Page 111 of A Gentleman's Wager

“Aw, no need to be shy, sir. It’s a fine pole, so it is.”

It seemed to dawn on him that she was nude.

Bella stifled a laugh. He was gawping at her maid like a village simpkin, eyes bulging and jaw slack. All he required was a hat and motley.

Emma turned her back on him and bent double to set down the water jug. She had the sort of plump and rounded bottom that men of a certain age—Charles’s age—seemed to particularly admire, but she didn’t treat him to the sight of it for more than a tick before she’d about turned again and knelt leaning over the side of the tub, soap in hand. “Let me give you a hand,” she said and dropped the bar into the water. “Oops!”

Her hands dived after it.

Charles drew a careful breath as her breasts bobbed nigh with his nose. He seemed to have lost the ability to speak.

“Jesus!”

Perhaps not entirely.

“Aw, sir, you’re as thick as a poker and twice as hard, and if you’ll but give me a moment I’ll have you clean as a whistle.”

“Uh.” His head bobbed in some semblance of consent.

“That’s if… Well, I wouldn’t like you to think me too forward,” Emma began, near making Bella choke on her tongue, given that her maid was far and beyond the essence of the word. “If you wouldn’t prefer me to join you in the water?”

Charles made another of those strange gurgles, which Emma evidently translated as a yes, for she promptly climbed astride him. “Shall I just pop it in my arbour?”

Bella blinked in her own form of bewilderment. She’d always known her maid was a strumpet, but not that she was quite so extreme in her lasciviousness. Charles was red in the face and could hardly keep his eyes in his head.

“That’d be very—damned obliging of you.”

“I do always aim to please those I service.”

She began to ride him apace, drawing great huffs and snorts from him. Much more and Bella did not think he’d care if Robespierre’s ghost made an entrance. It was time. She lurched from the shadows with a shriek of rage.

“Bella,” he cried. “What the devil, woman, you can’t be in here?”

“What the devil, indeed?” She planted both hands firm upon her hips. “Is that my maid you’re debauching?”

“Me! Yours? No. No.” But no matter how innocently round he made his face, he couldn’t magic the wench astride his lap away. “Just invited herself in, she did.”

Bella narrowed her eyes. “That sounds likely.”

“It’s true. I swear it. Ask her.”

But true to her role, Emma didn’t stick around to be grilled. Arms laden with her discarded clothing, she scurried for the exit as if in fear for her position, and perhaps her posterior.

“You ain’t supposed to be in here,” Charles huffed, as he groped about for a towel. “Ain’t you going to go after her, if she’s your abigail?”

“Presently. We have business to attend. My brother bids me to deliver you this.” She produced a heavy pouch from her pocket. “Said he’d heard you were a little short of readies.” She’d obeyed Joshua to the letter so far, going to the mine to collect the sum. Each coin Haggard had counted into her palm had stung like a slap. Charles blushed. His cockstand wilted. Bella refused to avert her gaze. “I note you did not share with him the details of your disgusting bet.”

“Harmless—”

“Despicable.”

“It were only meant as fun.”

She didn’t need to hear his pitiful excuses. “Do please accept these, I’ve counted them myself.” The coins rained upon his unprotected flesh, clattered and splashed against metal and into water, while he winced and yelped over each stinging impact. “Sixty shillings in total.” She dropped in the empty purse for good measure. “You may tell the marquis, from me, that’s all he was worth.”

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Bella