“You mean you bedded those women?” she asked in shock.
He once again pulled his chin into his neck. “Heavens, no,” he replied. “I never engaged in that way with those girls,” he added. “They were my employees.”
“Then how did you learn what women truly want?”
The ghost of her father once again leaned against the wall, the book disappearing from his arm. “I listened. When they talked in the parlor. When they gossiped in the corridors. When they conferred with the madame. Women can be most enlightening when they don’t think anyone is listening,” he said wistfully.
“How will I know what I want?” she asked in a whisper.
David furrowed a brow. “Oh, you’ll know what you want. From the moment you murmur that first ‘oh,’ you’ll know,” he assured her.
Dahlia stared at her father for several seconds before she allowed a nod. “Since Anthony withdrew his offer of marriage, I don’t know that I want to marry him,” she whispered.
“Yes, you do,” he replied. “For if you don’t, you’ll regret it for the rest of your life. He’ll marry some insipid miss, father an heir and a spare, and then take a mistress so he doesn’t have to listen to his wife complain about the cook and housekeeper while she tups the footman.”
“Father!”
“Trust me, Breckinridge’s future is not a good one unless you are in it.”
Dahlia inhaled softly, her gaze going to the garden beyond the window. “Oh, my,” she murmured.
When she turned to say that she would give the viscount another chance, she discovered she was alone in the library.
