It was to be expected that Lady Henrietta would have plenty of dance partners and thus would not miss her brother’s presence.
Even though he was new to London, Christopher found that his father’s name gave him the entrée everywhere. There were many young bucks of noble birth who remembered him from Oxford.
If Christopher’s title as Marquess of Clydekill, along with his reputation as a ‘varsity sportsman, had not made him friends, his cheerful, honest face would have done the trick. He rode well and drove his phaeton with flair. He gambled a little, and lost money at the tables with good grace. In short, as a young Marquess, he appeared to be in his element.
* * *
Secretly, the Duke was quite proud of how his son was getting on—although he didn’t want to say so—it might give Christopher a swelled head. These days, the boy did him credit, and he wanted to show him off. The Duke would introduce Christopher around at his club—the boy had been down for membership almost since he was born, so it was time he got to know the establishment.
There was theater and opera his son might enjoy, with many a gorgeous actress or singer who would welcome the personal patronage of a young Marquess. Gresham would see about that.
And there was one more thing the Duke needed to see to. He got the sense the lad was still a virgin. Couldn’t have him go to his marriage bed within the year and still not know his way around a woman!
The Duke had not had that problem in his own youth. There were plenty of pretty young scullions and dairy maids willing to give a boy a hand, as it were. But lads today were so fastidious. No doubt Christopher would be embarrassed to tell his fine, fashionable new friends that a scullery maid had made a man of him.
No, there were expensive establishments, frequented by the very best men in the ton, that could take care of Christopher’s problem instead. That would make a much better story to relate to those precious young dandies he called friends.
Christopher enjoyed the opera and the theater, but his father suspected he liked these entertainments for their artistic merit, rather than as a showcase of pretty, willing young ladies seeking advancement in their careers—on their backs, if necessary.
To the Duke, the boy just seemed bored by the fillies. For heaven’s sake, he was twenty now. Time to develop an interest in that side of life, if he ever meant to do so.
The Duke got them both cards of admission to the Empire, a very fashionable establishment one would never call a brothel, although money certainly exchanged hands for personal services rendered.
The girls there were brought up to London fresh from the countryside. They looked brand new—they didn’t have the hardened demeanor of more experienced women. They were pretty and clean and kept free of disease.
For the right price, men could even get virgins, if that titillated them. These were usually very young, very shy, and very gently reared: parsons’ daughters and the like.
How they had been enticed to the fleshpots of the capital, and how much they ever saw of the significant sums of money paid to the madam of the place, the Duke didn’t know and didn’t care to ask.
Presumably everyone was happy with the arrangement. It was not his affair.
He only told his son where they were headed when they were already in a hansom cab on their way there. Christopher’s mouth set in a tight, hard line. He resented his father’s interference in such a personal matter.
On the one hand, Christopher thought it might be good for him to get some relief—to get Joanna out of his system once and for all. It would feel good finally to spend himself in the body of a willing woman—and if she were a stranger for whom he felt nothing, then so much the better.
On the other hand, there was Joanna. Still. They had hoped they’d be each other’s first, hadn’t they? It would serve her right if he went off and did the deed with another woman, after she had teased his appetites so mercilessly and yet to no avail.
But he had to be honest with himself. Back in the caves last summer, it had been he who had stopped their lovemaking, he whose scruples had gotten in the way. She had been ready and willing. “Begging for it,” as some of his ‘varsity friends would say in their cruder moments. In truth, she loved him so much that she felt absolutely no shame in her desire for him.
As he thought of her, again he grew hot, remembering that last afternoon. Could he ever forget it? Would having another woman cure him?
Thus Christopher entered the Empire with his mind still not made up about what he wanted to do there.
The madam, a middle-aged, overdressed woman with a phony aristocratic air, welcomed both men as old friends when they entered. “Your Grace? And your son the Marquess, I understand? My Lords, come this way and make yourselves comfortable with a sip of my finest Madeira. Nothing but the best for you, of course. I have Your Grace’s favorite little filly reserved and waiting.” It was news to Christopher that his father was a regular here.
“And for My Lord? A sweet young country lass for you, our own Rosie. I understand you’re just getting started on the paths of pleasure. Rosie will be a good girl for you. Nothing coarse or loud about her, very sweet and submissive.”
Christopher was embarrassed by this reference to his personal affairs, but no one else seemed to notice or mind, so he let it pass.
Rosie came out of the back parlor. “My Lord,” she said demurely, curtsying to the Marquess before leading him to a set of stairs in the main hall. “Would you come this way?”
They reached a pleasant bedroom, fairly large and well-appointed. Christopher found he was trembling. Be a man, he told himself.
Rosie proceeded to unlace her bodice. She couldn’t reach the back fastenings of her stays without help. “Be a love, dear, would you please,” she said, gesturing to the troublesome garment.
Christopher obliged, somehow managing to keep his hands steady. She was left wearing silk stockings held up by garters, and nothing else.
Nearly naked, Rosie looked nothing like his gypsy Joanna, which was a relief to Christopher. She was buxom, plump, and fair, with curly light-colored hair piled up artfully on the top of her head. She looked like a large, tasty candied treat.
No doubt she met some men’s ideal of beauty.
“You’re shy, aren’t you, dearie? That’s all right. They told me I’m your first, and to tell the truth, I’m honored. A handsome Marquess’ first taste of pleasure! I’ll remember this always, I can tell you.”
He sat there, looking at her nakedness. He did not know where to begin, or indeed if he even wanted to. It was all so different from his time with Joanna. This was so rehearsed, so artificial. That almost made it more obscene to him.
With Joanna, it was real, he told himself. We neither of us had to make chitchat to try to start the ball rolling. His encounter with Joanna had been rough and lusty, but in its own way it had been so much more decent than this. He felt cheapened by tonight.
“What’s wrong, sweetie? Shall I be the one to get things going this first time?” She sat astride his lap, her powdered quim leaving moisture on his breeches.
“Oh, you’re a handsome one, all right. Here, let me take some of these clothes off. You just sit back and let Rosie do the work.” She reached knowingly between his legs.
“No! That is—”
“You don’t like me, My Lord? I’m not to your taste somehow?” Now she looked like she was on the verge of weeping. What is it about me? Every time I try to have sexual relations with a woman, she ends up in tears. Am I the only man this happens to?
He patted her on her chubby little shoulder, trying to placate her. “No, Rosie, you’re fine. That is, you’re more than fine,” he said quickly, because the tears appeared ready to flow again. “You’re beautiful. Any man would be lucky to have you, not just like this, but in any way. You’re a sweetheart, Rosie, honestly you are.”
She looked at him suspiciously. “What’s the problem, then? If I’m so beautiful and all that.”
“You’re beautiful. It�
�s just that you’re not—”
“Not what?”
He took the plunge. Tell the truth and shame the devil, my old nanny used to say. “You could be the most beautiful woman in the whole of England. But you’re not her. The girl I love. We want to be each other’s first. So I just can’t—”
“But that’s just lovely. That’s the sweetest thing I think I’ve ever heard. It makes me want to cry.” No, no, please don’t.
“She’s just about the luckiest girl in the world, I think. She—wait, what’s her name?”
“Joanna. But it’s a secret, you can’t tell anyone.”
“Oh, I won’t, don’t worry. I’m awfully good with secrets,” Rosie said. “I wish I could tell this Joanna, though. I wish I could tell her how lucky she is, with all the horrible, selfish men there are out there. You’re in love with her. And you’re saving yourself for her. And you’re going to be a Duke. Boy, some girls have all the luck.” Rosie was beaming. She seems to like a good love story, maybe because it’s likely she’ll never have one of her own.
Then her cheerful face clouded over again. “But I don’t know what I’m going to tell Mrs. Hartnell. That’s our madam. You met her. She’s awfully strict. She’s likely to fire me and put me out on the streets if she finds out I wasn’t pleasing to you. A Marquess, a Duke’s son, and he didn’t even want me. What will I do? Life’s not too good on the streets.”
His own problem resolved, Christopher’s generous nature reasserted itself. “Look, we’ll tell her it happened. I’ll pay full price, even throw in a good gift, to show I did so well by you. I’ll say you were amazing. And if you don’t mind, maybe you could say I wasn’t too bad a lover, either. It would get my noble father off my back.” He laughed. The world was a good place.
“Are you sure? You wouldn’t mind? That would be so kind of you. I might even get a raise out of it.”
Her face darkened again. “Wait a minute. Help me rumple up the sheets a lot, so it looks like we had a good romp. She checks the sheets after, you know. Could you spit on them a few times, maybe? Make them good and damp, as if….”
Oh, for the love of our Lord…. What next? But apparently he had disarranged and moistened the sheets sufficiently for her liking.
“Don’t leave yet,” Rosie told him. “We have to take enough time to seem like I pleasured you two or three times. Sit and talk with me. Tell me about your Joanna, it will help us pass the time.” And it did.
Chapter 10
“Love” at First Sight
Seemingly satisfied that his son was now a proper man, the Duke turned his attention toward his primary goal in coming to London: finding Christopher a wife.
They were at a ball given by the Earl and Countess of Worthington marking the coming-out of their daughter, Lady Georgiana.
Lady Georgiana was a fun girl, in Christopher’s opinion—not half as stuffy and foolish as the girls surrounding her. She was not a beauty—her hair was sandy, and her eyes pink-rimmed and somewhat nearsighted. But she had a good sense of humor, and Christopher didn’t mind giving her a few dances.
Being a modest young man, he did not notice that tongues were flapping behind fluttering fans as he gave her a third dance. The Countess of Worthington was beaming, and even Lady Georgiana—had Christopher but noticed it—had stars in her myopic eyes.
“What a catch it would be, my dear!” the old Dowager Countess whispered to her daughter-in-law. For, although Christopher did not know it, he was considered the most desirable match of the Season.
Christopher’s father strolled by, a fake smile of good cheer on his face. “A word with you, Christopher,” he said genially.
Father and son stepped out of the ballroom into a gilded hallway.
“Are you mad?” the Duke barked, all pretense of good will wiped from his face.
“What are you talking about?”
“I’m talking about the Lady Georgiana. What the devil do you think you’re doing, paying so much attention to her? Her father will be calling on me next, asking your intentions toward the gel!”
Christopher was taken aback. He had no romantic interest in the girl whatsoever. He was simply being kind, and he told his father as much.
“Not that there’s anything wrong with her,” Christopher added. “She’s got more brains than most of the girls I’ve met, and you have to admit her family goes back all the way to William the Conqueror.”
“You fool! I didn’t bring you here to marry a bluestocking, and I don’t care if her line goes back to old King Alfred! Listen to me: the Worthingtons have no money! Never mind, though. I think I’ve found exactly the lady for you.”
* * *
At eighteen, Dorothy Coleman was already a bitter young woman. Although she was one of the richest heiresses in England, she had been snubbed since her school days by girls with better lineages and poorer pockets.
Her father, the enormously wealthy Frederick Coleman, was not quite a self-made man. The Colemans had had money for three generations. But among an aristocracy that could trace its roots back seven hundred years or more, a mere three generations seemed like just the blink of an eye.
A hundred years before, Dorothy’s great-grandfather James had worked the tin mines of Cornwall. To be a miner was a dirty, despised task, relegated to the uneducated and unwashed.
But James Coleman was no ordinary miner. His sights were set on bigger things. He knew he was handsome and had a pleasing manner of address. He pursued the affections of the daughter of a Cornish lord, Baron Penzance, and they married secretly.
Neither of them was “received” by the inbred local gentry for many years. But their son, Frederick—strategically named for the Baron—was ultimately accepted by his mother’s family, and he inherited a significant part of the Penzance mining fortune.
Money made yet more money, and Dorothy’s father, the second Frederick Coleman, was said to own more than half the tin mines in Cornwall. All that was needed now was a title for Dorothy, his only child.
Dorothy had been a spoiled, willful child. “Young Madam” expected to have her way in everything, and as a result, she usually did. If she did not, a terrible tantrum would ensue. The servants quickly learned to stay clear of her.
It was a terrible shock to Dorothy, then, when she was enrolled in the prestigious Miss Maitland’s Seminary for Young Ladies, only to find that her schoolmates looked down her.
Dorothy had far more in material possessions than many of the other girls. She had the finest dresses for all occasions; she had seemingly unlimited spending money for special treats and excursions.
Why, then, did the daughters of the nobility treat her with disdain? Of course, it was partly due to the fact that her family’s wealth came from trade—and the lowest of trades at that.
But that might have been overlooked, if Dorothy had had a sweeter disposition.
Instead, she was as haughty among the titled young ladies as she had been among the servants at home. She assumed all sorts of airs and graces to which she was not entitled. The other girls laughed at her for a jumped-up little nobody. They mimicked her behind her back.
“I’ll show them!” became her innermost battle cry. She would use her family’s wealth to surpass these aristocratic ninnies who dared to mock her.
She was coming out this Season. Her father swore he would spend every penny he had, if necessary, to make her the belle of the Season and the bride of some fine young titled buck.
Dorothy knew she was close to victory when she heard that her father had been introduced at his club to Rowland Albertson, the 9th Duke of Gresham. She had heard it whispered that the Duke had a healthy respect for wealth, almost as much as Coleman admired an aristocratic lineage.
* * *
Christopher surveyed Miss Coleman with a sinking heart. Yes, she was moderately beautiful, in a tasteless, overdressed sort of way. She had fashionably golden locks dressed à la mode—a Grecian sort of hairstyle, with tendrils pulled loose from an elaborate arr
angement atop her head.
Her rather bulbous blue eyes sparkled with the reflected radiance of all the jewels bedecking her. Yet they had a sharp, mercenary look, as if she would count every copper expended on anyone other than herself.
Miss Coleman’s voice was unpleasantly nasal, an attribute she affected because she thought it sounded well-bred. Her movements were stiff and self-conscious, as if she always felt on display.
In Christopher’s eyes, she was dreadful.
Joanna, why would I ever want this painted doll, when I could have had you? The more I see of other girls, the more I realize just what I’ve lost.
His fingers brushed the scrap of paper he carried in the pocket of his breeches. It was Joanna’s final note to him, left in the tree on the morning of the hunt. It was with him always.
* * *
Christopher’s father stood nearby whenever the young man chatted with Miss Coleman. By Gad, he’ll keep his promise to me, and pursue that filly with a smile on his face, or I’ll want to know the reason why. I’ll marry her myself, if that damned fool of a boy won’t have her.
The two fathers winked at each other across the crowded drawing room. It seemed their mutual plan was going quite well.
Chapter 11
A Reluctant Courtship
As the weeks passed, and Christopher paid Miss Coleman his dutiful attentions at every social gathering, it was gossiped that a match had been struck.
Many ambitious mamas were disappointed in their attempts to attach their pretty daughters to the young Marquess of Clydekill. Many of the daughters themselves wept into their lace handkerchiefs at the realization that the Marquess had again failed to ask them to dance that evening.
Tamed By The Marquess (Steamy Historical Regency) Page 6
