Page 24 of Five Nights with a Rakish Duke
“No, it is not cards or money he wants,” Penelope said, lowering her gaze back to her glass. She said no more, letting the words hang in the air. Veronica shifted in her seat as realization took hold.
“Well, he is an audacious man, is he not? You are telling me that the deal he made isyou, is it not?” Veronica said.
“Well… for five nights.”
“God’s wounds, Penelope!” Veronica said and stood to her feet, flouncing across the room. She hastened to the other end of the room and flung out the door of a cupboard. “Have you just decided to throw your reputation out of the window for this?” On the shelf of the cupboard was Veronica’s secret vice. Penelope knew few others knew of it, apart from herself. Veronica snatched up the pipe.
Shortly after her husband’s death, Veronica had taken up smoking. Of course, it was deemed inappropriate for ladies to do such a thing, so she kept the habit a secret. She lit the pipe and puffed a few times, filling the room with vapors before she turned to look back to Penelope.
“You said yes, didn’t you?” she asked. Penelope lifted the glass to her lips and drank half the contents again in answer.
“God have mercy. What we women will do to have our rights on our own properties,” Veronica said with a sigh, placing the pipe back in her mouth as she walked around the room. “Have you thought this through?”
“There isn’t much to think through, is there?” Penelope asked, lowering the glass and finding her godmother’s gaze across the room. “He said I’d just have to spend the nights with him, not share his bed. If I do not do it, I lose my estates. I lose my dowry. I will have no money and no chance of marriage. Can I allow that to happen?” Veronica didn’t answer as she puffed on the pipe, sighing deeply. “I am trapped, Veronica,” Penelope said eventually. “I must do it if I ever want my estates back.”
“I wish there was another way, but I cannot see it,” Veronica said, pacing up and down the room as she waved the pipe in the air. “You wish me to help, do you not? Coming up with excuses to where you will be for your cousin.”
“Yes, please. I fear it must be so. I do not intend to share his bed, we have discussed as much, but if anyone sees me at his house, then they will think the worst regardless.”
“Very well,” Veronica said, wobbling the pipe between her lips. “I suppose there is at least one good thing out of the deal.”
“What is that?” Penelope asked.
“The Duke of Kendall is a handsome man. Of all men to sell yourself too, there are worse.”
“I am not selling myself to him!” Penelope said indignantly. “I have said I will not share his bed.”
“Some men are quite persuasive, you know,” Veronica said. Penelope huffed and slumped back in the chair, pulling the glass back to her lips. “He’s giving you two estates to spend a few nights with him. He must think highly of you for so great a price. Especially if he has said he will not take you to bed. I see I am not helping.”
“It’s an awful situation all around; what could help?” Penelope asked miserably, staring into her glass.
The atmosphere in the room shifted. Gone was the angst and the fury, replaced by a kind of pensive sadness. Penelope heard her godmother cross the room toward her though she didn’t look up from staring at the bubbles in the glass of sparkling wine.
“Do not be dismayed, my dear,” Veronica said in a kindly tone as she took the seat beside Penelope. “As far as I can see, this could have ended in a worse way. You could have lost your estates entirely with no hope of ever getting them back.”
“It just comes at a cost, doesn’t it?” Penelope said, looking up from her glass. Veronica winced in answer, making Penelope groan and lift the glass to her lips yet another time.
“The way you’re going through my wine, there won’t be any left soon,” Veronica said, urging Penelope to lower the glass again. “Think of it this way. You spend five nights with a man, and then you have the future you want, and the income that should be yours. Perhaps that is no great price to pay, especially with a man such as the Duke of Kendall.”
“What do you know of him?” Penelope asked, biting her lip.
“I knew more about his father. Good man by all accounts until he passed away earlier this year,” Veronica said, waving a hand in the air. Hearing that the Duke had lost his father too made Penelope flinch. She wondered if he went through the same sadness that she did every night, thinking of the father she had lost too early from this world. “This Duke is known for being a charmer though I have not heard of any specific woman who has shared his bed.”
Discretion. That is what he said.Penelope tipped her head back, realizing that maybe there was some sense in the Duke’s offer. If he was as discreet as he claimed to be, then there could be no great risk to Penelope’s name. She did not intend to share his bed anyway.
“You were scared, weren’t you?” Veronica asked after a minute of silence.
“What?” Penelope said, turning her eyes back to her godmother.
“You looked so scared to tell me I can only presume you feared I would disapprove.”
“Do you?” Penelope asked in a small voice.
“Yes… and no,” Veronica said decisively.
“That doesn’t help me!”
“Penelope, listen.” Veronica leaned toward her and placed an arm comfortingly around her shoulder. “Do I wish you could have had your estates without all this trouble? Yes, of course I do. Yet we cannot undo what has been done; we can only make the best of what is before us. You have decided to take control of your assets and take that control out of your cousin’s hands. I think that a wise thing indeed.”
