Falling for a Rake

by Pendle, Eve

  She opened her mouth to say that thus had been her arrangement with half a dozen servants before he’d scared them out of the room. It would be much quicker for him to leave. But instead, she pointed to a set of oak bookshelves with an open chest next to it. “All the books need to be shelved, in such a way that I can find the one I need.”

  “Alphabetically, then.” He strode over to the book shelf, knelt, and pulled out a volume. “The Ferns of Great Britain. Hmm. I anticipate some issues.” He looked up. “Do you prefer by region?”

  In the hallway, the tall clock chimed. One o’clock.

  Oscar stilled, then rubbed his thumb over the cover of the book.

  Lucky book. She wanted that again, his clever hands on her body, stroking her.

  “It’s time for luncheon.” His gaze didn’t meet hers. “You should eat. And rest. And I should leave you in peace.” He slipped the book onto the shelf. Quick steps and he’d crossed the room, taken her hand in his and kissed her knuckles, then left.

  Her hand throbbed. Not where she’d been cut, but where the brief warmth of his lips had touched her. Traitorous body. She wouldn’t go to him tonight. Her pride was worth more than this.

  She’d participated in his lust and accepted his help, only to be rejected. He wasn’t even inviting her to dine with him. Tonight, if it was like previous nights, he’d be out until late, avoiding any contact with her. Constantly being away from home was a sign of an inconstant husband, was it not?

  He didn’t want to spend time with her. She was just… She shied away from the words that came to mind. An outlet.

  The advice books said that a reformed rake was the best sort of husband. But only if they reformed. Marrying a rake was a risk. It was a perilous step to reach a beautiful thing, like leaning over a cliff to reach a rare fern. And the cliff was crumbling.

  Chapter Eighteen

  Emily returned to the townhouse at three in the afternoon, a little earlier than she’d anticipated. It had been a trying morning and luncheon. Connie had refused to talk to her for half the morning after Emily had suggested that perhaps a little economy would be sensible. Everything about Connie’s debut had to be bigger and better than Emily’s.

  Her ordinarily endless patience seemed to have been compromised by being married and she hadn’t been able to stay and listen to any more. The only reason Emily continued to try to help was for her mother, who was at her wits’ end over Connie’s unreasonable demands. Yesterday’s morning calls had already tried her serenity, with it taking all her effort to be the Perfect Lady when the women put out sentences of congratulation like pretty roses–complete with barbs.

  Emily had managed to restrain herself since the incident in her parlor, two days before. Her self-control was made easier Markshall being out at his club all evening and the mornings found him still abed. Yesterday they’d met in the hallway and she’d enquired civilly about what he’d been doing. His only answer had been a curt reply that he’d been ‘busy’.

  She’d indulged in a brisk walk back from her parents’ house, repeating arguments in her head that didn’t get voiced out loud. That had somewhat cleared her head, but she still had the itch to take off her dress, loosen her corset and stretch out her arms properly. She was tired. For the second night, she’d been unable to sleep. Visiting Oscar’s bed would have fixed that, but her pride had forbidden it and her own manual efforts left her empty.

  The whole state left her exhausted. If she went upstairs to ‘lie down’ for a while, she could–

  “Is it the state’s job to provide clean sin?” Her thought was paused by Markshall’s voice from the library.

  She stopped and listened.

  “Should not the state provide a more wholesome activity, like murder?”

  Steel, rigid and cold, bolted through her. What on earth was going on?

  The gentle sound of the baize door opening reminded her that she couldn’t stand around in the corridor. The morning room was next to the library. Perhaps she’d be able to hear from there.

  Silently, she slipped into the room, positioned herself next to one of the small spaces of wall that wasn’t covered in paintings, and pressed her ear to the wall.

  “We don’t subject the rugged sailors of the navy to these examinations,” Markshall was saying. “But a delicate woman with a roaming womb is ostensibly hardy enough. If anything were to make a womb displace, in my opinion, it would not be vigorous exercise, it would be shrinking away from the cold metal of a doctor’s examination with a phallic instrument.”

  “You sound like a cross between a Marxist women’s magazine and a quack doctor.” That was Jones’ voice, half laughing. Markshall’s valet.

  Emily frowned. Why was Markshall talking to his valet, and why was Jones telling him off?

  “What I do not understand is where you think those innocent girls from the country, that you gentlemen defile in your expensive brothels, end up?” She could imagine Markshall gesticulating and playing to his audience. Presumably just Jones though, as she hadn’t heard another voice.

  “A woman cannot take a man against his will, and yet we blame the woman,” Markshall said. “It’s like blaming the bolt because the nut won’t fit.”

  He was wasted being a Lord. He could have been in a music hall performance. He’d have been a sensation.

  “You sound like a Whig,” Jones replied. “An angry, sarcastic Whig, but a liberal nonetheless.”

  More pacing. Markshall clearly took Jones’ comments seriously.

  “French letters should be standard issue for prostitutes, as boots are for army men,” Markshall said. The pacing sound halted and there were words she couldn’t hear. “Are they not always given boots? Well, hardly surprising that they have VD.”

  They were discussing venereal disease, VD. It was, according to papers she’d read, a serious threat to national security by compromising the sailor’s health.

  Markshall growled, an exasperated sound. “Some days, I just can’t find... Ahg.” He sucked in a breath. “This is why we discuss it. This is why I practice. But damn it, Jones...”

  “Lord Selby is relying on you, my lord.”

  There was a long pause, punctuated by irregular footsteps. She imagined Markshall frowning at the wooden floorboards, impatiently.

  “We call women the weaker sex, and yet subject them to an examination a brave navy sailor will not. It says very little for the quality of the navy,” Markshall said.

  “No, my lord.”

  “I always said that the army’s far superior,” Markshall muttered.

  “You can’t be a Tory and insult the armed forces,” Jones replied. “As you well know.”

  There was the rapid clunk of footsteps as Markshall, presumably, paced around.

  “If the problem is VD in sailors, why not have a doctor examine every man in front of his Captain?” Markshall tried again. “And a nurse. And instead of locking them up, just send them to Haslar, which is practically a prison anyhow, or send them to sea, an unlimited prison.”

  “You’d cause a riot if you tried to do that,” Jones said dryly. “It’s beneath the dignity of–”

  “If the women do not object to such examinations, but the sailors do, perhaps we would have better success in our conflicts if we sent our prostitutes to sea rather than these milk-and-water navy men.”

  “Did you just say that the crown should hire prostitutes?” Jones laughed. “That’s good. It’ll go down well, I suspect.”

  “Sea air is the fashionable healer of all things. Send the sailors back to sea with the prostitutes and they will all be cured.”

  “Yes. That’s it.”

  Emily eased herself away from the wall and padded over to the other side of the room. She sank into a deeply cushioned chair looking out of the window.

  She wasn’t completely sure what she’d just heard. Jokes and camaraderie, for certain. A different sort of person to the one Markshall portrayed to the world. A man who seemed to be a fraud. He’d given
her a hint of it when they’d been stuck in the hole. But this covert side of him seemed much more serious and calculated than she’d realized.

  Usually, when one said that a man was a fraud, it was an insult. It certainly would be if someone called her a counterfeit. That, and probably true.

  He was a much better man than he let on. She needed to talk to him, persuade him to be the man he could be. Her chest filled like an urn of hot water at the thought and that heat seeped further down. She’d avoided his bed because she didn’t want to be in the thrall of a man such as him. But if he was a sheep in wolf’s clothing, there was a way to satisfy both her urge to see him and to be with him.

  * * *

  Oscar was weary and beaten as he finally reached his bed at four o’clock in the morning. The debate on The Contagious Diseases Repeal Bill was tomorrow and the talk was prolific and not encouraging. The lords were not going to look favorably upon a repeal, however much he mocked the concept of the act. There was too much concern about the welfare of the sailors and the ‘morality of the Nation’. All evening he’d alternated between the urge to leave for the train station to find out why there had been such a long silence from Sir Thomas about Annie, and to simply return home and beg Emily to come to him. He’d compromised by sending a note to Jones to make further inquiries and leaving his club earlier than he ought.

  He stripped off his clothes by the light of the single candle he’d brought upstairs with him.

  He longed for his wife. His Perfect Lady, Emily. For her lips on his, for the curve of her bottom under his hand. Far from being the beginning of further intimacy, their passion in her parlor had stopped her nighttime visits, as if seeing him in daylight had revealed to her the full horror of what she was doing. She’d stayed away since their coupling in her fern parlor. It had been long, long days without her to look forward to when he finally returned home.

  He’d wanted to stay and spend idle hours helping her with her overabundance of pteridological items. But the clock had reminded him of his other duties. Of who he really was – a man who’d dedicated himself to living in the shadows and manipulating situations from behind a wall of rakishness. It wouldn’t do to spend too much time with his wife.

  Jones hadn’t put out a nightshirt and Oscar couldn’t be fussed to find one. He almost staggered to the bed, blowing out the candle on the way. Slipping into the warm sheets–the servants had done remarkably well with the bedpan–he let the cover fall over his shoulders and stretched out an arm.

  He found plump, soft woman. Tracing a hand across warm skin, he wondered if he was dreaming.

  Emily. She was in his bed again.

  It was like flame to gas. He was instantly awake, amazed, and burning for her.

  He pulled her closer and their mouths met in a hot kiss, her tongue sliding against his. The curve of her hip was seductive, but there was too much fabric over it. He gathered her nightgown, trying to get to her skin, but finding with each attempt an encumbrance of cotton. His cock had risen already, impatient and hard.

  He wanted her soft skin next to his. All the encumbrances of clothing were in the way. Without opening his eyes, he took two fistfuls of cotton and wrenched them apart, ripping the garment from top to bottom.

  She squeaked.

  He was beyond caring if it was a reckless act. Reaching for her naked breasts, he licked at her nipples, dragging the rough stubble of his across her skin.

  Her hands clutched his shoulders and a moan escaped her.

  He held her firm and moved her under him. Holding himself on one arm, he pushed her knees apart so she was fully spread beneath him, every sensitive, trembling part of her unfurled. Even in the dark shadows of his warm bed, she was beautiful. The curls of hair between her legs were downy and he stroked them down with a finger.

  She shivered.

  He dragged over the delicate skin around her secret place. Her quim was a soaking wet heat as he eased first one finger, then two into her snug passage and angled his hand so his thumb was drawing circles over her clitoris.

  She began to pant, and her hips surged under his ministrations. He moved down, leaving kisses on her neck and collarbone, to have better access to her breasts. Every part of her was exquisitely sensitive to his touch. Her other nipple was already puckered in anticipation of his mouth and her breath hitched as he licked the sweet flesh. He could feel slickness, more evidence of her desire, over his fingers as he held her nipple between his teeth and tongued it.

  He shifted onto his elbow to support himself over her, allowing his hand to pinch her other breast, bombarding her with erotic sensation as he reveled in the feel of her skin and her arousal.

  When her thighs fell open a little wider, he took advantage and increased his movement to wide strokes over her clitoris. Then she was clawing at him, sobbing and calling his name as her pussy tensed into his fingers. So quickly, she’d reached her crisis without so much as penetration or effort on his part, coming apart as though she’d been waiting, thinking and wanting him. That made his cock swell further.

  His lust was not well restrained. As she seemed to come-to and reciprocate, caressing him as he smoothed down her sides and thighs, a debauched idea occurred to him.

  One didn’t do such a thing to one’s wife.

  But to a woman in his bed, voluntarily, in the middle of the night… It would be wrong. But then, he’d been wrong his whole life.

  Moving up, he kissed her long and hard. When she let her knees fall open, his hardness nestling into the nook of her legs, he nearly took her invitation. But if she’d wanted something so prosaic as making love with him on top, face to face, she’d have come to him in the evening, when all things were more civilized.

  She wanted him to be untamed and dirty, in the dark of the night.

  “Wife,” he growled. “I want you to suck my cock.”

  The command went through them both like a quake.

  Her breath caught, but he felt her tiny nod as her cheek brushed his.

  He continued up then, deliberately allowing his cock, painfully hard now, to bump against her stomach, then her breasts, then her chin.

  Reaching down, he didn’t need to implore her. She’d already opened her mouth and he slid into perfect softness. Then he was above her, holding himself back so he didn’t choke her. One hand he braced against the head of the bed, the other he tangled in her fine hair, uncaring that he was undoing the braid that held it in place during the night. Her hands came up and cupped his buttocks, urging him deeper and faster into her mouth.

  He couldn’t last long. He didn’t even want to. And instead of climaxing in silence, he whispered how good she felt, how delicious she was, and how much he’d enjoyed her. He told her how much he wanted to fuck her in every position, in every way. He praised every part of her body, from her dainty feet to the crown her head. The words were a stream before he finally came in her mouth.

  He was almost conscious enough to see that she swallowed down his seed, and that sent a secondary thrill from his balls to his core.

  Shifting down the bed, he pulled her into his arms, fitting her bottom against his groin. She let him, her supple body pliant. He breathed in the smell of her, fresh and sweet despite the late hour.

  Tomorrow he’d have to return to subtly dissuading support for the Contagious Diseases Act Repeal and waiting impatiently for a reply from the latest letter he’d sent to Sir Thomas. In the meantime, he’d enjoy the warm feeling of his wife in his arms as he drifted into sleep. In the darkness he could pretend it was just the two them, together.

  * * *

  James gave a low whistle of admiration. “Emily, you are one hell of a shot.” He nodded at the bird, fallen in the distance. “Go on then,” he said to his cocker spaniel, who rushed off to grab the bird.

  She smiled at him, but she knew the smile didn’t reach her eyes.

  “I know you’ll like Alice,” he mused. “She’s utterly adorable. Thanks for being such a sport about it.”

 
“Mmm.” Bile rose in her throat. “Maybe.” She wasn’t a bloody sport about it. He’d betrayed her.

  “Daft dog can’t find it.” He whistled and gestured, but the little black cocker spaniel continued to bounce around in completely the wrong bit of grass, tail wagging merrily. “I’ll bring Alice to hunt day next month.”

  Her chest froze. He couldn’t mean their seasonal hunt day. Not the day, four times a year, where they’d get together to drink and laugh together after a day of whatever hunting was in season at the time: pheasants in autumn, foxes in winter, fishing in spring, and deer in summer. That was their tradition, going back years to when they were children. “Does Alice hunt?”

  “No. She likes crochet or some-such.” He rolled his eyes indulgently, then frowned at his dog, whistling again. He didn’t look at Emily.

  “You’re inviting a someone who doesn’t hunt to our hunt day? We never even have friends or family with us on hunt days. But more importantly, what will she do?”

  “Oh, I thought we’d skip hunting that day,” he said blithely. “We can go for a walk. Not too far, though. She’s not much of a walker.”

  “That’s preposterous. We always hunt.”

  “Don’t be cross. It’s not as if I’m missing your birthday. Bloody hell, that silly dog can’t find it. I can see the dip where it fell. I’ll fetch it.” He strode off into the long grass.

  Emily watched him walk away from her. No. He wasn’t missing a big event, where one person wouldn’t matter. He was wrecking their thing. This was their activity together, and apparently, it meant so little to James that he’d throw away years of friendship, of her love for him and their engagement, to placate some bit of skirt.

  She watched as he beat around in the damp grass, then unsuccessfully called the dog to him to help search.

  After a few minutes, he shrugged and smiled. “I can’t find it. You’ll have to shoot another, prettier one.”

  Another one. A replacement, just like he’d replaced her. As if she were a just a bird, whose plumage was a disposable fashion accessory.