Page 104 of Duke of Wickedness

David risked alittlesarcasm in his tone as he gestured at himself. If Xander didn’t murder him right now, they would be family in very short order, so it was better to begin as he meant to go on.

Unless it got him killed.

“I was sleeping,” he said pointedly.

Godwin looked displeased, though David couldn’t tell if this was because he’d put forth a good point or a bad one.

“It’s half two in the afternoon,” he retorted.

Good sense intervened in time to stop David from saying,Your sister told me to get some rest, because it had not yet seemed to occur to Godwin to ask where, exactly, David had taken her when they’d left the ball the night before, and he didn’t want to give his future brother-by-marriage any reason to ask such a thing.

“I’ve been feeling unwell,” he said diplomatically instead. “Though I feel much improved this morning.”

He was very pleased to note that both of these things were true.

Godwin looked like he wanted to stay angry but was struggling to find a good reason to do so. He narrowed his eyes at David.

“Fine. Get dressed. We are going to sign the papers immediately.”

This was what David had been hoping to do with his morning—er, afternoon—anyway, so it was easy enough to agree. Besides, he might get to see Ariadne, which was the main thing he was interested in doing for, oh, the next thirty or so years.

“I would be happy to,” he said graciously. “Do you think I might have some privacy to get dressed for the day?”

Godwin looked like he wanted to argue, just to be difficult, but he stalked out, leaving David alone with his extremely nervous valet, who scurried in the moment the Duke of Godwin was gone.

Damn, David was going to have to give his entire staff a paid free day, wasn’t he?

He found, however, despite that inconvenience—not to mention his rude awakening—that he was in too good a mood to mind.Nor did he get particularly fussed about the stony silence he faced from Godwin as they journeyed to Oldhill House, the Godwin London residence.

Ariadne was worth it. She was more than worth it.

He would have suffered a great deal more in order to see the way Ariadne’s face lit up when he entered the house.

“David,” she said happily, turning to stride in his direction. Then, she paused, and her expression grew thunderously dark. “Xander,” she said mutinously.

“Don’t you ‘Xander’ me,” Godwin said.

“Don’tI—?” She made an outraged noise. David found that her temper was highly diverting when it wasn’t pointed at him. “Why did you drag my betrothed over here?”

David felt his shoulders loosen at the wordbetrothed. Good. He would have cleared things up with Ariadne—now that she’d convinced him of the wisdom of marrying her, he was bloody well going to do it, and he’d like to see anyone try to stop him—but it was very nice to be able to present a united front against her brother.

“Ah, yes,” Godwin said tersely. “About that. Why didn’t you tell me that Nightingale here asked you to marry him?”

Ariadne crossed her arms and got a very smug look on her face.

“He didn’t,” she told her brother arrogantly.

Oh, well, that was nice while it lasted, David thought. I guess I will just get murdered instead, after all.

But then Ariadne continued.

“Itoldhimthat we are to be married,” she went on. “I was the one who decided.”

This time, when Godwin looked over at David, he wore an expression that was not entirely hostile. David shrugged. It was essentially true, and he found that he didn’t mind a bit.

Godwin looked at Ariadne, then back at David, then at his sister again.

He let out a long, heavy sigh.