32: Boat or ship ?

*Everly*

I know I am babbling, talking about nothing of consequence or importance. It irritates me that I worry what people think, that I feel as though I move about with a great big M sewn onto my chest. I see many couples parading about. Surely they aren’t all married.

And surely if my father had not been ashamed of me, he would have brought me when the park was teeming with people. I don’t doubt that he loved me, but I am beginning to realize that he might not have been as proud of me as he always claimed. He never took me into a dressmaker’s. He never rode by my side through a park.

I suppose Tristan Rafe does it without any embarrassment because he is notoriously scandalous himself. I can’t deny that he epitomizes what I imagined would fall into line with most ladies’ dreams… tall, handsome, with just enough aloofness to be intriguing. He would make the women come to him. I wonder if he will expect me to initiate our coming together. I very much doubt it.

If he waits on me to