His hand trembled over the glass, and a few stray drops of liquor splashed onto the surface of the desk.Hell. He’d requested frankness for himself; it was hardly fair to expect her to couch her own speech in oblique references. “Yes,” he said. “But it was just once, well before my injury—before I went off to war.” A pretty young barmaid he’d met one evening before he’d shipped out. He’d been young, shy, and completely inexperienced. Hadn’t really known what he was meant to do. It had been only a quick tumble, which had been satisfying enough for him, but almost certainly less so for her, though he’d been too embarrassed to ask.
“Why?” she asked. “Surely there were women in the camp that would have made themselves available had you an interest.”
“Officers’ wives and daughters,” he said. “I’d not have touched them out of respect for my fellow officers. There were, occasionally, women who came to camp to sell their services, but I’d seen how quickly certain ailments spread through the infantry. Thought it best not to risk it myself.” There was nothing quite like waking to the agonized cries of a fellow soldier who had gone to relieve himself in the morning only to discover that his prick burned when he pissed.
“Probably wise,” she mused. “I treated many of those men, saw firsthand what ravages those diseases could inflict. I always chosemy benefactors with care for that reason. I can think few things worse than falling victim to a disease for which there is no cure, given to me by someone less scrupulous than myself.”
“So you have some methods, then, of preventing them?” he inquired.
“And pregnancy,” she said, “which would be ruinous in my line of work. Condoms, always, and an herbal tea once daily. Of course it has been some time since I’ve had a need for it, which suits me well enough, because it is dreadful bitter.”
“You’ve had no lovers since your retirement?”
“No, though not for any particular lack of offers. You sacrifice a great deal,” she said, “when you are a mistress. There is no great expectation of privacy even within your own home, for your benefactor might choose to drop round at any moment. And it is neveryourhome, buthis—the one he leases for you, for the duration of your arrangement.” She took a thoughtful sip from the glass in her hand. “I suppose,” she added, pensively, “that I have grown too much accustomed to the precious privacy I’ve attained. I find I am not particularly eager to cede it to someone else. Even a lover.”
“I think I understand, at least a little,” he said. “I’ve been something of a hermit these last years.” Tucked away in a small cottage, and it had been…pleasant, even if it had also been lonely. There had been no one to gawk at him, no one to whisper behind his back. “My return to England has been a difficult one. I am the object of much speculation.” He hesitated. Reached for the decanter and refilled her glass, which had grown dangerously close to empty. “I don’t want a mistress,” he said. “I could have paid a woman for at least the pretense of looking past my face, if that was of any interest to me.”
Charity canted her head, and an artful curl slipped down the side of her neck, smooth and shiny in the lamplight. “So not since before the war for you?”
“No.” Probably it should have shamed him to admit to it, but thus far she had reserved judgment upon him, for whichever reasons she might have. “I am not…particularly practiced,” he said. “And men are easily pleased, I’ll admit. I don’t want a mistress to pleaseme. It would be more apt to say—to say that what I require is a tutor. A woman to teach me how to please her, so that I will have some certainty that the woman who becomes my wife will not suffer me in the bed chamber.”
“You realize,” she said dryly, “that a courtesan is a purveyor of pleasure, not a receiver of it.”
“You have got the experience which I lack,” he said. “And I would be grateful for the benefit of it.” He poured himself a glass of liquor, and confessed, “It is not easy to be the object of fear or disgust for the unfortunate arrangement of one’s features. It is less easy still to admit to one’s deficiencies, when one knows one might be mocked for them. I think you might well be the first,” he said, “not to do so, when given the opportunity. I think I could learn more from you than only how to give pleasure.”
“What do you mean?” she asked, and the tip of her finger slipped around the edge of her glass in a slow circle.
“I think you could teach me how to rise above such concerns, as you have.” Because she carried herself with an unshakable poise, an air of such self-possession that he could hardly conceive of ever attaining for himself. Like the duchess she was, even if her position was temporary at best. So far above such things that not even the worst of slurs could touch her unassailable pride. “I think you could teach me how to be…contented.”
“Confident,” she said simply.
“Comfortable in my own skin,” he countered. “Or—the skin that is left to me.”
“First, you must stop doing that,” she said. “You must stop speaking of yourself in such terms. You must stop even thinkingin them.”
“How am I to do that?” He flattened his palm upon the surface of the desk, tented his fingers. “How did you do it?”
A small shrug, which set that loose curl rolling down over her shoulder. “Perhaps I have always been a little more subversive than is considered acceptable,” she said. “I decided I would not accept criticism from anyone who has not themselves been in my position. People may render their judgment, Captain—”
“But you don’t have to accept it.” She had said as much before.
“That’s it. That’s it exactly.” She favored him with a smile. “So when they do, I simply disregard it.”
“I wish I could do the same.” He wished he had half so much strength as she did, half so much self-assuredness.
“You can. I cannot pretend that it will always be easy. But you’ve come out the other side of war. You can weather theTon, Captain.”
“You say that,” he said, “but sometimes I think I’d rather brave a battlefield than a ballroom. At least I’d be armed.”
Her melodious laugh rippled through the air, and the sound of it trickled to his ears, warm and sweet as honey. For a moment, Anthony found himselfstunned by it. He could not recall the last time he had made someone—anyone—laugh like that. With pure, genuine amusement rather than mockery.
“You cannot take a musket into a ballroom,” she said, the last hum of her laughter lingering still upon her lips. “But every duke comes equipped with a cutting glare, or so I am given to understand. That must be your weapon of choice. Only make judicious use of it.” At last she sobered, straightened in her seat, and drained the last of her liquor. “Your eyepatch,” she said. “Will you remove it?”
The dread that skittered down the back of his neck felt as cold as if someone had dumped a bowl of ice down his collar. “Why?”
“Because I would like to see how it has healed.”
“Why?” he asked again, rattled, and it was an effort not to use that cutting glare upon her.
