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“A bit like Fleur, I suppose.” His brow came together as he remembered. “Although her eyes were green. Fleur’s are more hazel—a mix of our parents’.”
“Your father had brown eyes, then?”
Richard nodded, tipping back in his chair.
“I wonder what color eyes our children will have.”
Richard’s chair came down with a thunk, and he spewed tea all over the table. “Sorry,” he muttered. “Lost my balance.”
Iris looked down at her plate, spotted a bit of tea on her toast, and decided she was done with breakfast, anyway. What a strange reaction, though. Surely Richard wanted children? Every man did. Or at least every man who owned land.
“Is Maycliffe entailed?” she wondered.
“Why do you ask?”
“Isn’t it the sort of thing I ought to know?”
“It is not. Entailed, that is. But yes, something you ought to know,” he acknowledged.
Iris found herself a new teacup and poured some more. She wasn’t really thirsty, but she found herself strangely loath to release him from this conversation. “Your parents must have been quite relieved that their firstborn was a boy,” she remarked. “They would not want the property to be separated from the title.”
“I confess I never discussed it with them.”
“No, I imagine not.” She added a bit of milk to her tea, stirred, and took a sip. “What happens to the title if you die without children?”
One of his brows rose. “Are you plotting my demise?”
She gave him a bit of a look. “It seems like another sort of thing I ought to know, don’t you think?”
He waved a hand dismissively. “Distant cousin. I think he lives in Somerset.”
“You think?” How could he not know?
“I’ve never met him,” Richard said with a shrug. “You have to go back to our great-great-grandfather to locate a common ancestor.”
Iris supposed he had a point. She might know a prodigious amount about her overabundance of cousins, but they were first cousins. She wasn’t sure she could locate any of her more distant relations on a map.
“You have nothing to worry about,” Richard said. “If something were to happen to me, you will be well provided for. I made sure of that in the marriage settlement.”
“I know,” Iris said. “I read it.”
“You did?”
“Shouldn’t I?”
“Most women don’t.”
“How would you know?”
Suddenly, he grinned. “Are we having an argument?”
Suddenly, his grin turned her insides to mush. “I’m not.”
He chuckled. “That’s a relief, I must say. I should hate to think we were having an argument, and I missed it.”
“Oh, I don’t think there’s a chance of that.”
He leaned forward, tilting his head in question.
“I don’t raise my voice often . . .” Iris murmured.
“But when you do, it’s a sight to behold?”
She smiled her acknowledgment.
“Why do I have the impression that Daisy is the most frequent recipient of your temper?”
She made a motion with her index finger as if to say—wrong! “That would be incorrect.”
“Do tell.”
“Daisy is . . .” She sighed. “Daisy is Daisy. I don’t know how else to describe her. I’ve long thought one of us must have been switched at birth.”
“Be careful what you wish for,” Richard warned with a smile. “Daisy is the one who looks just like your mother.”
Iris felt herself smiling in return. “She does, doesn’t she? I favor my father’s side of the family. I’m told I have my great-grandmother’s coloring. Funny how many generations it managed to skip before finding me.”
Richard nodded, then said, “I still want to know who provokes your temper, if not Daisy.”
“Oh, I didn’t say that she doesn’t provoke my temper. She does. All the time. But it’s rarely something worth getting riled up about in the end. Arguments with Daisy are generally petty things, all snappish and snide.”
“Who makes you angry, then?” he asked softly. “Who can make you so furious that you’d jump out of your skin if you were able?”
You, she almost said.
Except that he hadn’t done. Not really. He’d vexed her, and he’d hurt her feelings, but he’d never reduced her to the sort of rage he was describing.
And yet, somehow she knew he could.
He would.
“Sarah,” Iris said firmly, putting a halt to her dangerous thoughts.
“Your cousin?”
She nodded. “I once had a row with her . . .”
His eyes lit with delight, and he leaned forward, resting his elbows on the table and his chin in his hands. “I must have every detail.”
Iris laughed. “No, you don’t.”
“Oh, I’m quite sure I do.”
“I can’t believe that women are said to be the bigger gossips.”
“This isn’t gossip,” he protested. “This is my wishing to better understand my bride.”
“Oh, if that’s the case . . .” She chuckled again. “Very well, it was about the musicale. Honestly, I don’t think you would understand. I don’t think anyone outside my family would.”
“Try me.”
Iris sighed, wondering how she could possibly explain. Richard was always so confident, so sure of himself. He couldn’t possibly know how it felt to get up on a stage and make an utter fool of himself, all the while knowing that there was absolutely nothing he could do to stop it.