First Comes Scandal (Rokesbys #4) - Julia Quinn Page 0,20
that prostitution is not my only option. You have an education.”
“So do you.”
She snorted. “From my governess. It does not compare, and frankly I’m insulted that you’d even imply that it did.” She stabbed a potato with enough force that Nicholas winced in sympathy.
“I beg your pardon,” he said politely.
She waved this off, leaving him to wonder if she found this, too, to be mostly rhetorical.
“It doesn’t matter, anyway,” she said, “because we are talking about hypothetical me, not real me. Hypothetical me does not have the support of a loving and wealthy family.”
“All right then.” He could play along. “Hypothetical you has three children. Are they old enough to work?”
“Not old enough to earn a decent wage. Unless I send them into the coal mines, and frankly, that seems worse for their health than a broken bone.”
“What are you talking about?” Edmund asked.
Nicholas ignored him. “Wait, so are you now saying you want me to break your children’s bones?”
“Of course not. Not if you can break mine instead.”
“This is precisely my point. You would never allow me to do such a thing if you were not being paid.”
“I’m not stupid.”
“Just desperate.”
Something flashed in her eyes, something pained. Wounded.
“Hypothetical you is desperate,” he said softly.
She swallowed. “It isn’t pleasant to be without choices.”
“No.” He brought his napkin to his lips. He needed a moment. He wasn’t sure what they were talking about any longer, or even if they were talking about the same thing.
“This is why you cannot pay someone to do something like this,” he said quietly. “Consent can be coerced. Hypothetical you says she agrees to have her arm broken in exchange for money to feed her children. But is that really consent if your only other choice is the sale of your body?”
“Some would say that it’s the sale of my body either way.”
“Touché,” he admitted.
“I understand your point,” Georgie said. “I even agree with it a little. There are some things in life that ought not be for sale. But on the other hand, who am I to decide that for another human being? It is easy for me to condemn a decision I would not make, but is it fair?”
“Are you still talking about broken bones?” Violet asked. “Because you look very serious.”
“Our conversation has taken a turn for the philosophical,” Georgie told her.
“And the morbid,” Nicholas added.
“We can’t have that.” Violet nudged her husband. “They need more wine, don’t you think?”
“Absolutely.” Edmund nodded to a footman, who immediately refilled their glasses.
Not that there was much to refill, Nicholas noted. He and Georgie were both staggeringly sober.
“I am not sure,” he said slowly, and in a tone only Georgie could hear, “if we have the right to condemn people for the decisions they make if we ourselves are never forced with a similar choice.”
“Exactly.”
He was quiet for a moment. “This has taken a turn for the philosophical.”
“And are we in agreement?”
“Only in that there is probably no answer.”
She nodded.
“Now the two of you look like you’re going to cry,” Violet protested.
Georgiana recovered first. “Philosophy does that to me.”
“I concur,” Edmund said. “My least favorite subject by far.”
“You always did well in it, though,” Nicholas said.
Edmund grinned. “That’s because I can talk my way out of almost anything.”
Everyone rolled their eyes at that. It was the absolute truth.
“I think baby Colin takes after you in that way,” Georgie said.
“He’s four months old,” Edmund said with a laugh. “He can’t even speak.”
“There’s something in the way he looks at me,” Georgie said. “Mark my words. That boy is going to be a charmer.”
“If he doesn’t explode first,” Violet said. “I swear, all that baby does is eat. It is unnatural.”
“What are you talking about now?” Lady Manston asked, clearly exasperated by a seating arrangement that kept leaving her just barely out of earshot.
“Exploding babies,” Georgie said.
Nicholas nearly spit his food across the table.
“Oh.” His mother placed a hand over her heart. “Oh my.”
He started to laugh.
“One baby specifically,” Georgie said, elegantly flipping her wrist with perfect sardonic punctuation. “We would never talk about exploding babies in the general sense.”
Nicholas started to laugh so hard it hurt.
And Georgie … Oh, she was in fine form. She didn’t even crack a smile as she leaned ever so slightly in his direction and murmured, “That would be tasteless.”
His laughter turned silent, the kind that shook the room.