“Describe him to me.”
Agatha frowns. “Why?”
“Because I’m a lonely old spinster who must live vicariously through her slightly younger widowed friend.”
Agatha rolls her eyes. “You are so dramatic.”
“Indeed. Now details, please.”
“Very well. He was ridiculously tall and broad and I suspect he has a physical job of some sort because his chest was incredibly firm to the touch.”
“You touched his chest?”
Agatha waves her hand dismissively. “During the kiss.”
“His hair is unfashionably long and golden—like his mother’s—and he wears it tied behind him in a queue. The room was rather dark, but I believe his eyes were a sultry green. Perfectly sculpted cheekbones and jawline and a deliciously plump mouth. I’ve never before noticed a man’s lips, but his were decidedly kissable.”
Violet fanned herself with her own hand. “Yes, I can see why spending intimate time with a man like that—naked—would be tedious.”
“I can’t explain it, Violet, but there was something about him. Have you ever met someone and known that they had the potential to irrevocably change your life?” Agatha puffed out a tight laugh. “That doesn’t even make sense. I might as well read those tea leaves.”
Violet’s features softened. “I tease you, my dear friend, because it is how I love. But the truth is, if this man makes you too nervous to enter into an arrangement with him, then I think we can find another solution for you.”
4
“Look at my beautiful boys,” Sebastian’s mother cooed.
“You don’t have to say that to us every week, Mother,” Spencer said.
Their mother smirked and shrugged. “I’m getting older and I need to be nice to you so you’ll make sure to take care of me when I’m too old to do it for myself.”
Sebastian chuckled. “So you’re resorting to bribery.”
“My love, I built an empire on my back and raised the two of you heathens, I am not above bribery.”
Spencer groaned. “Mother, please do not remind us of your former occupation.”
“Don’t be sure a prude, Spencer,” their mother quipped. “And I never said it was a former occupation.”
Sebastian chuckled again and looked down at the napkin in his lap.
“Can we change the subject?” Spencer asked.
Their mother clapped her hands. “Yes because we haven’t yet discussed your brother’s new endeavor.” She leveled her greeneyes on Sebastian, their gaze so familiar as they mirrored his own.
Spencer turned to face Sebastian. Though they were twins, they could not look any more different from one another. Spencer was dark, where Sebastian was light. In looks only, their personalities were the exact opposite. Sebastian swallowed a laugh as he considered the number of times over the last few years when he’d expected his brother to declare he was going into the church to do God’s work instead of living like sinners the way Sebastian and their mother did.
Instead, he became an artist. It suited his more sentimental and sensitive nature. Spencer has the heart of a poet. Whereas Sebastian has the heart of a, well, he wasn’t even certain if he had a heart.
“What is your new project, dear brother?” Spencer asked. He meticulously cut his egg into tiny pieces.
“I was meeting with mother yesterday in her office and a woman arrived to inquire about hiring mother to teach her how to seduce a man. As it turns out the little bird wants to be a mistress and thought the best place to learn how was at the hands of Lady LeBlanc.” Sebastian shrugged. “I simply explained to her that learning to please a man would work much better if she had a man for an instructor.”
His words came out casual as if his entire world hadn’t shifted on its axis in the last twenty-four hours. He’d had barely a moment without a though of Agnes Pennybrook.
“Darling, you’re leaving out some key elements,” their mother said. “The part where she admitted to be not just a widow, but an untouched widow.”
Spencer maked some sort of strangled laugh noise. “How does a widow remain a virgin?”