If it had been put to her differently, she might have found the proposition almost enticing. If it had been suggested as a partnership that benefited them both, she might well have considered it. It could be no worse a fate than lying night after night beneath John Ridge, bearing his children…
Unconsciously, she moved her hands over her body outlined beneath the thin shift. That strange effervescence coursing through her again. A jubilant, exhilarated sewnse of anticipation. The Duke of Redmayne was an arrogant tyrant, but when he touched her, her body took off on some weird flight of fancy over which her mind had no control. She could enjoy that, if she decided to. She could enjoy the Duke of Redmayne, if she decided to. But she didn't have to let him know that.
A slow smile curved her mouth.
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After Juliana's solitary dinner Bella came in, her habitual beam on her round face. "Mistress sent ye up a right pretty chamber robe, miss." She shook out the delicate cambric folds of a white lace-trimmed wrapper. "Shall you put it on?"
Juliana took the garment from her. It was an exquisite froth of lace and ruffles, embroidered with tiny cream daisies. Another of the duke's sartorial inspirations?
"It's for when the duke visits ye," Bella said, confirming this unspoken assumption. "I'm to 'elp you get ready for 'im."
"Now?" Despite her earlier resolutions, Juliana's blood began to speed and her heart banged against her ribs. It was too soon. She wasn't prepared.
" 'Is Grace will be along after tea," Bella said. "Mistress said as 'ow I was to show ye about perfume an' what kind of refreshments the gentlemen like." She put a small vial on the dresser. "We jest dabs this be'ind yer ears, and knees, an' between yer breasts. Some gentlemen care fer it in other places, too, but I daresay 'Is Grace will tell you what 'e wants. They usually does." She smiled and nodded reassuringly. "Miss Rosamund 'ad a gentleman once what liked it between 'er toes. He liked to suck 'em." Bella giggled. "She said it tickled summat chronic. But she couldn't laugh in case 'e got upset."
Bella matter-of-factly began to remove Juliana's shift and petticoat. Juliana was for the moment speechless as she absorbed the maid's informative chatter. She'd heard similar discussions about adorning a prize pig for auction at the summer fair.
"I wonder if’n we should put a little rouge on yer nipples," Bella mused. "I don't know as 'ow 'Is Grace would like it. Lots of 'em do." She poured hot water into the basin and dipped a washcloth in. "I'll jest wash ye a bit. Freshen ye up a bit. Very fussy Mistress Dennison is about cleanliness in this 'ouse. We don't 'ave no need of mercury treatments or Dr. Leakey's pills 'ere."
"What are they for?" Juliana was prompted out of her stunned silence by this.
"For the clap a'course," Bella said in surprise. "Don't ye know about the pox?"
"Not intimately," Juliana said aridly. "But I imagine it's an occupational hazard, like the cart's arse and Bridewell."
The sarcasm missed Bella completely as she plied the washcloth over Juliana's naked body. "Oh, our ladies don't worry about that, miss," she said. "This is a respectable 'ouse. Only the best customers and the freshest pieces. We don't dabble in the market. Don't get no raids 'ere."
"You relieve my mind." Juliana gave herself up to Bella's attentions. The girl clearly knew what she was about when it came to preparing a harlot for a customer. She patted Juliana dry, then dabbed perfume behind her ears, at her throat, on her wrists, and behind her knees.
"What about the rouge, then, miss?" Bella opened an alabaster pot and dipped a finger in. "Jest a touch." Her finger approached Juliana's breast.
Juliana jumped back. "No." she said, revolted. "There are some things I'll endure, hut that's not one of them."
Bella looked disappointed, but she wiped her finger clean on the washcloth. "What about paintin’ yer toenails? Lots of the gentlemen likes that."
"No," Juliana declared. "No paint, no powder, no rouge. Just pass me that robe."
Bella hastened to fetch the chamber robe and slipped it over Juliana's shoulders. It fell in soft folds to her bare feet, caressing her sweetly fragrant skin. Bella fastened the fringed embroidered girdle at her waist and adjusted the high ruffled neckline.
"Oh, that's so demure, miss," she said in awe. "Doesn't show nothin' of you at all. I wonder what Is Grace fancies, then? Some men like the girls to dress as schoolgirls… and that Lord Tardeton likes 'em dressed like a nun." She shook her head wisely. "None so strange as gentlemen."
Juliana examined herself in the mirror. Demure was certainly the word, and yet not quite. The material was so fine that her skin glowed pink beneath, and when she moved, the gown flowed over her, revealing the shapes and shadows of her body. It was a most seductive garment.
Lord of hell, she was beginning to think like a whore! She took several steps around the room, feeling the sensuous swish of the robe, inhaling her scent as her skin warmed the fragrance. A bud of excitement grew in her belly, little rivulets of fire darting into her loins.
"Yer 'air, miss." Bella flourished the hairbrush. "I'll brush it fer you."
Juliana sat down on the ottoman, her head drooping beneath Bella's strong, rhythmic strokes. Her hair crackled, springing out from beneath the brush with a life of its own. It seemed to fill the room with color. She watched in the mirror as the candle's glow caught each vibrant strand.
"Will I thread the ribbon through it?" Bella laid down the brush and took up an ivory silk ribbon. Juliana nodded. She hadn't the will to make small, pointless gestures of independence tonight. They could prepare her for the duke's bed however they thought best. She had enough to do with mental preparation.
She watched as Bella fastened the ribbon around her forehead so that her hair was caught and held at the top but poured out in a river of fire beneath, framing her face and cascading onto the white cambric of her robe. "I look like some virgin shepherdess," she murmured. For some reason the thought set her eyes alight with the excitement that was blooming in her belly.
"All innocent like," Bella agreed. "I expect that's what ‘Is Grace fancies this evening."
"Do the gentlemen always make their preferences known beforehand?"
"Not always." Bella began to tidy up the dresser. "Sometimes the ladies 'ave to change all of a sudden like, if a gentleman 'as a change of fancy. I 'elps them, then. Me an' Minnie." She gathered up the basin, ewer, and washcloth. "I'll get rid of these, miss. Then I'll bring in the refreshments."
Juliana went to the window after the maid had bustled out. Dusk was falling, and the riotous sounds from the Piazza came clear on the still and sultry air. There was music, a fife and drums, rising above the general cacophony. In the street below a blind harpist sat on a box, plucking his strings mournfully in competition with a shoeblack who was hailing potential customers in a shrill singsong.
She was watching for the Duke of Redmayne. But even as she watched, she wondered if perhaps he was already in the house. The door knocker had been sounding for the last hour, and the customary evening buzz was in the air. Hurried footsteps, giggles, rushed whispers, came from outside her door as the girls returned to their chambers for some minor repair. She hadn't yet heard a male voice, but presumably they were still drinking tea and conversing in the drawing room as if this mansion on Russell Street was a conventional, fashionable household.
" 'Ere we arc, then." Bella staggered in under the weight of a laden tray. She was followed by a flunky bearing a tray with bottles and glasses. He set the tray on a low table before the empty grate and studiously avoided looking at Juliana in her robe of seduction. Presumably that was a rule of the house, she thought. He turned and left, again without acknowledgment, and Bella began to lay out covered dishes on the table.