by Celia Strapp
Contents
Title Page
TEASER
Copyright
PART ONE
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
PART TWO
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
PART THREE
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
MORE HISTORICAL EROTICA
THE DUKE’S LITTLE HARLOT
HISTORICAL EROTICA TRILOGY
Celia Strapp
Copyright © 2016 Celia Strapp. All rights reserved.
Logo Image © photochatree, bigstockphoto.com.
Cover Image © Konradbak, fotolia.com
TEASER
‘Excellent,’ said the Duke, as he walked in, soothing his clothes and walking right up to the end of the bed, his eyes focused in on that one soft spot between my thighs. ‘You’ll do very well indeed.’
He then walked around to the side of the bed, and began touching himself, in his most private of parts, while looking at my body with such ravishing pleasure as it actually made me forget my terror for a moment, and I felt – I don’t know – almost proud.
‘My filthy, dirty little harlot,’ said the Duke, staring at me, and I almost wondered whether Mary hadn’t done a good enough job of cleaning me, and that the stench was still upon my skin. But then I realized that I contained a sort of stench that would never truly disappear – the stench of my upbringing, of my lowly beginnings in life, of my fishmonger mother and of the orphanage for wayward children. And there was something about that stench that pleased this fine, aristocratic man…
This book may not be reproduced or used in any manner without the express written permission of the copyright holder. This story contains explicit content that is intended for adult audiences only. All characters involved in sexual situations are 18 years of age or older.
PART ONE
Chapter 1
Are you sitting comfortably, dear reader? For I have a strange and unusual little tale to tell you. If you’re the sort of shy, retiring mouse that likes to read about kind young barons and benevolent old matriarchs, bumbling through a life of eternal happy endings, then perhaps this isn’t the story for you…
If, however, you have ever sat close to a raging fire, and been tempted to stick your fingertips into the flames, just for a second, just for the thrill of it… Or if you have ever sat atop a towering clifftop, looking down onto the raging sea beneath, wondering how it might feel to dive in, swallowing bucketfuls of sea water, just to taste it washing over your tongue… Of it you have heard strange creaks and moans in the middle of the night, and – rather than fearing what monsters lurk out there in the darkness – you have willed those ghoulish creatures to come closer to you… then my curious little tale might just be for you.
But let me assure you, my dear, dear reader, that the tale I am about to share with you is not a tale of monsters nor dragons. This is not a fantastical whimsy, created as some mere game to tickle your fancy. This tale, I promise you, is quite, quite true. For it happened to me, and it is still happening, right now, truth be told. As I write this tale upon an old, stained piece of parchment, with this rough and rather sorry looking quill, I am sure, now more than ever, that it is time to share my tale. To let you know exactly what the Duke of Bedfordshire is really like, in case you too befall the same, stark fate as me…
Alas! I have perhaps already said too much. I do not want to scare you before my tale even begins. I need you to know, most dear and beloved reader, that I, like you, was once an innocent soul. My name is Anya Higgins, and I was brought to this country when I was but six months old. My beginnings were exotic, but that was through no foul fault of my own.
My father – Theodore Higgins – was a well-respected merchant, sailing the Atlantic and trading his robust and quality linens all over the Mediterranean and the East. He traveled to countries with the most fabulous sounding names – Bulgaria, Kazakhstan, and Estonia. One of those far-off, fabulous sounding countries, in fact, was my place of birth. I was born of Russian descent. I never knew much about my mother, for according to my father, she died in childbirth, but what he did tell me was that she worked at a fish market on the northern coast. My father had never had time to marry, given that he was always at sea, and he’d quite fallen under the spell of this simple Russian girl. As I grew older, I naturally pried him for as much information regarding my descent as possible, and he later admitted to me that she had been only sixteen years when they had consummated their love, my father being a ripe old fifty-one, and he had never expected nor wanted to be a father, but, lo and behold, that fate had been chosen for him.
He’d continued sailing the seas throughout my mother’s pregnancy, but, nine months later, he’d returned to find my mother had given birth, and he was left with me – a souvenir from his last trip. Reluctantly, he’d taken me aboard the boat, and not knowing what to do with such a young child, he’d named me Anya, after my mother, and let the ships’ servants look after me.
When my sorry excuse for a father died a year later, due to liver failure from too much rum, I was brought up entirely by those servants on the ship. My earliest memories are of the cold, wet sounds of sailors turning in their bunks, doing things most untoward to themselves and each other, to help them drift off at night…
With no mother and no father, I’m sorry to say, dear reader, I had no measure of morality, and I even spat and swore from the age of eight, though it pains me to admit it. When I reveal just what I was doing by the age of eighteen though, my dear and faithful one, you will think nothing of a little spitting and swearing here and there, believe me. You will forgive me that, at least.
Chapter 2
My story really begins many years after my birth. You can probably imagine what my childhood was like – being an orphan with no true home, I was passed from pillar to post – first his child, then hers, then somebody else’s. I suppose I belonged to whichever poor fool had drawn the short straw, and had to look after me that week. My education was received a little later than most, by the time I reached solid ground and stayed on land, in a most dismal part of London. I was taken to an orphanage for wayward girls, and there I was taught to curtsey and praise the King and mind my Ps and Qs, and, all in all, how to be a good little servant girl.
From the age of fourteen, I worked as a servant girl in the orphanage, cleaning the bunks and washing the other little girls, many of whom were far more stupid and unfortunate than me. But it wasn’t until I was eighteen that the Madame of the orphanage, Madame Nettlesford, called me into her small, dank parlour one cold, Wednesday morning, and told me her plans for me.
‘You’re eighteen years of age, now, Mistress Anya,’ she said, giving me a look of awkward repulsion. Madame Nettlesford always made it as perfectly clear as possible that any relations with her girls were an utmost inconvenience to her. ‘It’s time you paid your way in the world.’
She beckoned me to come closer to her, and, obediently I took several steps closer. She wrinkled her nose, dissatisfied at my terrible stench, it seemed. I assure you, reader, any smell I did have was through n
o fault of my own. The baths in the orphanage were more like pig troughs, and you oftentimes came out stinking more than when you’d gone in. Furthermore, we were only allowed one bath a month, and that’s if we’d completed all our chores on time.
Madame Nettlesford lifted one of my thin, pale arms, and then let it hang limply at her sides. ‘You’re one of our more… obedient girls here, wouldn’t you say, Anya?’
I thought about my only real friends at the orphanage – Hattie and Nellie and Nora – and their wicked untidiness, and terrible rudeness in front of elders, and I decided that the Madame was probably right. I was more obedient than most of the other scallywags here. Dumbly, I nodded my assent.
‘And you’re not an altogether… revolting… creature, are you?’ She grabbed a length of my flame red hair, and pulled at it with two sharp tugs. Then she grabbed my chin, and began prising my lips open with pointed fingers, looking at my teeth and then withdrawing her hand with a satisfied cluck. ‘Well then,’ she said, looking me up and down. ‘It’s your lucky day, girl.’
Still dumbly, I stared at her, waiting to find out what she was talking about, so I could go to my room and finish sewing the younger girls’ undergarments, which had ripped badly after being handed down from three older generations.
‘You’ve heard of the Duke of Bedfordshire, no doubt?’ she asked, her lips suddenly growing a little plumper and wetter, and a strange lasciviousness overcoming her.
‘No Ma’am,’ I mumbled. ‘I have not.’ I had not heard of any such man – or any men, in fact. I had not even seen a male creature for nigh on ten years, and had almost forgotten that they existed. Almost.
‘Well the Duke of Bedfordshire is looking for a new girl,’ she said.
‘A servant, Ma’am?’ I asked, politely as I could.
Madame Nettlesford looked at me for a few moments, and then grinned. ‘Something like that,’ she said. And then, remarkably, she winked.
Chapter 3
A week or so later – after a strange and surreal blur, in which Madame Nettlesford measured me up, gave me a new (though similarly filthy) pinafore, and even bathed me although I’d had a bath just three weeks ago – there I was, about to start my first real job, out of the orphanage for the first time in ten years, staring up at the most impressive mansion I’d ever seen.
Madame Nettlesford had warned me of the impropriety of staring, and reminded me to keep my mouth closed if there was any danger that I might gawp. So I kept my lips pursed shut, but the rest of my body was shaking. My trembling was in part due to the fact that I was terrified of setting foot in a place so grand, and it was in part due to the fact that a boy had driven me here by carriage – the first boy I’d seen in a decade. He must have been my age, at least – said his name was Toby, and just seeing the silhouette his body made as he sat up at the front of the cart had created strange new, and not entirely unpleasant, sensations to be aroused within me.
Bedfordshire Manor was enormous. I didn’t even have to go inside it to know how grand it was. It went five storeys up – I counted them – with ivy creeping right to the top. I could see a fancy glass thing hanging behind each of the big windows, where normally a gas lamp might be, and I could only surmise that it must be some incredibly expensive system of lighting. (It was only much later that I learnt the word chandelier.) There were too many windows to count. The brickwork was a deep robust red, with just the odd golden detail here, making it even more opulent. Behind the building, the soft English countryside looked so fragile, with its wintery green curves and rolling hills, completely dominated by this gigantic protrusion in the landscape.
‘Is this really it?’ I asked Toby quietly, afraid to talk to the boy beside me. ‘The Duke of Bedfordshire really wants me to work for him? Here?’
Toby smiled, and patted me on the shoulders, a little too hard, so that I could feel a stinging where his palm had been. ‘You’re a lucky bit ‘o’ stuff, ain’t ya?’ he said to me, laughing. ‘It’ll be worth all the… uh… favours you ‘ave to do for ‘im, I’m, sure.’
‘What do you mean? Favours?’ I asked, looking up at the grand front door.
‘Oh, uh… nothin’, I’m sure,’ said Toby, flashing me a big, dirty grin. I could see that one of his front teeth was missing, but rather than putting me off him, it made me want to reach out and touch his mouth, like the Madame had done to mine a week earlier.
I shook my head. Why did I want to touch a boy’s mouth? Ugh. What business had I there?
‘I just don’t want him to be disappointed with me,’ I sighed. ‘I’ve never set foot in a house like this in my life. I don’t want to make the wrong impression. I mean, what would the owner of a mansion like this possibly want with a girl like me?’
Toby rolled his eyes. ‘Jus’ be obedient and he’ll be delighted with you,’ he said. ‘Do as he says, and you’ll keep the job. You might even be the best ‘e’s ever had.’ He grinned again.
That word I kept hearing… obedient. Of course I was obedient. I’d been raised to be a servant, hadn’t I? Why wouldn’t I be obedient to my master?
‘I’ll be brave,’ I said, the most frightened I’d ever felt in all my short life. ‘I’ll do as the Duke says. I won’t let him down.’
Chapter 4
‘You can knock if you want to,’ said Toby. ‘It’s your future we’re talkin’ about ‘ere.’
I looked up at the big gold door knocker, and saw that it had been moulded into the shape of a lion, the kind of which I’d only ever seen in a dusty old book in the orphanage’s meagre library. The lion had a golden mane and an open mouth. Its sharp teeth were being revealed, as if it was about to give out an almighty roar.
I grabbed the heavy gold ring around the knocker, and pushed it as hard as I could against the door, one, two…. three times. Even with my puny muscles, the knock was loud, and seemed to echo throughout the peaceful countryside.
For a moment, there was no sound or movement, and Toby and I just stood there on the doorstep, looking at one another, waiting.
But as I heard footsteps approaching, all of those thoughts dissolved away, and I felt my legs again shaking with fear.
The heavy door creaked slowly open, and behind it, a woman’s face appeared. A beautiful woman’s face, it must be told, and then her body. She was wearing a servant maid’s outfit, but it was much, much nicer than anything any of us had worn at the orphanage. It had ruffles at the top of the sleeves, and the apron was white, with a delicate lace trim. Would I be given something to wear like this too? Did I really deserve to wear such a thing?
The woman standing before us was simply beautiful. She had long, pale legs, an apron tucked in neatly at her waist, and beautifully curved breasts – I’m sorry to say it, reader, but I did notice her breast, despite having been taught not to stare at such things. The breasts were so large, in fact that they pulled slightly at the black fabric that covered them. Her hair was long, and was wavy and dark, and her eyes were wide and blue. She seemed to be drinking me in.
‘You must be Mistress Anya,’ she said. Her voice sounded so prim, so well-educated, so smart next to mine. ‘The Duke is expecting you.’
She pulled the door back, and I could see even more of her body. Every curve of her outline was perfect. The Duke would think me so plain complained to a woman like her. I felt a twinge of jealousy, but then I remembered I was nothing more than a pathetic servant girl, way below the station of someone like this. I was probably going to be the servants’ servant. I may never even come into contact with the Duke, but rather be kept in the cellar all day long.
‘Come,’ said the woman, beckoning me in. ‘I’m Mary, by the way.’
She turned around, revealing an incredibly tight, pert little behind, and I looked back at Toby, who raised his filthy fingers to his cap, his eyes glinting, and gave me a quick bow of his head. My heart was so surprised at this small gesture that it felt fit to bursting, but I gave Toby a small, controlled curtsey, and watched him walk away, the do
or closing behind us.
It was, quite simply, the most remarkable place I had ever seen, read of, or dreamed about. Not one thing was out of place. There was not a single speck of dust anywhere to be seen. And everything was made of the finest quality materials. Marble floor, crystals in the lighting, red, velvet curtains. It looked fit for the King. If I didn’t know it, I’d almost think I was in Buckingham Palace right now! There were animal skin rugs, thick and luxurious, and, above the staircase, a tiger’s head protruded out of the wall, in a similar pose to the lion on the door knocker.
‘Well,’ said Mary, looking back at me with a smile, ‘what do you think?’
‘It’s incredible,’ I gasped, almost welling up with tears, but stopping myself from such a pathetic display just in time.
Mary led me into a large, dusty, drawing room, with plush, deep purple sofas, low mahogany tables, and several big sculptures dotted around at tasteful intervals. I walked up to one of the sculptures and held out my hand.
‘Don’t touch!’ shouted Mary, whipping around with panic in her voice.