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into the music room.
    Tristan stalked back downstairs, refusing to rub his smarting fingers. Now he would have to cut short his luncheon at White's to go purchase her another blasted fan. He gave a grim smile. Slender as his purse was, buying fans for Georgie was one thing he refused to give up. Nothing annoyed her quite so much as his gifts.

    Tristan looked at the herd of young, single ladies gathered at one side of the Ibbottson ballroom. The not-quite-so-young part of the herd stood closer to the refreshment table, as though nearness to food would render them more enticing to the circling pack of male wolves. He had yet to see Georgiana stand anywhere near that meat market, unless she happened to be conversing with some poor unfortunate who'd joined it.
    What he would never be able to imagine even in his wildest dreams was the Marquis of Harkley's golden-haired daughter reconciled to the hopeless spinster section. The idea that she might be forced there because of his actions six years ago was ridiculous. Georgiana was intelligent, well educated, witty, tall, and beautiful. She was also fabulously wealthy, which in and of itself was enough to entice most suitors.
    Hell, if he'd known at the time in what poor condition his father would be leaving the Dare properties and title, he might have—would have—made a more serious play for her affections. If she hadn't discovered the idiotic wager and convinced herself that was the sole reason he'd been in pursuit, they might have found their present circumstances vastly altered.
    "Isn't that your Amelia?" Aunt Edwina said from beside him.
    "She isn't my anything. Let's please make that clear." All he needed was another misunderstanding coming between him and a potential spouse. With his money woes, he was on the verge of becoming unmarrigeable himself. In fact, he was more likely to end up beside the punch bowl and the sweetmeats than Georgiana was.
    "So you've settled on a different one?" His aunt wrapped her fingers around his arm and perched up on tiptoe. "Which one?"
    "For God's sake, Auntie, none of them. Stop being such a matchmaker." She looked downcast and he sighed. "It'll probably be Amelia. I would like a chance to browse the entire fruit bowl before I select my peach, though."
    She chuckled. "You are becoming reconciled to marriage."
    "However can you tell?"
    "Last month, marriage was apothecary shops and poison. Now it's fruit bowls and peaches."
    "Yes, but peaches have pits."
    A wheeled chair rolled onto his toe and stopped there.
    "What has pits, dear?" Milly asked.
    Milly Carroway was a substantial woman, and her weight combined with that of the chair was enough to make him see spots. The chair's driver smiled at him, her eyes alight with green devilment. Keeping his gaze steady on hers, he wrapped his fingers around her hand and the back of the chair, and pushed.
    She flinched as though he'd struck her, but the wheel rolled back off his toe, and he could breathe again. He would have supposed her treading on his feet was better than being attacked with fans, but that didn't take into account large aunts and large wheeled chairs.
    "Peaches do," he said.
    "And what does that have to do with anything?"
    "He's going to marry a peach," Edwina offered. "He's just afraid of pits."
    "I am not afraid of pits," he retorted. "It's just a matter of wisdom."
    "So a woman is a piece of fruit?" Georgiana broke in. "What does that make you, Lord Dare?"
    He lifted an eyebrow. "Let's leave that question rhetorical, shall we?" he drawled.
    "Where's the fun in that?"
    Georgiana was in high spirits. On any other occasion he would have enjoyed the exchange, but since he intended on spending the evening convincing himself that he could tolerate the peach known as Amelia Johns, he didn't want to expend the energy necessary to keep up with his tormentor.
    "Why don't we continue the amusement later?" he suggested, patting Aunt Milly on the shoulder. "If you'll excuse me, ladies?"
    Tristan