At her silence, Charlotte caught and forcefully held her gaze. “Sophie York,” she demanded, “I want to know everything!”

At that very moment Patrick was looking anywhere rather than at his brother’s face, as he tried to figure out how much to tell him. Damn! Why hadn’t he asked Sophie what she planned to tell Charlotte? He had the hazy sense that women told each other everything. Did that mean that Sophie would regale Charlotte with all the details behind their hasty marriage?

Alex and Patrick were sitting in the changing room of Jackson’s Boxing Salon, relaxing after a punishing bout of sparring practice with Cribb himself. They had washed, and an attendant now stood alertly at each of their sides, waiting to aid them with their attire. Gentlemen who padded their garments, for example, invariably needed a final twitch here or there to make sure that their calf pads were lying evenly.

Granted, little Billy Lumley had figured out with one glance that these two particular men had no need of padding anywhere, but there was still the possibility of a tip, so he waited patiently, holding one of their coats. Damned if he knew which one the coat belonged to, since their lordships looked as much alike as those heathen Indians he’d seen, the ones imported from America. In fact, they didn’t look so different from the Indians, given that their skin was an odd golden color, not pasty white like most of the men they had in there.

But Patrick stretched out his long legs, drew in a long breath, and waved Billy and his fellow attendant off to a safe distance. Alex looked at him inquiringly as he pulled a fresh shirt over his head.

“I’m getting married in six weeks,” Patrick said, a smile biting at the corner of his mouth. “I thought you might like to be there.”

There was a moment of silence. “Daphne Boch?” Alex finally offered, his tone noncommittal.

“No. Your wife’s choice, in fact. Sophie York.”

Alex’s mouth curled in a smile uncannily like his twin brother’s. “I like Sophie, not that it matters. Mother would have liked her too.”

“She would, wouldn’t she?” For a moment both men thought of their effervescent mother, and the way she would run laughing into the nursery, gathering them up in a hug that smelled like bluebells. Until she died giving birth to a stillborn brother, and they were left with a taciturn, gouty father who promptly sent them away to school, and shipped them to whomever would agree to take two small boys during school vacations.

Alex was the first to stand up. “Why so soon?” he asked mildly.

“I have a fancy,” Patrick drawled.

“A fancy?” Alex’s tone was meditative.

He waved Billy over and took the coat from his hand, slipping into it without a bit of trouble, to Billy’s sorrow.