He turned, very reluctantly.

Standing a few feet away, one of his hands clapped firmly over his eyes, was Penvale.

Twelve

Brothers, Diana fumed. What possible function could they serve? Eating more than their fair share of dessert every evening in the nursery? Chasing their sister up a tree and then refusing to help her down for two whole hours? Getting so blindingly drunk at a sister’s seventeenth birthday fete that they were found the next morning in the hayloft?

These were all occasions upon which Diana had had cause to ponder the purpose of elder brothers, and now she had a new one to add to her ever-growing list: interrupting a sister in the middle of a kiss so good that she felt as though she were about to go up in flames?

Useless.

Unfortunately, this was precisely the sort of situation in which one’s brother thought himself to be at his most useful. He was entirely mistaken in this regard, of course, but men were mistaken much of the time—so often that they seemed entirely unable to recognize the state. She spared a thought to wonder if medicine would ever progress far enough to allow for the study of the human brain. She had grave doubts that the male brain would compare positively to its female counterpart.

Unfortunately, however, none of that helped in her present situation: her back pressed against a tree, her head throbbing painfully, the taste of Willingham’s kiss still upon her tongue, and a visibly traumatized—and, were she to hazard a guess, furious—brother standing before her, covering his eyes, practically vibrating with indignation.

She sighed. Moments like this were when men tended to be their most unreasonable. She would have to act quickly to avert disaster.

“Penvale,” she said coolly, using her hands to push herself away from the tree and move around Willingham toward her brother. “You may open your eyes. There is nothing to see that would offend your delicate sensibilities.”

Penvale dropped his hand, looking mildly sheepish. The sheepishness vanished, however, when his eyes landed on Willingham, and his gaze took on a decidedly more outraged glint.

“Do stop looking at me like that, Penvale, you’re not the dueling type. You’d probably shoot your own foot off by mistake.” It was true—her brother was a notoriously awful shot. Willingham, she recalled, was actually a very good shot; it was fortunate that he was not terribly hotheaded, or all of those duels he had fought could very well have ended in a body bleeding out on the grass and Willingham fleeing to the Continent to live out the rest of his life in exile. It was a surprisingly sobering thought.

“I think a man is entitled to look however he wishes when he finds his only sister being mauled by his supposed friend.”

“I say,” Willingham objected mildly, “I hardly think mauled is the appropriate word to use here.”

“Particularly not when the activities you witnessed were entirely consensual,” Diana added.

Penvale grimaced. “Please don’t make me reflect upon it further. I am already terrified that the images will be imprinted upon my mind for the rest of my life.”

Diana rolled her eyes. “Penvale, you are making a nuisance of yourself. I’m not an unwed girl whose virtue you need to protect, you know. I can take care of myself.”

Even when she had been an unwed girl, she had taken care of herself. A childhood spent in a house where she was aware every day that she was a burden, even if it had never been said in so many words, had created a powerful independent streak within her. She had arranged the details of her London Season; she had created her list of acceptable potential husbands; she had planned her own wedding. Penvale was not a bad brother, but even a good brother is no substitute for a mother, and he had been very young at the time—he had kept an eye on her, but the attention of a twenty-three-year-old is easily distracted by a pretty face, or a bottle of brandy, or a high-stakes game of cards.

For this reason, it was incredibly irritating to have him playing the role of her protector now, when she had no need of him.

“You are an unmarried lady,” he said.

“A widow,” she countered. “An entirely different creature.”

“But a lady without the protection of a husband nonetheless,” he insisted. “Easy prey for every lecher in the ton.”

“Should I be offended?” Willingham asked pleasantly. His tone was calm, but Diana could detect an edge of anger beneath it, and thought that Penvale should choose his next words very carefully indeed.

“You know your reputation, Willingham,” Penvale said curtly. For Penvale to use Willingham’s title was indication that he was very irritated indeed.

“I do,” Willingham agreed. “And so I think that we can both agree that, compared to my usual activities, a few kisses in the woods are nothing much to speak of.”

Diana felt a surge of irritation at hearing their recent activities described as such—a few kisses in the woods? Technically accurate, yes, but a bit dismissive of the kisses in question, which Diana had thought were rather spectacular. Though, considering their audience was her very irate brother, she supposed this might be for the best.

“They are plenty to speak of when it’s my sister,” Penvale said indignantly. Diana refrained from rolling her eyes with great difficulty. “Besides,” Penvale added, trying a new tack, “what are you doing, Diana? You were flinging Lady Helen at him at dinner last night—have you changed your mind about that?” He paused. “Are you trying to marry him yourself? You two can’t get through a conversation without arguing! Has this been some sort of lengthy mating ritual all this time?” He appeared disturbed by the thought, though still less disturbed than she was by this suggestion.