He’d married with haste and had a delicious protracted honeymoon with his bride. That had been wonderful, but when the invitation had come he realized she knew few people in London’s ton. What better way to remedy that than to take her to a hotbed of social activity for the holidays?
But now the word “hotbed” itself gave Jonathan a frisson of unease. The Fanshawes were part of a rackety, pleasure-loving set. Precisely because of that, they entertained some of the best minds in the land, from poets to politicians. Pleasure was a much sought-after commodity these days, the recent wars having left scars only pleasure seemed to heal.
Jonathan suddenly found himself hoping the Fanshawes and their friends wouldn’t leave any scars on his lovely bride’s tender, unsophisticated sensibilities. He’d just have to continue to keep close watch over her. At least that, he thought, glancing at his wife and remembering last night and their wonderful ongoing reconciliation, would be a pleasure.
The coach drew up at the bottom of a long wide fan of stairs. As a footman opened their coach door and Jonathan stepped out, the doors of the manor flew open.
“Coo-whee!” a voice sang out. “Look who’s here, Fuff!”
Pamela paused on the carriage stair and looked up, as did Jonathan. A plump old woman dressed in cerise, with a mop of hennaed hair festooned with plumes, stood at the front door of the manor, wreathed in smiles. A fat little gnome of a gentleman with a red waistcoat stood by her side.
Jonathan breathed a sigh of relief. The frumpy-looking female was the once-voluptuous Marianna Fanshawe. The fellow who resembled Father Christmas was Fanshawe himself. They’d both aged even more since he’d last seen them, and not well, except for Jonathan’s own purposes. They looked about as rackety as a pair of Christmas elves.
Jonathan looked at his wife and smiled. Now she’d see what he meant about a tempest in a teapot, and would be a little humble, perhaps, because of how she’d carried on.
“It’s Rexford and his new lady!” Marianna caroled in a voice that must have carried into the next county. “Now don’t be jealous, Fuff, my sweet. Remember, though he’s still handsome as he can stare, I gave him up years ago! Sorry, Rex, my old dear, but Fuff is a possessive fellow.”
“Yes, indeed,” Fanshawe said on a merry chuckle as he started down the stairs. “Welcome to my home, my lord. You’re welcome to anything in the house, old fellow—except for my lady wife, of course.”
“Senile, I suppose,” Jonathan said as he watched his wife pace furiously around the guest chamber they’d been shown to. “But we can’t just turn around and go, even if they are.”
“Not senile,” she said stormily. “Just careless. I wrote and asked my brother Charles. He knew about them. Careless of morals and manners, he says. Everyone says so.”
“Look, my dear,” he said in his best voice of reason, “you refine upon it too much. My association with the woman was over a decade ago. I imagine Marianna likes to remember our past association only because she hasn’t much else to cheer her these days . . . Now, wait!” He stepped back from the force of his wife’s outraged glare.
“You,” she said frigidly, glowering at him, “are as bad as she is. You made love to her.” She swallowed hard before she went on. Horrid to think that dreadful woman had kissed those firm lips of his, stroked that hard muscled back, delighted in his heat and strength, known the feeling of his most intimate embrace. What words of love had he whispered to her? She couldn’t bear it.
“You had biblical knowledge of her, and who knows what other kind,” she went on. “She remembers it fondly? And you? How do you remember it? Oh, I forgot, you’re too much of a gentleman to say, even to your wife. So what am I supposed to think? And what am I to do? Agree with her? I am appalled. I didn’t expect that you had no experience before we met. However, I didn’t expect to have to hear about that experience.”
“It means nothing,” he said. He didn’t know what else to say. Tell her that he’d never made love to Marianna, or any woman, as he had to her? That aside from that, he’d been young and overeager, and so overwhelmed by what seemed like his incredible good luck that he’d only taken, and never tried to give pleasure? That they hadn’t shared anything but a pillow? That it was a wholly other experience from what he shared with his wife?
All of it was true. But the codes he lived by made it impossible for him to say any of it. A gentleman did not discuss previous lovers with anyone. A fellow did not discuss his sexual experience with his bride. And a man had to stand by his given word. “It meant nothing,” he repeated.