He was furious with himself.
“Don’t do that,” he said.
“Why not?” she said.
He stared at her. “Why not?Why not?”
She brought her index finger to her lips and touched the place where he’d kissed her. “A little caress, a little teasing.” She studied his face. Then she laughed.
“It isn’t funny,” he said.
“That’s what you say because you can’t see the expression on your face.”
Expression? He didn’t wear expressions. “Zoe.”
“Did you not like it?” she said. “I did. I never kissed or touched any man but Karim, and that was like caressing furniture—softfurniture,” she said with a laugh.
“Zoe, you can’t talk like that.”
“Oh, I know,” she said. “My sisters tell me. You cannot say this, Zoe. You cannot say that. But you aren’t my sisters. You’re a man of the world.”
“I’m aman,” he said, “and I am not at all accustomed to resisting temptation. If you wish to have a proper launch into Society and be sought after and marry well, you had better not tempt me.” A thought struck him. “Ye gods, Zoe, do you even know how to say no?”
She shook her head. “Not in the way you mean. Not to caresses and kissing. All I ever learned in that way wasyes.”
“Oh, my God.” If he had been any other man, the kind given to emotional displays, he would have flung his hat on the ground and commenced tearing his hair out.
It was at this moment, finally, that the Duke of Marchmont fully grasped the enormity of the task he’d undertaken.
He could pave her way into Society, but she’d be undermining him at every turn, all innocently. Or perhaps mischievously. This was Zoe, after all.
But Zoe was the daughter of the man who’d stood in place of a father to him. In any event, Marchmont had said he would do it, and heneverbroke his word.
“Very well,” he said. “I can deal with this.”
Nothing could be simpler.
The words hung in his mind, mocking him.
He looked about him. Nobody who mattered seemed to be about. Perhaps they hadn’t been observed. The intimacy had lasted not a minute, after all.
He said, calmly, oh so calmly, “I attended the Princess Elizabeth’s wedding last night. The Prince Regent wasn’t there—he was ill. But the Duke of York—that is his brother—”
“I know,” she said. “I had to memorize all of them.”
“Good,” he said. “The Duke of York promised to speak to the Regent and see that you received an invitation. He said the royal family were deeply affected by the story in theDelphian.The Duke of York thinks it likely that you’ll be invited to the Drawing Room being held to celebrate the Prince Regent’s birthday.”
“On the twenty-third of this month,” she said. “This is not his birthday. But his birthday is in August, my sisters told me, and the Season ends in June and everybody goes to the country. No one would be in London to celebrate it then.”
Her sisters were the most irksome of women. Still, they’d saved him a good deal of tiresome explanation.
“Exactly,” he said. “It isn’t like ordinary presentations. You won’t be stuck among all the schoolroom misses.”
She nodded. “Then it won’t be so obvious how old I am.”
“Yes, there’ll be many other antiques attending.”
She smiled. “Good, because I have no idea how to appear young and naïve. It’s only a little more than a fortnight from today, and I have more than enough to learn as it is without having to learn how to act innocent.”
