The Historical Collection. Stephanie Laurens
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Twenty-Four
Tell me, he said.
Penny’s heart clenched like a fist. Did she dare? Unburdening herself of those memories meant unpacking them from their strongbox, dragging their ugliness into the light. She’d avoided it for so long, hoping that someday the time would feel right to confide in someone.
Now she understood that the time would never feel right. There could be no feeling right about things that were so very wrong. No, there would never be a right time to share the memories. But there could be a right person to tell.
And the right person was here, holding her in his arms.
“When I was a girl, my father had a friend. Mr. Lambert.” The name tasted foul on her lips, so she rushed on. “At the end of each summer, he came to visit. He and Father would go hunting, shooting. The usual autumn sport, you know.”
He nodded, waiting for her to go on.
“And ever since I was a young girl, he’d … Well, he’d always made a favorite of me.”
Penny could see it now, looking back, how early he’d started gaining her trust. Whenever he visited, he brought her lavish presents and demanded only a kiss in return. He’d given her attention at times when she felt overlooked, left out of Bradford and Timothy’s games. The year she was learning her letters, he would pat his knee in invitation and she would go run to sit on his lap. Come, poppet. Show me how well you read.
And when he held her a bit tighter than she would have liked, or placed his hand beneath her skirt to stroke her leg, Penny didn’t complain. She adored him.
“I looked forward to his visits more than I looked forward to my birthday, or Christmas. He always made me feel special.”
Gabriel quietly took her hand in his.
“He passed me sweetmeats beneath the table, when Mother would have said no. He read to me from books of frightening tales that my nursemaid would never allow. But the treats had to be our secret, he said. I mustn’t tell a soul, or my parents would be quite cross.”
Penny became very good at keeping secrets.
It was the autumn she’d just turned ten when he began to touch her.
“The weather was miserable that year. The rain made sporting impossible most days. While everyone else was reading or doing needlework, Mr. Lambert proposed a new secret. Dancing lessons.”
They met in the great hall on dark, rainy afternoons. Just the two of them. He showed her how a gentleman would bow to her, kiss her hand. Most important, she must carry herself as a lady. He showed her how to hold her body straight and corrected her posture with his hands. At first, he merely skimmed a touch down her body, from shoulders to hips. But then it grew worse. And worse. Gentlemen touched ladies in such a manner, he said.
Looking back, his ploy was so obvious. Like any girl of her age, Penny had been eager to grow up, chafing at her parents’ restrictions. Lambert knew it, and he used it to manipulate her. She was wise beyond her years, he told her. Her parents wanted her to stay a little girl, but he understood she was growing up. Becoming a lady. He suspected as much from the maturity in her manner, but touching her beneath her clothing was the only way to be certain. He made it sound so reasonable, even if his cold hands made her insides squirm. Mr. Lambert was her father’s oldest friend. Penny’s friend, as well. He would never hurt her.
When he departed at the end of the visit, he reminded her sternly—the lessons had to remain their secret. If anyone knew—even the servants—they would tell her parents, and her parents would be angry. They would blame Penny. Not only for the grown-up dancing lessons, but for all their secrets. The forbidden sweets, the gifts, the stories she wasn’t meant to hear and the pictures she wasn’t meant to see … Everything.
It would disappoint them greatly to learn how she’d misbehaved over the years.
After that autumn, things were never quite the same.
She was never the same.
When he visited the following year, she feigned illness to avoid him—to the point of making herself vomit. She felt so queasy around him, it wasn’t difficult to pretend. Headaches, colds, her courses … She invented every possible excuse.
However, she couldn’t play sick forever. Mama had gently, but firmly, reprimanded her. Mr. Lambert had always made such a point of being kind to her. Penny didn’t want to hurt his feelings, did she?
No, Penny had said dutifully, swallowing back the bile in her throat, she didn’t.
That’s my good girl, Mama replied with a smile.
Little did her mother know, Penny wasn’t her good girl. Not any longer.
She was dirty. What would her parents think of her if they knew? Maybe they would feel the difference in her when she hugged them, she thought. And so she drew away. She dreaded Sundays. Even if she could hide the shame from her family, God must know. Perhaps the vicar could see it written on her face as she sat on the church bench, pretending to be the same good girl she’d always been.
Her entire upbringing had taught her that her innocence was her most important asset. If she surrendered that, she would be ruined. Worthless.
Only the animals were a comfort. She embraced family and friends less freely, but kittens never shied away. They curled in her lap and purred, and kneaded her with their velvet paws. She was especially drawn to the lost and defenseless creatures.
“They needed me,” she told Gabriel. “And if I could save them, I still felt worthwhile.”
As she talked, a series of objects drifted in and out of her hands. She didn’t notice them being placed in her grasp, and she didn’t recall setting them aside. They were merely there, in easy reach, exactly when she needed them.
A handkerchief.
A pillow.
A cup of tea to warm her trembling hands, and then later, when her throat was parched from talking, cool water to down in a single swallow.
At some point, the objects ceased moving into and out of her grasp, and she found herself clinging to one steady source of comfort: Gabriel’s hand.
“I thought escaping to finishing school would be a relief,” she went on, “but it was worse. So much worse.”
Finishing schools ostensibly existed to instruct young ladies in playing the harpsichord and painting with watercolors. However, the lecture the matrons gave most frequently had nothing to do with art or music. The topic was virtue. The importance of staying pure, of never allowing gentlemen to take liberties before marriage. Not a kiss, not a touch. Without her innocence, a young lady was worthless.
By the time of her debut, Penny felt like a fraud. She wasn’t the sort of young lady she’d been told a true gentleman would want, and she never could be again. The event was a lie. She was a lie. And of course, the mere idea of dancing made her ill.
So she tucked a hedgehog in her pocket. Freya was a protective talisman. Curled up in a tight ball, all her soft vulnerability hidden beneath rows of sharp quills.
And even now, when she’d grown old enough to understand it hadn’t been her fault, and that her inner worth was intact, and the very idea of ruination was a falsehood …
She still couldn’t bring herself to dance.
When she’d finally emptied herself of words and tears, it felt like hours had passed. Perhaps they had. She was wrung out, exhausted in both her body and her mind.
As she lifted her head, Penny gathered the frayed bits of her emotions and tried to prepare. Gabriel knew how it felt to be an unprotected, suffering child. He would want justice on her behalf.
She would have to make him assurances. He mustn’t be angry or do anything rash, she prepared to tell him. She was better now, she’d say. So much better.
But