Page 7 of A Kiss Gone Wylde
She turned to look back, her face bathed in golden light. He’d thought her quite pretty, but that was not the word to describe her. She was arresting. Striking. Interesting. Her features were dynamic, her expression shifting quickly from one emotion to the next. Lovely, yes. But so much more than that. Entrancing, even when she was rather prickly.
She turned, climbed the last steps and disappeared inside the house.
“Bloody hell.”
“Sir?”
Payne looked to Jenkins who was watching him with concern. “It’s fine Jenkins. Go on ahead. I can walk from here. I need to clear my head.”
“Certainly, my lord.”
3
Inside, Benny faced the music, as it were. Her aunt was seated in the drawing room, her hair, mostly silver in the front but still quite dark in the back, in a heavy braid. An aubergine velvet wrapper was clutched about her. Charity and Cordelia flanked her, both of them looking chastened and contrite. They hadn’t known. Benny had kept her quest for adventure a secret from them because she knew her sister was hopelessly indiscreet. She never meant to tell, but she always,always, did.
“I didn’t tell them what I was doing,” Benny said. “I’m sorry, Aunt Marguerite. I Know you are very disappointed in me, but… well, that’s all I can say. I am sorry.”
Marguerite shook her head sadly. “You didn’t tell them what you were doing, but you left a note that they should not worry and that you would be back by morning. At that point, your sister and your cousin should have immediately informed me of your absence so that I could begin a search! Benedicta, you have no notion of how dangerous this city can be!”
Actually, she did have an idea. But telling her aunt that would not help her case. “I went to Vauxhall. I was looking for… well, an adventure, I suppose.”
A gasp sounded behind her and Benny looked over her shoulder to see Nancy delivering a tea tray. A guilty flush spread over the maid’s face and she quickly ducked her head.
“Vauxhall?” Marguerite asked, her tone clearly indicating that she thought Benny to be quite stupid. “My child, have you no notion of what goes on in such a place?”
“No,” Benny said. “I did not know. I still do not know in its entirety, but I have an inkling.”
Her aunt’s face paled. “Were you hurt?”
“No. I encountered an unlikely hero… Baron Davenport.”
Marguerite let out a sigh of relief. “Oh, thank heavens. He is at least an honorable sort. I presume he got you out of there without anyone seeing you?”
Benny felt her stomach rolling over. It wasn’t butterflies. It was swarms of angry wasps. Dread. Hot, awful, sickening dread simply filled her. “No. Not precisely. I was seen. And recognized. By several dozen people, as a matter of fact, in a somewhat… compromising position.”
“How compromising?” The question had come from Charity who was looking at her more with wide eyed wonder and rabid curiosity than any sort of disapproval.
“Hush,” Marguerite snapped at her niece. “This is not the way you were all to get husbands when I brought you to London!” She turned back to Benny. “You will be getting a husband, will you not?”
Benny gulped nervously. “Lord Davenport will be here tomorrow at noon.”
Marguerite’s lips thinned and for a change, she looked her age. “All of you, go to bed. And if you even think of getting out of your beds tonight, I will spank you. I do not care if you are all grown women… But I would like a private word, Benedicta before you go up.”
Everyone else dutifully filed out of the room leaving Benny alone with her aunt. Their gazes locked for a moment and then Benny broke away, looking down at a spot on the carpet between the toes of her ruined slippers. She didn’t fear her aunt. She loved her Aunt Marguerite. And that was why it was so horrible to look at her and see the terrible disappointment that she surely must feel with her.
“What was it? This compromising position?”
Benny shrugged. “It was only a kiss.” Not only. The kiss. It wasthekiss. Her first. And even with her lack of experience, she knew that it had been extraordinary. That was why she’d become so angry with him—she’d been desperate to reclaim some distance and clarity, but it hadn’t worked. Not in the least.
“You know what this means, of course. You are quite ruined. It will be the scandal of the season,” Marguerite predicted. “And that is not an enviable position, Benedicta. And it doesn’t simply affect you.”
Benny shook her head. Kissing aside, their temperaments were not at all compatible. “We are naught but spinsters. Women no one wanted and no one had any interest in. Until we do something wrong. And suddenly all of London finds us fascinating!”
“That is all very true. You were considered to be spinsters and you were not precisely the center of everyone’s attention. In fact, the lot you were thought to be rather dull—perhaps because the reputations you had earned in Bath had preceded you.”
That was rather hurtful, Benny thought. No one had ever said it so bluntly… that the lot of them were considered to be dull.
“But you will be the center of attention now. After the scandalous circumstances around Felicity’s betrothal and marriage, and now this? Let me tell you what else will come of this… Any chance that Charity and Cordelia had of finding a suitable husband will be eradicated. No gentleman of note or merit will wish to have a thing to do with them.”
