Chapter 6

CHAPTER6

Four months ago

Jacob got off the ferry at Richmond and wandered up the High Street in search of a drink.

The Red Boar Tavern had a familiar hops and malt smell that welcomed him. He ordered a pot of porter and a meal. The bar keep eyed him askance because of his clothing but when he produced the coin, he served him.

He sat at the bar on a high stool and drank and ate, watching the bar maid circulate the room dodging gropes and lewd comments from the clientele. She was built on generous lines, which her old-fashioned bustier cut low across the bosom accentuated. Her hips swayed as she sashayed her way round the room. His cock stirred as she bent over to retrieve some empty pots and return them to the bar, giving him a nice view of her cleavage.

She returned to the bar with her tray of empty pots and picked up another load of full ones. He leaned over and smiled. Jacob knew how to be charming when he needed to be.

“Those men giving you any bother sweetheart?”

She glanced at him and wrinkled her nose. He didn’t look or smell good at the moment; he knew that his brother’s clothes stank. “Forgive my attire, I gave my clothes to a poor beggar who needed them and took his instead. I’ll buy myself some new ones in the morning.”

“Why would you do that?”

“The fellow came to my aid when I was set upon by thugs,” he waved at the bruising on his face and knuckles. “I wanted to reward him.”

“Oh,” her face softened, and she smiled. Leaning in and giving him an even better view of her lovely bosom, she said softly, “I can handle the men, but thanks for asking, my name’s Maggie by the way.”

“Jacob,” he said, raising his pot in toast to her and smiling at her over the rim.

Her smile widened, and she swung away to deliver her next round of drinks. He sat at the bar and bided his time, exchanging glances and smiles with her every so often.

The patrons were getting drunker and more troublesome by the hour. When one of them lunged at Maggie and tried to pull her into his lap, Jacob rose stepped towards them. “Let go of her!”

The drunk, a wolfish man with a beard and a torn and stained waistcoat over a potbelly and broad chest, laughed. “Whose gonna make me, you?” His expression of contempt took in Jacob’s clothes and battered appearance. “Looks like you’ve been in one fight too many already,” he added clamping Maggie more tightly as she wriggled in his lap. “Sit still sweetheart, or you’ll feel the flat of my hand!”

Maggie elbowed him in the stomach, and he let her go with an “oof”. She leapt to her feet and Jacob closed in, gabbing the man by the throat and hauling him out of his seat. The man wrenched himself out of Jacob’s grip but not before he had bruised his throat. The man swung wildly, Jacob dodged and landed a punch to his jaw, the man went down heavily.

His friends all rose and converged on Jacob and the publican yelled sharply, “take it outside, or I’ll call the constable!”

The man Jacob had knocked flat sat up groggily and was helped up by a mate. Holding his jaw, he threw Jacob a sour look and limped out of the Tavern with his mate. The other men resumed their seats with some venomous looks and mutters in Jacob’s direction. Maggie returned to her rounds and Jacob went back to his third pot of porter.

A little while later the men got up and left.

Eventually Jacob rose and went out to the alley to take a piss. He was tired to the point of exhaustion, his body and particularly his head ached, he itched from the flea ridden smelly clothes and his stomach was sour with the events of the night. Leaning a hand on the wall he aimed at the brickwork and let go, closing his eyes.

The hot slice of a knife in the ribs came out of nowhere. He tried to turn and received a blow to the head that sent him down with a crash. He knew no more.

* * *

June 1815

Garmon, arriving at his place of operations in St Giles and having discovered that Diana had not responded to his note, sent a second one, with more persuasive language, alluding to Connor’s disappearance and requesting her to come to see him as a matter of urgency.

He then dealt with the pair of idiots who had kidnapped Genevra instead, not, as he had initially intended, with undue harshness. They had after all done him an accidental favour. He was still experiencing little thrills from last night’s encounter and looking forward to the evening with heightened anticipation. In fact, his humour was considerably improved, and he found himself frequently distracted during the morning by thoughts of the lady and what he wanted to do to her when she was within his reach once more.

In between fantasies, those blue eyes teased him, where had he seen them before? The mystery eluded him, but he would solve it, he didn’t like mysteries. Blue eyes and red hair were an unusual combination.

He was thusin a more conciliatory frame of mind when Diana appeared at his door in the middle of the afternoon. She strolled in wearing a very fashionable ensemble in leaf green, complete with parasol against the summer sun.

“Good afternoon, Uncle.”

He looked up from his desk, jerked out of a pleasant daydream concerning Mrs Tate. He rose and came around the desk to kiss her cheek, having rapidly re-thought his strategy.

“Diana. How kind of you to come.”

“I thought I had been summoned?” she said kissing his cheek and taking a seat in the guest chair.

“I thought you were ignoring me.”

“I had an engagement last night,” she said, removing her bonnet. “Now, what can I do for you?”

“I don’t know that you can do anything, but I thought that you should know. Connor is missing.”

She jerked and frowned. “What do you mean missing?”

“He left here on Monday around midday and hasn’t been seen since. I can’t find him. Have you seen him at all?”

“No. Not since-” she stopped and waved a hand. “I shot you.” She pursed her lips and added. “I’m glad you have recovered.”

“Kind of you,” he smiled but suspected it was more a baring of teeth.

“I had to stop you somehow. I couldn’t let you kill Anthony.”

“So, you thought you’d kill me instead! Your own flesh and blood!”

She widened her eyes and shook her head. “I never intended to kill you.”

“The shot itself wasn’t fatal, but the damned fever almost was.”

She lost some colour at this and said with what appeared to be true contrition, “I never intended or wished you harm, but you must understand that I cannot allow you to hurt Anthony!”

“Then persuade him to give me back the hell!”

She shook her head. “I can’t.”

“Nonsense, he dotes on you! If you asked him-”

“I won’t!” she interrupted him. “He needs the income from the hell to restore his estates and clear his debts.”

“I’m getting my hell back. You can help me or suffer the consequences!”

She rose. “In that case I will bid you good day Uncle.”

“Damn it! How much does he need?”

She widened her eyes at him. “More than you could afford to pay I’ll warrant.”

“How much?”

“Over half a million pounds!”

“My God!” Garmon sat back in his seat winded. “The hell can’t make that much profit.”

“Not all at once, but over a number of years it can.”

“But isn’t the debt pressing?”

“He needs the steady income to feed the estate. The sale of his mother’s property has covered the immediate debts and provided enough to begin repairs to the estate. The rest will have to wait until the hell begins to pay.”

“Got it all worked out then?”

She smiled wryly. “Anthony has, yes.”

“Damn it! It’s my hell. I built it from nothing...’’

“Then you shouldn’t have staked it. You were losing that night.”

“I never lose!”

“But you did,” she said quietly.

He sunk his head in his hands. “Yes, I did.”

“What possessed you?”

He shook his head. “I don’t know. The conviction that I never lose I suppose. I refused to believe that he could beat me.” He looked up. “Will he play me for it?”

“No.” She shook her head.

“How do you know?”

“I know.” She smiled a secret smile, her gaze losing its focus. “He made me a promise.”

“And you believe him? Devil Harcourt?”

She blinked and refocused on him. “Yes. He’s changed.”

“Leopards don’t change their spots.”

She retied her bonnet and picked up her parasol, turning towards the door. “He loves me Uncle, and I love him. But I don’t expect you to understand that. Have you ever loved anyone?” She reached the door and paused, looking back at him. He didn’t answer and she left, closing the door quietly behind her.

He stared at the door for a moment and then picked up the ink well and threw it at the door. The glass bottle smashed, and ink splashed all over the door panel and dripped onto the floor.

After a moment the door opened and Rooke stood there, his large form filled the door frame. “Is there anything wrong Mr Lovell?”

“Yes, damn it there is! Put the word out. I want the Duke of Mowbray. Get him for me! And get that mess cleaned up!” He waved at the ink and shouldered past Rooke heading for the stairs.

* * *

The day passedfor Genevra in a kind of euphoric fog. Her distraction and apparent happiness drew comments from her staff, and Joe in particular, twitted her on her evening at the theatre. She had told her staff that she was attending the theatre the previous evening with her family, to account for her going out in evening dress and leaving them to run the Tavern for the night.

As evening approached a nervous thrill had her stomach in a flutter, and she was so preoccupied over what to wear she mixed up two food orders and forgot to charge someone for their beer. Fortunately, Joe caught it and apart from throwing her a puzzled look didn’t say anything. She blushed and took herself sternly to task.

Ten o’clock finally crawled round and the last of the patrons left the premises, she told the staff they could leave and that she would close up. Mrs Bell and her son had already retired to their rooms for the night, so she was able to scoot round and hurriedly clean and tidy up ready for tomorrow morning and then fly upstairs to dress.

She dithered between her blue silk and block printed muslin and finally chose the blue silk because it laced at the front, and she could get it on unassisted. In her haste to get rid of the staff she had forgotten the logistical problem of dressing herself. Her day gowns all laced up, but the more exotic gowns for afternoon and evening wear, required assistance. The other advantage of the blue silk was the way the colour matched her eyes and gave her figure an alluring line due to the old-fashioned lacing.

Washed, perfumed, primped and dressed, she made her way downstairs to wait for Garmon’s carriage, her heart skipping and her body buzzing with nervous excitement. The sound of an equipage pulling up in the street sent her to the door to check. Letting herself out and locking the door with her key, she allowed the servant to help her up into the vehicle, and she sat back feeling like Cinderella going to the ball to meet her prince.

Which was such an absurdity it made her laugh.

The laughter relieved some of her nervous tension, and she peered out the windows to observe the route they took. Immediately she realised it was a different one than last night and wondered where the carriage was taking her. Not to Lovell’s nor to the house she had left from the previous evening which had housed a bookshop and printery.

Twenty minutes later, the carriage drew up to a narrow four-story house in Hart Street. The servant who had conducted her into the carriage, now helped her down and up the steps to the house. The door was opened by another servant who led her up a flight of stairs to a first-floor apartment and the door was opened, this time by Garmon himself. She was so pleased to see him, she couldn’t stop smiling.

He paid the servant with a coin and took her hand.

“Come in my dear,” he drew her into the apartment and shut the door. The room was elegantly furnished and finished with fresh paintwork, curtains covering the windows and a large Aubusson rug over the wooden floorboards.

The room was well lit and warm from a fire in the grate, the furniture elegant if masculine in style.

“Welcome to my current abode,” he said taking her cloak and hanging it on a coat tree near the door. “Would you care for a drink?” He led her towards two comfortable looking armchairs drawn up to the fire.

“Yes please,” she said suddenly shy. After thinking about him all day, she found herself unaccountably thrown off balance to be in his home. After all, despite their physical intimacy last night they were virtual strangers. She sat, and he brought her a glass of red wine, offering his own in toast.

“To a night of pleasure my dear.” She clinked her glass with his, and blushed.

She caught his smile of amusement, and it made her pull herself together. She was behaving like a schoolroom miss instead of a mature businesswoman. This was a business transaction after all and not some romantic adventure. She’d really had her head in the clouds all day, and that would not do.

“I haven’t been able to stop thinking about you all day,” he confessed sitting in the chair opposite. She noted that he had dressed more formally tonight, wearing both a jacket and neckcloth as well as shoes, with his shirt, waistcoat and tight-fitting pantaloons. His clothing was of excellent quality and cut, and fitted him to perfection. He could easily pass for a gentleman on Bond St. “It seemed an age until this moment.” A pause and then he added as if compelled to fill the silence, “Your dress becomes you very well.”

“Thank you,” she said, husky voiced of a sudden. She drank some more of her wine and noted that he swallowed his in three mouthfuls. Putting down his glass he reached for hers and set it with his empty one on the table between them. Rising he drew her up into his arms and said softly, “I think we both have other things on our minds, hmm?”

She blushed again and he grinned. “Your blush shows your freckles.” Then he kissed her, and conversation was no longer needed.

He tasted of wine and smelled of soap and sandalwood, he had bathed and shaved for her, his face smooth to touch tonight. He slid an arm round her waist and drew her against him, his other hand cupping her skull gently and guiding her where he wanted her, to deepen the kiss. The back of her head was still a little tender from the blow she received last night, but he handled her gently and his kiss was so distracting she didn’t care.

She wrapped her arms round his neck and pressed as close as clothing would permit. She wanted every inch of him as close as she could get him. Returning his plundering kiss with a ravenous appetite of her own, she wasn’t holding back anything tonight. She fully intended to reap as much pleasure from the encounter as she possibly could.

When he broke the kiss, they were both panting, and she knew her face was flushed, because all of her was flushed and tingling, just from his kisses.

“My God, Genevra,” he said with that gravelly tone that set off a shiver over her skin and a twitch between her thighs.

Then he made her squeak by picking her up in his arms and carrying her into another room. This proved to be his bedchamber. Dominated by a huge four-poster bed, draped in blue velvet and a matching coverlet, with the sheets turned back invitingly. Like the sitting room, a generous fire had warmed the room to perfection.

He set her on her feet beside the bed and tugged at the laces of her bodice, tracing kisses down her neck, his lips were soft and warm and left a tingling in their wake that set tendrils of pleasure through her body. She reached up to tug at his neckcloth and he let her pull it from his neck. He then stepped back a moment to remove his jacket and cast it aside.

Returning to her lacings, he pushed her gown off her shoulders and down to her hips, then set to work on her corset which he removed swiftly and flung to floor. She wriggled out of her gown which slid off her hips and pooled round her feet, then raised her arms as he pulled her chemise up over her head and revealed her naked, except for stockings and boots.

“God in heaven you’re beautiful,” he whispered, pulling her in for another kiss, holding her face and teasing her lower lip with his teeth, pushing his tongue into her mouth and working her lips with his. The effect on her body of this oral assault was electric.

“Garmon!” She gasped, leaning into him, reaching for the buttons on his waistcoat, she fumbled them open and helped him take it off. He reached behind his head to pull off his shirt, and she was able to see and touch his chest and torso for the first time. His chest sported a good crop of brown hair, as did his forearms, and she took a moment to appreciate the texture and the muscular form beneath.

He was taller and leaner than Jacob, who’d been broad through the shoulders and densely muscled with an insulating layer of fat overall.

She ran her hands over the swell of his pectoral muscles and the curves of his shoulders and biceps, his skin was warm and smooth beneath her fingers. His stomach was lean and ribbed with muscle, the whole of his upper body tapering nicely to his waist and hips.

She leaned in and placed a kiss on his left pectoral, rubbing her face over the hair that curled over his skin and sliding her hands appreciatively down his stomach.

She pressed her breasts against the roughness of the hairs on his chest and her nipples pulled tight in response, her arms going round his body. She wanted to say something but seemed to have forgotten how to speak.

He pulled her against him and kissed her again, seemingly their unspoken communication was sufficient. His lips and tongue plundered her mouth and his hands roved over her back and down to her buttocks, which he seized and squeezed with almost brutal roughness.

Releasing her abruptly, he knelt to remove her boots and then ran his hands up her thighs to her garters, swiftly rolling down her stockings and removing them, his lips tracing patterns down the inside of her thighs with warm damp kisses. His fingers reached for the soft flesh of her inner thighs, and he leaned in to kiss her mound, his warm laboured breath on her flesh made her shiver. A finger speared her with one searing swipe that made her gasp.

“Sorry sweetheart I can’t wait,” he gasped, rising he unbuttoned his pantaloons and shucked them, along with his shoes, and bore her down onto the sheets and pillows in a tangle of limbs. He drove his cock, hard and hot, against her flank, his breathing loud in her ear as his hands ran all over her body in a fevered rush as if he couldn’t get enough of her.

His mouth traced kisses over her face and neck and breasts, and she returned them, kissing whatever part of him she could get her mouth on, chest, shoulders, neck.

He rolled her under him and pushed her legs apart abruptly with his hands, spreading her wide. It occurred to her that she ought to be alarmed by this show of roughness, but instead she was aroused by it, he was clearly out of control with lust for her and her own body clenched on emptiness, she wanted him inside her. Memories of how it felt last night flooding her and making her wet with anticipation. She moved her hips in invitation and he groaned.

“Genevra!”

“Yes Garmon, please,” she panted.

Surging forward, he speared her with his cock and after a moment’s resistance the full hard length of him slid inside her, filling her up and making her cry out with the pleasure of being stretched and filled.

She lifted her legs to take him deeper, as he plunged again and again inside her. His arms holding her tight, his face buried in her neck. The thrill of the movement of his body within hers, built, and she clutched at him, writhing her hips to increase the pleasure, sounds coming from her throat that she didn’t know she was capable of making.

His thrusts became wilder and faster, deeper and harder and her body revelled in this rough taking, rising to meet each plunge with gathering desire.

Her breath came in pants to match his own laboured breathing, and she tore the pleasure from his body with frantic twists and rolls of her hips. His body plundered hers, and she loved every moment of it. Feeling the tremors, the tensing and rising of his pleasure in every part of her, he was nearing his crisis, she could feel it, rising like a wave, gathering with each fervid thrust.

He stiffened on a loud groan, and she felt the quiver and hot rush of his seed within her as his body let go of its tension in a fountaining rush.

Like an electric spark, arcing from one point to another, her own release was triggered, and the pleasure exploded through her body. She arched into him with the force of her release and shuddered through endless moments of bliss so intense, the scalp on her head and the soles of her feet tingled.

She collapsed back against the sheets, panting as a blissful lassitude took her, and she felt him likewise subsiding into a loose mass of lax muscles above her, crushing her to the bed with his weight, his panting breath hot against her neck.

Eventually he moved, lifting his head, gazing down at her, his face flushed and sweat dewing his brow. “I’m sorry, sweetheart, that was not how I intended this to go. I simply couldn’t wait to feel you again. To be inside you.”

“That is perfectly fine Garmon,” she said, stroking his cheek. “I was as eager as you for that fulfilment, and it was-” she shook her head at the impossibility of describing that explosive rush of pleasure that flooded her whole body.

“Yes, I agree, words fail me too.” He smiled and kissed her forehead. Disengaging and rolling off her, he hopped out of bed and disappeared into the other room, returning with the bottle and glasses. He put them on the bedside table and went to the dresser. He poured water into the basin; he washed himself quickly and brought a damp cloth back to the bed and offered it to her.

While she used the cloth, he topped up her glass, poured one for himself and handed hers to her.

He dropped the cloth back in the bowl and climbing back into bed, he banked the pillows and reached for his own glass across her. Offering her a second toast, he grinned and said, “To even more pleasure.”

She laughed and clinked her glass.

After a moment or two of savouring the wine, she said, “I had no idea it would be like this.”

“What?” he asked watching her from his banked pillows.

She slewed round a bit on the pillows to face him, enjoying the soft crispness of freshly laundered fine cotton sheets and pillowcases.

“When I was contemplating making you my offer,” she felt her face flush. “I thought it would be unpleasant and degrading at best and painful and dangerous at worst. I didn’t expect I would enjoy it.” She smiled at him shyly.

“There is no point to sexual congress if it’s not enjoyable,” he said.

“For the man yes, but for women-”

“Women are as capable of enjoying it as men, if the men will let them.” he interrupted.

“Yes, so I have discovered.” She paused chewing her lip. “Thank you.”

He took her hand and played with her fingers. Something in his expression made her heart skip a beat. “There is no need to thank me for something that is your right. And in any case, I am quite selfish in the matter. A large part of my pleasure is derived from my partners’. A woman who is aroused, arouses me!”

He kissed her hand and then took one of her fingers in his mouth and ran his tongue over the pad of it. The sensation was so delicious and unexpected she gasped, rubbing her thighs together in reflex. He gradually let her finger fall from his mouth. “Like that,” he said softly.

Putting his glass and hers on the bedside table, he took her in his arms and kissed her.

With the pillows behind her and his arms around her, his bare chest pressed against her and his tongue plundering her mouth she felt cocooned in warmth. Wrapped in a kind of decadent pleasure she had never felt before.

When he raised his head to gaze down at her, she ran her eyes over his face looking for clues as to what he was thinking.

“I am going to enjoy teaching you pleasure. It is clear to me that you have not had enough of it in your life. And quite selfishly I shall derive a great deal of pleasure in return. Your body is heaven Genevra. Let me demonstrate.”