“You, and only you, have my permission to linger in my bedchamber for as long as you want. I’ll make the arrangements before I go. You may touch any possession of mine except that mask and do your hair before the mirror. Mrs. Young is an old woman, threatened by your youth and beauty.” His hand smoothed over her bottom, and she held her breath. “Look at yourself in the mirror now, Miss Winslow.”
She turned her head as he pulled her skirts up and exposed the bottom he’d spanked. Matilda’s heart began to hammer. A smile lingered on the captain’s lips as he lightly touched her exposed skin with just the tips of his fingers. As the gentle caress continued, her face grew hotter and hotter.
“Look at me admiring you,” he said as his fingers trailed along her thigh, sliding down over the gaping hole in the stocking tied below her knee. Matilda was transfixed by his gentle touch, by the devilish light in his eyes. He teased his fingers into her best stockings, widening the tear. “You must replace these after I’m gone.”
His hand lifted slowly and he brought it down sharply on bare bottom again and then continued.
Matilda gasped through it all, overcome by sensation, pain, and anticipation for the next strike. She clung to his leg, stunned and fascinated by how his punishment affected her senses. An ache began between her legs, a sensation she’d never experienced before. She was breathless and restless. Captain Ford’s face was a mask of severity now. He did not smile or look at her again. His attention was reserved for her rear and the red flush growing on her skin.
Suddenly he glanced up and met her gaze. His eyes were wild, dark, and focused solely on her. Matilda panted. He gripped her tingling bottom tightly, then turned his hand a fraction and used his fingers to part her thighs. His brow rose. “More?”
She nodded, but was unsure of what he’d do next. As his fingers dipped between, touching a place only Matilda had tentatively explored before in the privacy her narrow cot afforded, she closed her eyes. She was assailed by strange sensations that made her feel warm all over. As his gentle caress grew bolder, she could not help the need to push her body into his touch.
He brushed against her sex while she shuddered and moaned to his bewitching touch. He continued to rub through her damp curls, more insistent with each stroke, and the sensations were so different that she couldn’t account for them. She squirmed a little as an ache began where he played with her; a burning need to widen her legs further so he might press his fingers into her body.
“Look at us,” the captain whispered. “Look at what I’m doing to you. How perfect is the moment just before your surrender?”
Matilda struggled to catch her breath. She did look, focusing on his hand moving between her thighs, on the pink of her bottom beside his pale wrist, on the flush of color on his cheeks. She ached so badly an unladylike moan tumbled from her lips.
“Please,” she begged of him, knowing there must be more to come. She was alive in his embrace in a way she’d never felt before. She could barely hold still.
“Trust me,” he whispered, leaning over her body so he could speak into her ear. “You’re as eager as I am but will learn not to rush such moments. I will make the wait worth your while.”
He teased her again, but so skillfully that Matilda began to shake. She stiffened and cried out as her body convulsed, taken over by sensations beyond her experience.
She hung her head as her senses spun out of control again and again until his touch gentled on her sex.
The captain’s fingers slipped away, and he eventually loosened his tight grip on her waist. He relaxed against the back of the chair and uttered a shockingly masculine groan. “An exquisite end to this affair.” He chuckled softly. “I had hoped you might hold out longer before falling. Next time you will.”
He reached into his coat pocket, and pressed a cold coin into her hand.
She stared at the new-minted sovereign as pleasurable satisfaction gave way to unease over what she’d allowed.
“Oh, God.” She was a fool. Matilda twisted to look at Captain Ford’s smiling face.
Matilda dropped the coin. She flew off his lap, shoving her gown down as she went, and fled the room as fast as she could unlock the door. She did not pause to tug up her mangled stocking; she did not heed his calls to wait. She could not bear to hear him offer more money as if she had expected to be compensated for her favors.
One
London, 1815
Matilda Winslow came to a screeching halt behind the tottering housekeeper and tried to contain her impatience before she ran the gasping woman down. She shuddered at the wail echoing through Captain William Ford’s cozy London town house.
It was not a pretty sound.
It was a sound no man should make.
“Dear God, have mercy,” Mrs. Young whispered as the sound trailed off. She struggled toward the steep mahogany staircase as if she were walking through knee-high mud. “He lives. He lives.”
But at what price? Matilda shivered and followed with mincing steps, trying to remember that the older woman would not take kindly to a servant brushing past her on the stairs. Mrs. Young had to always be first. Matilda struggled with showing deference to a woman with limited sense, and she had no doubt been both lucky and foolish to still have this employment.
Now that she could clearly hear Captain Ford crying out in pain, she understood she’d hardly any idea of how desperate the situation was when she’d first heard the startling news that he’d been returned to shore and to his London town house. The entire household had been belowstairs and most had erupted into frantic activity to cover up how little they’d been doing in his absence.
Matilda tripped along in a daze, her heart in her throat as the sounds continued to rise and fall unabated. She had hoped to find another position before his return, but without any sort of reference, she’d been unsuccessful. She cringed as Captain Ford cried out again. He uttered agonized, incomprehensible gabble that, in her three-year acquaintance with her employer, she would never have suspected he’d be capable of making.
The housekeeper turned to her, her cheeks an unhealthy shade of gray. “We will need to be strong. Go on without me, do what is needed.”
She stared at the woman, struck by the notion she had not heard correctly. “Me?”