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degenerate. He did adhere to some religious observance.
    “Please excuse me, my lord.” Sebastian stood up. “I would like to rest before dinner.”
    “Capital idea, Ravenswood! The butler will show you to your room.”
    Sebastian moved to the door. “I will see you at dinner, my lord.
    “Yes, of course, my good man. At dinner.”
    And with that, the baron promptly closed his eyes and went to sleep.
    Sebastian quietly vacated the study and made his way through the familiar passages. He didn’t need the butler to show him to his room. He had occupied the same bedchamber for eight years whenever he called upon the family. He knew his way around the house very well.
    Sebastian mounted the steps, making his way to his room. He was going to rest for a bit, then dress for dinner.
    But he was still baffled. If Henrietta wasn’t even engaged, then why hadn’t she come down to say hello?
     
    “You’re leaving after the holidays?”
    Sebastian glanced at his flabbergasted brother. “That’s right, Peter.”
    “But you just returned home, Seb. Why the rush to run off again?”
    Because Sebastian needed to part from a certain incorrigible hoyden…who happened to be late for dinner—as usual. Not that the family seemed to mind. Accustomed to the girl’s tardiness, the brood had simply immersed themselves in the freshly cooked fare, an empty chair left for Henrietta at the far end of the rosewood dining table.
    Sebastian sliced open the broiled fish. “I have a rather pressing matter of business to attend to on the mainland.”
    Peter snorted. “You mean you have a pressing itch in your—”
    “Peter,” Sebastian drawled. “Mind your manners at the dinner table.”
    Peter shook his head. “I don’t understand you, Seb.”
    “Oh?” He quirked a brow. “And what don’t you understand?”
    “Why you have to go abroad to attend to ‘business,’” Peter whispered. “What the deuce is the matter with English wenches?”
    Sebastian chuckled. “Nothing a’tall, brother. I just need to go abroad. Trust me.”
    The other man sighed. “Well, we’re here tillTwelfth Night, so let’s make the best of what little time we have together…Did you hear the baron has leather-tip cue sticks? We should play a game of billiards, Seb.”
    “I suspect we will, Peter.”
    Sebastian scanned the amassed company. The “we” included the baron and baroness, and all the Ashby sisters and their respective spouses. Sebastian didn’t really get along with the other gentlemen, though; too prudish for his taste. He only got along with his brother, really. And the baron, of course. Sebastian just wasn’t the sort of man to make friends easily or engage in platonic pleasantries. He was more of a flirt. A seducer. And after the death of his parents from consumption almost ten years ago, he’d immersed himself in more unsavory pursuits.
    “By and by,” said Peter, “why are you here? I’m bound to the family till death, but you’ve no familial obligation. Unless, of course, you want the last of the sisters for yourse—”
    “Finish that thought and I’ll stab this fork into your hand.”
    Peter chuckled, well aware of his brother’s plight with Henrietta. “And spatter blood all over Lady Ashby’s fine linen tablecloth? Heaven forbid.”
    “Then I suggest we let the matter rest.”
    “Sound advice, but I feel I must warn you, Seb, you might have to settle down one day, however foul the idea.”
    “Rubbish.”
    Sebastian was never going to tie the marital noose around his neck. What the devil for?
    “The estate needs an heir,” said Peter.
    “Yours will do just fine.”
    An airy sigh from Peter. “While nothing would please Penelope and me more, you know very well it might never come to pass.”
    It was a rotten truth, and Sebastian knew it. The three other Ashby sisters were already mothers—their seven brats, thank the heavens, tucked away in the nursery—but Penelope had yet to have a babe, much to the sorrow