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Max studied her pale, drawn, beautiful face. She was honest and she’d been badly used. He didn’t know what to say, but he had to offer what comfort he could. “Then you were forced into this work. You had no choice.” He wanted to exonerate her, but she wouldn’t have it.
“I had a choice. I could have worked my fingers to the bone and perhaps, with time, I’d have managed to win the affections of a man who’d have me as an honest woman.” She grimaced. “Lord knows, it’s not possible to survive on the wage of a draper’s assistant without learning the necessary economies that must support such a position. And even then, an unforeseen need for a doctor or pharmacist often meant there was not enough left of my wage to both put food on the table for the week and keep a roof over my head. What little I knew about money was that there was never enough of it. I was always late with the rent and constantly threatened with eviction. But you’re wrong. I did have a choice. And I chose to present myself on Madame Chambon’s doorstep the very next day because I’d heard her name spoken with the utmost contempt because she traded in Cyprians. Lightskirts. Barques of Frailty. Prostitutes. And that’s what Cedric had said I was. Not only had he said it, but he’d proved it. I knew it in my heart, and now my grandmother knew it. I can’t change my past. I am destined for hell and damnation; however, I still have some years on Earth which I would like to spend as pleasant
ly as possible. I have no intention of going to a nunnery to repent or throwing myself into thankless hard labour just to keep from starving. Women don’t earn enough to keep themselves, and I’ll not sell my body on a street corner for a few shillings just to keep ahead of the creditors. Lord Bainbridge is going to set me up. The arrangements have almost been finalised. Two weeks from now, after I have fulfilled my obligations to you, I shall leave Madame Chambon’s to become Lord Bainbridge’s mistress.”
Max felt unaccountably discomposed. There was such bleakness in her tone. Her judgement of herself was so harsh and cold.
“Surely you could go back home? Your grandmother could not be so unfeeling as to refuse to take you in. And there’s your sister. You need to think of her.”
“My sister is dead.”
She said it so flatly, yet the pain that flashed across her face was greater than that which she’d shown when recounting her own miserable situation.
He wasn’t sure what to say.
“Emily died of typhoid last year. She’s buried in the village of Ruislip which is where my grandmother lives and where I have no intention of ever returning. So, you see, I have no one to be good for.” She smiled and touched his face. “And I am certainly not here to be good, Max.” She rose, her delicate, long-fingered hands hovering at the buttons at her throat. “Please Max, I know you invited me here to prove you have scruples. But you didn’t have to prove that for I already knew it, just as I know that in less than a week, there will be nothing more between us.”
Max closed his eyes and tried to subdue the violent impulses that were warring within his breast and, quite as uncontrollably, in his groin. His whole being ached for this woman. For her touch, light and delicate upon his bare skin, that never failed to whip him into the most exquisite delight, a precursor to a myriad of intense sensations and ultimately devastating satisfaction that was the inevitable culmination.
She wanted this. It wasn’t an act. He wasn’t paying her extra. This was no additional bargain. It was simply a coming together through want and need.
And he needed it as much as she did. For she satisfied his need for closeness with a woman like no woman ever had. Being in her arms made him feel a sense of freedom and fulfilment he’d not felt before.
Chapter 10
Noon was far too early for Max to present himself to anyone. Certainly after the excesses of the night before. So, to discover that not only his grandfather, but his grandfather’s old friend and neighbour, Lord Camberwell were awaiting him in his drawing room was a shock of the highest order.
Hesitating before the door, he wondered if he should make an ignominious exit through the scullery. Perhaps he could pay Violet a call.
Immediately he realised Violet was not available to him for such spontaneous visits. He’d have to gird his loins and face what he must without her.
Feeling unaccountably forlorn at the thought, he turned the doorknob and opened the door, pushing back his shoulders to face the occupants of the light and elegant, high-ceilinged room, who were currently engaged in drinking tea but who would soon focus their frighteningly incisive scrutiny upon himself.
“Hello Mabel,” he said with commendable lack of irony as he stepped forward to greet his errant would-be-bride. “This is a surprise.”
She nodded her neatly coiffured head and fixed him with her intense green eyes, the most surprising feature in her pleasant, serene face, though there was nothing he could see that was precisely wrong with her mouth, which was turning up at the corners. Except that it completely failed to move him as did the full, soft, rosebud lips that belonged to Violet Lilywhite.
And as an image flashed through his mind of the violent sensations Miss Violet Lilywhite had evoked upon him during the three notable occasions this past fortnight that had changed his life, he reflected that he’d never actually kissed Mabel’s lips.
Nor had he ever wanted to.
“Not an unpleasant one, I hope.”
To his surprise, she rose and went towards him, stopping in the middle of the floor as she looked between Lord Granville and Max. “I think we need to talk, Max.” She smiled an apology at Aunt Euphemia who, Max noted, looked as if she didn’t know what to say, and his grandfather who reclined in his wingback chair looking like a kingmaker as he smiled upon the pair.
“Yes, Max. You and Mabel should enjoy the sunshine on this beautiful morning. Mabel has something to say to you.” He patted his checked waistcoat, his iron-gray moustache twitching, signalling the smile he was trying to suppress.
And Max felt the dread seep up from the soles of his shoes as he added, “I think it will make you very happy.”
It was afternoon by the time Violet opened her eyes and focused on the flock wallpaper of her small room.
The smell of burnt toast wafted through the cracks in the floorboards, and the chatter of girls and servants going about their business in the passage outside her room was mildly disturbing when all she wanted was silence.
She closed her eyes and hugged herself, imagining she was in Max’s embrace and the pressure around her ribcage and breasts came from his strong arms.
Last night, she’d experienced every emotion to be had. There’d been the shame of confession; the brazenness of putting into words the baseness of what she wanted.
And then the sweet joy of fulfillment.
