The Duke Is Mine - Eloisa James [45]
“I prefer dramatic ideas,” Justin was saying. “For example, sixty-seven of my poems promise to do the impossible for love.”
“I suppose that’s where walking on water comes in,” Olivia said. “What other kinds of things do you promise to do?”
“Walk through fire,” Justin said. “Hold the world in my hand.”
“Those two suffer from the same incompatibility,” Quin said. “While I suppose you might walk through fire—though I think leap would be a more accurate description—you clearly have delusions of grandeur.”
“Lord Justin, if you have a divine side, this would be a good moment to reveal it.” Olivia looked hopeful.
“I think we can all agree that the two of you have sadly prosaic souls,” Justin said. “Poetry is my destiny. Mockery won’t stop me. Someday I’ll meet a lady as beautiful as the moon, and I’ll already have the poetry written.”
“I have yet to meet such a lady,” Olivia said. “Your Grace, have you been moonstruck at some point in your life?”
Quin looked at her and rejected the whole notion of the moon. “Too cool, pale, and insipid,” he said. “I’d prefer a goddess who produces her own light rather than merely reflecting that of another.”
“I can’t imagine you in love, but one should never say never,” Justin put in.
“Poetry might be His Grace’s destiny as well,” Olivia said, her eyes dancing. “Just look at his creative twist on a castle . . . and he didn’t even get to the ramparts. Many people don’t think of the design of fortifications in such suggestive terms.”
“In what terms?” the dowager suddenly said, turning her head.
“As buildings,” Olivia said innocently. “His Grace has an architectural turn of phrase.”
Had Quin’s mother possessed Justin’s flair for the dramatic, she would have rolled her eyes. “We shall be hosting a small ball in a few days,” she announced. “A quite small engagement, naturally. But I would be unsurprised if we commanded a hundred heads at the least.”
She must be moving on to the next phase in the testing process, Quin realized. The thought sent an icy chill down his spine.
Yes, Olivia was charming. She was certainly amusing and undeniably sensual in her appeal. It didn’t matter that she was betrothed to someone else. She was all wrong for him.
All wrong.
Quin snapped his head away and turned to Georgiana. Her eyes were clear, sweet, and a bit anxious. It couldn’t be easy, being Olivia’s twin.
Georgiana was an elegant piece of fine china, but in comparison Olivia beckoned like the promised land.
He wanted—no, he had to remember that he couldn’t trust what he wanted. What he wanted was all wrong. He had to remember the wrenching awfulness of nights when Evangeline didn’t come home, or the weary bitterness of listening to her scream at him, telling him of his manifest failures, his inability to satisfy her, to make her happy. . . .
He smiled down at Georgiana. “Now that I’ve bored all and sundry with my mathematical monologue, do tell me what pastimes you enjoy. That is,” he added, “if you have free time. I know how busy young ladies can be.”
She gave an odd little hiccup of laughter. “Tatting and sewing and the like.”
“I suppose.” Just beyond his left shoulder, her sister was laughing, and laughing made Olivia’s breasts—
He pulled his attention back in line. “Which do you enjoy most? Tatting?”
“Do you have any idea what tatting even is?”
“Of course,” Quin said, before he thought. “It’s . . . something.” He met her eyes, which were full of quiet amusement that brought a smile to his lips as well. “Sewing?” he offered.
“Tatting is a method of constructing a very sturdy kind of lace.”
“Sturdy lace,” Quin echoed. “That doesn’t sound right.”
“An oxymoron,” she agreed.
“I gather you don’t care for tatting.” She smiled again, a kind of fleeting sweetness that was night and day to her sister’s mischievous grin.
“Not as much as other things.”
“What do you like, then?”