Then he became aware of a faint shuffling sound, which he suspected was his friends gathering around him, and the reassuring sound of a bung being plucked from a decanter.
Delacorte cleared his throat. “I was surprised you were able to get an entire handful of her derriere,” he said gravely. “I always imagined she was made of marble.”
Hugh slowly levered up his head and stared at him in rank amazement.
“Tink tink.”Delacorte tapped the air with his forefinger. Illustrating, presumably, the sound a marble derriere would make. Interpreting the incredulous stares as need for clarification.
“Some circumstances are better served by quiet commiseration, Delacorte,” said Captain Hardy, who thought every circumstance could be improved if only everyone just stopped talking.
“Oh, yes, of course, I take your point.” Delacorte lowered his voice to just a notch above hushed, bent until his limpid blue eyes were level with Hugh’s, and tenderly placed a hand on his shoulder. “She is terrifying and I am truly sorry for you, my friend. But I sincerely wish you every happiness.”
Then he stood back and clasped his hands, eyebrows locked in a worried position.
Hugh continued to stare at him. But Delacorte said every word of what he meant. There were few enough men in the world like that.
“Thank you,” Hugh managed finally, with great irony. His voice was a dry croak. He supposed itwas a good thing that somewhere in the smoke and wreckage of his life, his sense of humor was still alive.
“Drink this.” Hardy thrust a glass at him.
Hugh bolted it. Then coughed.
It was whiskey.
It burned a path down his gullet and he gasped, and suddenly he felt clearer but he didn’t know if that was better.
“I don’t suppose you’re in love?” Bolt mused. As though this predicament he was in—not so much a predicament as a cataclysmic event reshaping the landscape of his life, like an earthquake—was a problem that could be solved once Bolt had enough information.
“I’m not entirely certain we evenlikeeach other. But she’s...”
They waited.
“She’s...”
They leaned forward.
“We’ve naught in common except...”
Whiskey was truth serum, damn it.
“Ah, yes,” Bolt said. “That ‘except’ will get you every time. But here’s a hint: don’t say that to her father.”
Hugh glared balefully at Lucien.
“I’ve never been so grateful to not be handsome,” Delacorte mused. “Resisting all that temptation to become a rogue must be exhausting.”
“I’M NOT A ROGUE.”
Was he?
“Of course not,” Delacorte humored him soothingly, shooting an “if you say so” sidelong glance at Lucien and Captain Hardy.
Hugh gulped a few breaths.
“Bolt here was the one with a Moroccan mistress. And wasn’t there a soprano who threw a vase at your head? I think those are in theHow to Be a Roguehandbook.”
“Are you implying I might be a rogue? I’m an upright, somber married man now and will be for the rest of my life.” Bolt paused theatrically. “As you soon will be, too. For the rest... of... your... life.”
“You’re lucky I don’t have a vase to hand right now, Bolt.”
