The Duke at Hazard (The Gentlemen of Uncertain Fortune #2)

by K.J. Charles

‘Thank you,’ the young lady said into the stunned silence, giving herself a little shake. ‘Really, what great stupids men are.

He’d thought he had plenty of friends, just as he’d believed in his father’s careless affection and his mother’s love. But when it came down to the bone, people didn’t help, and they didn’t stay. They looked to their own well-being and left you behind.

‘You can take responsibility for that. You have. What you can’t do is magic the thing back onto your finger by sufficient application of guilt.’

are you sure? what if I were REALLY guilty

He had been obliged to watch a Shakespeare play once, for reasons he could not now remember, and it had been three or four, or subjectively eighteen, of the longest hours of his life. If he wanted to see people shout incomprehensibly at one another he’d go to the Continent, and the thought of being in the company of someone who talked about ‘the Bard’ or, even worse, ‘the Swan of Avon’ chilled his blood.

Daizell was a hanger-on, eternally a guest at someone else’s table; Cassian owned the table. They usually had half a dozen people living off Staplow at any given time: impecunious artists, amusing younger sons, spinster friends of Aunt Hilda, aspiring scientific minds, foreign travellers, temporarily embarrassed politicians. They’d once had a poet stay for three months, reciting his verse every evening, and only when Lord Hugo insisted they get shot of the blasted man before he resorted to violence did the Crosses discover that none of them had actually invited the fellow: he’d simply turned up.

‘My uncle likes to say, if the truth shames you, the fault lies with you, not with the truth.’

He did want his valet, since he was tired of being a scruffy mess and of packing clothes and organising laundry

I tapped my father for help working out the specifics of cards and cheating for the gambling scene. He promptly sat down with a notepad, laid out a full hand for each of the four players in the last round, identified how the decisive play would go, and spoke with feeling on the topic of Underleading A King And Why You Shouldn’t. Love you, Dad.

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