As Wicked as You Want: Forever Ours Book 1

by Nia Farrell

  “Mm. No. No.” Now that the clouds of post-coital bliss were dissipating, I realized that I rather liked being a woman. “It’s just…well, you surprised me, finishing as you did. Young women are warned against it. I suppose some residual self-preservation instinct took hold before my mind could grasp what was happening. I mean, I’ve never heard of it being done. I never would have considered it, but I can certainly see the logic in it.”

  “So you do not object?” he rumbled, a low bass vibrating in my ear.

  Still joined as we were, I could feel his phallus hardening, rising to the occasion. “No,” I smiled. “You may use me as you will.”

  He did, quite thoroughly, over the next four nights, repeating the scenario with minor variations. Massage and paroxysms. Penetration and climaxes. Each time ended with Edward culminating inside me, knowing that his seed would fall on fallow ground.

  It was messy business. Definitely messy. I had mixed emotions when we returned to normal—or what was normal for Edward—and he made use of every orifice, finishing anywhere but there. Most of the time, he preferred a rougher, Lesson Three le vice anglais sort of sex, particularly if it involved bondage and sodomy. But he never made me feel used, never made me feel anything but desirable. Lying in the circle of his arms, I felt somehow complete. He’d helped me find a part of myself that had been missing, and for that, I would be forever grateful.

  As much as I enjoyed our nights, I loved being abroad with Edward in the day. I’d emptied out my carpet bag and used it like a debutante would a reticule, but instead of frivolous things, mine held a sketch pad, pencils and charcoal, a pen knife for sharpening them, an India rubber eraser, a blending stump, and whatever book I was reading that day. If my seat was too sore from the previous night’s activities, I added a cushion as well.

  We stayed aboard ship when it docked in Havre. Had our departure not been eminent, I believe that I would have enjoyed the chance to dust off my French and immerse myself in the local culture. Edward, seeing my wistfulness, promised to take me to Versailles, perhaps next summer, between semesters, when we could explore France at our leisure. I smiled at the prospect. Smiled more, that he seemed to know exactly what to say. Other than Daniel, I’d never met a man who could read me so easily. More validation that I’d made the right choice to escape arrest in America by coming with him.

  Edward lived in an area of London dotted with parks. It was close to his university, as well as the British Museum, which he pointed out along the way. Our hired coach came to a stop before a Georgian-style townhouse that was very Edward, large and impressive and tastefully done, outside and in, three-and-a-half stories tall and built of brick. Although it had yet to be proven, Edward believed that John Nash himself had designed it, and pointed out the architectural features that convinced him this was so.

  Truly, I cared only because he did. Nash or no Nash, his home was marvelous even if it was not yet steeped in history. Its windows had eyed the world for only half a century. Its board floors and plastered walls and carved woodwork were only starting to whisper stories of those who’d gone. Of those here now, Edward introduced me to the most immediate members of his staff: his valet Benson, his cook Barbara, the maid Lucy, and Young Frank, Barbara’s son whose job seemed to be feeding fireplaces in winter and doing groundskeeping in the summer.

  I was introduced as the late Dr. Mrs. Wainwright’s daughter and received condolences which I accepted with thanks, even if I was still struggling to forgive her.

  Edward instructed Young Frank to fetch our trunks and take them to our rooms. The second floor held six of them. He offered me the chamber next to his, the one rightly reserved for the mistress of the house. The two rooms shared an interior door, designed to facilitate tête-à-têtes and allow for private, conjugal visits.

  “Will this suit?” he asked. “There are others, but this has a private water closet with a commodious bathtub that I feel certain you will appreciate, given your proclivities. I had already bought the house when I visited Turkey and had it plumbed on my return. There should be hot water on demand, unless Young Frank has let the boiler in the attic run out of kerosene again.” He curled his lips in a rueful smile. “Should you plan a bath, let Lucy or Babs—um, Barbara—know, hmm? They will make certain it is taken care of.”

  A private bath. Plumbing, hot and cold. My own water closet.

  A room adjoining Edward’s.

  I wanted to pinch myself. Could things possibly be more perfect?

  A shiver wracked my frame, as if someone had stomped on a grave. Shaking it off, I returned Edward’s smile with one of my own, soft and full of hope for the future that we could make here. “I shall,” I promised. “And the room is beautiful.” Spacious and well-appointed with a four-poster bed and matching pieces along walls painted a soft blush, rosy peach. The bed covering was a floral design in shades of pink, peach, salmon, and red, with green accents ranging from a soft sage to a deep forest green. Crown moldings circled the room overhead, creating a frame for the ornately painted ceilings and two medallions with their twin chandeliers.

  I excused myself to euphemistically inspect the water closet. I emerged a few minutes later, considerably more comfortable until I saw that Lucy had started to unpack my trunks. It was her job to do so, of course, but heaven help me if she found my codpiece. Edward was fascinated by it. One evening aboard ship, he had taken me for a stroll dressed as Lane. We’d mingled amongst other first class passengers in the gentleman’s lounge with none the wiser and had returned to our cabin in a state of heightened awareness. He’d pinned me against the door, dropped my drawers and taken me right then and there. Hips pounding my backside, he’d thrust one last time inside my dark passage and held until he was spent, his phallus not shrinking a whit until long after the pulsing stream subsided.

  “Please, no,” I said. “I have art supplies and finished pieces in there that I’ll need to extricate so that they are not damaged. Once I do the initial unpacking, you may see to the rest of it, hmm?”

  Lord, that sounded so Edward.

  He cocked a brow. His lips curled upward. I jutted my chin and stood firm, chasing Lucy out with the promise to ring for her when she was needed.

  “Jesus, that was close,” I whispered. “Tell me, where do I keep things that others should not see?” The codpiece was bad enough, but the nudes….

  “Your trunk locks,” he reminded me. “Get everything else out, and we’ll move it upstairs. A room with the most northern light should work well for you. Painting and sculpting smaller pieces, busts and such. If O’Flaherty comes before we’ve found a suitable space for your studio, the larger blocks of marble may have to sit in the kitchen garden out back for a bit. I am assuming the weather won’t hurt them for the short term?”

  The mention of Daniel made my stomach pinch. There had been nothing between us, yet I felt guilty somehow, as if I’d betrayed him by yielding to Edward. I’d lost so much in my life. I dearly hoped that I would not lose him, too.

  “No. No. They’ll be crated. Even if they weren’t, a stint outside might get them dirty, but it won’t cause harm.”

  Edward stayed and played my ladies’ maid, laying out my clothes upon the bed as I removed them from the trunk. Once it was empty, my codpiece, my male attire, and the pads with lurid sketches went back inside.

  I took the key from the chatelaine worn at my waist and locked everything up. Breathing easier now that it was done, I crossed the carpet to where Edward stood, caught his hand and kissed it, wanting nothing more in that moment than to hold it against my chest and let him feel the heart that beat for him. “Thank you,” I whispered, “for everything, Edward. Truly, I am grateful, and so very glad that you found me when you did.”

  He looked down, his turquoise gaze warm and inviting. I was still lost in it when I heard him say, “Now or later?”

  “Mm…what?”

  He canted his golden head, bemused. “Do you wish to see your room upstairs now or later?”

/>   “Oh, now, please!”

  There were two rooms, actually, one with windows facing north and east, the other with windows in the north and west. I was not, by nature, an early riser, but my time in the army had conditioned me to wake at the crack of dawn. Three years later, I was usually wide awake, breakfasted, and in my studio when other people were just rising. As an artist, this worked in my favor, allowing me to take advantage of the morning light. It influenced my art, imparting a soft radiance to counterbalance the darkness in my soul harboring the horrors of war that I would live with for the rest of my days.

  “This one,” I said, staking my claim on the northeast room. “If it pleases you.”

  “You please me,” he murmured, stroking my cheek with the backs of two fingers.

  His touch stirred the fire of need that seemed an eternal flame, never dying, sometimes banked but flaring to life in an instant regardless of where we were, alone or in company. I felt like pinching myself, to have this man’s regards, to be here—in my home studio, in Edward’s house, where he’d given me the finest room to sleep in, next to his own.

  I caught his hand, turned and held it, cupped to my face. “I am glad,” I said, as solemnly as a vow.

  He brought up his other hand and framed my face, the touch of his large, strong fingers as tender as his consideration for me, shining in the lambent warmth of his gemstone eyes. “I want you to be happy here,” he murmured. “We shall be as discreet as you wish, but I confess, I am conflicted. I want to show you off almost as much as I want to keep you naked, kneeling at my feet or tied to my bed, writhing with need, wet and open and ready for me. If I could but find a way to share your art with the world and keep you to myself….” He sighed. “It is no use. I fear that I must share you.”

  “Only part of me. And only fair, when I must share you, too. Every semester from henceforth, I shall be here, in angst over a composition whilst you’re taking on the next crop of students eager to glean everything they can from their professor. If I could but find a way to share your mind with them and keep you to myself….” I sighed dramatically. “I suppose that I must share you, hard though it may be.”

  That wasn’t the only thing that was hard, of course. Edward slid one hand to my waist and pulled me close against him. There was no mistaking his arousal.

  “Edward?” I pulled his name like taffy, drawing it out twice as long. “What do you think you’re doing?”

  “What do you think?” he said, nipping my ear and turning my question back on myself.

  “It’s daytime. The servants.”

  “Loyal. Discreet.” His lips teased my throat. He’d shaved early enough, the short, sharp stubble that ghosted his face abraded the sensitive skin of my neck. “They can and do keep secrets, Elena, or they would not be here. I am certain Babs is thrilled that I have finally brought home a woman. I suspect that she had written me off as a sodomite, given the usual fare.”

  I told myself that I should be flattered, instead of wondering how many men he’d entertained beneath his roof…or how many women he’d bedded in sporting houses or elsewhere, in the pursuit of pleasure.

  “What?” He crooked a finger beneath my chin and made me look at him.

  “Nothing.” Voicing my thoughts would give power to my fears, which were already challenging enough. I saw no reason to make my daily struggle worse than it was.

  He drew back his head and straightened himself, drawing himself up to his full imposing height. “No,” he said, a bit sharply. “No hiding. Honesty, acceptance, positivity, remember?”

  “Yes, Edward.” God, how I loathed my insecurities where he was concerned. But there they were, forcing me to ask him, “Am I the first…or simply the most recent?”

  He clucked and shook his tawny head. “Elena, it matters not who came, who went, who was first, who was next. You are here now.”

  He was being honest. I had no right to expect more.

  “I am.” Trying not to sound glum, I hoped the weak smile that I gave him showed an attempt at positivity.

  “And you, my dear, are the first,” he admitted, taking pity on me. “I have never opened my home to anyone. Never invited anyone here for more than the briefest of stays. That said, I expect that it will take some getting used to, having another person to consider. I am old enough to be fairly set in my ways, and you are used to living on your own. We shall see how well our regular routines mesh. If our journey here is any indicator, we should rub along nicely, hmm?”

  Heat bloomed in my cheeks, as much from the feel of his hips pressed against me as the memories of lazy days and decadent nights spent aboard ship. He’d continued my training, teaching me what he wished me to know, showing me how to please him and how to receive pleasure in turn. He was a stern taskmaster and a considerate lover, constantly assessing, pushing my limits without breaking me, never giving more than I could take. My backside was rarely free of marks these days, and yet I craved his discipline and the release it gave me, washed clean in a baptism of tears.

  “I rise early,” I told him. “The army ruined me for sleeping in…disregarding the past couple of weeks and those mornings that I stayed abed, having been kept up most of the night. Speaking of which, how can you be in the shape you’re in and have the stamina that you do? I’ve debated the matter to no avail. Pray, be so kind as to tell me.”

  Edward preened like a peacock at my compliment. “Of course,” he said, gentle humor in his voice. “I admit to a little riding, swimming, and rowing. But really? It is mostly fencing and fucking.”

  The image of Edward facing an opponent, blade of steel in hand, was tempting nearly beyond words. “Oh, please? May I watch?”

  “If you wish. But I would rather have you join us.”

  When he breathed the words into my ear and slid his hand to cover my breast, I realized he wasn’t speaking of swordplay. At least, not the kind that I had meant.

  I stiffened and felt my stomach sour. “Fencing.” I managed to push the word past a throat tight with emotion, absurd tears stinging my eyes. “I’d like to watch you fence.”

  I exhaled softly, forced myself to act as if the thought of him with someone else hadn’t cut me to the quick, sliced me open, and spilled my bowels onto the polished wooden floor. “Watch you fence, and perhaps learn it myself. I believe it’s something that I would enjoy if it’s allowed for females here. If not, I can always take up archery. As for the other, Edward…well…I don’t know if I want to know. I would prefer no secrets between us, but knowing that I’m not enough, that I’ve failed to keep you satisfied, that—”

  “Stop,” he ordered, gripping my shoulders and turning me to face him. “That is not what I meant. Christ, Elena, I have never met anyone like you. Able and willing to meet my every need, whether it is caning your bottom or fucking it, taking your mouth or burying myself to the hilt in that tight, wet sheath of yours. You are enough—more than enough for me…so beautiful in your submission. But there is a part of you…” He blew out softly. “I do not know if I can give you everything that you need. I will never bow my head and kneel at your feet and wait for instructions.”

  A vision of Daniel doing just that flashed before my mind’s eye. I gnawed my lip, wondering how Edward had come to know me better than I knew myself.

  Surely he hadn’t seen the sketches.

  When I shivered, Edward’s lips curled in a soft, telling smile.

  I ducked my chin, refusing to let him see the thoughts swirling inside my head. The possibilities that he alluded to were enough to make my pulse quicken and my breath stutter in my chest. “What makes you think he will?”

  “Because of what I saw in Chicago, my dear. You…caring for Daniel, directing him, instructing him, chastising him, the disappointment in your voice as effective as the lash of a whip. Him, eager for your approval, hastening to do your bidding, shame-faced at some failure, basking in your praise. Just as it is in your nature to submit to me, so it is in his nature to bow before you. Perhaps bow t
o us both. But that remains to be seen, of course. Once he knows…well, we shall see, hmm?”

  We shall see. What Daniel was willing to do. What it would take to have him, to keep him. How far was I willing to go?

  “You’ve done this?” I asked, already knowing the answer. “Three?”

  His hand skated across my corseted breast and settled at my waist. “Mm hmm.” From the way he smiled when he hummed it, given his proclivities, I would guess that he had experienced not just one ménage à trois, but likely every conceivable combination thereof. “I have it from a reliable source that, for a woman, there is nothing like being taken by two men.”

  He looked at me, suddenly serious. “You are young and the world is wide. If you choose to explore it, I am more than willing to guide you through it, in whatever ways you wish. And if O’Flaherty is as I suspect…I should think that you would like to watch, with that artist’s eye of yours.”

  Well, that answered one of my many unspoken questions: whether or not Edward managed an assignation with Daniel while I was hiding from the Pinkertons. But once my mind went there, the thoughts of the two of them…the three of us…refused to leave, and my traitorous body responded. My breasts swelled. My cheeks grew flush. I pressed my thighs together, a vain attempt to stem the tide of passion that threatened to sweep me away. All it took was a look, a breath, one touch to loosen the mooring, and I was gone.

  Chapter Eighteen

  Would I ever get enough of him? I wondered a half hour later, reduced to jelly by the paroxysms he’d wrested from me before finally allowing his own release in my tenderest passage.

  He shuddered one more time as he bucked his hips beneath me on the floor, his shoulders braced against the wall, the buttons of his shirt dragging against my back. His left arm banded my chest, his left hand grasping my right breast. Two fingers of his other hand gripped my pearl between them. Rubbing it as if for good luck, he moved his hands to my waist. “Lift,” he said. The timbre of his voice vacillated between pleasure and regret.