Jack's Hellion

by Eliza Lloyd

  Charlie sat on his arse, his back to the wall, his forehead pressed to his knees and his arms wrapped around them. He glanced up glassy-eyed and confused. “What took so long?”

  “Trouble. The usual.”

  “You should have minded your own business like I told you.”

  “Yeah, I should have. Come on. I want to go home.”

  Grousing about how unfair life was seemed pointless. She’d known for years that good things didn’t last, that loved ones went away and dreams were as easy to reach as the stars in the sky.

  Her boots dragged, slapping along the cobblestones, and her shoulders hunched. She shouldn’t have ventured out. That house was as close as she would ever get to Jack’s world. It was the single place where their two worlds could meet without colliding into a spectacular mess.

  Marriage to Jack was not only impossible, it was the silliest, most unattainable, impractical notion she’d ever had. An absolute impossibility. Still, he didn’t have to marry Catherine. It was a mistake that didn’t have to be made. An illiterate like her could read the writing on the wall.

  “Imo? Am I getting taller?”

  She glanced his way. “Aye. Maybe. Charlie? I need you to pray about something.”

  * * * * *

  “You didn’t need to wait up,” Jack said. As he walked into the room, he tossed his hat and a smart-looking cane onto a nearby chair. Tugging at his cravat, he strolled toward the bed and smiled with a tired warmth. He ran a finger over her cheek and then tapped her nose.

  “Saved you from having to wake me,” Imo said.

  He laughed, low and throaty, shedding his shirt as he walked across the room.

  Imogene had thought long and hard about what to say, but toward the end of her bath, she decided to tell the dirty, walked-on, hard truth. No one appreciated lies, especially when it could have a profound effect on his future.

  Only she wasn’t going to tell him it was Shiffington. That part he could learn on his own once he discovered Catherine was a lying, cheating bitch.

  She slipped out of the lacy nightgown. Libby called it some fancy Irish name Imo couldn’t pronounce. She just knew it was prickly against her skin, but the ruffly edge did make her tits look nice.

  Jack sluiced water over his face and torso, then dried roughly with a towel before sitting down and working at his boots.

  “Did you have a good evening?” She tried behaving like Mrs. Holland, all proper on the outside with quite a bit of naughtiness inside. Only Imo didn’t want to be considered a bitch like that fancy piece. Or like Catherine. You gave a man what you gave because you loved him, not because you were going to earn favors afterward. Then she thought about all that money at the bank and she felt a little ashamed.

  “Long.”

  “Come to bed then.” She patted the mattress.

  Since the first night they had been together, they had shagged every day and then some.

  He didn’t seem in a hurry, stopping at the sideboard to pour a drink. She glanced at the scars on his body. It was nothing to her and she hadn’t given it a second thought, having seen men with numerous scars, cuts and birthmarks far worse than Jack’s.

  Rather than join her in bed, he lowered himself into a chair, leaned his head back and closed his eyes. The glass dangled from his fingers for a moment before he lifted it and took a slow drink.

  Imogene rose from the bed and hurried to him, slipping into his lap and wrapping her arms around his neck. His hand touched her back and then slid upward into her hair. He pulled her close and sniffed her.

  “What is it?” she asked. Jack was rarely silent and his composed, unemotional face caused her heart to flutter in worry.

  He appeared on the verge of answering her question. Instead he patted her thigh. “Let’s go to bed.”

  Imo didn’t have the heart to tell him anything bad. He seemed tired and worn. He moved and she slid from his lap. Once on her feet, she reached for his free hand and urged him from the chair, wrapped her arms around his neck and pressed her breasts into his chest, one of the few ways she knew that could make a man forget his troubles.

  If Catherine caused him more pain, Imo would hurt her.

  She set her mouth to the skin at his shoulder. The texture was rough but not unpleasant to touch or taste. She wondered why she had never touched that part of him with any real attention. Maybe she’d subconsciously avoided the scars, which made her no better than Catherine.

  His hands gripped her shoulders. “Don’t,” he commanded.

  “Let me love you, Jack.” She worked at his trousers, pushing the soft material over his fine, hard arse. “I love everything about you,” she whispered as her hands slid up his back and then caressed both arms. He was solid, his arms curved with beautiful muscles.

  Jack sucked in a deep breath, closed his eyes and let her work magic on his tired mind.

  She tugged at him, urging him toward the massive bed. Imogene’s heart raced. Happiness had been so fleeting for her. With Jack, the physical pleasure seemed more than temporary. The here and the now was the only thing that mattered.

  He stared at her, sleepy and knowing, but followed her lead. When his legs hit the back of the bed, she placed her hands against his chest and gently shoved him. He fell backward, his hands stopping his descent and propping him up. She crawled into his lap, straddling his legs.

  “Where did you come from, Imogene? Are you some lost angel fallen to earth for my pleasure?”

  “An angel?” She laughed. “You know exactly what I am.”

  “No. Don’t, Imo. You are beautiful to me.”

  She slid her hands over his bare chest and skimmed the tips of her fingers over the slight ridges on the right side of his neck.

  “Why don’t you ever talk about it?”

  “Nothing to tell. I don’t think about it anymore.”

  “It doesn’t bother me,” she said. Shallow Catherine couldn’t see past the mild scars.

  His brow creased. “Why should it? It’s hardly noticeable.”

  “Did it hurt?” She soothed her hands over his shoulders. Her thumb grazed the ridges there.

  “At the time. I was only seven then. I was playing with the cook’s son in the kitchen. A cauldron of jam spilled on me. My clothes protected me, but I was burned on my neck and hand the worst.” He tilted his head, a question in his gaze. “A foolish boyhood indiscretion. I was fortunate not to have been hurt worse. Think nothing of it.”

  Mam had always preached truth-telling. Trouble was, Mam never quite got around to telling them how it should be done. They lied routinely to get what they needed to live. The twisted truth of Catherine’s deviousness needed to be told. And she would tell him, but how did she spill the truth without making it sound like she was glad Catherine had proven herself to be unworthy?

  The ugly truth was a burden.

  She cupped his face and pressed her lips to his. He enveloped her with his strong arms and returned the physical passion that came so easily to him.

  “I will love you forever, Jack. Forever and ever,” she whispered.

  He set a finger to her lips. “Imo, I can’t encourage you in your feelings. You know this is only temporary.”

  “It doesn’t have to be.” Peter, Paul and Mary! What was she thinking? An orphan. A whore. No man of Jack’s stature ever took a woman like her for an honorable association. Women like her were just thankful for the temporary security and the short-lived passion an affair brought. And she was thankful.

  Jack’s smile was brief and sympathetic. And knowing. “Imogene, there is nothing for us beyond these four walls. I do not mean to be cruel, but you must steel your heart. I do not want...I do not want you to be hurt.”

  She stiffened in his arms. He clamped his hands at her wrists. “You can’t tell me how to feel! You get my body; you don’t get to command my heart.”

  “No, but I can tell you that to feel anything is inadvisable.”

  “I love you more than she does.”


  “We will not discuss Catherine,” he said with uncharacteristic firmness. Jack, as sanguine as any man of her acquaintance, wouldn’t tolerate a word against a fine English bitch.

  She gritted her teeth. She did not want to tell him while she was angry. The words would sound all wrong.

  “Don’t be cross. You’ve known from the beginning where this was going.” He rolled, pinning her to the bed. He searched between their bodies, his hand finding and releasing the buttons of his trousers. His hot, hard cock warmed her belly.

  Imo’s breath rushed from her body. She wrapped her legs around his waist while he pressed one knee to the mattress. He canted his hips and she felt the tip of his cock before he pushed into her. She met his thrust, tightening her legs around him and taking him fully.

  She rolled her head, her hair tickling at her shoulders. She groaned under his continuing assault. Full and deep, Jack surged in and out of her.

  “Oh Jack,” she said.

  Thoughts of him filled her mind, except when he did this to her, and then she couldn’t think of anything else but the fullness between her legs. She swelled around him or he swelled in her, but the intense pleasure consumed her by slow, burning degrees. Beneath him, she bucked her hips, smiling at the sound of their bodies bumping against each other.

  The sound of mating was like truth. Recognizable. Right. Sure.

  “I don’t want anyone else to fuck me, ever.” She heard Jack’s chuckle and felt a new, deeper thrust into her body as he worked her harder and faster.

  Finally, his mouth descended on hers. She opened to him, taking his tongue deep and then pushing back with hers. She bit at him. He speared his fingers into her hair, forcing her head back. He placed his mouth on her neck, eating at her. Devouring her.

  Between her legs, she burned.

  His weight pressed her into the mattress.

  He slipped his free hand between their bodies then caressed the throbbing nub between her thighs.

  “I love you, Jack.” She breathed in his scent, wanting to take in all of him. She arched under him, enjoying the hard pounding and the fullness of his cock. She kissed him hard, open-mouthed and deep.

  “Imo,” he said, groaning against her skin. He trailed hot, wet kisses down her neck to her breasts. She heaved upward, offering them, wanting him to suck her.

  “I love you,” she said again.

  Jack slipped one hand under her arse and turned with her, positioning her over him. Imo dropped her hands to his chest, caressing over his perfect muscles, and used her thighs to rock up and down the hard length of him.

  He closed his eyes and moaned.

  “Not yet, Jack.”

  “You make it difficult,” he said, his gaze smiling up at her. Whatever had been bothering him seemed to have vanished. That is what she wanted. She wanted to be the woman who soothed his troubles, who he turned to and relied upon. She wanted what she could not have.

  “I don’t want to give you up, Imo. Stay with me.”

  “Forever?” she asked.

  “As long as you wish.”

  Imo lowered herself, pressed her breasts to his chest and kissed him again.

  She could give him everything she had and it still wouldn’t be enough. She took him deep and groaned.

  And this was all she would get from Jack. The privilege of being his whore. A few months of delicious food, warm baths and a comfortable bed. And kindness. Jack was kind to her.

  She would miss that most of all.

  She closed her eyes, forcing away the dark thoughts of her future. Life without Jack.

  He brushed his hands over her face, pushing back her hair. “This doesn’t have to end,” he said.

  “All your erections come to an end.”

  He laughed. “And you wonder why I want you.”

  Imo clung to him not because she was determined to find her pleasure. She clung to him because she knew that soon she would wake to find him gone.

  And she would be alone again.

  Chapter Nine

  Jack had to accept the truth of his impending marriage to Catherine but he was determined to help the Farrells as much as possible. Was it immoral to have asked Imogene to stay, knowing she loved him...and he was committed elsewhere? He had asked Imogene to break his wedding vows with him—surely it was a sign that he shouldn’t be marrying.

  But he could not go back on his word. At this point it was up to Catherine and he knew her family would not give up the Davenport money or the potential title.

  The carriage slowed and Jack peered out the window. “Ah, here we are.”

  “What do you want to see Danny about?” Imogene asked.

  “We have business.”

  “About Frank?”

  “That and other matters. I mean no harm, Imogene. Trust me.”

  Jack assisted her from the carriage. Impatient to be out after the last few days, she’d learned to curb a lifetime of rushing, but he could see when she was about to boil over. “Of all the lollygagging and simpering. I could have walked here faster.”

  “In that dress?” Jack asked.

  “It was your woman who made it.”

  “And pretty you are.”

  “Do you think so?” She would never believe it, even if he told her every hour of every day. How did one convince a woman who’d never looked in a mirror that her reflection was one that made his heart beat in strange ways? Lud, how he wanted her.

  They started for the door, but she halted in her tracks, dragging Jack to a stop. “I’ve never been through the front door. It doesn’t feel right.”

  “Funny thing, I’ve never been to the back door and that doesn’t feel right.”

  “You like to laugh at me, don’t you?”

  “You have a way about you that does make me smile. Rather than stand in the street and debate, why don’t we use the knocker and see if we are welcomed?”

  Imo lifted her skirt and allowed the escort.

  Abe answered the door. Upon glancing at Jack’s card, he said, “Lord Bancroft is not in today, sir. If you’ll leave your card.”

  “It is not Lord Bancroft I wish to see, but Mrs. Mary FitzPatrick.”

  Abe blanched but recovered with a, “Very good, sir.”

  He escorted them to a plain back sitting room which Imogene had helped clean every other day while she’d lived here. Abe hadn’t even recognized her.

  Imogene frowned and tugged at Jack’s sleeve. “I thought we were here to see Danny. I don’t want Charlie to know about Frank. It’ll upset him.”

  “Patience, little chick.”

  Imogene sat in the brown leather chair. Not since they’d come to Fitzroy Square had she taken such a liberty, but today she wasn’t just Imogene Farrell. She was Jack Davenport’s mistress and she damn well would sit where she wanted. Even if they weren’t invited to sit in the nicer front sitting room.

  Mary entered and waved Danny into the room. Imogene jumped to her feet then carefully wrapped her arms around her mending brother. He and Jack shook hands.

  “Why are you here?” Danny asked as he pulled away. He still held his arm at an odd, protective angle against his side.

  “I don’t know. Jack wanted to talk to you. To all of us. You look good.”

  “It still hurts, but I’ll live.”

  “I’ve asked Charlie to wait for a few minutes,” Mrs. Fitz said.

  “No. Let him come in,” Danny said. “Frank’s the one who saved Charlie. He needs to hear.”

  When Charlie came in, he hugged Imogene and looked up at her. “Did you tell him?”

  “No. That’s not why we’re here. Mr. Davenport has news.”

  “Imogene’s told you that Frank’s to be transported in eighteen days?” Jack asked.

  Danny nodded.

  “I’ve made arrangements for all of you to see him before he leaves,” Jack said.

  “Imogene said as much. But I don’t really think it’s a good idea,” Danny said. “For any of us. Tiny knows we’ll try to be th
ere.”

  “I had an idea about that. I thought you could go in disguise as one of my footmen. And of course, no one would recognize Imogene now.”

  “You do look pretty, Imogene. Like a real lady,” Mary said.

  “’Tain’t nothing. You should see the closet full of stuff I have. I’ll be an old woman before I wear it all.”

  Danny turned his attention toward Jack. “There’s really nothing else we can do for Frank?” He choked on his words. Imogene felt the hurt deep in her belly.

  “I’m afraid not,” Jack said. He felt no guilt only regret. He’d leveraged every ounce of his influence and money to anyone who would listen. “But we can make sure he knows you’ll remember him, and I can make sure he gets there in one piece.”

  “I want to see him,” Charlie said.

  “Me too,” Imogene said.

  “Then it’s settled. I’d like to speak with Danny alone for a minute. You go too, Imogene.” He could see her quick rebellion.

  “If it’s about Frank, I should stay.”

  “It’s not. I won’t be long,” Jack said.

  After they left and the door closed behind them, Jack glanced at Danny. Imogene saw him as a boy, but he was a man and needed to plan for his future. “Imogene indicated you would go away after Frank was transported.”

  “I think it’s for the best.”

  “But what about Charlie? And Imogene, after I get married.” He hated to say it, but Imogene would still need to be looked after if she didn’t agree to his long-term proposal.

  “I can’t stay here. Eventually someone will find me, and I won’t put them in danger.” He nodded toward the door, indicating Imogene and Charlie.

  “Would you consider hiring out to one of the Davenport estates? We have a large manor in the east of England, near Deal. I could find a position for you. You would still see Imogene and Charlie a few times a year.”

  “I don’t want you to go to no trouble,” Danny said. His face had turned red. He hung his head for a moment before looking at Jack. “But if you mean it, I’d promise to work hard. You won’t regret it. Never.”