Four Times a Virgin (Irresistible Aristocrats Book 2) Page 2

  Lady Dorchester muttered an idiom he couldn’t quite identify and he wasn’t certain if she scorned the way he’d been educated or if she approved. She wandered around his room, then meandered close-by and passed almost under his chin. He made the mistake of sucking in a deep lungful of air and, instead of it steadying him and his wayward thoughts, he inhaled her scent. Desire struck him squarely in the chest and the rush of arousal was so sharp and strong that, although it was out of character and dangerous, it felt right.

  If the old Duke had still lived, Max’s backside would have been whipped raw, because this sort of normal male reaction was forbidden for a duke as it robbed the thinking brain of blood.

  Carina’s head tipped back as she stopped and looked up at him and, in that moment, he knew that years of instruction were useless when he faced the one woman he’d never been able to dismiss from his mind. Her jewel-colored eyes sparkled like the priceless gems in jewelry he vaguely remembered his mother wearing. She was silently asking something of him, though a man whose main claim to fame was an ancient title and a hard heart was unlikely to be able to give her whatever she needed.

  Amazing that in such a short space of time she’d managed to confound and befuddle him when others had tried for years to bamboozle him and couldn’t. Lust could always be explained as physiological, but his compulsion to hold this woman in his arms and assure her that all would be well was incomprehensible. Only once before had a woman affected him this way, but when he’d been asked about that evening in Dorchester he’d lied and told his grandfather that the girl had been nothing special. The Duke had been vindictive when thwarted, and Max had feared for Carina’s safety if the old man had suspected him of harboring feelings for the girl, even if they had been only pity. Contrarily, he’d prayed that Carina had left England and was an ocean away, and yet he’d also longed to be with her again and finish what they’d agreed to never start on that ill-fated night.

  “...You believe that twaddle?”

  He pulled himself out of what his grandparent had termed his useless day dreaming and searched for a suitable response, despite having no idea what she meant.

  “It’s always served me well.”

  “So not one of the girls or women you’ve paid over the years has ever excited you or pleased you?”

  “That’s exactly what I’m saying.”

  “You felt no emotion at all?”

  He swallowed. “None.” He’d played the part of a cold-hearted aristocrat most of his life, yet now the role made his skin itch and his stomach churn. His inability to toss out one of his usual sarcastic retorts angered him, though it wasn’t Carina’s invasive questions that galled him, but rather his curt responses.

  “Rubbish!” She stabbed a finger into his chest. “You, Your Grace, are lying through your teeth.”

  He raised an eyebrow and fixed her with his most intimidating stare. “As I have explained, madame, I am the twelfth Duke of Stirkton. I do not lie.”

  If they had been present, his business associates would have advised Carina to not toy with him, but they were alone in his drawing room and she was carelessly baiting him, with no thought to how he would react. The innocent girl from Dorchester that he remembered had matured into a forceful and resourceful countess who’d tracked him down and confronted him, while he and his cousin hadn’t discovered any hint of her location.

  “And I’m the Countess of Dorchester.” She flicked a dismissive hand through the air and glared at him. “Who gives a damn? What matters to me is truth.” Her voice dropped to a whisper. “And justice.”

  For the first time, she wouldn’t look him in the eye. Her fingers knotted over the folds of her skirt and when she finally raised her face, sadness clouded her eyes. Now they appeared as deep and murky as stagnant pond water.

  “I’d been dosed with laudanum that night at the inn. Besides which, I was only ten and eight years. I was grateful for your understanding. You saw everything. My age, my terror and that I’d spat out most of the dose the Earl had poured down my throat. Though I cannot recall exactly what you said.”

  “I didn’t say anything.” Max shook his head. “Such intimacy was forbidden when I was with the girls my grandfather arranged.”

  “Did you know that the old Duke wrote reports on everything?”

  Max flinched. His grandfather’s appalling behavior still burned his gut like a stab from a hot poker. “By the time I met you, I knew.”

  “So you also know he secretly watched you.”

  “When he paid for girls at brothels, he demanded reports on my technique because discussing my performance was supposedly a necessary part of my education.”

  “Huh! Watching was also a way for him to keep control when not in the room with you.” Carina raised a brow. “Though standing in dark corridors and peering through bored holes also fed his more perverted obsessions.”

  Max couldn’t answer while he fought the surge of bile clogging his throat. He’d been physically sick after discovering that his grandfather had watched him through peepholes, the old man taking his own pleasure while his grandson performed as his proxy. The girls working those rooms had been accustomed to twisted sexual desires and would have ignored Augustus standing with his eye glued to a peephole and living vicariously through his grandson. The old voyeur had probably watched Max’s every thrust and retreat in and out of a girl’s body and imagined they were his own.

  But for Max, that deep betrayal had begun his quest to uncover every one of the old man’s secrets and to make amends. That night had also prompted Max’s desire to control when, where, and with whom he had sex. The cottage where he conducted his liaisons was owned by him and only he, and his workman, knew how many times the locks on doors and windows were changed, and only his handyman knew that walls were also checked.

  “My grandfather didn’t allow any form of compulsion in his life, or mine,” Max muttered, using his best Meacham voice—cold and without inflection.

  “Despite outward appearances, he was ruled by at least one evil compulsion and he indulged himself for at least two decades.”

  “You’re mistaken. My father and uncle were the Meachams who suffered cravings and weaknesses. Drink, gambling, and unsuitable women. Because of them, I was taught to avoid those temptations and to protect my future son from any inherited weaknesses.”

  Another often repeated lesson had been that men couldn’t bear heirs nor suckle babies. Women were created for men’s use and to bear children, nothing more. After reaching the age of twenty-nine, Max had followed in the footsteps of generations of Meachams and negotiated for a bride. In six months’ time, on his thirtieth birthday, he’d marry the chit selected for him years ago. He’d perform his duty, producing the required heir and a spare as quickly as possible, and then establish his duchess at his main estate where she would raise his children, leaving him to continue living mostly in town, his existence barely disrupted.

  “Do you deny that he frequently pandered to his evil side and without any thought to those he hurt?”

  “You’ve no proof to support those accusations.”

  “I do, but that discussion must wait, because I can’t stay long and we’ve other things to decide. But your declaration that you never gained, or gave pleasure to your virgins is clearly untrue.”

  Max shook his head, despite guessing what was coming next. Memories he’d fought long and hard to repress flooded his mind. His grandfather’s worst-ever fury had erupted the night Max had challenged him over his Peeping-Tom actions, but Augustus had underestimated Max’s own anger and his growing size and strength.

  “...because,” she said, “I remember the first time I was sold very clearly.”

  “The first time!” Shock was quickly displaced by savage rage at her implication.

  “Oh, yes. A man as depraved as the Earl wasn’t about to stop at one attempt. His greedy nature was encouraged by your grandfather’s fat wallet. He needed me carrying a child and he didn’t care who fathered i
t. Not long after selling my first virginity to you, the Earl─”

  “─did it again.” He shuddered at the thought of Carina being led like a slave to an auction block.

  “Twice more after you.”

  Merciful heaven, he’d been wrong. English aristocracy oozed with far more evil than even his distorted upbringing had led him to believe. He leaned head-down on the mantle and tried to swallow past the constriction in his throat. Her late husband’s treachery outstripped Max’s imagination, even though during the years he’d searched for Carina and the other women he’d imagined plenty of horrors. Though Augustus had equaled the Earl in treachery as his schemes had grown from callous to malevolent as he aged.

  “Did the Earl have more plans?”

  “The next victim to be offered my so-called virginity had been selected, but the Earl died prematurely.”

  Carina’s chilling revelations were more disturbing than an emotional outburst, and he couldn’t help but wonder if she’d seen murdering her husband as the only way to avoid her virginity being sold to even more men. He’d lied to Carina about not recalling their rendezvous, because that night was etched in his mind and she was one of the women he’d failed to locate. When he’d entered the Highway Inn in Dorchester on the night of his majority, he’d sensed that bedding his assigned virgin would change his life, but he’d never imagined just how much impact that one night or one girl would have.

  Max and his cousin had searched high and low for Carina, despite knowing that women forced to prostitute themselves often died at a young age through circumstance or disease.

  The breath caught in his chest as a new thought occurred to him. “Who was it? Who was the Earl selling you to next?”

  “Ah, we’ve come to the crux of the matter at last. I risked coming here because I need you to tell me his name.”

  Max frowned. “How would I know?”

  She hesitated. “To answer your other question─”

  “I didn’t ask another question.”

  She gave a small brittle laugh. “Like everyone else, you want to know if I killed my husband.”

  “Did you?”

  She smirked. “That, Your Grace, is for me to know and you to never find out.”

  He stared, open-mouthed. “You’re a cool one.”

  “Not as cool as you taking a virgin each year with less emotion than asking a lady to dance with you at a ball.”

  Max bristled. Each year on his birthday, he’d been taken to an experienced prostitute, and after he’d turned eighteen his companions had been virgins. According to Augustus, bedding virgins prepared a duke for dealing with his untouched wife, and as those girls were destined to lose their virginity to the man paying the best price to the brothel nun who owned them, Meacham money might as well win.

  “Women were for enjoyment and all were well compensated.”

  “Incorrect on both counts. The Earl may have been paid, but I received no compensation for surrendering something that a lady is taught to save for her marriage night. Secondly, you were shown how to gain physical release but never enjoyment because, like the Earl, the old Duke couldn’t perform the act himself. You were a substitute, and someone they despised, because you were capable of finding pleasure with women while they couldn’t.

  “How do you know these things?”

  “I’ve spent three years collecting information and preparing for my next step.”

  “I’ve no interest in whatever you think you know about me.”

  “But the things I know will surely shock your betrothed.”

  “At last, the real reason you’re here. Blackmail. I allow you access to my family papers, and in return you’ll not speak to the girl I’m to marry and not reveal my sordid past.”

  “Not all your past will be of interest to your future family members. Merely the procession of courtesans who live in your cottage on Brent Street.”

  Max kept his breathing even. He wouldn’t allow any interference with his marriage plans or his vow to wed on his thirtieth birthday. Neither his grandfather’s passing nor the Countess’s arrival would disrupt his plans, one of which was to follow Meacham tradition and sire his heir soon after his thirtieth birthday and while he was in his prime.

  Young brides like Lady Alice Johnston expected that a mistress would be part of her husband’s life once they’d gone to bed together enough times to produce a son and heir. Unfortunately, gossip about a duke spread faster than normal and Alice would be embarrassed about the news that her husband had kept a string of mistresses, even if they hadn’t all occurred at the same time.

  “I can destroy your reputation.”

  Carina threw back her head and laughed. “Your good name will suffer far more than mine, if I reveal your family’s depraved secrets.” She shrugged “My reputation was shredded long ago.”

  She shook her head and her curls flew around her head. They looked like fire yet they swung as softly as cool silk, and again he saw her lying on a bed with her hair fanned out like an open clam-shell.

  He dragged his gaze back to her face. “Our past is entwined so exposing me will also expose you. Therefore, you shall present yourself here tomorrow morning at ten, when I’ll present you with the first box of papers and you’ll agree to my terms.”

  “There’ll be no terms except mine.”

  He paced the length of his room with his hands clasped behind his back and didn’t look at her. Negotiating tactics; he sensed he’d need every one he could employ to stay a step ahead of Carina. “In exchange for the names of those two men and for my help uncovering the third,” he said in a cool voice, “you’ll entertain me for a month.”

  “Your wealth can buy you a companion in any brothel in London and your title would ensure you were invited into beds all over the city.”

  “None of those women interest me at present.”

  “By some ridiculous whim, you’ve fixed your attention on me, despite the fact that I’ve only been here for twenty minutes.”

  “My mind has been fixated on you for a lot longer than twenty minutes.”

  She frowned. “I’m unsure whether I should be flattered or insulted. Is this supposed to ease your guilt?”

  Damn the woman for she was far too astute. He studied the portrait of Augustus and reminded himself that a Meacham never relaxed their guard, because someone might discover the chink in his armor and get under his skin—someone like the Countess.

  “I don’t agonize over past events.”

  “No regrets? No guilty conscience?”

  “None.”

  “Why then, ye of little conscience, has your mistress’s house stood empty for so long? Is it a year? Or even more?”

  Max stilled. “I’ve no intention of explaining myself.”

  “I realize you’re past due for your month of physical release but, sadly for you, my body is no longer for sale. I’ll not play whore for you, or any man, ever again.”

  With her head held high and without a backward glance, the Countess of Dorchester walked to the door and through it, leaving Max alone in his drawing room with the blood running hot through his body and no willing woman available. Nobody had stirred him this way, not his body nor his mind, since going to a country inn to bed a virgin.

  He’d tried to treat a sweet girl with care, as gently as he dared, knowing that they may be observed. Risking a beating hadn’t mattered as he’d tried to alleviate her fear by whispering words of instruction and comfort and despite it being forbidden, kissing her. Over and over. Tonight, that girl had appeared before him as a beautiful woman. And she was still unlike any of the others he’d bedded, before or since.

  Alone, his body tight with arousal, Max addressed the spot where the Countess had defied him. “I will have you again, Lady Dorchester. One way or another, your body will be mine once more.”

  Chapter Two

  Woods House, Lawnton Place

  “What if he doesn’t come?” Carina spoke over her shoulder to Gertie, her loyal friend
and companion for many years. “When I threatened to expose all the Duke’s past secrets, I was shamming. I can’t reveal anything from that time in case it’s traced back to my husband and his immoral deeds.”

  The older woman raised her head from her mending. She was seated straight-backed, regal as always, her elegant skirts spread above the green and gold pleats of the fashionable settee. The trappings in Woods House were new, purchased with an eye to enhancing Carina’s status as a countess and a widow recently arrived in town for the ritual of a social season.

  “Carina, there is nothing to be gained by fretting yourself into a state. As you said, the only way to deal with the Duke of Stirkton is to present him with a façade even more remote and cold than his is reputed to be.”

  Carina had deliberately donned her finest carriage gown and leather walking boots so the Duke would view her as a well-occupied lady who could spare only a few scant minutes to receive a caller, even if it was he who was calling upon her. On her sixth turn past the bow window overlooking the street, she glanced at her heavily shod feet and sighed. Gertie was correct: her ceaseless pacing in boots was wearing unwanted patterns in her lovely new Persian carpet.

  The overly-ornate ormolu clock, also bought to flaunt her wealth and status before the ton, informed her it was twenty minutes before the hour. The non-fashionable time at which she’d instructed the Duke to arrive was a deliberate ploy, another trick to keep him off balance and give her an advantage. It was also a half-hearted attempt at keeping this, their second meeting, as secret as their first last evening. Nothing remained secret in London for long, especially in these exclusive gardened squares where servants shared gossip from house to house before their masters had arisen for breakfast.