Page 2 of Notorious

“Gabe!” Eva was bouncing up and down when her slipper caught on the grubby hem of her white gown. An audible riii-iiiiiiiiiiip! drew the attention of everyone in the vicinity.

Her face, so happy only a second earlier, collapsed into a frown. “Oh bother.”

It was a big rip, but nothing Eva hadn’t done before.

Drusilla laid a hand on her friend’s forearm. “Don’t worry, Eva, I have plenty of pins and we’ll fix it in a trice,” she said as Gabriel stopped in front of them.

“Good evening, ladies.” He greeted his stepsister by kissing her on both cheeks in a foreign fashion Drusilla secretly found charming. He never greeted Drusilla that way. But at least today he smiled at Drusilla after hearing her volunteer to fix Eva’s gown.

“You have an excellent friend in Miss Clare, Eva. Not to mention a forward-thinking one to come armed with so many pins.”

Drusilla tried not to bask in the grateful—almost warm—glance he shot her. Instead, she narrowed her eyes and dropped a slight curtsey. “Mr. Marlington.”

He appeared not to notice her cool greeting. “You two ladies are looking in fine fettle this evening. Is that a new gown, Eva?”

Eva snorted at his poor attempt at fraternal flattery. “You are such a dunce, Gabe. How can a person tell one bland white gown from another?”

He laughed at her rough words. “It is not very ladylike to call one’s brother a dunce, Evil.”

Eva smacked him with her fan, but Drusilla knew her friend reveled in both the pet name and the brotherly affection; who wouldn’t? Drusilla had no siblings—half or otherwise—and could only imagine what it would be like to have such a playful, teasing relationship. She was fond of her Aunt Violet, of course, but their relationship was neither close nor particularly deep. And she’d loved her kind but distant father, but he’d rarely had the time to spare for her when she’d been a girl, and he’d died when she was only fourteen, and still away at school. And that was the sum of her family, at least any she knew.

Drusilla did not understand how Eva managed to view the delicious man as nothing more than a brother. After all, not only did the two share no blood, but they’d just become acquainted with each other a little more than five years ago.

It was beyond maddening;just thinking about Gabriel Marlington made Drusilla swoon, but Eva seemed perfectly comfortable abusing him, physically mauling him, or ordering him around.

Eva grabbed his arm, bouncing up and down on the balls of her feet, her expression chiding but affectionate. “You’re so late—it’s almost the supper dance. I thought you might not come tonight.”

“It was wretched weather just this side of Epping, so that slowed me down. But I gave you my word I’d be back tonight. You should know I always keep my word.”

Gabriel looked from Eva to Drusilla, his warm smile still in place, but his eyelids lowering over his vivid green eyes.

“And how have you been, Miss Clare? Organized any prison rebellions while I was away?”

She sighed and unfurled her fan, adopting her most bored expression. “That never grows old, does it, Mr. Marlington?”

He chuckled. “I’m a man of simple pleasures.”

Drusilla snorted. His pleasures provided more fodder for ton gossip mills than a dozen young bucks bundled together. If only ten percent of the rumors were true, then his pleasures were anything but simple.

“And I did not organize a prison rebellion.”

“Ah, that’s correct—you merely provided the funding.”

Drusilla sighed. The incident he was referring to had taken place last year, when a group of militant prison reformers used the money she’d given them to provide necessary items for prisoners to stage a gaol protest that led to hundreds of pounds of damage and the escape of four hardened criminals who’d been slated for transportation. It had not been the best of months for her and she’d resolved to donate only to causes she was personally affiliated with, or those advocated by the members of her small, intimate reform group.

She gave him a contemptuous smile. “Surely you can come up with something more recent to irk me about after so many months?”

“Oh, I don’t know, it seems like a rebellion and an escape should be good for more than a few months of irksomeness.” He turned to Eva. “Or is that irkishness?”

Eva chortled. “You’re such a ninny, Gabe.”

“Ninny would not be my first choice of word,” Drusilla muttered.

His eyebrows arched high in mock confusion. “Whatever do you mean, Miss Clare?” He turned to his sister. “Do you know what word she means, Eva?”

“I don’t think you want to know what word she means, Gabe.”

He turned his distracting emerald gaze back to Drusilla, his lips curving in a way that made her breathing hitch. “Oh, but I do. Tell me, what word would you choose for me? Witty? Handsome? Clever?”