Hyacinth just smiled and ate another biscuit.
“I think,” Lady Danbury said, apparently over her pique, “that we should write a book.”
To Hyacinth’s credit, she didn’t choke on her food. “I beg your pardon?”
“I need a challenge,” Lady D said. “Keeps the mind sharp. And surely we could do better than Miss Butter-worth and the Mealymouthed Baron.”
“Mad Baron,” Hyacinth said automatically.
“Precisely,” Lady D said. “Surely we can do better.”
“I’m sure we could, but it does beg the question—why would we want to?”
“Because we can.”
Hyacinth considered the prospect of a creative liaison with Lady Danbury, of spending hours upon hours—
“No,” she said, quite firmly, “we can’t.”
“Of course we can,” Lady D said, thumping her cane for what was only the second time during the interview—surely a new record of restraint. “I’ll think up the ideas, and you can figure out how to word it all.”
“It doesn’t sound like an equitable division of labor,” Hyacinth remarked.
“And why should it be?”
Hyacinth opened her mouth to reply, then decided there was really no point.
Lady Danbury frowned for a moment, then finally added, “Well, think about my proposal. We’d make an excellent team.”
“I shudder to think,” came a deep voice from the doorway, “what you might be attempting to browbeat poor Miss Bridgerton into now.”
“Gareth!” Lady Danbury said with obvious pleasure. “How nice of you finally to come visit me.”
Hyacinth turned. Gareth St. Clair had just stepped into the room, looking alarmingly handsome in his elegant afternoon clothing. A shaft of sunlight was streaming through the window, landing on his hair like burnished gold.
His presence was most surprising. Hyacinth had been visiting every Tuesday for a year now, and this was only the second time their paths had crossed. She had begun to think he might be purposefully avoiding her.
Which begged the question—why was he here now? Their conversation at the Smythe-Smith musicale was the first they had ever shared that went beyond the most basic of pleasantries, and suddenly he was here in his grandmother’s drawing room, right in the middle of their weekly visit.
“Finally?” Mr. St. Clair echoed with amusement. “Surely you haven’t forgotten my visit last Friday.” He turned to Hyacinth, his face taking on a rather convincing expression of concern. “Do you think she might be beginning to lose her memory, Miss Bridgerton? She is, what can it be now, ninety—”
Lady D’s cane came down squarely on his toes. “Not even close, my dear boy,” she barked, “and if you value your appendages, you shan’t blaspheme in such a manner again.”
“The Gospel according to Agatha Danbury,” Hyacinth murmured.
Mr. St. Clair flashed her a grin, which surprised her, first because she hadn’t thought he would hear her remark, and second because it made him seem so boyish and innocent, when she knew for a fact that he was neither.
Although…
Hyacinth fought the urge to shake her head. There was always an although. Lady D’s “finallys” aside, Gareth St. Clair was a frequent visitor at Danbury House. It made Hyacinth wonder if he was truly the rogue society made him out to be. No true devil would be so devoted to his grandmother. She’d said as much at the Smythe-Smith musicale, but he’d deftly changed the subject.
He was a puzzle. And Hyacinth hated puzzles.
Well, no, in truth she loved them.
Provided, of course, that she solved them.
The puzzle in question ambled across the room, leaning down to drop a kiss on his grandmother’s cheek. Hyacinth found herself staring at the back of his neck, at the rakish queue of hair brushing up against the edge of his bottle green coat.