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“He wasn’t able to satisfy her,” Stella said, throwing him a sad look.

Silvester’s hand was sliding up her leg, but it stopped. “No?”

“Thank goodness, she brought her dildo with her when she changed establishments.”

Silvester choked, and his fingers curled into the soft curve of Stella’s thigh. “Indeed?”

“As she told him, her dildo never bent or folded, but always stood as stiff as if made of steel.”

“This was written in the 1600s?”

Stella nodded. “Is your surprise related to her resourceful use of a specialized tool, or the historical pervasiveness of the problem?”

Silvester laughed. “Historical pervasiveness?” His left arm tightened around her. “It’s not a problem I’ve experienced. May I prove it to you?”

Stella tipped her head back to meet his eyes. The heavy mass of her hair fell over the side of his armchair. Her hair was redder than he had thought, closer to dark mahogany.

He caught up a silky lock. “Your hair is darker than I knew.”

“My aunt prefers me to pull it back and wear a light powder to dull the color,” Stella said calmly.

Anger thudded through Silvester’s gut. “She doesn’t like your freckles, or your reading, or your spectacles, nor your hair either?”

Stella looked at him with evident surprise. “It’s not really Mrs. Thyme’s fault. After I was orphaned, she was forced to confront dreams she had buried, about having a daughter of her own.”

“So?”

“I was not what she would have hoped for. My mother and her sister were known as the two lilies when they debuted. They were both very elegant. Deportment and distinction were important to my mother.” She gave him a mischievous grin. “She would have liked you.”

Silvester’s arms closed around her like a vise. He had a sudden vision of how he would feel if a small, befreckled daughter of his was treated unkindly by the likes of Mrs. Thyme. “If your aunt were a man, I could challenge her to a duel,” he said, his voice coming out with grim intent.

Stella chuckled. “Don’t be silly!”

“I’m not.” He said it flatly.

“My aunt was never cruel to me,” Stella said. “She was always kind, and so was my uncle, though I believe he thinks of me as a gourd that has taken too long to ripen.”

“How is it kind to treat you like a green gourd?”

“Kindness is allowing me to wear spectacles though my aunt abhors them. Respecting my decision not to paint my face. Not complaining too much when I break things because of my imperfect vision.”

“Hmm.”

“Allowing Specs to stay in my bedchamber even though my aunt dislikes animals. Though not, it turns out, kittens.”

“That’s not kindness. That’s sufferance.”

“I wouldn’t have been their choice, their first choice,” Stella said.

The words hung in the air between them. She hadn’t been his first choice, either, and they both knew it.

Banishing the thought, Silvester tipped up Stella’s face and caught her mouth in a kiss. He tried to say with the stroke of his tongue what he didn’t seem to be able to articulate: what he felt for Yasmin was nothing like the driving, raw desire he felt for Stella.

Yasmin had been his first choice.

But a first choice is not always the right choice. The day would come when Mrs. Thyme understood how lucky she was to have a niece who loved her enough to understand her terror and tolerate her hysterics.

Silvester didn’t express the thought, though, because he had Stella’s luscious, curved body in his arms. He wanted to make love to her more than he had wanted anything in his life. Desire slammed into his mind as he tried to communicate the wild craving that was ravaging his body.