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made him realise he’s in love with her.’

      In love with her? He wasn’t in love with her.

      ‘Oh,’ said Chepstow, breaking into a grin. ‘Now I know why you cannot string three words together and get them to make sense.’

      ‘Do you?’

      ‘Yes. Falling in love does tend to addle a man’s brains. As well as making him feel as though he wants to flatten anyone who hurts the woman he loves, then rip them to small pieces and put them through a mincer.’

      ‘Does it?’

      ‘Oh, yes,’ said Havelock.

      ‘But...I don’t love her—’

      ‘Oh, yes, you do,’ Havelock said. ‘Lord, for a man who’s supposed to have brains, it’s taking you the devil of a time to work out what is plain to anyone else. Ever since she arrived in Town you’ve been acting out of character. Getting hot under the collar, haunting balls and such just to get a glimpse of her—’

      ‘Striding across the room to wrest her from whichever admirer happens to be with her when you do spot her,’ chipped in Chepstow.

      ‘And now coming to blows with Eastman—Eastman of all men—just because he makes a bit of a nuisance of himself.’

      ‘That’s all the hallmarks of a man in love,’ said Chepstow sagely. ‘Exactly how I felt about Honeysuckle when she was in trouble. Knew I had to rescue her. Look after her. Mince anyone who hurt her into tiny pieces. That sort of thing.’

      That wasn’t love. Love was...was...well, he didn’t know exactly what it was, but it wasn’t that. He’d read a bit of poetry. And he’d never come across a poem about turning rivals into mincemeat.

      ‘If you ask me,’ said Havelock, ‘it’s about time you proposed to her and put yourself out of your misery.’

      ‘Well, I didn’t ask you,’ said Edmund irritably. ‘Besides, she...’ didn’t want a normal marriage. And what kind of fool would propose to a woman, knowing the kind of terms she’d demand?

      ‘She what? You don’t mean to tell me you’re afraid she won’t have you, are you? You’re an earl, ain’t you?’

      He ground his teeth. That was the trouble with letting people even just a little way into your confidence. They started assuming you would tell them everything. And there was no way he was going to betray Georgie’s fears and insecurities to anyone.

      ‘It isn’t that simple,’ he said, after they’d both been staring at him expectantly for some time. ‘I...’ He supposed he could give them a reason for not marrying her that they might consider valid, without making it look like Georgie’s fault. He leaned forward and clasped his hands together over his knees. ‘I offended her.’ By turning down her proposal in such cutting terms he’d reduced her to tears. ‘If I was to propose to her, now, I fear she would either think I was mocking her, or...if she took my proposal seriously, she would throw it in my teeth, just to get her own back.’

      ‘Ah,’ said Chepstow. ‘That was pretty much what Honeysuckle did when I proposed. Threw it in my teeth,’ he said, rubbing a hand absentmindedly down the front of his waistcoat as though attempting to remove an invisible stain.

      ‘But you persuaded her to accept your proposal in the end,’ said Edmund, whose curiosity, for some reason he didn’t understand, was roused by the notion that here stood another man who’d persuaded a woman into accepting a proposal she rejected at first with some vehemence, by the sound of it.

      ‘Well, yes, obviously,’ he said as though Edmund was an idiot.

      ‘Well, then, how?’

      ‘Ah,’ he said, turning a dull shade of red. ‘Well, actually, I kissed her.’

      ‘And that worked, did it?’

      ‘Not to begin with,’ he said, looking distinctly guilty. ‘Matter of fact, had to keep on kissing her until she saw sense.’

      ‘But that’s...’

      ‘Highly improper,’ said Chepstow defiantly. ‘I know, but it worked, didn’t it?’

      ‘Actually,’ said Havelock, ‘that’s the tack I took with Mary, too. And no point saying it wasn’t the proper thing to do. Time was of the essence. If I’d gone courting Mary in the regular manner, she’d probably still be keeping me dangling to this day.’

      ‘So, both your brides were reluctant, too? And you...subdued them with, ah, masterful kisses? Do I have that correct?’

      Havelock stared moodily into the distance. Chepstow tugged at his neckcloth.

      ‘You make it sound as if we coerced them into doing something they didn’t want,’ Chepstow complained. ‘And they did want to marry us. Deep down. Just needed to realise it. So a spot of kissing was totally justified. They’re both happy now. Ain’t that right, Havelock?’

      ‘Very happy,’ he said belligerently. ‘You just get her alone somewhere, kiss her senseless and she’ll come round, you’ll see.’

      Edmund snorted. ‘Get her alone? How, pray, when she is chaperoned every hour of the day and night? When she takes great care not to be alone with a man, or let any man trick her into situations where he might have a chance to take liberties.’ He pressed his hands to his temples in disbelief. What was he saying? He had no intention of devising a scenario whereby he could coerce her into accepting a proposal he had no intention of making.

      ‘Kiss her in public, then,’ said Havelock. ‘That’s what I did, actually. Mary had no choice but to marry me after that.’

      Edmund imagined walking up to Georgie in a ballroom, taking her in his arms and... He shook his head.

      ‘She can box,’ he said with impatience. ‘I taught her myself. She’d flatten me if I attempted anything like that in public.’

      ‘You’ll have to kiss her in private then.’

      ‘Yes,’ Chepstow agreed. ‘And even if she does draw your cork, then, you won’t be obliged to desist.’

      Kiss Georgie into submission? Were they mad? He certainly would be if he attempted any such thing. Even if it was for her own good.

      Even if it was what she wanted, deep down.

      Which some people might argue it must be, or she wouldn’t have proposed to him in the first place.

      ‘After all,’ said Chepstow cheerfully, ‘what’s the worst that could happen?’

      The worst that could happen?

      For Georgie to think he was just like every other man who thought her nothing more than a lush body to grope and paw and subjugate. And he was, that was the trouble. Worse. Because he had been lusting after her whilst knowing full well that the prospect of becoming intimate with any man completely sickened her. His own stomach promptly turned over and squeezed into a knot as he realised he was a worse scoundrel than Eastman, who’d also lusted after her without having any intention of marrying her.

      He lowered his head, and almost groaned.

      ‘No need to despair,’ said Havelock. ‘You’ll find a way. Clever chap like you.’

      ‘You could just try telling her you love her,’ put in Chepstow. ‘You’d be amazed how effective saying the words can be.’

      The trouble was, they would constitute a lie. And there was no way he could lie to Georgie.

      And anyway, why was he sitting here, listening to all this talk of love and marriage as though he...he...

      He sat up straight. He couldn’t stay here any longer, his mind going round and round in circles.

      ‘I need to take a walk,’ he said, getting to his feet. ‘Think things over. Get things...straight in my

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