Improper Relations (5 page)

Chapter Five

He left before breakfast the next morning. For the
first fortnight of his absence I was untroubled; he’d said he might be gone as
long as a week or two. My duties with Aunt Augusta kept me occupied during the
day, and though I was bothered by frequent twinges of desire, no one around me
seemed to notice. When my drawers caught and pulled against my cunny, making me
gasp, I had the presence of mind to cough. Soon I was coughing often enough that
Aunt Augusta ordered me dosed with her syrup for catarrh, a most unpleasant
experience indeed.

The rasp of my chemise against my nipples was an even worse
torment. Every time I moved, it seemed, I could feel them stiffening against the
linen, and images of Leo at my breast, suckling and nipping and tickling, would
pop into my brain, no matter what else I was doing.

At first I resisted the act of self-pleasure that Leo had shown
me, certain I could wait for his return. But a third week passed, then a fourth,
with no word from him, and I grew frantic with worry and suppressed desire. Had
he tired of me already? Perhaps he’d found another lover, a woman of experience
who knew how to please him.

Soon I was waking in the middle of the night, my sheets and
nightgown in a tangle around my legs, the place between my legs throbbing with
need. It was unbearable—I could wait no longer—so I did as he’d shown me. When
the great house was dark and silent and cold each night, I would hide under my
bedcovers, close my eyes and allow myself to dream.

As I touched myself I thought of his cock in my hands and in my
mouth, and I remembered the feel of his mouth between my legs, licking and
sucking at me until I came. In my fantasies I became Ida, and he was bending me
over the table in the library, pulling my skirts out of the way, pushing roughly
into me, fucking me soundly, and the sight of it, behind my clenched-tight eyes,
gave me orgasms night after night.

But then, after the beauty of my release had dulled and died, I
would still be alone in my cold, drafty room, shivering alone in my bed, and I
would miss him more than ever. I’d never been more lonely, never more alone.

And then, as my hope faded to twilight, Leo returned.

I had no knowledge, no presentiment of his arrival—he was
simply there, one morning at breakfast, exactly thirty-eight days after he had
left. Ignoring me, as I knew he had to do. Or perhaps it reflected a change of
heart.

I murmured a good morning to all, curtsied to the marquess and
seated myself at some distance from the others. Plucking a slice of toast from
the rack at my end of the table, I introduced the merest glaze of marmalade to
its surface and ate as quickly as good manners allowed.

I dared not look at Leo, but I could feel his presence as
strongly as if he were sitting next to me. He and his father and brother hardly
spoke, concentrating instead on their plates of curried kidneys, cold mutton and
kedgeree. What passed for conversation seemed to revolve around their plans for
the day.

I listened, my heart stuttering, and learned that Leo intended
to ride to Abbotsbury, a village some five miles distant. Perhaps he had a
mistress tucked away in one of the ancient thatched cottages that lined its
pretty lanes.

I rose from the table, made my farewells to those still
gathered and departed the breakfast room as quietly as I had entered. No one so
much as nodded in return.

When I was halfway across the hall I heard a door open and
close, then the echo of boots on the marbled pavers. Someone was approaching. I
felt a rush of warmth behind me, the brush of a hand against mine. I turned to
look, but Leo was already departing, bounding through the great house’s entrance
doors, which had been drawn wide for him by a liveried footman.

Only then did I realize he’d tucked a scrap of paper into my
hand. It took every ounce of discipline I possessed, but I resisted the urge to
look at it, there and then, as I hurried up the grand sweep of the stairway.
Instead I continued to Aunt Augusta’s rooms, begged her permission that I might
collect a fresh handkerchief before we began work, and hastened to my
bedroom.

Safely hidden from prying eyes, I unfolded the scrap of paper
Leo had given me.

Third floor, east wing, old nursery—usual time.

Regards,

L

He hadn’t forgotten me, after all,
hadn’t tired of me. That day would come—I knew it as well as I knew my own
heart—but for now, for today, he was mine.

The hours that passed were interminable. Correspondence,
mending, luncheon, a walk through the gardens, more correspondence, more
mending. And then, at last, it was two o’clock.

We retired to Aunt Augusta’s sitting room, where she took to
her chaise longue—in her opinion only invalids belonged in bed during the day. I
opened
Little Dorrit
and began to read aloud. Within
moments her eyes had closed, but I dared not stop. Sometimes she liked to test
me by feigning slumber. I read on until the Meissen clock on the mantel chimed
the hour, and only then did I close the book and set it aside.

Taking up my mending basket, I proceeded to the servants’
stairs at the end of the hall, only instead of going downstairs, to the library,
I ascended to the third floor. It was but a short walk to the nursery in the
east wing.

The corridor was dimly lit, apart from a stray sunbeam peeking
from a door that had been left ajar. I approached it, my heart pounding, and
pushed it open.

The chamber I entered was ablaze with late-afternoon sun. Even
more Spartan than my own modest chamber nearby, the room held but a narrow iron
bed, a lone chair and a plain deal wardrobe. The bed had a mattress but no
sheets or pillows; a thin, worn counterpane was its only adornment.

Leo stood by the window, his eyes fixed on the door. He still
wore his riding boots and breeches but had thrown his coat, waistcoat and stock
on the chair. Through the fine white linen of his shirt, now open at the neck, I
could see the faintest shadow of hair on his chest.

I tried to swallow, but my throat was parched. I opened my
mouth to speak, but no words came forth. So I walked toward him, daring to meet
his gaze, not looking away.

“I missed you,” he said.

“I’m sorry to hear it.”

“And I’m sorry to have been so long in returning. I was
delayed. Had no way of letting you know.”

I nodded, not knowing what else to say.

He smiled, and it seemed to me that he really was sorry for it.
“Do you forgive me?”

“Yes,” I said, resolving to forget the misery of the past
weeks. “There’s nothing to forgive. You’re here now.”

“I am indeed. And I don’t care to waste another minute.”

He walked to the door and wedged something beneath it—a wooden
bootjack. “Good thing I remembered there aren’t any locks on the nursery
doors.”

And then he was looming before me, his breath warm against my
ear. “Do you know how it has tormented me? To be apart from you for so
long?”

“Leo, I—”

“Will you disrobe for me? Or do I ask too much of you?”

“I want to,” I confessed, “but what if I disappoint you? I’m no
longer young, and compared to other women—”

“Forget them. I think you’re lovely and I’ve certainly told you
so before. Why don’t you believe me?”

“But I’m older than you,” I said, although the simple act of
saying it aloud pained me.

“And I don’t care, not a whit. When I’m with you, Hannah, I
only see a beautiful woman. Albeit one who is encumbered with an excessive
amount of clothing.”

I needed no further encouragement, though I reserved judgment
on his true feelings in regard to my appearance. It was enough, for now, that he
desired me.

He watched me remove my bodice, skirt, petticoats and drawers,
offering his assistance when I faltered, kneeling before me to unlace my half
boots.

He untied my garters, peeling back my much-darned black
stockings with them. And then, somehow, he unfastened the metal busk closure of
my corset. Only my threadbare linen chemise remained.

“Open it,” he commanded.

I tried to comply, but my hands were clumsy and slow. So he
brushed them aside, loosened the ribbon at its neck and bared my breasts.

“Just as pretty as I remembered. Your tits are beautiful,
Hannah. I’ve been thinking about them for weeks now.”

He hefted them in his hands, as if they were fruits to be
weighed, then played with my nipples, which were tingling in a way that was
almost painful. He pinched them, scraped them less gently with his thumbnails,
rubbed them into his palms and finally, just as I was about to beg him, he
suckled on them, taking great, greedy mouthfuls that made the room spin and
swirl around me.

He pushed my chemise up to my waist, stuffing the fabric into
my nerveless grasp. “I want to see your cunny again,” he told me, and a thrill
danced up my spine at the sound of his coarse talk.

“I can’t stop thinking about it. You’ve ruined me for anyone
else.” This as the rasp of his stubbled cheek burned into the skin of my
thighs.

I wanted so badly to believe him.

“Widen your stance.” As soon as I had moved my legs apart, his
fingers went to the folds of my sex, spreading them wide, baring me entirely.
“Shall we see if you’re ready?” He pushed a finger deep inside me, groaning
raggedly as he found the answer he sought.

“Take off your chemise. Go to the bed and lie down,” he
ordered, and I shivered at the note of command in his voice.

I obeyed. I shed my chemise, knowing it left me naked before
him, and sat on the bed. But instead of reclining, I began to pull the pins from
my hair. It was my only true claim to beauty, and I wanted him to see.

Removing the last of my hairpins, I unraveled my plaits. He’d
made no sound; perhaps he wasn’t interested in my hair and simply wanted to get
on with fucking me. I took a deep breath, steadied myself and looked at him.

He bore the expression of a man transfixed. “Has any man ever
seen you like this?”

“No. Not even Charles.”

He moved to the bed, his eyes glittering with surprise and
delight, and lifted one heavy, curling lock from my shoulders. “It’s so
long.”

“I’ve never cut it.”

“No queen ever wore a more beautiful mantle,” he whispered, and
for a moment I thought he might say something more.

Instead, he stepped back, his eyes never leaving mine, and
shrugged off his braces. Pulling his shirt over his head, he tossed it on the
floor, then sat to pull off his boots. Wearing only his riding breeches, he
approached me where I sat on the bed.

“Have you missed me?” he asked, his voice rough and low. “Have
you missed this?” He took hold of my hands and pressed them to the front of his
breeches.

I nodded.

“Then you know what I want you to do.”

I unfastened his breeches and pushed them down his legs; he
wore nothing underneath. His cock was even bigger than I had remembered.

I couldn’t resist. I bent my head and licked him once, twice,
like a kitten with a dish of cream, then opened my lips wide, ready to attend to
him as I’d done the last time we met. But before I could take him into my mouth,
he pushed me away, and I tumbled back on the bed.

He kicked off his breeches, and then he was kneeling between my
legs, his hands on my breasts, rubbing, pinching, tormenting. I heard my voice
begging him to kiss them, to come closer to me, to please, oh please, press
against me.

“First tell me what you want,” he said, unmoved by my
entreaties.

“I want you,” I moaned.

“What do you want from me, then?”

“What you said you’d do, before you went away.”

“And what was that? I won’t do anything more until you tell
me.”

“I want you to take me,” I whispered.

“Come now, Hannah. You know I’m not a man for euphemisms. What
do you want me to do?”

“I want you to fuck me.”

“Good girl. Spread your legs for me, nice and wide. Bend your
knees a little. Yes, that’s it.”

He took hold of his cock, bracing his weight with his other
arm, and I felt the head of it against the opening of my cunny. I braced myself
for the pain to come, for the dreadful dry friction I remembered from the times
when Charles had lain with me. But I was as wet as Leo had said I should be, and
his cock slid into me so smoothly, it might have been covered in silk.

He was big, though, so big that he was able to advance only a
few inches before pausing to let my body accommodate him. He pushed forward but
once again halted his advance.

“Christ, Hannah, you’re so tight. This is killing me.”

He pushed forward more, then more, and it occurred to me that I
ought to raise my legs and open them a little wider. He groaned, and for a
moment I wondered if I’d made a mistake. But then he drove into me, all the way
in, and it didn’t hurt at all.

I waited for him to start moving in and out of me, but he made
no move to retreat, instead grinding himself against my cunny in precise,
controlled circles.

“Tell me what this feels like,” he demanded.

How should I answer? “It’s very nice,” I said, which seemed to
fit the moment.

“Nice? That’s all you have to say?
Nice?
”

“I beg your pardon—”

“It’s more than goddamn nice,” he growled. “It’s bloody
perfect, that’s what it is.”

He pulled back a fraction, then pushed into me again, and I
felt a twinge of something—what it was I couldn’t quite tell. But it was more
than nice.

I wanted to touch him, so I trailed my fingertips through the
whorls of hair on his chest. I spied his nipples, flat and almost hidden, and I
pinched one lightly, experimentally. It puckered and grew tight, and I wondered
if the touch of my mouth there would feel pleasant to him. I flicked my tongue
over it, as he’d done to my nipples, and felt absurdly pleased with myself when
he moaned in response.