Chapter 9 #2
“We know how often we’ll spend time together, how we’ll interact in public. And…” She trailed off because the other rule she was about to tell her sister was the very one he’d suggested they change after that heated kiss in the carriage two nights before.
“Will he fuck you?”
Evelina jerked her head up. “Gracious, leave it to you to be so damned direct about it.”
Arabella shrugged one shoulder lightly. “It’s part of my charm. Will he?”
“Well, at first we agreed that wouldn’t happen. That we would be only friends and partners in this deception. But then…then something happened after the opera.”
“Something?” Arabella’s brows lifted. “Is it the something I think it was?”
“We didn’t go to bed if that’s what you’re thinking.” Her sister looked almost disappointed but didn’t interrupt. “But we did kiss. Not for show like it’s been before…but a real kiss, in the privacy of the rig.”
“I see. And how was that?”
“It’s been a long time since someone kissed me like that. Like I was breath, do you know what I mean? Like he might starve if he couldn’t devour me.”
Arabella smiled gently. “I do know. That’s a hell of a kiss for two people who aren’t going to mix business and pleasure.”
“It was,” Evelina agreed. “Afterward, he asked if I wanted to renegotiate the terms of our arrangement. He left me to think about it and said we could discuss it the next time we meet.”
“Which is?”
“Tomorrow night,” Evelina said. “We’re going to a soiree at the home of a mistress of one of his friends. He sent me the details yesterday.”
“With any pressure to consider making your connection more than a kiss?” Arabella asked.
“None at all,” she said. “But I think I must have an answer when we next meet. So that we don’t get things mixed up and one or both of us gets even more hurt than we already have been. So it is real or not real?”
Arabella wrinkled her brow. “It’s very rarely real for women in our position, you know. We build sandcastles around it, we might even enjoy it and truly care for the men we align with, but Evelina, most of us don’t expect a future. You had something different with Harry, but that was rare.”
“And very much a lie,” Evelina said with a shiver.
“All I’m saying is that you don’t have to choose sex or pretend. You can have orgasms and fun and still have it be meaningless beyond your desire to the same end. It can be brief and leave you unscarred.”
“I was never very good at that part,” Evelina said.
“No. For a variety of reasons scarring seems like it’s always been part of your journey.” Arabella covered her hand. “And Julia is little better. She’s been chasing a fairytale since we rescued her from Father’s traps and brought her here into the life.”
“Funny that you, the only pragmatic one, is the one who ended up with the fairytale,” Evelina said.
Arabella blushed now and it was such a rare thing that Evelina caught her breath to see it. “It is a fairytale,” her sister agreed. “Sometimes I think I don’t deserve it. But it’s mine and I won’t return the life Silas and I share.”
“Nor should you.” Evelina sighed. “I know you’re right about the passion part. That I can have passion without love, or the hope of a future.”
“If that’s what you want,” Arabella stressed. “So is it? Do you want him?”
Evelina shivered because the question set off a cascade of reaction through her body that she had no control over.
“Oh, Arabella, I haven’t wanted anyone but Harry for so long.
It almost feels like betraying him to say yes.
But yes. Yes, when Vaughn kissed me all I wanted was for him to ask me to go upstairs.
To press me against any surface that would bear our weight and just take me until I could forget all the pain and heartbreak of the last six weeks. ”
“That sounds like as good a reason to do it as any.” Arabella smiled. “It will certainly make your outward appearances be more genuine. The passion will look real between you because it will be real.”
“So you’re advising that I tell him I want to change the perimeters of the agreement?”
“Yes, so long as you can separate your heart and your body, why not? Have orgasms and fun and not just revenge. In fact, perhaps the orgasms and fun would be the better revenge for both of you.”
“I’ll consider it,” Evelina said, and then shook her head. “Oh, but I can’t talk about it anymore. You mentioned a moment ago that Julia was little better than I am about love. What do you think of her viscount? I’ve only met him in passing.”
Arabella rolled her eyes. “Oh, you know how men like that are. Silas and I bumped into them at a club and he was fine. Rather like a potato, but not entirely unpalatable. She seems like she’s keeping her head about herself, but I’d like to keep monitoring her if you don’t mind doing the same.”
Evelina nodded and she and Arabella began a conversation about the logistics of how to act as nursemaid to their youngest sister without it being too obvious.
But even as they did so, Evelina couldn’t help but wonder how much she, herself, needed an angel over her shoulder so she wouldn’t forget herself.
She’d done it once and she had to be careful never to do it again, no matter what she decided when it came to Lord Blackburn and his drugging, seducing kisses.