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about
the house, entertaining society. Even your charts haven’t found such a
creature.”
    “It’s not as if I’ve charted every bachelor in England!” Aster
waved the maid to set the tray on the low table she used to provide a distance
between them. “I have found several who are at least temperamentally suited to
you, but you make it difficult,” she added, caustically. “It’s challenging
enough to match an intelligent woman, but your stubbornness and lack of
interest in all things feminine, and the fact that you spend twenty-four hours
a day either researching or gardening, makes husband-hunting impossible.”
    “Not all things
feminine,” Emilia said demurely, sipping her tea. “I do like men. They simply
don’t like me.”
    “There’s no accounting for male taste,” Aster agreed,
swinging the other direction. “You are beautiful, well-spoken, and wealthy. You
should be able to stand in the middle of a ballroom and draw men like flies to
honey. But then you open your mouth . . .” She sighed in
despair. “I don’t suppose I could persuade you to play a mute?”
    Emilia laughed. “Not likely. Whereas you babble incessantly
of absurdities, and men flock to you proclaiming undying love. Perhaps the
trick is to not want men, although I
have tried that. It doesn’t work for me.”
    “It’s not that I don’t want them . . .” Aster wrinkled her nose. “I just don’t dare care for
one. Perhaps I should just take them as men do mistresses, then dismiss them
before we become emotionally involved. It would be lovely to have a man escort
me occasionally, to have someone who listens and understands . . .
Which is preposterous, of course.”
    Emilia looked sympathetic. “Have you tried drawing another
chart for yourself? Surely the stars do not say you must live alone forever.”
    “I draw a solar return faithfully every year. It’s as if the
heavens want me to invent another planet. The calculations show me as
indecisive and argumentative, when we both know I’m pragmatic and a
problem-solver. Why can I chart everyone else correctly but not myself?”
    “It could be that your gift is to read others, not
yourself,” Emilia said reflectively. “Our Malcolm gifts are not always clear. You
could be wrong about your danger to others.”
    “I am not wrong
about my dangerous propensities. According to my tallies, my predictions have
been proven true over eighty-percent of the time. Even my own mother agrees
that it is best if I live elsewhere. Georgina died in my arms!”
    “She was born just a year after Finnian and your mother is
no longer young . . .” Emilia said hesitantly. “Perhaps she
wasn’t meant to survive.”
    Wiping angrily at her eyes, Aster shook her head. “I
appreciate the thought, but that last episode with the carriage and my sisters
and Finnian proved otherwise. If we’d lost my father’s heir because of my
presence . . .”
    Aster shuddered in horror and caressed the onyx brooch. “I
miss all of them terribly, but it was my arrival that stampeded the horses.
They could have all broken their
necks!”
    “Admittedly, that was an odd episode, but it was over five
years ago. Surely your fortunes will look up soon. One may hope mine will do
the same.” Emilia looked more miserable than hopeful.
    “I will go over your chart again,” Aster agreed. “Perhaps I
missed something. And then I will dig deeper into our library. I’d thought
someone of Malcolm ancestry would be best, but I could go through DeBrett’s and
see if any other eligible gentlemen catch my eye.”
    In some ways, it was excellent that she must live alone. It
meant she had time to do all the research her family needed and to help with
their various charities. She must remember to think constructively. “Perhaps a
gentleman who will simply be happy to have an income and won’t mind barely
having a wife—”
    Nick appeared in the doorway with his salver, hovering until
Aster signaled him to