His Lordship's Downfall: The Complete Edition

by Josie Litton

  “Why on earth would anyone be sorry to tell me that? But wait…” What was she suggesting? Bunny and Tata he could certainly see. Actually, might not have minded doing so. But--

  “She’s bonking both the Monktons?” He truly had not seen that coming. Tony had always seemed like such a sensible fellow.

  His lordship prided himself on his liberal attitudes, at least in matters of the flesh. Live and let live, that was his motto. Even so, there were some sexual practices that his mind could not stretch to. Speaking for himself, there was nothing wrong with a threesome provided it included two women. But one involving Bunny? He could not restrain a shudder.

  “I’m afraid so,” Jane said. “At any rate, she thought having you otherwise occupied would afford her some time to shore up her defenses in the face of your unkind intentions toward her.”

  He scoffed at the very idea. “She can try for all the good it will do her.”

  Although whatever it was he’d intended doing to his errant wife would have to wait. Payment for his pet’s effrontery had to come before anything else and was likely to take up a great deal of his time.

  “Be that as it may,” she said, “before Lady Annabelle left, she was kind enough to lend her expertise to this enterprise.”

  Enterprise? This was sounding worse and worse. “What is that exactly?”

  Patiently, she said, “Your reform, of course. Do try to focus.”

  “Still on that, are we? The 2nd century Roman emperor and philosopher, Marcus Aurelius said--”

  “I know who Marcus Aurelius was.”

  “You do?” How could she possibly? All that reading in the abandoned library? What a strange child she must have been.

  “Well, good, then you’ll recall that he said: ‘The best revenge is to be unlike him who performed the injury’.”

  “This isn’t about revenge. It’s about the need for you to become--”

  “Bollocks. You can give this any gloss you want but what it’s about is all those orgasms you didn’t get to have. I could point out that orgasm denial was perfectly permissible under our contract, might even have been anticipated by any remotely intelligent person but--”

  “Does the concept of ‘excess’ have any meaning for you at all?”

  In the spirit of improving his situation as rapidly as possible, his lordship stopped and considered. Thoughtfully, he said, “Generally, I try to avoid it. I’m a man of moderate habits. I neither eat to excess nor, generally, drink to the same. I do have a tendency to work overly long hours but--”

  If her eyes rolled back any further in her head, she was going to be the one losing consciousness. And then he would--

  “Your lack of self-awareness is exceeded only by your complete failure to have a shred of empathy for any of your fellow man--be they male or female. You, sir, are a selfish cad!”

  Selfish? When his entire life was one of service to his monarch? What an absurd barb. Made all the crueler for possessing just the smallest resonance of truth. Perhaps he was selfish in personal matters but damn it, how could he be otherwise? Empathy had not been on the curriculum at either Eton or Oxford.

  But deflection had been, the avoidance of any reality that did not fit the accepted view of life, the world, and most especially one’s self. He had become extremely good at that.

  “Which only makes Aurelius’ point. You should do everything possible to avoid being like me in the slightest regard.”

  Hah! Let her try to refute that. Not for nothing was he considered the government’s most skillful negotiator. Rajahs, pashas, emirs, khans and chieftains whose ancestors going back centuries had bested the wiliest of rivals regularly fell victim to the force of his irrefutable logic. Backed by the brute might of the British Navy and the entire rest of the empire’s world-spanning military but there was no reason to dwell on that.

  “Is that obvious ploy truly the best you have?” she asked, thwarting his hopes of overwhelming her with the brilliance of his reasoning. “Don’t be like you?

  Why had he even bothered trying to talk to her? She was as utterly oblivious as she claimed him to be.

  Under his breath, he said, “Pot, kettle.”

  “What?”

  “Never mind. Just get on with it. Do your worst.”

  She needed no further encouragement. Positively oozing anticipation, she said, “There is a device currently in vogue at certain clubs, a collar, if you will…”

  Even as she spoke, he became aware belatedly of the weight encircling his neck. So distracted had he been by all the rest that he hadn’t noticed it until then.

  “What the hell--”

  Brightly, Jane said, “I picked out a version that I thought would suit you. It looks rather like the gold torques that Viking chieftains awarded their most fierce warriors.”

  Her gaze narrowed, which paradoxically had the effect of revealing her true feelings. Smugly, she said, “However, I’m afraid its purpose isn’t so laudatory.”

  Dismay roared through him. He’d seen a particular sort of collar in use at the Odalisque and elsewhere. Yet another marvel of modern technology, it use bio signatures to detect and punish undesirable behaviors.

  She wouldn’t have dared--

  Quietly, she said, “If you attempt to use your strength against me, you will lose consciousness. Temporarily, of course.”

  She was bluffing, she had to be. Knock a man out? That was nothing less than low, conniving treachery.

  More concerned than he wanted to admit even to himself, he adopted an air of nonchalance. “Then you have nothing to worry about. Unchain me.”

  She hesitated. He assumed she was wavering between inbred obedience to the orders of her betters and lingering concerns--well deserved--for her own safety.

  And yet…as her gaze traveled slowly down the length of his body, his lordship was forced to consider that he might--however unlikely it would seem--just possibly be mistaken as to her motivations.

  Clear blue eyes lingered over his broad shoulders and tapered chest, the washboard ribbing of his abs, the V of muscle bracing from his hips before settling finally on his trapped cock and tightly drawn balls.

  The frankly carnal nature of her scrutiny unsettled him. He would have had to be dead not to know that women found him sexually appealing. But this was different. Those women had been intent on pleasing him. Jane’s perusal seemed entirely directed to her own satisfaction.

  Inevitably, that raised the question of just how far down that path she intended to go. As her small white teeth nibbled on her lower lip, he had to wonder what exactly she intended.

  He was not quite in a cold sweat but getting there when she finally said, “Very well but I strongly advise you to take my warning to heart.”

  Cautiously, she approached the bed. He inhaled the tantalizing perfume of her skin as she bent over and took hold of his right wrist. A lock of her hair brushed over his bare chest. His cock strained, squeezing against the limits of its cage. He stifled a groan.

  It took an age for her to release that single shackle. Or so it seemed. The moment it was loose and his right arm freed, she darted back, a good ten feet from the bed.

  “You will have to do the rest.”

  Far more quickly than she had managed, he undid the remaining shackles and swung his legs over the side of the bed. He was playing with her, although she didn’t know it, going slowly the better to take her by surprise. Once he had--

  What would he do? The possibilities were almost endless and all so very tantalizing. Punish her, of course. Fuck her, obviously. Combining the two would be ideal but there were limits beyond which even he would not go and besides, he hated repeating himself. A prolonged bout of orgasm denial would have been perfect but he’d already done that. He needed something new and fresh, so overwhelming that it would crush any flicker of resistance in her.

  Before he was done, she would be enslaved to him, dewy-eyed and dripping, crawling on her hands and knees at the crooking of his finger to please h
im in any way he desired.

  “Damn!” The expletive broke from him before he could contain it. Fuck that hurt!

  He had to find some way to avoid rampant erections while his cock was still squeezed in the godawful cage. Not thinking about all the many ways that he wanted to swive, tup, wap, prig and bugger her might be a good start.

  Standing, he made a show of stretching and was gratified to see the lip nibbling resume. Idly scratching his chest, he resisted the urge to tug on the damned collar. Instead, he asked, “Did I mention that I played rugby at school?”

  With her gaze focused on his caged cock thrusting from his groin, she murmured, “I don’t recall you speaking of it.”

  “Marvelous game, rugby. Puts a great deal of emphasis on speed.”

  Maybe so but the fact remained that he got five feet, no more, before the arms of Morpheus seized him in their relentless grip and he crashed to the floor.

  When he returned to consciousness shortly thereafter, Jane was standing over him.

  Quietly, she said, “You may wish to know that the collar also has a pain setting.”

  Chapter Twenty-one

  Lord Adrian had always prided himself on the rationality of his mind. His thought processes were sound and prudent. He weighed up facts, arrived at logical conclusions, and acted accordingly. Having done so with admirable decisiveness, he moved on and did not look back. Self-reflection was not his strong suit or even, it could be said, in his repertoire.

  Unfortunately, his present circumstances were so aberrant--deviating as they did from anything he had ever remotely experienced before--that they overloaded the hitherto well-ordered circuitry of his mind. The result was what in other circumstances would be termed a systems crash. All semblance of reason deserted him, leaving in its place only brute instinct.

  Barely had he regained consciousness than he jack-knifed to his feet, ignored the warning Jane had tried to give him, and reached out again to seize her.

  With precisely the same result.

  It has been said that doing the same thing over and over while expecting a different outcome is a sign of insanity. To the degree that is correct, it must be concluded that being so maddened by his circumstance, his lordship lost possession of his faculties, albeit temporarily.

  When they finally returned to him some time later, he was lying on the floor with his head in Jane’s lap and the sheen of tears in her lovely eyes.

  “Please,” she said, “stop doing this. You are harming yourself to no good purpose.”

  In a flash, Lord Adrian experienced several seemingly contradictory but in fact inter-related sensations: He was vindictively pleased by her distress and at the same time oddly touched by her concern for him. Her unhappiness provoked an absurd urge to offer comfort, as though she was the victim of an injury rather than its purveyor. Faced with that conundrum, acceptance of the reality of his situation--temporarily, of course--appeared to be the lesser of two evils.

  Reason having reasserted itself with admirable speed, he concluded grimly that for the moment he could not defeat the damnable device around his neck. He would find a way to do so before too long, that went without saying. To consider otherwise really was the path to madness. But for the short term, he would have to concede that he could not physically subdue her. Another tack would have to be found.

  Inwardly, he was raging but he refused to show it. Instead, he rose with as much dignity as he could muster and waited to see what she would do next.

  Her relief was evident; she didn’t even have the sense to hide it. Starkly revealed, it confirmed what he had known all along--she was soft, tender, malleable. In short, a woman.

  He, on the other hand, affected a look of boredom that wavered only slightly when his ‘pet’ produced a sturdy chain-and-leather leash.

  “Hold still,” she said as she bent to latch one end of it to the ring piercing the tip of his cock.

  To do so required her to take hold of said cock, straining in its cage, cup it in the warm, soft palm of her hand into which the fool thing tried to nuzzle affectionately, and maneuver the leash onto the ring with the other. Doing so, her busy little fingers brushed repeatedly against his cruelly confined erection far too much to be accidental.

  His hands curled into fists at his sides, he said, “I’m keeping track, you know. Every moment, every act, you will pay for.”

  “In that case, I had better assure that I get good value.” Straightening, she gave the leash a little tug.

  And off they went to the kennels. With hindsight, he supposed that he should have guessed their destination. She would be familiar with the kennels since he’d consigned her to them, however briefly. At least he could console himself that they were a step up from being chained to a bed.

  Even so, being led naked by his cock past a couple of google-eyed kitchen maids did nothing for his humor. The tally of her offenses was mounting by the second.

  The swish of her skirt against silk-clad legs, the sway of her hair, the motion of her delectable bottom, none of that could be allowed to distract him. When the reckoning came between them, he was damn determined that it would be full and correct to the last measure of her infamy.

  Even so, the rage-edged grimness of his mood could not survive the reception he received when they arrived at the kennels.

  At sight of him, the dogs went wild. Achilles, Ajax, Asteria and Aura all welcomed him with ecstatic tail wagging and determined efforts to sniff his crotch. Achilles in particular seemed puzzled by the apparatus located there. Sensible dog, knew an offense against the natural order when he came nose to nose, as it were, with it.

  “You’re much nicer to them than you are to people,” Jane observed when he patiently pushed them away.

  “That’s because they are intelligent and loyal, two qualities presently in scant supply.”

  Without so much as a blink, she replied. “Intelligence must be recognized to be appreciated and loyalty must be earned. In you go.”

  The same stall he’d put her in, he noted. The only differences being that bedding was already in place and that unlike her, he was too tall to stand fully upright.

  With an exaggerated sigh, he sat. The floor was pleasantly cool, the dogs had quieted a bit, and he was at leisure to contemplate his revenge.

  “If the object is to bore me,” he informed her as she stood on the other side of the bars, studying him, “you are succeeding beyond all expectations.”

  “Am I? In that case, I shall put my mind to assuring that you do not remain in that state.”

  With that threat hanging in the air between them, Jane of Arc took her leave.

  The afternoon passed slowly for his lordship. Accustomed as he was to an endless round of demands on his time equaled only by strenuous bouts of recreation, he was quickly at a loss. Dreaming up creative ways to punish his pet--he clung to that term for her--only went so far. Ultimately, he had to confront the limits of his own imagination.

  Not even an interlude on the run outside throwing sticks for the dogs cheered him up. The plain fact was that he could not remember a time in his busy life when he hadn’t been constantly occupied--by the demands of office, by the expectations of society, or by his own choice of amusements. There had always been something to do.

  Absent any such activity, he was left to contemplate the low estate to which he had fallen. Not through any fault of his own, absolutely not. Except insofar as he had been foolish enough to acquire a pet. Any man could make that mistake. More than a few no doubt had. The entire process should be shut down, absolutely forbidden. He would see to it at the earliest possible opportunity.

  Dinner arrived, brought by Jameson who refused to be baited by his lordship’s expressions of dismay over such disloyalty from an old and valued servant intermingled with promises of revenge. The butler went off shaking his head.

  Lacking any appetite, Lord Adrian merely picked at what was, even he admitted, a well prepared repast. The steak, a quantity of potato--the kind he like
d with the truffles--a bit of salad accompanied by a healthy few chugs on the wine and he was done.

  Or so he thought.

  It was getting on for ten p.m., by his reckoning, when he was informed that “Mistress Jane” required his presence.

  Chapter Twenty-two

  She received him in the library. The night being warm, there was no fire but a few scattered lamps had been lit. Enough for him to notice that the stirrup chair remained but the electro-stim device had been banished elsewhere. Or possibly scrapped.

  He felt no relief at that, being fully aware that while the device would have accommodated his pet perfectly, he was far too large and heavy for it.

  But not for the tall wooden X-cross now mounted between two of the library windows.

  “I see you’ve taken it upon yourself to redecorate,” he said.

  The white silk of her robe fluttered around her long, slim legs as she walked toward him. Her hair was down, a silken curtain gleaming in the light. She looked young and far too entrancing.

  “Only a little. Do you like it?”

  He eyed her warily. “That depends. What are you going to do with it?”

  “Oh, I think it’s rather what I’m going to do with you.”

  She gestured for him to step up to the cross. When he balked, she said, “This will go so much better for you if you cooperate. Besides, as I’ve said, it’s for your own--”

  “Do not repeat that damnable phrase. It makes you sound like a demented schoolmarm.”

  “Then--” Another cheery little wave in the direction of the X-cross.

  He hesitated, considering his options, none of which appeared to be of any use at the moment. God only knew what she’d do if he was knocked out again. He could come to only to find himself in a condition even worse than what he was already experiencing. Who knew what other diabolical torments she had up her sleeve. Bad enough that she was smiling as though she knew exactly what was going through his mind.