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reason.
    Aidan made a sound of aggravation. He had to put that woman back in the past where she belonged.
    “Sir?”
    “Hmm? What?” He looked up to find his secretary watching him with a puzzled expression, waiting to carry on with the matter at hand. “Sorry, Mr. Lambert,” he said with a shake of his head. “Where were we?”
    “Today’s correspondence, sir.”
    “Ah, yes, thank you.” He gestured to the chair opposite his desk, and the secretary sat down, placing his clipboard on his lap and opening Aidan’s appointment book before reaching for the first invitation.
    “Lord Danbury wishes to know if you are free for tennis on Thursday morning.”
    The invitation surprised him. Given his ill-fated entanglements with both of Paul Danbury’s female cousins, he and the other man had the tendency to avoid each other these days, but perhaps this invitation to play tennis was an attempt by Paul to heal the breach. “Am I free Thursday morning?” he asked his secretary.
    Lambert nodded, scanning that day’s page of appointments. “You have no commitments that morning, so I believe you would have time for tennis.” He glanced at the note again. “His Lordship warns you that he’s been honing his serve, so if you accept his invitation, be prepared to lose.”
    Aidan grinned, liking the challenge. “Tell him I accept, and that I’m impressed he’s improved his serve because it certainly needed improvement. Also tell him all the practice in the world won’t help him because my backhand shall dispatch any serve he sends my way as it always does.”
    The secretary, who was not in the least athletic, did not quite understand this sort of bragging and insulting badinage between men about their superior skill at sport, but he scribbled the dictation on his clipboard, noted the engagement in Aidan’s appointment book, and lifted the next letter from the stack. “Lord Marlowe wishes to confirm your receipt of his latest proposal, and if so, he suggests Thursday afternoon in his offices for the final negotiations, if that would be convenient.” The secretary looked up. “You are free from half past two until five o’clock.”
    “Confirm with the viscount’s secretary that we are in receipt of the proposal and that his time for an appointment would be acceptable, Mr. Lambert.”
    After another notation, the secretary moved on to the next item. “Lord Vale wishes to know if you would honor him by sharing his box with him and his family at Covent Garden Thursday night.”
    He hesitated, for although Lady Yardley might be a provocative minx, she was also a very accomplished judge of character. And he, too, had suspected Vale’s youngest daughter to be somewhat lacking in brain matter. On the other hand, it wasn’t fair to judge the girl so precipitously, and Lady Yardley could be having him on for mischievous reasons of her own. “Tell Vale I’d be delighted to call upon him and his family in their box during intermission.”
    “Yes, sir. First or second?”
    Aidan blinked. “I beg your pardon?”
    “I believe it’s a Wagnerian opera on Thursday, sir. That means two intermissions. You might prefer the second one, since you also have an invitation to dinner for Thursday evening.” He pulled the next invitation from the pile. “The Duke of Scarborough has asked you to dine with him; his ward, Miss Annabel Wheaton; and her mother, Mrs. Henrietta Chumley, at the Savoy. Half past seven. You could accept if you called at Lord Vale’s box for the second intermission rather than the first.”
    Aidan shook his head. “No. I shall have to return to Grosvenor Square at some point and change into evening clothes before the opera, and I hate rushing back and forth across town. Express my regrets to Scarborough and tell him I should be delighted to dine with him another night.”
    Lambert nodded in confirmation as he made notes. “It’s probably for the best anyway, sir,” the secretary added, running his finger