Page 11 of When the Marquess Needed Me (The Rake Chronicles #4)
Chapter Nine
S weet Lord and savior.
For a second, in that carriage with Beatrice Salisbury, Leith had, for the first time in his entire life, worried he would spend without a single stroke to his cock.
Christ, she hadn’t even touched him.
He had had to use most of his self-restraint to quell the overwhelming desire that he had felt as she told that blasted little story.
Of course, in theory, he knew all about the carriage activities she described. He was a Rank Rake, the last one standing, in fact, for the love of God!
Just because he himself was not partial to carriage carnality did not mean that he hadn’t heard a thousand stories of the like happening to other men. And none of these narratives had previously ever stirred him at all. He had always thought it had sounded, well, deuced uncomfortable. And messy. In the past, the notion had only made him fixate on how difficult it would be to get seed out of his velvet squabs.
Furthermore, he had never particularly liked the act she had described. He had only experienced it a handful of times, with mistresses who had been, to his mind, overzealous in their attentions. While the sensations were, obviously, quite pleasant, he had never liked the way it made him —and his lackluster cock—the center of attention.
In short, he was never usually tempted to try the act. And certainly not in a carriage of all places.
And yet Miss Beatrice Salisbury, with her infernal hypothetical, had tempted him. Very, very much.
He shook his head as he guided her through the hall and to his box.
Luckily, the crush was intense, and his cockstand had died down. Otherwise, his state of arousal might have otherwise been plain to anyone who cared to look.
“Leith!”
Fuck. He knew that voice. He turned.
“Stratton,” he said, tonelessly. Lord Randall Huntington, the Earl of Stratton, had been many years behind him and his friends in school, but, recently, as the men his age had married, he had begun encountering Stratton and his friends more and more. They did not provide a flattering mirror, to put it mildly, and so they were never a welcome sight.
Unfortunately, Stratton and his set appeared to look up to him which, for reasons he did not want to examine too closely, he found grating.
“I must beg an introduction, Leith,” Stratton said, his rakish smile, which had grown more confident by the year, aimed at Beatrice. He lowered his voice and leaned towards him so that, over the din of the other opera goers, only Leith could hear him. “Especially since I know your fair friend may soon be in need of another protector. You never keep them for long.”
Leith bit back a snarl. God, he didn’t want Beatrice to end up with Stratton . The thought irritated him, unaccountably.
He shook his head. He needed to bed this woman. He was getting downright sentimental.
Not to mention, she wanted to be introduced to men like Stratton. Men liberal with their money and looking for a mistress who would heat their blood and impress others.
“Miss Beatrice Salisbury, Lord Randall Huntington, the Earl of Stratton. And Mr. Pennington,” he said, nodding to the balding gentleman who seemed always to be at his elbow.
She nodded at the men, and they feasted on the sight of her in that infernal green dress.
Leith regretted having bought it for her now. Much better to have brought her to the opera in the hideous, antiquated frock she had worn in Monty’s drawing room.
“Come,” he said to her, directing her to his box. There was only so much of that he could take. “Good evening.” He nodded to Stratton and Mr. Pennington.
When the men were out of earshot, Beatrice looked up at him. “You did not want to linger.”
“I do not enjoy the sight of other men ogling what is mine.”
Of course, historically, that wasn’t true at all. Historically, it was the opposite. He would never forget how he swelled with pride when he first brought Fanny, the now Lady Killston, to this very opera house. Every man had been out of his wits for her. And he had been her lucky protector.
But Beatrice didn’t need to know that.
“For now. What is yours for now,” she said tartly.
He made no response to that. After all, she was utterly correct.
Blessedly, he steered her to the box without incident. The opera began and he could focus on the players. Unlike Trem, John, and Montaigne, he actually liked the opera. They teased him for it. Monty used to call him an “artiste” because of how rapt he became at a Royal Opera performance.
He smiled, thinking of that old joke between them. Monty had always made it easy for him to laugh at himself. To convince him to loosen the strictures that he lived under.
It was the same reason he liked the opera. The unbridled emotion of the actors and their voices…they gave vent to feelings within himself that he never could indulge and, hopefully, never would.
He looked over at Beatrice. Her expression was opaque. He couldn’t tell what she thought.
“Have you ever been to the opera before?”
Her eyes did not move from the stage. There, two lovers flitted around each other below, singing about their ardor.
“Miss Salisbury?”
But she didn’t hear him. She was too absorbed, it seemed. Well, he could understand.
Her absorption even kindled a slight warmth about his sternum for her. He liked that she could appreciate what happened on the stage below.
When the players vanished for the first intermission, he watched as she shook her head, as if coming out of a daze.
“Have you ever been to the opera before?” he repeated.
She looked up at him, clearly still wrapped up in the story.
“No,” she said, finally, “I’d never been to London before this week.”
“Are you enjoying it?”
“London or the opera?”
He smiled. “The opera.”
“Yes—it is rather—but I suppose it doesn’t seem remarkable to you.”
He shook his head. “I love the opera. Even the dreadful shows, I enjoy.”
She looked at him with surprise.
“Thomas,” said a voice from behind him.
No.
Dear God.
For the second time this evening, the sound of a particular voice made him curse.
What on earth was she doing here?
She never came into his personal box. As far as he could recollect, she had never met one of his mistresses.
That was, clearly, about to change.
She was going to start a scandal if she wasn’t careful. Ton tongues would surely wag now, especially since Beatrice would attract attention anyway this evening.
“Mother,” he said, standing and bowing.
Behind his mother, Gresham appeared. He stifled a huff of irritation. The man had a nerve treading into his box after what his mother had revealed this afternoon.
“Mother, please let me introduce to you Miss Beatrice Salisbury.”
“A pleasure to meet you, Miss Salisbury,” his mother said, all graciousness, as Gresham also tendered a nod.
Beatrice, wisely, said nothing, bowing her head modestly in acknowledgment.
“Mother, it is foolish to come here. You will start untold tattle.”
“Oh, let them talk,” his mother said. “They will talk anyway when our engagement is announced.”
“You may be reconciled to being freely spoken about, but I do not consent to have my name bandied about in a similar manner.”
“Thomas, when did you become such a prig? Gresham and I merely wanted to stop by and greet you and—and Miss Salisbury.”
“Here, Leith,” said Gresham. “I want to make clear that I love your mother. I will take care of her. You needn’t worry on that score.”
“Very comforting,” Leith hissed, his irritation at the man’s silvery handsomeness growing by the second. “And quite a gentlemanly sentiment—if I didn’t know you’d already dishonored her.”
“Thomas!” his mother cried. “ Truly. ”
“Your mother is her own master, young man,” Gresham huffed. “She does not answer to you .”
“I never said that she did. But how can I respect the intentions of a man who takes such a low and creeping action as to bed a lady before he marries her?”
“Sir,” Gresham sneered. “Mind your company.”
Leith bit his tongue. He doubted Beatrice would be much offended by his intimation that she was not a lady in the same line as his mother. It was an entirely different thing, of course. But, still, he could see why this argument was less than profitable to him at this moment.
“My apologies, Miss Salisbury,” his mother said. “I did not mean to subject you to a family row.”
“Do not apologize, Lady Leith,” Beatrice said, her cool voice a balm to the irritation of the situation before him. “I am not at all affronted.”
Leith glanced at Beatrice. Her eyes sparkled with mirth. She was clearly finding the situation quite amusing. When he tried to see it from her perspective, he supposed it must look somewhat humorous indeed.
“I offer you my congratulations,” Beatrice said, smiling at her mother and Gresham.
“Your companion is more civil than yourself, Leith,” Gresham said. “I hope you are influenced by her.”
Leith opened his mouth to bite back a retort.
“Lady Leith,” another familiar voice called through the curtain. “It is always a pleasure.”
Trem strolled into the box. Leith could seldom remember a time when he had been so happy to see Trem and his wide, easy smile. Trem had a special easiness to him that made him liked wherever he went. And he needed that quality of his friend’s very badly at present.
His wife, Henrietta, was on his arm. Henrietta had once been merely John’s little sister, but, a year ago, she and Trem had shocked everyone by getting engaged. Their marriage had happened under chaotic, tempestuous circumstances that had scandalized society—and which fit the sensibilities of its principals quite well, if one knew them intimately, as he did.
Henrietta herself grinned as she took in the scene. Leith fought back a scowl. He loved Henrietta like a sister, but they had always clashed. She was so unruly. When she and Trem had become betrothed and run off through the countryside together, as of yet unwed and clearly fornicating, John had been apoplectic. It was a miracle that both parties could laugh now about the quarrel that had, at the time, seemed so serious.
“Lord Tremberley,” said his mother, smiling. “And your lovely wife. It is wonderful to see you both so well.”
“Thank you, Lady Leith. My wife and I heard a rumor and would like to tender our congratulations.”
“Ah, thank you, my boy,” said Gresham, smiling.
“It will be the match of the season,” Henrietta said, an amused smile on her face, which irritated Leith greatly. “We are thrilled to hear it.”
His mother beamed, clearly pleased by the good tidings.
“We are a bit uneasy about the gossip,” his mother said, confidentially, “given the circumstances.”
Leith scoffed. “Trem and Henrietta are hardly representative of society, Mother.”
Henrietta gave an exclamation of undisguised irritation. “What are you suggesting, Leith?”
“It means the circumstances of your own marriage were highly unusual. I am merely giving voice to that truth.”
“Leith,” Trem said, warning in his voice. “There is no need.”
It was a warning that Leith had heard often since Trem had married Henrietta. Trem was irritatingly, annoyingly defensive of his wife. A woman who, as she made clear time and time again, was perfectly capable of defending herself, especially where he was concerned!
“I apologize for my son,” his mother said. “He has become, as of late, impossibly rude.”
“I have grown used to it,” Trem said, easily, that smile the world loved returning, and employing a voice that, Leith was sure, had never met rebuff. “Come, Leith, brother, do not quarrel with my wife. You know you never win.”
Yes, Leith thought, these days getting any of his friends to side with him, especially when their wives were on the other end of the disagreement, was nigh impossible.
When Trem had angered John to the point that the men came to fisticuffs, Leith had been the one to help him. And what gratitude was he shown in return now? None, it seemed.
Leith once more looked at Beatrice. Her expression remained as placid as it had in the drawing room at Carrington Place yesterday morning. Although now she looked more amused than she had then.
“Good evening, Trem, Lady Trem,” his mother said, moving on Gresham’s arm to exit his box. “It was a pleasure meeting you, Miss Salisbury. And, Thomas, if you aren’t going to be reasonable, stay at St. James’s, won’t you? I don’t want to see that glower haunting my drawing room.”
She swept out and Leith stifled the impulse to kick the chair in front of him.
“Your mother is acting differently,” Trem said, with a laugh. “I am Trem, by the way.” He was addressing Beatrice. “I understand you are a relation of Monty’s.”
“Oh, yes,” Beatrice said, haltingly. “Very distantly.”
“We are very pleased to meet you,” Henrietta said. “I don’t think we’ve met a paramour of Leith’s since…when was it Trem, do you think? Would we count Mrs. Matthews as a meeting?”
Leith could throttle Henrietta. Mrs. Matthews had been his mistress six months ago. He had chanced to see Henrietta and Trem coming out of the park with her. Leith had barely stopped to greet them.
“I would not say so, my love,” Trem said, his eyes sparkling.
“I am honored, in that case,” Beatrice said.
“The show will be starting again soon,” Leith grumbled.
“Ah, well, that doesn’t concern us, does it?” Trem said, staring into his wife’s eyes. “No, no, we were just going home ourselves. We think we will find…better diversions there.”
Leith cast a gaze up to the heavens, wondering what sin he had committed to be thus punished. He seemed condemned to witness the love-struck ardor of every living being around himself.
A moment of silence filled the box as Trem and Henrietta gazed at one another. They were standing so close—well, it was indecent. And they had a child!
They had been married for over a year and yet they still were as they had been during their notorious engagement. Disgustingly engrossed with one another. Heedless of common decency. So in love that anyone could see it. No, worse. That in looking at them, one could feel what being in love was supposed to be like.
It was one of the many reasons Leith knew he had never experienced that emotion.
“Very well,” Leith said, praying that his friends received the hint that he was very much giving. “ Good evening. ”
“Farewell,” Trem said, a look of rakish gloating dancing across his features. “Enjoy the second act.”
Finally, he was alone again with Miss Salisbury. He never thought he would feel relieved to find himself with only her, but he found that was, indeed, how he felt.
Their eyes met. A little smile twitched on her face. That gap between her front teeth was briefly visible.
“Don’t,” he said.