Page 3 of Submitting to the Widow

* * *

When his interviewwith the she-dragon was at an end and he was summarily dismissed, Stephen swept from her inner chamber and gave Col a warning look as he strode through the anteroom. “Not now. Later.”

There was no time. She’d given him precious little warning to make preparations for the trip to the tiny village of Combe Down just southeast of the spa town, Bath. Why, the damned place was over a hundred miles from London. Maybe he’d hire a fast sailing ship to take him to Southampton and then go by mail coach or horseback from there north. That would certainly be faster, and more comfortable, than an endless series of mail coaches overland from London.

He shuddered when he thought of his practice. He was scheduled to plead a case in court not two weeks hence. Maybe young Whitley-Bowles would jump at the chance for more experience in front of the bench. Of course he would, Stephen thought bitterly. He’d love to unseat one of the “old men” at the practice and make a name for himself.

He shook his head hard and hailed a hackney cab outside Goodrum’s. He had lots of preparations to make before…before he sought out the elegantly scrawled name and address on the crisp, neatly folded vellum sheet Captain El had handed him just before they parted company.

The other sealed paper she’d given him contained a list of four names. Names of men with whom she apparently planned a grim reckoning. All he had to do was find them in Combe Down and somehow convince them to travel to London to meet with the terrifying owner of Goodrum’s. God help the poor sods.

With the extra gratuity he’d guaranteed, the hack driver flew through the streets toward the townhouse he kept on Berkeley Square.

The task he’d had to agree to before she revealed the identity of the mysterious woman in possession of his ill-conceived journal pages was an onerous one. Considering the names on the second list she’d handed him he might end up spending a great deal more time than he had to waste in Combe Down. However he’d been intrigued by the task she’d given him, and determined he’d go as far as necessary to give the beautiful, somehow tragic, Eleanor Goodrum some peace.

* * *

Lady Jane Trevellyngrasped the fabric of one of the many long silk nightgowns her late husband had lavished on her in the hopes of producing a male heir to inherit all his ill-gotten gains from his time as a British officer in India.

She paused in long hesitation, and moisture pooled in her eyes. The tapestry hangings of the wide bed above her blurred, and she finally closed her eyes and dragged the gown slowly up her warm thighs until she reached the place that throbbed with need. The place that had throbbed with need every night since she’d reached puberty in Rajput.

Even though her late husband had visited her frequently for vigorous lovemaking in the hopes of planting an heir in her womb, his measured, methodical ministrations had never addressed her needs. Her sensuality, like her soul, had never been touched by the retired Major. He’d been old enough to be her father. In fact, her father, a lower ranking officer in one of the East India Company’s regiments, had been Major Trevellyn’s closest friend and confidante in India.

And like her father, he’d been kind, but controlling. Both of them had treated her like a prize mare who needed cosseting but could not be trusted to run free outside the paddock gates.

She shook her head hard and began the deep breathing and slow, rhythmic rocking of her pelvis in time to her breaths that was a kind of sensual meditation she’d learned from her dead mother’s sister on her twelfth birthday. She sometimes thought her aunt had suspected Major Bostwick, Baron Trevellyn, had already set his sights on possessing the innocent young Jalia she’d been back then. Thank the gods the woman had decided to teach her something that would be for her pleasure alone.

After one final, deep breath, she slanted her pelvis upward and slid the pad of one finger over the small, swollen nubbin, already firm and slick to the touch.

2

SATURDAY, APRIL 15, 1826

TREVELLYN HOUSE, COMBE DOWN

“Lady Trevellyn, I’m prepared to pay a great deal of money for the return of the stolen pages of my personal journal.” Stephen crossed his arms in the firm stance he often used to convey a negotiation had ended.

“Mr. Forsythe, I’m afraid I already have a great deal of money. And I don’t believe the pages were actually stolen, were they?”

Panic fluttered in his chest, like a coop of pigeons so eager to fly, they slammed into one other. What should have been a ridiculously simple exchange was not going the way he’d intended.

Before he could protest, she continued. “Why would you have kept proof of the indiscreet liaisons of your youth for all these years? Do you open the journal pages and read whilst you pleasure yourself?”

Stephen struggled to maintain his usual cool demeanor. Lady Trevellyn’s scent of cloves, cinnamon, and well pleasured woman filled his nostrils, made his cock try to force its way out of his expensive, custom-tailored trousers. The silk morning dress she wore was buttoned all the way up her delectable neck, yet the thin, darkly patterned silk caressed and whispered against her skin, hinting of the curves beneath. The delicate fabric rose and fell against the tops of her generous breasts with the obstinate woman’s every breath.

* * *

Jane sensedshe’d had the advantage from the moment she’d had the sinfully seductive barrister shown in to her beloved conservatory bower. Jungle-like plants surrounded the thermal spring-heated pool and waterfall.

When her servant, Raj, had shown the well-known legal expert, but much better known cricket all-rounder into the conservatory, she’d beckoned to him to join her on the plump-cushioned sofa placed at the end of the pool nearest the entrance to her library.

After Raj had announced her guest, she’d asked for tea. “Or would you prefer coffee, Mr. Forsythe?”

“Actually, I hadn’t planned on imposing on your hospitality and taking up that much of your time. We have a very simple transaction to complete.” He remained standing, fairly vibrating with the need to get what he wanted and escape.

“You haven’t answered my question, Mr. Forsythe.”

“Baroness, I’m afraid you wouldn’t understand the coarser nature of, um, men like myself and my old school chums.”