Total pages in book: 84
Estimated words: 78100 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 391(@200wpm)___ 312(@250wpm)___ 260(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 78100 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 391(@200wpm)___ 312(@250wpm)___ 260(@300wpm)
“Your valet cleaned up the blood before we tumbled you into bed. You weren’t a pretty sight, Georgie. Lucky that one of our mutual friends alerted me to your drunken escapades before someone sank a knife in you.”
“Was I that bad?”
“A bit worse than usual, yes. Drink your water like a good boy.”
Marlow forced the liquid down, having suffered enough hangovers to know his best cure. “Rosalind wants to marry me,” he told August when he’d finished half the glass.
“We all know that.”
“I asked to marry her.” His words sounded thick. He wondered if his lips were bruised. “But her parents said no.”
August’s brows rose. “You asked them?”
“She told me to. I knew they’d say no. Stupid.”
“What is it about these Lockridge girls?” his friend said after a moment, then chuckled ruefully. “They married off Felicity before I even had a chance to ask for her.”
“They hate me. Despise me. I’m not good enough.”
“They love you, Marlow. Just not enough to let you marry Rosalind. You’re a hellraiser and she’s an angel. You wouldn’t suit.”
“Curse you. What do you know about it?” He rubbed the persistent ache in his forehead. “It doesn’t matter now. We can be miserable together,” he said as August refilled his glass.
“I’ll tell you from experience, being miserable gets you nowhere. You’d be better off avoiding drink for a while and getting on with your life.”
“How? Can’t go to Pearl’s,” he groused. “She threw me out. Told me not to come back.”
August’s dark brows rose a second time, even higher. “God’s blood, Marl, what did you do?”
“Spanked the bloody hell out of a girl who looked like Rosalind. She didn’t enjoy it.”
“Ah. Did you enjoy it?”
“No.”
“Feel better afterward?”
“Not at all.” He touched his eye again. Now that his head had stopped pounding so hard, he could perceive the tenderness there. “I look like hell, don’t I?”
August’s lips pursed. “You may want to stay in a while to avoid frightening the ladies. They’re accustomed to you looking handsome, not monstrous.”
Monstrous. He felt monstrous. Ashamed. He’d not be able to face the Duke and Duchess of Lockridge for months, perhaps years. God knew how many of his contemporaries had seen him on his drunken, fighting rampage last night. And Rosalind…
Rosalind.
He’d not be able to face her either. He’d have to stand aside all season and watch others court her. At some point he’d probably be expected, as a family friend, to attend her wedding to that respectable dull stick Lord Brittingham.
“I can’t stand being here,” he said, outlining his sore, swollen eye. “I’ve got to go.”
“We could go to Bath.” August shrugged. “The season’s near to starting but I’m not of a mind to swan around tea parties and balls. Or we could go to the country, to Oxfordshire. You could set up at Maitland Glen.”
Maitland Glen, a small, airy property belonging to his mother. The Glen would be an excellent place to hide away if it wasn’t so near the other families’ manors, places where he and Rosalind had interacted together through the years.
“No, I have to go somewhere farther. Somewhere that’s not England.”
“Another grand tour? Sounds fun, but I couldn’t go with you. I’ve got my seat in the House of Lords now, and I’ve promised my mother to help with her charities this summer.”
A grand tour to the Continent? That was something green, young gentlemen did. He was nearly thirty years old. As he sat stewing, aching, needing to do something desperate and big, the idea came to him. “India.”
“What?”
He looked at August, the thought of it already whirling to a conceivable plan. “I could go to India. Explore the cities, even visit the villages where my mother grew up.” His mother rarely spoke of India but he knew she’d lived there for an extended portion of her childhood. There were business interests he could embroil himself in to keep busy, and plenty of English citizens about if he began to pine for home. Which he doubted he would. “India would be a new experience. Exotic. Exciting.”
“It’s a far way, my friend.”
“Perhaps, but that’s what I need. A new climate, new vistas.” And no chance of running into Rosalind.
“What am I to do if you go to India?” August threw up his hands. “Wescott and Townsend are married now, and you’re going halfway across the world.”
“I don’t know. Go dance with some girls at balls, August. Their mamas like you far more than me.” It was time for his friend to move past his unrequited love for Felicity, just as Marlow would move past Rosalind when he had other things to think about. India. He imagined colorful cultures, bustling trade, and warm, fragrant air that felt nothing like London’s oppressive stultification.
There was a knock at the door. His valet, Pierre, entered the room when Marlow failed to respond.