Scandalous Love, 8-14

Just a listing of each chapter's main points, pretty much


Chapter 8
- Another ball, where Nicole makes her reappearance into Society.  She catches her first glimpse of Elizabeth and hopelessly believes she cannot compare to the petite, blonde girl.
- Duke of Clayborough (Fabio/Hadrian) figures that Nicole came to London just to stalk him, no matter how much she tries to deny it.

Chapter 9
- Elizabeth meets Nicole.  Elizabeth likes Nicole.  Nicole despises Elizabeth.
- Stacy Worthington is Elizabeth's cousin, and Stacy is still a bitch.
- Stacy vs. Nicole in a tennis match: Nicole wins.  Stace gets pissed.
- Elizabeth tells Hadrian that she wants to be a friend to Nicole (though the Duke, Nicole, and myself as a reader know that this is going to turn out horribly).  She's basically too nice and too sweet to be cruel to anybody.

Chapters 10 and 11
- Elizabeth extends invitations to Society gatherings towards Nicole.  The initial one, Nicole refuses (a poetry club gathering).  The next one, Elizabeth personally visits Nicole to invite her to a charitable luncheon auction (females make lunches for the males, and the males bid on them).  Nicole's pride makes her enter the competition.
- Problem is, nobody is bidding on Nicole's lunch.  The ton wants to make her feel god-awful and like a nobody.
- Hadrian saves her by bidding the most out of anyone else for her lunch (they don't even eat together because of the sexual tension).  Elizabeth sees this as gallantry.  Hadrian and Nicole see this as something that they just can't do.
- Elizabeth leaves early in Hadrian's coach.  Hadrian needs a ride so he gets Nicole to let him ride in her coach where a nice makeout session happens, in which they park in front of Hadrian's residence and are still making out.  Wouldn't people notice the carriage shaking weirdly??  And the coachman would be able to hear, right?  How did they do this in the 1800s?

Chapters 12 and 13
- Nicole wants to leave London for Dragmore, then changes her mind.  And she changes her mind again.
- Her mom knows of the thing going on between Nic and Hadrian.
- Duchess of Clayborough (Isobel, Hadrian/Fabio's mother) invites the Earl and Countess of Dragmore, and more specifically, Nicole, to a hunting party on the Clayboroughs' property.  This leads to a really big family sleepover at the Clayboroughs'.
- Comparison between Elizabeth being small and fragile to Nicole being healthy and vitally alive
- Elizabeth gets fatigued easily and has to leave each event early.  Why is this?

Chapter 14
- The hunt, in more ways than one.  Hadrian wants to either avoid or protect Nicole by ordering her to ride in the back, while he stays at the front of the hunting line (large groups of horses cause accidents).
- Nicole's pride gets the best of her, but at least it doesn't hurt her when she bests the lot of the entire group and she's able to catch up with Hadrian.  I think at one point, she even bested him.
- Hadrian's furious with her for being so reckless
- The ton (generally the females, with the exception of the Dowager Duchess Isobel) is appalled by her unladylike actions.
- The Dowager Duchess is impressed.
- After the hunt, Nicole has to walk her horse back because there was a small pebble stuck in the hoof.  Hadrian wonders where she is and goes to look for her.
- Sexual tension (lots of it)
- By the way, Elizabeth isn't with the hunting party.  Apparently she's caught a bit of a flu.
- Sooo...Nicole and Hadrian are alone, completely alone, at a riverbank.  They start making out and he gives her her first orgasm by jerking her off.  Lovely.  He was about to completely take her, but then he suddenly remembers who he was, who she was, and just what they should NOT be doing with each other.

This totally reminds me of The Masquerade, except Scandalous Love came first.

Thank you, Brenda Joyce.