“Yes.”
“And Lady Perdie is his sister?” Charity demanded. “Why ever did you not tell us that is why you turned her away?”
Theo whirled around. “Will you repeat everything I said in this exaggerated manner?”
Charity scowled. “Yes! Until I understand the matter at hand.”
Prue interjected, “You cannot travel alone with the duke after last night. If this is to be known…yours and the duke’s absence left everyone in a fine twitter. I am certain the scandal sheets will be linking your names together forweeks.”
Theo groaned and flopped onto the bed, staring at the canopy. “I do not think His Grace thought beyond his anger and fear for his sister. I could hardly sleep last night for wondering where Perdie could have gone. How could she have been so reckless? What if she is hurt? What if she trusted the wrong person in this mad scheme of hers?”
Of course, Prue nor Charity could not answer her demands, the only sound in the large chamber was the crackling fire in the hearth.
Charity sauntered over to lay beside her. “Theo?”
“Yes.”
“I too am worried for Perdie, but we know her to be a very smart and quick-thinking girl. She would not have acted without planning.”
“That is what I am dearly hoping.”
“It is still very risky to your reputation to travel alone with the duke,” Charity bemoaned with a sigh.
Theo pushed into a sitting position on the edge of the bed. “I feel myself under an obligation to help him. I…if not for me and this very club, would Perdie have acted in such an irresponsible manner? I will risk it, but I will be very careful to remain veiled. If anyone should see the duke traveling with a lady, they might only question the mysterious nature of it.” Theo stood, walked over to the table by the window and took up a few books she had been reading to put in her valise.
“I want to know something if you will grant me your undivided attention,” Prue said.
Theo glanced at Prue who was now sitting up on the chaise, her eyes twinkling with something naughty. “What is it?” Theo asked, glancing between her two friends.
“Why are your lips swollen?”
Theo raised her fingers to her lips, shocked to feel her cheeks heating as if she were a girl in the schoolroom. “Are they swollen?”
“Yes,” they cried together.
“The duke kissed me,” she whispered.
“I knew it! The way he looked at you last night was not all about his sister,” Prue cried triumphantly.
“You speak nonsense, this kiss was born from the duke being irritated and was more likely wanting to tease me…or distress my sensibilities.”And curiosity.
“I suppose you showed him you are made of stern stuff,” Charity said with a light laugh.
Theo’s breath caught remembering the feel and taste of him. She lied to herself about what he felt. The raw intensity of his stare promised Theo something she inexplicably wanted. His kiss…his touch…perhaps even his ravishment. He’d tempted her with a passion she had never experienced but had felt low in her belly in her dreams. Those indecent yearnings once again welled from a place deep within Theo. What would it be like to have a lover, for a man’s body to move inside hers? Would it end the emptiness and the loneliness, or would it only fill it for a brief moment in time?
Should she trust him with her body, would he marry her after if she were even amenable to such a suit?Surely not. The Duke of Hartford was rumored to have an alliance with a most sought-after debutante in the ton. A great heiress, a beauty, with apparently an impeccable character. If Theo were to give in to the burning lust in his gaze, it would only be for an affair. There had been a time in her life Theo had felt desperate to live, to have adventures, to feel passion. Theo had been so young and frightened when she’d married Viscount Winfern, a man who was two and sixty. She had wanted to experience life to the fullest with the boy she had loved, but it was not meant to be. “That the duke might desire me means very little.”
“I think what is most important is that you want him in return.”
With a gasp she glanced at Charity who stared at Theo somberly. Had she been so transparent with her thoughts?
“Is it safe to travel alone with him?”
“I shall be perfectly fine. I am not about to fall at his feet and offer myself for his ravishment.”
“Perhaps you should,” a voice said behind her.
“Prue!”