Not Proper Enough (A Reforming the Scoundrels Romance)

by Carolyn Jewel

  “Fenris. Fox.” One more drink of whisky. Still holding her glass, she stuck out a finger and jabbed him in the center of his chest. Lord, but he felt solid. “Poor, deluded vegetable lover. The only proper formal arrangement you could offer this turnip is marriage. And neither of us want that. Can you imagine?”

  He didn’t laugh. Or scowl. Or do any of the things she expected. He returned to his position that was far too close to her, and this time, his hand curled around her ankle. The air went away again. “I disagree. Shall I prove it?”

  Which did he mean? Did he disagree there was only one formal arrangement he could offer or was he disagreeing that he didn’t want to marry her? She searched his face for the answer and did not find it. “Proof. Yes, in a case like this, proof is called for.”

  His hand glided up her stocking to her garter. She gasped when the tips of his fingers brushed over her skin.

  “Good, yes?”

  She stared into her glass and saw it was empty. Now how had that happened? “May I have more whisky?”

  He took her empty glass and set it aside. He stretched for his glass, looked at what was left, and drank half. “You may have the rest of mine.”

  “The world is still pleasant, Fox.”

  “I agree.” He gave her a quick smile. “Let’s keep it that way for a while yet.”

  She took a sip, a properly small sip from his glass. His hand remained beneath her skirts, and now, his clever, agile fingers were well past her garter.

  “Lean back,” he whispered, and she did, settling into the corner of the sofa. He followed so that the distance between them did not change. “Still relaxed?”

  She nodded. Lord, his fingers reached her thigh, and she was going to melt.

  “Ginny. My turnip. Like so.” He nudged her, and she parted her legs in response. He cupped the back of her neck, and his other hand slid along the folds of her sex, stroking so she could barely think or breathe. She could feel, though. Every shiver. It had been so long since she’d been touched like this, brought to the very edge of orgasm. He drew his other hand down her arm. He took away her glass and she was glad to have it gone from her hands. “Spend the night with me, Eugenia.”

  “Will I see you naked?”

  He smiled that secret, dark, and wicked grin. “Yes.”

  Chapter Eighteen

  FOX DID NOT ENTIRELY RELAX UNTIL HE CLOSED THE door to his private apartments with Eugenia still at his side. Not entirely sober, but not drunk, thank God. He lit the candles in the girandole while they waited for Golde to arrive with the repast he’d ordered. He kept an eye on Eugenia, who walked around the anteroom to his bedchamber. On the walls were several of the paintings he’d bought over the years, by artists who were not necessarily well-known but whose work he liked. She paused by each one.

  He’d hardly put away the flint when Golde tapped on the door. Since Fox did not think it proper to have female servants, given this was a bachelor establishment, Golde presided over a staff of men. There weren’t many. His personal chef and two footmen, one of whom doubled as a groom, a kitchen boy. His valet, of course, would be summoned from Bouverie. In the morning, he’d see about sending for a girl who could do for Eugenia.

  “Milord,” Golde said with a bow. He gestured, and both footmen entered with the various parts of their meal. His butler had found somewhere a vase of white roses, just moments, it seemed, from being too old, and these he placed in the center of the table once the tablecloth was laid. While the two footmen arranged the table, Golde went about the business of preparing the room, lighting more candles, bringing up the fire here. The butler disappeared into the bedroom where he would turn down the bed, ensure the linens would be warm, and light a few more candles than when Fox came here without a companion. These days, that was always the case.

  Fox stayed by the fireplace while she inspected the room and his servants laid out the table. He’d always admired the way she moved, and even with the whisky she’d consumed, she moved gracefully.

  Golde came back from the bedroom to put the finishing touches on the arrangement of the food. He opened the wine, a ’75 Burgundy, to let it breathe. On his way out, he drew the curtains. Shadows deepened with the silence.

  He and Eugenia were alone. In his private quarters. He locked the door, and when he turned around from that, Eugenia faced him. She held one end of her shawl, a fringed silk that draped over her arm and dangled to the floor. “I take it,” she said with a sideways look at him, “that this is where you come when you wish to be improper.”

  He returned to the fire and set one foot on the grate. “This is the place to which I retire when I wish to be private.”

  “With a woman.”

  “No.” He shook his head. “Rarely. And not since before my visit to your brother’s house.” He was capable of charm, he knew that. He had learned to be charming in order to counter his father’s brusqueness. He’d spent years mending fences and rebuilding bridges destroyed by his father’s vitriol once he’d become man enough to understand the damage Camber had done all those years and days past when he’d been so angry at his sister marrying Lily’s father. No more the damage he himself had done during the time he’d slavishly adopted his father’s prejudices.

  “Did you bring Lady Tyghe here?”

  “I did not then have this house, so no.” He moved away from the fireplace. “I’ve brought relatively few women here. There are other locations that accommodate one’s fleeting interest in a woman. If I were to be interested in pursuing someone for more than an evening, there are arrangements that can be made that do not involve my home.”

  “I’m sure.” She looked around one more time. “It’s a very nice home,” she said. “It suits you.” She cocked her head at the painting she’d stopped before, then at him. “And reveals you.”

  He nodded. He did like the way she looked at him with such an assessing glance. She saw him. The man, not Fenris, the heir to a dukedom. “The monstrosity that is Bouverie represents my family honor.”

  “I like Bouverie. You don’t?”

  “It is my father’s home. My grandfather’s home, the home of all men who have been Camber.”

  “I don’t find it monstrous.”

  “Though one day that frigid set of bones will be mine, I cannot look forward to it. But here?” He gestured. “Here you may find my heart.”

  “There’s no denying your good taste.”

  “I’m glad you think so.” He wanted very much to go to her, pull the pins from her hair, and thread his fingers through those thick straw-colored tresses.

  Still with the end of her shawl dangling, she moved to the next painting, one of his favorites. She stood facing it. “Is this from Anatolia?”

  “Persia. A depiction of the Festival of Fire.” Sumptuously dressed Persians danced outdoors, to a tune played by musicians at the outer edge of the gathered people. The top and sides of the painting were of an inverted teardrop-shaped window, intricately decorated, and painted in exquisite detail. In looking on the painting it was as if you were yourself in the center of that window, watching the musicians and dancers outside.

  “It’s very old, isn’t it?” She looked at him over her shoulder. “The painting, I mean. The colors are just lovely.”

  “It is.”

  She returned to her study.

  “Above all else,” he said softly, “my staff is discreet.”

  After a bit, she faced him again. “Nothing less for you.”

  “Not if they wish to remain in my employ or get a character from me if they should leave.” He walked to the table and surveyed the repast of fruit, cheese, thinly sliced beef, quail, bread already sliced, and, in a welcome touch, a plate of marzipan, another of sweetmeats, and a bowl of candied almonds. He made a note to give the entire staff a bonus. “Would you like some wine with our meal? It’s an excellent vintage.”

  “Yes, thank you.” She joined him at the table, standing, as he did. She touched the flowers. One of the petals dr
ifted to the table.

  “Not so potent as the whisky.” He poured two glasses of the Burgundy and handed one to her. Before she accepted the goblet, she draped her shawl over a chair. She sipped so small an amount he doubted she tasted it. He busied himself with selecting a plate of food for her. He added a section of orange then ate one himself. It was still cold from the ice it had been sitting on in the larder. The fruit was sweet, and, without much thought, he took another and held it to her lips. “Taste.”

  She put down her wine, untouched but for that one sip, and did. She ate it slowly, half the slice, then the other, eyes closed, and one hand just under her mouth to catch the juice until she’d swallowed the last bit. Her eyes opened. The tips of her eyelashes were blonder than her hair, her irises blue as the sky. “Mm. That was delicious.”

  “So, my dear Ginny.”

  She didn’t need him to say more. Her cheeks pinked up. “Give me a little more whisky first.”

  He laughed, at his expense, not hers. “I am too full of myself tonight.”

  “That’s always so.”

  “Boiled too long in the wine of my self-importance.”

  “Boiled, you say?” She laughed softly. “It’s not fair to amuse me so. How can I hate you when you make me laugh?”

  “I use every weapon to hand.” He waited until her attention returned to him. “It’s a rare vintage, Ginny. A lesser man than I would be drunk on it.”

  “I’ve not given you leave to call me Ginny.”

  “Your point?”

  “None, I suppose. An observation is all.”

  “I’ve learned that if I do not take what I want, I am not likely to get what I want.” She made a face at him, and his mouth twitched up. “Besides, it’s what your friends call you. Lily calls you that.”

  “Yes, but you and I, we’re not friends.”

  “No.” He slid an arm around her waist and brought her close. “Not friends at all.”

  Her hand got in between them, but instead of pushing him away, she ran her fingers down his waistcoat and past the waist of his trousers until her palm curved over his not entirely soft sex. With her hand firmly covering him, he was getting harder by the moment. She pressed lightly, and two of her fingers swept over his balls.

  “Mm. God, I do love your cock.”

  He let out a slow breath, as soft as he could, but there was no hiding his reaction from her. Then he ruined the illusion of his self-possession by sucking in a breath when her fingers moved over the top of his cock.

  “It is very large.” She leaned against him, and when was it, exactly, that he’d lost control of the encounter?

  Eyes closed as he savored her handling of him, he pressed his hips forward. “Ginny—”

  “Don’t call me that.”

  “Ginny, my love.” He opened his eyes and stared into hers. She lifted her chin. “I’m going to put that inside your naked body, and you will scream my name before I’m done.”

  “I won’t.”

  He absolutely refused to smile. It was a near thing, though, stopping himself from that. “Several times, in fact.”

  “Never.”

  He brought her hard against his body. His senses were completely overrun. She was smiling at him, a smug, private knowing smile. She smelled like orange water. Common everyday orange water, and the scent was driving him mad. He lowered his head and kissed her. Hard and fast, mouth open, not waiting to ease her along to kisses that invaded her mouth. He started there. Taking her mouth.

  She did her share of taking, damn her. When he pulled back, they were both breathing hard.

  He held her by the shoulders. “I like a woman who wants to be fucked hard, and not necessarily in a bed. I like a woman on top and when she’s on her knees and I’m behind her. Or up against a wall.”

  “A wall? You’ve done that?” She stared into his face, eyes wide, and he kissed her again. A little slower, but no less carnally. The woman still had her hand on his sex.

  “Yes.” He permitted himself one very tiny smile. “Have you?”

  She let the hand that wasn’t on his cock fall away from his shoulder. She leaned toward the table and with her bare fingers picked up and rolled a slice of roast beef. She ate slowly. When she was done she wiped her hand on a napkin. “That’s none of your business.”

  Fox returned her wayward hand to his cock, and got a smug look in return. Followed by another stroke along his length. “I’m happy to close any and all gaps in your sensual experience.”

  She made a face at him.

  “Now, perhaps?”

  “You’re being crude on purpose.”

  “If I were being crude, Ginny, I would have told you I want to fuck you against the wall right now. If I were being crude, I’d ask you if you know that if you were to shave the hair on your quim, your newly bare skin would be unbearably soft. And then I’d demand that you do so before our next fuck.”

  “Is that so?”

  “Yes.” He pushed his pelvis forward and was amply rewarded for his crudity. “If you were to do such a thing, I would write my name there, above your slit, in purple ink.”

  “Your entire name?” Her eyes opened wide, but her innocence was disingenuous. He had not ever been this aroused in his life, he was certain of it. “My lord, I don’t think there’s room there for all those names.”

  “I would write Fox, and when the ink was dry, I’d put your back against the wall there—” He nodded in the direction of the door. “I’d lift you up, and I’d push inside you, and you, my dearest Ginny, would be wet for me, and I’d take you hard and fast.”

  “I think you’re all talk.”

  He leaned in and nipped the side of her throat. “Imp.”

  “Incorrigible.”

  “Oh yes. I’m a hard case.”

  While he drew a hand down the curve of her back she said, “Do you even have purple ink?”

  Chapter Nineteen

  “IDLE CURIOSITY?” HIS HEART LURCHED ALONG WITH parts south. “Or something else?”

  Her smile was secret, unreadable, and it put an ocean’s distance between them. “What would I write on your noble skin, I wonder? In purple ink.”

  He laughed, looking at her, drinking in the sight of her, hardly able to believe she was here with him and following him down indecent paths. No matter what she was thinking about him or feeling about him, she was here. In his house. In his private rooms. “Where is more my concern.”

  “Just above, I think.” She cupped him again. “Perhaps I’d draw a picture.”

  He stood his ground, and the tension between them filled the room. His prick was now at painfully full attention. “Your name would suffice.”

  She put her free hand in the center of his chest and pushed. “Get your purple ink, my lord.”

  His mind filled with images of him with his hand over her freshly shaved mons, and he forgot how to breathe. She gave him another push, and he took a step back. Not very far, though. “A pen, as well?” he asked.

  “What did I say?” Eugenia tapped his chest again.

  “The ink.” Fox took a backward step, toward his bedchamber. “Which, I feel I ought to point out, is useless without a pen.”

  She tapped her chin. “A pen, too, sir.”

  “Your wish is my command.” But as he retreated, he grabbed her hand and brought her along.

  “I’m hungry,” she said, looking back at the table with the food Golde had laid out for them.

  He stopped. “Take the plate, then.”

  She picked up not the food he’d assembled for her but the plate of marzipan.

  And then, there they were. In his bedroom with the fire just warm enough and the candlelight casting a glow that did not reach all the shadows. He took her hand and walked her to the desk. He retrieved his bottle of purple ink from the drawer where he’d stashed it the day the gift had been delivered to him. He held it up with a flourish. “Behold.”

  Eugenia moved to the side of the desk, set down the marzipan, and
leaned her forearms on top of the desk. “Lady Tyghe gave you this, didn’t she?”

  “Mm. Arrived last week as I recall.”

  She licked her lips and considered the ink he held. “Unopened, I see.”

  “I’d not thought I’d ever have a use for it.” He put down the ink and opened the drawer that contained his quills. He fished out a scrap of blotting paper as well. Would she really? Would Eugenia Hampton Bryant, who had every reason to dislike him, do this and more with him?

  “Are you going to tell her that you’ve used her ink?”

  Supplies in hand, he faced her. His attention went to her bosom and lingered. He imagined his hands covering her bare breasts. Such charming curves. He wanted her naked in his arms. Now. Ten minutes ago. A year ago. “What do you suppose?”

  “Not.” Eugenia considered the candies on the plate. “She’s not as stupid as she pretends. Am I right?”

  “No. She’s not.”

  She grinned. “Purple ink is a gift you are to use for her benefit. To write her poetry and lavish her with compliments.”

  “Precisely.”

  She ate a piece of marzipan, and while he watched her, he wondered if Robert had understood the treasure he’d had in his wife. Of course he had. Robert had never been any sort of fool. There had been times when the man’s enormous intellect consumed him. Some subject caught his fancy, and he was never satisfied until he had reduced the idea to nothing but bone and gristle. When in the grip of intellectual curiosity he had often been curt to the point of shocking rudeness. Had Robert, with his brilliant mind trapped in a deficient body, been able to satisfy his wife? He saw no sign that he hadn’t.

  When she was done eating the candy, she smiled. Slowly. Wickedly. Hers was not the smile of a woman who did not understand the pleasures of the body. They had managed, those two. Imperfect Robert and perfect, happy Eugenia.

  She held out a hand for the pen and ink, and he handed them to her. Was she really going to be so bold? “If you’ll just remove your britches. And lie down on the bed, there.”