The Duke of Robinsworth tapped the table between him and his brother, signaling that he’d take another card.
Finn looked at him and raised a golden eyebrow. “Perhaps you should join the others below stairs. With luck like yours, you could take all their money before Mother gives hers up to them.” He slid a card across the table to Ashley, and then he cursed when he saw a two and that Ashley had a total of twenty-one. “Damn you, Robin. You may not be lucky in life, but you certainly are in games of chance.”
“Life is a game of chance, my dear Finn,” he said, recognizing the grim sound of his own voice. “We play the cards we’re dealt.”
“Unless we stack the deck.”
Ashley chuckled. “Obviously not the case in my situation,” he said. He’d played the cards he’d been dealt since the day he was born. He’d been raised for greatness. Raised to be a duke. Raised to be respectable. It was unfortunate that his deck had been stacked against him.
“Yet still you play,” Finn lamented.
“I sent a gift to Miss Thorne this afternoon,” Ashley suddenly blurted out.
“Am I familiar with the lady in question?” Finn appeared to search his mind and came up empty-handed.
“I doubt it. I met her in the park a few days ago.”
&nbs
p; Finn sat back, his eyes opening wide. “Pray tell,” he encouraged.
“There’s nothing to tell.” Ashley shrugged. “We met very quickly when she took Anne to task over something.”
Finn laid his cards on the table. “Someone took Anne to task?”
“Quite effectively,” Ashley continued. “She appeared as though from nowhere and told Anne how a lady behaves.”
“And…?”
“And Anne listened. It was quite profound.”
“And all of this provoked a gift from you?”
Ashley never should have opened his big mouth. He should have kept his secret to himself. But whiskey did have a way of loosening the tongue. And he’d had more than his share. And Finn’s tongue had been loosened as well. He set his cards to the side. Obviously, Finn wanted to gossip more than he wanted to win his money back.
“It was nothing, really.”
Finn shook his head. “Robin, I haven’t heard you speak of a lady in quite some time. It must have been some meeting.”
“She’s in residence,” Ashley admitted.
“In London?”
“Here, at the Hall.”
Finn sat back and glared at Ashley. “Here? Have I met her?”
Ashley shrugged. “About as tall as my chin. Dark hair.” He took a deep swallow of his whiskey. When he noticed how quiet Finn was, he looked up to find his brother with his mouth agape. He threw a card at him. “Stop looking at me like I’m bound for Bedlam.”
Finn chuckled as he gathered the cards into a neat pile. “Someone is interested in a lady,” he sang out loudly. Then he ducked as a whole deck of cards sailed past his head. “And touchy about it, too,” he laughed. “What’s her name?”
“Miss Sophia Thorne,” Ashley groused good-naturedly.
“Thorne… Thorne…” Finn repeated as he searched his mind. “It doesn’t ring any bells for me. Is her father a peer?”
Ashley wasn’t certain. He knew nothing about her. “No idea. She’s traveling with her grandmother.”
“But you’d like to learn more about her.” It wasn’t a question. It was a statement.