Simply Voracious (6 page)

Despite his worries, Paul found himself grinning back at his old friend and sometime lover. “Perhaps you’d like that honor?”

“No thanks, my friend. I detest the sight of blood. Ask Delinsky. He’s a true military hero.”

Gloom crashed over Paul again. “He’s supposed to be coming here to see me this evening.”

“Isn’t that a good thing?” Ambrose asked gently. “I know you’ve always liked him.”

“And as usual the Fates are working against me. I’m going to have to tell him good-bye tonight.”

“Why? Does he object to your work here? You can always stop doing that. You aren’t actually employed here. In truth, Delinsky looks happier than I’ve ever seen him.”

“Don’t say that,” Paul groused. “I’m happy, too, and I’m going to have to spoil everything.”

Ambrose sat back. “You are dying, aren’t you? Tell me the truth.”

“I might as well be.” Paul rose to his feet. “Is Madame Helene here by any chance?”

“I believe she is. She had a meeting with Christian earlier and stayed to finish up some paperwork.”

“Excellent.” Paul blew Ambrose a kiss. “Thank you, my friend.”

“Will you be coming back to the kitchen before you see Delinsky? I’ll ask Madame Durand to save you some dinner.”

“That would be most welcome.” Paul wasn’t sure if he’d ever feel like eating again, but he had to be polite. “Now let me go and find Madame.”

He found her in her old office, sitting behind her desk, a pair of spectacles perched on the end of her pert nose as she studied a crumpled letter. She wore a faded muslin gown that did nothing to diminish her considerable beauty. He knocked softly on the open door, and she glanced up at him and smiled.

“Paul, I was just thinking about you today. How is your family?”

He came in and shut the door behind him, noticing the piles of boxes strewn around the floor and an unusual sense of emptiness.

Helene made a wide gesture encompassing all the disorder. “I’m cleaning out my office so that my daughter-in-law, Elizabeth, can use it. I can’t believe how much I have accumulated over the past twenty or so years. Can you find a seat?”

Paul removed a box of ledgers from a chair and sat. Madame put down her work and studied him.

“Now what can I do for you?”

“I would appreciate your advice.”

“Of course. How can I help you?”

“I asked Lady Lucinda to marry me, and she refused.”

Helene went still. “What on earth made you do that?”

He sighed. “She needs to marry, and it will make her family happy if she marries me. That’s all I am going to say about the matter.”

“I’m sure that isn’t all there is to it.”

He met her gaze. “You are correct, but I don’t wish to betray a confidence.”

“And what if I told you that I already know why Lady Lucinda might need to marry?”

Paul blinked at her. “You
know?
”

“Emily brought her to me after the event.”

“That was very astute of her.” Paul let out his breath. “Did Lucky tell you who the bastard was?”

“No, she didn’t, and even if she had, I wouldn’t tell you.”

“But you would take steps to deal with the man.”

Madame’s smile was cold. “Naturally. I would have ruined him.”

“I appreciate that. If you do manage to find out who he is, I’d appreciate being informed of his demise.”

“You wish him dead?”

“He hurt Lucky. She is . . .” He struggled to find the words. “She is the sweetest girl I have ever known.”

“She’s far more than that, Paul. She is also very brave,” Helene said quietly. “Faced with similar circumstances, most women of her class would have gone running to their parents, screaming for help. She told me she doesn’t want to worry them.”

“She said the same to me.”

Helene watched him closely, nodding as he explained Lucky’s somewhat flawed reasoning about worrying her parents and her belief that there had to be another way out of her dilemma.

“She can’t marry the man. I won’t allow it.”

Helene studied him. “Even at the expense of your own freedom?”

He sighed. “Madame, you know me. I am no more suited to be a woman’s husband than I am to be a duke, but Lucky is . . . she is the most important thing in the world to me. I can’t allow her to suffer.”

“Would she not suffer being tied to you?”

“I thought I would tell her the truth about myself, the whole truth. Then she can make an honest decision about whether she really wants to be tied to a man like me.”

“You don’t think she will be too naive to understand what you are saying to her, and grasp at any opportunity to avoid disgrace?”

“I’ll make sure she understands me,” Paul said firmly. “And as she has already turned me down once, I don’t think she is grasping at straws.”

Helene studied her clasped hands. “This other man might be able to give her children.”

Paul raised his head as the hollow sensation in his gut increased. “If she wants children, she can have them, either with me or a man of her choosing. I’d never stand in the way of her happiness.”

Helene sighed. “But what about your happiness?”

Paul fleetingly thought of Constantine Delinsky and swallowed down his unexpected grief that something so promising was doomed to a quick death. He met Madame’s worried gaze head-on.

“My uncle and aunt brought me up, and they have asked very little of me. If marrying Lucky makes them happy, secures her future, and keeps this fool away from her, I’ll be happy, I swear it.”

Madame’s face softened. “You are a good man, Paul.”

“Not according to the Bible and the laws of this land.”

Madame snapped her fingers. “As if we care about that here.” She hesitated. “May I make a suggestion?”

“Of course.”

“Lady Lucinda is still very young, but she isn’t stupid. When you tell her about your sexual tastes, don’t be coy. Tell her the whole truth. It is only fair.”

Paul stood up and bowed. “I agree, and thank you for your help.” He glanced around the room. “Are you leaving us for good?”

“It appears that I am.” She swallowed hard. “Philip is determined to whisk me away on what he calls a much belated wedding trip, and Christian is perfectly capable of running the place, as you know.”

“You’ll still be missed.”

“Nonsense.” Her smile was a little uncertain. “You won’t even notice that I’m gone.”

Paul walked toward her and bent to kiss her hand. “We’ll notice. But have a wonderful trip.”

Tears glinted in her beautiful blue eyes. For a moment, Paul wondered whether he had the nerve to put his arm around the formidable founder of the pleasure house. Before he could act on the notion, she drew away from him and busied herself with the books on the desk.

“Well, I mustn’t keep you, Paul. I’m sure you have a lot to discuss with Constantine Delinsky.”

Paul groaned. “Does everyone know about that?”

“Everyone who cares about you. I’m sorry that you have finally found each other just as your path is so unsure.”

“You don’t need to worry. I won’t bed anyone if I marry.”

Helene smiled. “That remains to be seen. Perhaps you should also talk about that with your potential wife.” She held his stare. “I did say that you should be completely honest with her, didn’t I? Just because you are tied together doesn’t mean that neither of you can ever have a lover.”

“I hadn’t thought of that. It seems . . . deceitful somehow.”

Madame shrugged. “Only if one of you is lying to the other, surely? If you are both happy about it, and let’s be honest, there are many married couples in the
ton
who have similar arrangements, then why shouldn’t you?”

Paul simply stared at her as a thousand new possibilities flooded his thoughts. “Thank you.”

“Don’t thank me, thank the fact that you might be marrying a woman who sees exactly who you are and still loves you anyway. Don’t you think you might do the same for her?”

Paul nodded and walked out into the hallway. Madame had a way of seeing through conventional problems that sometimes astounded him. He liked to consider himself unconventional, but when it came down to it, it seemed he was too worried about exposing Lucky and her family to the scorn and ridicule of society.

He paused to look down the stairway at the now busy first level. Was Constantine already here? He couldn’t think about that. He had no idea how his lover was going to react to his abrupt withdrawal from their relationship. But did he really know Lucky at all either? If she had been forced . . . His hand tightened on the banister. She might not even know what she wanted physically, or her view of what was normal might be scarred for good. He could help her with that. At least he could do that....

Paul set off along the corridor to the servants’ door and used his passkey to access the dimly lit narrow stairs that went down to the kitchen. He’d force down some food, and prepare Christian Delornay, the new owner of the pleasure house, for the fact that he might not be offering his sexual services any longer. He couldn’t decide if Christian would be pleased to be rid of him or annoyed at his loss. But that wasn’t his problem. He had far more important things to worry about after all.

5

Constantine sat quietly drinking a glass of brandy in one of the second-floor salons and watched the erotic tableau unfolding in front of him. Two men and two women were entangled on the low bed in the center of the room, and all of them were engaged in some kind of sexual congress with at least one of the others. He angled his head to try and work out which appendage belonged to which of the writhing bodies but it still wasn’t clear.

As always, his gaze was drawn more to the women than the men, but he appreciated all of the erotic sights. One of the men was blond and slim and reminded him of Paul St. Clare. Constantine found himself smiling as he thought of his new lover’s remarkable skill in bed. He’d never met a man like Paul before, or felt quite so sexually aroused since his days in Russia. Just thinking about the things Paul could do with his mouth made Constantine’s cock twitch.

“All alone, sir?”

“Not anymore.”

He looked up into Paul’s smiling face and rose to his feet. Paul had his back to the center of the room. Constantine stepped close and deliberately palmed the other man’s cock. “I was just thinking about you.”

Paul’s pupils dilated and he pushed himself into Constantine’s hand. “And I wanted to talk to you.”

“Can I fuck you first?” Con asked. “I’m desperate.” He nuzzled Paul’s ear and bit down on the lobe. “I’ll be quick, I swear it.”

“Here?”

Con almost came in his breeches at that salacious thought. He could just see Paul bent over the back of the couch while he pumped himself deep and hard into the other man’s arse.... He knew Paul had no qualms about being publicly fucked, but he wasn’t quite so open. “No, somewhere more private.”

Without another word, Paul turned and headed out of the room to the discreet line of doorways that shielded the more intimate chambers. He opened a door, and Con followed him inside, spun Paul around, and kissed him full on the mouth.

“I haven’t felt like this with another man for years. I woke up last night hard and aching for you.”

Paul kissed him back, and Con shoved his hand down between their bodies and worked on the buttons of both sets of breeches. Something in Paul’s face made him eager to have the other man under him immediately. “I want to be inside you.”

“I don’t think I have the will to stop you.” Paul sounded strained, but Con was too far gone with lust to want to break away now. He freed Paul’s cock and worked his fingers around the straining shaft, using the increasing wetness to lubricate his pumping fist.

“Fuck me hard, sir, make me scream for you.”

Constantine spun Paul around until he was facing the side of the bed and shoved Paul’s breeches down, revealing his muscled buttocks. He sank to his knees and used his tongue to lick and lubricate the tight pucker of Paul’s arse and the swell of his balls.

“Oh, God, sir, that’s . . .” Paul arched his back, giving Con more access. Con reached around and drew some of the wetness streaming down Paul’s cock onto his fingers, swirling it around Paul’s arsehole until he could ease a finger inside.

“Give me more, give me all of you,” Paul gasped.

“Not yet, you’re not ready,” Con murmured.

“You said you’d be quick.”

Con pushed his finger deep and Paul bucked under his hands. “But I don’t want to hurt you.”

He flinched when Paul reached back, grabbed his wrist, and squeezed it until his bones ground together. “But I want to feel you rough and hard, feel you owning me, making me come for you.”

Con’s cock grew even bigger and he stared at Paul’s arse. “Just me?”

“Please . . .”

With a harsh groan, Con spread the wetness seeping from his cock over the crown and pressed the head against Paul’s arsehole. “Are you sure?”

“Just do it, sir, please.”

Con shoved himself inward, ignoring both the unforgiving but exquisite tightness and Paul’s gasp. He worked himself gradually deeper, one hand now wrapped around Paul’s shaft, rubbing him hard. It took a while, but eventually he was lodged deep, his balls tucked against Paul.

“Do you like that?” he breathed into Paul’s ear.

“Yes.”

“Like it when I take you hard and raw?”

“Yes.”

“You’ll like it even more when I start to fuck you and you’ll be full of my come.”

Paul sighed Con’s name and that was enough to make Con start to thrust himself in and out, in and out, until he was slamming himself deep and hard with every long, deliberate stroke. He reached down and drew Paul’s mouth toward him so that he could kiss him.

“You’ll still feel me tomorrow, you’ll be so sore. Do you like that too?”

“God,
yes
.”

He felt Paul start to come all over his hand, gave one last desperate thrust, and spilled himself inside.

He lay over Paul for a long time, regaining his breath and simply enjoying the texture and scent of the other man’s skin. Eventually he kissed Paul’s cheek and eased his cock free. When he straightened, his legs were shaking, and it took him a moment to walk over to the table where he could wash himself clean. He rinsed out a washcloth and returned to the bed to administer to Paul, who still lay sprawled against the side of the bed.