Striving to sound calm and unflustered, she said, “What was that about?”
He said coolly, as if the answer were obvious, “As I said, it’s a time-honored way of sealing an agreement.”
His words, like a dash of cold water, brought her to her senses. This was what lords did. Take what they felt like, no care for anyone else. “Hah! So you kiss your horse coper like that when you buy a horse, do you? Or your wine merchant when he agrees to deliver wine?”
“Of course not. Men usually shake hands on an agreement, but ladies”—he grinned, a purely wicked grin—“ladies don’t shake hands with gentlemen, do they? So what else was I to do?”
She couldn’t think of a response. Truth to tell, she was still dazzled by the effects of his kiss. She tried for a withering look, but he stood there looking smug, handsome and annoyingly unwithered.
The buzz of conversation inside suddenly rose. Laughter and exclamations floated out onto the night air.
“The unmasking has begun,” he said. “I’ll go inside first. Wouldn’t do for us both to appear together, especially with you looking as though you’ve just been thoroughly kissed.”
She rubbed at her mouth as if he’d somehow branded her. What did “thoroughly kissed” look like anyway? She pressed her hands against her hot cheeks to cool them.
At the steps leading up to the ballroom, he turned and looked back. “And by the way, that permission-to-waltz thing? I’m fairly sure it applies only to Almack’s, not at a private ball.”
“Now you tell me—” she began wrathfully, but he was gone.
She sat back down, not yet ready to return to the ballroom and play her part. Some people had come out onto the terrace to cool down after the dance, but most would be going in to supper.
She was betrothed. To Lord Thornton.
It was the last thing she’d expected. No, the kiss was the last thing she’d expected. Why had he done it?
She removed her mask, ran her hands lightly over her hair and the circlet of vines, and checked the rest of her costume. She appeared to have lost a few leaves, but other than that, everything seemed quite intact.
Taking a few deep, steadying breaths, Lucy returned to the ballroom.
Chapter Thirteen
Shortly after five the following day, Alice went to keep her appointment with Lady Peplowe. She was absurdly nervous.
She’d arranged for Lucy to walk in the park with Penny Peplowe while Alice was visiting Lady Peplowe. It would ensure their privacy.
The girls headed off with a footman and maid in attendance, and Alice was shown into the drawing room. Nobody seeing this part of the house would imagine a grand ball had been held there the previous evening. Everything was immaculate. The servants must have been working since before dawn.
Lady Peplowe was seated in the bow window. She patted a chair in a welcoming gesture. “Good afternoon, Lady Charlton. I’m just watching our girls heading off to the park and wishing I had half their energy. It’s going to take me days to recover from the ball, but they bounce right back, bless them.”
Alice forced a smile. Her stomach was a tight knot. “I know how you feel.”
“Nonsense, you’re still young yourself. That peach walking dress really suits Lucy, doesn’t it? I do so like it when young girls wear colors instead of the endless white so many affect.”
Tea and biscuits were brought in, and while they drank and ate—or rather, Lady Peplowe drank and ate; Alice was too nervous—they chatted about the ball and the costumes and how much everyone had enjoyed it. Alice did her best, all the while nerving herself to broach the dreaded subject. Finally it simply burst from her. “I need to ask you a personal question, Lady Peplowe. Very personal, I mean.”
The older woman gave her a shrewd glance and set down her teacup. “Of course.” She added with a smile, “I might not answer it, but I promise I will respect a confidence.”
That would suffice. “It’s about the . . . the marriage bed.”
Lady Peplowe’s elegantly plucked brows rose. “So you can prepare Lucy, I presume. But surely, after your marriage—”
“It’s not the, er, mechanics, I’m asking about. It’s—” She broke off, feeling her cheeks heat. She recalled Lord Tarrant’s words. “Did you ever find it . . . pleasant? Pleasurable I mean? Because I’m told most women . . .” She couldn’t finish. It was too humiliating.
There was a short silence. Lady Peplowe’s brows knotted, and she took a deep breath. “I never did like that husband of yours,” she said briskly. “Are you saying that you never . . . ?”
Alice, face aflame, shook her head.
“The selfish pig!” The older lady reached out and patted Alice on the hand. “Well, thank goodness it’s not too late to learn.”
Alice blinked. “But I’ll be forty in a few years.”
Lady Peplowe chuckled. “And I’ll be sixty. But the good news, my dear, is that it only gets better with age and experience.”
Better? Alice struggled to hide her amazement. It had never occurred to her that older ladies might still do that. Even though there was no chance of children.
“I married young, and for love,” Lady Peplowe began. She glanced at the overmantel, where a family portrait hung. Alice followed her gaze. Lord Peplowe was a nondescript-looking man of medium height. These days he was balding and with a paunch, but Alice had seen the fond way his wife looked at him.
“I was just eighteen, and Peplowe had just turned one-and-twenty.” She sighed reminiscently. “We were both so innocent—my mother had prepared me for my wedding night by telling me to do as my husband bid me, and Peplowe, well, his papa had died when he was twelve, and he’d never been one of those boys who chased after women—we’d grown up together you see.”
She chuckled. “A pair of ignorant virgins we were. Oh, we fumbled around and managed to get the deed done, but it was awkward and uncomfortable and quite ridiculously strange. But we both assumed that was how it was done, so we persisted.” She took a sip of tea, grimaced and rang for a fresh pot.
“But we both had the feeling that there ought to be something more—I mean, what the poets go on about was nothing like what we were finding, and we were in love.” She glanced at Alice. “And then Peplowe had the great good sense to seek out a courtesan.”
Alice gasped.
“A retired one,” Lady Peplowe hastened to assure her. “You don’t think I’d let him actually do anything with another woman, do you?” She laughed. “She was a good deal older, but a woman of great experience, and she explained to him just exactly how things worked, and what he should do to make it better. And even what I should do. Courtesans know all about how to pleasure men—some of them, the most surprising things. I don’t think anyone ever asks them how to please a woman, but she was happy to instruct my darling Peplowe.”