No one had bowed to him, but as Colette, the girl he’d met at the phone booth, walked over to him, every man bowed and every woman curtsied. Kingsley probably should have bowed as well, but he was too overcome by the sight of her to move lest he break the spell. Her eyes were on him alone, as if the people she passed were nothing but shadows and only he was present in flesh and blood.

“You,” he said as she came to stand in front of him. She held out her two small hands to him and he took them instinctively. They shook in his grasp. For all her apparent composure, she was nervous.

“Me,” she said in a whisper. Then she gave him a smile, the exact smile every groom wanted his bride to give him the moment before the marriage. The smile that said, You, only you, always you.

He wanted to ask her a thousand questions. Why him? Had there been a test? Had he passed it? Who was she really? How had she found him at the phone booth? And, most important of all, could he kiss her right here right now and never ever stop?

Before he could open his mouth, Madame began to speak again.

“The Midwinter Queen has chosen her King, and now we join them together with ribbons of white to symbolize our Queen’s purity, ribbons of red to symbolize the blood of rebirth, and bands of gold to symbolize the endless cycle of life.”

Madame brought his right hand together with Colette’s and she wrapped a length of white silk around their joined wrists, a length of red silk over the white, and then placed gold band on their left ring fingers. Kingsley wanted to find it ridiculous. He wanted to laugh at the silly paganism of it all. And he might have, if Colette’s eyes hadn’t been shining with unshed tears. If there was a man in the world who could remain unmoved by the sight of a beautiful girl trying not to cry with happiness, Kingsley didn’t want to know him. This—whatever this was—meant something to her, and if it meant so much to her, he would at least pretend to take it seriously. The longer he looked into her eyes, at her quivering bottom lip, so soft and kissable, the less pretending he had to do.

“And now,” Madame said, her words cutting through Kingsley’s reverie on Colette’s lips, “let there be kissing and let there be laughter and let there be new life.”

“You’re supposed to kiss me now,” Colette whispered.

She didn’t have to whisper twice.

Their right hands were still joined by the white and red ribbons, and Kingsley lifted her hand to his lips and gently kissed her knuckles, her palm, and all her fingertips. As his lips brushed the back of her hand she made a little sound, a little intake of breath that told him she desired him almost as much as he desired her.

He hadn’t expected the girl who’d asked him if he was circumcised at their first meeting to be timid, but she kissed like she’d never been kissed before. Her lips trembled and her breath hitched in her throat as he explored her mouth. She tasted sweet as strawberries and he chased that taste with his tongue. Her head tilted back and she moaned softly in the back of her throat. Around them people clapped and cheered and oh-la-la-ed but they might as well have been a thousand miles away for all Kingsley heeded them. He had one purpose in that moment and that was to make Colette moan like that again. And again. And again…

Colette broke the kiss, but only, it seemed, because she had to or she would faint. Her cheeks were pink and eyes damp and wide. She was young, terribly young, and it must have been overwhelming for her to be kissed like that in front of so many.

“Children,” Madame said to them. “Let us be about Midwinter’s business.”

As the music struck up again, Madame untied the cords from their wrists (though she left the plain gold bands on their ring fingers). As soon as they were no longer joined by ribbons, the women of the house—Polly and Nadine and Louise—took Colette by the arms and swept her from the room.

“Shall we?” Madame asked Kingsley, and offered her his arm. They followed at a slower pace behind the ladies, who were running far ahead of them down a long torch-lit corridor. As they left the ballroom, one final cheer went up just as the lights went down.

Things were going to happen in that room.

“Did you enjoy that?” Madame asked once they were alone in the hallway. The ladies were long gone.

“I have no idea what just happened in there,” he said. “But I got to kiss a gorgeous girl, so I can’t complain.”

“You’ll do more than kiss her.”

“I’m really going to sleep with her?”

“Do you mind?” Madame asked.

Kingsley laughed and the laugh hit the rafters. “No. Not at all. If the lady is willing.”

“Oh, she’s more than willing. She did choose you. There were, of course, many other options.”

“Why me?” he asked.

“All the obvious reasons. You’re close to her age. You’re very handsome. You made her laugh. You laughed at her. You offered to father her children and convert to her faith.”

“Flirting,” Kingsley said. “That’s all. She’s never been flirted with before?”

“Not by the likes of you,” Madame said.

“I’ve had some practice.”

“And you have this face,” she said, patting his cheek. “Pretty words and handsome faces have been making the hearts and loins of girls come to life since the beginning of time. Plus…she said you offered to let her use the phone even though you were waiting on a call from me, and you’d been waiting for six hours.”

“It would have been rude not to,” he said.

“Even ladies like us can have our heads turned by chivalry. Especially ladies like us.”

“I’m glad I pleased her. I look forward to pleasing her all night.”

“Polly said you were a very good lover. Colette needs that.”

“Has she had bad experiences before?”

“No.”

“That’s good.”

“She’s had no experience before.”

Kingsley stopped midstep and stared at Madame.

“She’s a virgin?” he asked.

Madame smiled. “Not for long.”

Kingsley looked for words. He looked for them and didn’t find them.

“Don’t worry,” Madame said, patting his arm. “I’ll be there the whole time.”

“That’s not comforting,” Kingsley said.

“You’ve never had sex while someone watched before?”

“I have, yes,” he said, “but this is a little different.”

“How so?”

“For starters, I’m not stoned out of my mind.”

“I’ll give you champagne.”

Kingsley had certainly had sex in front of other people before. At seedy clubs for fun. Once on a mission for business. This was different.

“She’s never had sex before,” Kingsley said. “Don’t you think it’ll be better for her if we’re alone? She might like her privacy. I know I would.”

“She wants me there,” Madame said. “She wants you there. This is her night. She gets what she wants.”

“If I’d known she’d never done this before…” Kingsley groaned. “There is an epidemic sweeping France where people are rendered incapable of telling me the important part first.” He raised his clenched fingertips in imitation of his Italian grandfather when irritated.

“Unless you’re a brute, which you aren’t, you won’t hurt her. She’s already open. We don’t let men near hymens. What’s that English saying—like bulls in China shops? We don’t let cattle near the good dishes.”

“What do you mean you don’t let men near hymens? Am I supposed to take her in the ass?”

“You can if she wants you to. What I mean is that she’s used a vibrator,” Madame said. “And a dildo. Often.”

“Christ, how many dildos do you have in this house?” he asked, smiling despite himself at the thought of Colette opening herself with a vibrator.

“Enough that were you to suddenly disappear, you would not be missed.”

Kingsley heard the warning, and kept his mouth shut.

“Colette is very special to me,” Madame said. They turned a corner and walked up a curving staircase. “She was born in this house, like Polly. When her mother fell in love with a local barrister, they moved to the village. But Colette came by every day after school as she got older. Came for tea, came for my company, came to learn. She was drawn here the way some seabirds are drawn to the place of their birth. She’s my goddaughter. We’ve been looking a long time for the right man to be her first. I know you won’t disappoint us.”

“Another English saying,” Kingsley said. “I’ll give it the old college try.”

“Good boy.”

“You should know, however, that I never went to college.”

That got a rare laugh out of Madame. “Officer training will do,” she said. “I know you can take orders.”

Kingsley exhaled—loudly.

Madame paused outside a door and took his hand in hers. “You know how poorly women are treated all over the world, yes?”

“Yes,” Kingsley said.

“Under this roof, we try to undo a little of that damage the world has done to women. Every girl on earth deserves to have her first time treated with respect. Every girl on earth deserves to feel pleasure.”

Kingsley got the message.

“I’ll take good care of her,” he said.

“I believe you will. But if you don’t…”

“Yes?”

“I’ll see to it no one ever finds your body.”

The door opened.