by Jess Russell
Then they all three watched till his figure disappeared behind the rocks. Egg met Olivia’s gaze and hooked her arm through Lord Bertram’s. “And I am not short-sighted,” she said to his lordship as she towed him toward the far rocks.
Olivia waited a full seven waves before she devoured the rest of the plum and hurled the pit into the sea.
Chapter Sixteen
Rhys refilled his pipe, first pressing the tobacco into the bowl with the pad of his thumb, and then reached for a bit of straw to light it. He pulled in air, igniting the leaves, and sat back, hoping the familiar comfort of his old steward’s room would settle his nerves.
He closed his eyes, willing himself to dispel the vivid images lapping the shores of his brain—her mouth sinking into that plum, the juice running down…
He had taken himself off to the next cove and plunged his hot body into the water using fistfuls of sand to scrub his thighs and arms. But when he’d emerged, his cock still bobbed heavy and hard against his belly. He ended up wearing himself out by swimming, and—in the other way as well.
Rhys shifted in his chair.
The London trip had been a waste of his time and money. Daria’s friend had been “called away,” but Daria had instructions for Rhys to go to a bawdy house in Seven Dials, where he would find Dee Gooden or at least news of her. It was the beginning of a long string of “Oh, that bitch? She was here a while back, but I had to throw her out. She weren’t clean, you see. Too many blokes complained.” The next establishment said nearly the same, only adding that she seemed to have a need for laudanum as well as drink. At the last place, he had missed Gooden by only a few days. As he was leaving, a bawd pushed her gray pockmarked breasts up to him and smiled through black and broken teeth. “Two bits for a toss, gov?” She couldn’t have more than thirty years but looked to be at least sixty. He almost felt sorry for Dee Gooden. Almost.
Mac sat in his old rocker to Rhys’s left, and Toby lay between them on the well-worn rag rug, his huge head between his paws. The old dog occasionally slapped his tail and lifted his head for a scratch. One or other of the men would comply, and then he’d settle back into a snuffling snore.
“The young miss is a fair lass.”
Rhys stopped his rocking and just as quickly resumed it. Mac always had a tendency to read his mind.
“Young miss?” He knew very well who Mac was referring to but played dumb just the same. “Are you referring to Mrs. Weston, by any chance?”
His old friend only looked steadily at Rhys and continued to puff on his pipe, his lack of words conveying more than a whole sermon.
Rhys drew on his own pipe. A long moment passed. But their companionable silence was over.
“I am not in love. You, of all people, know I do not believe in love. Indeed, I do not even think I am capable of it.”
Again, all Rhys got for his protestation was another sage look and an exhaled puff.
“I will admit to being in lust. Yes, that I will own.” A shard of ember popped, landing on the edge of the rug. He nudged the coal with his boot and tamped it out. “It has quite overtaken me, but I assure you it will not end as it did years ago.” Toby stared up, and Rhys realized his voice had risen. He slowed his rocking. “You may trust me on that. I have learned a thing or two since my raw youth. I am in complete control of this particular situation. Indeed, all I have to do is say the word, and she is mine.”
The old man waited a moment, stubbed out his pipe, and rose, but as he left the room Rhys felt Mac’s light touch on the back of his head.
Rhys did not stir himself but sat smoking and staring into the hearth’s dying embers as those painful memories surrounded him…
Meet me at the boat house at five.
Dee.
He had arrived at the boathouse at two that afternoon, nearly insane with want and anxiety.
Dee came in breathless and laughing, sorry to be late. He began to kiss her, his pent-up passion spilling out of every pore. He was quite sure he would drown soon.
She laughed again and pushed him aside. “Not yet, silly boy.”
He felt the hot blush of confusion, but deferred to her experience. He splashed the wine he had brought into two goblets and prayed his hands would stop shaking.
He met her by the window. “To love,” she said, taking a small sip.
He tried to kiss her again, but again, she pushed him away, this time with some anger. Stretched to his limits, he gulped his wine. Nothing was going as he had planned. She seemed somehow different, and he did not know how to approach her.
Suddenly as if some phantom clock had chimed, she threw herself at him and began to pull her bodice down, free her breasts, and open his falls all at the same time. Rhys was shocked but so hungry for her he was quickly consumed.
“Well, well, what have we here?”
It took Rhys a moment to comprehend this terrible intrusion. Only Dee pulling away made his mind connect to the voice so like his own. Dear God, it was his father.
Dee broke from him, and Rhys turned to shield her. But she pushed him aside and did not even attempt to cover herself. Then she smiled.
Smiled? Rhys, with his breeches around his ankles, did not know where to look, at his father and the four burly footmen who stood flanking him, or at his lover who was looking like a cat with a dish of cream.
“Dee, I see you have been busy, my dove,” drawled the duke.
Dee? He called her Dee? Nothing made sense. As if he had stepped from a beautiful dream into a hideous nightmare.
She made a moue and walked slowly to the duke. “I have been lonely. Surely you would not begrudge me a bit of dalliance, Ian?”
Ian?
“I could not deny you anything, my dove,” said his father. “I only wonder at your choice of plaything. Why would you choose to sully yourself with this oafish pup? He is nothing.”
Dee looked back at Rhys. “Oafish pup? Really?” She laughed. “Hmm…Do you mind, my love”—she shot him a wicked smile—“if I have a look? Who knows? I may even like the son better.”
The duke let out a low laugh and gestured to the footmen. “By all means, remove his clothes. The lady wants to see what she missed.”
Finally all the pieces clicked into place, and Rhys erupted like a madman. A scream tore through him and he lurched for his father. The footmen were upon him in a moment. Three held him fast as the fourth smashed a fist into his mouth.
“Enough,” said the duke. “There will be time enough for that later. We must let the lady look her fill first.”
Dee began a slow circle around Rhys. “Ooooh, he is a tall, awkward lad. And skinny as a scarecrow, all arms and legs.” She looked up at his face. Rhys jerked his chin up, his breath coming hot and fast in his nostrils. “A scarecrow with spots.” He felt his neck and face flush. She noted her effect on him and cocked her head. “But his eyes alone are enough to set him above the rest of the male population.” Her mouth thinned and she narrowed her eyes. “Why is it men always seemed to have the lashes we women crave? It is truly vexing!” Dee shook her head, moving on. “But what a set of shoulders, Yes, with a few years—and stone—he might do well enough.”
Heat fired his face and neck, and his scalp burned as a footman’s fist tightened in his hair.
“But why ever would I want the son,” Dee said, turning back to the duke, “when I have the finished version right here before me to confirm my opinions? Is he not a near copy of you, my love?” She moved to the duke’s side, and deftly opened the older man’s falls. Rhys clenched his teeth to stop from screaming.
“Oh,” Dee crooned. Then she turned to Rhys, homing in on his now thoroughly limp member. “But now I see something very different.” Rhys would not look, but he could not miss his father’s hand as he pushed Dee’s head down. “Yes, my love,” she said from between the duke’s legs, “I believe in the final analysis, he is quite paltry next to you.”
The fist in his hair loosened, and the footmen relaxed their grips slightly,
their attention riveted on the kneeling woman.
Rhys ran.
Pain shot through his knees to his chin. He had forgotten his breeches still lay round his feet. He spat blood and gritty sand as laughter rang above him.
“Not so fast, my son.” His father’s boot nudged Rhys’s bleeding face. “I don’t care for interruptions. Your behavior calls for some form of punishment, don’t you agree? We can’t have you poaching on a man’s property without some consequences, can we?” At the duke’s order, the footmen yanked Rhys to his feet. “Obviously I have been far too lenient in your upbringing. Tie him to that chair.” And then he walked to a cot-like bed against the far wall, Dee giggling after him.
Rhys had been wrong. The real nightmare was only beginning.
His father took Rhys’s “love” on the bed like a dog, all the while looking straight at Rhys, who would not give his father the satisfaction of looking away.
When his father lay satiated, like some sort of pasha, the woman—she had ceased to be Dee—offered him a glass of the wine Rhys had brought. The duke merely flicked his finger when he wanted a sip.
“How did you like that, my boy? Quite an education for your poor mind, I am sure.”
Rhys could hardly feel his body much less his numb mind.
“What? No thanks? Oh, Dee, I am not sure he has learned his lesson. What can we do to make this a truly enduring tutorial?” The duke rose and stood in front of Rhys. “Ah, I know, my dove, come.” He crooked his finger at the woman. “Come and see if you can raise this poor—what was the word you used—ah, yes, paltry thing from the dead.”
Rhys spit in his father’s face.
The strike came in an instant, but it had been worth it to see a glimpse of his father’s rage. Rhys was nearly senseless by the time his father was finished with him, his eyes almost completely swollen shut and his lips torn and bleeding. Still, he would not look away.
His father laughed. “All right, lads, now it’s time to see if there’s any life in the boy. I’ll give you ten guineas he can’t get it up for Miss Dee here. What say you?”
And the bets were on.
To Rhys extreme humiliation, the fifth Duke of Roydan lost his bet. As the woman lowered her head and took him in her mouth, Rhys’s cock began to stir…
The fire was nearly all ashes now. Just as the old boathouse had been reduced to ashes as soon as Rhys had attained the title.
He heard a soft whining and then a wet nose pushed into his fisted hand. Rhys slowly opened his fingers, and Toby’s tongue licked them once and then again. Rhys buried his face in the dog’s furry neck and stroked his long velvet ears. The dog thumped his tail and nudged Rhys again. Rhys sat up, slowly sloughing off the terrible memories, replacing them with the familiar sights and smells of Mac’s home. He stood, feeling suddenly as ancient as Mac. “Come, Toby, old boy. It’s time we both got some relief.”
Chapter Seventeen
“It will be a small party again,” Egg assured Olivia. “Just ourselves, Lord Bertram, the Hargetts, Squire and Mrs. Winslow, Lady Bainbridge and her son, Percy, who is lately home from Oxford. That is nine…I am forgetting someone…Oh, good heavens, of course, the duke—Roydan, as I must remember to call him.” She laughed and shook her head. “Dear Olive, it is not always easy to remember I am Lady Wiggins now.”
What a contrast the two women presented—Egg practically skipping about Olivia’s bedchamber, chattering like a magpie, while Olivia slumped at her dressing table applying a bit of rouge to her too-pale lips and cheeks. Her mood was foul, and her mind thoroughly tired of trying to guess Rhys Merrick’s next move—or lack of movement.
She glared at the mulish face in the mirror and rose to take a final look at her gown. Well, at least it was not one of his.
She had worn it to the Dillingham mask so it had escaped the fire, only a scorch and a few small burns marred the sheer cerulean organza overskirt. Easily mended. Tonight she had paired it with a golden-pink petticoat. The gown had always been a favorite and reminded her of a sunset over the Seine—that opalescent light that happens at dusk.
Egg came up behind her. “Ah, I remember this beauty. Wasn’t it for the Comte d’ Orsay’s going away ball?” Olivia nodded. “But you have re-made it, how clever you are. One would swear it had never seen Napoleon or a breath of fire and smoke.”
Olivia, now more confident, gathered her shawl. “Shall we deign to grace these mere mortals with our glorious persons?”
The guests were already assembled in the drawing room when Olivia and Egg arrived. The duke, in conversation with Lady Bainbridge, immediately excused himself and went to greet his final guests.
“Lady Wiggins, I trust your health continues to improve?”
“You are all kindness, Roydan. I have only the slightest tenderness in my hands now, and my lungs have never been better. The sea air at Valmere has done me wonders. I only wish I could bottle it and take it away with me when I go.”
“I am gratified to hear it, my lady. But you have only just arrived. You must not think of leaving us.”
“I am flattered you think our stay has been so brief. Indeed I had begun to think, with my health so improved, Mrs. Weston and I should be moving on and not tax your generous hospitality. After all, we have been in the dower house nearly six weeks.”
“Nonsense!” Lord Bertram had appeared to stand at Egg’s elbow. “I will not hear any more of this silly talk of leaving.” He smiled at her. “Roydan, surely you would not be easy with our fair ladies departing any time soon?”
“No, Uncle, at least not until I have patented my sea-air elixir,” the duke said with utter seriousness. “And I am quite sure that will take several years, perhaps even a lifetime.”
Olivia’s stomach pulled itself into a neat french knot.
“That is a lovely gown, Mrs. Weston,” he said, turning to her, his gaze like a brand.
“It is old, Your Grace. Indeed, I believe you have seen it before?” Her question hung in the air between them.
“I’m sure I would remember if I had,” he said finally.
It was no admission, yet he did not precisely lie either. She employed his own weapon, raising her eyebrow.
“I thank you for consenting to be one of our small party,” was all he said.
“Your Grace,” she murmured dipping into a brief curtsey. But he had moved off to join Reverend Hargett.
Olivia preferred to be a spectator for most of the evening. She noted the various conversations that swirled about her but took no part.
The dinner done, they were all gathered together again, when the conversation turned to painting.
“I believe your mother, the late duchess, was painted by Mr. Reynolds, was she not, Your Grace?” the Reverend offered.
“Yes, it was her wedding gift to the duke.”
“Mrs. Weston,” the Reverend continued, “I understand you are fond of painting. Do you admire the works of Mr. Reynolds?”
“I would imagine there is no one who could doubt Mr. Reynolds was one of the great masters of our time, Mr. Hargett. Yes, I admire his work very much, though I have not seen as much as I would like.”
“I would be pleased to show you the portrait now if you wish, Mrs. Weston.” The duke rose, his steely face showing no pleasure whatsoever.
“Oh, I did not mean to beg a viewing, Your Grace.”
“I should very much like to see it myself,” Percy Bainbridge bounced up from his seat next to his mother. He found himself face-to-face with the piercing eyes of the duke. “But now I recall”—he peeled his eyes from the duke to settle on the next available person—“I particularly wanted to hear your thoughts, Reverend Hargett, on the merits of gas lighting, and so I will forgo the pleasures of Mr. Reynolds for the time being.” And he scurried to join the Reverend.
“Madam, will you come?”
She hesitated. Was this a challenge? Lord knew she was mightily tired of this frustration and inertia.
“Yes, thank you. I will c
ome,” she said issuing her own challenge. But he either missed the dare, or more likely, chose to ignore it.
He led her through a maze of halls and passageways. They finally came to a huge set of double doors. He opened one side, and they entered a great hall. It must have been one hundred feet long and half as wide. She looked above to a ceiling made mostly of glass. In the daylight it would allow the portraits to be viewed at their best advantage. But now, only feeble moonlight and stars shone through, casting rows of venerable Merricks into shadowed ghosts. He gestured her forward, holding a candelabra to light their way.
The paintings were arranged chronologically. The first subjects wore huge ruffs and collars, enormous coats and jeweled stomachers. Next were sitters with powdered wigs dressed in lavish brocades.
She and the duke proceeded slowly down the hall. The candlelight momentarily brought to life the sitters’ white, solemn faces before dying back to blackness. She stopped at a portrait of a rather youngish man who bore a striking resemblance to the present duke. She glanced back at him, but he made no comment and they continued on.
At last they came to the end of the hall. If she thought the portrait of the earlier young man resembled the duke, this portrait was him incarnate. It must be his sire, the fifth Duke of Roydan. The resemblance was uncanny. If it hadn’t been for a slightly different era in clothing, she would have sworn it was the man standing just behind her.
She turned to that man now.
He merely looked at her and moved on to the painting next to it, the Reynolds. His mother. He used a candle to light the tapers on either side of the work, and then blew it out and set the candelabra down. She thought she heard him take a deep breath but when she looked over at him there was no way of divining any emotion, his gaze was fixed on the portrait.
“I did not know you painted,” he said.
“There are many things you do not know about me, Your Grace.” It was churlish of her, but she was not in the best of moods. She gave her full attention to the portrait. The Duchess had not been a beauty, but Olivia’s heart turned over as she gazed into the young woman’s eyes.