Chapter 5 #2
Arabella guided her to the settee and smiled up as Barnaby himself brought the tea service in. Likely because the other servants were busy doing other preparations for the day that didn’t usually involve the interruption they were encountering now.
“Why couldn’t you sleep?” she asked.
Julia let out a sigh. “Oh, you know. Just pondering my options. Unlike you, I don’t have a line of gentlemen out the door to offer protection. It’s always hard to make these decisions."
Arabella covered her sister’s hand with hers and squeezed gently.
Of the three of them, Julia was the least certain about her path.
She had only been a courtesan for a few years, after Evelina and Arabella had swept in and rescued her before she could be married to a wretched man, their father’s last attempt to use his daughters for his own gain.
Arabella had tried to protect Julia from the life for a while, but in these walls it was impossible for her younger sister not to understand what and how Arabella and Evelina made their way in the world. Ultimately, she had stepped into that world, herself.
“You judge yourself too harshly,” Arabella said. “You have many gentlemen who are interested in you.”
“But not like you,” Julia insisted.
Arabella shrugged. “That’s because my way is to dazzle them until they’re so blinded by lust that they have to have me.
But that isn’t the way of everyone. Many men want someone soft and demure and gentle on their arm.
They have an unpleasant relationship at home, perhaps, or they’re of a shy bent and want their lover’s company to soothe as much as inflame. ”
“I suppose.”
“And there is the fact that you are…” Arabella hesitated. She had to go easy now, she didn’t want to hurt or anger her sister. “That you are looking for a fairytale. You see Evelina with her arrangement with Harry and you want that same thing.”
“A long-term lover who adores me and me alone?” Julia said with a laugh. “Oh yes, what a mad desire.”
“It isn’t mad,” Arabella said, though to her it seemed mad.
It seemed a recipe for heartbreak, though for a moment she thought of Silas again.
No, that was fun. Just because he’d been her fantasy didn’t mean he was her future.
Her future was herself. “But it may not be realistic for women like us. What Evelina and Harry have is rare.”
She didn’t add that sometimes she wasn’t even certain it was real. The duke made promises to her sister constantly about her being the love of his life and how he would keep her and protect her forever. For many women of their kind, that was the dream. And it did work for some.
But Arabella sometimes watched Southwater with her sister and wasn’t certain.
She shook her head. Those were troubles for another day. If Evelina needed her, she’d be there and otherwise she wasn’t about to intrude.
“You know, I could introduce you to a few gentlemen,” Arabella said. “Help you pick if you’d like.”
Julia got up and went to the sideboard where she poured them both tea and put two scones on a plate. When she returned she looked resigned. “Yes. That might be best. You’ve always been quicker to identify just the right gentleman to put in place. Perhaps I need that keen eye on my side.”
“You always have it,” Arabella said and then sighed with pleasure as she bit into her scone. “Oh, apricot. Mrs. Barnaby is a treasure.”
Julia laughed. “She is that. Where did you go last night?”
Arabella sipped her tea. “Donville.”
Both Julia’s eyebrows lifted and Arabella understood why.
She’d said many a time that she was taking her time choosing her next protector, letting the gentlemen sweat a little, gather some steam to fight for her, thus making her a bigger prize.
Going to Donville was the very opposite of that measured plan.
“Does that mean you’ve chosen someone?” Julia asked.
“No.” Arabella sighed. “I just wanted to have a little fun and forget the nastiness at Aunt Caroline’s about Father’s letter. Was Evelina very angry on the drive home?”
“You know Evelina,” Julia said. “She blustered for a bit, but it wasn’t about being angry. Father frightens her. I suppose he frightens all of us after everything he put us through. I distracted her talking about going to that new play at Covent Garden.”
Arabella pursed her lips. “Well, hopefully she’ll be past all that by the time I see her next. I wish Aunt Caroline hadn’t pressed about it. There’s nothing to be said or done.”
Julia didn’t look certain, but Arabella was pleased when she changed the subject. “So you just went to Donville to have fun. And you must have if you came creeping back into the house at dawn.”
“I did,” Arabella said.
Julia’s brow wrinkled. “What aren’t you telling me?”
Arabella hesitated and hated herself for it.
The situation regarding their father aside, she tried to be honest with her sisters, but there was something about this thing with Silas that she didn’t want to share.
And that meant she had to do just that. It was dangerous to make an affair too precious.
“Do you recall when we saw Simone a few days ago?”
Julia nodded. “You two had your heads together for a long time.”
“Yes. She told me…she told me Silas Windham was back in London.”
Her sister’s eyes widened. “ The Silas Windham?”
Arabella felt rare heat rush to her cheeks. It was one thing to talk about the man, go on about her thoughts about him when he wasn’t…real. But now he was here and very much real and it felt a little raw.
“Yes. At any rate, I went to the Donville Masquerade and he was there.”
“Well, if I know you at all, which I do, I assume you sprung at him like some gorgeous, sleek cat and sprinkled all your magic until he couldn’t resist you.”
“Something like that,” Arabella said with a chuckle. “You view me through very pretty glass, my love.”
“I think I’m fairly accurate. You are a sparkling force of nature, Arabella.”
Arabella ignored the compliment. “I did approach him, sleek cat or not, and we…there was an encounter.”
“Ah!” Julia straightened up and set her teacup down. “And how was the man who has starred in every fantasy?”
“Spectacular,” Arabella admitted on a sigh. “Oh, Lord, Julia, I haven’t felt something like that in a long time. That spark, you know? When you want something so much and then you have it and it’s so perfect.”
Her sister’s expression shifted slightly and she nodded. “I see. So is the man your protector now?”
Arabella got up and went back to the sideboard. She didn’t actually need more tea, but she shuffled around like she did so she wouldn’t have to look at her sister when she said, “Er…no. Just a lover.”
“Oh, so just a night.”
“No.” Arabella still didn’t turn. “I think I’ll play with him a while longer.”
“Arabella!”
She had to face Julia now and found her sister on her feet, hand clutched around a fistful of robe, dark blue eyes that were so like Arabella’s own wide with surprise.
“ You are the one who ground the rules of engagement into Evelina and me,” Julia said.
“Who told us both that it was a risk to play without protection. That it could reduce your value on the courtesan’s market and set a poor precedent.
And now you’re considering taking a lover for more than just a night of fun?
One who isn’t in an arrangement with you? ”
Hearing it said out loud in that tone with that shocked and slightly judgmental expression was like cold water on the heat of her night.
Arabella folded her arms. “I have never been without a protector since the first few months after I started in the life. I have a sterling reputation that I’ve worked hard to cultivate amongst the courtesans and the gentlemen.
Since I’m between gentlemen at present, why shouldn’t I have a little something for me? A treat.”
Julia rubbed a hand over her face. “I think you deserve all the treats in the world. All the fun and pleasure and anything else you want. And I know this man has captivated you for years. I just worry, Arabella. Our lives are on a knife’s edge.
One wrong step and the entire thing can come down around us.
You’ve worked too hard and sacrificed too much to deserve that to happen to you.
Even if he has the nicest cock in all of England. ”
Arabella choked out a laugh at her younger sister’s rare foray into the vulgar.
“It is a very nice cock.” She shook her head.
“I know what you’re saying. I understand the worry.
But I…I want him, Julia. And he says he won’t be here long, so I think I need to do this.
Just have something for me for a little while.
What could it be? A few days, a few weeks?
Before the Season is half-over I’ll be back beckoning them to my side, deciding whose company will best provide for me. For us.”
Julia was quiet a moment and then she nodded. “You always know best, Arabella. I know you’ll be careful.”
“I will. And now I’m going to bed because I’m exhausted.” She stepped to her sister and enveloped her in a hard hug. “You are a darling love for reminding me of the rules. I know I need to follow them and I will again. I promise I know my path.”
But as she parted from Julia and slipped away to go up to her chamber, Arabella ignored the nagging voice that told her her sister’s fears were correct.
That she might know the rules but that she was thwarting them.
And that it could end in heartbreak and ruin for her if she wasn’t very, very careful.