“But you can askme?”
She shrugged. She trusted Fletcher in a way she did not trust Rotherfeld yet. “I see your point. I will ask him when next I see him, but now I’m curious. What about you, specifically?”
Fletcher’s eyes went wide. “I don’t see the relevance of that.”
“You are an average man, I would say. Well, perhapsaverageis the wrong word. I think you are a fine man. But you are typical of other lords of theton, from what I can tell.”
Fletcher sputtered. “We cannot…that is, it is inappropriate to discuss—”
“Come on, Fletcher. We’refriends. Surely you discuss things like this with your male friends.”
She knew she was pushing him, and he looked utterly terrified, but now she really wanted to know. Likely Fletcher’s level of experience with women and sex would not shed any light on what Rotherfeld had gotten up to in his misspent youth, but Fletcher and Louisa never talked about these things, and now she needed to know.
“Yes,” Fletcher said. “I do talk about these things with mymalefriends.Youare a woman.”
“Did we not just finish establishing that we that we arefriends,and, dare I say, equals, of a sort?”
“I do not go into details with my male friends, either.”
“I have no experience with men and am not shy about telling you. I’ve reached this ripe old age still pure as the driven snow…”
Fletcher rolled his eyes. “All right, all right. No need for dramatics.”
“You have been with women, yes?” Louisa decided the direct approach might yield more results.
“Yes,” Fletcher said, with some reluctance.
“Anyone I know?”
He frowned. “I doubt it.”
That meantyes. She leaned closer to him. “Who?”
“If I tell you, it can’t leave this carriage.”
“Who would I tell?”
Fletcher shook his head. “I can’t believe I’m telling you this. But it’s possible I had an affair with Lady Richelieu.”
Louisa gasped. Lady Richelieu was a much older woman—nearly fifty now. “You didn’t.”
“It was after her husband passed, in my defense.”
“How long did it last?”
“A few months. And this was two years ago. It wasn’t…it was not romantic. It was… No. I can’t talk about this with you.”
“Fletcher.” Louisa was growing increasingly frustrated by his reticence. Usually, he was candid with her. “Do you think I do not understand? Do you think I do not also have desires?”
“I’m certain you do and that I need not know about them. I don’t want to talk about any of this, but you asked.”
“So, you had a purely physical relationship, just pleasure and gratification, with the widow Richelieu, who is, what, twenty years older than you?”
“Something like that.”
“And other women?”
“Yes, but you definitely do not know them.”
