The Sherbrooke Bride - Catherine Coulter [44]
With the two females standing side by side, Ryder understood his brother’s sense of betrayal. He had a mouth full of scone and strawberry jam. He swallowed too quickly and choked and continued to choke. Alex calmly walked to him, and hit him as hard as she could with her fist between his shoulder blades.
She nearly knocked him over with the force of her blow. He stopped choking, however. Still red-faced, Ryder looked up at the young lady and quickly got to his feet. He studied her in silence for several moments, then nodded slowly.
He took her hand and kissed the wrist. “I’m Ryder, your brother-in-law. You’re Alexandra.”
“Yes. Are you all right?”
“You nearly sent my back through my chest, but yes, I am quite fine now. The bit of scone found its proper way down. Welcome to the Sherbrooke family. Did you really knock Douglas off his horse?”
Alex shook her head even as she said, “I didn’t really mean to do it at the time.”
“Ha! I recall making an observation about something quite bland and you coshed me onto the ground!”
“She is quite large and brawny, isn’t she?” Ryder said. He lightly closed his fingers around her upper arm. “Ah, strong as an Amazon and as muscled as Squire Maynard’s bull. She is terrifying, Douglas, she certainly is.”
“You weren’t at all bland,” Alexandra said to Douglas.
“Neither am I,” Melissande said.
Tony laughed. “No one in his right mind would ever call you bland, sweetheart.”
“Would you call me succulent?”
Tony’s face tightened ever so slightly. “I would but no one else would dare to.”
“Ah,” Melissande said and gave Tony a look so provocative it would sizzle any male’s toes.
Douglas stared at her.
Ryder said to Alexandra, his voice easy, and oddly gentle, “Won’t you sit down and join us?”
“I shall join you too,” Melissande announced. She eyed her sister with grave perplexity. This was beyond strange, she thought, staring at Ryder, who was looking closely at Alex. Mirrors didn’t lie. Perhaps poor Ryder was excessively myopic as she’d first thought. She turned back to her husband, saw that mocking gleam in his dark eyes, frowned, then turned to Douglas. Her soul found instant balm. His heart was in his eyes and both looked wonderfully bruised to her.
She gave him a sweet smile and nodded. “Please forgive me if I caused you discomfort last night.”
Douglas shook his head.
“Come and serve me tea, Mellie,” Tony said.
“I told you I don’t like that horrible name!”
Douglas’s right eye twitched.
“Come, Mellie,” Tony said again.
“It’s a lovely nickname,” Ryder said, eyeing the heart-stopping creature, who looked ready to spit at her husband of two weeks. When she didn’t react, he stoked the fire a bit. “I rather like the feel of ‘Mellie.’ It sounds rather mussed, comfortable, like a pair of old house slippers a man can slip his feet into and point them toward the fire.”
Alexandra laughed. “ ’Tis better than Alex. I would rather sound comfortable than like I was a man.”
“No one would ever make that mistake,” Ryder said.
Both Douglas and Melissande frowned together.
“Your gown is deplorable,” Douglas said to his wife. “It is so out of fashion I doubt it was ever in fashion at all.”
Her chin went up and the broom handle straightened alarmingly up her back. “It is blue, and blue is a very nice color.”
“You look like a schoolgirl.”
“Then perhaps you would like to buy me a new one? Or perhaps a dozen? Is my tone wheedling enough, my lord?”
Douglas realized this wasn’t the time to show his ill-humor.