Excerpt of The Winter Bride by Anne Gracie

"I want you to look after Aunt Bea and the girls while Abby and I are on our honeymoon,” Max, Lord Davenham, told his friend, the Honorable Frederick Monkton-Coombes.

Freddy almost choked on his wine. “Me?” he spluttered after the coughing fit had passed. “Why me?”

“You’re my oldest friend.”

Hard to wriggle out of that one, Freddy thought. But damn, it was a hell of a thing to spring on a fellow the night before a wedding. As if being best man weren’t trauma enough.

The less he had to do with the bride’s sisters the better, as far as he was concerned. Pretty, unmarried, respectable girls were not Freddy’s female of choice. Good girls? No, he much preferred the company of bad girls—the badder the better.

Good girls, especially good pretty girls, were . . . dangerous. And one Chance sister in particular was, to Freddy’s mind, more dangerous than most. She . . . disturbed him. In ways he preferred not to examine too closely. And now Max must come up with this. And playing the “oldest friend” card, dammit.

“You mean all of them? All the girls?”

“Yes, of course all of them,” Max said impatiently. “There are only three. They’re not exactly a horde.”

That was a matter of opinion. “What does look after entail?” Freddy asked cautiously.

Max shrugged. “Nothing very arduous, just the kind of thing I’d do if I were there. My aunt is well up to snuff, of course, but she’s still somewhat of an invalid and would appreciate having a man to rely on if needed.”

Having a man to order about, more like it, Freddy thought.

Max continued, “And Abby’s been fretting a little about leaving her sisters—you can understand that after all they’ve been through recently. Knowing you’ll be on hand to protect them if necessary will ease her mind.”

“Isn’t there anyone else you could ask?” Freddy said desperately. “I mean, you know my problem with unmarried females.”

“Your problem is with the kind of unmarried female you call a muffin. You told me Abby and her sisters were most definitely not muffins.” “They’re not, but—”

“Then there’s no problem.”

The noose was tightening. Freddy ran a finger around his suddenly tight collar. “Am I really the sort of fellow you want associating with Abby’s sisters? I don’t have the best reputation around women; you know that,” he said hopefully.

“I have complete faith in you.”

Damn. “What about Flynn? Didn’t you say he’d be arriving any day now?” Flynn was the head of the company in which Freddy and Max were major partners. “Couldn’t you ask him?”

"If he turns up, the two of you can share the responsibility if it makes you feel better. But Flynn doesn’t know Aunt Bea and the girls like you do. Nor does he know anything about London society. In fact, I’m hoping you’ll show him the ropes.”

“Oh,” Freddy said. More responsibilities. Delightful.

Max’s grin widened. “He’ll need your fashion advice too. He’s planning to cut a swath through London society, and currently he’s a little . . . unorthodox in appearance.”

“Oh. Joy.” Just what he wanted, to play guard dog to respect- able females and social and sartorial adviser to a rough Irish diamond.

Max laughed. “Don’t look so glum. Flynn is a good fellow. You’ll like him. But you don’t need to worry about Flynn—he can look after himself. It’s my aunt and the girls I’m most concerned about.”

Freddy sipped his claret thoughtfully, trying to work out a way to wriggle out of what, on the surface, seemed quite a reasonable request.

Max, misunderstanding his silence, added, “Look, it won’t be hard. Just drop around to Berkeley Square every few days, make sure they’re all right, see to anything if there’s a problem, protect the girls from unwanted attentions, take them for the occasional drive in the park, pop in to their literary society—”

“Not the literary society. The horror stories those girls read are enough to make a fellow’s hair stand on end.” Max frowned. “Horror stories? They don’t read horror stories, only entertaining tales of the kind ladies seem to enjoy, about girls and gossip and families—”

“Horror stories, every last one of them,” Freddy said firmly. “You asked me to sit in on their literary society last month, when you went up to Manchester, remember? The story they were reading then . . .” He gave an eloquent shudder. “Horror from the very first line: It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a single man in possession of a good fortune must be in want of a wife. Must he, indeed? What about the poor fellow’s wants, eh? Do they matter? No. Every female in the blasted story was plotting to hook some man for herself or her daughter or niece. If you don’t call that horror, I don’t know what is!”