by Jude Knight
“Mama, Pansy has been sick all down my dress,” the child complained.
Becky apologised as she helped the little girl to wash in a nearby stream and change into fresh clothes. Aldridge made sure the travel-sick maid was supplied with a bucket. Did Rede know the maid was subject to travel-sickness? Aldridge dismissed the thought as unworthy.
Becky attempted to persuade Sarah back into the carriage, but the little girl burst into tears again.
“Bring her in with us,” Aldridge suggested.
Becky looked stricken, and he reassured her, “Do not worry, Becky. We have two whole years. We can wait another afternoon.”
After two hours in the carriage, he called for his horse and rode the rest of the way to the inn where he’d booked a suite for the night. His spirits, somewhat depressed by domesticity, lifted as he reflected that the little girl would be tired and go early to bed.
He had dinner served in their suite, but went down to the tap room afterwards to let Becky put her daughter to bed, the exhausted maid asleep on a pallet in the child’s room. “If you are tired,” he said, “we can wait till we reach London.”
She lowered her lashes. “Give me one hour, my lord. I will be in bed when you return,” she murmured, and just like that he was hard as nails again. Not long now.
He found a table in a corner and worked his way through the day’s satchel of mail. It included a letter from his friend Overton—one that had clearly followed him for several weeks, from London to the various houses he’d visited and back to London before ending in the satchel of duchy business. It was just a brief black-bordered note saying Baroness Overton and her baby had died.
Poor Overton. He had been full of dreams when they parted—for the promised heir, for mending his marriage which was, Aldridge gathered, not a happy one. All dust now. Aldridge started a letter in return, but he could not find the words to express his sadness for his friend.
His mind drifted to the woman upstairs. He would write to Overton tomorrow.
At one hour to the minute, he returned up the stairs. The suite was silent and dark. He lit a candle from one in the hall sconce, and let himself into the bedchamber he’d reserved for them. “Becky, I am here,” he said.
No reply. She must be tired, after spending the day keeping little Sarah amused. He put the candle down on the bedside table and stripped naked, muttering to himself as his fingers fumbled over buttons and laces.
He’d wake her with kisses, then... his mind full of images of what came next, he had one knee on the bed and one hand already reaching for the blanket when a tousled dark head emerged, confused cornflower blue eyes blinking at him. “What are you doing in my Mama’s bed?” asked little Sarah.
Chapter Six
The Marquis of Aldridge assured Becky he hadn’t minded spending the night in Sarah’s bed rather than his own, that the maid barely disturbed him at all when she woke vomiting again in the early hours of the morning, and of course, the girl should travel no further. He would pay for her accommodation until she recovered, and her transport home to Longford, and Becky was to take Sarah in the carriage with her and think no more about it.
He rode.
Several times in the course of the morning, he passed the carriage, not looking, his face set and distant, though when he caught her watching, he smiled, a wicked gleam that lifted her spirits. Perhaps he was not angry. Perhaps he was just thinking.
When they stopped for something to eat, he was his usual affable, charming self, flirting with the maid who brought their meal, teasing Becky about insisting Sarah eat her meat before her pudding, telling stories about journeys he’d made when he was a boy.
As they finished, one of the grooms presented himself in the private parlour. “If you please, Mrs Darling, if Miss Sarah comes with me, I can show her the kittens they have in the kitchen.”
Becky gave her permission, and then, as the door closed behind Sarah and the groom, looked suspiciously at Aldridge.
“Yes,” he said. “I arranged it.”
“You knew they had kittens?”
“Or puppies, or foals, or some other small, furry distraction. We have little time, Becky. I just wanted to give you something to think about between now and London.”
She stepped towards him, expecting an embrace, but he held up his hand. “No. Stay there, or I will have you right on this table, and you do not want your daughter walking in on that. But I do want to tell you precisely what I have been planning for tonight as I rode.”
He reached out and skimmed her shape from neck to waist, without touching.
“First, we will settle Miss Sarah in nursery, and she may have a dozen maids to keep her company and do her bidding, but prepare her, Becky, for the fact that you will be otherwise occupied.”
Becky nodded.
“Then,” his lips curved in that same wicked smile. He took a step backwards and breathed in deeply, letting his eyes follow the same curves he’d shaped as he breathed out slowly.
“A bath first, I think, one large enough for two, my dear, waiting, piping hot and perfumed. You will stand by the fire, Becky, where it is warm, and I will be your maid. Or perhaps not quite, for would a maid, as she loosened and removed your stays, brush your arms with feather-light touches? Would she gently and tenderly caress your lovely thighs as she rolled down your stockings, running her fingertips up, oh, so softly, almost, but not quite, to your most secret treasures?. Would she, when she lifted your chemise, cup your beautiful breasts and run a thumb over your nipples?”
She could feel them contract and harden under his intent gaze.
“They tighten and pebble. Is it the cold, Becky, that makes them so hard? Let us have you up and into the bath, then.
“Now, your turn. I have gazed upon your glories. Lie back and soak up the heat, and I shall disrobe for you. Will you be pleased with what you see, I wonder? Ah...” she was about to speak, but he put his finger just above her lips, still not touching. “Yes, you saw me before, by the light of one candle. But my room shall have many candles, Becky.
“Where were we? Ah, yes, you are lying in the bath, all relaxed in the hot, perfumed water, waiting for me to serve at your pleasure. Picture me at your feet, dear Becky, soaping my hands. We will order your own soap, the softest, finest soap money can buy, and you shall choose the perfumes to scent it with, but tonight, we shall use mine: bergamot, almond, a touch of wintergreen.
“What shall I wash first, I wonder. These?” He reached out again, this time shaping her breasts, his hands a bare inch from the dress that now felt tighter against her skin.
Step by step, he described how he would bring her to completion in the bath, and then what they would do afterward, “on the rug by the fire, dear Becky, this first time, if you will allow,” and then how they would sleep and wake again, for another encounter he had also planned, and described in detail.
By the time the servant returned with Sarah, Becky’s eyes were glazed and her thighs slick with arousal.
If it was revenge, it was a good one. She’d spent the rest of the trip in high suspense, struggling to respond to her daughter, grateful when Sarah fell asleep for part of the afternoon and she could spend the time imagining the night to come. Aldridge seemed as interested in her response as his own, which was outside her experience.
Still: make her burn, would he? She’d done her best to serve him likewise at every post change along the way, stroking her hands down his arms when he lifted her from the carriage, whispering suggested amendments to his erotic plans when they were in company and he could not respond, leaning towards him so her breasts lifted in her loosened dress, licking her finger and sucking it into her mouth, lifting her skirt so he (and only he) could see her ankles. Only Sarah’s presence, she was sure, prevented him from following her into the carriage when, his body screening her from view, she brushed her thumb up his fall and wondered out loud whether her mouth was big enough.
By the time they arrived in the mews behind Haverford
House, she was beyond worrying about propriety. Aldridge assured her the heir’s wing was quite separate, he did what he wished there, and his servants were paid to make no comment and pass no judgement. And, in any case, the duke and duchess were not in London.
“You will stay here till we find the right house,” he insisted. “And no one will say a word.” Because no one of any importance would know, she thought. But he didn’t say that, and certainly, when he escorted her through the private entrance to the left side of the massive house, the servants were everything polite and deferential. In short order, she and Sarah had been introduced to the maids assigned to look after the little girl, and whisked up to a freshly-aired nursery.
Becky gave Sarah her bath, by which time a maid had set out a nursery dinner.
“Do you eat with me, Mama?” Sarah asked.
“No, my love. But I will stay while you eat, and see you to bed. And you will have Jenny and Clara and Mary to keep you company and look after you in the morning.”
The maids all nodded, beaming smiles, and Sarah nodded gravely back, her mouth full of bread and jam.
Poor darling. At seven, well accustomed to being left with a maid, or even on her own, while Becky tended to the desires of whatever male had them in keeping. Becky forced a cheerful smile.
Becky heard Sarah’s prayers and told her a story, then bent to kiss her goodnight. “G’night, Mama,” Sarah murmured, not even opening her eyes.
“Now, don’t ye fret, ma’am,” one of the maids said, benevolently. Clara. Becky was fairly certain this one was Clara. “We will look after the little miss, we will.”
They looked kind, and Sarah had reacted well to them. And Becky had kept Aldridge waiting for nearly two hours. It was time.
A servant waited to escort Becky through the house. She followed in his wake, hands bunched and twisting in the shawl she’d donned against the chill of the long halls. What if she didn’t live up to his expectations? He, after all, had bedded some of the most famous harlots in England, amateur and professional. Surely they knew far more than she?
He said this would be about her pleasure as much as his... and when he was kissing her, or detailing his plans, she believed him. But she had believed men before and been disappointed. Whatever he chose to do, she could not object.
And for the first time ever, she would not be able to hide her real self from what someone did to the Rose of Frampton. When he asked leave to call her Becky, she had been pleased to be known. Now, she wondered if that had been a mistake. Rose had been the one who sold her body; not Becky. And that was about to change.
The servant showed her into a comfortable sitting room in what must surely be the master suite of this huge complex of rooms.
Dinner settings for two had been laid on a small table, and a deep steaming bath waited in front of the fire, with large cans of hot water keeping hot on the hearth to rinse and refill.
Despite her nerves, she smiled. The stage was set for Scene One of Aldridge’s fantasy.
Aldridge suddenly appeared, leaning against the frame of a side door, a darkened study behind him. She’d seen how hard he worked, disappearing into Lord Chirbury’s study for hours each day to deal with whatever business had followed him by courier. Even on their trip, he had worked part of the time; in her carriage the first day, and at the inn this morning.
He was still wearing pantaloons and a shirt, but he’d stripped off his jacket and cravat, and his waistcoat was unbuttoned.
“Did she settle?” he asked. How typical, that his first words were of her child. Defending her heart from this rogue was not going to be easy.
“I left one of the maids telling her a story. She knows she will not see me until tomorrow. She will not make a fuss.”
He lifted one brow, giving her a slow, smouldering smile that set her temperature soaring. “Possibly not until afternoon,” he said, holding out his hand. “Come. I will show you around.” He pushed away from the doorpost, and led her to the door on the other side of the sitting room.
She took two steps into the bedchamber and stopped. Every surface was red or gold, ornately painted or upholstered. Except for the gilt-framed mirrors glittering on each wall and—she craned to check—on the ceiling of the enormous bed. Huge though the room was, the bed dominated. She couldn’t help herself; she started to laugh.
“What?” Aldridge was frowning, but it was really too funny.
“Your cousin was right,” she managed to say, before going off into another peal of laughter.
It took him a moment to fathom her meaning, then his ready sense of humour melted his irritation. “A fornicatorium, is it? I will show you just how right you are, my sweet.”
He gestured to a door with his free hand. “Your dressing room. You can investigate later. Dinner now, Becky? Or bath?”
His face was calm, as if the answer meant nothing, but when she whispered “Bath” through a suddenly dry throat, his intent eyes gleamed and his lips curved in triumph.
“Bath it is.”
Being undressed by Aldridge was every bit the sweet torture he had promised. By the time she reclined in the bath, she was yearning for more. And he knew it, the fiend. “Patience makes the reward sweeter, my lovely,” he told her, stepping away so he stood just out of reach and in the plain glare of the many candles.
The waistcoat first. Already unbuttoned, it shrugged easily off his shoulders and was tossed to a chair. “Shirt, stockings or pantaloons?” Aldridge asked.
“Stockings,” Becky decided. He propped one foot on the bath while he rolled his stocking down, giving her a close view of his fall. She should have chosen pantaloons. Could he read her mind? His grin suggested he knew exactly what she was thinking.
He pulled the stocking off, revealing a long elegant foot, the toenails carefully kept. The man was too perfect. If there were justice in the world, he would have knobbly knees or thin calves. She was glad he didn’t. The second stocking went the way of the first, both tossed after the waistcoat.
“Shirt or pantaloons, Becky.” The slow tease was affecting Aldridge, too, his voice soft and husky.
“Shirt,” she chose, and he slipped his braces off his shoulders, then ran one hand down into his pantaloons, slowly untucking his shirt tails. She watched the hand moving under the fabric, and trembled. Once the tails were no longer wrapped under him, he tugged the shirt loose, then lifted it slowly over his head, revealing the muscled chest beneath an inch at a time. He stood, then, displaying himself with unconscious arrogance, confident of her answer when he asked, “Do you like what you see, my sweet?”
“You do not sit at a desk all day,” Becky observed.
“I fence. I box. I ride.” That quick Aldridge grin again. “Different types of riding.”
“Pan...” She had to stop and swallow and try again. “Pantaloons.”
He went slowly, turning his back as he inched the pantaloons down, lifting first one leg and then the other to work them over his feet. Again he stopped, his back to her, and she was content to admire the broad shoulders, the tight planes of his buttocks, the sculpted thighs.
Then he turned. “Do you like what you see, Becky?” he asked again.
Becky shook her head in slow wonder. Nine years of old men, fat men, men who acted and smelt like swine. They were far away. This part of her new life, at least, would not be unpleasant.
He’d mistaken her head shake. She smiled to chase away the slight indignant frown, her smile broadening as her mouth dried again.
“I was right about my mouth, my lord,” she teased, and was rewarded with a shout of laughter and a splash as he vaulted into the bath to join her.
“Becky, my darling,” he said, as he soaped his hands ready for the next step in the evening’s entertainment, “I see I can count on you never to bore me.”
And Becky, as she lay back waiting for Aldridge to serve at her pleasure, devoutly hoped that would prove to be true.
Part Two
1810
&nbs
p; Chapter Seven
1810, London
As soon as Hugh Overton managed to unstick his eyes and crawl out from whatever was weighing him down, he would search out another drink. He’d been keeping the world’s largest hangover at bay for nearly a fortnight, and he wasn’t going to stop now.
Meanwhile, he lay still, trying to sort through his memories and match them to sparse sensory information to decide where he was. Aldridge. That’s right. And the bet.
He cautiously opened one sticky eye. The room was dim, a matter for gratitude, but light enough to confirm he was in Aldridge’s private sitting room in the heir’s wing at Haverford House, lying on the enormous fainting couch. And the weight holding his legs in place was a sleeping woman sprawled across his thighs. The untidy mass of brown hair didn’t identify her—at least half of the women he’d bedded in Town had brown hair.
‘J’ something. Joselyn? Johanne? Or was that the other one? There must be two women; the details of the bet were surfacing more clearly in his mind.
Hugh shifted his hips, attempting to slide one leg out from under the woman, whoever she was. She stirred, then sat up in one motion, already talking before she was fully upright. Hugh, who had not yet dared move his head, was all admiration at her resilience.
“Devil take it, I fell asleep. What time is it? Lord Overton, do you know the time? Is it morning? It must be morning. Look at the light!”
As she spoke, she collected pieces of apparel from around the room, a dress, a stocking, another stocking—this one clocked in a different colour. She dropped it back on the floor where she’d found it, and kept searching. “Overton? The time?”
Hugh had been paying attention to her naked curves, not her words. “I beg your pardon, ma’am,” he said, unwilling to hazard a guess at the lady’s name. “I appear to be without my watch.”
She huffed her displeasure through her nose, and marched over to the table, where his watch lay in a heap of other bits and pieces—his coin purse and, undoubtedly, his cuff links and tie pin.