Page 22 of Provoked

“Infinitely,” Chalmers agreed. “And you, my lord? Will you ever exchange the pleasures of London for those of the country?”

“Actually, I am considering just that.”

“Really?”

“Yes, I’ve been looking for a property for some time. Kilbeigh will go to my older brother, of course.”

“What kind of property do you seek?” David asked.

Balfour turned his head to meet David’s curious gaze. “Something in the country. To begin with I was determined it should be small.” He gave a lazy smile. “A mere cottage, if you can believe it, Mr. Lauriston.”

David raised a brow. “I doubt my idea of a cottage is the same as yours, my lord.”

Balfour’s dark eyes twinkled and the corner of his mouth lifted, that dimple of his flashing for the first time this evening.

“Perhaps not,” he conceded. “I was originally thinking of a hunting lodge. Somewhere I could put up a few guests with decent fishing.”

“Hardly a cottage,” David observed, smiling to take the sting out of the comment.

“True. In any event, as it happens, I’ve taken a liking for a property in Perthshire that’s rather larger than a lodge and most impractical. It’s far too big for me and was left in a muddle by the last owner, whose executors have been trying to get rid of it for more than a twelvemonth.”

Chalmers chuckled. “It sounds like a bad bargain, my lord. Stay away, that’s my advice.”

“What do you like about it?” David asked.

The other corner of Balfour’s mouth lifted. He had beautifully carved lips for a man, the upper bow very precisely symmetrical, the philtrum above a deep, sensual groove. When he smiled, as he was doing now, that appealing little pleat of flesh flattened and stretched, and that unexpected dimple appeared in his left cheek. David blinked and looked down at the tablecloth.

“The views are exquisite,” Balfour said. “Very romantic.”

Chalmers laughed outright then. “Romantic views? Oh beware! Beware! Many a bad bargain has been made over a romantic view. Marriages have crumbled and fortunes been lost. Take my word for it. Stay away.”

“I’m sure you’re right,” Balfour replied with a chuckle. “I’ll try to rein in my poetic soul.”

“You do that,” Chalmers said. “In the meantime, have another whisky. There’s enough poetry in this bottle for any man’s soul.”

It was only then, as Chalmers refilled their glasses, that David realised he’d drunk the last dram without even noticing.

“It’s a good whisky,” Balfour agreed, holding his glass up to the candlelight.

“You like whisky?” Chalmers asked.

“Yes, though I prefer French brandy generally,” he replied, adding with a grin, “smuggled, of course.”

“They don’t look dissimilar in the glass. Until you taste them,” Chalmers observed.

“And yet they have such different ingredients,” Balfour said.

“The colour doesn’t come from the ingredients,” David interjected quietly. “It comes from the wood barrels the spirit’s stored in.”

“Goodness me, Mr. Lauriston,” Balfour drawled. “What a thing to know! You are not just a pretty face, are you?”

David’s cheeks heated again. Christ, he wished he could control his blushes.

“Oh, our Mr. Lauriston is bright, all right,” Chalmers said, chuckling. “I’m fortunate enough to get more briefs than I can manage alone, so I employ junior advocates to work with me. But they have to be the very best, you see. Not the ten-a-penny ones with dull minds and aristocratic families. I don’t need more influence with the judges—I’ve got that in spades already. No, I want a man withintellect. Like this young man.”

Balfour listened to Chalmers’s soliloquy with fascination. “You rate him highly.”

“I do indeed,” Chalmers replied jovially. The whisky was making him fulsome in his praise. He reached for the bottle to pour himself another.