainted reputations and the realization that no one was admiring them after all.”
Hawk rubbed his thumb on the bottom of his wineglass. He’d come to expect that she wouldn’t temper her words to spare him any ridicule or shame for what he’d already admitted was a mistake.
“It wasn’t meant to be cruel to the young ladies. It wasn’t even meant as a joke. It was a wager among friends that no one else was to ever know about. Our folly was that we were only thinking of ourselves and our own desire to win the wager.”
“And now someone may want to endanger your sister’s reputation in like kind in order to take revenge upon you for endangering the reputations of other young ladies.”
“Though you might live far from the streets of London, I see you are up on the latest gossip.”
“Mr. Huddleston always picks up copies of the all the latest newssheets when he’s in Grimsfield each week. And I always readMiss Honora Truth’s Weekly Scandal Sheet.”
“You and the rest of the world,” he grumbled.
“She’s entertaining with her words. How much of the gossip she writes is true?” Miss Quick asked.
Probably far more than he was willing to admit.
“I don’t know. That’s the problem and why I make no apologies for what I’m doing to spare my sister. The samegossip that swirled around the Duke of Griffin’s sisters last year is surfacing again now that Adele is making her debut. She could be in danger from someone wanting to ruin her chance at making a good match or simply playing her for a fool in the hope of breaking her heart just to get even with me for the secret admirer letters. As I told you, if she is already betrothed, no one will have reason to pursue her, and thereby I will keep her from being set upon by mischief-makers.”
“And in order to keep this retaliation from happening, you want to completely alter my brother’s life to save your sister because of something you did.”
She wasn’t teasing him when she said she liked to go straight to the heart of a matter. She knew how to put everything on the line. Hawk leaned forward, closer to her, but not in a threatening way, and said, “Because he would be a good match for Adele and she for him. Remember, I know them both.”
Leaning back in her chair, she sipped her wine and then asked, “Why did you and your friends decide to wager on something as delicate as a young lady’s heart?”
“You do like to thrust the knife in deep, Miss Quick.”
“I am only stating the truth, am I not? I have nothing to lose by being honest with you. I am not seeking your favor or trying to impress you.”
“Perhaps I wish you were. However, you can’t make sense of what we did because you couldn’t possibly understand the thoughts of a young man and his ego, especially one whose mind was befuddled by drink and arrogance and no fear whatsoever.”
“That’s probably true.”
“We now know we shouldn’t have done it—for a number of reasons, including the very real fact that not a oneof us thought about our sisters and that they would grow up to be young ladies one day.”
“That must have been sobering when you finally did.”
Hawk grimaced. “It was never our intention to cause anyone harm. It was supposed to just be a simple wager among friends.”
“So money was the reason you decided to send those letters to the young ladies?”
“Not the money. The winning. But there were several things that led to our downfall concerning that event.”
“Share a few of them with me.”
Share?
That wasn’t a word he was used to hearing, and he certainly wasn’t used to doing it. Furthermore, he’d never talked about that time almost ten years ago with anyone other than the other two men involved, Rath and Griffin, until Miss Quick. How had she managed to do so effortlessly what no one else had done?
Hawk took a sip of the wine and watched the candlelight play on her face. She looked even more beautiful than when he’d first entered the room. She looked comfortable, too, and that was probably the reason he was opening up to her and even discussing the wager.
Without further thought about why, he said, “The thing that started it all was a book that had just been published titledA Proper Gentleman’s Guide to Wooing the Perfect Lady.”
