In the Flesh

by Portia Da Costa

  “This is my final offer, Bea, and I urge you to take it.” His midnight eyes narrowed. He didn’t actually scowl, but his elegantly molded mouth hardened. “But bear in mind that even though I’ve bought up a large part of your foolish brother’s debt, he’s taken out additional loans from certain characters that you’ll find are even more despicable than you obviously believe me to be.” He twirled his pen at her. “And I saw a couple of very disreputable fellows lurking around across the road just now when my associate and I arrived, and they’re precisely the kind of ruffians a shylock might employ.”

  A cold hand seemed to grip Beatrice’s vitals. Ritchie owned some of their debts? Just how determined was he to get her? It hardly bore thinking about, but the alternative was as frightful as it was true. There’d been some unpleasant scenes on the doorstep in the past few days, and it was getting harder and harder for Charlie or indeed anybody in the house to fob them off. The household was primarily an establishment of women, apart from her brother and Fred, a yard boy whose services they shared with their next-door neighbors. Charlie had no pugilistic skills, and tended to hide out at his club most of the time. They had no big, substantial male like Ritchie around to deal with any awkwardness…or worse.

  Trapped. No choice. She had to sign. And hope that when it came to it she had enough natural bedroom skills. It wouldn’t do not to give Edmund Ellsworth Ritchie good value.

  “Very well then, I’ll sign.” She marched over to the secretaire, snatched the pen out of his hand and scribbled her signature before she could give way to further doubts or the device could leak ink on her fingers. Charlie had purchased one a while back and made a terrible mess with it. “But I doubt if even the most experienced courtesan in the demimonde could give you a tumble worth that amount of money. No woman on earth could be as exotic as all that!”

  The moment the words left her lips, the pen was out of her hand, capped and tossed aside. Ritchie grasped her fingers and bore them again to his mouth, pressing his lips first to her knuckles and then turning her entire hand over and pressing his mouth against her palm like a hot sweet brand. His tongue touched her skin, and he murmured, “Ah, but a tumble’s the very least of what I want from you, my beautiful Bea. Don’t you know that?”

  Beatrice couldn’t speak. Her mind circled like a carousel, fragmentary notions dancing in her brain while physical sensations cavorted around her body. She’d posed for Eustace, yes, but she was quite certain he hadn’t debauched her even though he’d had the chance. He’d been more interested in developing his precious plates than disporting himself with his laudanum-dosed model.

  Which left her a virgin, even if not completely naive. Like many women, she suspected, she’d picked up a variety of hints and whispers. Polly liked nothing better than to chatter about scandal and sexual antics, Charlie was sometimes careless with certain items of clandestine literature, and even the Ladies’ Sewing Circle was unexpectedly educational. Beatrice was well aware that games were played, diverse pleasures indulged in, and that in the privacy of their bedchambers, cosmopolitan men and women savored a whole cornucopia of outré entanglements that had little or nothing to do with procreation.

  And this was exactly what Ritchie wanted from her. This was what he’d paid twenty thousand guineas for.

  “Indeed I do, Mr. Ritchie, indeed I do.” Tentatively, she reached out and touched his thick fair hair. It felt like silk and, without benefit of Macassar oil or lotion, it curled waywardly.

  “Ritchie,” he reminded her, straightening up, his teeth white in a wolfish smile, his dark eyes glistening. He was so far from the polished gentleman of last night that he might as well be a different species of creature entirely. Perhaps a perverse and very masculine angel had tumbled to earth in order to tantalize and goad her?

  “Very well, Ritchie.” He was still holding her hand as if he owned her. Which he did, of course, now she’d signed the paper.

  I’m a whore now. A fallen woman. I’ll never be respectable again and I’ll probably never marry. I’ll be an unmaidenly old maid, typing for others for the rest of my days if Charlie spends all the money.

  Sobering thoughts.

  “What are you pondering about, Bea?” Ritchie’s eyes were narrowed again, but his expression was paradoxically gentle. “Not having second thoughts, are you?”

  “Not at all. I was merely reflecting on my new status.” She looked down at their hands. Ritchie’s was big, but elegantly shaped, and capable, as she knew from experience, of the most delicate mastery. Just thinking about how those fingers had felt between her legs made her anticipate them anew.

  “And that is?” He lifted her fingers to his mouth again, the kiss more formal and courtly this time, before releasing her.

  Beatrice stiffened her back, trying to ignore the melting, yearning, embarrassingly moist sensation he induced with every simple action. She cast her mind back to their conversation in the study at Lady Southern’s last night. It seemed like an aeon ago. “Well, Ritchie, as of now, I am the wicked woman that everybody believes me to be. I’m a whore.”

  The declaration was exhilarating. Liberating. Like a huge rush of pleasure at Ritchie’s hand. Of course, the sensations weren’t quite the same but the excitement was comparable. She’d thrown off a set of metaphysical shackles and could now float free, do anything, feel anything, enjoy anything. Her month with Ritchie could be the grand adventure of a lifetime, if she so chose, not a shameful state into which she’d been maneuvered.

  And after that? Who could tell what life might hold with twenty thousand in the bank and an annuity? She certainly wasn’t going to let Charlie get them into a horrible mess this time, that was assured.

  She held Ritchie’s gaze throughout the entire revelation. Allowing him the freedom to observe her feelings was a facet of her new understanding, a new kind of power. His slow smile told her he recognized it too.

  “Not a whore, Bea. I’d never say that and I’d never believe it.” He stroked his chin for a moment, and fascinated by even his smallest gesture, Beatrice admired the strong line of his jaw. “No, ours is a rational arrangement between two free-thinking adults who recognize a mutually pleasurable and advantageous situation when presented with it.” Such modern talk as he pushed back his jacket and reached into the inner pocket of his rustic jacket. “But if you must label yourself, I suggest you consider ‘courtesan.’”

  Courtesan? Infinitely better!

  Even to Beatrice’s relatively untutored ears, courtesanship conjured up images of luxury, decadence, sophistication and a state of willingness to be drenched in breathless, sumptuous pleasure.

  Her eyes popped wide when Ritchie withdrew his hand from his pocket—revealing a thick bundle of folded white banknotes. For all her new resolve, the sight still shocked her.

  But she willed her hand steady as Ritchie held out a portion of her remuneration on account.

  Yes, she’d be a courtesan…and revel in it.

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  Below Stairs

  GRITTING HER TEETH, Polly Jenkins stared up at the ceiling beyond the old airing rack.

  I should have bloody well stayed up there. Made some excuse. I shouldn’t have left Miss Bea all alone with that sweet-talking bastard.

  Concerned about her mistress, Polly was distracted. In other circumstances, she’d have been flirting by now. She was alone with the nice-looking brown-haired fellow who was loitering by the range, drinking tea and eating the slice of fruit cake with which Cook had plied him, and he was normally just the type she’d set her cap at. Especially as, with coast clear outside Cook and Enid had set off together for the market. Miss Bea didn’t like anyone to go out alone, so Cook went in person to haggle with stallholders for bargains now that tradesmen would no longer deliver, and Enid, who was a strapping lass, helped carry the bags.

  With t
he coast clear inside too, Polly should have been making good headway with her handsome guest. But instead she was fretting about Miss Bea, and in danger of braining herself with the airing rack.

  “Stupid thing,” growled Polly, grappling with the swinging monstrosity and getting slapped in the face by a dangling chemise for her trouble. The household was too hard up to send out its laundry but the rack was heavy and one of these days, it was going to collapse on their heads and bring the kitchen ceiling down with it.

  That’s all I need. Miss Bea ravished or murdered by some high-handed stranger, and me out cold on the kitchen floor, with not even a grope from his mate for compensation.

  It would never have been like this back in the happy old days at Westerlynne—a proper establishment, everyone seemingly comfortably off. Miss Bea happily engaged to her childhood sweetheart, the Honorable Tommy Hastings, and Polly herself courting his manservant, Sam. Even Mr. Charlie behaving with a bit of sense.

  But here in London every new day bordered on chaos and most arrangements were topsy-turvy. Hence the shopping and washing at odd hours, and breakfast not served until Mr. Charlie rose from his bed, somewhere around lunchtime.

  Polly tried to will herself into the morning room. She was a servant and should know her place, but still. Should she have insisted on waking up Mr. Charlie now? Even though she’d been told expressly not to by Miss Bea?

  Not that Charlie would be any help. He was a sweet man when you knew him, but not the slightest bit of use in defending his sister’s honor. In fact he’d helped her lose it in a roundabout way. If he’d only introduced her to a decent, respectable chap with a bit of money, instead of that sod Eustace Lloyd, they might all have been nicely set up by now instead of fearing the bailiffs and worse at any moment.

  Reaching for another chemise, she eyed her silent, watchful companion out of the corner of her eye.

  And who the hell are you, when you’re all at home?

  Was he a bailiff? A moneylender’s thug? Him and his mate had arrived together half an hour ago, with a letter for Miss Bea, and now the other fellow was upstairs, getting the answer. What a cheek, expecting that Miss Bea jump to it and reply straight away? And then insisting on going up to get the letter from her hand.

  “If your mate doesn’t come down soon, I’m going up there to sort him out! It’s not right him bothering Miss Beatrice. She’s got enough to contend with as it is.” She turned on the man by the fire, who was the younger and had seemed to defer to his cohort. There was something decidedly fishy about the pair of them, and Polly had a feeling she knew the older one from somewhere. If only she’d never let Enid open the area door in the first place.

  Even if she did fancy Mr. Quiet and Watchful over there.

  “I wouldn’t do that, if I were you. Mr. Ritchie doesn’t like to be disturbed when he’s conducting business with a lady.”

  Polly’s blood boiled. How dare he threaten her, the scallywag? He was no better than she was, and neither was his mate. She didn’t trust the pair of them further than she could throw them.

  “Mr. Ritchie, eh? Who the hell is he? Who the hell are the pair of you? Marching in here, laying down the law and getting Miss Bea up at an early hour when she was out late last night.” She glared at him, meeting his bold stare head-on. He might be a wiry, strong-looking type, just how she liked them, but she knew a trick or two herself, in a tussle. “She could easily have sent her answer round to your boss with Fred, the next-door’s boy. That is if we were allowed to know who your mysterious boss is?”

  The man unwound himself from Cook’s chair by the hearth and joined her at the airing rack. Without speaking, he reached into the basket, took out a pair of Miss Beatrice’s drawers and, with a salacious grin, hung them up along with the rest of the washing. As he reached for another item, Polly grabbed him by the arm.

  “I asked you a question, Mr. Whoever you are. What’s your real business here and who do you work for?” She held on tight to the solid muscle beneath the wool of his work jacket. He felt good, despite the danger he presented. “If I don’t get a straight answer, I’ll have to fetch Mr. Charles and then we’ll see.”

  The brown-haired man laughed suddenly, as if he knew what she knew. Handsome Charlie meant well, despite his many faults, and he loved his sister. But he couldn’t knock the skin off a rice pudding, much less deal with a couple of toughs on his own.

  A warm hand effortlessly removed hers from his arm.

  “Well, I work for Mr. Ritchie, who’s the gent upstairs. And he works for no one but himself.” He held on to her hand, not in a cruel way but with no sign of yielding. Despite her crossness, Polly trembled with excitement. “And don’t worry, your lady won’t come to any harm. Quite the reverse, he’s here to do her—and this entire household—a lot of good.”

  “What the dickens do you mean?”

  “I’m not at liberty to reveal the particulars, but my Mr. Ritchie thinks very highly of your Miss Beatrice, and only wants the best for her. You needn’t have any concerns on that score.”

  But she was concerned. She couldn’t help it.

  Mr. Ritchie was a handsome bastard, that was a fact, even though for her own taste his friend here was more toothsome. But Miss Bea had been betrayed and exploited already by one despicable, smooth-talking beau, and she didn’t need it happening with another.

  “It’s still not right,” she muttered. “Who knows what that blackguard is doing to her. And even if he isn’t doing anything, she shouldn’t be alone with him without a chaperone. It’s just not right!”

  “Don’t worry, gorgeous, your mistress will be safe with Mr. Ritchie. He never forces women into doing anything they don’t want. He doesn’t have to. They lift their skirts without him even having to ask.”

  “You wicked bastard!” Polly attempted to shake her hand free, and this time her antagonist relaxed his fingers and let her go. “Miss Bea isn’t like that. She wouldn’t lift her skirt for any man except if she were married to him, never mind your pal up there.”

  The man laughed. Obviously he’d seen the cabinet cards.

  “Look, I know what you’re thinking and you’re bloody well wrong! She’s a respectable gentlewoman, I’ll have you know. Posing for artistic photographs is just posing for artistic photographs, nothing more!”

  “I don’t doubt that. But like I said, my Mr. Ritchie is a gentleman, and he’s very taken with your mistress, so there’s no need for you to make a fuss.” He reached down, took the last chemise from the basket and draped it over the drying rack. “There we go. I’ll haul it up for you, if you like.”

  Polly eyed him up. Despite his cheeky smirks and his cockiness, he seemed an honest sort. And easy on the eye too. Despite everything, Polly had a peculiar urge to trust what he said. And he certainly seemed unshakably loyal to his boss.

  “Thank you. That’d be very kind. It’s a heavy old bugger, and that’s a fact.”

  He laughed, then looped his hand in the cord and effortlessly hauled the rack up to the ceiling. Polly imagined him being just as sure and effortless in his dealings with a woman, and beneath her skirts, her belly tightened with sudden desire.

  “Thanks again, Mr… What is your name, by the way? Would you like some more tea?”

  “Yes, I’ll take a drop, thanks,” her new friend said easily as he secured the cord with a competent-looking twist and turned to face her. “And the name’s Brownlow. But you can call me Jamie, if that suits you.”

  Jamie. Such an easy, quiet, innocuous name, yet he looked very far from that. Jamie Brownlow was a man of the world, clearly, and tough. And he had a tricky, clever quality that was exciting.

  “Jamie, eh? I expect I could call you that.” Polly reached for a cloth to push the heavy kettle onto the hottest part of the range. Jamie Brownlow was at her side in the blink of an eye,
and before she could protest, he had the cloth and was doing the honors for her. “Thank you, Jamie… My name’s Polly Jenkins, but you can call me Polly, I suppose.”

  “Polly it is then.” Laughing, Jamie reached for the teapot. “Let me make the tea. You maids are always worked to a standstill. Take the weight off your feet, and have a breather for a change.”

  How very modern. Men almost always expected women to do the serving, even if they were belowstairs types like Jamie. Not even Mr. Charlie, when he wanted some comfort, was so courteous.

  “That’s very decent of you, I must say.” Polly settled on the old, ill-stuffed sofa that was set to one side of the fire, opposite from the armchair. “Although I’m not sure that Cook will be so pleased with you handling her pots and suchlike.”

  Jamie grinned over his shoulder as he set about his task. “Oh, don’t you worry, my Polly. I’m fully accustomed to handling a female’s pots and suchlike. In fact I’ve been told I’m quite an expert in these matters.” He winked, and Polly was struck by his provoking, wicked eyes. They were green, quite light, but with an unusual slate-colored cast, and they twinkled with intelligence and guile.

  “Don’t be so saucy, Mr. Brownlow. We’ve only just met, and I don’t hold with overfamiliarity with men I don’t know anything about.”

  “Ah well, we’ll have to rectify that, won’t we? What do you want to know about me?” He was moving about the kitchen as he spoke, working efficiently through the ritual of making the tea.

  “I…I don’t know.” Polly felt flummoxed. As he neared the stove again, he unbuttoned his jacket and tossed it over the back of a chair, then rolled up his sleeves to show strong, well-shaped forearms. “Who are you, really? Why are you here? And who’s your Mr. Ritchie when he’s all at home?”

  “So many questions… Let’s have our tea, eh? And then maybe I’ll answer some of them.” He waggled his eyebrows at her in a way that made her belly tingle. “When’s your Cook coming back, by the way? Will she be long?”