Page 55 of Claimed By Her Forbidden Duke
Mary glanced at her. “You can agree vocally, you know,” she urged. “Finley cannot hear you. He should not control which words leave your lips.”
He certainly did not last week at the opera, Penelope thought to herself, and from the intrigued look on Mary’s face, she did not hide the accompanying blush very well.
“Penelope,” Mary began, her voice rising in question. “What is that look for?”
“What look?”
“That very one you are fighting to scrub from your face, but it is being ever so stubborn. It is like it is saying,Mary, do continue asking Penelope what she is clearly keeping from you.I do so love some gossip.”
“My life is not gossip,” Penelope countered, giving a dismissive laugh.
But there was a part of her that longed to recount the events of last week, to share the way the Duke had touched her, the way he had lit a flame inside her that hadn’t gone out—not for several nights—and she had chased that fire with her fingers but never felt sated afterward.
“At least not until I decide to make it such amongst us ladies.”
“Oh, Pen, youtease.” Mary giggled. “You must tell me at once while the men are busy.”
They sat on a bench at the edge of the Bathurst Gardens, watching the two men play while Emily and Amelia ran around them, giggling.
Penelope could see how they got on Finley’s nerves—more children to mess up his very tidy, ordered life—but he had insisted on joining her for a social outing, so he could endure this.
When, for a moment, only silence filled the space, Mary cocked her head. “Do you ever think about how we could easily beat the two of them?” She nodded towards Stephen and Finley, a smug grin on her face. “I would love to see your brother’s face when you knock every single one of his shots aside. He would get rather competitive.”
“He would throw a tantrum,” Penelope corrected, laughing. “But, oh, the satisfaction I would get.”
“And I would get satisfaction knowing what is the matter with you.” Mary lowered her voice, both of their eyes fixed on the men ahead as they strolled further away to other arches in the ground.
Amelia and Emily skipped along with them, Emily trying to slip a crown of daisies onto Amelia’s head.
“I have kissed a man,” Penelope whispered.
It felt ludicrous to keep such a thing so hushed when Mary had conspired to send her to an escort, but this was her secret, and she had tucked it away in her heart for days. She did not want to risk shattering it with a voice loud enough to be overheard.
“The… the Duke of Blackstone.”
“Pen!” Mary cried, drawing the attention of the men.
Finley put a hand over his brow as if squinting to look closer, but Penelope only waved, her smile tight, and he continued.
“You must be quiet,” she hissed, but her smile was loosening as she thought of the kiss, even as her stomach knotted with nerves. “He found me on a balcony at the opera last week. I was merely getting some fresh air and asked him to leave me alone, but he persisted, saying I did not seem well. In truth, I was not, not really. You see, Finley has had me wearing these awful, stifling dresses and—” She broke off with a heaving breath, finding herself rambling.
“And then he kissed me,” she continued in a whisper. “He said I am no spinster but a lady he desires. To be truthful, Mary, I have not stopped thinking about it ever since. It comes to me in flashes… very, ah, hot flashes.”
“Penelope,” Mary admonished, even though her eyes sparkled with excitement. “It is not like you to get so flustered over a man.”
“With Finley being so overbearing, I have scarcely had the chance,” Penelope sighed.
“How was it?” Mary whispered, her voice cracking with eagerness. “Do the others know?”
Penelope shook her head quickly. “Not yet. Daphne likely still sees the Duke as dangerous, and in truth, I do not know if he is not. And Cecilia would ask me why I have not woken up in his bed.”
Mary sniggered. “Of course, she would. But what was it like?”
“It was…” Penelope caught her breath, flushing as she recalled the feel of his hot lips on hers, dragging down her neck in a tangled moment of passion, each of them as caught off-guard as the other.
The feel of his fingers pulling at her gown, the tear in the collar that she had excused as rough handling of her own to Finley, stating she had been too careless when loosening the dress.
“It was dizzying. It was… well, I felt as though I was floating yet stood on two feet all at once. As if I was in my body, though I could not feel it, and yet I felt every touch. It was searing, Mary, and I… I have found myself… craving in certain ways.”
