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And, like that, she’d ruined his win

At first, he told hieously foolish things he’d seen women do in his life, this one had to be the irls could get The lengths to which they would go for what they wanted

He knew it better than anyone

So, of course, it was she Lady Sophie, youngest of the Soiled S’s, to whom he had expressly refused conveyance, had refused to leave well enough alone

And she’d stoay

As she was dressed as a foote, where she would have been safest Instead, she’d likely ridden atop the vehicle, next to the driver Christ She could have fallen off

She could have been killed, and it would have been on his head

He closed his eyes, and an iirl, broken and lifeless, flaxen hair spread out in a halo against the packed dirt of the road

Except, it wasn’t Sophie Talbot he saw lifeless and broken It was another girl, another time

He cursed, low and dark in the quiet roo to his feet and crossing the roo to drink, to push thethe tre to the , looking down at the inn’s courtyard, e and Sophie Talbot in his place, eyes wide, shocked that he’d recognized her He’d have to be dead not to recognize her

Christ How had no one else recognized her?

And where had she gone?

He didn’t care Sophie Talbot wasn’t his problenored the thought The way the tears had somehow made the blue of her eyes, lined with those thick, sooty lashes, even ht outside the inn She’d done it to manipulate him After all, wasn’t that what the Talbot sisters did? Trap unsuspecting aristocrats into e?

It had made a duchess of the eldest, why not a future duchess of the youngest?

Well, she had chosen the wrongoff a foote ride Sophie Talbot was no si wallflohatever her reputation He knew little about the girl--only that she was the most serious of the five Talbot sisters--not a difficult task considering the tittering vanity and disdain for propriety that marked the others in the family

Her actions did not bear out her seriousness, however Indeed, they ht be a fool, but he wasn’t

He wasn’t getting anywhere near her

She wasn’t his problem

She’d found her way here; she could find her way ho his way back to Cuood on his proain, unable to wrap his head around the idea of his father dying Dying was for creatures with beating hearts, after all, and the Duke of Lyne was too stern and un to have blood in his veins Surely

Come quickly Your father ails

A sines Graycote, housekeeper of Lyne Castle since King was a child The woman had served the duke for decades without hesitation She’d stayed on after King left, after the duke had stopped traveling to London, after he’d given up his atteht ever be possible As though he hadn’t ruined King’s life with his bitter aristocratic pride As though King hadn’t replied to every request for audience with the same five words--the only honest punishnes’s call

Almost