My Lady Compelled
By Shirl Anders
Smashwords Edition, My Lady Compelled, published by Shirl Anders/ Allure Books
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Copyrighted©2000 by Shirl Anders.
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Blurb: erotic regency, m/f. The 1st novella from Shirl Anders in her continuing erotic Regency series, the Archangel’s. Meet our Lady St. John who is bought from a scandalous “wife’s sale” by her first beau and now former ex-spy, the Duke of Kittridge.
My Lady Compelled
By Shirl Anders
Chapter One
Drummond Penhurst, Duke of Kittridge, relaxed in the lavishly furnished gaming salon of his country manor as he regarded the five gentlemen seated around the table. The game was Monte and these five men, chiefly including himself, compromised one of England's most successful spying circuits in the last forty years. The fact that he had been the administrator of this notable spying venture brought him satisfaction. The fact that it no longer existed with Napoleon's demise, brought him feelings of restlessness that he had seldom before encountered.
Their illustrious code name had been Hellagon. Regardless, the clandestine people in the offices at Thirteen Whipple Street had called them surreptitiously as the Queen's Archangels. The pretentious naming had adhered and until the last throes of Napoleon's demise, one needed only mention the Archangels on French soil to obtain a pale and fearful reaction. Yes, Drummond considered pragmatically, he had done his job with skill and even exceedingly artful at times, managing over the years to deliver them through alive. Barely.
His gaze flicked casually to Harrison, the reclusive Earl of Ravenscar and the only man present who was near to his own middle age. Together, he and Harrison had operated in the macabre world of espionage for more than eight years. His gaze followed the movement of Harrison's leather gloved hands, dealing the next round. Harrison's hands were perpetually gloved now, hiding the acid burns from their last spying operation gone array, just as Harrison's voice was now a permanent rasp from those same acid fumes.
Damnation, Drummond cursed silently. He had nearly lost Harrison in that last fateful debacle. He still questioned seriously who had betrayed their team. Who was it that had nearly cost Harrison his life and had cost Radford the Duke of Sutherlin one eye and Brynmore, Baron of Duneagan the hearing in one ear?
He felt every day since that time that he had better find the traitor before Harrison did. Harrison was set for his own style of dark vengeance and it was nearly as if Harrison knew who the betrayer was. Nevertheless, he reflected, it was unlike Harrison not to confide in him if he did indeed know. And all of this coming to pass well over a year before, so now it seemed to him like so much muddied water beneath the proverbial bridge.
What in the hell, he wondered, for the hundredth time since his return to England, did a master spy do with his life after the intrigue of espionage was no longer viable because of peace time? It appeared to him that he had arranged his life a bit too well around his spying efforts. His one and only wife had passed away several years before he had taken up the cause of spying, but not before she had given him the prerequisite heir and one daughter.
His son, Samuel, was a fine man and everything but the Duke of Kittridge in name. Samuel administered all the sundry ducal concerns with a firm hand and intelligent mind, having done so for several years now. His daughter, Tabitha, was married with a child of her own and a life completely established well without his presence. Neither of them had need of a slightly jaded, retired spy gumming up their well-ordered lives. So what did men of his age and accomplishments do, finding themselves very well unneeded at all turns and certainly not interested in the frippery of London's ‘ton'.
Hmm, he mulled as he tapped his fingers on the armrest of his chair, while he surveyed the men around him once again. It was quite clear that the gentlemen surrounding him also needed some type of settling. Not that he would consider, especially for the younger men, the possibility of foisting a wife on each of them. However, with the others injuries, there was also Saxonhurst, Marquess of Hartely's hand lost to cannon fire and Wyndham, Earl of Hawkenge's bad leg caught by shrapnel at Waterloo.
So he pondered soberly that all of his companions, well including himself, had definite needs of settling, perhaps there was a purpose yet. He would have to consider it. However, just then Harrison raised the ante and he turned his ear to the waggish conversation around him.
"I would favor a woman with the attributes of a courtesan for my wife, gentlemen, if you must know," Wyndham replied, somewhat defensive, to Radford's question.
Wyndham had gone to war, an idealistic young man and returned world-weary, but tightly honed, Drummond thought, as he watched the gilded-haired man propping his injured leg up on the brocade stool provided by his chair. Perhaps they all had, Drummond mused.
"You clearly have no one to answer to except yourself, Wyndham," Radford said, dropping some of his sardonic veneer that went with his piratical, black satin eye patch. "What with your brother and his wife killed by way of that carriage accident, while we were all dancing the minuet of Napoleon's demise." Radford turned his one startling light blue eye balefully on Wyndham. "I do imagine that you are required to produce an heir for your title, and what a deliciously wicked idea . . . to take a whore for a wife."
"I surely understand the man's need to be carrying on his family line by marrying," Brynmore interrupted. "In your position you canna do no less," he finished with a firm tug of the red and black tartan, tossed over his shoulder as if to emphasize family pride. No one in the group had more familial pride than the Scottish, Laird Duneagan, especially after the loss of nearly all the Duneagan's clan at Waterloo.
Radford sharply turned his vivid blue eye over the table at the Scottish Baron, then resumed his interrupted speech. "And, I must admit that I would rather have an intelligent tart in my bed for the next thirty years . . . if I were to choose wisely."
"It should be possible to find," Harrison rasped, sweeping the group with his brooding, black-eyed gaze. "Somewhere among all of the prissy and frigid daughters of our peers. There has to be a few worth training to a man's needs. The crux of the matter is not to mount the mare while searching."
"No cock in the pussy," Drummond mused.
"Exactly," Harrison replied in his raspy voice. "Last card," he added to those around the table in general.
"Really," Saxonhurst chuckled sadly. "Harrison, you are too ruthless at this game for my innocence," he added as he tossed his cards down conceding Harrison's win.
Drummond casually watched Saxonhurst maneuvering the silver hook that replaced his hand with dexterity as Saxonhurst took up the next shuffle. It was an amazing feat after only a year of dealing with the missing limb.
"Still, gentlemen," Saxonhurst continued in his pensive way. "The ladies of our esteemed 'ton' are very unlikely to offer forth any sort of courtesan persona. If only they understood that life is too short not to indulge in full-blooded passion from the very beginning of their tender ages. Then by admitting that they do have the capacity of heated passions, they would secure their husbands to them more tightly."
"What cause would any man have for a mistress outside of his marriage if he had a hot-blooded woman at home in his bed?" Wyndham asked, seriously intent.
"Think of the trouble to be spared the families lives, his wife, and their children, if a man was not driven to take up a wee doxie on the side. Those lasses can be a bit of trouble as many times as not," Brynmore observed.
"What man does not dream of a passionate woman as his sole possession?" Drummond mused. "The facts are, gentlemen, that if you discover a lady with potential, it is for you to exploit it because the lady will never admit to herself the baser instincts that could control her. Unless the man teaches her inexorably otherwise."
"Speaking from experience?" Harrison asked with a hedonistic glean in his ebony eyes.
"It is no mystery that I am the only man here who has been married," Drummond replied easily. "I have incurred two such errors in my life along this very line. With my wife it was understandable, for it was an arranged marriage. Even still, with the wisdom that I have now gained, I do believe even that very proper lady could have been turned to more passionate natures if I had simply proscribed to put my wit and intelligence into the matter."
"Put forth as much effort into making your wife your mistress as you put into plotting Napoleon's fall?" Radford quipped with sarcasm.
"Exactly," Drummond replied. "I know now that the feat could be well accomplished with, ah, shall we say, firm resolve and a masterful plan. I aver, gentlemen, that most women need us to thrust through their inbred moral objections and show them the way." He paused and held forward his glass of amber colored whiskey as if in toast. "They would applaud us in the end."
"Here-Here," Brynmore announced, raising his glass. "Here is to wiping away all the lasses' inhibitions."
"Here-Here," Radford followed. "And to instructing them each intimately on their passionate natures."
"Here-Here," Wyndham offered intently. "And, to provoking each of them into hot-blooded courtesans."
"And to showing them that life is too short not to be enjoyed to the fullest." Saxonhurst toasted with solemn brown eyes.
"Now," Harrison rasped as he finished toasting the last decree. "Here is to discovering the second woman in Drummond's tale and I could be just patriarchal enough to remember the lady's name."
Drummond gave Harrison a calculating glare, as he drawled, "Really, Ravenscar?" Harrison nodded in the sublimely venomous way that he had. It was a product of his deadly assassination skills, Drummond supposed.
"The Lady Gabriella St. John, if I recall correctly," Harrison replied in a hoarse whisper, pausing to take a sip of his whiskey. "You were quite young and enthralled, I am told."
"I certainly place you too well, Harrison, to find that lady's name from my past a coincidence from your mouth," Drummond observed, feeling a heightened sense of awareness strum along his nerve endings. He had not heard the lady's name spoken in more than twenty-five years. However, he had never forgotten . . .
"Her husband, Lord Reginald, proposes to sell her," Harrison conveyed. "A wife's sale. You have heard of these sales in the lower classes before, I'm sure."
"I see," Drummond uttered through his throat gone suddenly dry. He was shocked and for a man who seldom let anything unravel him, this came perilously close to doing just that. He leaned forward, snuffing out his expensive cigar. "It appears, gentlemen, that I have some unexpected business to which I must attend. Stay as long as you will and, Harrison, I do thank you for finally arriving at the point of your suggested gathering this evening."
Then as Drummond strode from the salon, he heard Harrison's last toast. "Here-Here, gentlemen. Here is to finding that right woman."
Chapter Two
"I cannot believe you did this, Lord Kittridge. S-Saved me! I-I . . . thank you, Drummond." Gabriella St. John voiced demurely, appearing very near to grateful tears.
"Do not thank me, Lady St. John," Drummond uttered curtly.
"B-But, I . . . this is all so embarrassing. I just don't know quite what to say, I . . ."
Drummond interrupted her misconception ruthlessly. "You, my lady, shall remove your clothes for me now. And say nothing."
"Drummond!"
"Let us not be hypocrites, madame. You are now mine, completely and without recourse, to do with as I please." He paused in vibrant tension. "Do you refute this, madame?"
"No, I . . . No, you know that I cannot!" Gabriella cried, obviously more shaken than she had already been.
"Then, I shall see what I have purchased, madame," he continued, relentless. "Now!"
"You have become an arrogant beast, Lord Kittridge," Gabriella exclaimed, appearing more furious and embarrassed now as she tossed her mink muffler onto the wing chair in his study along with her trim mink hat to follow. She eyed him uncertainly through beautiful violet colored eyes, apparently gauging his resolve in this most daring scene, and then she cried, "I certainly could not begrudge you the entire twenty-thousand pounds that it cost you to purchase me!"
Her white gloves came off next, furiously following the mink accessories. "Just what do you intend to do with me?" she exclaimed as her shaking fingers worked on the black pearl buttons of her fashionable silk walking dress. "Make me into your whore," she panted as the dove gray dress slid to her slippered feet and she shuttered in fevered distress. "How you must hate me to do this," she despaired in obvious anguish, jerking down her petticoats one by one, until she stood in only her cream-colored, gauzy camisole.
Drummond saw at once that she was still exquisite after all these years. Infinitely more so dressed in an utterly feminine camisole. The camisole covered only to her creamy-colored upper thighs above her silk stockings held in place by frilly garters of violet satin. The lacy top edge of the camisole dipped into the sultry curves of her magnificent bosom, showing her pink nipples clearly outlined against the fragile silk. She was sumptuous with her auburn hair and purply colored eyes, little did her contemptible husband realize, but he would have paid ten times as much to have her.
"Come here to me, madame, now!" Drummond commanded. Completely ignoring Gabriella's questions and tirade as he reclined imperiously in his high-backed leather chair behind the desk in his study.
"Answer me!" Gabriella exclaimed indignant, even as she came forward with faltering steps. She only tiptoed to the edge of his desk, with one of her hands attempting ridiculously to cover her ample breasts, while the other scrunched between her perfect thighs. He could see the pulse beating wildly in the hollow of her slender throat.
"I do not have to answer to you for anything, madame. It is you, who are now fully and completely beneath my proprietorship." Drummond reached forward.
"Oh, you-you," Gabriella squealed as he clasped her wrist, hauling her unceremoniously into his lap with her back plastered to his chest.
"There is nothing for you to do, madame, . . . no place for you to go." Drummond moved his hand then with bold rapaciousness. He slid his fingers beneath Gabriella's camisole to aggressively capture in his hand her hot flushed little pussy, while she tried instantly to clench her legs together, eliciting a strangled screech.
Then, he uttered harshly. "You may not abandon me this time. You must submit!"
"Oh, I will escape you-you, arrogant bastard!" Gabriella cried, trying to struggle from beneath his arm clamped around her slender waist, while his fingers dipped, relentless into the hot, moist lips of her sex, making her gasp loudly in denial.
Suddenly Drummond's fingers halted their exploring motion as Gabriella's final words registered in his mind and he released her just as quickly. "Go then! Back to your husband. Now, madame," he snapped.
Gabriella braced her hands upon his arms to peer back over her shoulder at him. "You know that I cannot . . . he has everything. I-I."
"The streets then, madame, I care not!"
"B-But . . . there is nowhere for me to go."
"Precisely, madame." Drummond allowed his gaze to burn with demand into Gabriella's. "Spread your legs for me now! Place them up and over mine."
"I shall hate you . . . I-I,"
"We shall see," Drummond replied intently as Gabriella turned her gaze forward, and then collapsed upon his chest, raising her legs, so slowly . . . faltering, up over his.
Drummond relaxed then. He had routed the first major skirmish and he did intend to win the entire battle. The woman in his arms was everything that he had ever dreamed her to be. Soft, feminine, and gracefully feisty, although she had no chance. Who would have ever thought in the grand continuum of life's events that he would be given this second singular chance? He never questioned the mores of God's greatest design. More appropriate, he molded those events to his own design. But this time . . . This time, lent him nearly to believe in divine providence.
Gabriella's shapely curves trembled where they settled over his muscular frame. Her breathing was agitated, her soft brunette hair tickled his throat from where her head moved, restless beneath his chin. Nonetheless, she struggled no more when he placed both of his palms flatly onto the gossamer flesh of her shivering inner thighs.
"What will you do to me?" she moaned, with a helpless whisper. Still, she did not fight his hands presence . . . nor their right to be there.
Intent, Drummond did not answer her . . . and he would not for a long time to come. Instead, he inhaled deeply, catching the fragrances of light orange blossoms mixed with lavender in her hair, and then the scent of hot woman's flesh beneath it all. All the while, his palms stroked upward, caressing her tender creamy flesh, following the inner curve of her thighs. Spreading her thighs open wider to expose her voluptuous apex.
"Drummond," she whimpered in a renewed attempt of maidenly protest that fell far short, because it sounded more like a mincing purr, as her flesh beneath his palms quivered and tensed.
"I should have a mirror placed to view you," Drummond murmured wickedly into her ear as his fingertips slid into the dewy, hot crease of her femininity. "I should shave these damp little curls away to see."
"Oh! You shouldn't do-!" she gasped on a throaty squeal.
"The next time I shall, madame," Drummond murmured as he parted the steamy folds of her pussy with his fingers, baring the fragile pearl that he sought. "We shall both watch you writhe just for me."
Aggressively, Drummond flicked his second finger over Gabriella's hot, protruding clitoris. That little bud that he bared to his assault. Instantly causing her to quake, then shiver as she mewled. "I shan't . . . I've never. N-No one has ever touched me, like . . ."
The last of her verse was lost within an involuntary squeal as Drummond rubbed his finger greedily over her thrusting and swollen flesh, using a blatant and sensuous rhythm. He wondered briefly at what she tried to disclaim, then shrugged it aside. He would be a fool to believe that she had not reached a climax at her age. Saints, she had been married for twenty-five years, it was unimaginable that the lady had not . . .
"Oh my god, Drummond," Gabriella mewled, clearly involuntarily as she squirmed on his hard thighs with delicious shivers running through her voluptuous body. Now she was industriously seeking his fingers motion with uplifting and sultry motions of her own.
Drummond allowed himself a satisfied smile. He was secure in the knowledge that Gabriella could not see the momentary crack in his polished veneer, as he used his other hand to finger the juicy, swollen flesh around her succulent vagina. One heady and exploratory roam around this tender circular opening and he speared his second finger straight into her tight sheath. She cried out, arching upward, seating his finger firmly with frenzied, honey-filled gasps escaping her throat.
All of his thoughts were ungodly lustful at how tight and provocative she was as he began to ambitiously fuck her with his finger . . . one . . . then two, while she cried out incoherent and quivered dangerously close to her summit. Her pale knees rose upward, spreading outward toward each armrest with increased expectancy as he inhaled the musky scent of her submission to him.
His control tottered on a fissure as a surge of lustful intent swept through his rigid control for a moment. He was hard . . . he had been hard this entire time, but now his shaft throbbed, demanding to be master. He battled for several straining moments with his cock's lust, as he aggressively dipped his fingers in and out of seeping heaven. But his willpower was victorious in the end . . . as always. Later perhaps, he would be surprised at his loss of control, but for now, he only wished to fulfill a private dream and with his control in check, he settled back to relish this lifetime's fulfillment.
Gabriella's mind fractured, just as her loins exploded into star bursting rapture. She could not control her body's spasms. She did not want to! She only desired to yield and follow the convulsing tide of pleasure as Drummond's wicked-wicked fingers continued to move inside her. Stroking her, while she moaned embarrassingly out of control. Unable to catch her breath, she heard Drummond's husky aristocratic voice command.
"Again."
She was fire. An impassioned body of flesh and bone to be molded to this arrogant man's whims. But he had the right to be arrogant, she thought incoherently, with his devilish fingers. He had a right to be anything that she could beg him for!
"Oh, Drummond," she whimpered, caught within the throes of passion, for the first time in her life.
"Yes," Drummond whispered in a throaty tenor against her ear, while his wide hand curved inward, cupping over her loins and taking her entire plumpness, possessively into his hand. She arched her loins upward, shamelessly against his palm as he stroked and rubbed her womanhood decadently with his fingers once again. This time her body eagerly encouraged him with undulations of its own, gnawing to feel that incredible bliss of rampant release that was ruling her now beneath its newest awakenings.
She could not think that she lay, straddled scandalously, backward over this man and exposed completely to the room . . . to him. Mindless, she wished her pompous and cruel husband could see her now, finding passion in a man's arms, writhing brazenly for this man's touch.
"Ah-ah . . . Oh, god," she cried, twisting beneath the rapid flicking of Drummond's fingers, deep in the swollen folds of her sex.
"I shall have you this way, madame, anytime that pleases me," Drummond averred into her ear. "Anyplace that I wish it."
"Ah . . . ah . . . Drummond," she whimpered, clutching Drummond's thick wrists in abandon.
"Bent over my desk, madame. In my carriage or at my dinner table. You will yield your pussy to my hand, my mouth, anything that I desire," he murmured, hitching her up higher on his lap with his arm beneath her breasts as his fingers continued to tattoo a dance in the folds of her womanhood.
"Oh-h-h . . . ," Gabriella cried, tottering once again on the molten summit.
"Yes, sweet lady," Drummond rasped. "Give me your passion . . . let me feel it, Gabriella."
Gabriella sobbed Drummond's name as the passion rippled through her, stronger and more intense this time. Shaking her very limbs! Tears streamed down her cheeks as she gasped at the raw pleasure, twisting . . . tickling . . . bursting from her loins!
"Again," Drummond commanded hoarsely.
"Oh God, Drummond!" Gabriella cried.
"Yes," he growled in near savagery.
"N-no, I c-can't," she whimpered.
"Yes! You will!" he commanded.
Chapter Three
Gabriella realized immediately that she must have truly lost consciousness in the last explosive throes of raw passion that Drummond commanded from her body, because she came awake reclining on a settee. Drummond was standing over her, languidly smoking a spicy smelling cigar. His slate gray eyes revealed nothing. There was not a modicum of tenderness in their reserved depths.
Gabriella quickly crossed her arm over the transparent material that was covering her breasts, placing one hand modestly between her legs as heat flooded her cheeks to burning. She was so confused, feeling indignant, shameful, and yet completely sated . . . somehow. She never imagined in her wildest dreams that a man could bring a woman to such passion!
"Maidenly modesty does not become you at this moment, madame." Drummond raised a perfectly sculpted silver-gray eyebrow in reprove. "Nor shall I allow it to become a part of our newest relationship." He puffed lazily on his cigar with his gaze demanding that she move her arms.
Gabriella huffed, flustered with her familiar and graceful composure, thoroughly in shreds as she floundered, not knowing where or how to act. In one short afternoon her life had completely changed. Nothing seemed of herself anymore and she did not know where to begin to regain the pieces that had become lost or irrevocably changed.
"They prohibited slavery years ago, Lord Kittridge," she exclaimed, principally to halt the words that she would have spoken, begging Drummond to comfort her. Still, she lowered her arms as he silently commanded and she realized in a moment of panic what possession he held over her now.
Drummond ignored her comment wholly, as appeared to be a trait of his, while his gaze boldly studied her barely concealed breasts. "It could have been worse, madame. It was only by chance circumstances that I learned your husband had intentions to sell you. Quite a barbarous ideal, selling one's wife, however, for my purposes, effective."
"Your purposes?" Gabriella questioned in a whisper, holding forth little hope that Drummond would answer her inquiry.
"And to a lower class patron no less." he paused, tilting his head upward for a slow stately puff on his cigar. "Imagine my surprise?"
Gabriella shuddered, but offered no verbal comment as her gaze irrevocably slid down over the length of Drummond's tall frame, while he was not looking at her. Even at his age, he was still the most attractive man that she had ever seen. He was muscular and trim with short cut, silver-gray hair, adding a dramatic and handsome maturity to his tanned and hawkish features.
"And for what?" Drummond mused. "This claim that you are barren?"
Gabriella's mind suddenly fired from its confusion as pain and deep humiliation flared in her breast. She came upright, off the settee, with jerky and angry motions. Remaining mute, she stood and quickly gathered her clothing, holding it before her like a shield. She would not even take the time to dress. What difference could it make after this horrible day? She would find her cloak quickly and that would be enough.
"I choose the streets," she muttered, gazing downward at the shambles of clothing in her arms. Just like her life. She did not hear Drummond's approach, until suddenly he clasped his warm strong hands around her bare upper arms as he turned her to face him.
"That is no longer an option for you, madame."
Her gaze shot to his face. Somehow, he had rid himself of his cigar and she thought she detected a fleeting second of sympathy in his charcoal-gray eyes, coming and going so quick that she was sure she had just imagined it.
"Your husband will no longer have you, madame. That paragon, whom I might mention was chosen over myself twenty-five years ago. You have no further family alive, no money, and the papers signed this day between your husband and myself, while not entirely legally binding, are enough so that if you breach the contract by leaving me without my consent, I could stretch the situation enough to have you arrested, until a lengthy courtroom battle could ascertain the ramifications."
"Jail," Gabriella whispered, horrified.
"The Gaol to be exact, Lady St. John." Drummond paused searching her gaze intently as if to ascertain her complete understanding, then he released her and strode toward his desk saying, "I shall expect you to join me for dinner at seven. Your clothes have been delivered to my chambers where you may go now and refresh yourself. Rest if you need to, madame."
Gabriella remained mute, watching in horrid fascination as Drummond sat in his high-backed desk chair, facing her nonchalantly from across his inlayed marble-topped desk. His gaze was inscrutable, his mouth outlined in perfect masculine firmness, as he casually lifted two of his fingers up to his regal nose, and he inhaled. Then, he licked the tip of his second finger . . . slowly. That same finger that had touched her-her!
Gabriella gasped and fled the room before Drummond's warm, masculine chuckling.
Chapter Four
Gabriella came awake several hours later, sprawled on top of Drummond's four poster bed. She had not meant to fall asleep, however, the last thing she recalled was weeping uncontrollably into the plush blue quilts. How long she cried, she had no idea, it had been as if a dam finally burst inside her and she must have succumbed to exhaustion after her tears abated.
She sat upright, brushing the brunette tresses of her shoulder length hair away from her face and off her forehead. It was obvious that the hairstyle she had worn today, a stylish French twisting braid, was in ruins. Foolishly, that conclusion made her nearly cry again. She had always taken pride and the time to achieve the best appearance she could present, from her deep chestnut-colored hair, which was soft and elegantly cut, to her long polished fingernails. She might now be the age of a mature woman, however, she looked well for her age. Except that now one of her exceptionally long red fingernails was cracked and her life was in ruins.
So why did she feel like sighing? In truth, she felt like running her hands over her body to discover the newness lurking there. She wanted to feel. She wanted to stretch and linger, thinking of the passion, dreaming of Drummond's wicked fingers!
"Oh . . . gracious . . . me," she exclaimed, bringing her hands up to her hot cheeks to keep them from roaming some place on her person. "This is so dangerous . . . he is so dangerous," she muttered. Oh God, she thought, what was she to do?
At that precise moment Gabriella heard knocking upon the bedroom door and she nearly bolted from the bed in alarm. However, when she took a moment to realize that Drummond would not knock, she gathered her tattered nerves and the quilt about her, calling entrance.
It was a maid of stoic proportions and disposition. Her name was Matilda and her clip accent proclaimed her to be of German descent. The order from Lord Kittridge, Matilda explained, was for Gabriella to bathe and dress for dinner. This followed by no less than six footmen bearing a large and intricately worked brass tub with pails of water to fill it.
"Mien lady, I will return in one half hour," Matilda announced after the footmen left and the toweling had been placed.
After the door closed behind Matilda, Gabriella sighed, thinking that if she were a proper scion of society and breeding she would refuse the bath with indignation. The only failing with this was that she adored comforts too well and longed for the hot and soothing consolation of a bath. After that? Well, she would not dwell on that at this moment. After stripping her chemise, garters, and stockings off, she sank into the tub of hot water gratefully. She washed her hair and body vigorously, feeling as if she were washing away mounds of dirt, which could not be. It was the humiliation that she was trying to wash away, the humiliation of having her cruel and heartless husband abandon her in such a horrible and degrading fashion. No, he threw her aside as if so much trash to be discarded, completely ruining her.
"Oh," she whimpered on a tearful note into the humid steam swirling around her, then she fought her tears. She would not succumb again, she would not! No, from this exact moment forward, she would take one moment at a time.
"Yes," she breathed, what was it that they called it? "Carpe diem," she whispered. She would live to survive each moment to the next.
"An excellent philosophy, madame."
Gabriella yelped in shock and surprise. It was Drummond, tall and masculinely fluid in buff gray trousers and a sapphire blue hunting jacket, invading the intimacy of her bath. Why even her husband Reginald, had never seen her so . . .
"One which, I believe shall define our relationship," Drummond finished.
Gabriella clasped her hands over her breasts, bringing her knees upward to her chin. The water was soapy . . . yet? "Drummond," she gasped stupidly through her embarrassment. He was so bold and quite utterly handsome.
"Come, madame," he said imperiously, bending forward slightly to hold his hand outstretched to her. "It is time to seize this moment."
"You cannot mean for me to-to . . . just?" she sputtered.
"Ah, but I can, madame, and I do. I believe that I explained that quite thoroughly in my study earlier this day." His gray eyes were rich with intelligence and resolute command. "Come, madame, take my hand and step from the bath so I may dry you."
Gabriella understood that she had no choice, just as she knew that she was flushing pink when she reached her hand forward and Drummond clasped it. Oh too soon, she was rising upward, completely nude, from the spilling warm water, while Drummond's gaze slowed, and then very thoroughly roamed over every inch of her naked flesh.
"Step out and turn around, madame, so I may view your exquisite endowments from behind," he murmured with his voice sounding husky to her ears.
Exquisite, Gabriella wondered, as she stepped from the tub and hesitantly turned her back to him, while water dripped down her skin, feeling extremely sensitive. It felt somehow heady to be viewed, dripping wet and naked by a fully clothed man . . . a man who seemed to admire the way she looked. This confused her because Reginald had never liked . . .
"Hmm, your pink bottom has a dimple. Absolutely perfect, and your legs are trim and shapely."
A dimple, Gabriella wondered . . . perfect . . . shapely?
Drummond still held her hand and was using it to turn her fully around to face him again. "And your breasts, madame, how glorious. I have a deep desire to touch them. Nibble my teeth on those rosebud tips." His gaze was smoldering, charcoal embers. "Shall you allow me?"
Gabriella hung hopelessly on the sensation of his words. Nibbling her breasts? Then his last words registered. He would let her choose?
"I want to, madame. I want to touch your breasts . . . to pet them. But, I will not, unless you ask it of me."
She parted her lips, but no sound came forth, before he said, "Ah, but I have a gift for you. A perfect setting, I believe."
"A gift," she whispered, trying to find any strength in her voice.
"First let me dry this white velvet skin of yours, then I shall give you my gifts . . . two of them, I have, madame. Do you fancy presents?"
White velvet skin, why I never? "I l-love presents," she blurted, feeling instantly embarrassed as the admission just spilled out of her.
"I thought so," Drummond murmured as he began to apply a fluffy white linen to her back, bottom, and legs. And she let him! "Turn around again for me, madame," he ordered quietly.
Drummond was so close that Gabriella could feel the heat of his body, nearly feel the brush of his hunting jacket, as she turned. She found herself gazing at the small ruby stud that he wore in his left earlobe. Such a masculine ear, she thought a bit off kilter, and the crimson ruby was unusual, but quite attractive. Then, his downy linen found her loins and her legs parted with a melting new appreciation, as he chuckled low and arresting.
"Not yet, madame, . . . perhaps for dessert this evening."
Her gaze flew to his, but there was no disdain or mockery, just appreciation, heady masculine appreciation.
"I shall leave the drying of your plump beautiful breasts to you, madame. I did promise," he murmured, gazing deeply into her eyes for long moments before he handed her the towel and stepped away. The whole while Gabriella heard the words, plump and beautiful, fluttering through her mind, so much so that she dared to peek downward. A lady never really looked upon her naked self, but . . .
Chapter Five