These were eyes that wreaked havoc on the women around them—unless the woman in question was a sister. In which case, they served to simply exasperate.

“Ah. Talk of the Devil.”

Alex moved farther into the room and perched herself against the edge of the chaise, leveling her brothers with a cool look. “What has you three so amused?”

“Just the fact that, even on our most difficult of days, we have never infuriated Mother the way you seem to with virtually no effort. An admirable trait, to be sure.” William Stafford, already the Marquess of Weston and heir to the dukedom, spoke wryly from across the room.

“She merely holds you three to a different standard, Will. She manages her expectations of you—a trio of mediocrity. Aren’t you three, as gentlemen, supposed to stand when a lady enters?” Alex was beginning to regret returning to the sitting room.

Christopher shot his sister a questioning glance. “A lady entered?” At his sister’s withering look, his face broke into a broad grin as he made himself more comfortable in his chair. “Come now, Allie…just because you’re about to have your first season doesn’t mean you have to lose your sense of humor.”

“On the contrary, Kit, my sense of humor is very much intact.” She shot a conciliatory look at Vivi and Ella and spoke frankly: “You’re simply not that amusing.”

A deep, rumbling laugh came from the doorway. “She has a point, Kit.”

Alex spun around to face the newcomer with surprise, followed by delight. “No one told me you were back! Of course…with this lot”—she nodded to her brothers, none of whom seemed moved by the new arrival—“I shouldn’t be surprised.”

Gavin Sewell moved across the room toward her to bow low over the back of her hand. “It would seem that I am indeed back…and that you’re still making as much trouble as you were the last time I saw you.” His eyes met hers with a smile.

“Not on purpose,” Alex defended herself. “How am I supposed to remember all the silly rules of the season?”

Ella piped in practically, “In fairness, it seems not wearing your first ball gown in the front sitting room in the middle of the day is a fairly simple rule to remember.”

Gavin chuckled over Alex’s glare, unable to resist teasing her. “It does seem that way, although never having had to wear a ball gown myself, I can’t guarantee I wouldn’t be confused as well.”

“It’s a good thing, too. I’m not sure you’d survive the corset.”

He cocked an eyebrow in response to Alex’s retort and moved to greet Ella and Vivi. As Gavin bowed over the backs of their hands, Vivi was the first to speak. Her “Good afternoon, my lord Blackmoor” surprised Alex.

“Oh,” said Alex quietly, remembering her manners and falling into a curtsy, “apologies, my lord, your new title slipped my mind.”

Gavin turned back toward Alex, surprised. “No need to stand on ceremony, Alex. I forget that I’m the earl myself most of the time. I cannot seem to get comfortable with the idea that I carry the title now. Besides, I don’t see how it would change much. Nick has been an earl your whole life and that doesn’t seem to change the way you treat him.” He shot her an odd smile and nodded in the direction of Alex’s middle brother.

Nick, as always, was quick to chime in. “That’s right! You lot have never respected my title,” he said, puffing out his chest in a false air of pompousness. He added a thickly arrogant tenor to his blustering. “Why should Blackmoor get any respect? I’ve been the Earl of Farrow since before you were born and it doesn’t earn me an ounce of esteem!”

Everyone laughed and, with that, the awkwardness of the situation had disappeared. Gavin moved to sit by Alex’s brothers, throwing himself into their conversation about a horse auction they planned to attend the next week.

Alex rejoined Vivi and Ella, who resumed their discussion about a novel that the three girls had recently read, Mansfield Park, but she couldn’t shake the odd feeling she’d had during the scene that had just unfolded. She hadn’t missed the fact that, even when Nick was making light of his own title, he’d casually referred to Gavin as Blackmoor—the name that was now rightfully his, along with the earldom and all its privileges—as though it were the most natural thing in the world. But when she’d seen him in the doorway, Alex hadn’t even registered that Gavin was any different, that anything had changed. With one ear on the girls’ discussion, Alex stole a glance at the object of her thoughts.

Gavin’s father had been her own father’s closest boyhood friend—something that was bound to have happened, considering the fact that Blackmoor and Stafford lands bordered each other both in the Essex countryside and in London, where the townhouses shared expansive back gardens on Park Lane. Proximity and age had made Gavin a natural companion of the Stafford sons. The four had climbed trees together, been schooled together, and wreaked general havoc together.

For all the afternoon teas, suppers, and dinners that Gavin had been a part of, Alex thought of him as a fourth brother, equal parts exasperating older sibling and wonderful protector. When, at the age of seven, she had climbed a tree in the back garden trying to emulate her brothers and become stuck in its branches, it was thirteen-year-old Gavin who had come to rescue her—talking her down to a low branch and convincing her to let go and trust him to catch her when she fell. Of course, once it was over, Gavin went back to teasing her; he had never let her forget that she “climbs trees like a girl.”