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Prologue

Aphrodite’s Club,

London

Late Spring 1850

Aphrodite, the fayptian style chair, her dark eyes bright with curiosity “Lady Ellerslie It isn’t often that a wo comes to see me at my club Please, tell me what it is you wish from me, and I will make it come true”

“Madame, if only it were that simple”

“But perhaps it is Tell me and ill see”

Portia, Lady Ellerslie, hesitated, and for a li so hard to hide “I anity

“We are all most discreet here, my lady”

It had seehtforward in the hansom cab on her way here, but now she was face-to-face with the wohtforward at all But she had , she went through with it Besides, as the alternative? Creep back ho? She could not bear it, not for another day, not for another moment

Not for another night

Portia drew a deep breath “I am a , madame, as you know My position is such that I must be extremely cautious, which is why I have co a false name”

Aphrodite inclined her head, but her eyes said she had heard all this ave Portia some comfort She wasn’t alone after all; there were others like her, ere desperate to escape the strictures society had imposed upon them

Escape?

No, escape was iet as expected of her and pretend to be someone else

“You would like soo on “A glass of soe?”

“No, please, I don’t want anything to drink,” Portia said in frustration, her gloved hands clenching her reticule Suddenly, the words spilled out of her, like a da polite, and I don’t want politeness and good ood intentions, I don’t want to pretend to be happy when I aer, to be so…so devoid of e to sho one truly feels…”

Aphrodite slittered “Go on, Lady Ellerslie”

Her inner feelings, once set free, could not be stemmed, nor could her sense of desperation “Mada woain and not a marble memorial to my dead husband”

Silence hung heavy in the small, chic room Portia wished she could look away from the courtesan, but that would be cowardly—a denial of the words she had just spoken—so she kept her gaze still and steady As if she were not quaking in her boots

“I will let you in on a little secret,” Aphrodite said, her voice conspiratorial “You are not the only English lady of quality who has co my help, and you will not be the last”

“I a to!” She sounded just like the queen, Victoria, as she had

“The world is designed by men, my lady I will say to you what I said to those others There is absolutely nothing wrong in a wo to satisfy her sensual needs; it is a natural thing But in your situation you are taking a greater risk, and it ht be safer, andyour own circle A friend? A servant?”

Portia shook her head “No I must be beyond reproach, madame, and if the merest whisper reached the ears of my family or the palace…I cannot soil my husband’s spotlesshere today I put all in jeopardy?”

Aphrodite inclined her head “You must be seen to uphold the pure perfection of Victorian woently “I understand very well, my lady, and I sympathize with your dilemma You have been placed upon a pedestal and it is lonely up there Especially if you are a sensual woive me, but can you not remarry? It has been two years since Lord Ellerslie died”