The Wicked Confessions of Lady Cecelia Stanton (5 page)

Without further word, Bess captured me in her arms and pulled me into her bosom where I began to sob. William had left me, I felt sure. What could possibly keep him from his son and heir?
Whores and gambling houses, whisky and opium.
Were they worth more to him than I? Than our son?

I found Bess’s hands back on my chin and she tilted my head upwards to meet hers. Her eyes were dark with some unfathomable thought, and without a sound she brought her lips to mine.

Her lips cushioned mine like sweet pillows and I felt my body spark back to life in a way it had not since Alexander’s arrival. Her kiss turned slightly more urgent, her hands gripped my face and held me as her tongue moved to plunder my mouth.

‘Bess,’ I breathed as she kissed me, ‘never leave me, Bess.’

She pulled away, her cheeks were flushed and her eyes sparkled again, though she did not smile. ‘Milady, you need not worry. I am not going anywhere.’ She kissed me lightly on my cheek, her hands moving towards my waist, she held me, watching carefully.

I knew it was wicked to feel this about my maid, but how could something that felt so right be wrong?

‘I couldn’t bear to lose you too. I couldn’t,’ I heard myself sob.

Bess’s hands moved and cupped my milk-laden breast and kneaded gently, before she dipped her head and kissed me once more. ‘I know,’ was all she replied.

Without further preamble, she took my hand, ‘Let us prepare you for bed,’ she said. ‘You are tired.’

I followed her then, as a lamb does its shepherd.

‘Will he return?’ I asked softly.

Bess turned, and something, a peculiar shadow chased across those molten brown eyes. ‘Yes,’ she replied. ‘He will.’

I did not question how she knew, but her belief was enough assurance for me.

We retired to my rooms, where Bess undressed me and laid me back on the bed. I was dressed in only my nightdress – though I felt no shame nor discomfort for Bess knew my body better than I knew it myself.

‘What is it you want from me, milady? There is precious little I can tutor you in now.’ she asked very softly.

I looked at her then, what was it exactly that I did want? I could not rightly answer. I wanted the pleasure her hands could give me, it was true, but I wanted something so much more. I wanted her arms around me as I fell asleep. I wanted to know I was not so alone as I thought.

‘Sleep with me, Bess,’ I said, and tapped the bed beside me. ‘Do not leave me alone.’

She looked at me with those unfathomable eyes. ‘I will lay with you a time, but I must return to my own rooms soon.’

I understood of course, she was my maid,
not my husband,
and her prolonged presence in my rooms may well incite gossip, which I was most anxious to avoid.

‘Of course,’ I murmured, but felt her weight tilt the bed as she crawled onto of the covers behind me and enclosed me in her arms.

‘Sleep, milady,’ she whispered as she kissed my hair – and I did.

My husband finally returned to Stanton when his son was nearly three months old. I had sent many more letters into London requesting his return to meet his son and heir, but they had been dismissed. He was busy with commerce once again, or so he stated. Socially, I was becoming a pariah – William’s antics in London had been the talk of the town
and
countryside. The fact that he had long delayed his return to the Hall to visit his newborn son merely added to the scandal. It was only Bess whose stalwart friendship and confidence that gave me strength.

I was reading in the sitting room as one does on a winter’s afternoon. Alexander was abed and the last sickly rays of winter sunlight lingered through the windows. The fire crackled, and I sipped at my tea. It was then I heard the carriage.

‘Your husband returns,’ Bess commented, standing by the window and peering out over the winter gardens.

At her words my heart twisted. The hurt I had initially felt over his betrayals had deepened to resentment. I cannot deny it.

I felt it somehow wrong that it was Bess, not William who had made my journey into motherhood possible. It was she who soothed my overwrought mind and held me as I slept. Not William. He had betrayed me, hurt me and shamed me. How could I forgive him?

I didn’t want to.

I felt as petulant and wild as the recalcitrant child I once had been.

Yet my body made to stand and greet my husband regardless.

‘Are you well, milady?’ Bess asked, her hand resting lightly upon my elbow.

I need not answer, for she knew what I felt. Our relationship had grown. My husband’s neglect and my long confinement had sent me deeper into her strong, soap-scented arms. She pleasured me greatly and offered me more comfort than I’d ever hoped to find in the arms of another living person.

‘I do not know what to say,’ I started, my hand flying to straighten my hair.

‘Say nothing then,’ was her sage advice. ‘Lord Stanton shall not notice your silence. He will merely be pleased to see you looking so fine so soon after your delivery.’

Was he that shallow a man? I wondered.

Her velvet soft lips brushed past my cheek and my nipples puckered beneath my dress. I feared for a moment, my milk would spring afresh. Though I had a wet nurse with ample supply for my child, I fed Alexander from my own breasts every day. The physician had insisted upon it. He claimed a child needed mother’s milk, particularly his own mother’s milk. Though he confessed that a wet nurse was a wise idea so as not to drain oneself entirely.

In a gust of icy air, the door to the sitting room opened. William stepped in, and I believe my heart tried to strangle me. I could scarce breathe when I looked upon him.

He looked well – devilishly handsome, in fact. He had allowed his hair to grow long and somehow appeared leaner and older. Yet it was his eyes that melted me. They were sincere and wide. I found moving towards him, though I had not directed my legs to do so. Bess released my elbow, and William closed the remaining distance between us.

‘Ceecee,’ he whispered, his eyes glistened and he fell onto one knee before me. ‘Forgive me.’ He buried his face in the cloth of my skirts.

It was not the greeting I had expected, nor could have possibly envisioned. I had imagined anger, sharp words, resentment, not remorse and sorrow. Never this.

Reciprocal tears seemed to pour forth from my eyes, and I found my hands stroking his head as he sobbed into my dress.

‘Forgive me,’ he choked once again.

My hands ran paths through his longer hair and my heart contracted painfully. I turned my head and saw Bess to my right. Her face was tight and her lips down turned.

‘Stand, William,’ I whispered and he did.

He stood before me, tears glistening down his cheeks, face crumpled and miserable, as his hands gripped mine tightly.

My anger disappeared, and I spoke the only words I could.

‘You are forgiven,’ I said.

I heard Bess gasp behind me, but continued regardless. ‘Make no mistake, I do not agree with what you have done, nor the length of your absence, but you are my husband and I am, and ever will be, your wife,’ I said.

I was not brave enough then to mention his whoring, though I wished to. ‘Do not drive us to poverty with your gambling and excesses, William. I beg you.’

He exhaled as if he’d been withholding breath. ‘I shall not, you have my word. You are too good,’ he whispered and bent to kiss me. ‘You are too fine a woman to be shackled to a man like me.’

Inwardly, I had to disagree. Though I had not gambled nor shamed myself with other men, I still had not been true. I loved Bess, and had accepted her caresses in the guise of tutelage since the first night of our marriage. Yet I loved William too, despite it all. Who then had been more untrue, I wondered, William or me?

William leaned forward and kissed me, his lips were hesitant at first, as if expecting me to recoil. I did not. I accepted his lips as I accepted his apology, with everything I had.

He was my husband after all.

It did not take long, but William’s passion began to mount. His tongue slipped between my lips and wrestled with mine own. He had never kissed me with such fury, and my loins began to smoulder. Within a moment, I found William grinding the hardness of his staff into my lower belly and his chest flattening my milky breasts.

I pulled away as my breasts tightened and threatened to leak. ‘Your son, William. Do you not wish to see him?’ I frowned.

Excitement and unexpected joy replaced his lust-filled expression. ‘Indeed I do,’ he exclaimed and looked towards Bess.

‘Bess, would you be so kind as ready your mistress’s room for us?’ His hand wrapped itself around my waist and he pulled me close towards him.

I think I saw Bess stiffen then, but she gave a curt nod and swept from the room. My eyes lingered on her as she left.

I could sense Bess’s resentment as if it were my own. I closed my eyes and prayed to the good Lord to give us strength. Alas, I could not dwell on Bess’s dissatisfaction. It would not do myself, nor Bess, any good to do so. My husband was returned and most eager to see his son, and I was most proud to present him.

With arms linked, we made our way upstairs. It seemed to me that William could not keep his hands from my person, and I relished it. Several times on the journey towards the nursery he stopped our progress to again kiss me.

‘I have missed you greatly,’ he confided as we stood half way up the stairwell. He ran a torrent of kisses down my neck.

I shuddered in response. ‘You have?’ I could not keep the doubt from my tone.

‘More than you will ever know,’ he replied and brushed an errant strand of hair from my brow.

There was much I could say in response, but instead I said nothing.

We resumed our walk to the nursery room. The sun had set now and the chambermaid had lit the lamps and stoked the fire. At our entrance our wet nurse bobbed into a curtsey.

‘Milady,’ she exclaimed with breathless surprise. She was a sweet thing of calm and gentle demeanour. Her name was Nancy, a young girl from the village who’d found herself in a delicate condition. Unfortunately, or perhaps fortunately, her infant had died shortly after birth. Thus, for the past few years she’d hired herself out as a wet nurse to noble families. Her milk was famed in the county for being a fine quality, and under her bounteous bosom, supplemented by my own more refined milk, Alexander was flourishing.

William’s eyes lingered over her open nursing cloak, and the wet nurse swiftly closed it.

‘The young master is asleep, milady,’ she bobbed nervously at me again, her eyes flickering betwixt me and my husband.

‘Nancy, this is Lord Stanton, my husband,’ I said.

Nancy bobbed into a curtsey again. ‘I’m honoured to be nursing your fine boy, milord.’

William nodded, his eyes lingered on the bounce of her bosom before he looked towards the cradle where our son slept.

‘May I?’ he asked me.

‘How could I stop you?’ I replied, realising only belatedly how terribly bitter I sounded.

He threw me a smile that was both cheeky and apologetic, and strode towards the cradle.

Without hesitation he leaned over and peered in.

Alexander was sleeping the contented sleep only a babe with a full belly and dry bottom can. His dark hair curled over his forehead and his lips puckered and flexed in sleep.

William turned towards me, his smile broad. ‘We have made a handsome boy, Ceecee.’

I felt absurdly proud to hear this decree and hastened to agree. ‘Yes. We have, and a strong one too. The physician claimed he was one of the strongest boys he had ever brought forth into the world.’

‘Then we shall have to make another,’ William commented, his hand lingering and stroking the peachy down of Alexander’s sleep swollen cheek.

I felt myself stiffen with surprise. I was no longer so used to my husband’s bawdy-talk, and colour flared on my cheeks.

Nancy looked away, and attempted to gaze out the window to mask her embarrassment.

‘William,’ I began to chide. ‘It does not do to speak so, in front of the servants,’ I muttered, knowing he would take no heed.

‘In my home, I will speak as I wish and you shall too.’ William retorted with a wry wink and smile. ‘So, Ceecee, shall we make another?’ he asked once again.

What could I say to that? My wayward husband wanted me once again, and the thought made that place between my thighs moisten.

‘I am your wife, William, I will do as you bid me.’

William’s handsome face frowned, but only briefly. He scoffed. ‘You could at least sound a trifle more eager.’

I raised an eyebrow but said naught.

‘Well?’ he insisted, his gaze turning wicked. ‘Have you not missed the beast in my breeches?’ he laughed now. ‘For it has missed your tight, little quim most grievously during your confinement.’

I stared with horror at Nancy. The poor wet nurse was very close to a faint due to my husband’s outrageous vulgarity.

Mayhap my quim had been longing for his ‘beast’, but I would never reveal such a confession before my wet nurse. I turned with as much dignity as I could muster and stalked from the room.

I heard him follow after me, his chuckle echoing down the landing. The sound sent thrills down my spine.

How quickly he returned to his former habits.

As I reached my open doorway, I felt his hand grasp my arm. He spun me around and pulled me to his chest.

Unused to such physical address, I found myself releasing a startled cry.

‘You have changed, Ceecee,’ he said, his whisky-laced breath caressed my cheek.

‘Mayhap I have,’ I replied as I tried to steady my shuddering breath. My nipples had turned to hardened peaks beneath my gown, and the mounds of my milk-swollen bust heaved over the lace edging.

‘Once you would have laughed at my unseemly tongue.’

This of course was quite true.

‘Perhaps I would once more, if the mind behind that unseemly tongue was more judicious in his timing.’ My gaze met his and his eyes sparkled once more as a smile tugged at his lip.

‘Quite. I shall endeavour to remember that,’ William agreed. His tongue leapt from his mouth and ran down the length of my ear. I shuddered again, then, without warning he bit my earlobe before releasing it with a kiss. ‘Unseemliness aside my dearest, the question remains.
Have
you missed the beast in my breeches? Or has some other beast taken his ease in your hot little
cunny
in my absence?’