ThePleasureDevice Read Online Free PDF Page B

a
chance to dance with so magnificent a young woman.”
    Helena colored demurely.
    Charlotte approached the trio with a slight huff and puff. “My
dear,” she said to Sophia, “I have not forgotten my duty.” She wrapped Helena’s
arm around hers. “I have some very nice gentlemen to introduce you to.” She
nodded politely to the doctor. “If you will please excuse us, Dr. Christopher.”
    “Of course, my lady.”
    Sophia caught the doctor’s eye and offered a smile infused
with subtle promise. He smiled back graciously. As Charlotte whisked her and
Helena deeper into the fray, Sophia cast a last glance at Dr. Christopher, once
again feeling a touch of envy as the exquisitely beautiful Lady
Foxley-Graham—her dress the very same color blue as his mesmerizing eyes—approached
him accompanied by the brown-haired object of Helena’s desires.
    * * * * *
    “That woman!” Lavinia huffed.
    Nicholas chuckled.
    Lavinia sneered at her lover. “Don’t laugh. One really has
to know her if one is to survive in London Society. Charlotte knows absolutely
everybody—”
    “Including, it seems now, even me.”
    Lavinia ignored his sarcasm. “But she’s so overbearing! I
think she plays the distracted, fashionable old lady a bit too much, really.”
    Nicholas sipped at his champagne as his gaze wandered to
Charlotte and her companions. “Who’s she with now?”
    His voice held far too much interest and Lavinia saw
immediately why. With her striking copper-colored curls framing her angelic
face, a perfect figure swathed tightly in pale-purple silk, draped tulle
accentuating her hips, and richly decorated silver brocade underskirts
distracting attention from her décolletage, Helena Phillips was possibly the
most eye-catching debutante at the Wrexham ball. Nicholas gawked at the
beguiling girl with a faraway expression, one Lavinia rarely saw but
immediately understood. He was head-over-heels smitten. More than that, he was
fantasizing an erotic scenario at that very moment, as evidenced by the slight
bulge in his trousers.
    Upon looking back at the Phillipses and Charlotte, Lavinia
was surprised to see Dr. Julius Christopher with them, being very charming—as
he always was—to the ladies in question. Despite his status as a baronet and
having a clientele among the families in the big houses, grand social occasions
were not his usual milieu.
    “Vinny,” came Nicholas’ entreaty to break her thoughts. “Who’s
the girl in lavender?” Mere interest had turned into earnestness.
    “Ah, there’s a scandal there.” Lavinia sipped her champagne.
“That’s Sophia Phillips and her daughter. Mrs. Phillips was formerly Lady Sophia
Harwell—well, I suppose she could still use her title if she wanted—until she
went and fell in love with an American. Some sort of industrialist. Builds
machines and such. She was more than three months gone when they ran away
together.”
    “Outrageous!” Nicholas hissed sardonically.
    “Yes, dear, you may well mock, but that puts the daughter
Helena far out of your league. In order to redeem her twig on the family tree,
she must marry a man high in the ranks of society.” Lavinia brought her glass
to her lips. “Someone like your brother.”
    That got a rise out of him. “My brother wouldn’t know what
to do with her.”
    “He knows how to fuck a woman, Nicky darling. And he only
needs to do it until he’s made an heir.”
    “Funny how he hasn’t figured that out yet.”
    “Well, dear, Jack being childless and dissipated puts you in
direct line to be Earl of St. Albans, and,” Lavinia gave him a sidelong glance,
“available to the likes of Helena Phillips.”
    “I left that life behind, Vinny.”
    Lavinia was afraid of that answer. Perhaps Nicholas wasn’t
as interested in the lovely Helena as she had guessed. Or he might need some
prodding. “Then you will have to admire from afar.”
    Nicholas harrumphed just as Charlotte dragged the girl away
into the crowd to find a