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“Do you think so?” she asked delightedly.
Andrew gave her a look of pure disbelief. “That wasn’t a compliment, Billie.”
Billie looked at George.
“I have no idea what it was,” he admitted.
Billie just chuckled, then jerked her head toward Andrew. “I’m calling him out.”
George knew better – oh, he definitely knew better – but he couldn’t stop himself from turning the rest of the way around to gape at her.
“You’re calling me out?” Andrew repeated.
“Mallets at dawn,” she said with flair. Then she shrugged. “Or this afternoon. I’d rather avoid getting up early, wouldn’t you?”
Andrew raised one brow. “You’d challenge a one-armed man to a game of Pall Mall?”
“I’d challenge you.”
He leaned in, blue eyes glittering. “I’ll still beat you, you know.”
“George!” Billie yelled.
Damn it. He’d almost escaped. “Yes?” he murmured, poking his head back through the doorway.
“We need you.”
“No you don’t. You need a nanny. You can barely walk.”
“I can walk perfectly well.” She limped a few steps. “See? I can’t even feel it.”
George looked at Andrew, not that he expected him to exhibit anything remotely approaching sense.
“I have a broken arm,” Andrew said, which George supposed was meant to serve as an explanation. Or an excuse.
“You’re idiots. The both of you.”
“Idiots who need more players,” Billie said. “It doesn’t work with only two.”
Technically that was true. The Pall Mall set was meant to be played with six, although anything over three would do in a pinch. But George had played this scene before; the rest of them were bit players to Andrew and Billie’s tragic, vicious leads. For the two of them, the game was less about winning than it was making sure the other didn’t. George was expected merely to move his ball along in their fray.
“You still don’t have enough players,” George said.
“Georgiana!” Billie yelled.
“Georgiana?” Andrew echoed. “You know your mother doesn’t let her play.”
“For the love of heaven, she hasn’t been ill for years. It’s time we stopped coddling her.”
Georgiana came skidding around the corner. “Stop bellowing, Billie. You’re going to give Mama a palpitation, and then I’ll have to be the one to deal with her.”
“We’re playing Pall Mall,” Billie told her.
“Oh. That’s nice. I’ll —” Georgiana’s words tumbled to a halt, and her blue eyes went wide. “Wait, I get to play, too?”
“Of course,” Billie said, almost dismissively. “You’re a Bridgerton.”
“Oh, brilliant!” Georgiana practically leapt into the air. “Can I be orange? No, green. I wish to be green.”
“Anything you want,” Andrew said.
Georgiana turned to George. “Are you playing, as well?”
“I suppose I must.”
“Don’t sound so resigned,” Billie said. “You’ll have a splendid time of it. You know you will.”
“We still need more players,” Andrew said.
“Perhaps Sir Reggie?” Georgiana asked.
“No!” came George’s instant reply.
Three heads swiveled in his direction.
In retrospect, he might have been a bit forceful in his objection.
“He doesn’t strike me as the sort of gentleman to enjoy such a rough and tumble game,” George said with a haphazard shrug. He glanced down at his fingernails since he couldn’t possibly look anyone in the eye when he said, “His teeth, you know.”
“His teeth?” Billie echoed.
George didn’t need to see her face to know that she was staring at him as if she were afraid he’d lost his mind.
“I suppose he does have a very elegant smile,” Billie said, apparently prepared to concede the point. “And I suppose we did knock out one of Edward’s teeth that one summer.” She looked over at Andrew. “Do you remember? I think he was six.”
“Precisely,” George said, although in truth he did not recollect the incident. It must have been a milk tooth; Edward was no Sir Reginald McVie, but as far as George knew, his brother’s smile was fully populated.
“We can’t ask Mary,” Billie went on. “She spent the entire morning hunched over a chamber pot.”
“I really didn’t need to know that,” Andrew said.
Billie ignored him. “And besides, Felix would never permit it.”
“Then ask Felix,” George suggested.
“That would be unfair to Mary.”
Andrew rolled his eyes. “Who cares?”
Billie crossed her arms. “If she can’t play, he shouldn’t, either.”
“Lady Frederica went to the village with her mother and cousin,” Georgiana said. “But I saw Lady Alexandra in the drawing room. She didn’t seem to be doing anything important.”
George was not keen to spend the afternoon listening to more tales of Lord Northwick, but after his vehement refusal of Sir Reginald, he did not think he could reasonably lodge another objection. “Lady Alexandra would make a fine addition to the game,” he said diplomatically. “Provided, of course, that she wishes to play.”
“Oh, she’ll play,” Billie said ominously.
Georgiana looked perplexed.