Chapter 8
Eight
Marchmont didn’t answer. He stayed where he was, regarding Priscilla through half-closed eyes while he waited for his erection to subside and his breathing to return to normal.
Zoe raised herself up on her elbows and glared at her sister. “I am going to kill you,” she said. “Are you a crazy woman, to interrupt at such a time? I do not care how pregnant you are. There is no excuse—”
“Excuse?” Priscilla cried. “You cannot—cannot—” She waved the umbrella. “You cannot do what you were doing. You cannot do that—here—in Hyde Park!”
Marchmont took his time sitting up. After another moment, he swung up onto his feet. He held out his hand, and Zoe took it. She rose awkwardly. Passion having cooled—and far too abruptly—she must be paying the price for her gallop.
“The exceedingly round lady is right,” Marchmont said. “We ought not to do this in Hyde Park.”
“But what is she doing in Hyde Park, I want to know,” Zoe said. “She should not even be awake at this hour.”
“It’s a good thing I was,” Priscilla said.
“And why should I not be here at this hour? It’s not as though I have entertainments to keep me up late.
Augusta said we must not show our faces at Almack’s until you’ve made your curtsey to the Queen—whenever that is, if it ever is, which, given today’s escapade, I think highly unlikely. ”
If the Queen refused to meet Zoe, it would be his fault. He’d promised to make her respectable.
“You know no one does anything else of any importance on Wednesday nights,” Priscilla raged on.
“It is the most vexing thing, to be trapped in the house with a husband who is determined to be contrary in everything. I could not abide Parker’s sarcasm and went to bed early.
Then, when I went to visit Mama this morning, I saw Jarvis returning to the house—without you—and knew instantly something was wrong. ”
“Did Jarvis not tell you that I was dealing with the matter?” Marchmont said.
“Indeed, you are dealing with it splendidly, I see,” said Priscilla.
“Of course Jarvis told her,” Zoe said. “But my sisters will not leave me in peace.” She reverted to Priscilla. “None of you will let me out of the house. Marchmont is too busy with his concubines to take me out.”
“I don’t have any concu—”
“I cannot meet the Queen for a fortnight. Today, all I want is to enjoy his body—but no, you must interfere, even though nobody is here to see what we do.”
“You’re not allowed to enjoy his body!”
“It was only kissing and fondling,” Zoe said.
Only, he thought.
“Only?” said Priscilla. “He’s a man. Did you imagine he’d be content with preliminaries?”
“I know what to do to content him,” Zoe said.
“Heaven help us,” said Priscilla.
Amen, he thought. He looked at Zoe. He could still taste her, and her scent seemed to have entered his skin. Remembering the press of her hand on his swollen cock, he stifled a groan.
She didn’t know how to say no. Neither did he—even when his honor depended on it.
Priscilla’s fit continued. “You are most fortunate I did come,” she said.
“The world is more than ready to view Zoe as damaged goods. If anybody else had witnessed this, she would be ruined, and you’re the last man on earth who’d be able to restore her reputation then.
” She turned toward the maid. “If you utter one syllable of this, you will be turned off without a character.”
“Leave Jarvis alone,” Zoe said. “She is not your maid and she would never do anything to make trouble for me. Give her back her umbrella, in case somebody tries to kill me and she must beat them off.”
“You’re as ridiculous as he is,” said Priscilla. But she returned the umbrella to the maid, who said, “I’ll be on the footpath, miss, if you need me,” and moved out of hearing range.
Priscilla wasn’t done with them yet. “If anyone gets an inkling of what happened here today—”
“Enough,” said Marchmont. “I’ll marry her.”
Zoe stared at him.
“You weren’t taught how to say no,” he said. “I’ve never had to.”
She remembered the taste of his mouth and the wicked game his tongue had played with hers and the fire his hands had made on her body. She remembered the possessive way he’d squeezed her breast. She remembered her hand upon the front of his breeches and the heat and size of his arousal.
That was wonderful.
But she remembered, too, the way he’d ordered her about and showed no regard for her feelings. She remembered Lady Tarling.
He would never be a faithful husband, not even a loving one.
He would never give his heart fully. He would engage his wife’s heart, then he’d grow bored and abandon her.
That wasn’t the kind of marriage Zoe wanted.
She wasn’t that desperate. If she had to, she’d run away to Venice or Paris.
If she did wed, she must have a marriage like her parents’.
After twelve years in the harem, she would settle for nothing less.
Her problem was simple enough: She had no perspective. She needed to meet other men.
“I can say no to this,” she said. “You’re not thinking clearly, and no wonder.
You’ve been aroused and all the blood has gone out of your brain to fill your membrum virile.
Even I am confused, and I’m a woman and women are not so much ruled by our lust. The trouble is only that Priscilla is making us feel ashamed. ”
“You ought to feel ashamed,” said Priscilla.
“I don’t,” said Zoe. She shrugged. “He is very beautiful and desirable, and his membrum virile grows hard so easily. I scarcely have to touch him. And what other men do I see?”
“Thank you,” he said. “I think.”
“Marchmont, you said you would see this through,” Zoe said. “You said it wasn’t necessary for us to wed. I believe you. I trust you.”
“That is one of the most frightening sentences I’ve ever heard,” said Priscilla.
Zoe lifted her chin. “All of my sisters said no invitation would ever come, but you have arranged it.”
That got Priscilla’s attention. “Invitation?” she said. “What invitation? You can’t mean…” She trailed off, looking from Zoe to Marchmont.
“The Duke of York has promised to see that Zoe is invited to the Prince Regent’s Birthday Drawing Room on the twenty-third,” he said.
“The Birthday Drawing Room?”
“It is preferable, in the circumstances, to a Drawing Room reserved for presentations,” said Marchmont. “Zoe won’t be mixed in with a lot of girls barely out of leading strings.”
“The Birthday Drawing Room,” said Priscilla. “Good grief, Zoe, why didn’t you say so?”
“I forgot,” Zoe said. “He told me yesterday, but I was so angry with him that it went out of my brain.”
“Oh, my goodness! The twenty-third. That’s only a fortnight away!” Priscilla grabbed Zoe’s arm and started to drag her away.
“What are you doing?” Zoe said. “I cannot go with you. Mama’s horse is on the bridle path.”
“Let him deal with it,” Priscilla said. “You’re coming in my carriage. The sooner you get away from Marchmont the better. Come along, you absurd creature. Forget? How could you forget such a thing? Stop dawdling. We’ve not a minute to lose.”
Lexham House
Friday afternoon
Zoe stood in the corridor outside the open door of the large drawing room, preparing to enter. The two younger of her sisters were in the corridor with her, to provide guidance. The two older ones were inside. Augusta was playing the queen. Gertrude was playing Mama.
For one who’d navigated the deadly shoals of Yusri Pasha’s court, the rules governing court presentations were laughably simple.
Not so simple were the hoop petticoats. Her mother, grandmothers, and great-grandmothers had worn these interesting undergarments beneath the elaborate gowns Zoe had seen in family portraits.
In olden times, though, a dress’s waistline had been at a woman’s natural waist or lower, and this made for some balance between top and bottom.
Nowadays, the waists came up under one’s breasts, and the gown spread out from there, forming a dome, somewhat flattened fore and aft.
“You could not wear this in the desert,” Zoe told her sisters. “If a sandstorm came, it would lift you up and carry you to Constantinople.”
“What nonsense,” said Augusta. “There are no sandstorms in London.”
“You needn’t worry about winds,” said Dorothea. “You need only step down from the carriage. Then it’s merely a few steps into the palace.”
“The train is heavy enough to act as an anchor,” said Priscilla with a giggle. “Oh, Zoe, how droll you look.”
Zoe wore one of Priscilla’s gowns. A pearl grey silk confection adorned with ruffles and lace, it was the size of a tent sufficient to house a family of Bedouins. The dress was a few inches too short, but there was plenty of train to make up for the hemline.
Moving forward in a relatively empty space like the corridor of Lexham House had felt strange, but it had not proved very difficult. That, however, was only the beginning, her sisters assured her.
“The palace doorways are wide enough to pass through, but you must be prepared to contend with a tremendous crush of people on the stairs and in the corridor,” Dorothea said. “You must practice and practice if you wish to move gracefully, particularly when you’re presented to the Queen.”
“You must make your way up a crowded staircase,” said Gertrude. “You must gracefully maneuver your hoops and train among not only other ladies in hoops but men wearing swords. You must make a very deep curtsey to Her Majesty, and be careful not to get the plumes in her face.”
“Take care they don’t fall off, either,” Dorothea said.
“You must contrive to rise again without stumbling or dropping your fan and gloves,” said Gertrude. “Then you will back out of the royal presence, curtseying as you go.”
“Without getting tangled in your train,” said Dorothea.
“Yes, yes,” Zoe said impatiently. “But one thing at a time. Let me get through the door first.”