Chapter One Jasper Finley, Baron Montford, was twenty-five years old. Today was his birthday, in fact. At least, he amended mentally as he loosened the knot in his neckcloth with one hand while the other dangled his half-empty glass over the arm of the chair in which he slouched, to be strictly accurate in the matter, yesterday had been his birthday. It was now twenty minutes past four in the morning, allowing for the fact that the clock in the library of his town house was four minutes slow, as it had been for as far back as he could remember. He eyed it with a frown of concentration. Now that he came to think about it, he must have it set right one of these days. Why should a clock be forced to go through its entire existence four minutes behind the rest of the world? It was not logical. The trouble was, though, that if the clock were suddenly right, he would be forever confused and arriving four minutes early--or did he mean late?--for meals and various other appointments. That would agitate his servants and cause consternation in the kitchen. It was probably better to leave the clock as it was. Having settled that important issue to his own satisfaction, he turned his attention to himself. He ought to have gone to bed an hour ago--or two. Or even better, three. He ought to have come straight home after leaving Lady Hounslow's ball--except that that would have put him in the house alone before midnight on his birthday, a damnably pathetic thing. He ought to have come after leaving White's Club an hour or so later, then. And that was precisely what he had done, he remembered, since here he was in his own familiar library in his own familiar house. But he had been unable to go straight to bed because a group of gentlemen had somehow attached themselves to him as he left White's and come home with him to celebrate the birthday that had already passed into history. He wondered through the mist of alcohol clouding his brain--actually, it was more like a dense fog--if he had invited them. It was deuced forward of them to have come if he had not. He must ask them. "I say," he asked, speaking slowly so that he would enunciate his words clearly, "were any of you invited here?" They were all in their cups too. They were all slouched inelegantly in chairs except for Charlie Field, who was standing with his back to the fireplace, propping up the mantel with one shoulder and swirling the contents of his glass with admirable skill since not one drop of precious liquor sloshed over the rim. "Were any of us--?" Charlie frowned down at him, looking affronted. "The devil, Monty, you practically dragged us here." "By the bootstraps," Sir Isaac Kerby agreed. "We were all bent upon toddling home after we left White's to get our beauty sleep, but you would have none of it, Monty. You insisted that the night was young, and that a fellow suffered a twenty-fifth birthday only once in his life." "Though turning twenty-five is nothing to get unduly maudlin about, old chap," Viscount Motherham said. "Wait until you turn thirty. Then you will have every female relative you ever possessed down to cousins to the second and third generations and the fourth and fifth removes admonishing you to do your duty and marry and set up your nursery." Jasper pulled a face and clutched his temples with the thumb and middle finger of his free hand. "Heaven forbid," he said. "Heaven will refuse to intervene on your behalf, Monty," the viscount assured him. He was thirty-one years old and one year married. His wife had dutifully presented him with a son one month ago. "The female relatives will rout heaven every time. They are the very devil." "Ee--nuff," Sir Isaac said, making a heroic effort to get th Excerpted from Then Comes Seduction by Mary Balogh All rights reserved by the original copyright owners. Excerpts are provided for display purposes only and may not be reproduced, reprinted or distributed without the written permission of the publisher.
