I couldn’t have been,” she replied. “My husband used my body on our wedding night.” She shivered openly with the memory. “It was horrible! Not at all like Your Majesty’s treatment of me.”
“Sweetheart,” the king said gently, “your maidenhead was quite intact, and I am a man who knows such things. Tell me what this man did to you, Fancy, and I will attempt to explain further. Did your mother not offer you the knowledge you would need for that momentous event in your life?”
“Mama said that she supposed that my sister Maeve and my friends had already told me what I needed to know, for all girls were inclined to chatter about such things. Then she told me to put myself into Parker’s hands and all would be well. She said that a gentleman doesn’t want his wife to be overly knowledgeable. That such a woman but frets a man since he wonders from where she has obtained her information.”
“Had your sister spoken with you?” the king wondered aloud.
“Maeve was very impressed that I was to wed a Virginia Randolph. She said it was best I be pure as the driven snow else he be suspicious. So I asked nothing more. Oh, I knew that men kiss and fumble with your breasts, but other than that I had no knowledge.”
“How did your husband make love to you?” the king questioned.
“He made me lie on my belly, and pushed my face into the pillows so none would hear my cries. He said he did not want to see my face when he did it. Then he pushed into me, and the pain was so terrible that I fainted dead away. So you see, Your Majesty, I couldn’t have been a virgin.”
The implication of her words slammed into the king’s brain, and he closed his eyes for a short moment. The pervert had violated this exquisite girl in the most vicious and debauched way. Were he not dead, Charles Stuart, the king, thought, I should kill him myself. Then as his shock eased, he said to Fancy, “Sweetheart, you were yet a virgin for me because your husband used you in a corrupt fashion. No decent man would use a respectable woman in that fashion, particularly an innocent virgin. Someday you will tell me how he died, but even if you feel you are responsible for his death, he deserved to die, Fancy. Did you tell your parents what happened afterward?”
She shook her head. “There was such an uproar over Parker’s death that I tried to put it from my mind,” she admitted.
“Rightly so,” he agreed, and then he bent and kissed her. “I shall never let any man harm you again, Fancy,” he told her. “You have my royal word on that, my darling.”
“And I do not have to speak of it again?” she said.
“Not until you are ready,” he promised her.
She looked at him flirtatiously. “Can we do it again now, Your Majesty?” she queried him prettily.
He laughed. “So you like being fucked, my little colonial.”
She looked a bit shocked by his use of the crude word, but then she answered, “Aye, I like being fucked by Your Majesty.”
“What is it about you, Fancy,” he wondered, caressing her face with a gentle hand, “that makes me want to keep you from all harm. You are hardly shy, or meek, and yet . . .” his voice trailed off.
Reaching up, she drew his head down to hers. “Kiss me,” she said simply, and he did.
He made love to her a second time that night, and her passionate response to him set his senses reeling. He felt like a boy again. Afterward she fell asleep, but before she did he told her that these rooms were now hers.
“Are they not yours?” she said puzzled.
“I do not often take my mistresses to the royal apartments for I would not offend the queen,” he told her, and she nodded her agreement.
“Am I to remain here?” she wondered.
“The rooms are yours if you choose to take up residence at Whitehall or they are yours in which you may entertain me and your friends. Shall I have a servant sent to you?” He arose from the bed and began to dress himself.
“I have a maid, Bess Trueheart,” Fancy responded. “She will either still be in my uncle’s apartments or will have returned to Greenwood House with my cousins.”
“I will have her found and sent to you in the morning,” the king said.
“But how will she find me? I have no idea where I am for Mr. Chiffinch led me down so many corridors and up so many flights of stairs, I am totally lost,” Fancy said with a helpless smile.
The king laughed. “Whitehall is a hodgepodge, I will agree,” he replied. “I will assign a page to serve you when you are here, my darling little colonial.” He bent and ruffled her tousled raven’s black curls. “Sleep well, my darling Fancy,” he said softly. He kissed the top of her head. “We have but begun a lovely friendship.” Then he departed the bedchamber, closing the door behind him.
The king quickly made his way back to his own apartments. He had to speak with his cousin about Fancy. No! He would not speak with Charlie. Not yet. He would send for the dowager duchess of Glenkirk. She must be informed of this turn of events. Fancy had been a virgin! He had certainly never expected it, and had they not been so far along in their amorous pursuits he might have been able to stop. But if the truth had been known, he didn’t want to stop with her. The king knew that his sexual appetites were greater than most men, but it was just because they were that he had learned to control them. Considering the violence that had been visited upon Fancy Devers, he was glad that it had been he who had finally introduced her to the delights of passion. She could not have had a better teacher, he thought without bragging, for he knew that he was an excellent lover.
Page, his keeper of the privy closet, was awaiting him. He helped his master disrobe. The king quickly bathed and, clothed in a clean nightshirt, lay down for a few hours of rest. Soon enough he would be surrounded by the formalities and daily routine of his court. Time spent with his mistresses was private and precious to him. He fell asleep dreaming of turquoise eyes and perfect little breasts.
In the morning he told the keeper of his appointments to find a time in which he might speak with the dowager duchess of Glenkirk this very day. And when the time had been settled, a messenger was to be dispatched to the lady. The king’s tone told the royal servant that he would not accept the excuse that his calendar was already full.
The keeper of the appointments bowed and said, “Yes, Your Majesty.”
Jasmine, dowager duchess of Glenkirk, was sitting up in her bed drinking her morning tea when Orane bustled in holding a sealed packet. The maidservant handed it to Jasmine with a curtsy.
“This has just come from Whitehall,” she said, “and the gossip is that Mistress Fancy did not come home last night with her two cousins. Oh la la, madame! The duke does not know whether to be angry, or not.”
“I would advise he not be angry,” Jasmine said with a smile. “A king is a king as we both well know, Orane.” She broke the seal on the parchment packet and opening it, read the contents. When she had finished, she folded it back up again, and said, “I have an audience with His Majesty at four o’clock this afternoon, Orane. Bring me my jewel cases so I may decide what I will wear that His Majesty remember he is dealing with the Mughal’s daughter and not just any old woman.”
“Shall I send the duke
