A House East of Regent Street Page 4

But…

  “Are your knees tired?” he heard himself asking her. “Do you want to give them a bit of a rest?”

  “Oh no, not at all. Whatever you want, luv.”

  But he could tell that her knees were tired. Still, a whore didn’t rest while she was entertaining a customer. After all, she’d agreed to do everything he wanted, promised to do her best to please him.

  And wasn’t that the idea of this bargain they’d struck? After all, he’d laid out a lot of money. Her part of the agreement was to guarantee his pleasure. Better, really, if she had to pain herself a bit to give him what he wanted.

  And yet…

  “Come here.” He drew her up to his lap. “I want a kiss from you as well.”

  She shrugged as though it were all the same to her. But he thought he could see a hint of gratitude in her eyes. He reached to kiss her.

  “Wait,” she told him. “Unless you want me smudging kohl and lip rouge all over your neck cloth.”

  He laughed as she unknotted the linen and tossed it onto the floor.

  “We could have used those quick fingers aboard ship, to help with the rigging,” he told her. “And to help in…” His voice caught suddenly – he hadn’t expected her to begin undoing the buttons of his shirt. “To help in other ways,” he said, leaning back to allow her to caress his chest – first with her fingers, and then with her mouth.

  “I’m not a very good sailor,” she murmured. “The rolling of the waves,” she planted a tiny kiss below his collar bone. “The bumping,” this time nibbling on his neck. “The sudden jolts and movements…”

  She stroked his head, tickled his earlobes, nuzzled his cheeks. “All that pitching around, luv, could make me quite giddy,” she told him.

  “We shall have to see just how much pitching around you can tolerate.” He pressed his lips to hers and then forced them apart with his tongue. He could taste himself in her mouth, feel the hard tips of her breasts grazing his exposed triangle of chest. He bit down lightly on her lower lip – it seemed he’d been dreaming of doing nothing else since he’d first laid eyes on her. She breathed deeply, surrendering the moment to him. If he’d wanted to draw a drop of blood, he knew she would have allowed it. But he loosened his teeth, relaxed his mouth into a deep, shuddering kiss.

  He slipped his hands under her bum, kneading and squeezing her flesh, lifting her, parting her; she was straddling him now. His mouth moved down to her neck. She shifted her center; he moved a bit as well, positioning himself – for he was ready again – to enter her.

  She opened to him; the lips of her cunt were about the head of his cock. He grasped her waist, intending to pull her body smartly downward. But she resisted him. “Touch me,” she whispered. “Touch me a little before you fuck me.”

  He almost slapped her instead. Well, he was the one doing the paying, wasn’t he? And anyway, he was a man and he made those decisions. Well, wasn’t he? Didn’t he?

  It all came from that moment of sympathy he’d felt – for her aching knees. Stupid, Jack. Give a woman like her a moment of consideration and there she’d be, ordering him around for her own purposes. He should have bitten her lip until the blood dribbled down her chin.

  “Please,” she said, “please touch me. Just one finger, for just one minute.”

  It wasn’t much to ask, he supposed. But it was the principle of the thing.

  “Please.” He wasn’t here for her benefit.

  Still, she was only asking for a minute of his time and his touch. Just his fingers after all. Certainly his cock could spare a minute – no reason to be so precipitous, to fear a loss of control. Not when she was touching the head of it as provocatively as she was, kissing it, so to speak, with the lips of her cunt.

  Certainly he was man enough to… just to rub the tip of his finger at the outside of her slit. Lightly. Where the lips came together in front. Where she was swollen, trembling…

  “Yes, yes, just like that.” She moaned, thrashed about – actually, he found himself rather enjoying the spectacle of her pleasure. Not to speak of knowing just how little it took to arouse her like that. Just a subtle fingertip – had he ever before considered what a mystery the female body was?

  “Ah yes, all right. Thanks, darling.”

  But he didn’t like that calm, self-satisfied tone of voice. He liked her better when she was moaning, gasping – not to speak of pleading. He played with her some more – the softer, the more controlled his touch, he discovered, the more profound her response. He ran another finger around the outside of her cunt, lightly pinching the lips, then stroking and petting, as he would a furry little animal. Her face had become pink, her eyes soft.

  By now he had slid his cock within her – or perhaps she’d lowered herself onto him. Did it matter which it was? She was soft, warm, and eminently ready, it seemed to him, for some jolting and pitching about. He thrust up into her, quickly, roughly; she cried out, and now so did he, delighted by the bouncing of her bum against his thighs and of her breasts against his chest. “Oh yes, lovely,” she called – quite as though he needed her opinion of the matter.

  He wanted her underneath him now. A quarter turn and he had her lying on her back on the settee; she bent her knees more sharply and he hoisted her legs around his neck. He drove more deeply into her. Excellent – except that the settee was a damn uncomfortable piece of furniture – where was that blasted Elastic Bed she’d talked about? He wanted to raise himself onto his toes, give himself better leverage. His knee ached a bit; there wasn’t room to stretch his legs as he wanted.

  But even with the knee, he seemed to be managing all right; she bucked under him, twisting and pinching his nipples while he sucked on hers. He could feel her begin to tremble inside. If he could only hold off his own orgasm, he thought. He wanted to see what she looked like at the crest of hers. But he couldn’t. He could only fuck her harder and more furiously, too far gone even to notice that one of the settee’s delicate legs had cracked, and that the bloody piece of furniture was beginning to teeter unsteadily beneath them as they continued to rock in their embrace him deep inside her and both of them gasping, groaning, even laughing now, in their shared ascent to climax.

  The leg must have detached itself entirely: the thought made its slow way toward his conscious mind as the settee pitched onto its back – at the very moment she screamed her release and he discharged into her, collapsing on top of her.

  Or to the side of her. Or wherever the ruined settee had deposited them. Jack, for one, was too disoriented to get his bearings for a moment. And both of them were too exhausted even to disentangle their limbs from one another for – well, who knew how long? Except that it seemed that the sun had set; there were no more slants of light coming through the window.

  “You are all right, aren’t you?” he murmured into her neck. “Umm, I must be,” she replied. “Well, I haven’t broken or sprained anything, anyway. But the settee will be needing some repair.”

  He shrugged. “I’ll cover the cost.”

  “That’s good of you,” she told him. “Thanks.”

  She was speaking in her shopkeeper’s voice once more.

  “And we’re lucky” – she rolled out of his arms and onto the floor – “that we didn’t upset the lamp and set ourselves afire.”

  They stared at each other for a moment, both of them considering that they’d come pretty close to doing just that – even without the lamp.

  “But it’s already evening” she told him. “I must go. And perhaps you have an engagement as well.”

  He tried to move and groaned.

  “Oh dear, your knee,” she exclaimed. “I’d forgotten about your knee.”

  He laughed. “I rather forgot about it too, for a while. But it seems all right. No, the problem is that I’m weak. I’m hungry.”

  Now that he thought about it, he hadn’t eaten all day. He grinned and stretched. His belly rumbled, and he wondered, just a bit sheepishly, if she could hear it from whatever dark corner of the
room she’d disappeared to.

  No matter. And anyway, she was likely preoccupied with her own personal adjustments. Washing herself, he expected, somewhere inside. Prostitutes did that. Women’s stuff; their business.

  Her voice rang out from the shadows. “Didn’t eat enough before you came? Poor Jack, how very foolish of you. Well, what would you think about our meeting in the kitchen tomorrow? I’ll feed you up a bit, can’t have you expiring of hunger on top of me. Do you care for oysters?”

  The rules were supposed to be that he’d specify the room. But he loved oysters; the feeding up part sounded quite nice. He grunted. “Yes, yes, oysters, the kitchen.” Quite as though he’d had the kitchen in mind all along.

  She emerged from her dark corner, carrying her outer clothes and some other items with her. “And then we’ll repair to a bedroom, of course.”

  “Of course.” He stared at her, fixing herself up in the lamplight. She’d produced a handkerchief and some sort of stuff in a little bottle, to remove the lingering traces of paint from her face.

  And now a loose gown, to slip over her undergarments. She dressed quickly. He expected that she wanted to get home to her Frenchman.

  She was looking less whorish – and less approachable – at every moment. Especially after she’d combed the tousles out of her hair. Her face was beginning to fall into the haughty lines he’d seen yesterday. Well, what did he expect? It was only a business transaction, after all.

  And as for the cries of pleasure he’d elicited from her – the gasps, the moans, and the way she’d thrown back her head when he’d touched her as she’d asked… To look at her now, you wouldn’t believe that any of it had happened.

  Shoes now, and her velvet cloak again. “Well, I’ll leave you now, Mr. Merion.”

  She’d called him Jack, he thought, when she’d proposed feeding him oysters. And in fact, he’d rather liked the sound of it, though he didn’t recall ever telling her his name.

  But Mr. Merion was more appropriate to the terms of their bargain.

  “All right, then, Cléo. Tomorrow. The kitchen.”

  The Frenchman sighed and shifted a bit in his sleep.

  He was going to wake soon, she thought. Time to turn up the lamp. Georges, the valet, had assured her that the gentleman had been resting comfortably for the duration of her absence.

  That’s how he’d put it: “your absence, Madame.” For Georges could express polite censure in neutral terms and with not much facial expression – though given the rough modeling of his features, a little expression went a long way. Whereupon, having delivered his message, he’d taken her cloak without even a glance at the unaccustomed dishevelment of her hair and gown, or at the bits of kohl she knew were lingering at the corners of her eyes.

  No question that he knew where she’d been. Georges knew everything, whether he’d been told it or not.

  And – ergo – no question that he also knew quite well that she and Philippe had agreed, calmly and in very few words, on the necessity of today’s errand.

  They needed to rent the house near Soho Square. It was a pity that she had to be part of the bargain, but no more than a pity. They’d each suffered worse indignities over the years: her childhood had been unspeakable, and Philippe had almost died in the Terror. Their time together had been gay and tranquil for the most part, but not without its financial ups and down, its emotional complexities. No matter.

  Lovers and companions both, they respected each other. They were adults; when hardships arose, each of them took on his or her portion of the burden.

  They kept no secrets from each other. And it was impossible to keep anything from Georges, who gave his opinion unsolicited and free of charge. Which was only fair, she supposed; these days he was virtually working for free as well. They’d dismissed all the other servants, except for a char who came in for the heavy work. They’d waited too long, hoping that a property settlement in France might go differently than it had. And they’d agreed not to draw upon the money they’d put aside for this brothel business.

  They couldn’t afford anything west of Regent Street; this house was their best hope.

  She stroked his cheek. It was pleasantly warm and dry; no clammy sweats today, perhaps he was finally on the mend. His sleeping face looked serene in the light.

  Perhaps he’d be able to take some bread and salad when he woke, or even some of the leftover cassoulet. Her mouth watered at the thought of the cassoulet: Jack Merion wasn’t the only one who’d worked up an appetite this afternoon. She quite ached, inside and out, from the vigorous pounding he’d given her. A lovely sort of ache, really. “Demanding” was the word he’d used.

  Demanding indeed.

  Her lips curved into a smile as she remembered how astonished he’d been by her own modest demands. Astonished, but not intractable – well, that was a good thing anyway. He’d caressed her quite prettily when she’d insisted upon it. And she’d enjoyed those rough, sailor’s hands of his.

  Of course, he’d know more about what a woman liked if anyone had ever bothered to teach him. He’d been spoiled, no doubt about it, for being so pleasant to look at. Even now. A girl could forgive him a great deal, just for the sight of that smile. Those wide, light, still somehow innocent hazel eyes too. Not to speak of the fancywork below and his energetic way of using it.

  One could take him as he was. Well, one could, perhaps. But she wouldn’t. She wasn’t the naïve, accepting girl she’d once been. She’d bring him round, make a lover of him in the four days remaining to her. She hadn’t expected the flashes of kindness and decency under his blustering awkwardness.

  No, that wasn’t true. He’d turned out to be precisely the man she’d known he’d be.

  Four days. Only four days.

  But she wouldn’t think of it as only. These days were a gift, and she’d value them accordingly. Do anything she liked with him – even feed him, if it pleased her to do so.

  The prince’s eyelids fluttered. After supper perhaps she’d read to him for a bit. They wouldn’t discuss the events of the afternoon. What mattered was that she was safe, that his health was no worse, and that they were a day closer to leasing the property. He liked to see her smiling when he woke. She was surprised to realize that she was already smiling.

  Forgive me, Philippe, she thought. But I do have a secret.

  A burdensome one. It was hard, bearing it by herself. For a moment she found herself wishing that Georges would use his mysterious powers to divine her thoughts.

  Her companion opened his eyes and drifted back to consciousness.

  She took his hand. They exchanged smiles.

  Life was complicated.

  Forgive me, old friend.

  Wednesday: The Kitchen

  Right prompt today, he congratulated himself as he stepped up to the front steps. Well, he could hardly not be, lurking around the corner as he’d been, anxiously consulting his pocket watch until the hand crept round to three. Pleasant set of streets, actually. The truth was, he found the shabbiness comforting, the buzz of trades and laboring people invigorating. Immigrants made their homes in Soho, French and Irish mostly, the mix of accents and the cadences of speech a kind of music. When a flock of tiny chattering Jewish boys crowded and jostled out of a doorway, he couldn’t help but feel a bit of their joy, for being freed from their school for the day. It might be interesting to live in such a neighborhood, he found himself thinking – for a moment only, before dismissing the idea with an impatient shrug.

  He shut the door behind him. It fit snugly into its frame. The house really was a fine piece of construction, he thought, as he started to the back stairs.

  Damn, she thought. He was early. The food was ready, but she could have used a bit of freshening up.

  Damn and double damn, she didn’t like being taken by surprise.

  Still, he didn’t have to know that, did he?

  A splendid aroma wafted up to greet him: mussels, stewed with butter, cream, leeks, and some ingre
dient Jack couldn’t identify. He could hear her rattling the pots and pans, singing as she worked, her voice thin but sweet. He waited, just outside the doorway, to hear what she was singing.

  A Wife’s like a guinea in gold,

  Stampt with the name of her spouse;

  Now here, now there; is bought or is sold;

  And is current in every house.

  An insulting ditty, at least to a man who intended to marry. One didn’t like to imagine one’s future wife being passed around like a gold coin.

  No doubt he was especially sensitive to such a possibility, as he’d finally gotten that kiss from Evelina last night. She’d been pleased to see him, concerned about his “touch of malaria,” and pleasantly surprised by how well he looked. A bit tired, of course, she’d observed, but that was to be expected; he also seemed calmer, more at his ease; bed rest had clearly done him good. Well, something had done him good, anyway. He’d blushed invisibly under his sun-browned skin. Perhaps it was his look of confusion that had done the trick. In any case, that’s when he had finally gotten the kiss. Hardly a passionate one: in truth it had hardly been a kiss at all – more like a promissory note, redeemable upon delivery of the marriage contract.

  But now who was sounding cynical about marriage?

  In any event, she’d finished the lyric and was humming to herself while he lingered silently in the stairway, wondering how she’d greet him. Like the adorable slut who’d so obligingly wriggled out of her yellow peignoir? Or the distant, self-possessed woman who’d visited him in his sitting room?

  He wondered which of the two he wanted.

  Each of them. Both of them. The slut in yellow for – well, for obvious reasons. But he also wanted the grande horizontale in her velvet cloak, for reasons that were quite unfathomable to him.

  Today, though, she was neither of those women. She wore a different peignoir today – of some pale, indefinable color, what little he could see of it under her voluminous white apron. Her face was flushed, and a bit moist, from the steam rising from an iron pot on the stove. Her brow was furrowed – all her concentration directed, it seemed, toward the mussel stew. She’d taken a bit of the sauce into a wooden spoon and was sipping its contents.