Parlor Games

by Leda Swann;Julia Templeton Jess Michaels

  Marriage. He’d not seriously considered it before, but the more he thought about it, the more it appealed. Sarah would make him a fine wife. Her occupation did not bother him—in fact, he was man enough to admit that it turned him on. He was a grown man and his parents were no longer alive to be shocked by his choice of bride. Nobody else’s good opinion mattered to him.

  If she stayed at Mrs. Erskine’s establishment, she would attract plenty of lovers, men with far more money and status than he could ever hope to aspire to. Any of them would set her up in luxury and she would want for nothing. They might not offer to marry her, but then again, such things had happened before.

  If wealthier and more aristocratic men than he was did not blink at marrying a fallen woman, then why should he? Besides, Sarah was no whore, but an abused woman. Only an animal would have no pity on her situation. It was his duty to rescue her from Sir Richard and other men who would take advantage of her.

  “Can you walk?” Reluctant though he was to put her down, he could not carry her all the way to his apartments.

  She struggled to her feet. “I would crawl on my hands and knees to get out of this house tonight.”

  They made their way downstairs and out of the front door, unobserved and unmolested.

  Arm in arm through the dark streets, they walked to his lodging house. Tom did his best to support Sarah, but she was strong and would not lean on him.

  The street was dark, his latchkey was stiff, and his landlady had an ear like a fox. Clad in a voluminous flannel nightgown, a knitted nightcap on her head, and a candle in her hand, she accosted them both on the stairs. “This is a respectable establishment,” she hissed at him, looking askance at Sarah’s ripped silk shift and low décolletage. “I will thank you to take your fancy piece elsewhere. I want no such shenanigans in my house.”

  Tom gave her an icy glare. “I will thank you not to refer to my wife as a fancy piece.”

  “Your wife?” both women asked at once. Thankfully his landlady’s strident squeal utterly overwhelmed Sarah’s quiet gasp.

  “It is hardly the hour for introductions, but since you insist.” He gave Sarah’s arm a squeeze to warn her not to contradict him. “May I present my wife, Mrs. Thomas Wilde, until this happy afternoon Miss Sarah Chesham, and daughter of the late, and highly respectable, curate of Wigglesthorpe.”

  The landlady looked doubtful, but in the face of his insistence, she had no choice but to back down. “Well, if she really is your wife—”

  “Which she is,” he interjected.

  “—then I suppose she is welcome to stay as my guest for tonight.” She gave Tom a meaningful look. “We can talk about your rent in the morning.” With that, she took her candle and waddled off into her apartments, muttering loudly about Sarah’s strange and highly suspicious choice of bridal attire.

  As soon as Tom had shut the door into his rooms behind him, Sarah collapsed into a corner of the sofa. The effort of pretending to be strong, of pretending that she was not hurting in every way that she could hurt, was exacting a heavy toll on her. “That was gallant. Unnecessary, but gallant.”

  He paced around the room, his head averted from her gaze. “Mrs. Fitchett is not known for her kindness to distressed souls. She would have refused you entry if I had made any other excuse for bringing you home with me.”

  His voice was strangely uncertain. Was he already regretting his offer of a sanctuary for the night? She leaned back and closed her eyes, unwilling to face his rejection just yet. “What will you do tomorrow when she finds out you have told her a lie?”

  “There is no need for it to be a lie.”

  The darkness was a blessing. It matched her mood. “You do not mean that.”

  “You are wrong. I meant every word of it.”

  All she wanted was for him to make love to her and remove the taint of Sir Richard from her body. She would not feel clean until every trace, every memory of him was washed away. “Then you are either too foolish or too drunk to know what you have just said.” She wanted nothing more from him than his help erasing her memories. She could take nothing more from him.

  “I am not drunk, and I make a very good living by my wits, so you should not call me foolish, either.”

  “It does not matter. You cannot marry me. I would not ask it of you.” Her arms ached to hold him. “Come to me, Tom. I will be your mistress for tonight at least, though I cannot be your wife.”

  “You will marry me.”

  Her mouth curved in a faintly malicious smile. “Are you that scared of Mrs. Fitchett that you would marry me to escape her wrath?”

  “Damn Mrs. Fitchett. I don’t care a bean for her.”

  “Then come kiss me.”

  “No.”

  Had Sir Richard’s attack on her spoiled even this? She forced her eyes to open, to gaze at his face and read the truth that was in his eyes. “Do you not want me anymore?” His loss of desire was understandable, even excusable. He had seen another man on top of her, preparing to violate her body. The blame for his disgust lay with Sir Richard, not with Tom himself. She would try not to hate Tom for it.

  “Of course I want you.” He smashed his fist down on the mantelpiece above the fire in frustration. “I’ve done nothing else but want you from the moment I first met you. I’m just about dead with wanting you.”

  “Then why won’t you kiss me? Why won’t you take me to your bed?”

  “I am a respectable bewhiskered Victorian gentleman of impeccable morals,” he said, his mood changing from frustration to frivolity on the instant. “I will not succumb to your wicked blandishments until you have agreed to marry me.”

  “You are being ridiculous.”

  “I don’t care.”

  “You warned me weeks ago that you would never marry me.” The memory of their conversation still niggled at her soul. “Why have you suddenly changed your mind?”

  “For all the usual reasons.”

  She raised her eyebrows at him, waiting for an explanation.

  “Companionship, a partner to share my life with, children, great sex.” He gave a comical leer. “Especially the great sex. I’m particularly looking forward to that part.”

  Lust was no basis for a marriage. Not the sort of marriage she had dreamed about. “Maybe I won’t want to be intimate with you anymore if we get married.”

  His leer turned into a confident smile. “I have had a month’s worth of practice in tempting you to fall into my arms. I am confident I will be able to persuade you into it.”

  “Maybe I will want to fuck other men,” she said, pushing him to see how far he would go with his absurdity. “Consider, I was a coffee house girl after all. I may have picked up a taste that you will not be able to satisfy.”

  His face darkened with distaste. “You enjoyed being beaten and nearly raped by Sir Richard?”

  An involuntary shudder wracked her body. “That was not kind of you.”

  “I apologize.” His voice was clipped, but his irritation was directed not at her for baiting him, but at himself for rising to her bait. “It was cruel of me.”

  She should not allow him to flagellate himself simply for reacting to her provocation. “I accept your apology.”

  “And my offer of marriage? Do you accept that as well?”

  His ability to switch from deadly seriousness to even more deadly foolishness in the space of a heartbeat astonished her. “You will regret it in the morning.”

  “Never.”

  She pulled her ripped bodice lower, exposing her naked breasts, tempting him as best she knew how. “Come and kiss me.”

  Impervious to her nakedness, he stuck his hands in his pockets and did not move away from the fireplace. “No.”

  Her skirts were easily adjusted to show off her bare calves and thighs. “You will not make love to me until I agree to marry you?” She lifted her skirts higher, almost to the juncture of her thighs. “Are you sure about your decision?”

  He gulped at the sight, but tur
ned away resolutely, refusing to be tempted. “I will not.”

  “Then I suppose I have no choice.” She rose from the sofa, clasped the tattered remnants of her clothes around her, and walked with dignity toward the door. “I will not accept charity. If you do not want me as your mistress, I will have to leave.”

  His solid form blocked the doorway. “You cannot leave.”

  “You have no right to keep me a prisoner here.”

  He shot her a reproachful look. “Mrs. Fitchett thinks we are married. What ever would she think of me if my new bride deserted me on our wedding night?”

  “She would simply realize the truth—that you had the barefaced effrontery to tell her a whopping lie to her face, and the ill manners to introduce her to your whore.” The thought of Mrs. Fitchett’s horror was almost enough to bring a smile to Sarah’s face. “No doubt she would turn you out of doors for it.”

  “I like my apartments. Mrs. Fitchett doesn’t cheat me as much as most landladies would. I do not want to leave.”

  “Tom, please be serious.” The room, which had seemed so comfortable and welcoming before, now felt like a prison whose walls were closing in around her. “This is not a joke to me. This is my life you are playing with.”

  “I am deadly serious.” He ran his hands through his hair. “I like you, Sarah Chesham. I like you more than any other woman I have ever met. I like you enough to want to set up house with you and to spend my life with you.”

  His plea touched her heart. “I have offered to be your mistress.”

  “I could not live with the knowledge that you could up and leave me without a thought if you met a wealthier keeper. I want a permanent arrangement, not a temporary one.” His hands were on her shoulders and the warmth of his body was a comfort to her. “I want your life entwined with mine, so strongly that our ties to each other cannot be broken. That is why I want to marry you, Sarah. I want to be a part of you as you are a part of me.”

  Desperately as she wanted to, she knew she ought not accept the gift he was offering her. It was too much for her to accept. “You want a great many things.”

  “I cannot give you the sort of life you led at Mrs. Erskine’s establishment. I cannot give you a wardrobe full of fine silk dresses and a new pair of kid gloves every week.”

  She shrugged. He did not know her very well if he thought that she hankered after such fripperies.

  “I would not blame you if you liked that life too well to want to leave it for me. You are a beautiful woman, Sarah. Such a woman as you will have no shortage of wealthy protectors—wealthier by far than I am. I can offer you so much less.”

  “I am only a milliner—and a whore. Nothing more. You offer me far more than I can ever deserve.”

  “And I am a journalist who makes his money by exposing the dirty little secrets of the rich and titled.” He shrugged, his body warm against hers. “Marriage to me would not mean an entrée into society. I am tolerated by those on the fringes, and only because they fear the power of my pen. They would not like you any the more for marrying me.”

  His self-criticism roused her to his defense. “You are more than your profession. They cannot know the real you if they do not love you as well as you deserve.”

  He gave a self-deprecating smile. “I have a few genuine friends who would welcome you with open arms simply because I chose you. But do not be deceived—they are not society. I doubt your father would have approved of them.”

  She turned her face to his shoulder. “My father would not have approved of what I have become, either.” The thought still pained her, even now.

  Taking her face in his hands, he gazed searchingly into her eyes. “All my life, such as it is, I would like to share with you.”

  Miraculous as it seemed, it appeared he really did want to marry her. She still could hardly believe it, but the truth of it was in his eyes. “You really do want me?”

  “You have such strength and resilience that I cannot help but want you.”

  Her resolve was weakening under his insistence. “Prove it to me. Kiss me and show me just how much you want me.”

  “Will you promise to marry me in the morning?”

  She had no more energy left to fight both him and her own desires. “Yes.” The word was barely a whisper in the darkness. Giving in to him felt like she was drowning in Paradise.

  His embrace was almost painful in its intensity. “I have had your promise. You will not break your word.”

  For better or worse she had made her decision and she would stick with it. “I will not break my word.”

  He had wanted her so badly and for so long that it was sheer torture to have to maintain his self-control. For Sarah’s sake, he had to. Keeping a tight rein on his lust, he undressed her slowly, taking as much care of her torn clothes as he would of the finest silk. With his gentleness he would atone for the harm that Sir Richard had inflicted on her. “You are shivering.”

  “I want you so badly,” she confessed to him in a small voice, her arms reaching for him. “I never knew before I met you how much I could want a man.”

  The knowledge that she needed him as badly as he needed her was a powerful aphrodisiac.

  Gently he ran his hands over her naked mound, stroking her pussy as tenderly as he could. “Are you sure you want me to make love to you?” He forced himself to ask the question, though he would die if she refused him now. “Sir Richard did not hurt you too badly?”

  She moved her legs wider apart, nudging his hand in between them, encouraging him to explore her body. “He beat me and bruised my wrists, but you saved me before he could hurt me any further. Any hurt he caused me will be gone as soon as you make love to me.”

  “In that case,” he said, picking her up and carrying her into his bedroom, “I had better hurry.”

  The wax candles beside the bed gave off a muted glow and the eiderdown was soft on his back as he came to lie beside her.

  The whiteness of her naked body gleamed in the soft candlelight.

  With tender fingers he stroked her breasts, her stomach, her thighs, glorying in the sight of her. Her beauty and her generosity overawed him and made him want to give back to her all that she had given him and more.

  This night she would lose her virginity in earnest—not to Sir Richard, but to his own tender loving. He would show her what true lovemaking was all about.

  Sarah’s fingers were at his shirt buttons. “I want to feel your naked skin against mine,” she whispered, as she unbuttoned his shirtfront and slipped his jacket and shirt off his shoulders.

  He could not help a smile of satisfaction. He’d waited weeks for her to say those words to him.

  Her fingers moved tantalizingly over his torso, touching and caressing him until they stopped at the waistband of his trousers.

  If she wanted him to stop now, he would stop, even if it killed him.

  “I want to see all of you.”

  He groaned with relief. She wasn’t going to stop him.

  With a few deft moves, his trousers and underlinen lay discarded on the floor.

  Her eyes grew wide in the candlelight as he approached her. “You are big,” she murmured. “Much bigger than…” Her voice trailed away into nothingness.

  “I will not hurt you.”

  “I hope not,” she said doubtfully, reaching out and stroking him with one fingertip. He arched his back and nearly came in her hand there and then.

  “You will soon learn to appreciate my endowments,” he murmured, hanging on to his self-control by a thread. Desperate to possess her, he pushed her onto her back and knelt above her, his erect cock nudging between her thighs. “Open your legs for me.”

  Hesitantly, she did just that, allowing him his first clear sight of her pink cunt lips.

  He reached down and touched her there, sliding one finger inside her. Her pussy was hot and warm, and as wet as he could have hoped for. Her hips moved against his hand, urging him on to push deeper into her.

  He could no
t wait any longer to take her. Spreading her legs apart, he nudged the tip of his ravenous cock into her pussy.

  Her muscles tensed around him and she gasped, but she did not pull away.

  He held himself still, the tip of his cock just inside her, until he felt her relax around him.

  “That is n-not so bad,” she stuttered.

  “Only not bad?” he queried, as he pushed into her a little way farther. “I cannot be doing it right.”

  Again she tensed up, and again he held still until she melted around him.

  “It’s better than not bad,” she admitted, a little breathlessly. “Indeed, it’s r-rather nice.”

  If it got any nicer than this, he was going to disgrace himself and go off half-cocked. Slowly he withdrew a little way, steeling himself to regain control.

  She made a moan of protest and grabbed tightly to his buttocks.

  “I’m not going to leave you. Just positioning myself,” and he pushed into her more deeply, “for that.”

  This time she did not tense up against him, but arched into him as he thrust so that he went deeper than he intended until he was buried in her up to the hilt.

  Though he was aching to fuck her hard and fast and pound her into oblivion, he held tight to his self-control.

  Gently he rocked her back and forth, impaled on his ironhard cock, wringing every drop of sensation from her. He wanted to show her that there was more to fucking than violence and aggression. He needed to give her pleasure and introduce her to the joy that was to be found in the embrace of her lover.

  Droplets of sweat were dripping off his brow when finally she gave a choked cry and he felt her convulse around him. The clenching of her pussy muscles around his cock was too much for his overtaxed restraint. With a cry almost of anguish, he thrust into her hard and fast until the waves of his own pleasure overtook him and he spent his seed inside her until his body was wrung dry.

  Exhausted, he collapsed beside her, pulling the bedcovers over them both to protect them from the chill of the night air.