And Kate Sheffield was surely writhing in agony by now, horrified at the thought of her precious younger sister in his evil clutches.
Anthony looked down at his evil clutches—hands, he reminded himself, hands—and grinned anew. He hadn’t had this much fun in ages, and all he was doing was loitering about his office, picturing Kate Sheffield with her jaw clenched together, steam pouring from her ears.
It was a highly entertaining image.
Not, of course, that this was even his fault. He would have left right on time if he hadn’t had to wait for Edwina. She’d sent word down with the maid that she would join him in ten minutes. That was twenty minutes ago. He couldn’t help it if she was late.
Anthony had a sudden image of the rest of his life—waiting for Edwina. Was she the sort who was chronically late? That might grow vexing after a while.
As if on cue, he heard the patter of footsteps in the hall, and when he looked up, Edwina’s exquisite form was framed by the doorway.
She was, he thought dispassionately, a vision. Utterly lovely in every way. Her face was perfection, her posture the epitome of grace, and her eyes were the most radiant shade of blue, so vivid that one could not help but be surprised by their hue every time she blinked.
Anthony waited for some sort of reaction to rise up within him. Surely no man could be immune to her beauty.
Nothing. Not even the slightest urge to kiss her. It almost seemed a crime against nature.
But maybe this was a good thing. After all, he didn’t want a wife with whom he’d fall in love. Desire would have been nice, but desire could be dangerous. Desire certainly had a greater chance of sliding into love than did disinterest.
“I’m terribly sorry I’m late, my lord,” Edwina said prettily.
“It was no trouble whatsoever,” he replied, feeling a bit brightened by his recent set of rationalizations. She’d still work just fine as a bride. No need to look elsewhere. “But we should be on our way. The others will have the course set up already.”
He took her arm and they strolled out of the house. He remarked on the weather. She remarked on the weather. He remarked on the previous day’s weather. She agreed with whatever he’d said （he couldn’t even remember, one minute later）。
After exhausting all possible weather-related topics, they fell into silence, and then finally, after a full three minutes of neither of them having anything to say, Edwina blurted out, “What did you study at university?”
Anthony looked at her oddly. He couldn’t remember ever being asked such a question by a young lady. “Oh, the usual,” he replied.
“But what,” she ground out, looking most uncharacteristically impatient, “is the usual?”
“History, mostly. A bit of literature.”
“Oh.” She pondered that for a moment. “I love to read.”
“Do you?” He eyed her with renewed interest. He wouldn’t have taken her for a bluestocking. “What do you like to read?”
She seemed to relax as she answered the question. “Novels if I’m feeling fanciful. Philosophy if I’m in the mood for self-improvement.”
“Philosophy, eh?” Anthony queried. “Never could stomach the stuff myself.”
Edwina let out one of her charmingly musical laughs. “Kate is the same way. She is forever telling me that she knows perfectly well how to live her life and doesn’t need a dead man to give her instructions.”
Anthony thought about his experiences reading Aristotle, Bentham, and Descartes at university. Then he thought about his experiences avoiding reading Aristotle, Bentham, and Descartes at university. “I think,” he murmured, “that I would have to agree with your sister.”
Edwina grinned. “You, agree with Kate? I feel I should find a notebook and record the moment. Surely this must be a first.”
He gave her a sideways, assessing sort of glance. “You’re more impertinent than you let on, aren’t you?”
“Not half as much as Kate.”
“That was never in doubt.”
He heard Edwina let out a little giggle, and when he looked over at her, she appeared to be trying her hardest to maintain a straight face. They rounded the final corner to the field, and as they came over the rise, they saw the rest of the Pall Mall party waiting for them, idly swinging their mallets to and fro as they waited.
“Oh, bloody hell,” Anthony swore, completely forgetting that he was in the company of the woman he planned to make his wife. “She’s got the mallet of death.”