Page 88 of The Lady is Trouble

She laughed, and he felt the pinch. Of wonder. Of ecstasy. Of disbelief.Hemade her happy. Amazingly, Julian Alexander made Piper Scott happy. This incredible, vibrant, generous woman. Almost daily, he wondered what he had done to deserve her.

“Are you worried about Ashcroft? Is that it?”

Julian let loose a sound falling somewhere between a snort and a sneer. “Come again?”

“It was in this morning’s broadsheet. An opera singer this time. A slight skirmish, no flames whipping through Covent Garden or anything like that. I have to say, his control is remarkable, which it should be after years of diligent effort.”

“Except when it’s not. Remember the debacle at the Epsom Derby last year?”

“He’s your friend. An essential part of the League’s success. He can’t continue like this, one woman after another. You could—”

“Love’s going to sneak up and bite him on the ass just like it does the rest of us. We’re going to have to ride his idiocy out, I fear. Someday, someone will mean enough to make him change his mind. And his ways. Make him understand he can share his gift, lighten the load.”

“It’s possible to have love and a mystical talent. We’re proof of that.” She sighed a heated breath against his neck. “I’ve told him this a thousand times. I only wish he believed me.”

Julian wedged his shoulder against the wall and counted to twenty. He didn’t want to seem too eager to ask the question. Broach the topic currently top of mind, the reason his mood was tinted as dark as the night at his back. “Anyone else in this family featured in the scandal sheets lately?”

“Oh,Julian.”

He tipped his head back and closed his eyes. What was the use of artificiality when she knew him as well as she did? “We’re losing Finn.” He would have taken the words back—or never spoken them at all—if he knew they’d sound like shards of glass when they spilled out. Most days, he viewed Lucien and Finn with the same parental lens, which made Finn, a determined, confounding young man of twenty-three, viciously displeased. “The boy we couldn’t save damaged him in a way I didn’t expect. A crushing blow, when we can’t possibly protect everyone. He’s aimless, unable to recover. It’s like he’s cut the rope connecting us and set himself adrift. Living above that gaming hell I only bought as an investment, never thinking he would be involved. A graduate of Oxford managing a gambling establishment? Is this his path?”

“I think he’s trying tofindhis path. That’s the point of rebellion. Learning from one’s mistakes.”

“First-rate insight from a master. What about that drunken scuffle with the Earl of Sandford fiveblocksfrom the rookery hellhole where he was born? Why would he want to step foot in that neighborhood again after we risked our very lives to get him out of it?”

Piper’s fingers brushed his cheek and snaked into his hair. Her lips found his, her love and understanding flowing through him, giving him courage when he had little. “He’ll be home next month, Jules. Simon’s birthday is the thirteenth. Finn would never miss that.”

“You’ll talk to him? Because I’ll get mad if I do.”

Piper snuggled against him with one of those relaxed purrs that made the hairs on his nape stand on end. “I’ll talk to him. Make him see a graduate of Oxford need not manage a gaming hell.”

“Because I know what it’s like to feel unworthy of happiness. So bewildered in this strange world we find ourselves thrust into. I don’t want Finn to wait as long as I did to embrace love. A strong partner will help him navigate the chaos, find who he’s meant to become.”

“He’s thought to be the most handsome man in England, Jules. Love isplentiful. He breaks hearts by doing nothing more than strolling down the street.”

Julian smacked his head against the windowpane. “That doesn’t make me feel better, Yank. What if he gets the pox?”

Smothering laughter Julian wouldn’t appreciate, Piper lifted her nightdress to her shoulders and with a suggestive shimmy, let it drift to the floor. Then she climbed atop him as his breath left his body in a whoosh. “If you promise not to wake the babe, I have an interesting proposal, Viscount Beauchamp. A way to take your mind off your troubles.”

A gorgeous, enthusiastic viscountess, naked and astride him?

He would promise anything.

~ END ~