Chapter 8

8

C assandra Collins glanced across her dainty rosewood tea table at her employer, Derek Welkirk, Earl of Framlingwood, and a pang of concern settled into her heart as if coming home for the winter. This occurred more and more often these days where he was concerned. The earl sat sprawled on the settee in her private parlor at the back of Number Two Grosvenor Street, his head resting against the overstuffed wool fabric and his eyes closed in abject exhaustion. She had never seen him so weary nor heard him so tortured and confused. She poured him another cup of tea.

“I don’t think more tea is going to help,” he murmured as he tilted his head toward her and opened his eyes.

“I concur,” she replied as she pulled a silver flask from the pocket of her dark green merino wool gown. She unstoppered the flask and poured a generous splash into the cup before offering it to him across the table. He sat up and took the cup, downing the contents in a few long draughts. He held the empty cup out and she filled the delicate blue Wedgewood piece from the flask.

“I should not have come,” he said. “You have burden enough managing all of this without my adding to your troubles.”

“Anything to do with the ladies is my burden, my lord. You made it so when you hired me. And I need to know any changes in their circumstances so I might help you to keep them safe.”

“It isn’t your duty to keep them safe.” He set the half empty cup onto the table so forcefully it rattled. “The duty is mine, and I have already dragged too many good, innocent people into the fray. I should have taken care of this myself. I should have—”

“You should have done as you have always done? Alone? And what then? What if this blackmailer had met you all alone in the Prospect of Whitby and murdered you? What would have happened to the ladies then? To the Rutherfords and the other servants who serve these houses? To me?”

He ran his hands through his hair and fell back against the settee cushions. “I am not accustomed to asking for help. These men have wives, children, Lady Camilla is no longer young. Dickie Jones is too young. And they have all risked their lives and safety to…to…”

“To what, Derek?”

He raised his head and studied her, his expression unreadable to most, but she knew him too well. She’d been housekeeper to his mistresses for five years and had been his only confidante for nearly that long. He’d given her his leave to use his given name when they were in private long ago, but still appeared stunned when she did so. Or perhaps he experienced some other emotion when she did so. That much of him was a mystery to her.

“To what?’ she asked again. “To come to the aid of a friend? They are your friends, Derek. Whether you want them to be or not. Whether you admit them to be or not. They are your friends, and they want this to end well for you and for the ladies. Let them help you. You cannot do this alone. Why ever would you want to if you do not have to do so?”

“Because if I do this alone no one else’s blood will be spilt on my account.” He held his head in his hands. “No one else will die for my arrogance and neglect.”

Unable to stay away, Cassandra rose and came to sit beside him. “Arrogance and neglect? Derek, for pity’s sake, no man could be a better protector to these ladies. You have cared for them, provided them with homes and safety. Good Lord, you have gifted three of them the very houses on this street. To live in with their new husbands. How many gentlemen would do the same for their mistresses? How many would even care enough to protect a mistress from a blackmailer knowing…knowing she may have k-killed someone.” After a few hesitant attempts she rested her hand on his shoulder.

She steadied herself with a deep breath. She always walked a razor’s edge with this man. She dared not show him the extent of her regard, but she so wanted him to know that she saw him for who he truly was, which was not true of even the friends who sought to help him in his current dilemma.

“How many gentlemen manage to accumulate five mistresses at one time and ask the most capable of housekeepers to keep his secrets and keep these five households from descending into chaos?” He leaned back once more and covered her hand with his own.

“My life is never dull, my lord.”

He snorted. “I daresay not.” He sighed and closed his eyes, curling his fingers around her hand on his shoulder. “Has Barker-Finch managed to make his peace with my Lily? Or is she still shying books and boots at him?”

“They have reached a tentative agreement. He has taught her to write her name. She is terribly proud of herself.”

“As she should be. m glad. Perhaps he may yet survive to teach her to read as well.”

“We live in hope,” she said softly. He had begun to relax, and if she did not disturb him, he might actually succumb to sleep for a while. She glanced around and saw a heavy quilt draped over the back of her chair before the fire.

“What am I to do about Dickie Jones?” he asked, his voice heavy with the onset of sleep. “Must I go to the Duchess of Chelmsford and have her intervene?”

She drew her hand from under his and went to fetch the quilt. When she returned to the settee, she managed to move him around to lie down, though she had to raise his legs to drape them over the end of his makeshift bed. She tucked a large embroidered pillow beneath his head and covered him with the quilt.

“I suppose you could.” She brushed his hair away from his face. “However, I would suggest you go to Mister Carrington-Bowles first. He is a good and caring man, and he loves young Dickie like a son. Bringing Captain El into the fray may result in bloodshed.”

“Hmm.” He clutched her hand to his chest. “I should leave. Your reputation…”

“I am housekeeper to an earl’s mistresses, Derek. I have no reputation to harm. Sleep.”

“You’ll stay with me?”

“Of course.”

A quiet snore escaped him, and she smiled. However, as she began to go over all of the information he’d given her this night about the situation with the blackmailer, she realized she’d sleep very little this night. It was true she had no reputation to harm. Much like the five mistresses he accumulated over the last five years, she was an unknown woman in a sea of unknown women in London. Which was exactly what she preferred. For her there was no other way.

Cassandra had no idea how long she’d slept, slumped in the chair by her now cold hearth. She awoke to a quiet but steady knock at her parlor door. Her stiff body protested as she pushed out of her chair and paced stealthily to the settee where Derek still slept. The first rays of the weak November morning sun glimmered through the one window in her ground-floor quarters at Number Two.

Who the devil could be at her door at this hour of the morning?

“Cassandra?” The earl shifted on the settee, but did not awaken.

“I am here, Derek,” she said softly before she tip-toed to the parlor door.

She lifted the latch and opened a crack just wide enough to peer around the jamb. “Mister Barker-Finch?” She stepped back and held the door for him to step inside the parlor. “Is there something amiss? Has something happened?” She was whispering in an effort not to wake the sleeping earl. She dreaded to think what the barrister was thinking as he caught sight of their mutual employer sprawled under a country quilt on her settee. Whatever his thoughts the man neither voiced them nor evinced them in his expression.

“We needs must wake him, Mrs. Collins. All is well, but something has happened.”

Ari tried and failed not to stare at Lily’s lips as she repeated the sounds of each of the letters to which he pointed with his finger. His every nerve fairly vibrated with arousal and caused him to shift every few minutes in the chair next to hers. Her scent of lemon and jasmine teased him every time he bent close to answer her questions. His cock was so hard he dared not pull his chair too close to the table for fear the damned thing would rise up and start knocking against the heavy oak.

By all rights, he should be dead tired and ready for sleep. He’d not returned to his chamber across from hers until an hour past sunrise. After the passionate interlude he’d shared with Lily he’d barely managed to tear himself away to consult with the watch and Archer Colwyn. Then he’d gone to report the evening’s events to Mrs. Collins only to find Framlingwood asleep on the housekeeper’s settee. Once he’d dealt with the earl, he’d enjoyed only a few hours’ sleep before one of the maids came in to build up the fire in his chamber.

He and Lily had breakfasted together, but their conversation had wavered between stilted and languid with an undercurrent of desire. And now? Now he was supposed to be teaching her how to pronounce the various sounds of the letters of the alphabet. Instead, as he watched her lips form each sound, he imagined how those lips might feel against his…or on various parts of his body. What the buggering hell had he been thinking last night?

That all those hours he’d spent frigging himself to a fantasy of this woman didn’t hold a patch to the real thing?

“Ari?” Lily’s voice dragged him back to the present. “Ari, are you certain you are quite recovered from last night’s exertions?” She blinked and gazed at him with feigned innocence. In a matter of days, he’d come to recognize the wicked glint in her eyes.

“Exertions?” He raised an eyebrow “To what exertions do you refer, Miss Venable?”

She laughed. “Why to vanquishing those ruffians, of course. You do remember that, don’t you? Skulls cracking? Gunfire? Footmen falling from trees?”

“According to the Rutherfords those sorts of exertions have become regular occurrences here on Grosvenor Street.”

“Then I suppose I must concede your presence here is most fortunate.” She pretended to turn her attention back to the various pages of parchment on the library table.

“I hope so, Lily. I truly do.” Now he was uncomfortable for a very different reason. He meant what he said. In only a few days he’d come to want to teach her to read, to keep her safe.

She glanced at him and reached over to squeeze his hand. “What sound does this make?” she asked. Her finger traced two letters she’d added to her alphabet—k and n.

“Ah. That is a strange one. Those two letters together are pronounced as the letter n.”

She mouthed the letter n and then added two letters after the kn she had written. “So, this is pronounced now?”

“Actually, it is not. That is pronounced like the word no, but it means to know something.” He bit back a laugh at her puzzled expression.

“Who the devil came up with these tricks? It truly is the outside of enough.” She tossed down her quill. “I will never learn all of this.” She slumped back into her chair and crossed her arms which pushed her breasts into a tantalizing display over the bodice of her simple day gown.

“You already know this, Lily. Mrs. Collins allows you have memorized every word Shakespeare ever wrote.”

“That was easy. I have been learning his plays since I was old enough to walk.”

“How? How did you learn if you cannot read?”

“My mother was a seamstress for a theatre company in…Manchester. I sat backstage with her through every production as she had to be there in case a costume needed repair. After hearing a play one or two times, I could repeat every line. I have done the same with the novels the…other people have read to me.”

“One or two times? Every word?”

She shrugged. “It is something I have always been able to do.”

“Good God, Lily that is a great gift. If you can do that, you can certainly learn to read.” He dragged the pages closer and pulled his chair closer to hers. “Come. Let us continue.”

She sighed. “Perhaps I simply need to go on as I always have. I can have people read to me and learn what I need to know. If you are in want of a position, perhaps I can persuade the earl to hire you as my reader.” She ran her finger across his cheek and down the side of his neck which produced a shiver throughout his body.

“You need to be able to read for yourself, Lily. There will come a time when your life may well depend upon it.” He said the words so vehemently he stunned himself. From her expression he’d shocked her as well. He cleared his throat. “I want you to learn to read. For both of our sakes. Yes?”

She studied him so carefully he nearly turned away. He didn’t want her to know. There was no reason for her to hear of his greatest failure, but he suddenly realized she might be the one to redeem him, at least as much as he could be redeemed. This had started out as an obligation, then became something of a lark. Teaching Lily to read was suddenly something more.

“Yes. Very well. I shall do my best to unravel the mystery that is reading the bloody King’s English.” She picked up her quill and wrote another word on the parchment. “What is this word?”

He leaned over to read what she had written. “That word is who. Even though the letters sound like wa-huh-o, when they are written together like this, they are who. What you have written with these two words is know who.”

Her quill tremored slightly in her hand. Several drops of ink stained the page. Suddenly, she pushed the page away and pulled a clean piece of parchment in front of her. “I tire of these ridiculous words. What about the word you promised to teach me last night?” In an instant she turned from startled maiden to flirtatious coquette. The smile she turned on him was a siren song, and his cock throbbed as if eager to hear more.

“Last night?” He licked his lips. “What word would that be, Miss Venable?”

She turned in her chair and drew so close to him, her breasts rested on his arm. “Anticipation,” she said slowly, lingering over every syllable.

“An-anticipation. I do recall something being said about the word. Yes.” He reached for a piece of parchment, took three attempts and finally managed to pull a sheet in front of him on the table. Lily picked up the quill and used the instrument as an excuse to lean even closer as she handed it to him.

His voice rough with desire, he said each letter as he wrote the word in bold script across the top of the page. She repeated the letters as he said them in that rich contralto of hers, her breath caressing his neck as she did.

“Anticipation,” she nearly purred. He had no notion what she was about, but he was powerless to ask her to stop. She ran her fingers down his chest and unbuttoned his jacket.

“Perhaps you should write the word several times to lodge it f-firmly—” He jumped involuntarily as her fingers reached the falls of his breeches. “In your mind.”

“The word has been fixed in my mind since you fled my chambers last night.” She unbuttoned one button of his breeches and then another. “I have been in anticipation all morning. You, sir, have been remiss in my instruction of the subject of anticipation, and I demand reparations for that oversight forthwith.”

“Well, I…” He glanced at the parlor doors whilst she continued to unbutton his falls.

“Locked,” she said as his cock sprang into her soft, warm hand. “Whilst you were being the dutiful tutor and assembling my writing supplies.” She gave his cock one long, slow stroke.

He bit back a groan. “This is supposed to be a reading and writing lesson.” His wits had obviously left him as he was now babbling inanities whilst the most beautiful woman he had ever known was fondling his granite hard cock with a virtuoso’s touch.

She used her feet and free hand to shift his chair around to face her. “Of course.” She scooted her chair to face his. “I shall write anticipation and you can tell me if I have spelt the word correctly. With that, she bent over and touched the tip of her tongue to his pulsing cock. He nearly leapt from the chair. She tightened her hand around the base and began to trace her tongue up and down in slow, precise lines. After a few strokes his mind cleared enough for him to realize the minx was spelling anticipation with her tongue. On his cock.

Ari gripped the arms of the chair to the point his hands shook. His head lolled back as a low groan slowly made its way up from his chest. Once she finished each tongued letter she blew across the head of his cock and asked “Did I spell anticipation correctly?”

“Y-yes,” he gasped. “P-perfectly correct.”

“Then I deserve a reward.” She swirled her tongue around and then sucked his cock into her mouth with a devilish hmmm of appreciation. She continued to stroke with one hand and then cradled his bollocks in the other. Her mouth alternated between gently caressing to drawing on his aching flesh to the point of pain. Behind his eyes, closed in ecstasy, flashes of light nearly blinded him. His hips pumped up and down in time with her talented mouth until he was panting like a horse at Newcastle. His throat was raw with the harsh passage of air in and out of his lungs.

“Lily,” he rasped. “Dear God, Lily. Yes. More!”

She braced her hands on his thighs and bent to take as much of him into her mouth as she could before she took one lingering pull up his cock and flicked her tongue across the tip. “Tell me,” she said, and licked the tip again. “How do you spell more?”

“Wha…I…” The errant thought that his eyes had crossed and he could not think passed through his mind.

Lily stood and unfastened the buttons at the front of her dress. She wore no chemise or stays and with a shrug her breasts spilled out against the dark wool fabric in all their porcelain glory. She pulled up her skirts and climbed onto the chair to straddle his lap. “Perhaps you need help with the word more?” She reached down to pull his cock away from his belly and lowered her wet cunny to take him inside her with delectable languor.

“Oh, yes-s-s,” she moaned once she was fully seated and his cock throbbed inside her greedy heat. She braced her hands on his shoulders and began to ride him, shifting her strokes until she found the one that elicited shivers with every stroke.

Ari gripped her hip with one hand and cupped her breast with the other. He brought that perfect beauty to his lips and drew her nipple into his mouth. Her fingertips dug into his flesh, and she threw her head back with a soft cry. The harder he suckled, the faster she road. Before long, he was able to match her rhythm and pumped his hips against her thrusts. Soon they were racing together to the place where their bodies meeting would take them far from the world of ruffians, secrets, and lies. To the place beyond all sense and reason.

“Ari,” she gasped. “So good. So…fucking good. Ari!” she cried and her entire body went taut, bowed back and locked in a pose of complete sensual response. He released her breast from his mouth and held her in place with both hands as he pumped several strokes to join her with a long chest-rattling groan. His head fell back and his entire body went limp. She collapsed against him, her sweet breath warming his throat.

They stayed that way, draped over each other in the exquisite stillness of lovers replete and still joined in all the ways that made life worthwhile. That thought settled into Ari’s mind, amorphous and not yet grasped. He pushed the idea away quickly. Lily laughed softly and the sound sent a tremor into his chest.

“You were right,” she said.

“I was?”

“I don’t think I shall ever forget how to spell anticipation.”

“Hmmm.”

The doors rattled. Lily jumped up so quickly Ari flinched in pain as her body released his. She scrambled to button up her bodice and shake out her skirts. Ari tucked his shirt in and made quick work of fastening his falls. She reached over to smooth his hair before she went to the doors and opened them wide.

“You have a message, Miss Venable,” Slow Rutherford said as he nodded at Lily meaningfully. “I thought you might want to send a reply as the message is from Mister Charpentier. The boy is waiting.” He eyed Ari suspiciously, but Ari refused to be cowed by a footman, even one as useful and capable, albeit dangerous, as a Rutherford.

Her entire expression lit up, and Ari experienced the oddest sensation toward this Mister Charpentier. “Yes, of course. I’ll only be a moment.” She hurried from the room. Rutherford stared at him, his expression hard and decidedly unfriendly.

“Might want to learn how to button your own falls, seeing as your valet isn’t here to do it for you.”

Ari looked down. He’d made a right hash of his breeches in his haste to hide what he and Lily had been doing only moments before the footman tried to enter the drawing room. He quickly set himself to rights, but did not meet Rutherford’s still determined glower.

“Take care with her, barrister,” he finally said. “Mistress or not, Miss Venable is a lady.”

“She is at that, Rutherford,” Ari assured him. “More lady than most of the ones parading around Mayfair, make no mistake.”

The man’s face relaxed somewhat. He nodded and left. Ari stood and braced his hands on the library table. The long breath he let out stirred the various pieces of parchment there. The one where Lily had written various words for him to pronounce drew his eye. At the bottom of the various examples she’d written, she had put three words together in a way they had not spoken.

“I know who you are” was written several times in her careful, improving hand. He glanced at the closed drawing room doors and then back at the piece of parchment.