Read Online One Good Earl Deserves a Lover by Sarah MacLean - Free Book Online

ruby is red. And lovely.”
    “It is.” Pippa agreed. “When did you receive it?”
    A small, private smile flashed across Olivia’s pretty face. “Tottenham gave it to me last night after the theater.”
    “And mother didn’t mention it at breakfast? I’m shocked.”
    Olivia grinned. “Mother wasn’t there when he did it.”
    There was a twinge of something in the words—an awareness that Pippa almost didn’t notice. That she might not have noticed if not for Olivia’s knowing blue gaze. “Where was she?”
    “I imagine she was looking for me.” There was a long pause, in which Pippa knew she should draw meaning. “She was not with us.”
    Pippa leaned in, across the table. “Where were you?”
    Olivia grinned. “I shouldn’t tell.”
    “Were you alone ?” Pippa gasped, “With the viscount?”
    Olivia’s laugh was bright and airy. “Really, Pippa . . . you needn’t sound like a shocked chaperone.” She lowered her voice. “I was . . . not for long. Just long enough for him to give me the ring . . . and for me to thank him.”
    “Thank him how?”
    Olivia smiled. “You can imagine.”
    “I really can’t.” The truth.
    “Surely, you’ve had a reason or two to thank Castleton.”
    Except she hadn’t. Well, she had certainly said the words, thank you, to her betrothed, but she’d never had cause to be alone with him while doing so. And she was certain that he’d never imagined giving her such a lavish present as the Viscount Tottenham had bestowed upon Olivia. “How, precisely, did you thank him, Olivia?”
    “We were at the theater, Pippa,” Olivia said, all superiority. “We couldn’t do very much. It was just a few kisses.”
    Kisses.
    In the plural.
    Pippa jerked at the words, knocking over her inkpot, sending a pool of blackness across the tabletop toward a young potted lemon tree, and Olivia leapt back with a squeal. “Don’t get it on my dress!”
    Pippa righted the inkwell and mopped at the liquid with a nearby rag, desperate for more information. “You’ve been”—she glanced at the door of the orangery to assure herself that they were alone—“kissing Tottenham?”
    Olivia stepped backward. “Of course I have. I cannot very well marry the man without knowing that we have a kind of . . . compatibility.”
    Pippa blinked. “Compatibility?” She looked to her research journal, lying open on the table, filled with notes on roses and dahlias and geese and human anatomy. She’d trade all of it for a few sound pages of notes from Olivia’s experience.
    “Yes. Surely you’ve wondered what it would be like—physically—with Castleton . . . once you are married?”
    Wonder was a rather bland word for how Pippa felt about the physical nature of her relationship with Castleton. “Of course.”
    “Well, there you have it,” Olivia said.
    Except Pippa didn’t have it. Not at all. She resisted the urge to blurt just such a thing out, casting about for another way to discuss Olivia’s experience without making it seem as though she were desperate for knowledge. Which, of course, she was. “And you . . . like the kissing?”
    Olivia nodded enthusiastically. “Oh, yes. He’s very good at it. I was surprised at first by his enthusiasm—”
    In that moment, Pippa loathed the English language and all its euphemisms. “Enthusiasm?”
    Olivia laughed. “In only the very best way . . . I’d kissed a few boys before—” She had? “—but I was a bit surprised by his . . .” She trailed off, waving her bejeweled hand in the air as if the gesture held all relevant meaning.
    Pippa wanted to strangle her little sister. “By his . . .” she prompted.
    Olivia lowered her voice to a whisper. “His expertise.”
    “Elaborate.”
    “Well, he has a very clever tongue.”
    Pippa’s brow furrowed. “ Tongue? ”
    At her shocked reply, Olivia pulled up straight. “Oh. You and Castleton haven’t kissed.”
    Pippa frowned. What on earth did a man do with