Chapter Text
Anthony falls into his seat at the head of the table with an audible huff, reaching immediately for his whiskey glass.
As the formal host for the evening, he has been encumbered with a prime view of the sister he had previously thought his most sensible, now fawning over - and being fawned over by - the Duke of Hastings.
Forced by his duties as viscount, his tight smiles have been polite, his clenched fists saved for the neck of his dinner fork, his words barbed but not outwardly rude.
All the while, his supposed friend takes the chair to the left of Lady Bridgerton, but not before helping Daphne into the space by his side.
His hand lingers for far too long on the back of her seat for Anthony’s liking, the tips of Simon’s fingers straightening to brush the exposed skin at the base of Daphne’s neck. It makes her tilt her head up to gaze at him with doe-eyes so sickeningly sweet that the whole display almost tempts Anthony to have Gregory and Hyacinth escorted out of the room - perhaps even Eloise.
They are much too young to be viewing such obscenities.
“Hastings,” he barks loudly, startling the whole table. Someone’s knee bumps its underside, causing cutlery and glassware to rattle dangerously. Anthony’s glare remains steady and fixed on the duke. “Are you planning to eat your dinner standing up?”
Simon meets his steely gaze with a half smile and narrowed eyes that soften when he tips his chin down to meet Daphne’s eyes instead.
“Forgive me, Bridgertons,” he says, voice soft and smooth like warm honey as he charms the whole table without so much as glancing at them, “I find myself… quite distracted.”
Daphne all but melts.
It rankles Anthony even further to see how the duke maintains his composure, uncaring of how his beau’s guardian seethes and scoffs at the other end of the table. The viscount’s attempt to intervene in what was clearly a flagrant disregard for propriety against his sister has somehow only endeared him to her all the more.
Disgusting.
He bites his tongue, knowing that, despite his reservations - and he has many reservations - he does not have much ground to stand on after the whole Berbrooke fiasco, not to mention that he has no inclination to hear yet another lecture on the matter.
“You are being completely unreasonable,” Daphne often tells him, hissing like the feral cat she’d tried and failed to adopt when she was just seven, “obstinance for the sake of obstinance!”
His mother is softer in his chastisement, though no less exasperated. She’ll sigh and tilt her head in that way only mothers can, with twinkling eyes and lips pulled up at the corner, then say, ”you’ll understand one day, dearest.”
Anthony already has a list written up in his head of all the qualities the Duke of Hastings shares with the feline population, as well as a reminder that he was right about the damn cat and he’ll be right about this, too. There is nothing more to understand.
But still, he bites his tongue.
Literally.
He takes a long pull from his glass to wash the tangy taste of blood out of his mouth.
“What has you so irritated, brother?” Eloise asks, leaning across Benedict to prod at his knuckles with her spoon. “Is there something amiss, or is this simply another droll display of masculine infantilism? Are you finding it terribly difficult being a Lord with freewill and generational wealth?”
Benedict laughs, “Eloise, you do know that the ‘generational wealth’ part applies to all of us, yes?”
“Except that your inheritance is to be used as you please, whereas mine comes in the form of a dowry that he would see handed off to another man the moment-“
“Please, can we give it a rest for one evening?” Anthony groans, pinching the bridge of his nose between his thumb and forefinger.
He does not have the patience nor the constitution for any discussion pertaining to another of his sisters being wed - even one as vehemently set against the idea as Eloise.
“Don’t mind him, El,” Colin says from her other side, his elbow tapping goodnaturedly against her ribs, “our brother is feeling more than a bit put out about having to hand off Daphne into marriage, even though he attempted to sign her over to Nigel Berbrooke just last week.”
“Hand off,” Eloise parrots indignantly, swatting Colin’s arm away, “sign over! He does not own her.” She turns to Anthony then, replacing her spoon for a butter knife that she points at him quite menacingly as she hisses, “you do not own her.”
Colin smirks, leaning further into his sister’s space even as she huffs. “Well, he will be giving her away, so-“
“Enough!” Anthony snaps, begs, planting his face firmly into his palms and squeezing his eyes shut.
When he opens them, he hopes to find himself alone, nursing a brandy behind the locked door of his study or tucked between the fine silk sheets of his bed, and for all of this nonsense of his closest confidant courting his little sister to have been a dream.
A terrible, awful, no good, rotten dream.
Equally rotten, it seems, is his luck, for when he lifts his head, the table is still set, his siblings are still snickering and the Duke of Hastings is pressing a kiss to the back of Daphne’s knuckles.
Anthony is all set to launch himself out of his chair when Benedict, clearly anticipating the move, clamps a hand over his shoulder and pushes down, forcing him to remain in his seat or risk embarrassing himself.
“Come now, brother,” Benedict starts, “is this not what you wanted for our dear sister, what she has wanted so long for herself? A prosperous union, a titled and respectable gentleman, love.”
“I fear love is not what steers his desires,” he grunts back, shaking his brother’s grip off, “trust me, I know him well enough to know.”
“Passion is not a bad foundation, either,” Benedict counters. “He is a fine fellow, the duke. Even had I not had ample time to see it for myself, I’d know it because you have entertained his friendship for many years. I do not understand why you now paint him as the villain.”
Benedict tips his head towards Simon, who has folded his napkin into the shape of a pony and is trotting it along the tabletop, much to the children’s delight.
He is even neighing and braying, clicking his tongue to the rhythm of hoof beats, the insufferable, charming bastard.
“How would you feel if one of your friends came along and started sniffing around Eloise?” Anthony demands, waving a hand at their sister who looks affronted by the mere notion. Colin pats her arm placatingly, earning him a firm flick to the ear.
“Well, the chances of that are quite low,” Benedict chortles. Then, under his breath, he mumbles, “for more reasons than I can count.”
“Yes, well, perish the thought,” Eloise says, never one to be spoken of and not to. “Anyhow, whoever I spend my time with and in whatever capacity is of nobody else’s concern. Daphne’s courtship does not need a third participant, despite your best efforts to involve yourself.”
Anthony’s eyes narrow, considering his sister’s assessment. She, who has no qualms against looking down on them all from atop her high horse.
She who inserts herself into every conversation, always finding an opinion to correct or a moral flaw to tear asunder.
She who insists that she will live out her days in spinsterhood with her dearest friend, despite said friend’s obvious desire - and need - to be wed. How, he wonders, would she respond if she had to watch those plans unravel from across her own family’s table?
Quite hypocritically, he imagines. And wouldn’t that be just the vindication he needs…
Anthony sets his elbows on the table and leans forward. “You would not mind, then, if say… Penelope were to become entangled with one of your brothers?”
Eloise doesn’t spare a second for the thought to pass through her mind before she scoffs. “Ha! As if Pen would ever.”
“But let’s say hypothetically, she showed an interest in entering a courtship with one of us, a marriage. You wouldn’t begrudge her for it?”
Eloise leans back into her seat and crosses her arms over her chest, smirking in that all knowing, self satisfied, holier than thou way that she is wont to do.
“Of course I would not, for such a thing is ludicrous and shall not come to pass.”
“But if it does?” Anthony presses.
“It won’t.” Eloise replies firmly, her patience wearing thin.
Anthony, welcoming the distraction of a verbal spar with one of his siblings, cannot resist goading her just a little bit further.
“And if you’re wrong?”
“I am not.” Eloise snaps, pinching her eyes into a narrow, fierce glare - the sort she uses to send lesser men skittering away from asking her to dance or take turns around ballrooms.
“But,” she continues, “if, hypothetically, Penelope were to take an unfortunate knock to the head and find herself fancying one of you - well, I can not say I’d be happy for her, as she could do much better. However, I would, of course, support the choice as hers to make.”
“No intervention?” Anthony asks sceptically, steeping his fingers against his chin in mock contemplation. “No big fuss as you become her second favourite Bridgerton.”
Eloise releases a sharp breath, caught somewhere between a scoff and a condescending laugh.
“We shall not have to find out, will we, for Pen would never favour a man above me.”
Hmmm, Anthony thought, leaning back in his chair, eyes dancing between Daphne, Eloise and the Duke. We’ll see about that.