“Oh.” Well, Fletcher really hoped for the chandelier above him to fall on him and put him out of his misery.
“And I’ve kissed him a few times since to see if the first time was just an awkward moment.”
“And?”
“It was terrible. Every time.”
Thank God. Fletcher fought back a smile. “How could it have been terrible?”
“I don’t know. But kisses in novels are always nice. Is kissing nice?”
“It certainly has been in my experience.”
“Did I do it wrong?”
“I do not think that is possible.”
Louisa grunted. She looked frustrated.
Naive and bold. That was his Louisa. She wanted things and was never shy about expressing herself, but she was still an unmarried lady of thetonwho had not experienced much of life outside of her family’s narrow world.
“Apparently itispossible,” she said, “because kissing Rotherfeld was highly unpleasant. But that can’t be right, can it? I find him handsome. Iwantedto kiss him.”
Fletcher just shook his head, unsure of what to say. He really didn’t need to know about her kissing Rotherfeld, although he was enjoying the fact that Rotherfeld was a bad kisser. On the other hand, if Louisa did not want Fletcher, he did not want to sentence her to a life of dull conversations and unpleasant kisses. “Louisa, this conversation may be straying into territory that is not appropriate for—”
“Bugger off, Fletcher.”
He gasped at her use of language, but then he laughed. He adored this woman. He was tired of pretending otherwise.“See, this right here, this is my problem. I want you to tell me to bugger off at least once a day, but instead you’re planning to marry the dullest man in London.”
“Fletcher. That was unkind.”
“I’m sorry, but you were on your way to telling me you think the very same thing about Rotherfeld that I do.”
Louisa set aside her tea and began pacing in front of him. Fletcher leaned back in his chair and watched her. She truly was beautiful. He could imagine her figure underneath the layers of her gown, and he wanted to touch it. He wanted to pull all the pins out of her hair until those bouncy curls lay around her shoulders. He wanted to show her what kissesshouldfeel like. He wanted her naked and underneath him and…
Well. There was that whole sexual attraction between them that he’d thought was not there. Apparently it was an extremely strong presence in their relationship, and he’d just never noticed it. Somehow. But now that hehadnoticed it, it was all he could think about.
But it shouldn’t have taken her engagement to another man for Fletcher to fully wrap his head around how he felt about Louisa.
“All right,” he said, because she seemed cross. “I apologize. I’m sure there are other people who are not me who find Rotherfeld to be a very exciting man. I’m sure there are other men who are interested in discussing bird beaks and farming techniques with him.”
“And horses. I take it he loses money on races quite often.”
“I did see him at the Ascot last year. Lost a fortune on a profoundly stupid bet.”
“You see my concern?”
“Define your crisis for me precisely. Are you worried that your future husband is dull?”
“I worry I made a mistake agreeing marry him.”
Fletcher could see the agony in her expression. Louisa had always been the sort of person who made a decision and plowed ahead with it, and to see her questioning this one—arguably the most important decision she’d ever make—made Fletcher’s heart squeeze.
“I am sorry you are dealing with this,” Fletcher said, standing so that he might steer Louisa back to the settee, because her pacing was starting to make him anxious, too. “But why come to me?”
“Because you are my friend. You always steer me straight. Remember when we were young and I wanted to collect frogs, but you stopped me?”
Fletcher nodded, not knowing where she was going with this. When he’d been about twelve and she’d been about seven, they spent a summer together at the Greystone manse in Cornwall. Fletcher did remember an afternoon when they’d been sitting beside the pond and Louisa had piped up to say she wanted to gather all the frogs from around the pond in her dress to keep as pets. Fletcher had talked her out of it—the act of collecting said frogs would involve getting into the mud and frogs did not make for good pets because they could hop away too easily, and Louisa’s mother would have been horrified and infuriated by all of it—although she had still persisted in capturing one frog and keeping him in the pocket of her dress for the rest of the day. On returning to the house, her mother found it and screamed like she’d seen a ghost.
