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“Don’t be bothered by the gossip, Gabriel. It is harmless.”

“Yes,” the duke agreed, almost mumbling it.

Richard sat forward in his chair, straightening up and placing his glass down on the table to his left.

“There’s something else,” he suggested. When Gabriel didn’t answer, Richard stood up from his chair and approached his nephew. “What troubles you?”

Gabriel took a sip of his drink and shook his head. It was early, and she’d got him drinking. Fewer than ten minutes of interaction, and she had him thinking about it and drinking two days later.

“She might prove more difficult than I first expected,” Gabriel told his uncle. She has stirred something within me that is best not to elaborate about. “Let me just state that her personality makes her most inconvenient.”

A smile crept across Richard’s face. “You have finally met your match?”

Gabriel glared at his uncle, and another man might have backed down or shied away from the fight, but his uncle had known him for far too long and had become more than just an uncle in the nine years since his father had passed.

“She is no match for me,” Gabriel stated.

Richard unleashed a booming laugh that ran right through Gabriel and annoyed him further.

“I should hope not,” Richard stated. “Women can be fierce, but I saw how you fought as a young lad, and the fact that you haven’t had a physical altercation in almost a decade shows that you have enough respect from others that you don’t need to prove it. She’s a beautifully petite lady, and I would be shocked if she were the one to put you in your place.”

Gabriel knew his uncle was teasing him, and he wouldn’t have said anything else on the matter if it weren’t for the fact that Eleanor had gone so far beyond decorum that she would not be able to see it anymore if she turned around and looked for it.

“She is not what you might expect, Uncle,” Gabriel claimed. “With her father gone, and her mother’s mind elsewhere, it is little surprise that she has not been taught how to act properly before a duke. Still, most of that is her own doing, for she doesn’t know how to act properly in front of anyone.”

Richard’s smile broadened. “I like her already. A beautiful woman who speaks her mind. And you get to accompany her to events. This might be just what you need, Gabriel. Not only a beautiful woman on your arm, but an interesting one, too. Perhaps you should consider her for yourself. It is high time that you carry on the family name.”

If Gabriel had been drinking at the time, he would have spat out his drink.

“Perhaps I am being far too pleasant about her.” Gabriel set his glass down on the mantel. “I can admit that she is a beautiful woman, but there are many beautiful women in London, so that is not confined only to Lady Eleanor. She is the only woman who has had the gall to argue with me for as long as she did. It didn’t matter what I said; she had an answer for it.”

Except for one thing.

“Ah!” Richard mused as he turned and walked over toward the window. “Ladies these days are far too polite and boring. What I wouldn’t give for a good, rude woman to put me in my place!”

The duke couldn’t help but let out a chuckle as he shook his head at the man.

“Then I shall introduce her to you, Uncle.”

Richard held his hands out before him, palms up in surrender. “No, I am far too old for that. And if she were able to put you in your place, just imagine what she might do to me!”

“She didn’t—” Gabriel gritted his teeth. He knew his uncle was teasing him to get a reaction. “I will accept my duty with the good grace that the Lord has blessed me with.”

“Spoken like the duke I know you have grown to be.” Richard walked back to the chair he had sat in previously and fell back into it. He picked up his drink and took a sip.

Two footmen walked in, both carrying a large silver tray. The butler entered the room behind them, watching them as they took the trays to the table on the wall opposite the fireplace.

“Will that be all, Your Grace?” Watkins asked.

When the duke nodded, the three men exited the room.

“It is time,” Richard said out of nowhere.

Gabriel walked over to the platter of meat, cheese, spreads, fruits, and bread that the footmen had just brought in, but he didn’t feel hungry anymore.

“Time?” Gabriel questioned.

Richard’s voice softened a little as he spoke. “Your chances of finding a wife diminish as the Seasons pass. We all need a good woman to love.”