That eruption, of course, only get worse when she then relayed the news that the duke would be improving without her continued interventions, as he was no longer hers for the marrying.
“Well, Father, the duke’s usual physician has sent a… specialist of his acquaintance to tend to His Grace. And it seems to be working. The duke is able to feel his legs again, and he has begun to put on weight. He seems much healthier, to my own unskilled eye,” she said, pasting a smile on her face, which her father immediately copied.
Her mother continued staring into space, and Magdalene could not be sure she even heard her. It was no matter, of course; what was said would be repeated over and over by her boisterous father until he was red as a pomegranate and her mother was napping after a round of energetic sobbing, the only thing she ever did energetically. It was the foundation of their relationship, her father screaming and her mother sobbing then falling asleep.
“What sort of specialist? Where from? Do we know of him?” her father pressed, a glint of excitement in his eyes.
“Er, no, I don’t think we do. At least, I have never heard of… them,” she said, deciding to avoid gendered pronouns all together.
“Well, whoever they are, if they’re able to cure the duke, that’s all that matters! If His Grace is able to walk again, perhaps he’ll finally be amenable to setting a wedding date!” her father said, chuckling harshly to himself.
Magdalene knew this was the perfect moment to tell her father the news, and so, she opened her mouth and, plastering a contrite expression on her face, said, “Well, Father, I do not think the Duke will be amendable to setting a date regardless. You see, he broke off our engagement this morning.”
In truth, it had been she who had officially requested that they part ways. She knew that the Duke was far too honorable to end their association. It was one of the more infuriating aspects of the gentleman, his sense of honor and duty. It was why he was so reluctant to accept the help of the many physicians her family had paid for, and it was also why he had allowed himself to wither away these last few months.
Magdalene knew that he didn’t feel he was worth caring for now that he was lame. She knew that, if given the choice, he would choose death over a life with one injured leg and another that simply would not behave as it ought to.
Of course, that point was moot now that his wonderful new female physician was helping him back onto his feet.
“Broke off the engagement?!” her father exclaimed, causing her to look back up and meet his eyes, which had narrowed into slits, his normally brown irises looking almost black with rage.
“Y-yes,” she said, hating herself for stuttering. She made a point of always being collected in front of her father no matter the state of his temper. But normally, he was only enraged over trivial matters. Her marital status, she knew, was no trivial matter.
This was proven a moment later when her father jumped out of his seat and kicked over the table that separated the two of them.
Magdalene saw her mother flinch as the table came crashing down to the floor, one of the legs buckling underneath it. It had been replaced six times now, and it looked as though a seventh was looming in the near future.
“You must go back to him and beg him to reconsider, Maggie. You know what your union with the duke means for this family. For me,” he said.
Magdalene had to bite back the urge to roll her eyes. Of course her father would only think of himself in this situation. No question about how she might be handling the break, what her feelings were. Instead, all that mattered was their reputation, which she knew her father fancied affected him more than either her mother or her.
“I cannot, Father. He was very much decided. He said he did not want to continue our engagement. I pleaded with him,” she lied, accompanying this falsehood with a practiced frown of misery. “But he would not be persuaded. It is done, I’m afraid.”
Magdalene was expecting her father to continue his shouting, perhaps threatening her if she did not fix the situation, but to her surprise, he merely stomped out of his room. She heard the door to his study slam, the loud noise echoing down the hall, and then she and her mother were alone.
“Well, Mama, I think that went rather well, all things considered. What say you to a spot of tea?” Magdalene asked, turning to her mother, who was still quaking with fear.
Her mother made no move to accept or reject the offer of sustenance, so Magdalene stood up and rang the bell for the maid. She was going to drink her fill of tea, then retire to her room, to take the most restful nap she’d had since the duke returned from the war.
I can’t wait.
Life really was so much better without that pathetic gentleman dragging her down.
Chapter Ten
“Your Grace?” Lavinia said, poking her head through the crack in the doorway and looking inside.
The Duke was sitting up in bed with what looked like a bit of cake on a plate in front of him, eating with his fingers.
“Come in,” he said, looking up and smiling at Lavinia.
He had been smiling more and more lately, and Lavinia found him even more devastatingly attractive when he did so. It lit up his face, that grin, bringing a twinkle to his eye and making apparent a few truly remarkable dimples in his cheeks.
“How was your rest?” she asked as she walked into the room and shut the door behind her.
The curtains had been drawn, but the fire was going in the hearth, giving the room a cozy warmth that made Lavinia want to curl herself into bed with Peter.
This, however, was a scandalous thought, and she quickly dismissed it.
Climbing into bed with a duke! What a preposterous fantasy.
But a delicious one as well, her traitorous mind told her as she made her way toward her patient.
“It was fine, thank you. I am feeling much improved compared to earlier this afternoon,” the duke told her as he took a bite of cake.
“That’s excellent to hear. Are you ready to do your stretches, Your Grace?” she asked.
Peter nodded, his mouth too full to speak. Swallowing, he asked, “Miss Bell?”
“Yes?” she responded.
“What say you to using our Christian names? I would very much like it if you called me Peter, and with your permission, I could call you…” he trailed off.
“Lavinia,” she finished for him. “You may call me Lavinia. Peter,” she said, a giggle bursting forth at the use of his name.
Peter smiled in kind as he took another bite of cake. He had a sheepish smile on his face as he finished it, saying, “God, but I’ve forgotten how good Cook’s lemon cake is. Have you had some?” as soon as he swallowed.
“No, but perhaps I will seek some out after the evening meal,” Lavinia replied, lifting the plate and starting to pull the blankets off the duke’s lap. He stopped her with a hand on her wrist, and Lavinia looked over to see his eyes gazing at her with a wickedness she suddenly desperately wanted to know the cause of.
She found out a moment later, when the duke took the plate back from her hand and said, “Here. I shall give you a taste.”
The next thing Lavinia knew, the Duke of Kingwood was bringing a bite of fragrant cake to her mouth, pushing it between her lips with sensual slowness.
“Is it…sweet?” he asked, his voice suddenly raspy.
Lavinia moaned as she chewed, letting the sugary citrus flavor overwhelm her palate. She had never tasted anything so divine in all her life.
“A bit tart as well?” he asked, and Lavinia knew he wasn’t just asking about the cake. He was asking about her, about whether she might not have a hidden layer to her as well, something slightly sour and forbidden beneath her palatable exterior.
“Mm,” she agreed, chewing slowly, savoring every last bit of the cake.
The duke’s fingers had dropped from her mouth to her chest, where they rested on her collarbone, the only bit of skin her dress left exposed. She had never thought the collarbone a particularly sensual place
, but she was quickly revising that conclusion now, for just the barest brush of the duke’s fingers on the bone there sent licks of fire down her belly that settled in the very heart of her, that special, secret place between her thighs.
She could feel herself growing aroused, her breath coming faster as she swallowed the last crumb of cake. Suddenly, her stays were suffocating. She couldn’t get enough air in her lungs, and her nipples were excruciatingly erect, every brush against the fabric of her chemise nearly sending her moaning with a combination of pleasure and pain.
Her mind was flooded with visions of ripping the clothes from her body, letting what cool air there was in the room wash over her body. She could already imagine the blissful sensation of goosebumps covering her arms and legs as her bare skin met the air. She could imagine the duke’s searing gaze as he raked over the sight of her naked body.
Lavinia wanted that fantasy to come true, more than she had ever wanted anything in all her life.
“Lord, but you’re beautiful,” the duke rasped, letting his fingers trace lower, until they were skirting the edge of her bosom, just where her nipples were practically screaming for attention.
Lavinia waited with bated breath to see what the duke would do next, and she was not disappointed. His finger found the hard nub of her nipple, peaking out through her chemise and the heavy fabric of her dress, like no amount of cloth could deter it from making itself known.
His index finger skirted over the sensitive softness, and Lavinia released a gasp when he narrowed his finger and second finger, curling the tips around the small circle of pleasure and tweaking.
A noise unlike any Lavinia had ever made escaped her mouth, a cross between a laugh and a gasp. It happened again as Peter continued to tweak her nipple, before bringing his other hand up and hastily pulling the fabric of her bodice aside and diving his hand beneath it, where he met with the skin of her breast.
Lavinia found herself letting her head tip back as Peter dragged her closer to him, angling her chest so that it was level with his mouth, which connected with the skin of her nipple a moment later.
She was powerless to do anything other than submit to him, then, for the pleasure was far too great to do anything else. And she did not want to do anything else, anyway. Lavinia wanted to stand there and let the Duke of Kingwood ravish her chest and the rest of her body in whatever way he liked. She knew that any way he touched her would send similar swoops of excitement through her belly.
Peter’s mouth traveled to the other breast now, lavishing her nipple with the careful tip of his tongue while his hand tweaked at her other breast, the nipple just this side of sore. Lavinia put her hand on Peter’s head, ushering him closer to her skin, wanting to feel his lips pressed tight against her.
But then, a knock sounded on the door, and suddenly Lavinia was stumbling backward, one breast still freed from her bodice while the other was barely held in by the fabric.
Peter’s face was flushed, his breathing erratic as he looked from her to the door. It was clear he didn’t know what to do, and neither did she.
The knock sounded again, this time accompanied by the sound of Stevens’s voice.
“Pardon the interruption, Lavinia, but I wanted to see if you would be amenable to helping one of the maids once you are finished with His Grace. She has twisted her ankle on the stairs and looks to be in a great deal of pain.”
“Y-yes, of course! I will come down as soon as His Grace and I are finished,” Lavinia said, staring at Peter as she spoke.
“Very good,” Stevens replied, and then Lavinia could hear the echo of his footsteps as he walked down the hall toward the staircase that led down to the ground floor.
Only when the room and its surrounding area was once again silent did Peter speak. Or rather, he guffawed.
His laughter rang through the room, growing so fevered that at one point he ducked his face into his hands, muffling his chuckles.
“What is it that you find so amusing, Your Grace?” Lavinia asked as she shuffled her breasts back into place and righted her gown. She touched her hair and found her bun had sagged from its pins at the back of her head. She reached down and carefully undid each one, holding the removed pins on one hand as she walked to the table next to his bed.
“All—of—it,” he stuttered, continuing to laugh.
“What all?” Lavinia asked as she set down her pins and let her hair out. It felt so good to have it lying on her shoulders, out of its tight bun, but it would not do to go about the house with it that way. It wasn’t becoming, and while Lavinia might flout certain societal conventions, she would not go so far as to allow anyone to see her with her hair curling about her shoulders. It made her look a good five years younger and a lifetime more innocent, neither of which helped her when she was trying to command respect and obedience from her patients.
“Pleasuring your breasts while Stevens and the rest of the house assumes you are in here stretching me. Though in a way, I suppose you did stretch out some of me,” he said, and Lavinia looked down and saw that he was right. The blankets between his legs were tented slightly, clear evidence of his arousal.
And while she had seen her fair share of male members in her profession, and generally regarded them with about as much fascinating as she did the pigeons that littered the streets of London, now, she found herself blushing like a girl and giggling.
This of course sent Peter into another fit of chuckles himself, and soon they were both laughing, Lavinia bent over, clutching her stomach as she tried to catch her breath.
When she finally came up for air, it was to find Peter staring at her, all the humor gone from his face. Instead, there was fascination there, and he was gazing at her intently, though not with the heady pleasure of moments ago. Now, it was a gaze of mere appreciation, like one might use for a portrait at the National Gallery.
“What are you staring at?” she asked, anxiously lifting her hand to her head to check her hair. Her fingers came into contact with the lion’s mane of blonde locks cascading down her chest and back.
“Your hair,” Peter replied, reaching out and taking a lock between his fingers. Her hair curled at the ends, and he twirled the curl so it wrapped around his finger.
“It’s beautiful. You’re beautiful, especially like this,” he said, rubbing his thumb over the lock like it was the most precious thing in the world.
“Like what?” Lavinia asked.
“With your hair down, your cheeks pink from laughter, and pleasure, and sin. You’re always beautiful, Miss Bell, but right now, I think you might just be the most captivating thing I have ever seen.”
Unsure how to respond to such a compliment, the likes of which she had never in her life received, Lavinia stayed silent.
Peter also seemed unsure of what to say. Lavinia could see a touch of embarrassment tinting his cheeks now, as though perhaps he had not meant to be quite so forthcoming with his deepest thoughts.
Eventually, when the quiet grew too great, Lavinia straightened and said, “Well, shall we do your stretches?”
The next half an hour was spent with little words exchanged between them, other than “does this hurt?” or “can you feel anything here?”
When Lavinia left the duke’s chambers as the sun was setting through the large window at the top of the stairs, it was with confusion.
What had happened between her and the duke? Was it an isolated incident, or would it happen again?
Lord, but I hope it does. Lavinia descended down the stairs, still able to feel the duke’s hands on her, his eyes looking straight through her body to her very soul.
Chapter Eleven
Peter woke up curled into the fetal position, his legs tucked up beneath him. For most men and women of the world, this would not be unusual, but for him, it was a truly miraculous thing.
For the last few months, he had been forced to sleep like a corpse, his hands resting at his sides and his legs in a straight line, like guns lined up for fire. He had
n’t been able to move in his sleep, to stretch and adjust his position. It was one of the very worst things about his injury, the inability to get comfortable even in one’s sleep.
But last night, that had not been the case, clearly. Peter put his hand under the blankets and felt his legs, something that Miss Bell had encouraged him to do.
“You cannot ignore them any longer. Touch them, prod them, massage them if you like. They need and deserve your care and attention,” she had told him the first day of her treatment.
Peter had been reluctant at first, but he’d gradually gotten used to touching his limbs again. He did it a few times a day now, when he was alone, trying to think good, positive things as his palm skirted over the blonde, matted hair of his shins, the finer, down-like hair of his calves.
Often, Peter couldn’t feel his touch in his legs, but today, he could. And not only that, but, after overly careful movements, he found that he could stretch his legs back out from their curled position.
The true test came with his toes, which had refused much of Miss Bell’s and his ministrations. They were stubbornly numb, and while they would bend and wiggle if Miss Bell prodded them, Peter had been unable to mimic the action on his own.
Now, however, he was able to scrunch them every so slightly, and with that came a satisfying number of clicks, as though his toes were stretching after a long hibernation. And, Peter supposed, they were.
He couldn’t help the shout of victory that escaped his mouth as he continued moving his legs, swinging his feet from side to side, bending and stretching his knees. Flexing his muscles was still difficult, and he could feel the weakness in his limbs, knew that were he to try to stand, he would no doubt fall over immediately. But that didn’t matter. What mattered was that he could move. What mattered was that he was not broken, not lame, not immobile.
I am getting better, he realized with a smile. One day, I will be able to walk. Even to run!
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