Charlotte laughed, ignoring the uneasy pinch of her stomach. "Whatever you think best. As long as no one accosts me or demands anything of me I should be quite fine. ”
"Trust me, love, no one will. There are few rules among the Heavenly Host, apart from 'Do What Thou Wilt,' but one that remains sacrosanct is that all acts must be agreeable to every partner, and no one is to interfere or criticize a member's choice, be it an unusual act or simply to watch. No one will touch you, darling. I promise. "
Charlotte glanced down at the bright white ribbon she'd tied around her arm. "I'll be perfectly fine, Lina. Don't worry. I have complete faith," she said. And wondered if she lied.
Adrian stood off to one side, watching the ceremony. He hadn't bothered with monk's robes or any of the other ridiculous trappings the Heavenly Host liked to indulge in. He preferred his sinning to be flagrant—the idea of hiding behind robes and secret passwords was anathema to him. He liked to think there was nothing he wasn't willing to do, and no one he wasn't willing to let know about it. Including his esteemed, disapproving, hypocritical father, who'd indulged in the same excesses at an even more advanced age than Adrian's twenty-eight.
His mother was a different matter. She worried way too much, but he could rely on gentlemanly restraint to keep most people, including his father, from spreading too many tales.
She wanted him to marry, to give her grandchildren, and he supposed he'd do so, eventually, simply to make her happy. His mother's happiness was one of the few things he cared about, aside from his own determined pursuit of pleasure.
She wouldn't be at all happy to know he was at a gathering of the Heavenly Host. This would have
stopped a better man, but, then, he was a very bad man, as Cousin Etienne cheerfully assured him, a rake and a libertine, a seducer of the worst kind. He said it as if conferring a great honor, but Adrian felt no particular pride. In general, he felt nothing at all apart from the pleasure of the senses. The small death of an intense orgasm, the sweetness of the opium pipe, the wild absinthe dreams that could fuel his more intense couplings.
And that was why he was here, despite all the folderol, the Latin which was hardly up to the standards of his classical education. He came for the sex, in all its most unbridled variations, he came for the total lack of inhibition and restraint He came for the motto emblazoned across the stone arch that led to this outer garden: Do what thou wilt. He intended to.
Montague was up on the dais, an ironic smile on his lined, elegant face as he exhorted the motley crowd. He looked paler than usual, weaker, and Adrian knew with a sudden, sinking despair that Monty was getting sicker. He lifted a shaking hand to hold aloft the phallus-shaped goblet they were all supposed to drink from, some sort of profane communion. Adrian himself always avoided that part of the festivities—he was much too fastidious to share a cup with some of the worst degenerates in Europe, and he had no great faith in what exactly lay in the elixir of ergot rot had sent the entire party into hallucinations of sometimes horrific proportions. Pawlfrey had never recovered; he'd ended locked up in one of his family's country estates, raving mad.
Adrian had more faith in the strength of his own mind, but he preferred to make his own decisions when it came to the ingestion of drugs. He knew how well he tolerated absinthe or opium and regulated his use. The thought of someone else drugging his wine was unacceptable.
He could see Lady Whitmore on the other side of the avid group of nuns and monks, with the occasional bishop's miter thrown in. She was looking fetching, as always, in her habit. She was undoubtedly one of the great beauties, and she'd made it more than clear she was willing to lie with him. All he had to do was nod her way and she'd be on her back, or knees, in minutes.
Something stopped him. For all her flirtatiousness, her languid glances and casual touches, she left him with the feeling that she derived no real pleasure from the actual act. Even the well-paid courtesans he usually cavorted with expressed more enthusiasm.
No, he'd as soon bed her stiff-necked, virginal cousin, Miss Spenser. In fact, that particular fantasy had invaded his dreams recently. Only last night he'd been alone for a change, half asleep, and he felt his body harden at the thought of someone's mouth. The prim, serious mouth of Lina's cousin. He wanted to see if her hair was the same rich copper between her legs. He wanted to see if the freckles covered her breasts, her belly, the insides of her thighs. He wanted to strip the unflattering clothes from her long body, to—
Montague's voice rose to a wavering crescendo, and he passed the goblet to the next acolyte, disappearing back into the shadows. Lady Whitmore was the third in line, clearly anxious to get started, and Adrian knew he was going to have to make up his mind. Evangelina Whitmore was beautiful, available, he'd never had her. He was a fool to even have second thoughts.
As she moved he noticed the tall monk who'd been shadowing her and frowned. Had she already chosen her partner for the next hour, or for the full three days ahead of them?
And then he saw the white ribbon on the monk's arm. A watcher. He had no particular problem with that—he'd found a number of women enjoyed an audience. It inspired them to new heights. Though he always wondered if their noisy pleasure wasn't then more for the audience and less the result of his own expertise.
Not that that was something that troubled him overmuch. He was quite gifted at the giving and receiving of pleasure. An audience had long since ceased to be a novelty for him—if Lina Whitmore came equipped with a witness then he might look elsewhere.
But to his surprise he saw them part company, and he wondered if he'd been mistaken. He'd been very sure they were together, yet Evangelina was disappearing into the darkness, away from him, and he wondered if she'd gone after Montague. There'd be no joy from that union, for either of them, but that was hardly his problem.
It was the monk who suddenly interested him.
While he considered himself broad-minded when it came to the pursuit of pleasure, he found his own tastes ran to women exclusively. Monty had always chided him for his lack of imagination when it came to choosing partners thusly, but Adrian ignored his old friend. Women were such delightful creatures, so beautifully constructed, as if made for one reason and one alone.
He knew otherwise, but his blood was up and he was focused on that one thing alone. With Lina Whit-more gone, he needed to find someone equally enticing. It shouldn't be that difficult.
"Why the hesitation, my boy?" Etienne had sidled up to him, his monk's habit open to expose a burly chest thick with grizzled hair. Etienne was partial to group efforts, while in general Adrian preferred one woman at a time. There were too many people at an orgy—he tended to lose track of limbs and mouths, and sheer sensation had palled long ago.
Adrian gave him his charming smile. "My intended has gone off with another. I find I must regroup. "
"Can you not join them?"
The idea of having sex with his oldest friend was entirely unappealing. He remained close with Montague, whose tastes had made themselves evident later in life, by keeping the question of physical affection at a distance. To put it bl
untly, he didn't care who or what Montague fucked, as long as it wasn't
"I'll look elsewhere, I think," he said casually, his eyes still on the new monk. He could tell by the way he walked that he was quite young, and he moved farther into the gardens decorated with impressively explicit statues. Adrian could tell by the rigidity in the young monk's shoulders that he had never seen or considered what was going on between the carved participants, and—
A slow smile curved his mouth. "I believe I've found my muse. ”
Etienne followed his gaze. "You've changed your habits, mon cousin. I thought you didn't care for your own sex. ”