by Ann Jacobs
“Good,” Rob growled through unmoving lips.
Anne chuckled. “Be grateful that you are only here a day. I spent several days over nearly three weeks here sitting on the rest of the portrait.”
“You are more patient than I,” Rob said to her.
“Sir Robert, please,” James Goodwin, the artist, begged. “Only a little while longer, I beg of you.”
Goodwin continued to paint.
“Done, my lady, Sir Robert,” Master Goodwin said as he stepped back and looked at his work.
“Thank the Lord!” Rob said with feeling.
“Don’t blaspheme, Sir Robert,” Anne chided.
“It wasn’t blasphemy,” he replied. “Any longer standing in one place and I would have screamed.”
Master Goodwin, the painter said, “This needs until noon tomorrow to dry. Then I will frame it. Do you want it hung above the mantle in here?”
The current Lord Solway shot his mother a hurt look.
Anne saw that and understood. “I believe that we will instead hang the last portrait that was done of the late Lord Solway with his children and I above the mantle in the great Hall. This portrait will hang above the mantle in my private parlour for now. Once Garrick Hall has been rebuilt, the new portrait can hang there in a place of honor. Yet, this is still Solway’s house. Once he marries, he can replace the portrait of his birth family with one of himself and his bride. And later of his wife and children.”
Rob nodded. “Ever wise, my lady. Ever wise,” he said gently.
Anne only wished she felt wise. She watched as the artist moved the easel and the portrait to a corner of the room so that it faced away from view.
“Supper will be served soon. After supper, we shall have music and dancing,” Anne told them.
Rob smiled at her. Then his expression became serious. “You look tired, my lady.”
“It has been a long day, Sir Robert,” she said as she rose to her feet and walked over to the table.
“Milady,” Sally asked as she walked up behind Anne. “Mistress Giddings asks if you and your guests are ready for supper to be laid?”
Anne turned to face the girl. “Tell Mistress Giddings that we await the arrival of the Mistresses Norris. Once they have come, we shall be ready for supper.”
“Yes, m’am,” Sally replied. “Oh, and Thomas thanks you kindly and accepts the offer of the cottage.”
Anne smiled. “You see to it that the banns are called starting on Sunday, then.”
Sally nodded. “Yes, m’am. That’s the plan.”
“I wish you happy, Sally.”
“Thank ye kindly, m’am. By your leave, I’ll go to Mistress Giddings now, m’am, with your answer.”
“Indeed.”
John, Earl Solway, walked over to his mother. “Sally’s marrying Thom Wilson?”
“That’s their plan, my son,” Anne replied.
“And you are giving them the use of which cottage?” John demanded.
“Charlie Riggs’, Solway,” Anne told her son, although she was perturbed at being questioned.
John nodded. “Aye. That is a good decision. The cottage is close by the stables.”
Anne smiled tightly as the Mistresses Norris were announced. Cordelia Norris, the widow of the former Rector, was a well-preserved woman in her early forties. Her oldest daughter was twenty-two year old Caroline. The middle was twenty year old Elizabeth. The youngest was fourteen year old Katherine. Cordelia was the granddaughter of the previous Earl of Suffolk and a cousin, albeit at some distance, of the current Earl. Caroline and Elizabeth Norris supported the family by running a day school for the children of the Hepburn tenants and the servants. Anne provided the Norris family the house that had been the formerly reserved for an estate agent, and a sum of twenty pounds a year.
* * * * *
Supper was laid out. A vegetable soup with barley and the dried beef broth they made every fall at butchering time, with long loaves of crisp “french” bread began the arrangement. Another tureen of a second soup, a meatless lentil and rice soup, followed. The soups were followed by carp pie, crisp breaded fried oysters, pickled pike fillets with a lemon sauce, a platter of crisp cakes made from leftover salmon, stewed gurnets in a claret sauce, preserved purslane stalks, picked herring, the Queens’ pottage—a thick dish of almond milk, roast partridge, reconstituted dried mushrooms and pomegranates—stewed sausages with a currant-wine sauce, and a chopped salad of pickled onions and cucumbers. A hot apple-raisin pudding, an orange pudding, preserved quinces, and cheeses brought up the rear, along with rolled sugar wafers, a cookie known as “Naples” biscuits, and a nut cookie called jumballs. Toward bedtime, there would be another course of sweets and hot alcoholic drinks to send them all off to bed about ten.
Normally, she wouldn’t serve meat at all during Advent, but the last thing she could appear to be was a recalcitrant Anglican. She’d already been accused of keeping Advent. “Anglican” and “Royalist” went together in many minds. Suspicion about her religious views could lead to suspicion of her political sympathies. That would be dangerous in the extreme, especially now. The flesh meat and the broth-based soup was for any of the guests who wanted it. Anne herself wouldn’t eat meat again until after sundown tomorrow when Christmas began.
She forced herself to eat a selection of the fish, having little true appetite. Yet, she gave the appearance of enjoying her food. Her mind was on tomorrow and whether she could actually make those public promises to Rob, knowing they were in bad faith.
The Norris girls were behaving in only the most proper of fashions to the gentlemen. But Anne could see that Caroline and Sir Nathaniel were attracted to one another. Likewise, Major Clay seemed to be getting interested in Elizabeth, who by all appearances was returning the interest. And surprisingly enough Cordelia and Joshua Fielding were finding themselves of like mind on many issues, as she had been for many years a parson’s wife.
She met Rob’s eyes across the table. He smiled at her. She returned the smile, genuinely.
“Which dances shall we perform tonight after supper?” Anne asked her guests.
Caroline laughed softly. “There are four couples, my lady? Will you and your betrothed be dancing?”
“There are four couples,” Anne replied.
Caroline thought for a moment, “That would limit us to the longwise and the rounds for as many as will, as well as The Glory of the West, Argeers, Rufty Tufty, Saint Martins… What am I missing?”
Solway smiled and spoke, “Parson’s Farewell, Cuckholds all a Row, and Heart’s Ease, I believe.”
“My lord Solway, I do believe you are correct,” Cordelia Norris replied with a smile.
Katherine added quietly, “I believe Hit or Misse is also for four couples.”
John smiled at Katherine. “I believe that you are correct Mistress Katherine.”
Anne did not miss the look of affection in her son’s eye. Or the answering affection in Katherine’s. Oh, dear! This could prove interesting. Although John thought of himself as a man, he was still a boy. An emotional entanglement could prove disastrous just now, robbing him of the opportunity to go to University.
Anne looked at Cordelia Norris and saw that she was noticing the same thing. And she was no more pleased with this than Anne herself was.
“My lord Solway, do you furnish the music for us this evening?” Cordelia asked, drawing John’s attention momentarily from her youngest daughter.
“Nay, Mistress Norris. We have several servants who are skilled at performance. I may play a tune or two throughout the evening, yet, most of the entertainment shall be provided by the musicians,” John answered with a smile. “I pray Mistress Katherine would allow me to lead her out in at least one dance this evening.”
Katherine didn’t even look at her mother for permission. “Of course, my lord. I would be honored. Step Stately is for five couples. And there are many dances for as many as will.”
“Indeed there are,” Anne agreed, not
wanting to give this affection between the two children unnecessary attention. Likely, it was calf-love.
* * * * *
Dancing filled the next few hours; dancing and watching Katherine and John interact with one another. Anne became convinced that this was more than a simple crush between her son and the youngest of the Norris ladies. There was attraction between the pair of them, attraction that had been explored. How extensively she did not know, although she feared that the children had been intimate. The pair of them were too easy with one another. There was too much knowledge in their eyes for this to be an unexplored desire. When did this happen? Anne made a mental note to talk to her son about his responsibilities as the Earl of Solway, and as a man. They’d had the “sex “ talk several years ago.
About ten o’clock, the servants brought in mugs of hot spiced wine and chargers filled with sweetmeats. Everyone ate and drank, then made off to bed.
Anne dismissed her servants once they had her down to her chemise and her hair brushed out. She braided it into a single plait tied with a ribbon. Anne locked her hallway door. She threw on a quilted dressing gown, picked up a five-branched candelabrum, and went to the connecting door linking her chamber with Rob’s. She knocked once on the door. He came to the door and opened it.
Standing there in a long nightshirt and slippers, he looked dark and dangerous.
“Hello, Nan.”
“Rob,” she began. “Will you allow me to make love to you?”
Chapter Four
Rob smiled at her. “Have I ever given you cause to believe me to be stupid?”
“Never.”
“Then why would you think I would turn you away?”
“I’m hoping you won’t think me wanton.”
“I know better.”
Anne fought, and lost the fight with, the blush.
“Your bed or mine?”
“Yours,” she told him.
He stepped out of the way and let her walk over to the bed. She placed the candelabrum on the table beside the bed.
The she turned around to find him standing just two paces from her. “You walk quietly, Rob.”
“I do lots of things quietly, Nan.”
She chuckled. “Do you now? How interesting,” she said as she peeled off the robe and let it fall unheeded to the floor. Then she untied the drawstring at her chemise neckline and pulled that garment off her shoulders and let it fall to a puddle at her feet.
Rob drew a deep breath.
“Does my body please you, Rob?” she asked.
He swallowed hard. “Aye, Nan. Greatly.”
She stepped towards him. Unbuttoning the placket on the night-shirt, she reached down and pulled it off over his head and dropped it to the floor.
“We were entirely too hasty earlier today,” she told him as she placed her arms around him, allowing her hands to rest on his ass.
Rob drew a deep shuddering breath.
“I want to learn to please you,” she told him.
“Oh, Nan,” he said on a whisper, “you have that reversed. It is my job to pleasure you.”
“Really? Then shouldn’t you begin?” she teased.
“I can tell you are going to be a demanding wife,” he said as he touched her face. His hands traveled down her throat to her chest and came to cup her breasts.
“And you find that unacceptable?” she asked him, her voice careful.
“I find this room cold. Come get in bed.”
Anne laughed quietly then stepped back from him.
The bed had been turned down. A warmed brick had been placed in the foot of the bed, to heat up the cocoon of sheets and quilted counterpane.
Anne climbed into bed, and snuggled under the covers, as she watched as Rob walked around and locked his door.
He is so handsome! she thought. And he’s mine. Just looking at him took her breath away.
“Disturbances are decidedly unwelcome just now,” he explained as he climbed into bed and under the covers.
“That they would be,” she said as she snuggled closer to him.
“I was just debating about coming to your bed,” Rob admitted.
“What stopped you?”
“The prospect that I might not be welcome, Nan. You’ve had a long day. And I wasn’t exactly gentle or considerate with you this morning. I am sorry for that.”
“It takes two, Rob. If I had found your attentions unwelcome, I would have stopped them.”
“I’m stronger than you are, “ Rob said, disgust in his voice.
“You wouldn’t ever force intimacy on any woman.”
“So much confidence in me,” Rob said his voice thoughtful. “Do you trust me that much?”
“Do you think I would be here, now, if I failed to trust you?” Anne said, her voice both quiet and hurt. But she knew that she didn’t trust him, couldn’t trust him. It bothered her to lie to him.
Rob lightly kissed her forehead, obviously upset at himself for annoying her. “Sweeting, I apologize for upsetting you.”
Anne could hardly tell him that she was annoyed at herself and not at him. “‘Tis no matter, Rob. Just hold me for a moment.”
“Is that all you want?”
“Only the beginning.”
He chuckled lowly. It was a satisfied very male chuckle.
Anne kissed his earlobe. Then she moved her mouth to trace light kisses down his neck. At the jointure of his neck and shoulder, she lingered.
“Woman, you are tempting me.”
“That was the idea,” she told him, just before she moved her mouth down the dark hair of his chest to come to rest on the dark nubs of his nibbles.
He drew a shuddering breath as her lips closed around his nipples and she began to lightly, teasingly, suck on them.
“Nan!”
She lifted her head and looked at him from under the sheets and counterpane. She could make out his face in the faint gold of the candlelight. “Would you prefer that I stop?”
“Nay, lady!”
“Then hush and let me love you.”
“You realize that when you are done, I intend to reciprocate?”
“That presumes that you will have the energy to do aught but sleep.”
He reached behind her and swatted her ass sharply.
“And what was that in aid of?” she demanded.
“Don’t insult my manhood, woman!” he growled in a teasing voice.
“This manhood?” she teased as she closed her hand around his hard quimstake. “Why would anyone insult a wondrous thing like this?”
Then she began planting a line of kisses down his chest, down his stomach, and ending by kissing his balls.
He moaned slightly.
She licked his quimstake from the tip down the length of the shaft. “It’s a lovely quimstake, Robert. Hard and broad and simply the right size. Perfect for me, in fact.”
Then she took him into her mouth. With slow up and down movements of her mouth, she made him moan repeatedly over the course of several moments as she gave him oral sex. She had never done this before. And she hoped that those moans were of pleasure instead of pain.
Anthony and she, although they had loved one another deeply, had possessed a rather staid love life. Anthony always had asked permission to come to her and then their couplings had been mostly limited to his pleasure.
“Woman!” Rob moaned.
She removed her mouth from him. “Was there any doubt as to my sex?” she teased him.
“I certainly hope not!” he said lowly as she moved to lie atop him.
Anne chuckled before she kissed his lips. That kiss started as a light, teasing caress but exploded into passion almost as soon as it began.
Rob rolled them over, pinning her down under him. He lifted his lips from her. “Your turn, milady,” he told her, his voice low and holding sensual promise.
Anne smiled at him. “Why do you wait?”
“Eager are you?”
“Eager for you.”
He smile
d and planted a light kiss on her forehead. “Be eager a while longer.”
Then he began to kiss her left ear, her neck, her throat, the upper swell of her breasts, and the valley between her breasts.
She stirred restlessly beneath him.
Rob smiled. It was such a joy to have a woman actually want his touch. He wanted nothing more than to bury himself in her waiting quiff. But, he had been entirely too rough with her earlier. He needed to show her, to show himself, that he could also be gentle, tender, and give her as much pleasure as she gave him.
His lips closed over her left nipple.
Anne drew a shaking breath, then arched into him, offering him more.
He wasn’t slow in taking that offer. His lips teased and suckled first one breast, then the other, teasing her into a deeper state of arousal, teasing himself. How he wanted her! So much for gentleness. Right now, all he wanted was to bury himself in her, to possess her with all the fierceness of the passion he felt for her.
“Nan?” he whispered as he lifted his mouth from her breast.
“Rob?”
“I’m sorry, I thought I could enjoy the play. But my need for you is just too strong.”
She smiled at him. “Then come to me, Rob. Fill me.”
“Not so fast, my lovely,” he told her as he moved off her to lie on his left side next to her. “Not so fast.”
“Ah, but you were the one who said the time for play was at an end.”
“Spread your legs for me,” he told her.
She laughed softly. “Such a difficult request.”
“Indeed,” he answered as she complied.
Nothing could have surprised her more than the gentleness of his touch as his fingers parted the folds of her quiff. Without any hesitation, he found that most sensitive of nubs of flesh, her clitoris.
He rubbed it lightly, circling, teasing. “Would you like for me to give you pleasure with my hands?”
“With your mouth,” she answered.
Rob chuckled. “Ah, you enjoy that?”
“I think I’d enjoy anything you would give me,” she told him.
“Anything is a very broad amount of discretion, indeed,” he observed in a low tone that sent shivers of anticipation down her spine. “You trust me that much?”