Page 90 of Love and the Shameless Lady

“Back to your mutual seduction,” Julian said, rather like a governess guiding a pupil back to the point of the lesson.

Daisy tried not to balk. She wanted this lesson. Even if it turned out badly, at least it would be over with.

“I think he wanted to bed a lady, to see if it felt different from a common woman. I just wanted to find out what it was like.” She paused. “No, that’s not true. I did it to upset my mother.” A sob rose in her throat. “It was horrid of me. I knew it would hurt her dreadfully. I suppose, in my heart of hearts, I knew it might kill her. I’m not a good person, you know.”

“You are an angel. You take splinters out of the feet of snarling dogs. You think about others’ feelings and even forgive spiteful cousins. To continue with this diversion, though, may I ask why you wanted to upset your mother?”

“Because she wouldn’t stop saying horrid things about Colin. She ceased talking to him when he was twelve years old because my sister Emma drowned.”

“Yes, I remember, you told me that earlier.”

“She blamed it on Colin, which wasn’t the least bit fair. Emma wasn’t a baby. She shouldn’t have gone to the river alone. Colin is the best brother in the world. I think you’ll like him.”

“I’m sure I shall.”

“My mother was one of those people who talks a lot, and all the talking she might have done to Colin, she did to me, so I got a double dose of her grief and anger and-and hatred. How could she hate her own son? It made me love Colin all the more. I didn’t see him much, though. He was away at school and then at Oxford, and then he went to London and became a rake.”

She sighed. “My nurse, Mrs. Fletcher, did her best to shield and comfort me until she was pensioned off. I visit her sometimes, and she is always kind to me. To Colin, too. Her son is Colin’s valet.”

Julian said nothing, and Daisy realized that she was rambling again. “Now that I can see it more clearly, I realize that Mama was afraid she would lose me, too. She went everywhere with me, talking unceasingly, warning me of the world’s dangers. Not merely the kind of accident that had taken Emma, but rakes and ravishers and so on. She wouldn’t even let me walk to the village alone or with my governess. I appealed to Colin, who allowed me to go to school in Leicestershire, which made her hate him all the more. But soon I was too old for school and had to stay at home. Mama refused to take me to London. She said Colin’s pernicious influence would ruin me. She moaned about how tedious it was, stuck in Lancashire with me. She even—”

“What?”

Daisy shook her head, then swallowed her pride. “Sometimes, when I said or did something she didn’t like, she said Emma would have been a better daughter, not a bore like me. She wished Emma had lived and I had died instead.”

“Good God.”

“I just wanted to get away from her. Can you understand?” Daisy loathed the pleading note in her voice.

“Completely.” Julian’s voice was cold. “So that’s why you dislike the word boring.”

She shrugged. It wasn’t, not really. Well, maybe partly, but she didn’t want to enlarge on that particular subject. “And then I met Reggie.”

“A handsome, swashbuckling smuggler.”

She let out a tiny, mirthless chuckle. “Yes, he was handsome, and he certainly seemed swashbuckling, like a pirate from a romantic novel. Now that I am acquainted with many smugglers, I realize most are ordinary men doing a dangerous job, and bravado is sometimes necessary. In any event, he came out of the village inn just as I dropped a hatbox, and he bowed politely and restored it to me.”

“At which point your mother almost had an apoplectic fit.”

She flinched.

“Another faux pas on my part?”

“She didn’t have apoplexy until later. That day in the village, she took my arm and steered me away, but not before our eyes had met. It was instantaneous lust on both sides. Not that I knew much about lust, having been so sheltered, but my mother couldn’t control my imagination. In my innocence, I thought he loved me. I thought I would be the one Warren to prove that love existed. So stupid of me! To make a long story short, chance encounters led to assignations. Kissing him was exciting.”

“I’ve noticed how much you enjoy kissing.”

Daisy felt herself blushing. “Yes, but I was led to believe doing more would be even better.”

Julian took her hand. “It can be. It will be. Love makes a big difference to enjoyment.”

She frowned, finding this absurd, but reminded herself once again that Melinda had said much the same. “Why should that be?”

“Because the loved one’s enjoyment is as precious as one’s own, if not more so.”

“What a beautiful thought.”

“And perhaps because one can be oneself.”