“No.” The denial sprung from his sister. Some of the fight drained from her shoulders. She stomped over to the desk and then sat in the leather winged back chair. A golden curl fell over her brow. “I would not dare take her from Philippa’s side.”
Guilt needled his conscience. He’d known that her unflinching sisterly devotion would quell all arguments on her behalf. He took solace in knowing he merely sought to do what he’d failed to do as a youth—protect her. “I expect one of Mrs. Belden’s instructors to arrive within a fortnight.”
Chloe groaned and sprawled in the chair. “Does it have to be one of Mrs. Belden’s instructors?” She flung an exaggerated hand over her brow. “I understand Imogen and Alex are otherwise pulled away from Society events,” she pointed her eyes to the ceiling to indicate just what she thought of her favorite brother and best friend’s subsequent abandonment. “But surely there is someone, anyone, other than one of those dour, frowning, miserable beings?”
Despite himself, his lips twitched with amusement. “I’m afraid not.” Seated thusly, she resembled more the dramatic girl who’d slipped from the nursery and sought sanctuary in hidden corners of this very home to craft magical kingdoms in which to escape. His smile withered. At what point had she ceased to believe in hope and magic? After all, a person dwelling in hell always knew that one particular moment to so shatter your illusions of hope and happiness.
A curl tumbled over her eye and she blew it back on a huff of annoyance. “All those dratted instructors speak on are matters of marriage and proper husbands and proper decorum and…” She waved her hand. “Everything proper.”
In short, the woman who’d be assigned to his sister for the next two months was bloody perfect and, God willing, would be able to rationalize with his sister when he’d never been able to. “It is temporary,” he assured her.
“I’ve agreed to your foisting me off on a companion so you can be free of me, I do not, however, want a Belden dragon.”
Guilt tugged once more. “Is that what you believe?” His siblings all possessed such a low opinion of him. Then how could they not when he’d so failed to care for them as he had?
She arched an eyebrow. “Isn’t it true?”
He glanced over her shoulder at the wood door panel. Yes, he certainly saw how, on the surface, it appeared that way. After all, hadn’t his own father gleefully pointed out that Gabriel possessed the same vices as his sire? He’d proudly noted Gabriel’s ability to put his own comforts before all others. “It isn’t,” he said quietly. Instead, he’d spent his life fighting those addictive personalities he’d learned at his father’s knee and secretly striving to put his siblings first. “I very much enjoy your company, Chloe.” His lips pulled in a grimace.
A burst of laughter escaped his sister. “That is hardly convincing,” she said between gasping breaths. “You don’t enjoy anyone’s company, Gabriel.”
He’d built a fortress about his heart when his father had taken him under his wing, a boy of ten. It had been a mechanism to protect himself from hurt. To show emotion had wrought more pain at his father’s hands. Yet, in so many years he’d spent proving he didn’t feel, he’d done a damned convincing job of making his siblings believe that lie. In truth, he wanted her safely wed and at which point all those he loved would be properly cared for. Their security and happiness represented an absolution of sorts. Perhaps then, with Chloe wed, there would be a sense of having proved his father wrong. “That isn’t true,” he said defensively. “There is you and Alex and…” He slashed the air with his hand. “I’ll not continue this discussion.”
Chloe hopped to her feet. “Of course you won’t.” She leaned over the desk and patted his hand. “Because I daresay, but for your equally stodgy Lord Waterson, there isn’t a single soul you’d add.” Lord Waterson—a man who’d known Gabriel since he’d been a sniveling, afraid-of-everything coward at Eton. Any person who could set himself up as a devoted supporter of the miserable, cowering, weak fool he’d been was deserving of an eternal friendship.