Along with James, Devlin nodded, and the three of them set off.
Then James tugged his sleeve. When Devlin glanced his way, James nodded to the carriage just ahead. “That’s your carriage, along with your wife.”
Devlin looked and endeavored to keep his expression unrevealing. “So it is.” He paused, then lowered his voice. “Impossible to simply walk by—we’ll have to stop.”
Therese had been conversing with Georgiana Sheldrake and Emily Pritchard, both of whom had been walking the lawns and had joined her in her carriage, when Devlin, James, and Cedric strolled up.
Smiling, the three halted, doffed their hats, and half bowed. As all of them were acquainted, no introductions were required, and hands were promptly offered and fingers pressed.
After acknowledging the other ladies, Devlin met Therese’s eyes. “I needed to confer with one of the exhibitors and was on my way home.” Still smiling, he shifted his gaze to Georgiana and Emily. “Have you ladies had a pleasant afternoon?”
Georgiana shot Therese a mischievous look and brightly replied, “We have, indeed, my lord. You’ve just missed your old friend, Lord Child. He spent quite a few minutes entertaining us.”
Emily smiled serenely at Devlin. “He was thoroughly charming and so full of stories from his travels that the time quite flew.”
Therese didn’t miss the fractional tightening of Devlin’s jaw, although she doubted anyone else detected any hint of reaction through the languidly relaxed mask he kept firmly in place. She also caught the faintly wary looks James and Cedric threw him. But “Is that so?” uttered in a bland and disinterested tone was all the reply her husband made.
Deciding she didn’t need Emily and Georgiana to poke the bear any further, Therese blithely declared, “Did you hear that Lord Monk is threatening to cut off his son without a penny?”
“Hector?” James said. “That will put the cat among the pigeons.”
“We’ve heard that Hector is deep in the clutches of some moneylender,” Cedric confided. “Is his father’s ire due to that?” He looked at all three ladies. “Or something else?”
Georgiana smiled conspiratorially. “We all suspect it’s ‘something else,’ but exactly what—”
“Or should we say whom?” Emily put in.
“—no one knows.” Georgiana looked hopefully at the three men.
Devlin leaned a shoulder against the carriage’s side. “Given his lordship’s widely known penchant for opera dancers, that seems a trifle like the pot calling the kettle black.”
“Indeed,” Therese agreed, pleased to have succeeded in diverting everyone from the subject of Child. “But when the gentleman in question is his heir, his lordship apparently takes quite a different view.”
The company continued exchanging observations on a succession of ton topics, then the bells rang out for four o’clock, and Emily and Georgiana gathered their reticules and pressed Therese’s fingers, assuring her they would see her at Lady Wicklow’s picnic the next day.
While Cedric held the carriage door, Devlin gallantly handed the pair down to the verge. Georgiana and Emily took their leave of the gentlemen, waved to Therese, then hurried to where Georgiana’s small carriage stood waiting farther along the avenue.
Therese saw Cedric and James look questioningly at Devlin, but he waved them on. “I’ll go in the carriage—it’ll be faster for you two to continue down to the Stanhope Gate.”
James and Cedric agreed. They farewelled Therese, then strode across the avenue and continued south while Devlin climbed up and sat beside Therese.
After the mention of Child, Therese wasn’t surprised; it seemed the specter of his childhood friend held the power to stir Devlin’s possessiveness.
The observation intrigued her; until Child, she’d rarely glimpsed this side of Devlin. Then again, she couldn’t imagine that, pre-Child, he’d seen any need; being entirely comfortable in her marriage—as he knew her to be—she’d never been inclined to encourage any gentleman, but apparently, no encouragement was needed to have Child dance attendance on her.
She wondered if the time might come when she would have to put her foot down about that.
Having claimed the seat beside Therese, Devlin donned his hat, then gave their coachman, Munns, the word to head home.
The barouche rolled smoothly forward to join the queue of fashionable carriages waiting to quit the park. Alverton House stood on the corner of Park Lane and Upper Grosvenor Street, more or less directly opposite the Grosvenor Gate.
Thinking to excuse deserting his friends’ company for hers, Devlin murmured, “I have to admit I find James harping on about Veronica’s behavior wearying.”
“Oh?”
He glanced at Therese and saw she was smiling as if she knew something he didn’t. He thought, then pressed, “If James is so unhappy, I can’t see why he doesn’t do something about it—at least talk to his wife, if nothing else.”
Therese’s smile widened, and she softly chuckled. “But James isn’t unhappy—at least not about his marriage. In all ways that matter, he’s perfectly content, which, strange though it may seem, is a large part of his problem.”
