“Rupert”—she lifted her cheek for his chaste kiss—“how lovely of you to bring me chocolates! I shall take them with me. I have the most wonderful surprise for you.”
He smiled down at her. “What is it, dearest?”
“Ah, I want to show you, not tell you about it, Rupert.” She had decided that the advantages of showing him far outweighed those of merely telling him. She took his hand and led him from the house and along the pavement of Clarges Street with a conspiratorial air. She took him past three houses, then turned in at the fourth and pulled him up the steps.
Rupert’s excitement withered as he assumed they were going visiting. Her idea of a wonderful surprise obviously differed from his. When Olivia went in without knocking, he thought that she must know these friends extremely well, and he felt reluctant to follow. He stopped in the black-and-white tiled entrance hall, glanced up at the chandelier, then let his curious gaze roam about the well-appointed home. “Whose house is this?” he murmured.
Olivia’s eyes shone with suppressed excitement. “It is ours, Rupert! Daddy has bought it as a wedding present.”
Rupert was stunned. Pleasantly so. He had dreaded the thought of living with the Hardings. “Well, that’s most generous of your father, I must say, Olivia.”
“Come on.” She again took his hand and, clutching the box of chocolates to her breast, urged him up the stairs. She led him into a richly furnished bedchamber, set the beribboned box down on a bedside table, opened her reticule, and withdrew an iron key. “Lock the door.”
It took Rupert a moment to comprehend that this was a planned rendezvous, but in the very next moment, his body responded. Vigorously. He quickly did as Olivia bade him, then returned and handed the key back to her. He removed her bonnet and opened his arms wide.
When she stepped close and lifted her lips in eager invitation, Rupert knew instantly that he would not be able to control his desires. Alone, in a locked room, with a bed inviting dalliance, his resolve to be patient until their wedding night went up in smoke. His lips sought hers, but before his mouth even began to make demands, she opened her lips for him, luring him inside. When her tongue began to duel with his, he gave an inward sigh and enjoyed to the full the provocative little thrusts she initiated.
Her soft curves brushed against his hard leanness, tempting his hand to explore them. Olivia’s breasts were full, the nipples already taut as his fingers closed over one lush globe. She gasped with pleasure, and her own fingers unfastened the bodice of her morning gown, giving him full access to what swelled beneath. When his hand closed over naked skin to caress and knead, Olivia’s hands began undressing him with great urgency.
For one moment he fought to stop her, but he had no willpower to deny himself, not when his body burned for her touch. Instead, he began to remove his garments, leaving her hands free to roam over his hard, heated flesh. In seconds he was naked, and rampant. His impulse was to shield her from such male sexuality, but before he could collect his thoughts, Olivia took possession of his cock, wrapping proprietary fingers about it so tightly he almost came out of his skin.
He knew if he did not remove her lovely dress, he would ruin it. With gentle, shaking hands, he raised the skirt and lifted the gown over her head. Olivia’s own hands tore off her pretty undergarments quickly, and Rupert knew he had never before reduced a female to a state of nakedness this rapidly. Before her chemise joined her other garments on the carpet, she stood on tiptoe, wound her arms about his neck, and lifted herself onto his jutting arousal. Olivia was frantic for the joining.
With his hands beneath her buttocks, he managed to get them both to the bed, where they collapsed in a tangle of limbs. Olivia scrambled quickly to the dominant position, molding her breasts to his chest and her plump thighs to his groin. She rose above him, breathlessly, and sank down with a heartfelt moan.
Rupert gazed up at Olivia; she was panting and moving up and down on him voraciously. Over and over, she lifted herself high, then plunged down, greedily swallowing him whole, urging him to do his part as she rode him relentlessly. Soon, she was begging him to go faster, harder, and though he did his level best, he knew he could not satisfy her hunger unless he was on top and in control. Before he could roll her beneath him, she thrust so vigorously that she brought herself to her own rapture, and in doing so, made him spend. He melted into her as she milked him of his seed, then she collapsed onto her back beside him. He closed his eyes and was drifting in a warm sea of surfeit, when he felt her rub her body against his side and heard his name upon her lips. “Rupert?”
He lifted his head from the pillow and watched her pop a chocolate bonbon into her mouth whole. Then she took another, bit into it with sharp little teeth, and dipped her tongue into its soft pink center, licking the cream filling with relish. She swirled her tongue over her lips and cast him a sensual look that left no doubt in his mind. Again? She wants to fuck again? Rupert thought he had died and gone to heaven.
Chapter Sixteen
A few days before the wedding, Alexandra volunteered to help Rupert pack his personal belongings and his clothes so they could be sent around to the house in Clarges Street. She enlisted the help of Sara, and the conspirators sorted through Rupert’s wardrobe, culling garments that Alex deemed too shabby for a newlywed viscount. When they were finished, Alex ended up with a pile of male shirts, neckcloths, trousers, and jackets, numerous and varied enough to garb herself for any occasion.
Rupert gave his trunks a cursory check. “Where is my black formal attire? Perhaps you took it to be pressed?” he asked Sara.
Since Alex knew Sara had an aversion to lying, she quickly cut in, “You left it at Longford Manor, I imagine, along with copious amounts of other fashionable garments that you didn’t bother bringing to London.”
“A couple of wigs also seem to be missing,” he said, puzzled.
“That’s something I’ve been meaning to mention, Rupert. Wigs are going out of fashion. It is becoming de rigueur to wear your own hair.”
“Not that I noticed at Almack’s recently,” he said dryly. “Are you sure you haven’t pinched them, Alex?”
“Whatever would I want with a man’s wig?”
“There is no end to the things my mind conjures. Oh, well, I shall have to take a run into the country. Kit has a brand-new phaeton and matched pair of chestnuts we’re avid to try out.”
“Ah, anxious to take the reins into your own hands, are you?”
Rupert laughed with good nature. “Tweaking me about marriage, Mistress Sly Boots. One day soon it will be your turn.”
When Alex and Sara were alone, Alex began to change clothes and posed a question to the maid. “I’ve heard talk of places called ‘flash houses’ where scores of young boys are trained to be thieves. Have you heard of them?”
“Certainly I have. Girls are trained too, but the danger of being put in prison and flogged for thievery pushes girls into prostitution as soon as they are old enough.”
“And when are they considered old enough?”
“Twelve or thirteen, if you want the truth, miss.”
“I do want the truth, Sara, though it’s heart-scalding. These flash houses are purported to be in an area called the Rookery of St. Giles. Where is that exactly?”
“It’s up north of Soho somewhere, around High Street.” Sara gestured vaguely with her hand.
“Isn’t that where you used to live?”
Sara flushed and pressed her lips together.
Alex pounced. “You don’t want me to see where you used to live, do you, Sara?”
“No, miss. My mother was so relieved to see me escape from that terrible place and the wretched life that most of the people who live there endure. When I was lucky enough to secure a position as maid in the wealthy part of town, she made me promise not to go back more than two or three times a year.”
“I insist upon seeing it; we’ll go there today.”
“It’s not a fit place for a lady.”
“Then I shall wear men’s clothes, and you must call me Alex.”
“Better not wear anything fancy, or you’ll be set upon and robbed the minute you set foot in St. Giles.”
Alex, garbed in her brother’s oldest clothes, and Sara, wrapped in a shabby shawl, made their way up Charing Cross Road. The farther north they walked, the more the streets deteriorated. The buildings they passed were successively more dilapidated, then decayed. The area was filled with foul alleys and tumbledown houses. Raggedy, barefoot children mingled with emaciated dogs, rummaging among the offal of the rat-infested streets for scraps. Men slept, huddled in doorways, and girls on the streets were falling-down drunk. It seemed that every woman they passed had a baby suckling a pendulous breast, while swollen-bellied with another child.
Alex slipped her hand around Sara’s and squeezed. “I’m sorry, Sara. I had no idea.” No idea that such slums even existed!
“If Hopkins, the butler, ever finds out where I came from, I shall get the sack.”
“I promise that you will always have a position in Berkeley Square, Sara, and I shan’t let Hopkins know anything about you; I know that servants can be bigger snobs than the ton.”
The maid took Alex into a ramshackle building occupied by dozens of one-room hovels. The stench was putrid. Alex pinched her nostrils together and waited while Sara knocked on a battered door. It was opened by an old woman; Alex realized with a shock that this was Sara’s mother, only in her forties but aged beyond her years.
“Lawks, ye shouldn’t bring yer fancy man ’ere, luv!”
Sara lapsed into her mother’s cockney and explained who Alex was. They spoke so rapidly, often in rhyming slang, that Alex only understood every tenth word, though she was fascinated.
Sara’s mother was clean and the room was neat, a marked contrast from the other hovels in the squalid four-story building.
“Are you an only child?” Alex was clearly mystified how such a place had produced Sara.
“No, my mother had seven; I was the youngest. The boys are all grown and gone, Lord knows where; two older sisters are dead, God rest their souls.”
“Who taught you how to speak? How did you acquire the airs of a lady, Sara?”
“That was Maggie, who lives across the hall. She took me in when I was a little girl and my mother had too many mouths to feed. Maggie was a gentlewoman fallen on hard times. I owe it all to her. I’ll take you to meet her, but don’t get too close,” Sara warned. “She has the consumption.”
Before they left, Alex watched Sara hug her mother and give her money. She decided on the spot that she would speak to Dottie about giving her maid a raise. Then they went across the hall. Maggie’s face radiated pure joy when she saw Sara, but a lump came into Alex’s throat when she saw the hollow cheeks and sunken eyes of the woman who had saved Sara from a living hell.
“Maggie, this is my friend Alex.”
“How do you do, sir? It is a distinct pleasure to make the acquaintance of a gentleman who is Sara’s friend.”
Alex bowed. “My lady, the pleasure is all mine.” Alex wondered if Maggie had ever been beautiful. If so, the only thing of beauty that remained was her voice. Alex imagined she had once been tall, slim, and elegant; now, however, she was thin and hunched, as if she protected a painful chest. Alex stepped a distance away so that the two could talk privately. How unendurable this existence must be for a woman who was born to privilege. How does she bear it? Alex’s hand closed over the money in her pocket. She drew out the seven shillings she had earned from the newspaper, and slipped it onto the mantelpiece above the empty hearth.
As they left, Sara pointed to a four-story derelict building across the street. “That’s a flash house—the top two floors.”
Alexandra now understood that the children who became thieves to better their lot in life were completely justified. Since Society didn’t give a tinker’s damn about them, they had no choice but to look after their own interests, no matter what laws they broke.
“That’s where I would have ended up if Maggie Field hadn’t intervened.”
“Have you any idea what her circumstances were?”
Sara shook her head once, then said, “I think I took the place of her own daughter, who she lost through tragic circumstances, perhaps of her own making.”
When the young women arrived back in Berkeley Square, unfortunately, Dottie was in the reception hall. She swept a disapproving glance over shawl-wrapped Sara and shabbily-clad Alex. “I would like a word with you upstairs, Alexandra.”
Dottie entered her own chamber, and Alex had no choice but to follow her grandmother into her territory. “When I saw you before in male attire, I assumed it was a one-time lark. What in the world are you playing at, Alexandra?”
“Dottie, I’m doing what I love: learning about the world and writing articles for the newspaper. There are so many wrongs that need righting! Let me show you my article on climbing boys.”
“I read it in the Political Register. It was most commendable, but what happened to the novel you were intent upon writing? Such an endeavor, while wearing a morning dress and sitting at a writing desk, would be far more suitable for a lady, I warrant.”
“The novels I’ve read recently are piffle! We need reform, and the government does nothing. My articles just might fire up the public into demanding that the government make changes. My next article will be about flash houses. Disguising myself as a male makes it both easier and safer to move about London.”
“And if I forbid it?” Dottie looked as militant as a warhorse, ready to breathe fire.
Alex clasped her hands together in unconscious supplication. “Oh, please don’t forbid me. Doing this has given me the freedom for which I’ve longed and opened my eyes to what goes on beyond the narrow confines of the ton. It makes me feel alive, as well as worthwhile. It also is broadening my mind and giving me an education that I couldn’t get from books alone.”
“Fiddle-faddle! You think those arguments will sway me? You must make the most of being in London, Alexandra. You should be socializing and using it to your advantage. Men are not enthralled by ladies who devote themselves to good causes; they view them as fanatics!”
“I promise I won’t become a fanatic! Please allow me this taste of life before you compel me to settle down to marriage.”
“You will have to promise far more than that, Alexandra.”
Alex clutched at straws, ready to bargain. “I will promise anything within reason.”
“If I allow you freedom to pursue this calling, racketing about London with all the riffraff and ragtag, I want your faithful promise that you will marry Lord Hatton next year.”
“I … Christopher may not choose to marry me!”
“Piss and piffle, Alexandra! That is the biggest load of claptrap I’ve ever heard! The man does not do the choosing; the woman does. Females are far more interesting and fascinating to males than vice versa. A clever woman such as yourself can hold any man in the palm of her hand and make him do her bidding.”
“Are you willing to give me complete freedom?”
Dottie hesitated, thought about qualifying it to within reason, then decided against it. “Complete freedom in exchange for your promise to become Lady Hatton.”
Fleetingly, Alex thought of Nicholas, her first love. The love that was now dead. She had mourned it, and purged herself of it, and now accepted the fact that marriage with Christopher was inevitable. She realized that it had always been inevitable. “I faithfully promise, Dottie.”
“And I promise you won’t regret it, darling.”
Lieutenant Nicholas Hatton asked himself if he regretted joining the Royal Horse Artillery, and though it had turned out to be a supreme challenge, he knew he had acquitted himself well so far and had few regrets.
His men, however, were becoming extremely restless, because the end of October was in sight, yet still besieged Pamplona had not surrendered. Finally, Lieutenant Hatton decided to go on the offensive to help ma
tters along. The Artillery forces had an excess of gunpowder that had not been used in the siege of the Spanish town, and Hatton came up with an idea to put it to good use. He asked for volunteers, and selected young, unmarried men who as yet had no families.
On the last day of October, they carried twenty barrels of gunpowder and spaced them out along the outside walls of the town near the fortress. He instructed his volunteers to form a line like a bucket brigade, but what they were to pass from hand to hand were barrels of gunpowder. Hatton and Sergeant O’Neil stationed themselves at the ready with fuses and lit tapers, and as the gunpowder was thrust into their hands, the two men lit the fuses and flung the barrels over the high wall. The barrel brigade kept up a steady rhythm, never missing a beat, as one explosion followed another, filling the air with acrid black smoke.
Lieutenant Hatton’s arm was totally numb from wrist to shoulder before they finally saw the white flag of surrender, fluttering through the choking clouds of smoke. A great cheer went up from his men and from the other soldiers who had gathered at the first explosion. When General Rowland Hill entered the town to accept its surrender, a grinning Nicholas Hatton went down his line of courageous volunteers to shake each man’s hand and murmur a brief “Well done.” The two words felt like the greatest praise they had ever received.
As his troops entered Pamplona, through his vigilance and aided by Sergeant O’Neil, his men did him proud. Because they committed no vile acts upon the conquered men nor depraved lust upon the females, he turned a blind eye to their looting, happy that they set no fires. Nick was vastly relieved that Pamplona fell with no casualties to his men.
The good fortune did not last. Now that Pamplona was secure, General Hill gave his officers orders to move their men toward the French border to join with Wellington’s force, which would soon be doing battle with General Soult’s army. Nick bade his men break camp. Because of the unrelenting rain, which had turned the ground into a quagmire, it was a gargantuan task to move the gun carriages upon which the cannon were mounted, especially in such hilly terrain. For more than a week, Nick spent eighteen hours a day in the saddle, riding the line. The only times he dismounted were to help dig out wheels sunk into mud over their axels, tend a lame horse, or fall into his bedroll for four or five hours of sleep.