The Earl's Mistress (10 page)

She wore a morning dress of yellow silk and a shawl of paisley wool that looked warm but still elegant.

“Did you not come down last night?” he asked.

She shook her head. “I wanted a bath whilst the water was hot.”

A little irritated, he had risen and gone to the dresser where the breakfast china was kept. “You need to eat,” he said, taking down teacups. “You’re too thin.”

“Rethinking your boney little bargain?” she said dryly.

He turned and cocked one hip on the dresser’s ledge. “By no means,” he said. “I’m merely remarking on the state of your health. Go upstairs to the dining room, Isabella. I’ve got coffee on. I’ll serve you shortly.”

She looked with what he imagined was longing at the battered table. “Might we just stay here?” she asked. “It’s warm by the ovens.”

“It seems somehow inappropriate, given you’re my guest.”

She laughed without humor. “You sound like my mother,” she said. “I was never permitted in the kitchens as a child, even though our cook begged—”

Her words broke off, but he hardly noticed. Indeed, he was hardly listening. Instead he found himself again transfixed by her eyes. In the lamplight they appeared a deep, luminous purple—and filled with a barely veiled sorrow.

What had she just said? He tried to recall and failed.

Instead, he took the cups to the table and put them down. “I spend most mornings here when I haven’t a guest,” he said. “You may suit yourself.”

He went about serving coffee and putting out the food. To his surprise, she ate ravenously. It made him wonder again at her weight. There was no way on God’s earth a woman could eat like that, he decided, and look as she did.

Why had she not been eating? It troubled him.

Damn it, he did not wish to be troubled. He wanted to fuck her.

“Shall I clear?” she asked when they were finished.

“Mrs. Yardley will see to it later,” he said, extracting a small velvet box from the pocket of his dressing gown.

He rose and went to stand behind her. Lifting her hair, he bent over and set his lips to the tender, silken spot where her pulse beat. He heard her breath catch. Need stirred in his loins with a speed that shocked him, and it began at once to throb through his veins.

Rein it back, old boy,
he cautioned,
or it will be your master.

He stood and blew out his breath slowly. “I wanted you to have this,” he said, setting the package down before her, “by way of welcome.”

Isabella did not turn her head to look at him but instead merely lifted the lid. The twenty-carat amethyst brooch glowed with purple fire, the wide fan of pavé diamonds surrounding it ablaze in the lamplight.

Tentatively, she touched one corner of the box. “But why?” she said.

“Because it put me in mind,” he said, “of your eyes.”

She did turn then, her brow furrowed. “But I haven’t . . . done anything yet.”

He smiled at her innocence. “You are going to be my lover,” he said. “And it’s customary for a gentleman to offer his lover gifts to show . . . well, in this case, anticipation.”

The furrow did not clear. “And you just keep such baubles lying about, do you?”

He did not, but he wasn’t about to confess it.

In fact, upon learning the identity of Louisa’s latest acquisition, he’d sent Jervis to purchase the finest collection of amethysts money could buy, and to bring them at once for his careful perusal.

Even now, the rush of raw lust he’d felt reading Mrs. Litner’s letter could make his breath catch. The possibility of having within his grasp the woman whose eyes had begun to haunt his nights kindled in him a level of rapaciousness he would have been loathe to confess.

It should have worried him.

It did worry him, a little.

But Hepplewood was a hardened case, and once he’d scratched that amethyst itch, his lust, his life, and his sleep patterns would, he was confident, simply return to normal.

“Thank you.” Isabella shut the box without touching the stones. “You are beyond generous.”

“As you will be, my dear,” he murmured against her throat.

He let his lips slide down as he drew the tip of his tongue lightly along her skin. He felt her shiver and sunk his teeth into the soft flesh near her collarbone. She made a sound of surprise but tipped her head obediently, as if to grant him access.

“Isabella,” he murmured, “it’s time.”

For an instant—just enough to make him doubt—she hesitated. Then, “Yes,” she whispered.

He slipped a hand under her left breast, cupping it until it nearly spilled from his hand, then lightly thumbed her nipple until it budded.

“Go upstairs,” he said, “and lie down upon the bed. I’ll join you shortly.”

“Yes,” she said, rising at once. “And in which roo—”

“Yours,” he firmly interjected. “Always.”

“Of course,” she said.

Isabella left without looking back. More tellingly, perhaps, she left the brooch lying on the table. Slipping it back in his pocket, Hepplewood went to the narrow staircase to watch the luscious sway of her backside as she made her way up. Impatience bit at him like a fly at the back of his neck.

Waiting last night hadn’t tempered a damned thing, he realized. There was nothing else for it. Hepplewood went alone to his study, locked the door, and did the one thing he had not needed to do since the long, dreadful days of his marriage.

Opening his trousers, he closed his eyes and pleasured himself, jerking violently at his flesh and remembering the sharp sting of Isabella’s hand across his face. And as he did so, he imagined what he meant to do to her in return. How he would twist his hands into that beautiful mane of hair and ride her until she begged—for mercy, for more, or for sweet release; he almost did not care. And when he came, it was in a spasm of pleasure that nearly drew him double.

On a guttural, choking sound, he jerked again, spilling himself into his own hand.

Afterward, when the shaking had drained away, he restored himself to order and went up the second flight of stairs to his suite of rooms, lust already stirring in his loins again.

In keeping with his orders, Isabella lay supine on her bed, looking rather like a candidate for martyrdom.

Watching her, he shucked off his robe and toed off his slippers.

“Get up,” he said quietly, holding out his hand.

She pulled her knees round in an almost girlish fashion, then scrabbled to the end of the bed. He drew her to her feet and stroked the backs of his fingers down the hollow of her cheek. Her eyes dropped half shut, her nostrils flaring faintly.

Though Isabella likely did not know it, he mused, she was in the prime of her need. And he wanted very much to make her aware of that fact.

Dropping his hand, he began methodically to undress her. He did not expect much resistance. She seemed docile—and, he soon realized, appropriately dressed for the occasion.

He pushed the shawl from her shoulders and let it slither to the floor. Slipping his hand behind, he unbuttoned the yellow dress, then drew his thumbs around the neckline, pulling it down.

Beneath it she wore a gossamer chemise and a well-boned, strapless corset—one made, he was pleased to see, for a lover’s eye, cut enticingly low to cup beneath her breasts and thrust them high. The attire surprised him, and he wondered, fleetingly, if her late husband had required her to wear such things.

And on the heels of that thought came a stab of jealousy, sudden and explosive. Angrily, he bit it back, breathed deep, and forced his attention to her nearly bare flesh. Isabella’s gaze was uneasy, her embarrassment acute.

He ignored it; there was no cure for modesty save to push her ruthlessly past it.

Beneath the chemise, he could see her round, apricot-colored nipples, still unaroused. Thus challenged, Hepplewood set a firm hand between her shoulder blades and bent his head to suckle her. She drew in a sharp breath when his mouth closed over her, and a little tremble shuddered through her.

“Should . . . should I have worn less?” she murmured.

“Wear what you please,” he whispered against her wet flesh, “unless I instruct you otherwise.”

“Y-yes,” she said.

“I like that word,” he replied, cutting a glance up at her. “You’re using it often, I notice.”

“I wish to please you,” she said softly. “I’ve given my word. You must tell me, my lord, if I do not give satisfaction.”

He laughed and pressed his teeth hard into the tip of her nipple. When she cried out, he moved to the other breast, his hand roaming low to shape the swells of her buttocks. When the chemise was clinging wetly to both nipples, he deftly unhooked the bone busk and pushed her corset away.

The chemise followed, floating up and over her head and sending her silken hair cascading back down, one long curl catching across her damp breast. They were small, and her ribs almost painfully apparent, but on the whole, she was still the most sensual creature he’d ever laid eyes upon.

“Isabella, the mere sight of you gives satisfaction,” he said, yanking hard at the tie of her drawers. “But we have unfinished business, you and I.”

“Unfinished business?” The beautiful brow furrowed again.

“Turn your back,” he said. “Bend toward the bed, and roll down your stockings.”

Her face was already pink with embarrassment, but to her credit, she did so.

His mouth went instantly dry, and he seemed unable to swallow. For all that Isabella was too thin, the creamy swell of her arse was the stuff of a man’s fantasy. He allowed himself the luxury of setting both hands to it, weighing the plump globes in his palms, and slipping his fingertips into the sweet cleft between.

Shocked by the sudden intimacy, Isabella caught herself on the mattress, bracing her hands wide. “W-what are you doing?” she said over her shoulder.

For an instant, he hesitated, but the temptation was too much. “You struck me, Isabella,” he said very softly. “That day at Loughford. Do you remember?”

“Y-yes,” she said, her voice very small. “I’m sorry.”

“Are you?”

“Very.” As if sensing what was about to happen, Isabella shifted nearer the bed.

Lashing an arm round her waist, he yanked her back a little roughly and smacked her hard across her buttocks. She cried out and half turned, eyes shying wildly.

“Don’t move,” he growled. “Did you like that, Isabella?”

Obediently, she turned back. “No,” she said huskily, “but I . . . I deserved it, I suppose.”

“Yes,” he said, “and then some.”

He turned his attention to his night tables. They were a matched pair set on delicately turned legs, the interiors bespeaking the hand of an exquisitely skilled French craftsman. Hepplewood gave the upper cabinet a little push. With a mechanical
snick!
it spun on its axis a quarter turn to reveal a drawer that opened from the hidden side.

He pushed a latch concealed in the satinwood banding, and the drawer slid open. Isabella watched warily, cutting a sidelong glance at the fitted velvet interior. Carefully he lifted out the few items he meant to use, then selected a slender leather crop.

She drew in a deep breath and opened her mouth as if to protest, but immediately shut it again. His hand, he noted, had drawn a pink rush of blood to her bottom.

“We have to get through this, Isabella, you and I.” Hepplewood drew the tip of the leather between his fingers. “Don’t ever raise your hand to me again. Not unless I tell you to.”

“No, I-I won’t,” she choked. “And I
wouldn’t have,
but you—”

He snapped the little crop across her backside, causing her to yelp and jerk upright.

“Set your palms back atop the mattress,” he said calmly, “or I can bind you. Would you like that, Isabella?”

“I . . . I don’t think so.” Shaking a little now, she set her hands wide on the counterpane, bending forward at the waist to do so.

“You might be surprised, my pet.” He trailed one fingertip down the delicate arch of her spine and felt her skin prickle. “I can teach you. Some women enjoy it vastly.”

“I
wouldn’t,
” she whispered, “b-but if it’s what you wi—”

He gave her another snap, making her jerk, the soft orbs of her arse trembling.

“That stung!” she said.

“It should,” he said, striking her again. “You need to learn a lesson, Isabella. But it won’t sting for long, I promise.”

Then, tucking the crop under his arm, he stroked his hands soothingly down her buttocks, circled lightly, then urged them a little apart.

“Wh-what are you doing?” she whispered.

“
Deciding,
” he said gruffly. “And don’t ask a third time, my dear, or you mightn’t like the result.”

The truth was, he realized, he wanted suddenly to push himself inside; to work himself deep beyond that tight barrier to invade her in that most carnal of ways. It was not his general habit, but it was the safest way for a man to take his pleasure. And with an arse like that . . .

Still, Isabella was far from ready for that sort of erotic adventure. And he was not, he hoped, a cruel man.

Musing upon it, he extracted the crop and struck her twice more—just hard enough to pink the skin, not welt it. Isabella jumped, then sniffled a little pitifully.

“Would you like something to ease the sting?” he suggested, drawing one finger down her cleft. “You haven’t yet learned to savor this, my darling. Shall I pour you a brandy?”

“I would like you to
stop,
” Isabella gritted. “I don’t know what you want. Do you want me to beg you? Is that it?”

He laid the crop down beside her hand and cupped his body around hers. Bending over her, his chest pressed to her shoulder blades, he set his lips to her ear.

“I would love you to beg,” he said, drawing one finger through her thatch of curls, then probing deeper, “but only if you want this. Shall I make you
learn
to want it, Isabella?”

“I—I
don’t know
!” she said, her chest falling.

Her hands were still splayed on her mattress, her head hanging. Lifting his knee, Hepplewood nudged her legs wider, giving his fingers access. He slipped one into her soft folds, gingerly probing.