Married in Haste (9 page)

A musicale would be the perfect opportunity to ask such a personal question. Anne and Tess had learned long ago that some of the most public places were also the most private, since their chaperones were usually too involved with their own affairs to pay close attention.

“Yes, we should ask her tonight,” she agreed.

Two hours later, Tess found herself sitting beside Lord Merton, trotting around Hyde Park in an elegant carriage. It was obviously a hired equipage but Lord Merton had a good hand with the horses.

The day was overcast but there were still many people out taking a ride in the park. Tess knew the announcement of her engagement would be old news by the time it appeared in the papers. She said as much to Lord Merton. It was really the only intelligent thing she did say.

They sat side-by-side while Lord Merton kept a steady monologue going on about the joys of Wales.

She, who was usually so glib, felt tonguetied and nervous. She hadn’t acted this way since she’d been seventeen and presented at Court.

She was terribly aware of him. If she looked at him, she’d catch herself staring at his lips and remembering how they felt upon hers. And she couldn’t help but notice how his breeches outlined muscular thighs. Even watching him drive offered no peace. His light touch on the reins reminded her of the way he’d guided and pressed her to his will.

As he turned the horses toward home, she felt a wild impulse to confess the truth. To let him know she wasn’t a grand heiress, that she was a fraud. Yet the words could not leave her throat because such a confession would destroy the brother she loved.

At last, he escorted her to her doorstep. She faced him. “Thank you for the ride, my lord.”

He pulled off one leather driving glove. “Do you not think it is time to call me by my given name?”

“I—ah—”

“Brenn.”

“What?”

He smiled, his teeth even and white. “Brenn. That’s my name.”

She nodded, dutifully repeating, “Brenn.”

He backed down the steps. “I’ll see you this evening. Lady Ottley sent me an invitation to her musicale.

My social standing is rising.”

“You may not thank me after you hear one of her sopranos.”

He laughed, the sound easy, and she felt a bit more at ease. “I will see you later, Tess.”

She liked the sound of her name on his lips. It almost sounded different than she’d ever heard it before.

Behind her, Nestor held open the door, but she waited, watching Brenn’s tall figure walk toward his stamping horses. I’ll make a good wife to you, she promised him silently.

As if he’d heard, he turned before climbing up into the carriage and saluted her with one finger to the brim of his hat. With a snap of the reins, he was off.

Turning, Tess hurried inside, anxious to dress for the musicale. She had to talk to Leah.

Chapter Five

“Men have sticks,” Leah imported to them in a low voice that no one could have overheard above the warbling of Signora Luiguisi, Lady Ottley’s Italian soprano.

The three young women sat on the far left side of the assembled guests, close to a bank of potted palm trees. Everyone else in the crowded room appeared entranced by the singer’s vocal gymnastics—and to the casual observer Tess and the others gave the impression of attentiveness. They had all perfected the art of appearing to listen without actually doing so.

However, this piece of intelligence was too shocking.

“Sticks?” Tess exclaimed, just as the signora paused for breath. In spite of her having whispered, the word seemed to reverberate with a life of its own.

Heads turned in her direction. Lady Ottley half-stood, searching for the source of the interruption. Tess pretended to be looking for the nuisance too, although she did shoot a glance over her shoulder at Lord Merton—no, Brenn, she mentally corrected herself—to see if he had noticed.

He stood in the back of the room and if he’d heard her interruption, he gave no indication but appeared to be listening intently to the aria.

Anne jostled Tess with her elbow in a silent warning to keep her wits about her. Leah leaned closer.

“Does it bother you that he is lame?”

“I rarely notice,” Tess said from the side of her mouth, a fact which was startling, but true. The only time she’d been aware that he’d limped had been their initial meeting. On the terrace last night or even this afternoon, she hadn’t given it a thought.

“It would bother me,” Leah said with a slight shiver. “I don’t know if I would want to see him with his clothes off.”

Her words made Tess’s stomach do a little flip. Over dinner, with Brenn sitting across from her, she’d had just the opposite thought.

Interesting that out of all the men of her acquaintance, he was the first one to make her wonder about taking off clothes. “Tell me more about the stick.”

A young matron behind them rapped Tess’s shoulder with her fan and gave them a “shush.”

“Afterward, in the retiring room,” Leah whispered.

Anne gave Tess an impatient nudge. “What did she say?”

“Later. In the retiring room.”

Anne nodded.

Once Signora Luiguisi took her bow, the three young women didn’t hesitate to excuse themselves immediately to the retiring room, only to find that it was too crowded. Instead, they slipped into Lord Ottley’s library.

“Now what is this about sticks?” Tess demanded. She and Anne both sat on the leather couch.

Leah stood in front of the hearth. “Men are built differently than we are,” she lectured matter-of-factly.

“I know that,” Tess said. “I’m not a complete goose.”

“Then why are you asking me questions?” Leah said. “A man’s stick is here.” With a semi-comical gesture, she showed where the “stick” was located. The three giggled with forbidden knowledge.

Tess shook her head. “It doesn’t make sense.”

“I’m just telling you what the upstairs maid told me.”

“You mean your mother didn’t say this?” Anne asked.

Leah pulled back. “Mother would never talk of such an improper thing.”

“Did you ever ask?” Tess said, curious.

“Once. She boxed my ears and informed me my husband would tell me everything I needed to know.”

Leah slid a glance at Tess. “Did you ever ask your sister-in-law?”

“Would I be talking to you now if I had?” Tess countered tartly.

Leah warned, “You both must swear to secrecy. Mother would give the maid the boot if she’d known she’d talked about this. But the maid said, and I agree with her, that it’s wrong to keep silent and then expect a girl to know what to do on her wedding night. Or why gentlemen want to get us off alone in a dark corner and fidget around.”

“Yes, that’s what we want to know,” Anne said. “What is it that they try to do and why shouldn’t we let them? It must be something more than a kiss.”

Tess was still puzzled about the previous point. “I can’t imagine any man having a stick in his breeches.

Wouldn’t it show? Or be uncomfortable?”

Leah made an impatient sound. “It isn’t a stick all the time. It grows.”

Anne scrunched up her nose. “Grows?”

“Yes.”

“Then what is it most of the time?” Tess asked with a touch of exasperation.

“A pillow.”

Stunned, Tess and Anne glanced at each other and then burst out into laughter.

Leah stood before them, her hands on hips. “If you are going to laugh, I won’t go on.”

“We can’t help it—” Tess protested.

“Please go on!” Anne begged. “But the image is so odd. You are telling me that men have sticks that are really pillows and these are in their breeches. How do they sit? And why is it all such a mystery?”

“Would you want someone to know you had a pillow in your breeches?” Tess couldn’t resist, before hooting in the most unladylike manner possible.

“It’s not a pillow when it’s important,” Leah said. “And if you are going to mock me, I’m not going to tell you more.”

She made as if to leave the room but Tess quickly ran after her and pulled her back. She sat Leah on the couch between herself and Anne. “All right. Tell us all and I promise I won’t make light of the matter.”

Leah frowned. “I doubt if you can keep that promise. You’d laugh at anything, Tess Hamlin. But before I tell you any more, you must pledge to do a small favor for me.”

“What is it?” Tess asked.

“Never mind. Just agree or else I’ll leave.”

“All right, I will do a favor for you,” Tess said simply, “that is, if it is within my power.”

“It is,” Leah assured her. “Very well now.” She motioned them closer. “The pillow becomes a stick when a man touches you. That’s why men like to touch us so much and our mothers warn us not to let them.

Or encourage us to, if the man is rich enough,” she added bitterly.

“Then what happens?” Anne demanded. “Certainly there is more.”

“Once a man has formed his stick, he sleeps with a woman and she has a baby,” Leah finished in a no-nonsense tone.

Tess digested all of this in skeptical silence. Neil and Stella had separate rooms but she knew that from time to time they slept together. And now Stella was going to have a baby.

“Is that it, then?” Anne asked. “There must be more! What do they do with the stick?”

Leah pulled a face. “I’m not certain. But the maid said that sometimes, it is the most terrible thing that can happen to a woman. And other times, if it is with the right man, his touch will make you go warm with pleasure.”

Go warm with pleasure. Yes, that was how Tess would describe being kissed by the earl.

“And they like to touch your breasts,” Leah informed them.

Anne sat back. “Breasts? With their sticks?”

“Don’t you know anything?” Leah said. “With their hands.”

“What?” Anne said, offended. “Do they just slap their hands on them?” She looked down at her own small breasts.

“Some do,” Leah admitted, and then colored prettily at what she’d revealed. “Mother tells me there is no harm to it. She even says I must encourage them a bit.” She glanced over at Tess.

But Tess’s mind was working on other things. “It’s called ‘copulation.’”

“What is?” Leah asked.

“What happens when you sleep with a man,” Tess answered. “My governess Minnie left a copybook. It’

s like a journal where she wrote down poems and snippets of thought. I didn’t understand most of it at first. Some of it is very radical. She had ideas that Father and Neil would never have agreed with.”

“What does it say about this copulation?” Anne asked.

Tess searched her memory for the words. “Sweet, sweet copulation, I take my lover in to me.”

“That doesn’t make any sense,” Anne said.

“Poetry never does,” Leah admitted candidly, “unless some man is writing about your smile.”

“What does ‘copulation’ mean?” Anne demanded.

At that moment, the door to the library opened and four gentlemen started into the room, one of them Lord Ottley. The presence of the young women caught them up short. “Why, Miss Hamlin, I hope we aren’t disturbing you and your friends?” His curiosity at their presence in his library was obvious.

Tess mumbled some excuse about needing a moment of solitude after the signora’s brilliant performance as the three women slipped out the door.

“Do you think he overheard us?” Anne asked anxiously.

“I doubt it,” Tess assured her.

They were about join the other guests when Leah reached out and pulled Tess back. “You go on, Anne.

Tess and I will be with you in a few moments.”

Anne shot Tess an uncertain look but had no choice other than to leave them alone. Leah drew her back a few steps from the salon doorway. “Take this,” she said, pulling a small, folded piece of paper from inside the palm of her glove.

“What is it?” Tess said.

“Never mind what it is,” Leah answered. “Just see that it is delivered for me. You promised me a favor if I told you what I know about men and this is what you must do in return. This note must be sent to Captain Draycutt as soon as possible. He has quarters in Taverick Lane. And whatever you do, don’t let anyone know I gave it to you.”

Tess slipped the folded paper under her glove. “I’ll have one of my footmen deliver it, but before I do, you must tell me what it says.”

Leah’s chin came up at an obstinate angle. “Better you don’t know. But it must reach him tonight. Do you understand? Tonight.”

“Leah, is this wise?”

The younger girl’s gaze drifted to a point past Tess’s shoulders for a long moment. “Lord Tiebauld’s sister talked to my father this afternoon,” she answered, her voice carefully devoid of expression. “They argued over the marriage settlements. Father wants more. She will give it to him. It is only a matter of time before I, too, shall be a bride.”

“Oh, Leah,” Tess said in a horrified whisper. She placed her hands on Leah’s shoulders. “He is such a terrible man.”

“Is he, Tess?” Her brown eyes met Tess’s and Tess couldn’t lie to her, not when she asked with such honest emotion.

“I’ve only heard whispers,” she admitted.

“What do they say?”

Tess didn’t know if it wouldn’t be kinder to keep silent.

“Please,” Leah asked. “My mother tells me nothing and when Lord Tiebauld’s sister calls she is unusually quiet.”

“It’s nothing really, only something I overheard Stella say.” She looked over her shoulder to be sure that no one was listening. “It is whispered that he is little more than a heathen.”

A shiver went through Leah. “Are you superstitious, Tess?”

“I try not to be. Minnie always said superstition was a sign of ignorance.”

“Then I shall not be superstitious. But I don’t want to leave my fate up to my parents.” She grasped Tess

’s hand. “Deliver the note for me. I beg you.”

“It shall be done.”

“Thank you.” With those words, Leah turned and walked into the salon.

Tess thought her incredibly brave. The folded note felt strange in the palm of her hand. She would see it delivered immediately, but first she should go into the salon and make an appearance else Neil or Stella thought something was amiss.

She walked toward the salon but caught sight of Brenn talking to a group of three men just inside the doorway. She stopped and, for a moment, studied him.