Page 77 of What a Highlander’s Got to Do

The picnic? He tried not to scowl. “Please address it to my mother.” She was in charge of the bloody picnic. This whole damn thing had been her idea.

Mrs. Billings wrung her hands. “Yes, my lord. I asked her. She, ah, told me to ask you.”

It took all his fortitude not to snarl in annoyance. He had things to do, here in the music room. The last thing he wanted to do was tromp around outside and direct the servants on an event he hadn’t wanted to attend in the first place.

But—since his mother had apparently abandoned her role as hostess, and his father was God-knew-where with the other men—it fell to him. So with one last glower at his uncles and his erstwhile friends, he followed the housekeeper from the room.

What then transpired was an hour of sheer exasperation as he oversaw the layout of the picnic. Tables here. Croquet there. Seats beneath the shade trees for the older guests. For the men, some archery, and punting on the lake for the ladies.

By the time he was finished and returned to the music room, everyone was gone.

He stormed to the parlor to find his mother and her friends enjoying a rollicking conversation—but of Isobel, there was no sign.

“Edward, dear.” His mother turned up her cheek for a kiss, which he bestowed.

“May I speak with you for a moment?”

She blinked at him with a too-innocent expression on her face. “Of course.”

All heads turned toward them, like expectant baby birds.

“In private.”

A pout. “Oh. Yes. Of course. Excuse me, ladies.” She stood, smoothed out her skirts, and followed him to the door. She tipped up her chin and looked at him down her nose, as she had his entire life when she knew he was about to be quarrelsome—even since he’d grown far taller than she. “Yes?”

“What was that all about?”

“That? Whatever can you mean?”

“Mrs. Billings said you told her to have me arrange the picnic.”

“Oh. That.”

“It took better than an hour. And as the lady of the house, you should have done it.”

“But I was visiting with my friends.”

“As was I.”

“Besides which,” she said, as though he hadn’t spoken, “it’s time for you to learn these things.”

These things? “What things? How to set a table?”

“Well, yes, but in the greater sense, it’s time for you to learn to be a good host. You’ll be duke one day, and since it’s clear you have no intention of marrying, you willna have a duchess to make all these arrangements for you.”

He stared at her for a moment. Ye gods. Had that just been another underhanded swipe about his bachelorhood? “Perhaps not,” he said. “But I will have servants. And they will capable enough that I won’t need to attend them every moment.”

She laughed, his mother. Threw back her head and laughed. Then she patted him on the cheek. “You are so naive. It’s adorable.”

He bristled. He was hardly naive.

She gave him no time to respond to such insanity. “I do hope you’ve done a good job, because we’re all famished. Come, ladies,” she warbled to the room. “Let’s go enjoy the picnic dear Edward has arranged.”

What could he do but follow them out?

It was exceedingly irritating to see that everyone else was already on the lawn. Tully, Penny, and William were skipping rocks in the lake. His uncles, save Malcolm, were playing some kind of croquet that apparently required them to hit each other. For his part, Malcolm stood beneath one of the larger shade trees, surrounded by the young ladies—Elizabeth Pennington, Penny’s younger sister, Sorcha, Ellie, Catriona, and Isobel—no doubt filling their heads with all manner of depredation.

This was, of course, where the mothers headed, like bees who’d noticed a bear about to ravage their carefully constructed hives.