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"Some of us have responsibilities—"
"Oh, don't you dare lecture me about responsibility, Edward Grosvenor. I know exactly who you are." She paused, and when she spoke again, her voice had softened. "I also know you've been miserable lately."
That made me turn. "I beg your pardon?"
"You've been impossible to be around for months. Snapping at Mother, working until all hours, avoiding every social event I invite you to. The only time I've seen you even remotely human was..." She trailed off, a calculating look entering her eyes.
"Was what?"
"Nothing. Just show Lili around London, please? For me?"
I was opening my mouth to refuse again when my phone rang. James's name lit up the screen, and I grabbed it like a lifeline.
"I need to take this."
"Of course you do." Daphne flopped back in her chair with a dramatic sigh. "But we're not done here."
"Atwood," I answered, already dreading whatever social obligation he was about to thrust upon me.
"Edward, my friend. I was sitting at Claridge's being thoroughly charmed by a certain sister of yours, who's somehow convinced me that you're having an emotional crisis that requires my immediate intervention." James's laugh carried through the phone. "Something about American complications and your desperate need for a wingman?"
I could practically hear James's grin through the phone. "What kind of crisis?"
"The kind that involves your sister insisting I convince you to play tour guide to her best friend. Apparently, she's recruited an accomplice."
"Bloody hell."
"Indeed. I should be there in ten. Try not to flee the estate before I arrive."
He hung up, leaving me staring at the phone in disbelief. I turned back to find Daphne watching me with poorly concealed satisfaction. "You called James."
"I merely suggested he might enjoy meeting Lili. I had no idea he'd drive all the way out here." Her expression was thepicture of innocence, if innocence typically looked like a cat with feathers in its mouth.
"You orchestrated this entire thing."
"I created an opportunity. There's a difference."
Before I could come up with a solution, voices carried through the open window.
James's distinctive laugh mixed with a female voice—Lili's voice—and the sound hit me like a physical blow.
"They're here," Daphne said unnecessarily, already moving toward the door. "And James works terribly fast, doesn't he?"
I followed her, drawn by morbid curiosity and the inexplicable need to see how Lili was reacting to my best friend's considerable charm. We stepped onto the terrace to find James in full performance mode, regaling Lili with some elaborate story that involved sweeping gestures and what was undoubtedly complete fiction.
"—and that's how I ended up representing a circus elephant in a custody battle," James concluded, his hazel eyes twinkling with mischief.
Lili's laugh rang out, bright and genuine. "You did not represent an elephant."
"I absolutely did. Ask Edward—he was there."
All eyes turned to me. Lili's smile faltered slightly when our gazes met, her cheeks flushing that telltale pink. James noticed, of course. James noticed everything.
"Actually," I said, recovering my composure, "that particular story involves a property dispute and a very angry neighbor who objected to midnight trumpet practice. No elephants."
"You're no fun," James said, but his attention had shifted between Lili and me with the focused intensity of a predator sensing weakness.
"James, this is Lili," Daphne stepped in smoothly. "Lili, James Atwood. Edward's partner-in-crime at the firm and a notorious storyteller."