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Which, she took so, she never did

And if that weren't enough, 1813 was the year that theher thrice-weekly Society Papers The single-sheet newspaper became an instant sensation No one kneho Lady Whistledown really was, but everyone seemed to have a theory For weeks—no,else The paper had been delivered for free for teeks—just long enough to addict the ton—and then suddenly there was no delivery, just paperboys charging the outrageous price of five pennies a paper

But by then, no one could live without the alossip, and everyone paid their pennies

Somewhere sorowing very rich indeed

What set Lady Whistledown's Society Papers apart from any previous society newssheets was that the author actually listed her subjects' na behind abbreviations such as Lord P------or Lady B------ If Lady Whistledoanted to write about someone, she used his full name

And when Lady Whistledoanted to write about Penelope Featherington, she did Penelope's first appearance in Lady Whistledown's Society Papers went as follows:

Miss Penelope Featherington's unfortunate gown left the unfortunate girl looking like nothing more than an overripe citrus fruit

A rather stinging blow, to be sure, but nothing less than the truth

Her second appearance in the column was no better

Not a as heard froirl appeared to have drowned amidst the ruffles of her dress

Not, Penelope was afraid, anything that would enhance her popularity

But the season wasn't a complete disaster There were a few people hoerton, of all people, took a liking to her, and Penelope found that she could often tell things to the lovely viscountess that she would never dreaerton that she er sister of her beloved Colin Eloise was also just turned seventeen, but her mother had wisely allowed her to delay her debut by a year, even though Eloise possessed the Bridgerton good looks and charm in abundance

And while Penelope spent her afternoons in the green-and-creaerton House (or, hed and giggled and discussed everything under the sun with great earnestness), she found herself co into occasional contact with Colin, who at two-and-twenty had not yet s

If Penelope had thought she loved hi co to know hi, he had a devil-may-care jokester quality to him that made women swoon, but most of all

Colin Bridgerton was nice

Nice Such a silly little word It should have been banal, but so nice to say to Penelope, and when she finally worked up the courage to say sos and farewells), he actually listened Which made it all the easier the next time around

By the end of the season, Penelope judged that Colin Bridgerton was the only ed an entire conversation

This was love Oh, this was love love love love love love A silly repetition of words, perhaps, but that was precisely what Penelope doodled on a ridiculously expensive sheet of writing paper, along with the words, "Mrs Colin Bridgerton" and "Penelope Bridgerton" and "Colin Colin Colin" (The paper went into the fire the moment Penelope heard footsteps in the hall)

Hoonderful it was to feel love—even the one-sided sort—for a nice person It made one feel so positively sensible

Of course, it didn't hurt that Colin possessed, as did all the Bridgerton erton chestnut hair, the wide and serton ht, and in Colin's case, the race a human face

They were the sort of eyes that haunted a girl's dreams

And Penelope dreamed and dreamed and dreamed

April of 1814 found Penelope back in London for a second season, and even though she attracted the same number of suitors as the year before (zero), the season wasn't, in all honesty, quite so bad It helped that she'd lost nearly two stone and could now call herself "pleasantly rounded" rather than "a hideous pudge" She was still nowhere near the slender ideal of woh to warrant the purchase of a completely neardrobe

Unfortunately, her e, and the occasional splash of red And this time, Lady Whistledorote:

Miss Penelope Featherington (the least inane of the Featherington sisters) wore a gown of lemon yellow that left a sour taste in one's mouth

Which at least seeent h the compliment was backhanded, indeed

But Penelope wasn't the only one singled out by the acerbic gossip colued daffodil in her yellow dress, and Kate went on to erton, Colin's older brother and a viscount to boot!

So Penelope held out hope

Well, not really She knew Colin wasn't going to marry her, but at least he danced with her at every ball, and he h, and she knew that that would have to be enough

And so Penelope's life continu

ed She had her third season, then her fourth Her two older sisters, Prudence and Philippa, finally found husbands of their own and ht still make a match, since it had taken both Prudence and Philippa five seasons to snare husbands, but Penelope knew that she was destined to remain a spinster It wouldn't be fair to marry someone when she was still so desperately in love with Colin And maybe, in the far reaches of her mind—in the farthest-back corner, tucked away behind the French verb conjugations she'd never mastered and the arithmetic she never used—she still held out a tiny shred of hope

Until that day

Even now, seven years later, she still referred to it as that day

She'd gone to the Bridgerton household, as she frequently did, to take tea with Eloise and her ht before Eloise's brother Benedict had married Sophie, only he didn't knoho she really was, and—well, that didn't signify, except that it reat secret in the last decade that Lady Whistledown had never ed to unearth

Anyway, she alking through the front hall, listening to her feet tap along theher pelisse and preparing to walk the short distance to her own home (just around the corner, really) when she heard voices Male voices Male Bridgerton voices

It was the three elder Bridgerton brothers: Anthony, Benedict, and Colin They were having one of those conversations that rumble a lot and poke fun at each other Penelope had always liked to watch the Bridgertons interact in this manner; they were such a family

Penelope could see theh the open front door, but she couldn't hear what they were saying until she'd reached the threshold And in a testahout her life, the first voice she heard was Colin's, and the words were not kind

" and I aton!"