by Ava Sinclair
When he opened the door to the room, he found Imogen already dressed in the outfit she’d worn the night before. She was bending before the fireplace when he entered, and had not heard him come in. For a long moment, Royce looked at her kneeling there in her forest green skirt, white chemise, and bodice. The swell of her breasts was enticing, even now.
“Imogen?”
She looked up.
“I’ve spoken to your stepfather,” he said. “I was not toying with you when I said I would make this right. You will leave with me today, knowing the sacrifice of your maidenhead was not in vain. You will return with me to Stonehaven Manor. We will be married.”
She stood slowly, her hand at her midsection.
“Married?” she asked.
“Yes,” he said.
He walked over. “I suppose under the circumstances, I should introduce myself. I am Major Royce Kingsley, heir of Stonehaven, and the man who will be your husband.”
“An heir, are you?” She crossed her arms. “Well, sir. I’m sure you’ll make someone a fine husband, but it won’t be me. It matters not what we did, or who you are. And it doesn’t matter what you’ve been told. I’m not chattel to be given away, and I’ll not be given to you. I’ve no intention of marrying you, or any man.”
Chapter Two: Taken Away
They were all the same, men. They took what they wanted. Imogen’s father had taken her mother’s maidenhead and left, despite promising to stay. Her stepfather had treated her like a slave. She didn’t tell Royce that he wasn’t the first man who’d won her in a bet. Walter Blythe had gambled her off before, only those men had been too drunk to perform. When Royce had taken her upstairs, she’d prayed he’d fall asleep like the rest. He had not.
Imogen had known she’d lose her virginity in the inn beneath some stranger. That it had been a gentleman with a conscience was something she did not expect. But marry him? She would not.
She expected him to take advantage of her refusal, to sigh with relief and leave, content that his honor was still intact even if hers was not. But instead, he just turned and shut the door.
“This is not a matter of negotiation, young lady,” he said.
“I agree, Major Kingsley,” she said. “I decline your offer of marriage.”
He looked her up and down. “How old are you?”
She flushed at this. “Old enough for you to lay with, apparently.”
“How old are you?” He repeated the question, his tone harsher. Imogen noticed that the square jaw was set in resolve.
“I’m nineteen,” she said, “not that it matters. Why?”
“That is a marriageable age,” he said. “You can have no objection.”
“I can object to your offer if I so desire.” She raised herself to full height, realizing that her diminutive stature made her seem younger than she was, especially before such a tall imposing man. Now, as he stepped closer to her, it was all Imogen could do to hold her ground.
“My dear,” he said. “You would be able to object, if this were an offer. But it is not an offer. It is an order. I am an honorable man. I was raised never to disrespect or defile a woman. I will not start with you. I am taking you away from this place, and making you my wife.”
“And if I refuse?” She had to force the words out, her voice shaking. The room was small and Major Kingsley was blocking her path. Summoning her courage, she raised her gaze from the shiny buttons of his coat to his face. His eyes were a stormy gray, his lips full. She remembered the feeling of those lips pressed against hers, the feel of the stubbly jaw as it scraped her inner thigh before his tongue…
No. She’d let no man rule her.
“And if I refuse?” she repeated, tilting her little chin up in defiance.
“Then I shall take you over my lap, raise your skirts, and strap your pretty bottom until you agree to do as you are told.”
“Strap my bottom?” Imogen was indignant. “Sir, it sounds as if it’s not a wife you want, but a child. I’ll be neither.”
Hitching her skirts up, she made to move past him, but she was stayed by the sudden grip of his hand on her arm.
“To the contrary,” he said, his deep voice low. “You’ll be both. I’ve been away to war too long. I am in need of a wife and am in no mood to suffer the politics necessary to get one. You are in need of someone to show you a father’s guidance and care.” He paused. “You can be both wife and child. And you will be.”
Imogen’s heart began to pound at his words. Something in them both frightened and exhilarated her. Major Kingsley had pulled her to his hard chest, and she could feel both the threat and promise of his power. Her mind flashed back to the previous night, when she’d lain beneath him, helpless to that power and to the pleasure she’d never expected.
No!
With a sudden burst of resolve, she shocked Royce—and herself—by leveling a strong kick to his shin. In his split second of surprise, Imogen was able to get around the looming soldier. But his sharp reflexes had him recovering quickly, and he was on Imogen before she reached the door.
Despite her years of forced servitude in the inn, Imogen had managed to use her wits to avoid being manhandled. She’d always feared it, but that fear turned to anger as she realized that her captor was about to make good on his threat. His strong arm was like a band about her waist as he pulled her back to the bed. Sitting down, Royce threw her over his lap.
Imogen had never been spanked. Her stepfather’s mode of punishment had been to throw his fists, or to lock her in her room with nothing to eat. That she was about to be spanked like a child after surviving to adulthood without feeling a corrective lash was almost too much to bear. Leaning forward, she did the only thing she could in her state of confinement: she sank her teeth into the calf of the man holding her. She expected a yell, and was disappointed when his response was only a muffled curse, then shocked when a split second later his broad hand made contact with her bottom.
The first swat hurt, even through her thick skirt and layer of petticoats. But she had no time to prepare herself for what was to come next. She felt the cool air of the room raise gooseflesh on her bare bottom. The brute!
She’d inched too far forward to cover herself with her hands, so she did the next best thing, curling her legs back to block the expected continuation of her punishment. But Royce countered that strategy by snatching the slipper off of one foot and tipping her back. The next thing Imogen knew her legs were trapped between his and she was immobile.
It wasn’t his hand she felt next, but the fierce sting of her own leather slipper on her bared bottom. The shock of the burn caused her to scream, and for a second she had the frantic hope that her cry would result in some sort of rescue. But as the pain of Royce’s correction built, so did her despair. No one was coming to rescue her. Her father had never bothered to get to know her. Her stepfather had never loved her. To Imogen, the very word ‘father’ conjured up nothing but disappointment and pain. And now this man was proving no different. He’d ignored her request and was spanking her bottom. Hot tears rolled down her face.
But then the spanking stopped and Imogen found herself turned over and pulled to sitting in her disciplinarian’s lap. Strong arms that had clutched her so tightly now enfolded her with just enough strength to keep her where she was, not that she was about to try to escape with her bottom burning so fiercely. She could feel herself trembling in his gentle grasp, her fear now more from the uncertainty of her situation than of the man holding her. Punishment she had known. Kindness in the wake of it was new to her. As Major Kingsley stroked her hair, she was reminded of the previous night, of how he’d turned gentle once realizing she was a virgin. The secret place between her legs throbbed at the memory. She shifted on his lap.
“You’ll leave with me.” He repeated his assertion and this time Imogen did not object as he tipped her to standing and turned to pull the worn woolen blanket from the bed. He wrapped it around her shoulders and then scooped Imogen up into his a
rms before exiting the room. From the hallway landing, she could see the room below. A few patrons were looking up in her direction. So was her stepfather. Imogen turned her face into Royce’s chest, unwilling to meet the gaze of the man who’d gambled away her virginity to a total stranger. She squeezed her eyes shut as Royce descended the stairs.
“I’ll expect to hear from your secretary.” Royce had stopped and Imogen could hear the greed in her stepfather’s voice. “A hundred pounds just like we agreed to.” He paused. “And that’s my blanket. I’ll be expecting you to pay for that, too.”
Royce was silent. She felt him turn and then gasped as she was handed off to another man, who held her in a grip nearly as strong. The next thing Imogen heard was the crack of a fist against flesh followed by a thud and a groan from her stepfather. Now she did open her eyes and turned to look. Walter Blythe was just struggling to sit up on the floor, his hand pressing the hem of his dirty apron to his nose. Blood bloomed from where the officer’s fist had broken it.
“You are a disgrace,” Royce said, “to care more about losing a blanket than the girl you raised.” He stepped forward, his fists balled and Imogen could see the officer restrain himself as he loomed over her stepfather. When he turned back to her, his expression was one of compassion as he took her from his friend. “It’s going to be all right,” he said, then turned back to the innkeeper. “You will hear from my secretary, but pray you never hear from me again. Remember, Mr. Blythe. Should we meet again, I will not be so kind.”
Outside a boy was holding two horses. Imogen could see the other man who’d briefly held her now. He was also an officer, although clearly one of lower rank. He had red hair and the beginnings of a beard, and regarded Imogen as Royce put her up on his horse.
“So you’re really taking her, then, the girl you slept with last night?”
“I wronged her, Gerald, and I mean to do the right thing.”
The red-haired man shook his head as he mounted his horse. As Royce mounted his own horse, Gerald inclined his head toward the inn. “Looks like she’s used to being wronged by that lot.”
“She’ll be wronged no more,” Royce said as he settled in the saddle behind Imogen. “Are you fit to ride?” he asked.
Imogen wasn’t sure how to answer that question. Her bottom still throbbed from where he’d welted it with the sole of the shoe still missing from her foot. The place between her legs was still tender, with an accompanying ache she could not describe. But as she looked back to see her stepfather in the door, his small, rheumy eyes narrowed in anger above the cloth still clutched to his nose, Imogen decided she could endure any ride to leave. So she nodded and said nothing as the man who claimed her turned his horse away from the home she’d had since she could remember, and toward a future she could not begin to fathom.
Chapter Three: The Master of Stonehaven
Home. He’d not expected to return with a woman. He’d not expected to return at all.
How often had he conjured up the image in his mind, allowed himself to dwell on this place in the rare moments of quiet? Now as Royce pulled his horse to a stop and stared into the distance, he feared he’d suddenly be jerked awake by the groans of a starving soldier and find himself not on an English lane, but on the hot foreign sands.
But it was real, and less than a mile away, there it was: Stonehaven Manor. It loomed at the end of a long hedge-lined lane as it had in the day of Royce’s father, and his father before him. They were gone now, leaving him master of this place.
“This is your house?” The voice of the woman in front of him drew his attention. For the last day and a half, he’d felt her warmth against him as they’d rode. Their only stop had been at another inn where he’d bought Imogen a hot bath and found a merchant who’d sold him shoes, some underthings, and a decent dress for the young woman. The next day his friend and fellow officer had headed toward his own home, leaving Royce with only Imogen as his companion. They’d not spoken as they’d traveled. He could tell she was still uncertain, still afraid, and likely mourning the familiarity of what she’d known, even if her former life had been one of servitude.
“Yes,” he answered. “This is my ancestral home, Stonehaven Manor. This will be your home now.”
“It’s so large,” she said.
“Yes. And you are so small.” Royce smiled as he spoke into her hair, which still smelled like lilies from the soap she had used. “It is my job to see that you grow into it.”
He kicked his horse, impatient now as he sent the animal lunging into a canter. As he drew closer to the house, memories flooded back—the sweet mother who’d died when he was twelve, his stoic father who insisted his sons follow the family tradition of military service. Albert Kingsley did not believe societal rank should excuse one from service to country. Royce’s older brother, William, had believed just that. He’d refused to enlist, and after the subsequent row with their father, had been disinherited.
Since that day, Royce had only seen his brother once. William Kingsley came to their father’s funeral, but had stayed just long enough for the reading of the will. Royce knew why; in the back of his mind, his elder brother had hoped his father would have had a change of heart. But that had not been the case, especially not after the things William had subsequently done to hurt the family name. Everything—the vast Kingsley fortune, Stonehaven Manor and all its acres—had gone to Royce.
The staff was as solid as the house, and as Royce approached he could see that they’d kept the place up while he was away. Upon setting foot on English soil, he’d written to let them know he’d be home within a fortnight. That had been before the inn. He clutched Imogen tighter as he remembered. Before her. Mrs. Philbert would, no doubt, not approve.
The staff filed out as his horse clattered into the cobblestone yard. The semicircle of servants stood watching, with a few whispering behind their hands as Royce dismounted and lowered Imogen to the ground. As he approached the house with his arm protectively around her shoulders, his housekeeper and butler stepped forward.
“Mrs. Philbert, Mr. Plum,” he said, embracing first one servant and then the other. “It’s been too long.”
“It has.” The portly older woman had tears in her eyes as she looked at her employer. “But God has returned you to us, safe and whole.” Beside her, a barrel-chested man with wiry white hair nodded. “Indeed,” Mr. Plum added. “And we are so grateful.”
“But you’ve brought a…” The housekeeper turned her attention to Imogen and then looked questioningly at Royce. “…a child?”
“No.” Royce gently pushed his companion forward. “This young woman is Imogen. We are to be married, Mrs. Philbert.”
“Married?” To the left and right, servants were now tittering as the news spread down the line. “How…”
“It’s a story for later,” he said. “Imogen is tired from our journey. I’d have her settled in.”
“Yes. Of course.” Mrs. Philbert clapped her hands. “Libby.” A plain-faced maid stepped forward. “Take Miss…” She looked at Royce questioningly.
“Blythe,” he said.
“No.” Imogen finally spoke. “It’s not Blythe. He never let mother give me his name. Don’t you dare call me that. Ever. It’s Hill. Imogen Hill.”
Royce looked down into dark eyes flashing with anger.
“Very well,” he said, turning back to the housekeeper. “Miss Hill.”
“You’re to marry but you don’t even know her name?” The housekeeper’s voice was quiet as she asked Royce, but it was Imogen who replied.
“It didn’t matter to him,” she said tartly. “Once he stuck his great cock in me, the matter was settled.”
The housekeeper and everyone within earshot gasped.
“You forget yourself.” Royce kept his voice low, but tightened his grasp. “You will apologize, Imogen.”
When she glared up at him in silence, Royce placed his mouth by her ear. “You will apologize, my dear, or the whole staff will see you bare
d and spanked where you stand. Is that what you want?”
He felt her stiffen in his grasp, felt her resistance. A moment later, she slumped slightly, softening in defeat as she dropped her gaze. Her reply of ‘no’ was barely audible.
Royce squeezed her arm again, indicating the matter was not settled. He was fully prepared to follow through on his threat; if leading a regiment had taught him anything, it was that authority was nothing without consistency.
“I apologize for my rudeness.” Imogen’s words were quiet but distinct.
“Thank you,” the housekeeper said.
“You will go with Libby now.” Royce nudged her forward. “And you’ll stay put. Understand?”
Imogen looked a bit less certain of herself now. Good, he thought.
“Take her to the room in the south wing where Aunt Winifred used to stay,” Royce told the maid. “I’ll be up to see to her directly.”
All eyes turned to watch the diminutive woman walk away. When they had scaled the steps of the manor and disappeared inside, Mrs. Philbert turned to her employer.
“I know I’ve no right to pry…”
“You’ve every right,” he said gently, putting his hand on her shoulder. “You and Mr. Plum practically raised me. But let’s not include the entire staff in our discussion, hmm?”
“Of course.” Mrs. Philbert clapped her hands again, indicating that the other servants should return to duties. The butler and housekeeper followed them into the big house. Royce breathed deeply once they’d shut the huge oak door behind them. The smells of home—wood polish, leather, the faint, welcoming scent of baking wafting from the faraway kitchen—enveloped him like a comforting blanket.