Lord Savage (19 page)

The others groaned with disappointment.

“Come now, Savage,” Lord Carleigh coaxed. “Where’s the harm in a little wager?”

“Then share her,” Lord Blackledge said. His hands were already flexing and twitching
with unpleasant anticipation, as if he couldn’t wait to touch me himself. “You know
you’re going to fuck her again. Why not let the rest of us see how your Innocent spends?”

“I can find out how wet she is for you, my lords,” offered Mr. Henery, seated beside
me. His face and his courage were flushed with wine, his voice loud with it. “It’s
the work of a moment.”

Before I could react, he’d grabbed the napkin from my lap, yanked aside my costume,
and shoved his hand between my thighs.

Horrified, I struck at his hand and tried to pull the hem of my gown back down and
twist away from him. All around me the others were laughing and shouting encouragement
to Mr. Henery. Laughing at my reaction, he’d risen from his chair to stand over me,
his face flushed above his beard as I pushed and flailed at his hands as hard as I
could.

Abruptly Henery’s mouth popped open with surprise as Savage grabbed him by the arm.
He spun Henery around and away from me, and as Henery tried to regain his balance,
Savage’s fist caught him under his jaw. It was a single uppercut, powerful and efficient
and without mercy, and more than enough to make Henery’s head snap back. He staggered
backward, reeling, and Savage followed, punching Henery again with such force that
he toppled to the carpeted floor, his body following with a dull thud.

But Savage wasn’t done. He threw himself down on the other man, and grunting with
exertion, the two of them rolled across the carpet to the bare stone floor with the
tails of their evening jackets flailing behind them.

I watched with my hands clutched tightly together and pressed to my mouth. Around
me, women screamed and men swore, and everyone crowded together for a better view
of the fight. A wineglass was knocked to the floor, splashing red wine across the
pale carpet, and no one noticed. Even the servants clustered together in the doorway,
unable to resist the rare sight of their betters fighting.

Finally, Savage pinned the other man to the floor with his legs and began to rain
blows upon Henery’s face. Henery tried to defend himself, blindly swinging his fists,
but Savage’s attack was so ruthless that Henery was soon using his hands more as a
shield than as a weapon, curling his arms over his face. There was already blood from
his nose splattered across his shirt front, bright red on stark white, and on Savage’s
cuffs, too, above the tiny gold serpents on his onyx links.

None of the others tried to stop Savage, not wanting to risk having him turn toward
them. His expression was set and merciless, with only his pale eyes revealing the
extent of his fury.

I had never seen a gentleman behave like this. No, I’d never witnessed
any
man so deliberately determined to punish another with such primal violence.

“For God’s sake, Savage, enough!” ordered Lord Carleigh. “Stop at once!”

But Savage didn’t stop, and the viscount curtly waved for three footmen to intervene.
The footmen hovered indecisively to one side, torn between following their master’s
orders and the grave consequences that could result from laying their hands upon an
earl.

Tears of fear and frustration slipped down my cheeks as I watched. I knew I wasn’t
supposed to speak, and yet how could I not? This was not the Savage I knew, the man
who had kissed me tenderly as he’d introduced me to passion. This was madness, a terrible
madness, and if no one stopped Savage now, I feared he might kill the other man.

“Stop, Savage, please!” I cried at last, my voice echoing oddly in my ears. “Please,
please, no more! No
more
!”

At once he drew back, his head whipping around toward me as he still crouched over
Henery. His black hair was disheveled across his forehead and his pale eyes were as
wild as a wolf’s, his chest heaving from exertion. A tiny trickle of blood glistened
in the corner of his mouth where his lip had been split.

I brushed away my tears with my fingers and took a gulping hiccup of a sigh.

“Please, Master,” I said, barely remembering to call him that. “I beg you, please—please
stop.”

He gave a quick jerk of his head, shaking his hair back from his face, then used both
hands to smooth it back. He took a deep breath, visibly collecting himself, and rose
to his feet in a single graceful motion that belied his earlier violence. He straightened
the satin lapels of his jacket, and shot his cuffs, briefly frowning at the crimson
bloodstains.

He didn’t look back at Henery, who had rolled to his side, groaning, as the footmen
now rushed to attend him. He didn’t look at anyone other than me, coming to stand
directly before me.

He was so powerfully male that I felt it viscerally, a primal desire to mate that
was almost impossible to resist. It shocked me how much I wanted him now, splattered
as he was with another man’s blood, and yet I couldn’t deny the wet, welcoming heat
and fullness in my quim, longing to be filled by his cock.

There was a single bruise on his left cheek, more likely caused from striking the
stone floor than any stray blow from Henery. As lightly as I could, I reached up to
touch my fingertips to the bruised skin, a show of sympathy for so much more than
the injury alone.

“You’re mine, Eve,” he said, his breathing still ragged and his voice gruff. “Only
mine.”

His threaded his battered fingers through my hair and closed them together into another
fist, holding me fast as he bent to kiss me. His mouth ground against mine, hard and
aggressive, and I tasted not only the metallic tinge of blood from his lip but the
rawness of his need and the power that went with it.

That much I understood, for I felt it, too, roiling inside me like an undeniable force.
I thought I’d been aroused earlier, but it was nothing—
nothing
—like what was twisting and curling through me now.

“Savage,” said Lord Carleigh curtly. “A word, if you please.”

Savage took his time ending the kiss, giving me one last small nip before he finally
dragged his mouth away from mine. Although he let me turn to face the viscount, he
kept his arm possessively around my waist; it was a small gesture that I welcomed,
and was grateful for.

The others were beginning to return to their seats around the table, laughing nervously
and chattering too loudly as the footmen refilled their glasses. All were pretending
that nothing untoward had just happened, but every ear was listening to their host,
eager to hear what he’d say to the earl.

What the viscount did first was clear his throat.

“Lord Savage,” he began. “Mrs. Hart. I—my wife and I, that is—we can’t have this sort
of thing occur in our house.”

“Nothing occurred,” Savage said, his voice purposefully bland and a bit bored as well.
“Henery was warned. He chose not to heed that warning.”

Uneasily Lord Carleigh glanced over his shoulder, back to Mr. Henery. Henery was sitting
(or had been propped) upright in a chair near the wall with a servant attending him
on either side, his head tipped back with a bag of ice on his nose and a glass of
whiskey in his hand as a restorative.

“He’ll be well enough,” Savage said dismissively. “His kind always is.”

Lord Carleigh shook his head. “I know the man’s in trade, Savage, but he is a guest
of mine and I—”

“I’d say Henery’s not the one to blame, my lord,” interrupted Lord Blackledge, his
gagged Innocent following him like a dog on a leash. “I’d say it’s Lord Savage’s Innocent
that’s at fault. She’s the one who deserves a thrashing for what she’s caused.”

“She’s not yours, Blackledge,” Savage said sharply, his bored manner dropping away
like a mask. “There’s no fault with her.”

“You’ve been too gentle with her, Savage,” the baron said, goading Savage. “Education
must include punishment, you know. It’s the only way an Innocent will learn to be
properly grateful to her master.”

Blackledge’s gaze raked over me. I hated having him look at me like this, having him
picture me bound and chained like his own Innocent, and I shrank against Savage.

Automatically his arm tightened around my waist, drawing me closer. I felt the tension
in him coiling more tightly, and I feared he’d lash out at Blackledge the same way
as he had done with Henery.

The baron would be a much more challenging opponent. He wasn’t drunk, and he was much
larger and stronger than Henery. Worst of all, he was a bully, and he wanted to fight.
Even as unworldly as I was in such matters, I couldn’t miss the antagonism simmering
between the two men, threatening and dangerous.

“I require no advice from you, Blackledge,” Savage said, biting off each word. “She
is mine, not yours.”

Swiftly Lord Carleigh stepped between them.

“I’ll have no more brawling in my house,” he said firmly. “You are here at Wrenton
as my guests for pleasure and amusement, not for this kind of common, alehouse bravado.”

The baron bowed to the viscount. As the lowest ranking of the three men, he had no
choice.

“Forgive me, my lord,” he said to Lord Carleigh, though without so much as a hint
of contrition to match his apology. “I intended no slight. I was merely following
the rules of Lady Carleigh’s game that permit one Protector to challenge another for
the sake of an Innocent.”

“You press too far, Blackledge,” Lord Carleigh said. “I know as well as you do what
your intentions were, and they have nothing to do with my wife’s rules. Now I must
ask you and your Innocent to return to the table, and permit Lord Savage to, ah, compose
himself.”

“As you wish, my lord.” Blackledge bowed again, this time pointedly to Lord Carleigh
alone. As he backed away, he vented his frustration on his Innocent, giving an extra
jerk on her leash to make her stumble after him.

Reluctantly Lord Carleigh turned back to Savage.

“I’ll thank you, too, Savage, to keep your temper in check,” he said. “No more fisticuffs,
eh? You’re an old acquaintance. You know the rules of the Game. Laura will have my
head if there’s any of her precious bric-a-brac broken in a melee.” Then he smiled
weakly, trying to turn it all into a joke.

But Savage was in no mood for joking. “What are you trying to say to me in your ludicrously
complicated way, Carleigh?”

Lord Carleigh’s face reddened. “Only that you, ah, mind yourself and Mrs. Hart. Be
a good chap, yes?”

“‘A good chap’?” repeated Savage, leaving no doubt that there were few things he’d
be less inclined to be.

“Well, yes,” Lord Carleigh said uneasily. “I’m glad you understand, eh? I do appreciate
that—”

He was interrupted by a footman standing at the doorway, beating on a drum as a fanfare
to gather everyone’s attention.

“Let it be known,” he called in a solemn, booming voice. “Her ladyship is served!”

Four other footmen entered the room carrying an enormous platter on their shoulders.
Lying in the center of the platter was Lady Carleigh, completely naked and surrounded
by a bed of succulent sliced strawberries.

Relieved by such an amusing distraction, her guests began to cheer and applaud the
viscountess’s audacity, rising from their chairs to see more—and there was so much
of her pale, voluptuous body to see.

In place of clothing, the pastry cook belowstairs had piped elaborate curls and flourishes
of whipped cream, accentuated with more strawberries, across Lady Carleigh’s full
breasts and the dip of her navel, which enhanced her charms far more than it hid them.
The process must have tickled, too, since she was still laughing as the platter was
carefully set down in the center of the dining table.

“Fine, fresh strawberries, fine, oh!” she cried gleefully, mimicking a street hawker’s
call. She beckoned to her guests, raising her hands with care so that the whipped
cream wouldn’t slide off. “Fine strawberries and cream for everyone! Come, come, Protectors
and Innocents alike, and eat your fill!”

Eagerly the viscountess’s guests swarmed around her, men and women, Protectors and
Innocents, bending down to lick the cream from her body. She laughed and writhed with
lubricious delight, clearly relishing the feel of so many tongues lapping at her skin.

I watched, wide-eyed. So this must be Lady Carleigh’s grand entertainment, the one
that Savage had said he’d never forgotten—and no wonder, either.

“Ah, you see my dear Laura calls,” Lord Carleigh said with obvious relief. “Mustn’t
keep the viscountess waiting, eh?”

With a hint of a bow, he left Savage and me and hurried to join his wife. He pushed
aside the others crowding around the platter and bent over to kiss Lady Carleigh.
With husbandly devotion, he licked one of her nipples clean, giving the plump flesh
an extra nip with the edges of his teeth, which made her squeal. Then he opened his
trousers and pulled out his cock, already half erect. He scooped a handful of the
whipped cream from Lady Carleigh’s thigh and lavished it like frosting along the length
of his stiffening cock.

Before he’d finished, his Innocent, Lady Bilton, had appeared and dropped to her knees
before him. He thrust his cock between her open lips and she sucked it with greedy
enthusiasm, the sticky whipped cream oozing from the corners of her mouth as she fondled
his ballocks at the same time.

I watched, intrigued. After Savage had kissed and licked my quim until I’d climaxed
last night, I’d wondered if there was an acceptable—and pleasurable—way for me to
reciprocate. Here was the proof that there was, and my imagination raced as I considered
the possibilities.

But Savage did not feel the same.

“I’ve seen enough,” Savage said, his voice still curt. “No one will notice us if we
leave now.”

EIGHT

Savage’s hand closed firmly over my fingers, making it clear that I would be leaving
the dining room with him. Not that I’d object; I’d no wish to stay with the others,
either, with the prospect of being alone again with Savage before me.