My Fair Groom (The Sons of the Aristocracy) (8 page)

She often wondered how a proper young lady was supposed to just
know
how to kiss when her first opportunity to do so presented itself. How could she know what to do? How could she know how to respond? How to position herself? How to angle her head? How to hold her lips? Where to put her hands? With everything else a young lady of the
ton
was taught how to do – needlework, elocution, dance, speak French, and draw and paint – why weren’t lessons in
kissing
included?

“Are you well, my lady?” she heard suddenly.
Good grief!
How many times had the groom asked her that question today?

“I am quite well, thank you,” Julia replied, her free hand waving in the air, mostly to act as a fan to help replace the rather heated air that had somehow developed between her and the impossibly handsome groom. “Quite well, but in need of a gallop, I should think,” she said as she pulled on Buttercup’s reins. The horse, having found a bunch of flowers on which to munch, reluctantly stepped up next to her.

Alistair nearly groaned at her comment.
A gallop?
Good God! He could do with a ride of his own! He could imagine her mounting him, her legs straddling his hips, her wet and swollen folds of feminine flesh teasing his hardening cock until he could stand it no longer. He would lift her up and impale her, hold her hips against his own and provide her the ride of her life. He would wait until just before he was overcome with a sudden stab of pleasure to press a carefully placed thumb against her swollen womanhood and see to her pleasure. Watch as her head would be thrown back in ecstasy, exposing her throat to his teasing tongue. As her nipples would ruche into tiny buds his lips could taste and suckle.

But he knew damn well he would be in his own state of ecstasy at that point. There was no way in hell he would be able to hold on that long before his seed would spill from his manhood, sending his body into spasms of pleasure so intense he would pass out from the intensity.

And remain so for several minutes.

“I understand, my lady,” he agreed with a nod, wondering if she truly understood. Did ladies ever imagine making love to their men? Did they daydream about the pleasures that could be had in the marriage bed?

He pulled on Blossom’s reins, forcing the horse to come up alongside him. Alistair had to drop the reins, though, in order to lift Lady Julia onto her horse. He did so without informing her of what he was about to do. Her yelp of surprise was accompanied by her hands taking purchase on his shoulders, as if she had to steady herself as he raised her to the sidesaddle.

Julia knew her first response should have been a scolding. How dare he simply take her by the waist and lift her onto the saddle? He should have laced his fingers together and provided a step onto which she could have placed a dainty foot. Then he could lift her so she landed in the saddle in a smooth, effortless movement, leaving her skirts free to be arranged artfully along the side of the horse. And she was about to admonish him for having touched her, for having placed his hands on both sides of her waist, but she found she could not.

She rather liked the sensation his strong hands left on her body.

Would it feel like that if he had lifted her bare body onto his? So that she sat upon him, her bent legs off to one side of his body much like when she rode Buttercup? But instead of her knee wrapping around a pommel to keep her atop him, he would have impaled her with his manhood and left his hands gripping her waist so that he could ensure she wouldn’t be tossed off his bucking body. And once she touched him with her riding crop, she could imagine how his body would respond, his manhood impaling her deeper with each stride as she rode him. She’d have to leave her hands on his shoulders, she was sure. The power of his bucking body beneath hers would require she hang on for dear life, hang on as one large hand moved from her waist to cup a breast, while another pressed her harder onto his lifting body, a thumb reaching out to tease the soft, wet folds of flesh between her thighs until it made contact with the swollen bud that was at this very moment throbbing in anticipation. And she was about to imagine even more, but the groom had let go of her and was suddenly atop his own mount, his strong thighs wrapped about Blossom’s back in a manner that suggested he was as adept a horseman as he was a bed mate.

Lady Julia was suddenly very jealous of Blossom.

“Where would you like to go, my lady?” Alistair wondered just then.

Julia stared at the groom for several seconds, suddenly feeling a bit bereft. “To my bedchamber” was not an acceptable response, she knew, but she was tempted to put voice to the thought. “To your bedchamber” was also not acceptable, but, oh, so tempting at that moment.

“Home,” she said quietly, deciding she best remove herself from the company of the groom as quickly as possible. 

“Home it is, my lady,” Alistair replied as he lifted the reins and gave Blossom a gentle nudge in the ribs.

Chapter 7

A Talk While Shooting Arrows

Gabriel paused in the vestibule of Trenton Manor and inhaled. The familiar scents of his home filled his nostrils.

Home
.

He thought of how he used to react to this place, of how at one time, when his father was still alive, the scent would have him cringing, his shoulders stiff with fear and his breaths coming in uncertain gasps. His father had been an unpredictable man; sometimes in good spirits with news of recent successes at the gaming tables or in some risky investment, and sometimes in such a foul mood, his words would hurt as badly as if he had struck Gabriel with the back of his hand. On those occasions, Gabriel knew it was his mother who suffered the worst, for it was she who felt the brunt of the seventh Earl of Trenton’s wrath. His fists left marks on her, his raised voice berating her very existence.

Gabriel was still remembering the day he had walked in on his father as he held his mother’s arm behind her back, his eyes black with rage over some slight he thought of her to be guilty. Despite the haste Gabriel made in getting to her, his father’s vindictive nature prevailed. Lady Trenton was left with a twisted arm and a broken wrist that had never quite healed correctly. Gabriel, floored by the beast’s fist when it plunged into his middle, was left breathless and gasping for air. He was powerless to do anything to assist his mother – powerless to provide aid or to counter the earl’s attack.

As Gabriel lay prone, staring at the ceiling of his mother’s salon, he wished his father were dead. Who would have ever guessed that in the next minute, the seventh earl would suffer some kind of seizure that resulted in his death? A seizure that would leave him on the floor only a few feet away from Gabriel, his eyes rolled up in the back of his head and his tongue hanging out one side of his mouth.

Although Gabriel had watched his father fall to the floor, clutching his chest as he did so, Gabriel could do nothing more than turn his head and watch with contempt. When he remembered his mother, though, he struggled to get off the floor. He found her on a settee, holding her injured arm and whimpering in pain. And before he could send for the butler and see to a physician, Lady Trenton begged him to forgive his father. “He doesn’t know what he does,” she whispered, tears streaming down her face.

Gabriel remembered staring at his mother in disbelief. How could she forgive a man who had nearly broken her arm? Probably broken her hand? Who raised his voice and his hand against her and her son more times than he could count?

“Never,” he replied with a shake of his head.
For your sake and for mine,
he thought, but didn’t put voice to the sentiment.

Recalling that afternoon now, Gabriel shook his head and absently felt the ribs that had cracked when his father punched him. Breathing had been next to impossible for several days following that ordeal. The knowledge that he had inherited the earldom hadn’t been made clear until the day after his father’s death, when the estate manager had come to him for his signature on some document.

That day seemed like eons ago, he considered now. Back then, his new power – and the wealth of the earldom – had gone to his head. He’d had tailors, jewelers, hat makers, carpenters and all manner of artisans at his beck and call, making it possible to erase the façades his father had erected in favor of more elegant surroundings and more flamboyant clothing.

The clothing had been one of his mistakes, though.

In taking the advice of a tailor who claimed personal knowledge of how gentlemen in London dressed, Gabriel began sporting bright colors and rich, shiny fabrics when he would have been better off in more conservative attire.

Who could take a man seriously when he dressed like a molly? Especially in Parliament? Despite the black robes they wore while in chambers, every lord knew what Gabriel Wellingham wore when they were outside of the House of Lords.

Gabriel regarded his reflection in a large looking glass in the vestibule, noting how much older, how much more mature he appeared when dressed in the worsted wool topcoat and Nankeen breeches he now wore. Although his waistcoat was red, it was more scarlet in color, and certainly not as ostentatious as an embroidered silk would have been. He thought of all the waistcoats that hung in one of the clothes presses in the master suite at the end of the upstairs hall. Most were too bright or too colorful for his tastes now; he kept them for special occasions like balls and soirées.

Gabriel recalled the last time he had come from London to visit his mother at Trenton Manor. They had been having tea in her parlor, their conversation light until it was suddenly ... not.

“I was so happy the day you announced you were going to London to find a wife,” Charity said wistfully, one hand cupping the bottom of her tea cup as she lifted it to her lips. She took a quick sip, frowning as if she might have forgotten to add the sugar.

“I remember,” Gabriel replied, pausing before he took a drink from his tea. Steam curled up from the surface of the dark liquid, its swirls waving about until he blew gently. His breath sent the tendrils in various directions until they disappeared. “I was surprisingly happy myself,” he admitted. “Although, I soon learned I was in the minority when it came to wanting a wife. Most of my peers seem to wait until they’re nearly thirty, and then they marry debutantes who don’t have an original thought in their pretty little heads.”

Charity’s own head jerked up suddenly. One hand held a spoon poised above the sugar bowl while the other was covering her mouth, as if she was trying to hide her shocked expression.

“Really, mother, you needn’t react so,” Gabriel stated, as if he was offended.

Arching an elegant eyebrow, Charity straightened on the floral settee she favored when taking tea. “I seem to recall you were intent on marrying just such a girl last fall,” she accused with a smirk.

Gabriel shook his head. “I assure you, mother, Lady Elizabeth is not a typical chit just out of the school room,” he claimed in a quiet voice. Had he just paid a bit more attention to Elizabeth Carlington’s comments about charity, and been a bit less obvious about employing multiple mistresses – or not employing them at all –, he might have had the pleasure of marrying the daughter of the marquess he hoped to bring down in Parliament.

Or not.

He knew now that a marriage to Lady Elizabeth would have been the worst possible merger.
Two spoiled brats attempting to out-power one another.
Blood would have spilled. Hair would have been torn out. Vases surely would have been broken.
Thank the gods Viscount Bostwick had come along when he did and saved me from Lady E,
he thought as he drained his tea cup. And such irony that his mother’s name was ‘Charity’ when it was his original ambivalence about Elizabeth’s own charity, “Lady E’s Finding Work for the Wounded”, that had the chit realizing she couldn’t marry him – mistresses or no mistresses.

“I want you to know that I’m not expecting you to marry the daughter of a duke or a marquess,” his mother murmured between sips of her sweetened tea. “Given your rank, you should at least pursue the daughter of an earl, of course, but ...” She allowed the sentence to trail off as she seemed to stare into space.

“Mum?” Gabriel spoke, wondering at his mother’s sudden silence.

Charity Wellingham finally turned her attention back to her son, her memories of long ago having played out to remind her that aristocratic marriages didn’t always have to involve aristocrats.
If men were allowed to marry the women that made them happy, the world would be a better place,
she thought. So why make her son think he had to marry a daughter of the aristocracy if another suited him better? “You should marry someone for whom you feel affection,” she announced with a nod, secretly glad they were very far from London. If anyone in London knew she’d said such a thing, she’d be the
on-dit
in parlors for days to come.

Gabriel stared at his mother, stunned at her simple words. “Do you ... do you mean it?” he asked, thinking she was freeing him from having to marry a blue blood.

Shrugging one shoulder, Charity gave her son a smile and said, “Of course.”

Well, now he knew better. Another few months in London, whilst keeping a low profile, had given him some time to rethink his priorities and his thoughts on marriage.

“Might you know the whereabouts of Lady Trenton?” Gabriel asked of a nearby footman as he entered the main hall from the vestibule.

Surprised at being addressed, the footman stood at attention and nodded. “She is on the back lawn, my lord,” the young man replied with a nod. He returned his head to its previous position, leaving Gabriel with the urge to say, “At ease.”

“Thank you,” Gabriel replied instead, taking the hallway to the back of the house and using the back garden door to exit the house. The weather was surprisingly fine given it was early spring. A mid-afternoon sun lit the backyard and highlighted his mother as she stood with a bow and arrow. Gabriel paused to watch her take a shot, following the arrow as it split the air and landed near the middle of the target. Within a moment, a footman was offering Gabriel his own bow and a quiver filled with arrows. Taking his time, Gabriel strolled down the sloping lawn and stopped next to his mother.

“Good day, my lady,” he said by way of greeting. “It’s a beautiful day, made more so by you,” he added with a smirk.

About to draw back an arrow, Charity Wellingham paused and regarded her son with matching smirk. “Welcome home, my lord. Did something happen in London?” she wondered. Her left arm was bent and held out parallel to the ground whilst her right arm seem to struggle to keep the bow and arrow aimed at a target located at the other end of the back lawn. Despite her wounded wrist, Charity was able to shoot with a great deal of precision.

Gabriel, his gaze on a flock of birds that had just been flushed by one of the gamekeeper’s dogs at the edge of the estate, lifted his own bow and took aim at one of the birds, realizing almost too late that the small target was well out of range of his arrow.

Lowering his bow, he regarded his mother with a frown. “The usual, I suppose,” he responded, wondering why she would ask at just the moment she was about to let go of her arrow. She did so just then, the arrow whizzing to strike with a
thunk
into the target, landing just barely off the center mark. “Good shot,” Gabriel added, wondering how often his mother practiced her archery skills. In a large group, say, during a house party, the Countess of Trenton would have feigned inability at archery. But when she was with her son, she didn’t try to hide her expertise.

“And just what do you mean by that?” Lady Trenton asked with a grin as she faced her son. She leaned her cheek in his direction, and he kissed it just before re-aiming his bow toward the target.

Gabriel took a breath, held it and let go his arrow just as a gust of wind passed. Despite the arrow wavering on its way to the target, it buried itself exactly opposite of his mother’s in the second ring of the bullseye.

Shrugging one shoulder, Gabriel considered how to answer. “Balls, soirées, musicales, afternoons on Rotten Row, evenings at White’s ...”

“Do you expect me to believe you actually
attended
any of those entertainments?” his mother interrupted, her eyes twinkling as if she didn’t believe anything said by her son just then.

Gabriel blinked, tamping down the sudden annoyance he felt at his mother’s teasing. He didn’t dare lash out at the countess over such a slight offense, if she even meant to offend. He found he had become adept at controlling his anger these days. One instance of remembering how his father had reacted to any bit of bad news or a cross word, and Gabriel was suddenly calm. George Wellingham might have been a violent, abusive bully, but Gabriel was determined to behave the exact opposite in that regard. “As a matter of fact, I was a guest at Lord Weatherstone’s ball, I attended Lord Sommers’ wedding festivities ...”

“Sommers is
married?
” Charity interrupted, her mouth wide open in surprise.

Reaching up with a forefinger, Gabriel lifted her chin before she could pull away. “Indeed. He married Everly’s sister,” he added with a teasing grin.

“The bluestocking?” his mother countered, her mouth open once again in shock. She snapped it shut when Gabriel’s finger once again made its way in her direction.

His grin disappeared at her comment. “Even if she is, she is a rather attractive one,” Gabriel said in Evangeline Everly’s defense. He hadn’t met the chit at any balls the Season prior; the
on-dit
suggested her brother’s frequent expeditions to tropical locales meant Lady Evangeline was left without an escort, and rather than make arrangements with a relative to see to her come-out, Everly had just left the poor girl at home alone.

No wonder she’d become a bluestocking!

“Oh, and I did take a phaeton into the park a few days ago,” Gabriel stated suddenly, as if he was still defending himself from her assertion that he had hidden himself from polite society whilst in London.

Charity arched an eyebrow. “By yourself, or ..?”

Gabriel resisted the urge to tell his mother it was really none of her business, but he didn’t have to when he remembered why it was unlikely he could escort an aristocrat’s daughter into the park when driving a phaeton. “Really, mother, if I did have an occasion to escort a young lady into the park, where would I put a lady’s maid on a phaeton? There’s barely room for me on that bench, let alone an eligible lady
and
her maid,” he remarked lightly.

Lady Trenton merely nodded before suddenly lifting her bow and taking aim at the target. She released an arrow that struck the painted wood target with a solid
thump
.

“Bullseye,” Gabriel murmured with appreciation. He lifted his own bow and let go an arrow that seemed to strike in the same hole his mother’s arrow had created. “Whom were you imagining when you were taking aim just then?” he wondered with a cocked eyebrow.

Despite the deep brim of her hat, a red flush was suddenly visible on Lady Trenton’s face and neck. The trouble with having been married to a man who was so universally hated by his family as well as his employees and tenants meant that everyone felt sorry for her. No one would have blamed her if she had used the seventh Earl of Trenton for target practice. “Why
did
you marry my father?” Gabriel asked suddenly. He closed his eyes for a moment, silently chastising himself for the query. He had intended to ask her when they were alone in the parlor – not when they were on the back lawn with a footman carrying a quiver of arrows within earshot.

“I fancied myself in love with him,” Charity answered, turning to hand her bow to the footman. “I
was
in love with him,” she clarified as she lifted her skirts with both hands and made her way to the chairs at the top of the back lawn.

Gabriel gave up his own bow and gloves to the same footman and hurried to stroll alongside his mother. “So, he wasn’t always so ..?”

“No,” Charity replied quickly, her head shaking so the ostrich feather that arced out of the side of her hat waved about. “Your father was a perfect gentleman. Very pleasant, very handsome. Very even-tempered.” The last words came out in a whisper.

Frowning, Gabriel regarded his mother as she seated herself in the nearest chair. “What happened to change him so?” Gabriel asked as he took the chair opposite hers. A maid appeared with a tray of lemonade in crystal glasses, curtsying before offering a glass to the countess. Gabriel wondered if his mother might not answer his question. She certainly wouldn’t as long as the servant was within earshot. “Thank you,” he murmured as he took one of the glasses from the maid. When the servant curtsied and took her leave, Gabriel leaned toward his mother. “Tell me,” he insisted before taking a sip of the lemonade, surprised at the chunks of ice that bobbed at the surface.

Charity took a long drink of her own lemonade before setting the glass on the small table next to her chair. Positioned as she was, her back ramrod straight and her skirts splayed out and around her legs, she looked as if she sat on a throne. Gabriel thought she might be better suited to a more royal role, but she’d been far too young to be a bridal candidate for King George and probably too old to catch Prinny’s eye. “Your uncle,” she stated finally. The simple words seemed to cause her shoulders to slump.