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A smile instantly lit up the woman’s face, her fingers going to her lips. “Delightful.”
Pen offered her a hesitant grin, then bit into the gingerbread. Delightful, yes, but Pen could barely taste it for how much trouble she was having not shoving the whole thing into her mouth all at once. One bite at a time. Make Mama June proud.
The woman took another bite, chewing it slowly as she watched the madcap crowd at the market. After a few minutes, her gaze swung to Pen. “I am Daphne Bannon. Your name, dove?”
“Pen. Penelope Willington.” Pen’s mouth clamped closed, the gingerbread drying to powder on her tongue.Dammit.She shouldn’t have said her name. Damn her mind for not even thinking to lie. If she wasn’t so hungry and concentrating so hard on eating slowly, she might have realized her error before uttering her name out loud.
So stupid.Percival and his hangman’s noose were coming for her—so she couldn’t be Penelope Willington anymore—never again.
Pen took a sip of her tea, washing down the gingerbread determined to stick to her tongue.
The kindest smile crossed Daphne’s lips. “Ah, dove—you look like I just tossed you into the Thames. I don’t need to know your name. I’ll forget I ever heard it. I understand because I was once where you are now.”
“Daphne is not your given name?”
The smile on her face grew wider, her eyes twinkling as she shook her head. “So—Pen—you would like to keep that part?”
Pen nodded, her eyes wide.
Daphne looked up at the stone arches of the piazza for a long moment. “How about Pen—Penrose Smith? One cannot swing a riding crop without hitting a Smith.”
A hesitant smile lifted the corners of Pen’s mouth. “That…that sounds doable.”
“Excellent.” Daphne patted her knee. “You must tell me, where were you headed? You looked to be in a hurry.”
Pen took the last bite of her gingerbread, chewing and swallowing before answering. “I don’t think you want to know.”
“Try me.”
Pen glanced over her shoulder in the general direction she’d been aimed toward, her voice small. “The rookeries. A brothel. The first one that would take me.”
Daphne paused, her head tilting to the side as she stared at Pen. “Have you ever done anything like that before?”
Pen gave a slight shake of her head, refusing to meet Daphne’s eyes.
Daphne nudged a second gingerbread into her hand. “All the brothels would take you, dove. That wouldn’t be a problem.”
Pen’s look shot to her. “You’re not judging me?”
She shook her head. “I thought about doing it once myself, a long time ago. But then I discovered how I didn’t need to when I had one pivotal stroke of luck.”
The slightest glimmer of hope lit in Pen’s gut. “What was your stroke of luck?”
“I caught the eye of a man in Hyde Park—a rich man. He turned to look at me—a pig he was, truly. He was promenading with a woman—her hand in the crook of his arm—and he turned around to stare at me.”
“You are quite beautiful.”
She shrugged as she took a sip of her tea. “Beauty will only get you so far.” Her hand flitted into the air. “Anyway, the oddest thing happened—the woman that pig was with left him and came back to find me. She was his wife and she wanted to buy the hat off my head. She thought the hat was what had made the man look at me. That is when the luck of the idea hit me.”
“What was the idea?” Pen took a bite of the new gingerbread—she could taste it for real now that her ravenous belly was only irritably hungry.
“I could sell beauty. That’s what I do, how I am able to support myself. I sell beauty without selling my body. It’s what these women want—what many of them want most in life.” Her hand swept out toward the crowd of people. “They want a man’s head to turn to them, these forgotten wives of theton.It could be their husband’s head. Or their husband’s best friend’s head. Or a stranger’s head. They are not picky. These women just want someone to look at them. To want them. They want to matter.”
Pen’s brows pulled together. “How do you sell beauty?”
“I put something beautiful on someone beautiful and they line up to buy it. These women think a hat, a bauble, a fan, or a bracelet might just gain the attention they are so desperate for. I have made a business of sourcing those things and then selling them to the finest ladies and their friends. I am far below their station so they don’t find me a threat, especially when I only sell my collections to women. And I am very careful not to give any men in their spheres any attention.”
“That is amazing.” Even as the words came from her mouth, Pen’s heart sank a little. As wonderful a story as this was, Daphne’s business was so far beyond Pen’s capability at the moment, it hurt to even think about it.
