An Affair Before Christmas

There was something in his voice that sounded critical. “No, I have not,” she said fiercely. “But neither has any other woman of my acquaintance.”

“I was just offering to help.”

Now he’d made her feel guilty for snapping at him. After all, what difference did it make? He’d seen her naked more times than she could count. And she could see tar clumping her hair powder. The itch was beginning to drive her mad. “All right. But I’m going to bathe in my chemise.”

He shrugged. “I like to be really clean myself but I know many ladies aren’t like that. One only has to walk into a ballroom in July to realize it.”

“I am clean!” she snapped.

“Your choice,” he said kindly. “It certainly doesn’t matter to me what you wear in the bath. I might as well say it again, but that part of our marriage is over.”

It was all quite embarrassing. Poppy started trying to untie her gown and realized that she couldn’t unhook her sash by herself so it was just as well Fletch was there. He was working at the little hooks when she remembered what Jemma had said and started giggling.

“Thinking happy thoughts about Loudan again?”

He sounded rather unfriendly. “Jemma told me that men could come in quite handy on carriage trips,” she said, feeling the laughter bubble up inside her again. “She was right.”

He pulled her dress backward, off her shoulders and arms, and she stepped out of it. This par ticular dress had three separate petticoats sewn into it and it weighed quite a lot. Her stays laced behind, so Fletch started working on them and cursing a little under his breath. He certainly wasn’t very handy. Poppy started thinking about the possum in the Ashmolean again.

“Those opposable thumbs are very important,” she told him.

There was a ripping noise and her stays fell away. She spun around to find him holding up bits of lacing.

“They wouldn’t come apart,” he said with a silly grin.

Poppy put her hands on her hips. “Now what am I going to do without laces?”

“Well, you can’t wear that gown again anyway.” He turned it over with his toe and Poppy could see black marks on the sides. When she raised her eyes, Fletch was staring right at her chest. She looked down too and realized that she was wearing a chemise so light that the line of her breast could be seen through it. She even saw the pink tip of one of her nipples.

But before she could wrap her arms around her chest, his eyes slid away as if there was nothing interesting there and he said, “You get in the bath, and I’ll try to wash out that tar.”

Of course he wasn’t attracted to her body anymore. After all, he’d had four years to sate himself on her, and that was more than enough. Plus, Poppy knew quite well that many women had really large bosoms compared to hers.

She lifted the hem of her chemise and stepped into the bath. She cast a quick glance at Fletch, but he was over on the other side of the room, looking out the window.

“It’s snowing,” he said. “A proper snowfall.”

She could just see a blur of white over his shoulder. It made the room seem even smaller and more private.

“I’d like snow for Christmas,” she said. She sat down in the water, thinking about what would happen to her chemise when it got wet.

Not that it would matter to him, anyway.

The wet cloth looked as fine as netting where it clung to her legs. She tugged it over her knees, but where it fell between her legs she could even see golden hair through the tissue-thin cloth. Quickly she brought her knees up to her chest, splashing water on the floor.

“Are you ready?” he said from the window.

“No!” If she wrapped her arms around her chest and kept her knees up, she was covered. Not decent, but covered.

“Yes,” she said. “I’m ready.”

Chapter 36

Jemma and her husband were nearing the end of their game. If Jemma had to bet on it, she would say that she was winning, hands down. Beaumont had played the first game in this match with a fiery intensity, as if every move would determine the change of government.

But this game he kept moving carelessly and then talking of Fox’s India bill, the French trade treaty, the brandy tax, the situation of Scottish peers in the House of Lords. Almost as if he wanted her opinion. And she would lay out the board for another game (for they had fallen into the habit of playing a side game, as they called it), and if she felt he was truly spouting nonsense, she would point it out.

She’d actually started reading the Morning Chronicle and the Morning Post, though she was careful not to let him know. There was no point in letting one’s husband think that he was interesting; it would only end in disaster.

This night Jemma looked at the board and knew she had him. There would be three more days, because of the one-move-a-day rule, but the game was over. “You didn’t play this game seriously,” she said, moving her queen to King’s Four and taking his only remaining castle.

He moved a pawn in a hopeless gesture of solidarity toward his threatened queen. “True,” he said. “But I wouldn’t want you to think that I want any less to win.”

“I believe it’s competition that spurs you to play,” she said. “Last game, Villiers was your competition, not myself. Without Villiers playing a parallel game, you can’t bring yourself to play your best.”

She didn’t say the obvious: that if her assessment were correct, he didn’t really care to win. And given that she herself was the purported prize for winning the match…well, there was nothing there that she hadn’t known for years, was there?

“Fox’s India Bill will be voted on any day,” he said. “Shall we go to the country soon? My mother writes that she will remain in Scotland.” There was no need to explain that comment: the dowager duchess was known far and wide as a harridan.

“We are having a house party,” Jemma said. “I’ve just sent out invitations.”

He was putting the pieces back in place and his hands paused for a moment and then continued. “Of course,” he said. “A excellent idea.”

Jemma felt nettled that he didn’t show more reaction. “Shall I invite Miss Tatlock?”

The question hung in the air. She was deliberately baiting him, and why? Why?

“I would enjoy that.”

So there was the answer to that question.

“Not her sister, though. I can’t stand her sister.”

“She dithers,” he said, agreeing with her.

“Poppy and Fletch, of course.”

“But not her mother,” he said this time. “I can’t stand her mother.”

“Lady Flora is not fluffy,” Jemma said feelingly.

“She’s feral.”

She laughed a little. “I’ll invite that nice Dr. Loudan from the Royal Society,” she said. “That will keep Fletch on his toes.” Elijah looked amused once she explained. “Jemma the Matchmaker,” he said. “It boggles the mind.”

“Their marriage doesn’t have to be over. They love each other.”

“But if their intimate life is as terrible as you say—”

She shrugged. “Ours wasn’t much better.”

Too late she realized that she’d walked into a trap. “Our marriage,” he said thoughtfully.