Page 8 of A Dark and Stormy Knight
What had Lady Westlawn told her to say if she hadn’t made prior arrangements at Hyde Park? Oh yes.
“I’m here to peruse the night-blooming jasmine.”
The gate swung open on silent hinges and she took in a shaking breath. Thresholds, she’d heard were dangerous. Places of in-between, where fairy folk and demons could meddle with the living.
Or so superstitious ancestors once believed.
Tonight, she could believe it. Out on this street, she’d done nothing to speak of. She was no one of great importance. Prudence Goode. A second daughter of second-rate nobility.
A virgin.
To cross this threshold, was to be forever altered. Did a night like this always seem so monumental? Did the specter of fate seem to hover above every woman’s head upon making such a decision?
Something intangible drifted above the lamplight but below the stars. Something sentient and dark. Perhaps a bit dangerous and wrathful, though she somehow wasn’t afraid.
Destiny was on the other side of that gate, it told her. More than her virginity would be taken tonight.
No. Prudence shook her head. No, not destiny. What whimsical tripe.
She wasn’t here to court fate…only fantasy.
It took two tries to swallow her nerves before she picked up her skirts, stepped over the threshold, and lost her breath to a marvel.
For a moment, she wondered if she had, indeed, been snatched by the Fae.
The gardens at Miss Henrietta’s School for Cultured Young Ladies might have been a fairy patch. Strings of beads and ribbon flowed from curious shaped hedges and foreign willows with lush, wilting limbs. They glimmered and sparkled in the dim lamplight along lustrous cobbles, illuminating paths to dark places.
More importantly, they created concealing shadows, some of which were already full of revelry. The grounds were vast for the city, and the manor house glowed gaily on the other side of the garden.
She was not to approach the house, she was told. The ironically named school for cultured young ladies was anything but. Miss Henrietta’s was one of London’s most exclusive and expensive brothels wherementook their pleasure among a menagerie of women.
The Stags of St. James, however, made discreet house calls.
And in the summer on certain clear nights…they rutted out-of-doors.
Except, Prudence realized as she ventured onto the grounds, the out-of-doors was not so rustic as one might assume. The gardens at Versailles might weep for the luxury here, and if one wanted to find a place to feel ensconced in privacy, one needn’t look too far.
“Approach any stag you like, madam, so long as he is not engaged by another,” the young footman startled her by appearing at her elbow. She’d quite forgotten he was there. He leaned down to whisper, “They’ll lock horns for the likes ofyou.”
“Who—who would you recommend?” she murmured, instantly regretting the ridiculous question.
The footman didn’t even break his perfect form. He might have been engaged by a Duke, not a derelict debutant looking to debauch herself.
“Adam is in the orchard, seeking his Eve,” he proffered, gesturing toward a copse of trees, as if he directed her to pluck an apple, rather than the original sin. “Let’s see…Daniel is bound in his den in anticipation of devouring, if you are feeling the role of lioness tonight.” He pointed at a dark shadow in a glass enclosure covered by ivy.
“There’s Goliath, the barbarian who might be tamed by the right gentle hand. Or David, if you prefer someone…younger. More eager.”
Prudence stopped, suddenly seized by indecision and a not little fear of lightning, even on such a clear and cloudless night. “I’m sorry but are all of the—er—stags given religious names?” she queried. “Seems rather blasphemous, doesn’t it?”
He gave her a mockingly chiding look. “Go to a church if you want to judge, Madam, we’re all here to commit a cardinal sin, maybe several.”
A decent point, that. She nodded and mumbled an apology, suddenly feeling very itchy and out of her element.
With a jovial wink that told her all was forgiven, he bowed. “If you’re feeling indecisive, I encourage you to take a turn around the garden, let it dazzle your senses, and see what entices your…vigor.”
That seemed like an excellent idea. She’d come here for a thing. An experience. Why the devil hadn’t it occurred to her that what she was coming here for…was a person?
A man.
