Juliana had been expecting Camilla to be shocked, so she wasn't surprised that she would have to repeat herself. She raised her tea cup and took a small sip, as though what she had said wasn't any more interesting than making a mundane comment about the client list. "Lachlan MacFusty kissed me yesterday."

She might have continued, except she didn't really know what else she wanted to say about it. This was the sort of thing, she had been given to understand, that women normally discussed with their best friends, but she hardly felt like a giggling debutante at the moment. They were about ten years too late for a conversation like that, and surely Camilla would have known that, too. Juliana's tone when she conveyed the message in either instance had not conveyed a great deal of enthusiasm, or emotion of any kind, actually. She was just relaying a fact, and she was only relaying that fact because it would be difficult to have this conversation if she didn't, not because she had any particular desire to talk about it.

She paused, wondering what Camilla would think of this. After considering it, she added, "I didn't ask him to."