“I shall endeavor to keep you occupied,” Ethan said smoothly. “Try not to be too disparaging,” he added, lowering his voice. “After all, we do have to live here.”
“Which is a great pity,” Lottie said. “Could you not persuade the authorities to send you somewhere more congenial? Are there any shops?” she continued, without waiting for his reply. “I cannot live without shops!”
Well, he had wanted London Lottie, Ethan thought wryly, the frivolous social butterfly, the woman who lived for entertainment and required to be perpetually amused. And that was what he had got. He could scarcely complain now, now that she had regained all her town bronze and had become the creature he had wanted.
“Perhaps you could develop an interest in history,” he suggested. “Wantage is an ancient town, the birthplace of King Alfred the Great.”
Lottie gave an exaggerated yawn. “You know I am not bookish, darling. History? A remedy for sleeplessness, no more.” She squeezed his arm. “Do we have to walk to my new home?”
“Yes, of course,” Ethan said. “There are no hackney carriages here.”
“I should have bought another pair of shoes when I had the chance,” Lottie mourned. “I will ruin my lovely new slippers on these dirty streets.”
“I should think you have sufficient shoes in those portmanteaux to open your own shop,” Ethan said.
“Seven pairs only, darling,” Lottie said with a vague wave of her hands. “Just enough for one pair for each day of the week.”
They cut through a narrow little cobbled alleyway from the marketplace into a square where the parish church loomed tall over the houses.
“How quelling,” Lottie said, shuddering. “I feel it is disapproving of me.”
“You will need to get used to it,” Ethan said. He gestured toward a pretty brick-built villa standing back from the road on the north side of the church. “This is Priory Cottage. I have rented it for you.”
Ethan paid off the porter, who was out of breath pushing a handcart laden with five portmanteaux and had almost got stuck in the narrow alleyway, and pushed open the door of the cottage. By now there was an indiscreet tide of people who had followed them from the marketplace and were gawping on the pavement outside.
“I do believe,” Ethan said, as he ushered Lottie inside, “that Wantage has never seen anything quite like you before.”
“Well, that was what you wanted, was it not?” Lottie said, a slight edge to her voice. “I have barely begun to be scandalous.” She walked past him into the neat parlor, untied the ribbons of the enormous bonnet and cast it onto a chair. “The house is charming,” she added, looking around, “but Priory Lane, next to the church? Could you be any more inappropriate, darling?”
Ethan laughed. “I can be much, much more inappropriate, I assure you.”
He unfastened the buttons on her spencer and slid it from her shoulders. The dress was extraordinary, he thought, the pristine white of debutante garb and yet cut so low that her lush breasts were practically spilling out of it. She looked like a despoiled angel. It was impossible to look at her and not be consumed with lust and he was not even going to try to repress his feelings.
“Turn round,” he said abruptly.
He saw her eyes widen at his tone. “Ethan, darling, I have just arrived and require a pot of tea rather than a—”
“Turn around,” Ethan repeated. He could see a crowd on the pavement outside the house, peering in through the window, whispering and fluttering as though this were a royal visit and they were expecting something spectacular to happen. Well, he would give them something spectacular to talk about, though it would hardly be as respectable as a visit from the king and queen.
Lottie’s gaze narrowed on his face and for a moment he thought she was going to argue with him but then she turned slowly so that she was facing the window. Ethan stepped behind her and lifted her hair away from the nape of her neck, pushing it forward so that it spilled over her shoulder and across her breasts. He put his hands on her upper arms and started to kiss the side of her throat and the soft curve where her neck met her shoulder. Her skin felt warm and soft against his lips and she smelled of sunshine and roses. Lust speared him again.
He could feel how tensely she held herself beneath his hands. “Relax,” he murmured.
“I told you in London that I was not accustomed to an audience.” Lottie’s tone was tart. “I find it distracts me. Your crowd of busybodies is all of three feet away on the pavement outside with no more than a pane of glass between us. I have been here five minutes only and already you make a harlot’s display of me.”
“You made one of yourself in the marketplace,” Ethan said. “And that is why you are here. You are my mistress. I want there to be no doubt in anyone’s mind that you enjoy that role.” He nipped the skin of her neck softly. “You said,” he added, sliding his tongue down her nape, “that you had barely started to be scandalous. It is time to live down to your reputation.”
He felt her tense again and wondered if she was going to refuse, but then she closed her eyes and dropped her head forward in the most perfect submissive pose. Ethan slid the white gown off one shoulder and allowed his lips to trace a path across the skin he had exposed. The low-cut neckline of the dress fell farther still, almost uncovering her breasts now. She did not adjust it, despite the milling crowd staring in through the glass.
Ethan had not been sure how far he would take this but the fever in his blood was too violent to let it go now. From the moment Lottie had stepped off the coach the complicated, contradictory emotions had driven him. He had asked for Lottie to act the shameless harlot. And yet he had wanted the sweet, trusting intimacy they had experienced before. He ached for it and the need in him drove him on.
He slid a hand around Lottie’s waist and up to cup her breast.
“Ethan—” This time there was entreaty in her tone. “The window…”
“So modest,” Ethan mocked.
He leaned past her and whisked the curtains closed then pushed her gently down so that her palms were braced against the lid of the rosewood piano. He pulled the neck of her gown down the last inch so that her breasts tumbled out, full and round, into his palms. He kneaded the soft flesh, pulling on her nipples, and felt her shiver.
The lust goaded him, spurring him on. Without further ado he drew up Lottie’s skirts, unbuttoned his pantaloons with fingers that shook so much they could scarcely function and took her with one thrust.
It was hot, mindless, utter madness. He felt her body sheathe him, tight and close, and he thought he would shatter there and then. She clenched him, a deliberate movement that tore a groan from him. He held her hips and plunged into her, over and over, with a violent pleasure that spiraled into unbearable bliss. The piano creaked and rocked, Lottie’s breasts bouncing extravagantly with each hard thrust. Ethan felt himself fly over the edge of the precipice as his climax exploded within him and he shouted aloud.
And then it was over. The pleasure ebbed like a draining tide and he felt an extraordinary regret, almost a shock, at what he had done and the way he had used her so ruthlessly. He was empty of desire and there was a cold ache within him that was deeper than the physical. He straightened his clothes and noted dispassionately that his hands were still shaking a little.
Lottie straightened up, too, adjusting her bodice and smoothing her skirts as calmly as though she had been paying a morning call and had risen to depart. When she turned to look at him her face was expressionless, the mask of the sophisticated courtesan. She even smiled politely, as though he were a stranger.
“I trust that was to your satisfaction, my lord?” Her voice revealed nothing, either.
“I…” Ethan found that he was at a loss, groping for words that simply did not come.
It had been perfect in the sense that it was exactly what he had thought he wanted. Even now, word would be winging around the town of his outrageous behavior with his equally shameless mistress. Everyone would know what
they had been doing behind the drawn curtains. Everyone would be talking. He had created a storm of gossip and Lottie had played her part precisely as he had wished. Moreover, it had been exactly the emotionless, physically satisfying coupling that he had envisaged from the moment he had sought Lottie out. He had been afire with need and she had acted as the ideal complaisant mistress, accommodating his bodily requirements and making no awkward emotional demands upon him.
So why did he feel cheated? Why did he want to pull her into his arms and kiss her until her body softened against his and she responded with true passion? Why, when she was everything that he had required, did he want her to be different? Instead of triumph he felt a sort of hollow exhaustion. Instead of satisfaction he felt robbed in some way.
“I am going out,” he said abruptly.
He saw a tiny frown mar the perfect composure of her expression. “Will you be back later?” She spoke in tones of the gentlest enquiry. There was no begging, no expressions of pleasure in his company.
“I don’t know.” He knew that he sounded ungracious and also that she would not reproach him for it because perfect mistresses never rebuked their lovers. “I have rooms at The Bear in the marketplace,” he said. “I may dine there tonight.”
He threw some coins onto the table. They fell with an empty clatter.
“For my services?” Lottie’s voice was smooth. “Why, thank you. And I did so little, too.”
“For your expenses,” Ethan snapped. “I have engaged a maid for you. Send her out to buy some food.”
“I have run a household before,” Lottie said. “I expect I can manage that.”
The tartness was back in her voice. Not such a perfect mistress, then. Contrarily, the flash of spirit pleased Ethan. He did not want a cipher. It appeared he did not want a complaisant woman, either. His mind whispered that he wanted the Lottie Palliser he had known in London, the warm vulnerable woman who had argued with him, challenged him and responded to his lovemaking with a passion that had been sweet and unfeigned. But that woman was dangerous to him in a way that he did not understand. It would be far better to avoid that emotional intimacy, even if he were claiming her body with a physical intimacy that could not have been closer.
She was still watching him with those dark, expressionless eyes. Ethan shook his head abruptly and went out, closing the door behind him with an exaggerated care that belied the odd feeling of violence in his soul. He needed brandy. Good French brandy would solve most problems or at least numb them until he no longer cared. Unfortunately the Wantage inns only offered villainously poor brandy at inflated prices, another betrayal of the country he had adopted as his own. Nevertheless, just this once, it would have to do. Perhaps the drink would bring some clarity so that he could work out what he truly wanted from Lottie and why the simple, pleasant liaison he had envisaged as a disguise for his more covert activities was proving to be so damned complicated.
LOTTIE WAITED until the sound of Ethan’s footsteps had died away on the cobbles outside and then she threw open the parlor curtains and let the sunshine in. The street outside was empty. The crowds had gone, no doubt to spread the word of her utterly shameless and immoral behavior. She hoped that Ethan would be pleased. She had behaved as he had wanted. She had flaunted herself like a whore. She had created the scandal Ethan had desired. And she had only been here a half hour.
Lottie went down the corridor, through the kitchen and out into the tiny garden at the back of the cottage. It was shady and cool there. The sun beat down on the spread leaves of an ancient apple tree. There were old roses in pale pink and creamy gold entangled with honeysuckle on the tumbledown stone wall that separated the gardens from the priory lands beyond. The air smelled heavenly of hot grass and flowers, but Lottie did not seem to be able to smell or feel its beauty. She felt completely numb.
In a corner of the garden was a well. She turned the handle and heard the bucket splash down, then wound it up again, the chains slipping a little and grinding as the bucket rose, the water slopping over the brim. Lottie knelt down on the grass and scooped it up in her cupped hands. She gasped at the shock of the cold springwater against her face but it was so refreshing that after a moment she picked up the bucket and emptied it over her head. She refilled it and did the same again. The white dress now clung like a limp rag. Her hair was in rats’ tails. She shivered. Suddenly the sun did not feel so hot.
The cold sting of the water had cut through the strange lassitude that had possessed her after Ethan had gone. She felt clean and alive again but her feelings were now awake, too, and they felt bruised and sore, as did her body. She had not wanted to be taken like a strumpet. Until Ethan had used her and discarded her with such ruthlessness she had not realized that she had secretly been hoping for the sort of passionate and emotional reunion that their lovemaking in London had promised. Despite telling herself that it was merely business, that Ethan was cold and detached about their liaison and she would be, too, in her heart she had wanted more. She had wanted to curl up in bed with him, to talk, to feel, if not loved, then at least a little cosseted and indulged. She had wanted Ethan’s company in other ways, too, to eat together, to go out together in this godforsaken town and share whatever entertainment it had to offer.
She felt naive to have longed for so much when Ethan’s ruthless possession of her had made clear exactly what he desired of her.
Shivering again in the summer breeze she hurried back across the grass and into the cottage. It was not such a poor place, she thought. It was light, well appointed and quite comfortably furnished. She should count her blessings. It was not something she was accustomed to doing but she refused to mope around like a poor-spirited creature with no backbone. What Ethan wanted from her was in truth very similar to what Gregory had wanted—except that Gregory had never wanted sex, at least not with her. But the other aspects—to be at Ethan’s beck and call, to do as he desired, to be an ornament and a trophy, to be abandoned on whim when he went out—that was exactly like her marriage. How ironic. But at least she should be able to do this with her eyes closed.
The house was silent. Lottie paused in the kitchen and watched the sun chasing shadows across the wall. What she really wanted now was a cup of tea. Or several. And a plate full of pastries would not go amiss. There was something very comforting about tea and pastries when one felt bruised by life. There was only one problem. She had never made a pot of tea, never cooked or cleaned and had only recently learned how to dress herself without assistance. She had never been without servants in her life, and the kitchen was an alien place—the fire unmade, the utensils hanging on the walls strange implements with mysterious functions she could not even guess at. She could see a kettle but she had neglected to bring any water in with her from the well.
Sighing, Lottie went out into the hall to hunt up one of her new outfits from amongst the five portmanteaux. She was not going out in this harlot’s garb. She doubted she would ever wear it again. She had chosen it in order to make an entrance, at Ethan’s desire, and it had done its job all too well.
As she stepped over the first suitcase, wondering how on earth she was to get all her luggage up the cottage’s narrow stair, there was a gentle knock at the front door and a head poked around followed by a slip of a girl in maid’s uniform. She came in and dropped an awkward curtsy.
“Good afternoon, my lady.”
“Thank goodness,” Lottie said. “You must be the maid that Lord St. Severin engaged.”
She straightened up. The girl was staring at her with ill-concealed curiosity, which was hardly surprising given her appalling reputation. She wondered what the girl was thinking and how Ethan had persuaded anyone to take on the role of her maid. This poor creature looked malnourished and barely more than a child. She had hair the color of straw, drawn back so severely that it only seemed to accentuate the thinness of her face, and big gray eyes that were currently riveted on Lottie with fascination.
“You have weed in your hair, my la
dy,” the girl ventured.
“Madam will do,” Lottie said. “There is nothing of the lady about me.” She reached up and retrieved the offending piece of greenery. “What is your name?”
“Margery, madam.” The maid dropped another curtsy. “I have references,” she added, proffering a piece of paper. “From the employment agency.”
“Marvelous,” Lottie said. “I was not sure that anyone respectable would be prepared to take a post in this deeply disreputable household.”
“There are a lot of people out of work in Wantage, madam,” Margery said. “The tanneries are closing. Two of my brothers have no trade now so I have to take what jobs I can find.”
“That would explain it,” Lottie said with a sigh. “Could you make a pot of tea please, Margery, and then go into town to buy us some foodstuffs?”
“I’ll try, madam,” Margery said uncomfortably. “The stallholders have been saying that they will not serve you.”
Lottie put her hands on her hips. “Because I am an immoral hussy, I suppose,” she said.
“No, ma’am,” Margery said. “Well yes, ma’am, but mostly it is because you consort with the Enemy.” She glanced over her shoulder as though she expected Napoleon’s army to be creeping up on them even as she spoke.
“The Enemy!” Lottie said. “Am I to suppose that if I was the mistress of an English officer that would win greater approval?”
“Yes, ma’am,” Margery said, taking the rhetorical question literally. “Most people would prefer that.”
Lottie sighed. “Not that it is any of their business. Anyway, Lord St. Severin is Irish, not French, and I understand that some of his fellow prisoners are American. Do the people of Wantage show the same prejudice against all foreigners?”
“Oh yes, ma’am,” Margery said, nodding enthusiastically. “No one likes outsiders very much.”
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