Henrietta Talbot was in her element. Kneeling in a heap of fine muslin skirts and ruffled petticoats, she doled out cold roast chicken and other comestibles from a hamper. “For you, George.” She handed him a plate heaped with food.

George took it, barely succeeding in hiding a flinch. At the vicarage, he hadn’t been able to keep down his breakfast. “What I need,” he’d said earlier that morning, “is the hair of the dog that bit me.”

“What you need,” Alex had returned, “is to attend to your debts.”

It had been enough to sober George. And when Miss Talbot’s invitation had arrived from Edgington Park, summoning the pair of them to a picnic on the grounds, he hadn’t dared to refuse.

Alex’s gaze drifted over him before settling, once again, on Miss Hayes. She was resting on her hip not far from Miss Talbot, her more modest spill of linen skirts bunched up about her ankles, revealing a glimpse of well-worn leather half boots. Since her arrival, only minutes before they’d departed the house, she’d been assiduously avoiding meeting his eyes.

While he couldn’t seem to stop himself from looking at her.

It was aggravating at best. Infuriating at worst. When it came to Laura Hayes, he appeared incapable of exercising control. By rights, he should have been angry at himself. Instead, he was irritated with her.

The plaguing female.

There were faint shadows under her smoke-blue eyes, and a general air of distraction to her manner. She’d hardly strung five words together since they’d sat down.

“You’re peaky, Laura.” Miss Talbot passed her a plate of food. “You must eat something.”

George picked at the chicken on his own plate with a grimace. “No one could eat the amount you’ve given us, Hen. You’ve been too generous, as always.”

“I suppose you’d rather I brought something from Papa’s cellar,” Miss Talbot said. “But you can’t drink your meals, George. You’ll make yourself ill.”

“By the by, what have you brought to drink?” George asked. “Lemonade, I suppose.”

“Naturally. And a bottle of elderberry wine—”

“Aha!”

“—of which you may have one glass. Really, I don’t know what sort of dissipated life you’ve been leading in London, but you’re home now, and you can’t make such a spectacle of yourself as you did when you came to dine at the Park.”

“Every fellow drinks to excess on occasion,” George grumbled. “Even your father, I daresay.”

Miss Talbot glanced at Alex. “Even you, Mr. Archer?”

George laughed. “Archer doesn’t do anything to excess.”

Alex accepted a plate of food from Miss Talbot. “A man mustn’t be a slave to his vices.”

“A commendable philosophy,” she said. “Don’t you agree, Laura?”

Miss Hayes looked up from peeling an orange. For a fraction of a second her eyes locked with his. “Indeed.”