Lucy leaves Sabrina's underdrawers unwashed

Lucy tucked away Sabrina's underdrawers next to her pocket-handkerchief, feeling a tingle of the imp of madness that prompted her to keep them. How much did Clarissa know about their daughters' sapphic romance? Surely Clarissa could not be oblivious, but Clarissa was an indulgent, neglectful mother, and perhaps thought nothing of it. Or perhaps a fond remembrance of Clarissa's own schooldays romance with another young woman inclined her to encourage Sabrina's youthful indiscretions. Go, seduce Annie, Clarissa had perhaps directed. It will be good for you.

Lucy regarded her own hands, engines of so many climaxes for Lady Catherine Netherwood. Lucy recalled the satisfaction of a job well done, the praise from the lady of the house, the glow on Lady Catherine's face as she achieved her joys, the pleasant moist warmth of Lady Catherine's female parts in her hands and the sweat-and-dairy scent between her folds. Now and again there had been the grassy scent of Lord Jeremy's seed. Lucy had been an intimate servant, but never a lover. Guard your heart, Annie, she thought again.

Clarissa. As a mistress she had been whimsical, wilful, prone to moods. Now Lucy had accepted Clarissa's pledge, that Clarissa was wife, that Lucy was her lord beside Edmund.

"Mad," Lucy breathed, touching her fingertips to the pocket holding Sabrina's cunt-stinking underdrawers. "Mad. Edmund, where are you?"

There was a low, quick rapping at Lucy's stateroom door.