Blooming: Veronica (20 page)

He walked his new friend, his one and only friend, to the door. “See you tonight, Alfred.”

Left alone once more, Talbot worked on a manuscript until early evening, his editing undisturbed except for the maid’s hourly progress reports on his bride’s activities, when Veronica had risen, dined, bathed, grew restless.

Upon hearing the latter, Talbot put his work aside, grabbed the box, and went to visit his wife.

“Enter,” she replied coolly to his tap on the door.

“Good evening,” he said formally at the threshold and bowed. After placing the box on her bed, he went to the window where she stood, and bent to brush her cheek with his lips.

Uh-oh. A distinct lack of response met his nibble. First, a chilly reception at the door, and now this, no return pucker at the window. Obviously, he had placed his show of esteem too high. He must lower his performance. This occasion called for a grovel and some major ass kissing. Which, naturally, would be his pleasure, though unlikely to be hers.

Bracing himself for recriminations, he asked, “How are you today, my darling?”

“As well as a prisoner can be expected to fare. I am surprised you refrained from locking me in here.”

Had she taken him to task for a known transgression, he would have done the expected thing and apologized, but he could not be contrite about a phantom grievance. “Prisoner? Locked in? Could you possibly clarify?”

She held out the edges of her dressing gown. “Look at me!”

Now, there was an order easily accomplished. He never took his eyes off her.

“You look lovely,” he quickly injected, still floundering at the source of her irritation.

She stabbed a finger toward his nose or his eyeball or some equally sensitive target, hard to tell which with all her poking.

“Do not insult me with your meaningless platitudes,” she raged.

“But I meant it. You look lovely.”

“Enough!” she caterwauled. “I cannot look lovely. And do you know why?”

“I would not hazard a guess.” And a hazard a guess would be. His bride’s scowl was lethal. Or at least dismembering.

“At this ungodly late hour, sir, you still find me in my wrap. And do you know why?”

“Um—”

“I shall tell you why.”

Talbot briefly looked to the heavens.
Thank you, Jesus.

“Because, sir, the maid refused me access to my trunk of clothes. Something about your providing me with a costume for tonight. And so I have been ensconced in this gilded cage all day.”

”Hardly all day. You did not leave your bed until half past five.” He checked his watch. “Little over an hour ago.”

“Yes, no need to remind me. I am fully aware I have been remiss in my duties. I completely missed my noon appointment with the staff, the one I promised to take you to with me.”

“No worries. I went alone. Most informative. Who knew we had a new servant in the household?”

“Well…well…good. I am happy to hear you are taking an interest in your staff.”

“
Our
staff.”

“Fine.
Our
staff. But…but…I missed afternoon tea,” she said peevishly. “I am positively starved.”

“Even after the mounded tray of food you just tucked away? Let me see.” He stroked his chin. “A basket of assorted breads, a bowl of potato soup, a plate heaped with poached fish, and so on. I am gratified your appetite has returned.”

“You, sir—”

Now her stabbing finger took on a southerly direction, and Talbot backed up.

“Employ spies in this house, and I will not stand for it. If you need accounts of my every move, do your own damn peeping.”

A long restful sleep, a robust hunger, an argumentative spirit—his bride was rebounding rather nicely. Soon, she would be back to her old self.

No, better. Her ordeal would have strengthened her.

He smiled. “Here on out, no hourly reports. I promise.”

“Very well. I shall take you at your word. But make sure it never happens again.”

“I would never dream of curtailing your freedom, madam. I only ask you to include me in it. Now, how are you? Any worse for wear after last night?”

“Other than a bit of soreness, which is to be expected on a honeymoon, I am fit and well.”

Beneath her justifiable pique, his wife was fair and uncomplaining—two character traits he greatly admired. Alfred had been correct in his evaluation of Talbot’s marital circumstance. Over and above her potential as a promising author, Veronica would make him an excellent wife.

While he congratulated himself, the ever-curious Mrs. Bowdoin craned her neck to the box on the bed. “What is that?”

“That, my darling, is a gift for you.”

“Will I like it?”

“Questionable.”

She crossed her arms under her full bosom. “Why gift me with something where my enjoyment is questionable?”

“Because I shall certainly enjoy it, and in matters such as these, my enjoyment trumps yours.”

Leaving her stance by the window, she flew across the footboards, flung off the box’s lid, and peered inside.

“Ugh!” She turned back to him, her face screwed up in disdain. “Male attire.”

“Wrong. Within that box lies your means to emancipation.”

“Freedom is not so simple.”

“It is for the male gender, which you will be a member of tonight when I take you out on the town to a private gentleman’s club.”

She snorted. “A brothel, more like.”

“This place caters to a more sophisticated palate and a wealthier clientele.”

“A whorehouse all the same.”

“Think of the research materiel for your next book.”

“There is no ‘next book.’ I keep telling you, I no longer write.”

He stepped toward the door, his leg stiff but the pain manageable. “Dress, then meet me downstairs at the carriage in fifteen minutes.”

“I cannot possibly be ready so quickly.”

“Quit dawdling or you will have less.”

“A woman requires time, sir.”

“Ah, but for this one evening you are a man. Best think like one.”

“Breasts.”

“More like it.”

She rolled her eyes. “Mine will shift under a man’s shirt.”

“The waistcoat will minimize them.” He sighed for the shame of that.

“What of my hair. Shall I hack it all off?”

This threat provoked ire in him. “Do so and you will receive no more fucking from me.”

“That would be altogether too,
too
sad. Your fucking has much to commend it. Even thinking about last night makes me wet. Would you like to see the drips, sir?” She undid her dressing gown’s ties and let the edges fall open.

The little sex fiend. She was killing him with want. But only a bastard would take a wife who had just confessed to honeymoon soreness.

As he was a bastard in truth, Talbot backed up for the door. “I am sure you will come up with a method to disguise your glorious tresses.”

Her eyes softening, she raised a hand to her loose curls. “An unruly mess most of the time, but thank you for saying otherwise. A compliment, even an untruthful one, here or there buoys the female spirit.”

He waved her remark aside. “I never lie. And I should leave.”

“I suppose I could pin it all up—my hair, that is—and then cover the topknot with one of these black silk top hats you so kindly provided in the box.”

“A much better solution.” Her gold-hooped breasts seduced; her cunt wept for something he knew he could provide.

Pain. Excruciating pain. For both of them.

Talbot grabbed the doorknob for dear life. “Pin your hair up under a hat. Do that.”

“But whatever shall I do about my lack of a male appendage?” She batted her lashes. “Though few men can compete with your make, I must have something to show.”

Her flirtatious banter sent him careening to the end of his rope, where he hung suspended, scant seconds from either throttling her or pushing his
make
into her.

Why not do both?

This need not be an either-or situation.

His battle with control lost, he loosened his fingers on the doorknob. One stumbling step would take him to her, where he would throttle then fuck her, perhaps simultaneously.

He let go of the knob. “Oh, stuff it—”

“By golly, I shall. Marvelous idea, that. A tightly rolled sock stuffed in my drawers will mimic a cock and mop up the wetness that besieges me whenever I find myself in your company.”

Before lust consumed him, he opened the door and threw himself bodily out into the hall, Veronica’s mocking laughter following him as he hopped on board the oak banister and slid his haunches back down the railing to the first floor.

What a child his wife was at times!

Mrs. Bowdoin knew she had gotten him all hot and bothered, a fact only a cad would act upon, yet she had the poor sportsmanship to rub his weakness in his face.

Back in his office, Talbot sulkily plopped himself in a chair behind his desk, picked up a steam-powered automaton on top, flicked the lever on its side, and leaned back in his seat to watch the toy’s antics. To the sounds of the tin soldier’s drum clanging, Talbot reconsidered his bride’s laughter.

Perhaps he was being overly sensitive. Perhaps Veronica mocked herself, not him, with her laughter. After all, her confession of “wetness” exposed her weakness, not the other way round.

Imagine that. He made his bride wet, wet like droplets of steam.

Now steam was something he understood. Steam required heat. So much heat, it could bother a person.

Like steam, his bride made him hot and bothered. Like steam, he made her the same.

An equally steamy vulnerability.

And just like steam, his sulk dissolved.

Chapter Twenty-five

At first blush, Talbot’s transparent attempts to lift her spirits by forcing her to go with him to a private gentleman’s club positively incensed her. How dare he push her to reenter life when life had so very little to offer! But that evening as she walked through the establishment’s front door alongside her husband, curiosity beat out anger.

Dressed as she was in dark trousers and a matching coat, she would be privy to a male’s point of view, a perspective that had perplexed her when she was authoring her first book. How could something so revelatory not snap her out of her doldrums?

In
Diary
, the hero had proven difficult to write, particularly when the plot advanced into sexual territory. The private club would provide her with the unique chance to see the world through a male’s eyes. Who could resist?

Not that she ever intended to write a second book of erotica. Still, only an idiot refuses to take advantage of a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity.

A voyeur just like her husband for the evening, she gawked slack-jawed at everything and everyone, from the garish tasseled furnishings to a group of whores strolling about the club in loosened satin wraps.

Hmm. Apparently, dyed pubic hair was very much in vogue this season, the most popular shade being red.

No! Not red. Too blah. This scene called for an exotic description.

She bit her lip, her thoughts flying.

Vermillion. That was it! Ever so much better.

On second thought, that word choice was terrible. Simply awful. Pedestrian and juvenile. Florid prose was the mark of a rank amateur. A few weeks away from her writing desk, and already her skills had grown rusty.

Best stick with red. Red made for a dynamic visual without obscuring the picture under a heap of esoteric verbiage, she decided, her gaze darting back and forth, taking in the sights as if she were on an African safari.

Some prostitutes, she noted, passively lounged on chairs to lure big game to them, while other prostitutes actively prowled the rooms to hunt. Members of both expeditions dragged their catches upstairs. In this all male jungle, the Amazons reigned.

Now, there was a visual. Of course, the idea needed polishing. African safaris took place on the plains of Africa; Amazons confined their female warrior power to…well, who really knew where. Her understanding was Libya, in Northern Africa, but she might possibly be mistaken. But how to write the kernel of an idea? On what, with what?

A sheet of brown paper and a dull pencil would do. An imprisoned Marquis de Sade had scrawled whole chapters on the walls of his cell with his own feces.

She understood his desperation. Should she ask her husband for help with hers?

No. Why embarrass herself?

Talbot Bowdoin would never understand the writing process, the fits and starts, the occasional glimmer of creativity, the frustration of not being able to have a damn pen and paper within easy reach at a moment’s notice. What did he know about books, about the insistent worm burrowing in an author’s head to get it all down lest the phrases slip away?

Some of the patrons carried walking sticks quite similar to those owned by her husband, though not nearly as fine, and everyone wore masks.

When a courtly gentleman dressed in a red velvet cape approached them, Veronica turned to her husband. “I recognize him! What in heaven’s name is
he
doing here?”

“Whomever do you mean?”

“Bosh! Do not toy with me, sir. You know very well whom I mean. Note his shoes. He wore those exact same ones when we visited him the other day at his shop.”

“Like all born writers, you are observant.” He smiled. “Alfred owns this club.”

“I thought him a couturier.”

“My friend is a man of many talents, designing clothing is but one of them.”

The friend of many talents came to a stop in front of them. “A charming companion for the evening you have there, sir. I applaud your excellent tastes in…” Alfred winked. “Boys. What is your preference—watching or being watched?”

“Exhibitionism sounds about right. I would enjoy showing off my darling.” Talbot regarded her, his look intent.

No discernable difference there, as his gaze was never anything less, but still, Veronica felt as though this time he peered into her very soul. In that instant, she realized she was safe with him, that he would never do anything to jeopardize her faith or trust.

And she knew exactly why she believed as she did.

In Boston, a city where reputation was everything, a floundering marriage could ruin his prospects; a successful union might possibly buoy them. For whatever the reason, he had aligned their futures. If he hurt her, he would wound himself. That mutuality formed the very foundation of the marital institution.