“You know,” Eloise said, three days after Colin and Penelope made their surprise announcement, “it’s really a pity that Lady Whistledown has retired, because this would have been the coup of the decade.”
“Certainly from Lady Whistledown’s viewpoint,” Penelope murmured, lifting her teacup to her lips and keeping her eyes trained on the wall clock in Lady Bridgerton’s informal drawing room. Better not to look at Eloise directly. She had a way of noticing secrets in a person’s eyes.
It was funny. Penelope had gone years without worrying that Eloise would discover the truth about Lady Whistledown. At least, not worrying overmuch. But now that Colin knew, it somehow felt as if her secret were floating about in the air, like particles of dust just waiting to form into a cloud of knowledge.
Maybe the Bridgertons were like dominoes. Once one found out, it was only a matter of time before they all fell.
“What do you mean?” Eloise asked, breaking into Penelope’s nervous thoughts.
“If I recall correctly,” Penelope said, very carefully, “she once wrote that she would have to retire if I ever married a Bridgerton.”
Eloise’s eyes bugged out. “She did?”
“Or something like that,” Penelope said.
“You’re joking,” Eloise said, making a “pffft” sort of sound as she waved her hand dismissively. “She would never have been that cruel.”
Penelope coughed, not really thinking that she could end the topic by faking a biscuit crumb in her throat, but trying nonetheless.
“No, really,” Eloise persisted. “What did she say?” “I don’t recall, precisely.”
“Try.”
Penelope stalled by setting her cup down and reaching for another biscuit. They were alone for tea, which was odd. But Lady Bridgerton had dragged Colin off on some errand regarding the upcoming wedding—set for only a month hence!—and Hyacinth was off shopping with Felicity, who had, upon hearing Penelope’s news, thrown her arms around her sister and shrieked her delight until Penelope’s ears had gone numb.
As far as sisterly moments went, it had been something wonderful.
“Well,” Penelope said, chewing on a bite of biscuit, “I believe she said that if I married a Bridgerton, it would be the end of the world as she knew it, and as she wouldn’t be able to make heads or tails of such a world, she would have to retire immediately.”
Eloise stared at her for a moment. “That’s not a precise recollection?” “One doesn’t forget things like that,” Penelope demurred.
“Hmmmph.” Eloise’s nose wrinkled with disdain. “Well, that was rather horrid of her, I must say. Now I doubly wish she were still writing, because she would have to eat an entire gaggle of crow.”
“Do crows gather in gaggles?”
“I don’t know,” Eloise replied promptly, “but they should.”
“You’re a very good friend, Eloise,” Penelope said quietly.
“Yes,” Eloise said with an affected sigh, “I know. The very best.”
Penelope smiled. Eloise’s breezy reply made it clear that she wasn’t in the mood for emotion or nostalgia. Which was fine. There was a time and a place for everything. Penelope had said what she wanted to say, and she
knew that Eloise returned the sentiment, even if she preferred to joke and tease at that moment.
“I must confess, though,” Eloise said, reaching for another biscuit, “you and Colin did surprise me.”
“We surprised me as well,” Penelope admitted wryly.
“Not that I’m not delighted,” Eloise hastened to add. “There is no one I’d rather have as a sister. Well, aside from the ones I already have, of course. And if I’d ever dreamed the two of you were inclined in that direction, I’m sure I would have meddled horribly.”
“I know,” Penelope said, laughter forcing her lips up at the corners. “Yes, well”—Eloise waved the comment away—“I’m not known for
minding my own business.”
“What’s that on your fingers?” Penelope asked, leaning forward for a better look.
“What? That? Oh, nothing.” But she settled her hands in her lap nonetheless.
“It’s not nothing,” Penelope said. “Let me see. It looks like ink.” “Well, of course it does. It is ink.”
“Then why didn’t you say so when I asked?”
“Because,” Eloise said pertly, “it’s none of your business.”
Penelope drew back in shock at Eloise’s sharp tone. “I’m terribly sorry,” she said stiffly. “I had no idea it was such a sensitive subject.”
“Oh, it’s not,” Eloise said quickly. “Don’t be silly. It’s just that I’m clumsy and I can’t write without getting ink all over my fingers. I suppose I could wear gloves, but then they’d be stained, and I’d be forever replacing them, and I can assure you that I have no wish to spend my entire allowance
—meager as it is—on gloves.”
Penelope stared at her through her lengthy explanation, then asked, “What were you writing?”
“Nothing,” Eloise said dismissively. “Just letters.”
Penelope could tell from Eloise’s brisk tone that she didn’t particularly want to subject the topic to further exploration, but she was being so uncharacteristically evasive that Penelope couldn’t resist asking, “To
whom?”
“The letters?”
“Yes,” Penelope replied, even though she thought that was rather obvious.
“Oh, no one.”
“Well, unless they’re a diary, they’re not to no one,” Penelope said, impatience adding a short tinge to her voice.
Eloise gave her a vaguely affronted look. “You’re rather nosy today.” “Only because you’re being so evasive.”
“They’re just to Francesca,” Eloise said with a little snort. “Well, then, why didn’t you say so?”
Eloise crossed her arms. “Perhaps I didn’t appreciate your questioning me.”
Penelope’s mouth fell open. She couldn’t remember the last time she and Eloise had had anything even remotely approaching a row. “Eloise,” she said, her shock showing in her voice, “what is wrong?”
“Nothing is wrong.”
“I know that’s not true.”
Eloise said nothing, just pursed her lips and glanced toward the window, a clear attempt to end the conversation.
“Are you angry with me?” Penelope persisted. “Why would I be angry with you?”
“I don’t know, but it’s clear that you are.” Eloise let out a little sigh. “I’m not angry.” “Well, you’re some thing.”
“I’m just…I’m just…” She shook her head. “I don’t know what I am.
Restless, I suppose. Out of sorts.”
Penelope was silent as she digested that, then said quietly, “Is there anything I can do?”
“No.” Eloise smiled wryly. “If there were, you can be sure I’d have already asked it of you.”
Penelope felt something that was almost a laugh rising within her. How like Eloise to make such a comment.
“I suppose it’s…” Eloise began, her chin lifting in thought. “No, never mind.”
“No,” Penelope said, reaching out and taking her friend’s hand. “Tell me.”
Eloise pulled her hand free and looked away. “You’ll think I’m silly.”
“Maybe,” Penelope said with a smile, “but you’ll still be my very closest friend.”
“Oh, Penelope, but I’m not,” Eloise said sadly. “I’m not worthy of it.” “Eloise, don’t talk such madness. I’d have gone right-out insane trying
to navigate London and society and the ton without you.” Eloise smiled. “We did have fun, didn’t we?”
“Well, yes, when I was with you,” Penelope admitted. “The rest of the time I was bloody miserable.”
“Penelope! I don’t believe I’ve ever heard you curse before.”
Penelope gave her a sheepish smile. “It slipped out. And besides, I couldn’t possibly think of a better adjective to describe life for a wallflower among the ton.”
Eloise let out an unexpected chuckle. “Now, that’s a book I would like to read: A Wallflower Among the Ton.”
“Not unless you’re given to tragedies.”
“Oh, come, now, it couldn’t be a tragedy. It would have to be a romance. You’re getting your happy ending, after all.”
Penelope smiled. As strange as it was, she was getting her happy ending. Colin had been a lovely and attentive fiancé, at least for the three
days that he’d been playing that role. And it couldn’t have been particularly easy; they’d been subject to more speculation and scrutiny than Penelope could have imagined.
She wasn’t surprised, though; when she (as Lady Whistledown) had written that the world would end as she knew it if a Featherington married a Bridgerton, she rather thought she’d been echoing a prevalent sentiment.
To say that the ton had been shocked by Penelope’s engagement would have been an understatement, indeed.
But much as Penelope liked to anticipate and reflect upon her upcoming marriage, she was still a bit disturbed about Eloise’s strange mood.
“Eloise,” she said seriously, “I want you to tell me what has you so upset.” Eloise sighed. “I’d hoped you’d forgotten about it.”
“I’ve learned tenacity from the master,” Penelope commented.
That made Eloise smile, but only for a moment. “I feel so disloyal,” she said.
“What have you done?”
“Oh, nothing.” She patted her heart. “It’s all inside. I—” She stopped, looked to the side, her eyes settling on the fringed corner of the carpet, but Penelope suspected that she didn’t see much of anything. At least nothing beyond what was rumbling about in her mind.
“I’m so happy for you,” Eloise said, the words tumbling forth in odd bursts, punctuated by awkward pauses. “And I honestly think I can really, truly say that I’m not jealous. But at the same time…”
Penelope waited for Eloise to collect her thoughts. Or maybe she was collecting her courage.
“At the same time,” she said, so softly that Penelope could barely hear her, “I suppose I always thought you’d be a spinster right along with me.
I’ve chosen this life. I know that I have. I could have married.” “I know,” Penelope said quietly.
“But I never did, because it never seemed right, and I didn’t want to settle for anything less than what my brothers and sister have. And now Colin, too,” she said, motioning toward Penelope.
Penelope didn’t mention that Colin had never said he loved her. It didn’t seem like the right time, or, frankly, the sort of thing she cared to share.
Besides, even if he didn’t love her, she still thought he cared about her, and that was enough.
“I would never have wanted you not to marry,” Eloise explained, “I just never thought you would.” She closed her eyes, looking quite agonized. “That came out all wrong. I’ve insulted you terribly.”
“No, you haven’t,” Penelope said, meaning it. “I never thought I would marry, either.”
Eloise nodded sadly. “And somehow, it made it all…all right. I was almost twenty-eight and unmarried, and you were already twenty-eight and unmarried, and we’d always have each other. But now you have Colin.”
“I still have you, too. At least I hope I do.”
“Of course you do,” Eloise said fervently. “But it won’t be the same. You must cleave unto your husband. Or at least that’s what they all say,” she added with a slightly mischievous spark in her eyes. “Colin will come first, and that is how it should be. And frankly,” she added, her smile growing a bit sly, “I’d have to kill you if he didn’t. He is my favorite brother, after all. It really wouldn’t do for him to have a disloyal wife.”
Penelope laughed out loud at that. “Do you hate me?” Eloise asked.
Penelope shook her head. “No,” she said softly. “If anything I love you all the more, because I know how difficult it must have been to be honest with me about this.”
“I’m so glad you said that,” Eloise said with a loud, dramatic sigh. “I was terrified you’d say that the only solution would be for me to find myself a husband as well.”
The thought had crossed Penelope’s mind, but she shook her head and said, “Of course not.”
“Good. Because my mother has been saying it constantly.” Penelope smiled wryly. “I’d be surprised if she hadn’t.” “Good afternoon, ladies!”
The two women looked up to see Colin entering the room. Penelope’s heart did a little flip upon seeing him, and she found herself oddly out of breath. Her heart had been doing little flips for years whenever he walked into a room, but it was somehow different now, more intense.
Perhaps because she knew.
Knew what it was like to be with him, to be wanted by him. To know that he would be her husband.
Her heart flipped again.
Colin let out a loud groan. “You ate all the food?”
“There was only one small plate of biscuits,” Eloise said in their defense.
“That’s not what I was led to believe,” Colin grumbled.
Penelope and Eloise shared a glance, then both burst out laughing.
“What?” Colin demanded, leaning down to press a quick, dutiful kiss on Penelope’s cheek.
“You sounded so sinister,” Eloise explained. “It’s just food.” “It’s never just food,” Colin said, plopping down in a chair.
Penelope was still wondering when her cheek would stop tingling.
“So,” he said, taking a half-eaten biscuit off of Eloise’s plate, “what were you two talking about?”
“Lady Whistledown,” Eloise said promptly. Penelope choked on her tea.
“Were you?” Colin said softly, but Penelope detected a definite edge in his voice.
“Yes,” Eloise said. “I was telling Penelope that it is really too bad she’s retired, since your engagement would have been quite the most newsworthy piece of gossip we’ve had all year.”
“Interesting how that works out,” Colin murmured.
“Mmmm,” Eloise agreed, “and she surely would have devoted an entire column just to your engagement ball tomorrow night.”
Penelope did not lower her teacup from her mouth. “Do you want some more?” Eloise asked her.
Penelope nodded and handed her the cup, although she very much missed having it in front of her face as a shield. She knew that Eloise had blurted out Lady Whistledown’s name because she did not want Colin to know that she had mixed feelings about his marriage, but still, Penelope fervently wished that Eloise had said anything else in reply to Colin’s question.
“Why don’t you ring for more food?” Eloise asked Colin.
“Already did so,” he answered. “Wickham intercepted me in the hall and asked if I was hungry.” He popped the last bite of Eloise’s biscuit into his mouth. “Wise man, that Wickham.”
“Where did you go today, Colin?” Penelope asked, eager to get the topic firmly off of Lady Whistledown.
He gave his head a beleaguered shake. “Devil if I know. Mother dragged me from shop to shop.”
“Aren’t you thirty-three years old?” Eloise inquired sweetly. He answered her with a scowl.
“Just thought you’d be beyond the age of having Mother drag you about, that’s all,” she murmured.
“Mother will be dragging all of us about when we’re doddering old fools, and you know it,” he replied. “Besides, she’s so delighted to see me married, I really can’t bring myself to spoil her fun.”
Penelope sighed. This had to be why she loved the man. Anyone who treated his mother so well would surely be an excellent husband.
“And how are your wedding preparations coming along?” Colin asked Penelope.
She hadn’t meant to pull a face, but she did, anyway. “I have never been so exhausted in all my life,” she admitted.
He reached over and grabbed a large crumb off of her plate. “We should elope.”
“Oh, could we really?” Penelope asked, the words flying from her lips in an unsummoned rush.
He blinked. “Actually, I was joking, mostly, although it does seem a prime idea.”
“I shall arrange for a ladder,” Eloise said, clapping her hands together, “so that you might climb to her room and steal her away.”
“There’s a tree,” Penelope said. “Colin will have no difficulty with it.” “Good God,” he said, “you’re not serious, are you?”
“No,” she sighed. “But I could be. If you were.”
“I can’t be. Do you know what it would do to my mother?” He rolled his eyes. “Not to mention yours.”
Penelope groaned. “I know.”
“She’d hunt me down and kill me,” Colin said. “Mine or yours?”
“Both. They’d join forces.” He craned his neck toward the door. “Where is the food?”
“You just got here, Colin,” Eloise said. “Give them time.”
“And here I thought Wickham a sorcerer,” he grumbled, “able to conjure food with the snap of his hand.”
“Here you are, sir!” came Wickham’s voice as he sailed into the room with a large tray.
“See?” Colin said, raising his brows first at Eloise and then at Penelope. “I told you so.”
“Why,” Penelope asked, “do I sense that I will be hearing those words from your lips far too many times in my future?”
“Most likely because you will,” Colin replied. “You’ll soon learn”—he shot her an extremely cheeky grin—“that I am almost always right.”
“Oh, please,” Eloise groaned.
“I may have to side with Eloise on this one,” Penelope said.
“Against your husband?” He placed a hand on his heart (while the other one reached for a sandwich). “I’m wounded.”
“You’re not my husband yet.”
Colin turned to Eloise. “The kitten has claws.”
Eloise raised her brows. “You didn’t realize that before you proposed?” “Of course I did,” he said, taking a bite of his sandwich. “I just didn’t
think she’d use them on me.”
And then he looked at her with such a hot, masterful expression that Penelope’s bones went straight to water.
“Well,” Eloise announced, rising quite suddenly to her feet, “I think I shall allow you two soon-to-be-newlyweds a moment or two of privacy.”
“How positively forward-thinking of you,” Colin murmured.
Eloise looked to him with a peevish twist to her mouth. “Anything for you, dear brother. Or rather,” she added, her expression growing arch, “anything for Penelope.”
Colin stood and turned to his betrothed, “I seem to be slipping down the pecking order.”
Penelope just smiled behind her teacup and said, “I am making it my policy never to get in the middle of a Bridgerton spat.”
“Oh ho!” Eloise chortled. “You’ll not be able to keep to that one, I’m afraid, Mrs. Soon-to-be-Bridgerton. Besides,” she added with a wicked grin, “if you think this is a spat, I can’t wait until you see us in full form.”
“You mean I haven’t?” Penelope asked.
Both Eloise and Colin shook their heads in a way that made her extremely fearful.
Oh, dear.
“Is there something I should know?” Penelope asked. Colin grinned rather wolfishly. “It’s too late now.”
Penelope gave Eloise a helpless glance, but all she did was laugh as she left the room, closing the door firmly behind her.
“Now, that was nice of Eloise,” Colin murmured. “What?” Penelope asked innocently.
His eyes gleamed. “The door.”
“The door? Oh!” she yelped. “The door.”
Colin smiled, moving over to the sofa beside her. There was something rather delightful about Penelope on a rainy afternoon. He’d hardly seen her since they’d become engaged—wedding plans had a way of doing that to a couple—and yet she’d not been out of his thoughts, even as he slept.
Funny how that happened. He’d spent years not really ever thinking about her unless she was standing in front of his face, and now she had permeated his every last thought.
His every last desire.
How had this happened?
When had it happened?
And did it really matter? Maybe the only important thing was that he wanted her and she was—or at least she would be—his. Once he put his ring on her finger, the hows, whys, and whens would become irrelevant, provided that this madness he felt never went away.
He touched his finger to her chin, tipping her face up to the light. Her eyes shone with anticipation, and her lips—dear God, how was it possible that the men of London had never noticed how perfect they were?
He smiled. This was a permanent madness. And he couldn’t have been more pleased.
Colin had never been opposed to marriage. He’d simply been opposed to a dull marriage. He wasn’t picky; he just wanted passion and friendship and intellectual conversation and a good laugh every now and then. A wife from whom he wouldn’t want to stray.
Amazingly, he seemed to have found that in Penelope.
All he needed to do now was make sure her Big Secret remained just that. A secret.
Because he didn’t think he could bear the pain he’d see in her eyes if she were cast out of society.
“Colin?” she whispered, her breath quivering across her lips, making him really want to kiss her.
He leaned in. “Hmmm?” “You were so quiet.” “Just thinking.”
“About what?”
He gave her an indulgent smile. “You really have been spending too much time with my sister.”
“What does that mean?” she asked, her lips twitching in such a way that he knew she’d never feel any compunction at poking fun at him. She would keep him on his toes, this woman.
“You seem,” he said, “to have developed a certain penchant for persistence.”
“Tenacity?” “That, too.”
“But that’s a good thing.”
Their lips were still mere inches apart, but the urge to continue the teasing conversation was too strong. “When you’re persistently avowing your obedience for your husband,” he murmured, “that’s a good thing.”
“Oh, really?”
His chin dipped into the barest hint of a nod. “And when you’re tenaciously holding on to my shoulders when I’m kissing you, that’s a good thing as well.”
Her dark eyes widened so delightfully that he had to add, “Don’t you think?”
And then she surprised him.
“Like this?” she asked, placing her hands on his shoulders. Her tone was daring, her eyes pure flirtation.
Lord, he loved that she surprised him.
“That’s a start,” he said. “You might have to”—he moved one of his hands to cover hers, pressing her fingers into his skin—“hold me a little more tenaciously.”
“I see,” she murmured. “So what you’re saying is that I should never let go?”
He thought about that for a moment. “Yes,” he answered, realizing that there was a deeper meaning in her words, whether she’d intended it or not. “That’s exactly what I’m saying.”
And then words were simply not enough. He brought his lips to hers, remaining gentle for barely a second before his hunger overtook him. He kissed her with a passion he hadn’t even known he possessed. It wasn’t about desire—or at least it wasn’t just about desire.
It was about need.
It was about a strange sensation, hot and fierce inside of him, urging him to lay claim to her, to somehow brand her as his.
He wanted her desperately, and he had absolutely no idea how he could possibly make it through an entire month before the wedding.
“Colin?” Penelope gasped, just as he was easing her down onto her back on the sofa.
He was kissing her jaw, and then her neck, and his lips were far too busy for anything other than a low, “Mmm?”
“We’re—Oh!”
He smiled, even as he nipped her earlobe gently with his teeth. If she could finish a sentence, then he clearly wasn’t befuddling her as much as he ought.
“You were saying?” he murmured, then kissed her deeply on the mouth, just to torture her.
He lifted his lips off hers just long enough for her to say, “I just—” and then he kissed her again, reeling with pleasure when she groaned with desire.
“I’m sorry,” he said, scooting his hands under the hem of her dress and then using them to do all sorts of wicked things to her calves, “you were
saying?”
“I was?” she asked, her eyes glazed.
He moved his hands higher, until they were tickling the back of her knee. “You were saying some thing,” he said, pressing his hips against her because he honestly thought he would burst into flame at that very moment if he did not. “I think,” he whispered, sliding his hand over the soft skin of her thigh, “that you were going to say that you wanted me to touch you
here.”
She gasped, then groaned, then somehow managed to say, “I don’t think that was what I was going to say.”
He grinned against her neck. “Are you sure?” She nodded.
“So then you want me to stop?” She shook her head. Frantically.
He could take her now, he realized. He could make love to her right
there on his mother’s sofa and not only would she let him, she would enjoy herself in every way a woman should.
It wouldn’t be a conquest, it wouldn’t even be seduction. It would be more than that. Maybe even…
Love.
Colin froze.
“Colin?” she whispered, opening her eyes. Love?
It wasn’t possible. “Colin?”
Or maybe it was.
“Is something wrong?”
It wasn’t that he feared love, or didn’t believe in it. He just hadn’t… expected it.
He’d always thought love would hit a man like a thunderbolt, that one day you’d be loitering about at some party, bored to tears, and then you’d see a woman, and you’d know instantly that your life would be changed forever. That was what had happened to his brother Benedict, and heaven
knew that he and his wife Sophie were blissfully happy rusticating away in the country.
But this thing with Penelope…it had crept up on him. The change had been slow, almost lethargic, and if it was love, well…
If it was love, wouldn’t he know?
He watched her closely, curiously, thinking that maybe he’d find his answer in her eyes, or the sweep of her hair, or the way the bodice of her gown hung slightly crookedly. Maybe if he watched her long enough, he’d know.
“Colin?” she whispered, starting to sound slightly anxious.
He kissed her again, this time with a fierce determination. If this was love, wouldn’t it become obvious when they kissed?
But if his mind and body were working separately, then the kiss was clearly in league with his body, because while his mind’s confusion remained just as blurry as ever, his body’s need was brought into sharper focus.
Hell, now he was in pain. And he really couldn’t do anything about it here in his mother’s drawing room, even if Penelope would have been a willing participant.
He pulled back, letting his hand slip down her leg toward the edge of her skirt. “We can’t do this here.”
“I know,” she said, sounding so sad that his hand stilled on her knee, and he almost lost his resolve to do the right thing and mind the dictates of propriety.
He thought hard and fast. It was possible that he could make love to her and no one would walk in on them. Heaven knew that in his current state, it would be an embarrassingly fast endeavor, anyway.
“When is the wedding?” he growled. “A month.”
“What would it take to change that to a fortnight?”
She thought about that for a moment. “Bribery or blackmail. Maybe both. Our mothers will not be easily swayed.”
He groaned, letting his hips sink against hers for one delicious moment before heaving himself off. He couldn’t take her now. She was going to be his wife. There would be plenty of time for midday tumbles on illicit sofas, but he owed it to her to use a bed for the first time, at least.
“Colin?” she asked, straightening her dress and smoothing her hair, even though there was no way she was going to make the latter look anything even approaching presentable without a mirror, hairbrush, and maybe even a maid. “Is something wrong?”
“I want you,” he whispered.
She looked up at him, startled.
“I just wanted you to know that,” he said. “I didn’t want you to think I stopped because you didn’t please me.”
“Oh.” She looked as if she wanted to say something; she looked almost absurdly happy at his words. “Thank you for saying that.”
He took her hand and squeezed. “Do I look a mess?” she asked.
He nodded. “But you’re my mess,” he whispered.
And he was very glad for that.
