by Julia London
As he’d found no relief in Ashton Down, he walked down the street for his horse. But he happened to pass a dress shop, and a pair of kid gloves in the window caught his eye.
Jeffrey paused and looked at the gloves. They were kid leather. His wife would like gloves, wouldn’t she? Didn’t all women desire such frills? He stepped into the shop, his head brushing against the little bell that tingled, announcing a visitor.
A woman stepped out from a back room. Her jaw dropped with surprise when she saw him. “Oh! Welcome, welcome, my lord!”
He nodded and walked deeper into her shop. He was surrounded by frilly, pretty things.
The proprietress dipped into a proper curtsy, sinking down so low that he had a clear view into her cleavage. Jeffrey’s pulse ticked up, and he clasped his hands tightly at his back. “You’ve a pair of gloves in the window,” he said.
She looked toward the window. “Yes. They are Swiss made, kid leather. Quite exquisite.” She hurried to fetch them and returned to him, holding them across her palms.
The fingers of the gloves looked small to Jeffrey. “They will fit a grown woman?”
She smiled. “Yes, of course, my lord. Someone with delicate hands.”
He withdrew his purse. “I’ll have them.”
She beamed with delight and whirled around to her counter. She dipped down below and rose up with a plain white box, which she opened and lined with a bit of linen. “May I offer you anything else, my lord?” she asked smilingly as she wrapped the gloves in the linen.
He glanced at her and her shining eyes. She was a good, decent woman, and as it often happened with his demented mind, he thought of her sinking to her knees and taking him in her mouth. But then, something shifted, and it wasn’t this woman who looked up at him. It was his wife. It was Grace.
“My lord?”
“Yes,” he said, and looked down. “Perhaps you may be of some help. I am in need of a chambermaid. Preferably an older woman.” He handed her the coins for the gloves.
“A chambermaid,” she said, and her fingers fluttered around her bodice. Jeffrey thought of his wife’s breasts. They were firm and sweet, the nipple dark against her pale skin, taut beneath his tongue.
“I think I know someone who might fit that description. Julia Barnhill.”
Jeffrey glanced up at her.
“She was the old rector’s caretaker. But now that he has gone, and the new rector has come, she hasn’t a proper situation.”
“Where might I find her?”
“At the rectory, my lord.”
“Thank you.” Jeffrey fit his hat on his head. “Have the gloves delivered to Mr. Cox at Blackwood Hall,” he said, and went out.
It was a short walk to the rectory. He stepped through the gates and stalked past a pair of hens that waddled toward him. A dog barked at him from the corner of the courtyard, but Jeffrey didn’t bother to look at him.
When he rapped on the door, it was opened by a woman who was rather too large for her gown. The bodice was far too tight, and the hem too short. Her boots were scuffed and her hair was tied in an unforgiving bun. She had a bulbous nose, and two small eyes set too far apart. Better still, she was at least twenty years older than he.
She would do nicely.
The woman wiped her hands on her apron. “Sir?”
“Merryton,” he said, bowing his head. “I am from Blackwood Hall.”
Her small dark eyes widened. “Oh. Milord,” she said, and dipped into an awkward curtsy. “The rector’s not here, milord. He’s gone to read the last rites to old Mr. Davidson.”
Jeffrey nodded and looked behind her, into the front room of the rectory. It was tidy. “Do you keep this house?”
“What?” She looked behind her. “Aye, milord, I keep it,” she said, looking at him as if she expected some criticism.
“I understand you are without situation since the rector has died,” he said flatly. “I am in need of a maid to clean my personal rooms.”
She stared at him.
“I am very exact in my requirements for cleanliness and order. I expect my private apartments to be cleaned every day and things to be kept in their place. I prefer a minimum of fuss. Are you capable of that?”
“I... Me?” she asked disbelievingly.
“Yes. You. The pay is generous.”
She sized him up, her small eyes shrewdly taking him in. “If I might inquire, why me?”
The answer to that was so complicated that Jeffrey couldn’t begin to sort through a response. He merely shrugged. “Why not you?”
She eyed him suspiciously. “Did you say how much the pay, milord?”
Jeffrey hadn’t the slightest idea how much a chambermaid was paid on his staff. “Fifteen pounds per annum in addition to food and lodging.”
It must have been a good sum; the woman’s little eyes nearly bulged out of their sockets. “When shall I report?”
“As soon as you free yourself of your obligations here. Thank you, Miss Barnhill.” He touched his hat and went out of the rectory’s courtyard, pleased that he would at least be able to offer his wife the services of plain Hattie. That seemed small consolation for what he’d done to her, but at least it was something.
Jeffrey felt much more in control of his thoughts when he returned to Blackwood Hall. He walked into the foyer and handed his hat to Cox, which was the moment he heard the sounds coming from the music room. It was not pleasant music that was being played on the pianoforte, but fits and starts, with many wrong chords struck and then attempted again. Jeffrey looked at his butler, who wore a pained expression.
“Her ladyship has expressed a renewed interest in learning the pianoforte,” Cox said. “She informs us that she’s not had a music tutor in many years.”
That was quite obvious. Jeffrey nodded and started for his rooms, but as he walked through the foyer, he stopped. He looked at the consoles. The identical crystal vases of roses had been replaced with a chaotic arrangement of hothouse flowers. Nor were the vases in their places. Jeffrey’s pulse began to ratchet. He looked questioningly at Cox.
“Lady Merryton has made the arrangements today, my lord,” he said apologetically.
Jeffrey bit his tongue. He walked on, jogging up the stairs, twenty-four steps in all, swallowing down his discomfort.
But no matter how hard he tried, he could not stop thinking of the storm that seemed to be brewing in his foyer.
His discomfort was so great that he went down to supper early, so that he might see for himself that nothing had actually happened in the foyer. It was absurd, he knew it was absurd to believe that somehow those bloody flowers had damaged his foyer, but the fear of it was quite compelling.
He found the chaotic arrangement of flowers just as they’d been when he’d come in. But there was nothing else amiss.
Jeffrey was waiting for his wife in the dining room when she arrived, dressed in a silver gown, her hair bound in a chignon at her nape. She was clearly surprised to see him standing there; he could see it in the flicker of her eyes. She paused at the threshold and curtsied.
“Madam,” he said.
“Mmm,” she said, and walked in, looking to Cox.
Cox was ready with her glass of wine, offering it to her on a silver tray. “Thank you.” She smiled at Cox.
Jeffrey felt that smile swim like a pretty little goldfish through him.
He waited until they had been seated for the meal before he could begin the conversation that was burning in his brain. “How did you find your day, Lady Merryton?”
She looked up with surprise. “Tedious.”
He arched a brow. “I noticed that you arranged the flowers in the foyer.”
“I did,” she said, watching him closely. “The hothouse is teeming with them. I thought something different might be nice.”
Different. Chaotic. Impulsive, disruptive, wrong. He took a bite of his fish. “I prefer roses.”
He did not expect silence from her on that—he did not expect silence f
rom her at all—and when he looked up, he found her gaze locked on him. “I prefer a variety.”
The poor lamb had no idea how quickly she would be defeated in this. Order was the air that Jeffrey breathed. “By the by, I have given your request for Hattie more thought. She will begin as your lady’s maid on the morrow.”
Suddenly, everything in the room seemed to change. She gasped and smiled with such delight that he felt the warmth of her happiness wash over him. “I may have Hattie?”
He nodded.
“Thank you.” She laughed a little and leaned back in her chair, smiling as if she’d just won a prize.
Jeffrey’s gaze flicked over her shapely body. “Another matter has been brought to my attention,” he said.
“It is my music, isn’t it? It is fairly obvious that it makes Cox uncomfortable, and yes, I will admit I am quite unpracticed. But I am confident I might regain my competency.”
“I think there is a great hope among the staff that you will,” he said. “But I was referring to the matter concerning your older sister.”
That certainly garnered her attention. “Honor? Why, has something happened?”
“I understand she has married George Easton.”
His wife swallowed. She folded her hands in her lap like a chastised schoolgirl. So it was true, then.
“I was not made aware of the scandal,” he said.
“No, I rather imagine you were not.”
He leaned back in his chair. “Madam, I shall be perfectly clear. I will not tolerate scandal of any sort to besmirch this family’s name. What has happened between us is scandal enough, is it not? I pray you tell me now if there are any other skeletons in your closet, for I don’t think you will care for the consequences if I learn of more at a later date.”
She looked at her plate.
“My father spent a good part of his life building our name into one that is synonymous with respect and decorum.” Bloody hell, it was as if he was speaking to John. How many times had he said these things? “It is my duty as his son and as the current earl to ensure that our name remains free of scandal and gossip. Do you understand?”
She looked up, and peered straight into his eyes. “Yes, I understand. My family has an excellent reputation, as well, my lord. You need not concern yourself.”
He couldn’t imagine how fine her family’s reputation now with two daughters married under scandalous circumstances. “For your sake, I hope that you are right.”
“I think you mean for yours,” she said. “If you bring more scandal to our families, I won’t blame you.”
Jeffrey stilled. It was such an odd thing for her to say, and the sentiment behind it was so foreign to him as to make him uncomfortable. He’d been judged for his actions all his life. Everything he did was scrutinized, first by his father, now by him and, he supposed, society. He looked at her again, but his gaze fell to her décolletage.
Jeffrey looked down, ate more of his food.
This was how it had all begun. The pressure to be good, to be perfect, even as a young man had made him crave that which wasn’t good or perfect. He was craving it now. Just the mention of scandal and he was thinking of his wife’s fragrant skin, of his fingers in her wet flesh. Image after image filled his brain, and with those images, a rising fear of harming her. He wanted to put his fist through a wall, to break a window.
But he didn’t do that. He lifted his gaze to his wife’s and said, “Shall we retire?”
She looked startled by the suggestion. “Now?”
“It’s late.” He stood up, offered his hand.
She looked at his hand, then braced both of hers against the table and slowly rose to her feet. She seemed repulsed. Disgusted. He couldn’t blame her. He was a disgusting man, no one knew it better than he, and yet, he was powerless against it.
As he led her from the dining room, and they made the long walk upstairs with her hand on his arm, her head down, he counted to himself. She must suspect by now that he was depraved. She surely understood that he had no choice but to subject her to it, as they were both bound to produce an heir.
He told himself he was a necessary evil.
In her room, he shut the door behind them, then turned her about. He undid the clasp of her necklace and put it aside. He turned his attention to the buttons of her gown, his fingers moving deftly down the loops. He noticed she was trembling as he pushed the gown from her shoulders and slid his hands with the gown down her arms, to her fingers.
She was afraid of him. What else could those trembles mean?
He wished for all the world that he was a normal man with normal appetites. He wished he could explain to her that, in his mind, it was reasonable to imagine her pleasuring herself, to imagine her bound by the hands and wanting him to have his way with her.
The gown pooled at her feet; she stepped out of it. Jeffrey traced a line from the top of her neck down her spine, to the top of her hip. He pulled the string of her corset and began to unlace it, one loop at a time, letting it drop to the floor when he had loosened it.
She tried to turn around to face him, but he held her there, with her back to him. He drew a steadying breath and pushed her chemise from her shoulders, watching the silk ripple down her body, sliding over her hips and landing on top of her clothing.
She turned her head slightly and glanced at him from the corner of her eye.
Jeffrey withdrew the pins from her hair and let the golden tresses fall over his arm and down her back. He lifted one thick strand and put it to his face, closing his eyes as he brushed it across his lips. He pushed it over her shoulder and kissed her nape, and moved down her bare back, trailing a line of kisses along her spine, caressing her skin with his hands, to her hips. He lightly bit one hip, then the other, and kneaded the plump flesh with his hands.
His wife was shivering. She grabbed the bedpost to steady herself. Jeffrey was hard, his cock throbbing with want. He imagined her on the floor before the hearth, her fingers on her breasts, his mouth on her sex. He squeezed his eyes against such images, unable to bear the desire that flooded his veins, the strength it required to keep from putting her there. He rose again, his hand sliding up, to her neck, then slowly, but firmly, bending her over the bed.
“No,” she said, and tried to stand.
But Jeffrey stepped between her legs and palmed her sex, sliding his finger over the sensitive core and into her body. She was slick; she gasped as his finger slid inside her, and he felt her entire body shiver. “Yes,” he whispered. What a monster he was, a bloody monster.
He slid his cock into her, pressing gently at first, clenching his jaw as her body opened to him, admitted him and drew him in. He sank deep into her wet depths, and the feeling of it was the most pleasurable torment. He wanted to pump into her, to feel her body tighten around his and draw his release. He moved carefully, one hand on her hip to keep her down as he moved in and out of her. But his mind began to fill with images of what he was doing to her, of what he would like to do to her, and he felt himself losing control. He closed his eyes, but his need was too powerful—a deluge of want.
He could hear her gasps, her moans, and it alarmed him. If it had been any other woman, he would have believed she was finding pleasure in his body. But this was his wife, an innocent young woman who had played with fire in a tea shop and been burned. He guessed she was whimpering with dismay. He moved faster, harder, now desperately seeking his release.
It was explosive. He grabbed the bedpost, gripping it tightly as he sought his breath. When he had found his bearings, he realized he still had her bent over the bed. Jeffrey quickly withdrew and picked up her chemise, pressing it against her.
She wordlessly took the chemise and pulled it over her head. She said nothing as she pulled her hair free from the garment. He worried that he’d been too hard, too animalistic.
His fear was confirmed when she turned around. Her eyes were blazing with fury. It startled him; he didn’t know what to say, how to ask her forgive
ness. He tapped his finger to his thumb. “Are you hurt?” he forced himself to ask.
“Hurt?” she repeated, as if that were entirely too obvious. “I am not hurt— Just go. Please.”
“Grace—”
“Will you please leave me now?” she asked, her voice low and cool.
He hesitated before walking to the door, where he paused there and glanced back. “Good night, Grace.”
She did not respond. He walked out of her room. It was thirty-two steps to his rooms. He was wrong, all wrong. Eight steps to a sideboard. He was demented. Four fingers of whiskey. He tossed it down his throat and closed his eyes against myriad immoral images. Another four fingers of whiskey, drunk like water, until the liquor began to drown the acid in his belly and he could breathe again.
CHAPTER NINE
GRACE AWOKE THE next morning full of physical and emotional frustration, her thoughts still reeling from what had happened last night. She despised how Merryton made her face away, as if she were too hideous to gaze upon. Did he find her ugly? Did he find her revolting in some way?
It was even worse than that. Grace had felt herself sliding down a path of pleasure, her body desperately wanting its landing. She had liked the way his body and his hands and mouth had made her feel.
But then he’d withdrawn from her, and she’d felt unfinished and homely and used.
Hattie came at half past eight to help her dress, holding a box tied with a white ribbon. “His lordship bid me give this to you,” she said.
“For me?” Grace asked incredulously. She took the box and pulled one end of the ribbon, laying the box open. She moved the linen wrap and looked down at the gloves. Fine gloves, by the look of it, made of supple leather. Grace lifted the gloves, looking for a note and finding none. “There’s no message?”
“No, mu’um,” Hattie said as she leaned over to have a look at the gloves. “Just said I was to give them to you.”
Of course there was no note. That would require some effort at civility. Grace tossed the gloves into the box and turned her head. She didn’t want the bloody things.
