Love Reclaimed (5 page)

The next couple of nights he spent attending balls and afternoon recitals in search of perspective brides. Keeping to his promise, he spoke with some of the girls who had debuted a few years earlier. He could not stomach courting the young girls out for their first season. He sought a wife not a broodmare despite Marie’s notion he must carry on the family name.

He decided to attempt to court one of the ladies, a sweet-toned, plain girl who seemed eager to please. Miss Felicia Blackstone was no great beauty, but she had proven kind and generous in the few meetings they had and he hoped he could manage courting her without hurting her if it did not work out. He feared he’d already lost his heart to Marie.

***

The next day, he appeared at noon to escort Marie for a walk. She agreed because of the unfashionable and early hour he suggested, and they were limiting their jaunt to Maple Park near The Market. As they strolled, he sought the words to tell her he had held up his end of the contract. It seemed odd to him to be assuring one woman he courted another.

“Marie, I wanted to tell you I have begun courting a young lady as you stipulated in the contract. I am taking her out for a drive later this afternoon during the fashionable hour.” Her body stiffened next to his for the briefest of moments. Certainly that had been his imagination.

“I am happy to hear that, my Lord. I hope you continue to do so in earnest. It is for the best.” She gazed up at him with such longing it caught him off guard.

Hope bloomed in his chest. “Marie, if you decide to cancel that clause of the contract please feel free to inform me. I will gladly cease looking among the debutants for a wife.”

“No. No. You must continue,” she assured him as they arrived at the front door of The Market. “Thank you for the afternoon stroll. When might I expect you again?”

His heart leaped with the knowledge she wanted to see him again. “Tonight. I will be here at eight again. Until then.” He raised her hand, but at the last moment turned her palm up and planted the kiss there. With a tiny flame of hope flickering in his heart, he departed.

Bloody hell
! Marie couldn’t credit that she’d actually asked him when he would be coming to see her again. Foolish woman. He did not belong to her, nor would he ever. He deserved better, and he needed an heir whether he would admit it or not. More importantly, she refused to be courted out of some misguided sense of guilt for not having been there when fate and her father forced her down this path.

Apparently, the time had come to cease the kid-glove treatment and prove to him she had become far too cynical to make him a good wife. She needed to counteract the damage her wayward tongue had caused as they parted. In her chamber, she strolled to her toy chest and lifted the lid. Over the years, she had collected a number of strange and very useful objects designed to enhance sexual pleasure while also being quite beautiful to view. Reaching into her box, she withdrew a smaller one that held the companion piece to the cock ring she had introduced to Heartfield during their last interlude. Opening the hand carved square, she pulled out the exquisite phallus one of her protectors had gifted her with. Made of Chinese jade with a dragonhead carved at the base, the other end consisted of a few inches of smooth stone that mushroomed at the tip replicating a penis. The dragon, worn to rounded edges from a few thousand years of use, remained a beautiful piece.

How would Heartfield feel about adding this to their bed play? Would it shock him more than the cock ring had? She certainly hoped so once she showed him how she preferred it to be used. She smiled thinking of the surprise she planned to deal him and in anticipation of where the night would go should he prove to be game. Putting the toy away, she decided a hearty lunch was in order and then a nap.

If all went well, she would be awake into the wee hours of the morning.

By seven, Marie struggled to control her nervous energy. She alternated between pacing her office and shuffling the papers on her desk. In another hour, she would be a simpering idiot if she didn’t settle down. Deciding a stiff drink would be helpful, she poured herself a finger of whiskey and tossed it back. After a few moments, the burning settled into her belly and the warmth radiated out from there. She relaxed enough the next hour seemed far more bearable than the previous one had.

She returned to her desk and focused on reviewing the week’s expenses while she waited. As the clock in the foyer chimed eight times, a knock sounded at her door. He had arrived. Rising, Marie shook out her skirts and paused before a mirror to check her coiffure. Not a hair dared to be out of place, so she made her way into the salon. There she found Heartfield waiting at the bar. Handsome as always, he dressed in somber black and gray. His mask hid his face, but she would have known him from twenty paces on a foggy night by the way he carried himself. His shoulders back, head high, he displayed a proud but not cocky tilt of his chin.

“Good evening, my Lord.” Executing the perfect curtsey, she displayed a dazzling amount of cleavage. It amazed even her she did not spill from the neckline; it cut so low.

“Good evening, Madame.” His expert bow over her hand allowed him to breathe in the dab of perfume she had traced between her breasts earlier.

“Would you prefer to remain in company for a bit or retire to our private room?” Her breath hitched as she waited to see if her torment would end or be extended far longer than she thought she might manage.

“You are the one I am here to see; please lead me astray.” The seductive smile he displayed both excited and worried her. This side of him not one she experienced as a girl, but a part of the man she must learn.

“You flatter me, my Lord.” Heat pooled between her legs in response to his words and rather obvious desire to be alone. Upon reaching the room, he followed her in and locked the door behind them. She poured their usual drinks, brandy for him and Madeira for herself. They settled by the fire to begin their night in what was becoming their ritual. First they discussed their days and then drifted on to their respective histories.

“Where did you find the cock ring? Aside from the pleasant side effects, it is quite beautifully made.” The amber liquid swirled around the bowl of his snifter.

“A protector gave it to me as a gift. It is part of a set he claimed were used in ancient Chinese fertility rituals.” A low chuckle escaped.

“You doubt his claim?” His brow winged up in curiosity.

“I am no scholar, but I know a sexual implement when I see one.” Rising, she retrieved the matching jade dildo from the box on the bed and presented it to him. “Now explain, if you will, what a dildo has to do with fertility.”

He looked at her and then at the bauble in his hands. Marie waited for the next obvious question.

“I suppose from a scientific perspective we would need to assess the number of times you became with child after using one or both of the implements.” He eyed her with a charming leer.

“Never.” She sipped her wine to steady her nerves. This part of the evening would take a turn for the worse or the adventurous.

“And how often have you used this particular device?” The husky note in his voice skittered across her skin, puckering her nipples.

“I have easily lost count.” Her legs gave out amid her nerves and desire, and she sat in her chair.

“Mmm.” He paused considering the hunk of mineral he held. “And you are sure you used it correctly?”

The time had come. The moment of truth. “It is difficult to use it incorrectly as it can go almost anywhere you choose to insert it.”

His gaze jerked up from the device. Confusion flashed first until it dawned on him what she meant, then surprise, followed by curiosity. The various emotions crossing his face spoke volumes about his life experience and his determination to accept her as she was. It would seem things were going to take the adventurous route in lieu of the abrupt ending she half expected.

“And you have used this other than in the traditional sense?” His throat sounded parched beyond reason as his words rasped out.

“I have and I enjoyed it.” She paused letting the tension crackle in the air as the silence drew out. “I could show you.”

He nodded, despite his obvious shock, and he gave every appearance of being excited at the naughty prospect. Rising from their chairs, they each stripped off their garments.

He undid her laces, placing kisses along the way as he revealed each bit of flesh. Little shivers of bliss rippled over her skin in his wake. Both nude, they stretched out on the bed. The toy lay on the nightstand as they kissed and petted. He eased his hand between her legs and stroked her sensitive tissues until she writhed in his arms. He retracted his seeking fingers to reach for the jade piece, but paused to look at her in question. She rolled to her other side, produced a jar of salve from the dildo’s box on the side table, and opened the lid. With the thick, oily substance she coated first the colorful mineral and then reached around and coated her rear entrance.

“It has been a while so you need to ease it in slowly. I will tell you when to stop and when you can press deeper.” She smiled at him over her shoulder in encouragement.

The mushroomed tip of the stone nudged against her backside. The tight muscle resisted the initial invasion. “More pressure,” she said.

He pressed harder, even as he dropped kisses along her shoulder, and the head slipped past the ring. She drew a deep breath in and exhaled as he continued to press it deeper. “Hold.” Her body shook with the pleasure pain crests as her anal passage adjusted.

“This is hurting you.” He reversed directions, withdrawing it.

She fumbled behind her to still his hand. “No. It feels good, but I need to adjust to it. I have not been breached there in a rather long time.” Another moment passed. “Now, press it deeper.”

Reluctant, his hand remained motionless until she wiggled back against the phallus trying to impale herself farther. At last he drove it in as far as it could go and she gasped, her body rippling around the jade cock as her pussy pulsed with emptiness. He pulled the implement out. Then with no additional direction, and using a smooth motion, he slid it back in causing her to moan in pleasure.

Damn him for a fast learner.

His hand worked it in and out of her body as though he had been doing it for years. “Stop.” Her breathless plea came as she neared the precipice. “I want to feel you inside me with this in my bum. Please, I have never had the chance to—”

“On your knees.” A glance over her shoulder revealed him pausing to sheath himself with a skin before he moved behind her. He held the tip of his cock to her damp folds and dragged up and down her slit. Then, with a languorous shove he sank his cock deep into her pussy.

The unique sensation of fullness from both him and the phallus had her trembling as intense waves of pleasure buffeted her body. When he shifted the dildo deeper into her backside she physically shook with the carnality. “Take my cock,” he demanded grabbing a fistful of hair and slamming into her core. His free hand worked the jade in and out opposite of his thrusts.

“God that feels good.” He groaned as the green rod slid over his cock in the opposite direction. His shock and surprise were replaced with overwhelming sensation. Her silky warmth wrapped around him, while the hardness of the stone contrasted against the softness of her body. Her inner muscles clenched around him, and he decided to try a different rhythm. He drew the phallus out and reversed direction so he entered her sweet pussy in a dual plunge. She gasped at the sensation, as did he. The feeling like nothing he had ever experienced. Soon the pace increased as she pushed backward into his thrusts, and he met her stroke for stroke with his cock and the toy.

When she came, he could only compare it to watching a roman candle explode up close. He pumped into her working both channels until he joined her in final ecstasy. His orgasm rocketed into her with more force than he could remember since being a young man. In short, it was the most incredible sexual experience in his entire life. She amazed, even mesmerized.

She pulled away from him and the stone and proceeded to again tidy him up, remove the sheath, and whisk the bauble away for cleaning. She paraded around in the buff much to his delight. “You have the most delectable backside, Marie.”

“Why, Heartfield, I had no idea you were partial to a woman’s rump.” She flashed a coquettish smile and disappeared behind the screen in the corner of the room. When she emerged a few moments later she brought a rag and some water over to the bed. She sat and bathed his penis. “So, how are things going with your Miss Harrod? Might she be an appropriate new wife?”

“I’d prefer not to discuss my courtship of another woman with you while nude. In particular, we should not do so while you are handling my cock.” He repressed the urge to growl at her.

Marie sighed. “Very well, but I expect to hear if she will be suitable soon. You are not getting any younger.”

“Well, now that you have reduced me to my dotage perhaps you might like to also emasculate me?” He shot her a baleful glare.

“I did not intend to….” A pretty pink suffused her face as she tried to recover her composure. Then he ruined the whole effect and chuckled as he watched her reaction. “Why you insufferable man! You shouldn’t tease a body like that.”

“But I do so enjoy teasing your body.” He grabbed the damp cloth from her and tossed it aside as he tumbled her back to the bed. “I’ll show you who isn’t getting any younger.”

Chapter Four

Jonathan climbed down from his phaeton and cringed. His entire body ached from his exploits with Marie the night before. Of course, she would never know that little truth. Bad enough she teased him about being old, heaven forbid she discovered the truth of those words. Straightening up to his full height, he tossed a coin to the boy holding his reins and climbed the steps to the overstated abode of Sir and Lady Blackstone. A baronet, he sought to have his daughter marry up both in title and wealth, which made Jonathan a good prospect.