by Lorna James
After a particularly onerous day of accounting for Madame Beaumont’s new line of dresses, Lily’s butler, in a state of agitation, met her at the door of her apartment. “I’m sorry, Madame, but there are two dukes here to see you. One of them says he is your fiancé.”
Lily almost turned heel and ran, but she wanted too much to see them again. Her voice shook when she said,
“Thank you. Tell them I’ll be down in a moment.” Pressing her hands to her burning cheeks, she tried to control her emotions. Had they come all this way to berate her? Or were they there for another reason? Her heart quickened and her nipples hardened as a lustful wave of desire washed over her. It had been so long.
She found them waiting for her in her sitting room. William had bent down and was playing with George while his governess watched. Lily frowned, noticing the woman was standing far too close to William.
“You may leave us, Anne,” she said, more harshly than she meant it.
Charles was coiled on a chair, looking both lazy and furious, like a lion regarding his prey. It sent a frisson of desire through her. He held a glass of the only brandy she had in his hand, and it looked like it wasn’t his first drink.
“Take George,” William said, handing the child’s hand back to Anne. “We do not wish to be disturbed. And please draw a bath.”
She shivered. His voice was too mild and she could feel the menace rolling off him. They were going to berate her.
“Yes, Your Grace.” Anne dipped into a curtsy and closed the door behind her.
“George does not need a bath,” Lily said, once alone with the two men she loved most in the world.
“You will, when we are done with you. Now let’s go upstairs.”
“Now, see here,” she started, but Charles leaped off the couch, pouncing on her.
“We can do this here, but I thought you would like privacy.”
Her blood heated and her heart beat frantically. It wasn’t going to be beratement. She felt alive for the first time in months. The anger in each of them was palpable and edged in barely held restraint, but she knew they were not going to yell.
She nodded meekly and led them to her bedroom. As soon as they cleared the doorway, William closed the door and began taking off his jacket and cravat.
“How did you find me?”
“Do you really have to ask?”
William continued to strip off his clothes.
Charles unlaced her bodice.
“Now see here,” she said, slapping at his hands.
“It took a while to find you. You hid your tracks well,” Charles purred in her ear.
“We would have been here sooner, but the countess drove a hard bargain.” William pulled off his boots and his breeches soon followed.
“You little fool,” William said, kissing her.
Her knees wobbled. How could she have walked away from this?
“William,” she whispered, when he let her up for air.
Charles pulled her bodice off and yanked down her skirts, kissing her along the neck and back. “You shouldn’t have run away.”
“I had no choice,” she sobbed, unable to do anything but lean into him as he divested her of her corset. “You were at each other’s throats.”
“We’ve worked through that,” Charles said.
“You could have told us about little George.” William was naked now. She greedily took in his familiar long muscular frame and his erect manhood. Wetness dampened her thighs, even before Charles pulled off the rest of her garments.
“I tried to tell you.” Lily shivered, naked in the room as both men circled her.
Charles was still fully dressed. He cupped her breasts with his gloved hands. “You didn’t try very hard.”
She gasped at the feel of the soft leather on her sensitive tips. “You didn’t want a child.”
William pressed into her back. “We wanted you.” His mouth was like a brand on her neck as he kissed down her throat and shoulder. “We’d do anything to have you.”
“What about your freedom?” She was trapped between them now. William’s naked body pressed against hers and she could feel the heat of Charles’s body even though he stood fully dressed in front of her.
“Want you more,” Charles said, swirling his thumbs over her aching nipples. It sent waves of delicious sensations all over her body.
“We’re going to show you how much.” William rubbed his hardness against her backside.
“Please,” she cried, her knees shaking. “What about Sebastian?”
“That was part of the countess’s hard bargain,” William said.
Lily had a thousand questions about that, but couldn’t keep a thought in her head long enough to ask.
Charles pinched and rolled her nipples between his thumbs and forefingers. She leaned into the rough caress, feeling her entire body throb with need. “You are so beautiful.”
“But the child,” Lily said. “I can’t give him up. I won’t.”
“Quiet,” Charles said, laying a finger over her lips. “It’s our turn to talk and your turn to do as we say.”
Lily swallowed hard. She’d never seen Charles so intense. He tugged on her nipples and stepped back toward the couch. She followed, not wanting to lose contact with him. He sat down and William gently pushed her to her knees.
“Kneel on this, love.” Charles tossed her two pillows before reaching into his breeches and pulling himself out. “Come closer,” he said. “Now lean over.”
Charles guided her head to him. William continued his fiery kisses down her back. The thick feel of Charles in her mouth was both comforting and exciting. She wanted to see what William was doing behind her, but Charles held her face and lowered her head up and down his shaft.
“Mmm,” she sighed. He tasted like home, smelled like leather, and looked like every carnal desire she ever had. Charles shivered as she increased her pace.
William caressed her backside. “Are you wet enough, sweet?”
She was expecting his fingers, but not his tongue. William lapped at her until Lily couldn’t take it and gave a choking moan. Charles thrust deep into her throat. She became frenzied when William slid his prick through her slick folds.
“She’s soaked,” William grunted. Stroking it up and down her opening, he pushed in to find her little pearl. He rubbed against it until she moaned again around Charles’s cock.
“Oh fuck,” Charles groaned out. “She likes when you do that.”
Lily could barely concentrate on pleasuring Charles when William played with her like that. Charles moved her head in the rhythm he wanted and she tried to match it. But William’s hardness was pulsing through her. She wanted more.
William rubbed her, going in a little deeper each time until she couldn’t take it and backed up onto his cock as he slid neatly inside of her. “It is so good to have our Tiger Lily back.” He slapped her on the ass and settled deep. Sighing in pleasure, he felt his balls tighten. “I’m sorry, my love. I’m wound tight. You keep moving like that and I’m not going to last.”
Lily thrust back again and his laugh turned into a growl in his throat.
“All right, gel. You asked for it.”
Lily lost herself in the mindless fucking. Her moans grew into muffled shrieks of pleasure. Charles held her head deep on him and pumped his hips using her mouth like William was using her quim. It was too much. Too wonderful. She sucked down hard and was rewarded by Charles’s shout of pleasure. He warmed her with his release, his entire body shaking.
“I love you,” he groaned, letting his cock slip out of her mouth.
“I love you,” William said.
That was all it took. Lily clamped down on William hard when she came, milking him as her body clenched in orgasm. He released at the same time, meeting Charles’s amused eyes as he did so.
William pumped in and out of her a few more times. “I like the sounds you make.”
Charles was already stripping off his clothes and heading for t
he bed.
“Come on. You’re not done yet.” William helped her to her feet and held her while she got her balance. Her body trembled with reaction to the swift lovemaking. She whimpered as he took his time kissing and stroking her body until she was on the edge of another orgasm. Guiding her to the bed, William turned her so she could see that Charles lay on his back stroking himself back to hardness.
They watched him while William ran his fingernails lightly up her sides and over her arms. Lily shivered, but couldn’t take her eyes away from Charles.
“I want you,” she whispered and grinned at the possessive gleam in his eyes.
“On you go.” William helped her straddle his friend.
“Oh, Charles,” she sighed, taking him deep.
Charles cupped her breasts again, this time without gloves, and massaged them as she rocked on top of him. William put his hand between her legs and played with her button some more.
“Lord, she’s got a grip on her,” Charles panted.
William was too busy kissing her to respond. Lily bounced on Charles with enthusiasm, but it was William who fingered her to another orgasm, taking her scream of pleasure into his mouth.
“Fuck,” Charles gritted out and released her breasts to plant his hands on her hips.
“Finally,” William said, and took one of her nipples deep into his mouth with a hard suck.
Lily cried out again as her body responded to the cravings she didn’t know she had been in withdrawal for. William was relentless, knowing each place to touch her, where to bite and where to soothe with his tongue. He knew how to stroke her into a quivering mess and how to turn her into a demanding, lust-filled vixen. She wailed, rode Charles hard, and dug deep grooves into his shoulders.
Then a new sensation hit her. Warm oil was being drizzled down her back and into the crevice of her backside. She clenched around Charles and was delighted by his encouraging groan. William pushed open her back cheeks and teased her backside with a slick finger. It tickled and shot a pang of forbidden sensation through her.
“Please, please,” she sobbed. How could they torment her like this?
William took the other nipple in his mouth, pushing her lush breasts together. It was almost impossible for him to keep both of them in his mouth, because Charles was guiding her hips up and down. All the while, he continued to circle her puckered hole. When he eased his finger inside, everything in her clenched and released.
“Oh,” she puffed out in surprise at the pleasure.
Charles, grunting and snarling, pulled her flat on top of him. William moved away just in time. Her back exposed, William worked two fingers inside her, stretching her with gentle little circles. Lily panted and shivered, feeling completely vulnerable and open.
“Take her,” Charles gritted out.
“Almost ready,” William said.
“Please,” she sobbed and shook when the tip of William’s cock stretched her opening farther. More oil eased the way and soon he was lodged tight inside her.
“Steady,” William breathed, letting her get used to the two of them inside of her.
Her breath came in short, hard pants. She was stretched. She was too full. Then William rocked his hips and explosions went off under her eyelids. They moved together, and she was insatiable for more of them. Charles captured her mouth and her screams. William held her down as they glided in and out of her, never completely leaving her body. The rhythm took her over the edge and she was powerless and vulnerable to the pleasurable shocks her body provided. Limp and spent, Lily enjoyed their equally ecstatic groans and moans.
They lay in a messy heap. All of them unable to move.
After they had bathed and dressed, they supervised George’s bedtime ritual and then took a carriage for dinner. Unable to be apart from them any longer, Lily squeezed between them on the ride and held on to them as if they were going to disappear.
“Let’s try this again,” William said, as they waited for their dinner inside a luxurious restaurant. “Ask me about children.”
“Do you want to have a child in our lives?” she asked, butterflies in her stomach making her hands shake. She clasped them in her lap.
“I need an heir. You two don’t need any scandal. We go back to London together. The child is mine from a former mistress, and I am claiming him as mine.”
Lily’s mouth gaped. “But that’s a lie.”
“No one will dare say that to my face,” William said confidently.
“What about behind your back?”
Charles buttered a piece of bread for her. “Who cares?”
“Let them talk. They have no proof. His parents are dead, so there is no claim. It is done.” William clapped his hands.
The loud noise made her jump.
“The child’s name is now William. You are returning to England with us. I will see to the raising of my heir and to making love to my beautiful woman.”
“Who will also be my wife.” Charles kissed the back of her hand.
“Isn’t this a much better conversation?” William asked.
It was.
“But…” Lily bit her lip.
To their credit they waited for her to gather her thoughts. “The Countess Hainault…”
William groaned. “Can we please not speak of her again? I haven’t forgiven her for taking you away from us.”
“To be fair, it was my idea. She just gave me the means to do so.”
“Richilde never does anything without an ulterior motive. She is not your friend,” Charles said.
“Then, you weren’t arguing over me? Your friendship wasn’t at risk?”
Both men wouldn’t look at her.
“I see.” Lily twisted her fingers together. “I do not want you to fight.”
“We’re going to fight,” William said. “If for no other reason than Charles is an arsehole sometimes.”
Charles flung his napkin at him and scraped his chair back as he stood up. William stood up more slowly, grinning with mischief.
“Gentlemen,” she said in a freezing tone.
“He started it.” Charles pointed.
“Can’t handle a bit of truth?”
“William,” she said between her teeth.
He held up his hands in surrender and sat back down. After a moment, Charles straightened his clothes and followed suit. “You’re an arsehole,” he muttered to William.
“You’re both arseholes,” Lily said, and then covered her mouth as her face flamed scarlet. “See what you made me do?”
The bastards both laughed. After a while, she smiled at them as well.
“What the lunkhead meant to say, was we will have our difficulties. And we will fight, but as long as we remember how much you mean to us, it will work out,” Charles said, kissing the back of her hand.
“Yes, exactly. And George will bind us together. You will be whom he calls Mummy, after all.”
She frowned. “Won’t that have people talking?”
William shrugged. “By the time we have him out in Society, he will know how to behave so our close secrets do not become public.”
“I don’t want to come between your friendship.”
“You won’t,” William assured her.
She turned to ask Charles, “And you’re all right with George in our lives?”
“More than all right.”
“But what about Sebastian? What if he finds out about George’s history?”
Grinning, Charles ate a slice of his roast beef before answering. “I think Sebastian is going to have his hands full once Richilde is out of mourning.”
“The count has passed?” Lily’s eyes filled with tears. “How awful.”
William clasped her hand briefly. “It was a blessing. In the end. He no longer suffers.”
“I must go and see her.”
The dukes exchanged pained looks.
“Must you?” Charles asked.
“Clara and I will see her through this. Besides, if she is interested
in Sebastian as you say, she may be my future sister.”
“I’m not sure there is enough whiskey in Christendom to process that sentence.” Charles fumbled for his glass while William poured.
Epilogue
When they returned to London, Lily, Charles, and William set about to look for the perfect home for their new family, one that would afford them propriety to the outside world and convenience for their arrangement in the interior.
The Duke and Duchess of Densmore were fortunate enough to find a lovely townhouse in Bloomsbury, which could be recognized by its lush summer garden of tiger lilies. Some say they were in tribute to the woman of the manor, Lady Lily.
The Duke of Tennison resided in the neighboring townhouse, where his son, the young William, could often be seen playing on the front grounds. Though there were some eyebrows raised when the Duke of Tennison returned from France with the illegitimate son of his mistress, who he named his ward, the boy was so charming that his parentage was never discussed in polite Society—and all Society that the dukes trafficked in was nothing if not polite.
One unique feature of the Double Duke townhouses, as they came to affectionately be known to outsiders, was their little-known connection by a secret door between the master bedrooms.
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About the Author
Lorna James is the pseudonym of USA Today Bestselling author Jamie K. Schmidt and award winning NYC publisher, Lori Perkins. One day, they decided to write erotic historicals with a different twist. They enjoy the simple pleasures in life: the smell of leather, a cruel smile that promises dark desires, and of course, chocolate. Read all about them at LornaJames.weebly.com and follow them on Facebook as Lorna James and @LornaJWrites on Twitter.
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