“Are you seriously suggesting such a harebrained idea? I’m not a fit escort for innocent debutantes. And if you’re scheming about marrying me off to one of them, you’re wasting your breath.”

“God no.” West flicked cold water at Rafe. “I know too much about you. All of it bad.”

“Not as bad as you.”

The two men were both tall and kept themselves in fine trim, though Rafe used a cane and walked with a pronounced limp after a perilous encounter with a gang of French smugglers. The two of them attracted plenty of female attention wherever they went, but both were damaged goods, in more ways than one.

“Only thought you might dance with them.” West dabbed at the dried blood in his hair with a wet cloth. “Make them seem in demand. Blanche has been out for some time now. She keeps a stiff upper lip, but I can tell she’s near frantic with worry.”

Rafe lifted his ebony walking stick. “I’m not the most graceful of dancers these days.”

“Doesn’t matter. You’re brother to a duke and a reformed rake. There was a time when you would have joined the drunken melee instead of shutting it down. I miss the old Rafe.”

“Staring death in the face will make a man reevaluate his priorities.”

“What happened on that ship?” His friend had never divulged how he received his injury.

“I don’t want to talk about it.”

“And I don’t want to talk about the social Season. I’d rather face a ship full of unwashed and armed-to-the-teeth smugglers than a ballroom full of rose-scented, marriage-minded debutantes.”

“It’s not as bad as all that.”

“I don’t see you attending balls.”

“And you never will.”

“I only subject myself to such indignities for the sake of my sisters. I promised our mother before she died that I’d see all five of them safely wed, and so I will. The twins, Belinda and Betsy, make their debuts this year. I don’t have to worry about the youngest, Birdie, for several years yet.”

“Thankfully, I have but one sister and she’s happily married. I’m the charity project my mother is scheming about. She won’t rest until she finds me a respectable wife.”

“No respectable young lady will have anything to do with either of us, even though you’ve reformed more than I ever will.”

“I’m taking an extended journey to France and Switzerland with a departure date that coincides most fortuitously with the first ball of the Season.”

“Lucky you.”

“I have to finalize my travel arrangements. I’ll tell the club to put everything on my account before I leave.”

“In that case, send up some champagne and cigars. And a bottle of aged Scotch whisky.”

“Seriously, West, I’m worried about you.”