“I’ve taken nothing that wasn’t willingly offered to me.” Hodgeham reached out and touched her chin, the damp brush of his fingers making her recoil in disgust. “In truth, it’s been tame sport. Your mother is too docile for my taste.” He leaned closer, until the odor of his body—stale sweat liberally overlaid with cologne—filled Annabelle’s nostrils with a pungent stench. “Perhaps the next time I’ll try you out,” he murmured.

No doubt he expected Annabelle to cry, or blush, or plead. Instead, she leveled a cold stare at him. “You vain old fool,” she said evenly, “if I were to become someone’s mistress, don’t you think I could get someone better than you?”

Hodgeham eventually twisted his lips into a smile though Annabelle was pleased to see that it had taken some effort. “It’s unwise to make an enemy of me. With a few well-placed words, I could ruin your family beyond all hope of redemption.” He stared at the frayed fabric of her bodice and smiled contemptuously. “If I were you, I shouldn’t be quite so disdainful, standing there in rags and paste jewels.”

Annabelle flushed and knocked his hand away angrily as he reached out in an attempt to grope her bodice. Chuckling to himself, Hodgeham descended the stairs, while Annabelle waited in frozen silence. After she had heard the sound of the front door open and close, she hastened downstairs and turned the key in the lock. Breathing hard from anxiety and lingering outrage, she flattened her palms on the heavy oak door and leaned her forehead against one of the panels.

“That does it,” she mumbled aloud, trembling with fury. No more Hodgeham, no more unpaid bills…they had all suffered enough. She would have to find someone to marry immediately—she would find the best prospect she could at the Hampshire hunting party and finally be done with it. And failing that…

She slid her hands slowly along the door panel, her palms leaving streaking imprints on the grainy wood. If she couldn’t get someone to marry her, she could become some man’s mistress. Athough no one seemed to want her as a wife, there seemed to be an infinite number of gentlemen willing to keep her in sin. If she was clever, she could earn a fortune. But she flinched at the thought of never again being able to go out in good society…being scorned and ostracized and valued only for her skills in bed. The alternative, living in virtuous poverty and taking in sewing or washing, or becoming a governess, was infinitely more perilous—a young woman in that position would be at everyone’s mercy. And the pay wouldn’t be enough to sustain her mother, or Jeremy, who would also have to go in service. It didn’t seem that the three of them could afford Annabelle’s morality. They lived in a house of cards…and the merest agitation would cause it to collapse.

The following morning, Annabelle sat at the breakfast table with a porcelain cup clasped in her icy fingers. Although she had just finished her tea, the ceramic was still warm from the sturdy brew. There was a tiny chip in the glaze, and she rubbed the pad of her thumb over it repeatedly, not looking up as she heard her mother, Philippa, enter the room.

“Tea?” she asked in a careful monotone, and heard Philippa’s murmured assent. Pouring another cup from the pot before her, Annabelle sweetened it with a small lump of sugar and lightened it with a liberal splash of milk.

“I don’t take it with sugar any longer,” Philippa said. “I’ve come to prefer it without.”

The day when her mother stopped liking sweets was the day they began serving ice water in hell. “We can still afford sugar for your tea,” Annabelle replied, stirring the cup with a few brisk swirls of her spoon. Glancing upward, she slid the cup and saucer to Philippa’s place at the table. As she had expected, her mother looked sullen and haggard, with shame writhing behind her bitter facade. Once she would have found it inconceivable that her dashing, high-spirited mother—always so much prettier than anyone else’s mother—could have worn such an expression. And as she stared at Philippa’s taut face, Annabelle realized that her own facade was very nearly as world-weary, her mouth holding the same edge of disenchantment.

“How was the ball?” Philippa asked, holding her face close to her own tea so that the steam wafted over her face.

“The usual disaster,” Annabelle said, softening the honesty of her reply with a deliberately light laugh. “The only man who asked me to dance was Mr. Hunt.”

“Dear heaven,” Philippa murmured, and drank a scalding mouthful of tea. “Did you accept him?”

“Of course not. There would be no purpose to it. When he looks at me, it is clear that he has anything but marriage in mind.”

“Even men such as Mr. Hunt do eventually marry,” Philippa countered, glancing up from her porcelain cup. “And you would be an ideal wife for him…you could perhaps be a softening influence, and help to ease his way into decent society—”

“Good Lord, Mama—it sounds as if you are encouraging me to accept his attentions.”

“No…” Philippa picked up her spoon and needlessly stirred her tea. “Not if you truly find Mr. Hunt objectionable. However, if you could manage to bring him to scratch, we would all certainly be well provided for…”

“He is not the marrying kind, Mama. Everyone knows it. No matter what I did, I could never get a respectable offer from him.” Annabelle dug through the sugar bowl with a tiny pair of tarnished silver tongs, searching for the smallest lump she could find. Extracting a morsel of raw brown sugar, she dropped it into her cup and drowned it with fresh tea.