Rushed to the Altar (25 page)

He nodded. “If you have quite finished, then, I suggest we repair to the library fire.” He rose from his chair and held Clarissa’s as she stood up.

“I should go back to King Street to prepare for tomorrow’s move,” she said tentatively, moving ahead of him to the door.

“All in good time,” Jasper responded blandly. “It’s most impolite to dine in company and then rush off to pastures new, my dear. Although it does seem to be something of a habit of yours.”

“It is not,” she stated flatly. “Or, at least, only in your
company, my lord. In this instance I am thinking only of how much sooner we can be together in Half Moon Street if I’m ready for the coachman early tomorrow.”

He gave a shout of incredulous laughter. “Oh, you are utterly outrageous, Mistress Clarissa. How dare you try to bamboozle me like that? What kind of gull d’you think me?” He put an arm around her shoulders, sweeping her ahead of him across the hall and into the library. “That deserves a forfeit, ma’am.”

She looked at him warily. The laughter was still in his eyes but there was something else too, a deepening intensity that alarmed her as much as it thrilled her, and she felt herself responding with that sinking, plunging feeling in her belly, a heat over her skin, a swiftness in her blood.

He stepped close to her, taking her shoulders, looking deep into her eyes. “I wonder what you really are,” he murmured the instant before he kissed her.

This kiss was slow, deep, as if he would answer his question with the taste of her mouth, the scent of her skin, the feel of her body. His hands were all over her body, moving down her back, pressing into her backside, holding her tight against him, against the hardness she now felt rising against her loins.

Her breath shuddered and her own hands were moving now, slipping beneath his coat to feel the warmth of his skin through the fine lawn of his shirt. They slid around his back, traced the hard, knobbly line of his spine, felt the ripple of muscle across his shoulders and
the tight muscularity of his buttocks. The intimacy of this exploration took her breath away, but she didn’t want it to stop. Her eyes were closed and she was learning him through her hands, through her fingertips, and she wanted more of him. She wanted his skin, his body against her own.

And it was Jasper who stepped back first this time. He ran a fingertip over her kiss-reddened lips, a knowing smile in his eyes. He palmed the curve of her cheek, then traced the whorls of her ears with the tip of his little finger in a tantalizing stroke that brought prickles to her skin. “Well, well,” he murmured. “What a depth of passion you’ve been hiding, my sweet. It seems anticipation does indeed heighten sensation.”

Clarissa was too shaken, still too lost to respond. He bent and lightly kissed the corner of her mouth. “Perhaps I should send you home now, after all. I think we shall enjoy the consummation of this arrangement much more if it’s properly orchestrated. Tomorrow night, Clarissa.”

He opened the door. “Crofton, send to the mews for the carriage. Mistress Ordway is going home. Oh, and make sure there’s a hot brick and a lap rug in the carriage.”

“Right away, m’lord.” Crofton’s expression gave no indication of his astonishment. He couldn’t remember another occasion when his lordship had sent a lady of the night about her business before he’d conducted his own with her.

Clarissa drew a deep steadying breath. “My hat . . . gloves . . . ?”

“In the hall. Henry will have them for you.” He ushered her out with an arm around her, and the footman was indeed standing by the door, ready to hand her the straw hat and kid gloves.

“May I?” Jasper took the hat and set it on her head, adjusting the brim with a tiny smile before he tied the ribbons beneath her chin. “It is a most charmingly frivolous piece of headgear.”

Clarissa drew on her gloves, aware that her fingers were shaking a little. She closed her hands tightly and offered him a bright smile. “What time should I expect your coachman tomorrow?”

“What time would be convenient?” His expression was all solemnity.

“I should be ready by midmorning.”

“Then that is when he will be there.” He moved to the front door, his arm once more around her shoulders. Henry opened it and as they stepped out into the night a carriage drew up. The liveried coachman jumped down from the box and hurried to open the door. He let down the footstep and bowed as Jasper escorted Clarissa down the steps.

“Thank you for a delightful evening, my lord.” Clarissa gave him her hand. “I will see you tomorrow.”

“Oh, yes, you may be assured of that.” He raised her hand to his lips, then stepped back as she stepped up into the carriage. “Sleep well, Clarissa.”

A ready response to that did not come immediately to mind, so Clarissa contented herself with a smile and a wave as the door closed, shutting her into the welcome darkness of the closed carriage. A hot brick was at her feet and a warm sheepskin lap robe on the squabbed leather seat beside her. She wrapped herself securely, then leaned back against the squabs, closing her eyes as she faced the morass she had floundered into.

Either she ran from King Street in the morning and ensured that neither Mother Griffiths nor the Earl of Blackwater ever laid eyes on her again, or she gave her virginity to Jasper. Either she abandoned a foolproof plan to keep her brother safe, or she paid for the earl’s protection for both of them with her virginity.

Stark choices, but in her heart of hearts she knew there was no choice, and neither did she really wish for one. The wave of lust and passion that had engulfed her that evening had astounded her but had filled her with a deep delight. Her maidenhead seemed like a matter of no importance in the light of those feelings, and since its loss was the one sure way to achieve her brother’s safety, then it was best to accept that and work out how this consummation could be accomplished without the earl realizing he had bedded a virgin.

“Thirty-two King Street, madam.”

She realized with a shock that the carriage was no longer moving and the coachman stood at the now open door, letting down the footstep. “So soon . . . thank you.” She unwrapped herself from the rug, reluctantly
took her feet from the hot brick, and accepted his hand to descend to the street. The house was ablaze with light as always, music and laughter drifting into the street as the front door opened to admit a clearly inebriated pair of gentlemen.

She smiled at the coachman, wished him good night, and hurried to the door. The steward admitted her and she ran up to her chamber, expecting to find it cold and dark. Instead it was firelit, candles burning brightly, the bed turned down invitingly. Presumably the house worked on the assumption that a gentleman could accompany a lady to her boudoir at any time.

She cast aside her hat and gloves and sat on the edge of the bed. She needed advice, and who better to give it than Emily or Maddy, or, indeed, any of the other women at work in this house. She pulled the bell rope.

“What can I do for you, miss?” The maid stood in the door, her gaze studiously avoiding the bed.

“Emily . . . or Maddy . . . are they with gentlemen at the moment?”

“Miss Em’s not. She’s in the salon. Miss Maddy’s busy.”

Clarissa had learned in her time at King Street that if a girl was not with a gentleman she waited in the salon, where gentlemen who had no specific lady in mind would come in off the street, take a glass of wine, engage in superficial conversation, and then pick a companion from among the available ladies.

“Could you give Emily a message?”

The girl looked doubtful. “Maybe.”

“Ask her if she has any free time tonight to visit me here . . . Maddy, too, if she’s free later.”

“Mistress Griffiths don’t close the front door till four,” the maid said.

“No, I know that. But if by any chance either of them is free for a while, could you ask them if they would come here to me? It’s very important.”

The girl shrugged. “If I can, I will. Anything else you want?”

Clarissa shook her head. “No, thank you.”

The girl went off and Clarissa undressed slowly. Naked, she stood in front of the mirror, wondering what a man would see when he saw her like this. Would he see what she saw? A slim woman with insignificant breasts, skinny thighs, long thin feet. There was nothing voluptuous about her body, nothing particularly arousing, she thought. But maybe a man might see something that she couldn’t.

She wrapped herself in her chamber robe and climbed into bed. Might as well try to sleep until Maddy or Emily was free to answer her summons. But sleep wouldn’t come. She lay watching the flames flickering on the high ceiling, listening to the hiss and pop of the fire. What would she be feeling this time tomorrow night?
How
would she be feeling? Her body was filled with a restless energy that made her legs twitch until finally she got out of bed and went to sit on the broad window seat, watching the scenes in the street below. The revelers for
the most part were good-natured, but there were one or two scuffles, and every now and again the shrill sound of a watchman’s whistle would rise above the sounds of revelry.

Was her little brother asleep? Was he in a gin-soaked stupor, shivering in the freezing attic, his empty belly cleaving to his backbone? She couldn’t get to him until Sunday, the day after tomorrow. She had to have a safe place to take him, somewhere warm and comfortable where he could regain his strength, look once again like her little brother instead of the frightened waif he had become. Her heart swelled with hatred for her uncle. She would kill him given half a chance. But first things first. Francis could survive one more day. He
must
.

She was so lost in her anxious reverie she didn’t hear the door open until Emily spoke softly. “Is something the matter, Clarissa?”

“Oh, no . . . not really.” Clarissa returned to the present with a start. She jumped off the window seat, crossing the room with hands outstretched to her visitor. “Thank you for coming, Em. I desperately need some advice on a rather . . .” She gave a slightly embarrassed little laugh as she took Emily’s hands and drew her to the fire. “A rather delicate matter, and it’s quite difficult to explain.”

Emily looked puzzled but sat down willingly enough. “Tell me.”

Clarissa hesitated. “Would you like a glass of wine? . . . I think I would.” A tray with decanter and glasses stood on
a pier table against the far wall. She poured two glasses of Madeira and brought them back to the fire.

Emily took hers with a smile of thanks. “Tell me,” she repeated.

Clarissa took a deep breath. “This is going to sound very strange, but I need to lose my virginity tonight.”

Emily nearly dropped the glass. “What in the world can you mean?”

“There are some things I can’t explain, Em, but this is the truth, even if I can’t explain it properly.”

Emily listened openmouthed. Clarissa kept it as simple as possible, saying nothing about her true background, or about Francis and Luke, merely implying that she had agreed to the contract with Lord Blackwater for compelling family reasons of her own and now found herself obliged to fulfill the terms of the contract without his discovering that she was not what he believed her to be.

“Does Mother Griffiths know you’re a virgin?” Emily was still staring in wide-eyed astonishment.

Clarissa shook her head. “If she ever believed it, I’m sure she doesn’t now. Why would a virgin agree to a brothel contract to be a man’s mistress? But I do have my reasons, Em,” she added quickly. “I’m sorry I can’t explain them.”

“Well, we all have our secrets in this business,” Emily declared with a tiny shrug. “And we don’t pry.” She stood up. “We need reinforcements. Trudy is not busy at the moment. I’ll fetch her.” She whisked herself out of the chamber.

Clarissa sat down, sipping the Madeira, and waited, unsure whether she was right to trust the inhabitants of 32 King Street with so much of her secret, but she could think of no alternative.

Emily returned in five minutes, accompanied by a very curious Maddy and a somewhat skeptical Trudy. “Maddy’s gentleman had just left, so I brought her too,” Emily said. “I haven’t told them much, there wasn’t time, so you’d better tell them what you just told me.”

Clarissa did so, watching their faces somewhat anxiously. Their expressions ran the gamut of disbelief, astonishment, and finally amusement. When Clarissa fell silent, Trudy began to laugh. She had a deep laugh that seemed appropriate enough booming forth from her broad-shouldered, big-boned frame. After a moment, Emily and Maddy joined in.

Clarissa looked for the humor in the situation and couldn’t find it, so she waited patiently until their laughter ceased. Trudy dabbed at her eyes, which shone with tears of laughter, and her shoulders still shook as she pronounced at last, “Well, this is a new one, isn’t it, girls?” She picked up Emily’s wineglass and held it to the light. “Madeira . . . I’ll have a glass, Mistress Virgin, if I may.”

Clarissa filled a glass and handed it to her. “So, do you have a solution?” Her tone was a touch impatient; their laughter had galled her a little, although she wouldn’t admit it.

“We’re more used to solving the reverse problem,”
Emily explained. “Often we have to re-create virginity if a client demands a virgin. We all know how to do that, but this is quite different.”

“How do you re-create virginity?” For a moment Clarissa forgot her own problem in this fascinating subject.

“The midwives have ways of creating an artificial barrier, just some fine webbing. And there’s a little cubbyhole in the bedpost where we keep a vial of blood. The men are all so wrapped up in their own lust that as soon as they feel the barrier, they push like a ramrod through a portcullis and when their cocks break through, you should hear ’em crow.”

Trudy shook her head with a scornful chuckle. “Fools, all of ’em. We open the vial and smear the blood about while they’re still crowing, and oh, how it suits their manhood to think they’ve spoiled a virgin. Some of ’em actually believe a woman will remember her first for the rest of her days. Makes ’em so proud.” Her lip curled in disdain for the entire male sex.