With a huff, Evangeline set down her teacup. “I discovered his return when he came upon me bathing in his pond.”
Fanny’s brows went up again, higher this time. “Indeed!”
“I didn’t know it washispond,” hissed Evangeline. “At the time, it was no one’s pond!”
Enlightenment dawned on Fanny’s face, and—curse her—a little smile crossed her lips. More of a smirk, actually. “Ah, I see. The little pond not far from here? The one you regularly go swim in? And if it is nowhispond, that suggests he has taken that ramshackle old manor across the hill? Which means he is yourneighbor?”Evangeline had nodded in grim silence at each query and now her friend looked vastly amused. She took another cake. “Is he as handsome as he was four years ago?”
“No.” Evangeline threw herself back into the cushions and blew out an enormous sigh. “Even more so.”
“Oh my,” murmured Fanny.
“He came to call on me,” Evangeline continued, staring up at the ceiling. “Strolled up to the front door with a bouquet in hand and bowed like a gentleman.”
“Promising,” said Fanny in approval.
“Then he sat right where you are sitting and said he wanted to make my acquaintance properly this time,” she raged on. “He said he had thought of meevery dayhe was gone. What unspeakable cheek! He was gone for four years!”
“Ohmy,”murmured Fanny.
“Then he invited me to swim in his pond any time I liked. How is a woman to respond to that sort of thing?”
Fanny pursed her lips. “By fetching a towel?”
“Fanny! Can you imagine the scandal if people knew? Merely that he said that to me?” Evangeline glowered at her. “And I’ve been so good!”
“You’ve been so bored,” corrected Fanny.
Evangeline sighed, deflating like a burst ballon. That was true. “I’m doomed! Everything I do leads to scandal.”
“Would that we all experienced such doom as being pursued by a handsome, exciting man,” said Fanny wryly. “So he only came here to pursue a new affair?”
She picked at her skirt. “He says not.”
Fanny nodded sagely. “He was crude and lascivious, urging you to swim naked in his pond so he might discover you more often?”
Against her will, Evangeline smiled. “No.”
“He brought flowers. I presume he drank some tea. He’s even more handsome than he was four years ago. He wants to know you as you really are.” Fanny gave her a look. “If I were you, I would restrain myself from descending into a melancholy of despair over this tragic state of affairs.”
Evangeline sat up. “No. You would seduce him again.”
Fanny smirked again. “Well, if it had been a while since a man warmed my sheets, and an appealing potential lover presented himself, willing and eager, not to mention provencapable of satisfying any and all of my desires... I would be well within reason to do so.”
Fanny knew she hadn’t had a lover since Allen’s ball. She did not know that no lover Evangeline had ever had had been half as appealing as Richard Campion, because Evangeline had not wanted to admit that fact. She had tried to erase him from her mind; she’d flirted with a number of gentlemen, thinking she would discover that Campion wasn’t so special after all. She’d been certain that, sooner or later, a new man would make her forget about piercing blue eyes staring deep into her soul as he whispered that he wanted to be her friend as well as her lover, and that she would find equal pleasure in his arms.
It hadn’t worked. Every other man had let her down in one way or another, some dramatically and some quietly. She’d eventually given up. She wasn’t sure she could even remember them all. But the memory of her one night with Sir Richard still sent a little tremor through her.
“I won’t do it,” she declared. “Iamdone with him. It was only one night, and trying for more can only ruin the memory of how perfect that night was. I should forget it, and forget him, and find a new man who can please me just as well as he did.”
Fanny regarded her for a few moments in silence. “Perfect?”
Evangeline flushed. “It was... fairly magnificent.”Hewas magnificent, she thought to herself. Likely still was.
Her friend shook her head, brow wrinkled in pity. “My dear, if you can find another such man in Britain, I suggest you set a trap and devote every waking hour to luring him into it. They are surpassingly rare.”
Evangeline glared at her. “Where is the solace and comfort you are supposed to be offering? I pour out my heart to you and receive this in turn.”
Fanny laughed. “When you are so stubbornly refusing to admit that you still want him, and adamantly insisting you willnot accept what he is offering, no matter how desperately you want it, you do not need solace, my dear. You need someone to tell you to stop being a fool.”
