To Love and to Loathe (The Regency Vows #2)(82)
“It’s really rather clever,” Emily said slowly. “If the female body is so designed that pleasure can be achieved from—or is, as you said Violet, rather dependent on—an area not necessary to the reproductive act…” She trailed off for a moment, deep in thought once more. “… and if there are even imitations of the male organ that can be acquired, for ladies who happen to enjoy its sensation…” Another moment of thoughtful silence. “Why, it’s almost as though men aren’t necessary at all!” She beamed at the pair of them, like a pupil who had just worked out a particularly thorny mathematical equation.
“A comforting thought, is it not?” Diana asked her.
“It’s much more pleasant with a man,” Violet said, seeming to think that her instruction session had veered a bit off course. “If one’s inclinations lie in that direction, I mean.”
“Still, this is useful knowledge,” Emily mused. She blinked and redirected her attention to Diana. “But what does all of this have to do with whatever is bothering you?”
“Oh,” Diana said, her smile fading; for a moment, she had forgotten what she’d come here to discuss in the first place. “Well…” She paused. Her insides squirmed. The thought of being candid about how she felt—about how she truly felt, and about Jeremy, of all people—made the idea of flinging herself off the roof sound more appealing than it probably should… and yet wasn’t that the root of her problem? If she could not voice her feelings to her two closest friends, to Violet and Emily, whom she’d known for half her life, how could she ever muster the courage to tell Jeremy himself?
“It made me think, for a moment, about how much more difficult life is for people like Lady Helen. And for men who prefer men. About what they’re willing to risk, just to be with the person they love.” She paused, her mind still working, snagging on one thing in particular. “And about how marriage probably doesn’t seem like a trap to them at all, but a glorious, impossible dream.” Marriage had never felt like that to her—but it had, once upon a time, been a means of escape, and she had reached for it eagerly with both hands. If marriage to Templeton, a man she had barely known and had not loved, could have been an escape, how much more could it be with a man she cared for—and desired—a great deal?
“Marriage has never felt like a trap to me,” Violet said carefully, clearly recognizing how difficult it had been for Diana to speak even this much. “Even when James and I were in our worst moments, when we were sitting silently across the dinner table from one another, not saying a word, it never felt like a trap. It felt like something precious and wonderful that we had broken.”
“Marriage to someone of my own choosing is more than I have ever truly hoped for,” Emily said quietly. “It still seems out of my reach. But I am starting to think that if there is someone who makes that risk worthwhile, it might be worth taking.” She paused, a distant expression on her face; Diana and Violet watched her eagerly, and when she did not continue speaking after a moment, Violet broke the silence.
“Emily,” she said slowly, “has Belfry proposed to you?”
Emily shook her head. “Not in so many words. But he’s implied… well, he’s told me that he has more than enough money to pay off my father’s gambling debts—and that he knows something about Mr. Cartham, something about his past, that he could use to end Mr. Cartham’s blackmail of my father. I could be free,” she added, her voice faltering on the word, one she clearly barely even dared voice for fear it would vanish in a puff of smoke. “It would not be a love match, of course—but I like the fact that he spoke honestly to me. He… respects me.” Her tone was slightly wondering, as if this was something she had not thought possible, and Diana felt painfully sad for Emily, in a way she’d not felt in a while.
“In any case, he hasn’t even properly asked,” Emily said, her manner more businesslike all of a sudden. “But I’m starting to think that it might be worth the risk.”
For the second time that day, Diana was struck by her own cowardice. Lady Helen was willing to risk her reputation, her very future to be with the woman she loved; Emily was willing to risk marriage to a man she barely knew, to have some taste of freedom. But she, Diana, could not even risk uttering three small words, and seeing if Jeremy returned them?
“You’re making me feel rather ashamed of myself, all of a sudden,” she confessed. “My own romantic problems seem rather pitiful by comparison.”
“Is this about Jeremy?” Violet asked.
Diana sighed, nodding. “We came to our current arrangement under the understanding that it was to be temporary, mutually beneficial, and that we would go our separate ways when it ceased to please us both. But…”
She trailed off, at a loss to explain the complex whirlwind of emotions that had taken up residence within her without her consent. That was the trouble with feelings—they so rarely appeared when it was convenient, and even more rarely did they appear in a desirable configuration. It was one of the many reasons she had done her best to protect herself against them, but a certain maddening marquess had apparently fought his way through her defenses.
“Speaking to Lady Helen today gave me much to think on, appalling as that is to admit,” she said at last. “And it occurred to me that if she is willing to risk her name, her entire future, all to have some semblance of a life with the person she loves… well, it strikes me as being rather cowardly that I refuse to speak a fraction of my feelings.” And, indeed, she did not feel at all brave as she spoke these words aloud—so accustomed was she to keeping her deepest feelings tucked close against her heart that even this hedging sort of admission, which did not really admit anything at all, made her feel naked and exposed in a way that was utterly terrifying.