Wild Star (Star Quartet 3)

“All right,” Saint said agreeably. “Give me a drink, Del, and I’ll be mellow as a duck by the time Horace and Agatha arrive. They are coming after dinner, aren’t they?”

“Well after dinner,” Del said, laughing. “Don’t worry, you can give your greed full rein.” He added as he handed Saint his whiskey, neat, “What I’ve got to do is marry the both of you off.”

Saint choked on his whiskey.

Brent gave Delaney a raised eyebrow.

“I’ll have you know, Saxton,” Brent said, “that after Saint and I gorge ourselves here, we’re going back to the saloon, there to have a real Christmas party with Maggie and all the girls.”

“Oh, Lord, don’t have me guess what you two unworthies are getting for Christmas.”

Brent merely smiled. Celeste already gave me my Christmas present, he thought, two of them as a matter of fact, both this morning. He still felt pleasantly relaxed. I give her presents and she gives me her body. A fair exchange.

“It wouldn’t be the same thing with a wife,” he said, then realized he’d spoken aloud.

“What wouldn’t?” Saint asked.

“The entire system of barter,” Brent said easily. “If a man has money, he can buy his pleasure and not have to worry about it nagging at him.”

“Cynical bastard,” Delaney said to the blazing fire in the fireplace.

“He’s got a bit of a point,” Saint said, rubbing his ear. “Not everyone’s as lucky as you, Del.”

“Just look at that poor fool Butler. Lord knows he didn’t have to marry her,” Brent said.

Delaney leaned his shoulder against the mantel. “Ira is a lot of things, but he isn’t dishonorable. Byrony, despite your obvious dislike of her, Brent, is a lady. Whatever happened between them, well, Ira did the right thing. Women have so little power.”

Brent snorted. “They have what men want and are quite willing to pay for.”

“Who has what you men want?” Chauncey as

ked as she walked into the room.

“We were just talking generalities, love,” Del said.

“I just bet you were. Now that I’m in the room, your conversation will degenerate into proper nothings, fit, I’m sure you will tell me, for a lady’s delicate ears. Come, tell me what wickedness you were talking about.”

“We were talking about the fact that women have no power,” Brent said. “At least Del subscribes to that notion.”

Chauncey, to his surprise, stiffened a moment, then said, “It’s true, you know, very true indeed. A woman can’t go out and find a position, for example. Who would hire her? And if someone did—a man, of course—he wouldn’t have the slightest respect for her, and she would probably be open to whatever advances he chose to make. It isn’t fair, it really isn’t.”

“Coming from one of the richest ladies in San Francisco,” Saint said, “your words surprise me.”

“No, Brent,” Del said, “it wasn’t a case of barter. Chauncey had more money than I. I keep telling her that’s why I married her.”

“I wasn’t always rich,” Chauncey said. “Believe me, I understand powerlessness firsthand. It is not pleasant.”

“But if a woman is beautiful, she is immensely powerful,” Brent said. “She has but to pick her quarry and he will probably fall all over his feet giving her whatever she wishes.”

“I called him a cynical bastard already, love,” Del said.

“I would say rather that he was hurt quite badly by a woman,” Chauncey said.

“How about a whiskey,” Brent said.

Chauncey was feeling sated and lazy after one of Lin’s marvelous Mexican-Chinese dinners, tamales with ginger.

“I don’t think this wretched rain is ever going to end,” she said to Byrony. “I do thank you for spending the evening with me.”