Chapter 14

CHAPTER 14

T he Countess of Grenfell was a goddess tonight. A Venus draped in diaphanous gold, her creamy breasts lifted high above a daring decolletage that left almost nothing to the imagination. Brandon took one look at her upon her arrival in the private salon of his house in St John’s Wood, and his cock went instantly hard.

A primitive sense of possession surged through him, and it required all the gentlemanly self-discipline he had to keep from throwing her over his shoulder and carrying her away to the bedroom so he could devour her at once.

Not now, old chap , he thought wryly. You’ll have to wait your turn.

Instead, he took her hand in his, bringing it to his lips for a reverent kiss as he drank her in fully. Her riotous cinnamon curls had been coaxed into Grecian plaits coiled thickly at her nape, with a spray of ringlets left free, along with a fringe of them on her high forehead. The gilded flecks of freckles adorned her nose, and her full, lush lips were the pink of a wild English rose. A sapphire necklace at her throat sparkled as a complement to the brilliant blue of her eyes.

Briefly, he wondered if Grenfell had gifted the necklace to her, and then he vowed that he would buy her a hundred necklaces with larger, costlier gems and drape them around her throat. He’d fuck her as she wore nothing else when she was well and truly his.

He cleared his throat, inhaling deeply of the rich scent of violet and rose and Lottie. “Good evening, o beloved sorceress of wayward children and ragtag mongrels.”

He straightened to his full height, and she smiled at him, and he thought he could happily spend the rest of the evening just admiring her thus as her pretty Cupid’s bow curved with amusement.

“Good evening, o silly duke of ridiculous imagined titles and insistence upon sending secret carriages to take me to my destination,” she returned.

She was still bristling about his sending his own conveyance to her. He had done so for a very good reason. Brandon hadn’t been certain if she would deign to join him here, for St John’s Wood was notorious. It was where most gentlemen either discreetly engaged in affairs or settled their mistresses. Where a married man could keep his secrets and have his bed warmed beyond the watchful eye of polite society and his wife.

That wasn’t why Brandon had brought her here. Rather, it was because he couldn’t justify another coupling whilst his daughter was beneath the same roof. Pandy would face struggles enough because of her illegitimacy. There was no need to cause further scandal where she was concerned. When he had taken Lottie in his study, he had been overwhelmed. Overcome by a temporary madness brought on by Lottie and her steadfast devotion to his daughter.

“Your John Coachman doesn’t know my address,” he told Lottie lightly.

She arched a cinnamon brow. “He would have known it had I told him.”

“Yes, but would you have come to me here in St John’s Wood?”

“That would have depended.”

He was still holding her hand in his, so he availed himself of her wrist, pressing his lips there, absorbing the steady thrum of her pulse. “Upon?”

She held his gaze, unsmiling. “Upon whether this is a home where you have previously installed your mistresses.”

“This house has never been used for a mistress,” he told her honestly. “Not by me, at least. My sire is another matter, but you can rest assured that I had all traces of him and whatever filthy deeds he performed here removed. Everything, from the paper hangings to the curtains and the Axminster, has been replaced.”

He kissed along her inner arm until he reached the place where her glove ended and glorious, soft skin met his seeking lips. The inner curve of her elbow. Brandon couldn’t help himself. He nipped her lightly there.

She shivered, then inhaled sharply, the action making her breasts rise in tempting swells, threatening to burst free of her bodice. “What have you used it for, then?”

“Various purposes,” he said lightly as he straightened, for prior to choosing Wingfield Hall as the home of the Wicked Dukes Society revelries, this house had been used. “Most recently, as a discreet meeting place for Sidmouth and his new wife.”

“This is the house Hyacinth spoke to me of, then,” Lottie said, unsurprised by his revelation.

“She told you about it?” That rather startled him to learn, for Lady Southwick—now Lady Sidmouth, he reminded himself—hardly seemed the sort to bandy her private affairs about.

“We are dear friends. Of course she did. But she needn’t have done so. I am already more than aware of your love nest. All London knows about it, I daresay.”

“Love nest,” he repeated, thinking maybe he had done his cause a disservice in bringing her here after all.

“Perhaps you have more than one,” she mused, “given that you’ve just told me you never used this house for a mistress.”

He shook his head. “I never know what manner of scandal broth is swirling about me, and I’m increasingly persuaded that is for the best. I can assure you that I don’t have a love nest. But enough of idle gossip for now, however. Let us eat the dinner my chef has prepared for us.”

It was a dinner designed to impress. Intentionally decadent. Brandon was many things, but a fool wasn’t one of them. He was wooing her in every way he could.

“That sounds lovely,” she said, her soft voice settling over him like a caress.

“Excellent.” He offered her his arm, and together, they went into the dining room. “I’ve taken the liberty of having the 1864 Chateau Margaux brought up from the cellar and opened. I think you’ll enjoy it.”

The house was formal, yet intimate. He guided her to the dining room, trying to think about the meal awaiting them rather than about the stunning woman on his arm. Even if the air between them was sparking with mutual awareness, he was doing his utmost to prolong the evening. To torment them both with anticipation, until they were equally burning with need.

“Why did you choose this house for dinner?” she asked as they entered the dining room and he guided her to a seat.

By design, no footmen were about. He had given careful instructions concerning when the dinner was to commence, and they still had a few minutes until a discreet domestic would knock at the door, heralding the arrival of the first course.

“Because,” he said, bending down as she sat primly in the chair he offered, so close that his lips brushed the shell of her ear as he spoke, “I wanted to be certain I could have you all to myself this evening. Where you’re concerned, I’m a greedy man.”

She slanted him a sultry glance beneath her extravagant gold-tipped lashes. The light caught in the burnished glints of her hair and made her eyes deepen to the mysterious blue of the sky after a torrent.

“Greedy for my company—or for something else?”

His cock pulsed.

“For both, Venus.” He allowed himself a chaste kiss to her temple before rising and moving to his own seat.

“I’m hardly a Venus, Brandon.”

Her modest protestations had him grinning. “You’re right, of course. You’re far more magnificent than Venus could ever hope to be.”

She raised a brow. “You needn’t woo me with flattery. I’ve already come here at your bidding, have I not?”

“Flattery is glib. I speak truth.” He raised his glass of Chateau Margaux to her in toast. “To you, o goddess.”

“You’re absurd,” she said without heat, lifting her own wine in turn. “We both know I’m all too mortal.”

He sipped from his wine, savoring the depth of flavor, and she did the same, her eyes widening in the moment the excellent year must have rushed over her tongue.

“Oh my heavens,” she murmured when she had swallowed, licking her lips and making his poor cock twitch. “You were not wrong about this vintage.”

He winked. “I’m not wrong about most things, you’ll find.”

A servant gave the door a subtle knock before either of them could say more.

“Enter,” he called.

The first course arrived, a French oxtail soup that they consumed over lighthearted conversation until the filets de sole au beurre noir arrived. He waited for the footman to once again discreetly retreat before resuming with a more salient topic.

“You never did tell me last evening about the reason you are so set against another marriage,” Brandon said, keeping his tone conversational.

Lottie was quiet for so long, he feared she wouldn’t answer him. But then, at last, came her mournful reply.

“Because it destroyed me.”

Four words, and he felt them pierce his heart as surely and as painfully as the sharpest of blades.

“You were in love with your husband.” It was a statement rather than a question.

Brandon didn’t know why the realization had failed to occur to him during their previous discussions of her past. Grenfell seemed a murky figure to him, a man he knew of but scarcely recalled. And the notion of Lottie in love with another man—well, it cut him to his marrow. Jealousy blossomed, bitter and dark. Jealousy he had no right to feel. Lottie was not his now, not yet, nor had she been then.

Yet, he couldn’t help the way he felt.

“I was young and hopelessly foolish when we married,” she said sadly. “I thought myself very much in love with him. He was dashing and compelling in his own way, and I was too na?ve to realize that he was merely toying with me. That our every interaction served a purpose—giving him what he wanted without thought for anyone else.”

“And what he wanted was you,” Brandon said, understanding what must have possessed Grenfell.

Lottie was like the finest, rarest wine. Priceless. A man could spend a lifetime scouring the best vineyards, sampling years and varieties, and still never find anyone as glorious as she. But to have had her, to have won her heart, and then to have dashed it to bits beneath his boot heel? A terrible, dreadful waste.

Sacrilegious, even.

She nodded. “What he wanted was me. I’ll never know quite why. Oh, he told me he loved me, and perhaps he did in his own way. I don’t think he was capable of loving anyone else, not even himself. Perhaps it was because I was the most sought-after of the crop of debutantes I curtseyed with.”

She shrugged, her smile pained. “Either way, it hardly matters now.”

“It matters to me, Lottie.” He swallowed hard against a rush of raw emotion. “ You matter to me.”

But Lottie didn’t only matter to him. She also mattered to Pandy. To Cat. To Lord and Lady Sidmouth, to the countless others in her charmed coterie. She mattered to so many. He hated that she hadn’t mattered enough to the man she’d wed, despised Grenfell for all the hurt and damage he’d caused. He never wished ill of the dead, but it was a bloody good thing the man was buried and gone.

“I…” She hesitated, looking flustered. “I don’t know what to say.”

“You needn’t say anything at all. Thank you for telling me about your past. It helps me to understand how you’ve become the woman you are.”

“I wouldn’t trade the woman I’ve become for the one I was then,” she told him firmly. “Not for anything. I’ve worked hard to be who I am. I’ve wept many tears, fought bitter battles. But through it all, I’ve come to know myself, I think.”

“And I admire the woman you are, quite thoroughly—your wit, your spirit, your dauntless determination, every part of you.” Again, it wasn’t flattery. There was more he could say, more that he wanted to say, and yet, he felt like an awkward lummox in her presence. All the easy charm and practiced ease he had accumulated over the years had fled him in the face of stark, earnest appreciation.

The regal mask she so often kept in place shifted, and he was treated to a rare glimpse of the vulnerability hiding beneath as her face softened. “No gentleman has ever said something so kind to me before.”

How astounding to realize that no man before him had ever told this glorious woman that he admired her. Not just for her beauty, but for her mind, her determination, her sensuality, for all the nuances that made her who she was.

And suddenly, it disturbed him greatly that he had not been entirely forthright with her. She deserved his candor and so much more.

“In the interest of honesty, there is something I should tell you,” he said, broaching the subject of the Wicked Dukes Society for the first time. “When we spoke about my grandmother and Wingfield Hall, I wasn’t entirely truthful. For the last few years, Camden, Kingham, Riverdale, Whitby, Richford, and I have been operating a secret society.”

He paused, gauging her reaction, for whilst he knew why he and his friends had begun the society, he couldn’t deny that it all seemed so very gauche and seedy now. Earning one’s own money was bourgeois. But earning one’s own money through carnal depravity was more than one shade beyond the pale.

“Go on,” she said softly.

“Membership in the Society is selective and costly,” he continued. “And for good reason. The revelries we host are indulgent odes to hedonism. Members are assured anonymity and privacy to do whatever they wish with whomever they desire, as long as all parties are willing.”

“Do you take part in these revelries of yours?” she asked, her gaze searching.

“I have in the past,” he admitted, “though the appeal is no longer there for me. The next fête is in a month’s time, and I’ll not be joining the revelers.”

“Why do you tell me this now?”

“Because I don’t want to hide the truth from you. And because I want you to know the true reason I am desperate to keep Wingfield Hall. The Society holds its revelries there. If we lose Wingfield Hall, we will have to begin anew, and the six of us have already invested a great deal of time and funds upon it that we won’t be able to recoup. Not all of us can afford such a loss of investment and future funds.”

He was grateful that he was in no danger of penury. But for some of his friends, the only wealth they possessed was what they earned from the Society.

“Thank you for entrusting me with your secret,” Lottie told him. “You have my word that I shan’t tell another soul.”

He trusted her implicitly, and now that he had revealed the full truth to her, it was as if a great weight had been lifted from his chest. He felt lighter. Relieved.

“Thank you,” he said simply.

The footman arrived with the next course then, mutton pie à la Perigord . As usual, it was delicious, redolent with the earthiness of truffles and the rich flavors of bacon and butter. But they both ate sparingly, a new anticipation burning hotly between them. Not for the next course, but for what would inevitably come after this dinner.

By the time the blancmange arrived, he was positively aflame.

Lottie’s spoon hesitated over her plate, her gaze meeting his. “I find myself feeling quite greedy as well.”

It was a return to the beginning of their dinner, and his cockstand was instant, as was his reaction. Thank God. He might have shouted his relief to the heavens, so great was his relief—he didn’t give a damn about the blancmange .

Brandon shot from his chair, extending a hand to her. “Come here.”

She didn’t hesitate, settling her hand in his, the softness of her bare skin making his pulse pound harder. “Where are you taking me?”

He pulled her swiftly to her feet. “To bed. We’ve made use of a door and a desk thus far. I think it’s more than time we tried something more comfortable.”

He drew her hand into the crook of his elbow.

“I won’t be your mistress, if that is what you’re thinking,” she cautioned as he led her from the room and up the stairs. “You’ll soon be a married man, and I do not abet husbands who are unfaithful to their wives.”

“I didn’t ask you to be my mistress, did I?” he asked mildly. “Besides, I’m not presently a married man, and I have no one to whom I owe faithfulness.”

Except you , he might have said, but he kept that to himself.

Lottie was to be handled with kid gloves. Her instinctive reaction was to flee in the face of the slightest hint of matrimony. His intentions regarding her had never changed, not from that first meeting in the emerald salon when he’d bumbled through a regretful proposal. But she didn’t need to know that.

Yet.

“I suppose you haven’t,” she allowed. “However, it’s not an unreasonable expectation. We are lovers, after all.”

And he intended for them to be more than that. Much, much more than that.

“A lover is not a mistress,” he pointed out.

“Fair enough.” Lottie inclined her head, but the stubborn set of her lips suggested she didn’t entirely believe him. “Just so you know, it will never happen. I’m not a kept woman.”

“Nor do I expect you to be one. You are a force unto yourself.”

They reached the bedroom, and he stopped, gesturing for her to precede him into the chamber. Lottie released her hold on his arm, crossing the threshold, her golden silk skirts shimmering in the low gas lamps. He couldn’t help but to admire the way the light shone in her cinnamon hair, the curls that were artfully arranged to fall down her nape. He longed to brush them aside and press his lips there, to know the satiny heat of her skin.

To savor her, to take his time and learn every inch of her body.

And he intended to do that.

All.

Night.

Long.

He followed her inside the bedroom, which was his alone. Even when he had granted Sidmouth and Lady Southwick the use of the house, he had made certain to keep his private space precisely that. The door closed behind him with a soft snick, and the blood rushed to his cock.

This woman was his. She didn’t know it yet, but he fully intended to make it so.

She turned to him, a small smile flirting with the corners of her rose-pink mouth. “A force. A goddess. What else am I to be this evening?”

“Whatever you wish to be, darling.”

She moved toward him, her silk gown playing with the light like liquid gold, and he thought he had one more to add to the list: naiad.

“The woman who brings the greatest lover in London to his knees, I think,” she told him with sultry intent, sliding her hands up his waistcoat until they locked around his neck.

“You won’t even have to try, Venus.” He dipped his head and claimed her mouth.

She opened instantly, her kiss eager and hot, her tongue gliding past his lips to tease. She tasted like Chateau Margaux and sin and decadent desire, and despite the delicacies his chef had offered up that evening, nothing had ever been so delicious. He had intended to take his time, but she was kissing him ravenously, making soft sounds of need, crushing her breasts into his chest.

His fingers found buttons and hooks. Fabric parted and spilled and fell, giving way to glorious feminine flesh. To hot skin, curves, and the sweet scent of roses and violets. He found hooks and eyes and pulled them free, her satin-and-lace corset falling with a dull thump at their feet. He had her half undressed without his mouth ever leaving hers, and she did the same for him, working his coat from his shoulders, tugging away his necktie, tearing open his waistcoat.

Her nimble fingers danced over the fall of his trousers, and that was when he finally moved, denying her what she wanted, lest she make him spill in his trousers like a callow lad touching his first woman. He ended the kiss to find her lips lush and swollen, her blue eyes glittering up at him like twin storm-tossed seas.

“I want to suck your cock,” she told him.

And fucking hell, there went his ability to resist her.

He swallowed hard against a rush of desire so intense that he could scarcely think. “That isn’t why I abandoned the blancmange .”

“I know.” She traced the line of buttons bisecting his shirt. “You’re all I want for dessert.”

Sweet, holy God. He’d give her himself. He’d give her anything. Everything. Whatever she desired. She was brazen and beautiful, her gown flung on the carpet, standing before him in nothing more than her stockings, drawers, and chemise. But her glorious curls were still confined, and there remained too many barriers between them. If she wanted to pleasure him, then he intended to savor the moment.

“Take the pins from your hair,” he said. “Please. I want to see it down.”

He thought she might balk at his request, but she didn’t, reaching for her pins instead and plucking them from her hair, one by one. Cinnamon curls fell, framing her heart-shaped face, glinting with hints of gold in the lamplight. It was the first time he had seen her hair entirely unbound, for he had begun dismantling her coiffure that night in the emerald salon and never finished. The intimacy of the act—watching her remove each pin for him alone—made fire lick through him.

When she had finished, her curls rained down her back and over her shoulders, long and lustrous, and she laid her palmful of pins on a nearby table. “Your turn.”

“What would my lady have me do?” he asked, throat gone thick with want.

Her gaze seared his. “Take off your shirt and waistcoat.”

“As you like.” He took off his waistcoat and then worked open the buttons of his shirt, fingers fumbling in his eagerness, heart pounding, cock as hard as marble.

“Let me help.” She moved to him, chasing his useless hands, plucking buttons free until they both had him out of his shirt. “Now this.” She tugged at his waistband, her forefinger grazing his bare stomach and making him inhale sharply at the simple contact.

God, how he longed for her touch. Everywhere.

His reaction to her was unlike anything he’d ever experienced, so powerful it scared the devil out of him. He had to somehow persuade her to be his wife. He couldn’t lose her.

At the thought, he caught her hand in his, bringing it to his lips for fervent kisses on each knuckle before lifting his head and meeting her gaze. “I want you naked in my bed.”

“With pleasure.” She grasped handfuls of her chemise and hauled it over her head, revealing the milky globes of her breasts at last and hard pink nipples he couldn’t wait to suck.

She undid the button on her drawers and those, too, fell away, leaving her in nothing but her silk stockings and pretty gold-ribboned garters. Better than Venus, she was a lush deity unto her own, all riotous, flaming curls and copper-flecked curves and wickedly seductive femininity.

“Leave them,” he said hoarsely, knowing that watching her roll them down her legs would be a torment he couldn’t withstand.

His cock was already leaking, desperate to be freed from his trousers.

A knowing smile flirted with the corners of her lips. “Now you.”

He unfastened his trousers with lightning speed and, naked, guided her to the bed. He stretched alongside her, his mouth on the delicate curve of her shoulder. She was hot and soft, and she smelled so bloody good. Her hair fanned over the pillow like silken fire.

“God, you’re glorious,” he praised. “I’ve been longing to do this all dinner long.”

“Why did you not, then?” she asked breathlessly. “I wouldn’t have offered protest.”

He kissed a path over the curve of her left breast, tracing the trail of freckles that endlessly bewitched him. Following them to her nipple, which was puckered and pink and waiting for his mouth. He flicked his tongue over the distended tip, and her back arched, a gasp tearing from her.

Lightly.

Gently.

Teasingly.

“Brandon,” she said, her voice strained. “More.”

He caught her nipple in his teeth and gently bit. “Like this?”

“More,” she demanded again.

He liked her when she was desperate. When she was issuing orders and commanding her own pleasure. She made him ravenous.

Mindless.

Her devoted servant.

He tugged at the peak, then sucked harder while cupping her other breast in his hand, plucking at her nipple with his thumb and forefinger until she was arching into him, her body an offering he gladly accepted.

But then she flattened a palm on his chest, staying him. “On your back.”

His cock twitched at the bold command. “Why, Venus, do you intend to ravish me?”

“Thoroughly.”

He obliged, rolling to his back. And now it was Lottie peppering his bare skin with a dozen kisses, her sweet mouth falling hotly upon him from his collarbone to his chest, then lower, following the dark trail of hair that led to his groin as her hair spilled over his thigh. He held his breath, watching as she kissed his hip bone.

Another sultry smile curved her lips, her stormy eyes flicking to his. “I want you to come in my mouth.”

He clenched his jaw against a stinging rush of desire so potent that it robbed him of the ability to think for a moment. It took all the control he had to keep from rolling her onto her back and sinking his cock deep inside her now.

His grasp of the English language slowly returned as she kissed his navel, teasingly avoiding his aching prick, which was jutting upward, thick and ruddy and ready for her.

“Already on my proverbial knees now, darling,” he managed.

She sent him a Siren’s smile. “Good.”

Gripping the base of his shaft, she lowered her head and flicked her tongue over him. He moaned helplessly, wondering how he had gone from seducer to seduced with such haste and ease. She laved him, swirling around his cock head, then licking along the underside of his erection.

His hips pumped. He abandoned his hold on the bedclothes in favor of her beautiful hair, threading his fingers through those vibrant curls that were smoother than the finest silk. And then she took him in her mouth. Just the tip at first, then more, as half his rigid prick was engulfed in wet heat.

A strangled sound fled him. He wanted nothing more than for her to take him as deeply as she could. To fuck her mouth until he came and she swallowed every drop of him. But he also wanted inside her cunny just as badly. She sucked him and his ballocks tightened. She lowered her head, bringing him to the back of her throat until she withdrew, leaving his cock glistening with her saliva, her lips wrapped around him.

He wanted to tell her how beautiful she looked, taking his cock this way. But words were elusive. And when she slid back down his shaft, there was no chance for thoughts. There was only the roar of his body’s demands, urging more, more, more. His hips worked in time with her pretty mouth, his heart pounding ever faster. Her hand worked his cock with the same rhythm, and within seconds, he was there, on the razor’s edge of complete release.

“If you don’t stop, I’m going to spend,” he warned.

She made a low sound in response, her mouth never leaving him as her pace increased. Faster, faster, now. She truly wanted to undo him. And heaven help him, he wanted to be undone.

By her.

By Lottie.

Only, always, forever her.

The realization was as jarring as his release, both so potent and magnificent that blood thundered in his ears and black stars speckled his vision. A groan of pleasure tore from his throat as he spurted on her tongue. He felt her swallowing around him, felt the hot flood of his seed coating his cock, felt her sucking and draining him dry until there was nothing left but his sated body and a sudden, shocking recognition.

He had fallen in love with this woman.