In the Forest of the Night & The Barmaid and the Blacksmith

by Lizbeth Dusseau

  Not once, however, did she show her discontent to Joshua. As much as she wanted blast out at the horrid blackguard of a brother, she kept her tongue. Didn’t gentlewomen keep their tongues? Didn’t they refuse to be ruffled by the lowest kind of talk? Didn’t they turn a deaf ear to the sounds of scoundrel’s voices that would dissuade them from their virtue? She considered Lowell her great challenge and she intended to triumph!

  To ensure her resolve, she was determined to act the lady in all situations, and prove to this man her worth to be in this house at her husband’s side. In that regard, she refused to allow Joshua’s hands to rove her body while they were in the presence of his brothers, or the household staff. They would conduct themselves as the lord and lady of the manor, and only be lovers behind their bedroom door.

  Unfortunately, this situation led to days of near celibacy, since Joshua’s long hours reviewing the estate, and discussing accounts took him long into the evenings, long after Fiona was asleep in bed. There could be no stolen moments in some compromising places, so each night the “lord and master” climbed into next to his dozing wife deciding to let her sleep. Just once in the first days, Fiona woke from her slumber, and snuggling next to Joshua’s warm body, they had a quick sexual release before they fell back asleep.

  This circumstance left her wanting. She was woman of passion, now so muted, she wondered if they’d ever have time for each other the way they used to.

  Chapter Ten

  While Joshua spent his days taking charge of his estate, Fiona spent her first ones acquainting herself with her new home. She roved about the mansion, spending hours in rooms that were rarely used, where dust settled, and years of disuse had made them smell old and decayed. She could see right away, that the task of cleaning them was useless, for there was no legitimate purpose for so much space for so few people, especially when the Kane brothers were unlikely to take wives, and open the home to the grand lifestyle it once enjoyed.

  Other than exploring the house, which she seemed at liberty to do, Fiona walked the estate grounds, happy for the exercise. Joshua’s only command was that she stay with in sight of the house, so she wouldn’t lose her way home. Fiona also spent much time in the kitchen with the cook, Mrs. McCready. A jovial graying woman of nearly sixty, she was a great source of family information, any simple question about the estate or one of the brothers would send her into a long diatribe that was likely to skip time periods and even people, as the woman recounted her memories for the lovely new mistress of Kane Manor. She took it upon herself to instruct Fiona about the entire Kane history, knowing full well that Joshua was not the kind of man to give a young wife the details she would want about the family she’d married into.

  Fiona learned that Kane Manor had once been filled with a rich social life. At the helm of the fine estate was Joshua’s grandmother, a woman of robust and yet gracious manners, who enjoyed her living filled with fancy dress balls, long summer house parties, and dozens of people enjoying the splendid ambiance that Kane Manor was noted for. Her daughter-in-law, Joshua’s mother, Priscilla Kane, was her opposite, a recluse. Once the elder Mrs. Kane died, the social life at the estate diminished noticeably, after a while dwindling away altogether while Priscilla Kane pursued a life far different than the world expected of her.

  Priscilla enjoyed books and fine artwork, not social gatherings. Though she fashioned herself an artist and dabbled with oils, she would fly off in tantrums destroying her work because it was not perfect. Her preoccupation with her own pursuits, which not only left Kane Manor socially bereft, left her boys to their own devices. There was no question that she doted on Joshua, her eldest, and on Galen the youngest child, and the one most like herself. The other two boys were clearly their father’s children.

  The elder Mr. Kane was rarely discussed. Though Fiona had already gathered that Joshua cared nothing for the man. The other brothers endured him at best, and none seemed at all upset over his passing. Certainly the whole staff of servants breathed a collective sigh of relief at his death.

  Fiona managed to pass her time the first week enjoying her explorations and talks with the cook, but she’d soon seen all she needed to of empty rooms, and could only take so many of Mrs. McCready’s stories in one sitting. As far as walking the grounds, she liked this pursuit best, but she really hoped to have Joshua join her. To her dismay he always seemed preoccupied.

  As for family gatherings at the dinner hour, she looked forward to them because Joshua was there; but as the days passed, Lowell continued his rude whispered comments which made her dread dinner as much as look forward to it. Unable to stop Lowell’s untoward remarks, she grit her teeth and sat as demurely as she could at her husband’s side, trying to keep her attention away from the foppish man.

  On a few occasions, Fiona even began helping to serve the meal, as was appropriate for the mistress of the house. One night as her husband talked business with Nigel, she went from place to place, offering to fill bowls with steaming mutton soup.

  “Ah, back to old tricks, I see,” Lowell whispered quietly, as Fiona leaned over him, ladling broth into his dish.

  “You should hold your tongue,” she was bold enough to say in return, as she pulled the ladle from Lowell’s bowl.

  “You hold your tongue with my brother? Or does it serve him well?” His lips were practically at her ear as he spoke.

  “Lowell,” she gave him a warning tone as she backed off.

  “Ah, do my jibes hit their mark?” His hand was where it shouldn’t have been, on her thigh. She jerked away.

  “Would you like some more, sir,” she asked him politely, while she held back her mounting rage.

  “I would rather taste the salty tang between your fine breasts,” he murmured, looking straight at her bosom and the cleavage revealed by the low-cut bodice of her dress.

  Without thinking, Fiona set the ladle down, and slapped the rude man’s face with a vigorous wallop. “Mr. Kane, you are no gentleman!” she roared at him. The slap and the roar shocked her husband from the conversation with Nigel. “You are a bloody ass, a foul mouthed bastard, and I’ll thank you to keep your tongue in check, and your hands to yourself, or you shall find this boiling soup poured in your lap!”

  All eyes turned to Fiona, and then Lowell.

  While Lowell nursed his smarting face, a smirk of satisfaction broke out on Joshua’s face. Fiona was bewildered by the expression, but it was soon clear that he was laughing at his brother’s unexpected woe. Galen grinned as Galen would, and even Nigel snickered seeing his annoying sibling put in his place.

  “I think I’ve had enough of you all,” Fiona blurted out, and giving a brisk and rather defiant curtsy, she left the room.

  “You are distressed my dear,” Joshua said as he strode into the kitchen, where Fiona sat with the cook, drinking a mug of tea to calm her.

  “Indeed I am,” she snapped.

  “You belong at the table with me,” he said kindly.

  “But not with that bastard brother of yours.” Her green eyes flared again.

  “He’s harmless, Fi, but I’ve chastised him thoroughly, and he’ll apologize. Won’t you rejoin us?”

  “No,” she barked her peeved reply.

  “As you wish,” he replied, and he returned to the dining room.

  “You’ll get used to ‘im, ma’am,” the cook told her.

  “I’m sure I will.”

  “Did ‘im good to have his face feel a little righteous wrath. I hope he’s sore for days. That old boy gets fresh with all the young ones. I’ve trouble keeping maids for his randy attitude.”

  “I can’t believe that he would do this under his own brother nose.”

  “Ah, but if I know Joshua well, he’ll have his brother’s nose bloodied soon.”

  “I wouldn’t like that. I lost a future husband battling over my honor. I want none of that from my husband, least of all with his brother. There’s nothing to be gained by such wars. I’d just like that scoundrel to hold his t
ongue.”

  The cook smiled at her. She rather liked the feisty young redhead, had brought a bit of spark and life into the otherwise dreary household.

  ***

  Later that evening, Fiona strolled the garden by herself, thinking of the fate that had propelled her into a home so fine and vile at the same time. It should be a safer place to live than the rude village where she’d grown up; though she was beginning to think that there were no safe places, anywhere. She’d have to remain on guard, even if she did have a mighty man of a husband that would protect her.

  “You plan to remain outside all night, my love?” She heard Joshua’s voice behind her.

  “It’s a peaceful evening, sir,” she said turning around.

  “I am sorry for the scuffle with my brother.”

  “I handled it,” she said.

  “And very well, I might add.”

  “You’re upset with me?”

  “Good god no! I should have warned you about Lowell. He has too little to do. I’ll have to find some worthy work for him. Something outside the estate. But believe me, he’s harmless.”

  “That’s what Mrs. McCready says.”

  “And you don’t believe her.”

  “I have met many men, sir. I know all the types to take advantage of women. I’m sure that I can take care of myself with Lowell, but I’m not certain that he’s harmless.”

  “I wouldn’t worry, with the kind of mettle you showed him tonight, he’ll back off. You’ve already bested him once, when he knows he can’t get away with his torments, he’ll tire of it. He hates to look like a fool.”

  “I hope you’re right, because I vow, Joshua; I will dump boiling soup on his lap, and I’ll not care one bit if I burn him.” By the moon above, he could see the fire flash in her eyes.

  “You are a haughty wench,” Joshua said, in complete admiration. He was glad to see the spitfire return. His wife had been far too subdued since they’d arrived at the estate, as if she’d been walking on eggs.

  “So lass, shall we walk more, or go inside?” he asked her.

  She was beginning to feel a surge of warmth return to her, the warmth that came from Joshua to her, the warmth that fired her between the thighs, that created a fountain of delicious desires that she’d spend hours and hours enjoying at the cottage, when he’d taught her of love.

  “I suppose, it’s time to go in. It is a little chilly.” She was hardly chilled at all, the night was rather warm for the time of year, but she was ready to be warmed by more than just the weather.

  Arm in arm the two entered the house at the kitchen, which was left tidied and polished was after dinner. And empty as well, Mrs. McCready no doubt in her room humming songs and patching linens to spend her evening hours.

  “So, Fiona, are you happy here?” Joshua said, as he stopped her midway through the kitchen, and leaned her against the heavy kitchen table. He pressed his loins to hers and looked down into her face. In the dim light, she could see his eyes gleaming, knowing he had more than just her happiness on his mind, she could feel his cock as he rubbed himself against her.

  She thought a moment of his question. How to answer? Placate him with a “I just love it here, darling?” or tell him the truth, “I’d rather be home, at our cottage.” Or was there something in between that would communicate her feelings in more explicit detail?

  “Frankly, my love, I don’t like it here at all,” she finally said, opting for an enormous dose of the truth.

  He backed off and stared at her shocked. “My heavens why not?”

  “Don’t get me wrong, sir. It’s beautiful, more luxury than I have a right to know. But for me, your humble peasant wife, it’s bloody boring.”

  “Boring?”

  “Yes. There’s nothing for me to do, except embroider, and talk with Mrs. McCready about the meals and walk through the gardens. I am used to work, hard work. I don’t know if I could ever get used to the idleness. I feel wasted and useless.”

  “So, you want me to put you to work scrubbing the floors?” Joshua asked, amused.

  “I’d be happier, I’m sure,” she assured him.

  “But my wife cannot do such things,” Joshua reminded her, and he was quite serious.

  “Your wife, your wife, your wife. Perhaps I’d be better off being just your whore, while you remain a blacksmith. Perhaps we’d have more fun,” she said saucily. She pulled out from under his pressing weight, and sauntered around the table, swishing her behind ever so deliberately. She flipped her red hair with flick of her hand, a gesture he always found captivating.

  Fiona herself was thinking how much she wanted Joshua’s hands on her, how she wished for just one ounce of the passion that she knew with him at the cottage. She ached inside for his hard cock to impale her. She could beg for it, though she suspected this tease would do.

  And just as she figured, Joshua responded easily to her ploy. He loved her swaying rear, the swish of her skirt, and the sly smile that accompanied that movement as she glanced back at him and tossed her hair again.

  “Ah, but Fiona, you are my whore,” he laughed, deliciously. He followed behind her, attempting to fondle rear, though she would not be easily claimed. He spanked her ass with a good stroke, and she slipped from his outstretched hands. Opening the pantry door, she dashed inside, and slammed the door in his face. She was giggling with a little childish glee. When he pushed his way inside, seconds later, he had her cornered at the far end of the shelf lined room.

  “You think you could get away from me?” he asked with a jubilant grin.

  “Perhaps I want to,” she teased.

  “Then you wouldn’t have led me into this tight space.”

  She tried to escape under his arm, and she almost did, the move taking him by surprise, and her sleight form easily scampering away; but he grabbed for her skirt and caught a handful in his fist. “Oh no, you don’t.” He laid another brisk whack on her bottom, then pulled her up close to him, a hand going under the hem, so that he could find real flesh underneath. He made his way inside until he could feel the soft cheeks of her ass, and the lovely places where they parted, and he could slip a hand inside.

  “Ooo, you have my cunt,” she purred to him. “You shouldn’t be doing this now. Not here.”

  “But I’d do it to my whore, is that not who you are?”

  “But in the kitchen?”

  “We did it in the kitchen at the cottage. Besides, this is the pantry,” he argued, intending to win this battle.

  “But sir, there were never people around.”

  “Do I care? I am the master of this house, I’ll take my wife, excuse me, my whore, anywhere I want to.”

  “But Mrs. McCready …” she tried another useless protest.

  “Let Mrs. McCready listen and enjoy, the old lady could use the excitement.”

  He was not going to be dissuaded, and she was hardly resisting. Pushing her to the end of the room, against the table, he raised her skirt so that he could see her legs and thighs, and raising the skirts higher still, he found the target of his designs, her sweet womanhood, bare as bare could be.

  “As I thought, no underwear?”

  “It was hot today,” she told him.

  “How scandalous! Ladies of great breeding would never do this.”

  “I never told you I was a lady of great breeding. And now that I’m living in this house, I find good breeding has nothing to do with living here, nor does it have anything to do with your wealth and position.”

  “Ah, so you’re learning, my love.”

  He finally grabbed for the top of her dress, loosening all the ties, he shoved it down, baring her entire body, naked there in the pantry.

  He sat her on the table and laying her back against the hard surface, he spread her thighs and shoved his erection inside her.

  “Oh yes!” she gasped when the thrust hit bottom, sending a tingling pain everywhere.

  “You lusty one,” he purred happily, and jerking in and out, he pummeled
her deeply.

  “Ah no, my love,” she groaned.

  Her cries only inspired him, and he held her hips as he pressed himself deeply into her rich warm interior.

  So full. It seemed days since she’d had this much attention or satisfaction. Days since she’d allowed him to attack her with the spontaneous zeal that turned a simple moment into a bawdy sexual brawl. “You’re a scandalous man.” She was smiling as she spoke with her head flung back, abandoning the tedious and stilted virtue that she’d adopted since she entered her husband’s grand house.

  “Thank god there’s still a ribald wench in you, lass.” He grunted, grabbing her hips with his rough hands so he could thrust deeper still. He roared with a muted howl, only making the most modest of allowances for the fact that they were screwing in the kitchen pantry.

  Joshua was declaring his mastery in the house, one last piece of sovereignty that no one would deny him. This interlude with his commoner wife was his declaration of supreme command, his return, and a complete return it was.

  “Ah, ah, ah, ah,” she was gasping with the most beautiful sound, the most beautiful look of sheer emptiness on her face, as if she was seeing angels or devils perhaps; whatever it was, it delighted her. Joshua could feel the swell of her belly as she was releasing pent-up lust; her hips bucked against his crotch, and then shivered madly as the orgasm claimed her.

  To the rhythm of her pulsing cunt, he thrust again and again, until all his masculine power flowed into her; and she gratefully received, with first a snicker and then a giggle, as she watched the bizarre way his scowl contorted into an expression of jubilant release.

  “You won’t have trouble being the harlot with me again?” he asked her as he leaned over her reclining body. He saw the sweat on her skin, and bent down to taste the salty flavor of her breasts.

  “Here in the house?” she asked back.

  “Anywhere.”

  “I am trying so to be a lady,” she reminded, even as he was pulling from her warm wet cavern.