Pride and Pleasure

Chapter 16

With Westfield at his side, Jasper escorted Eliza and Vanessa Chilcott into the Melville residence. Disheveled and reeking of smoke, the four of them were incongruous in a household prepared for the celebration of a wedding. They stood shoulder to shoulder in the foyer, hard-faced and bemused.

Lady Collingsworth hurried from the ballroom where the ceremony was to take place and came to an abrupt halt a few feet away. “Dear God,” she muttered. “The parson awaits you, but it’s clear I should reschedule.”

“No,” Eliza said, astonishing Jasper. “If he can wait an hour, I can be ready.”

Recovering, Jasper said, “I can be repaired within an hour as well.”

Blinking rapidly, Lady Collingsworth took in Miss Chilcott’s appearance.

“Regina,” Eliza said briskly, “this is Miss Vanessa Chilcott, my stepsister. Vanessa, this is the dowager Countess of Collingsworth.”

“My lady,” Vanessa whispered, curtseying.

Admiration and pride filled Jasper. He could think of no other woman who would wade through the morass of the day’s events with such aplomb. Eliza could have left Miss Chilcott to her own devices after learning the truth of her identity. Instead, she had asked one question of the woman- “Why?”-to which Miss Chilcott replied, “I want to be self-sufficient and independent. Who better to learn from than you? And how else to manage it, but to shed the Chilcott name that has defined my life thus far?”

Eliza had offered to take the woman in for now, since Miss Chilcott’s residence and all her possessions had been lost in the fire. At the very least, it kept the woman close while they delved into her circumstances. They would address other considerations tomorrow.

“Miss Chilcott will need a bath and a room,” Eliza said. “If you could see to that, Regina, I would be deeply grateful.”

“Of course.” Lady Collingsworth looked at Jasper. “You have visitors, Mr. Bond. In the parlor.”

Jasper met Eliza’s querying gaze by extending his arm. I go where you go, she’d said, and despite everything, she wished to be married to him with as much haste as he felt. He treasured her for that and countless other things.

Westfield set off to join the handful of other guests in the ballroom. Jasper and Eliza moved into the formal parlor. There were five people in the room. The Crouch twins, Lynd, Anthony Bell, and Mrs. Francesca Maybourne.

Surveying the group with raised brows, Jasper wondered why the lot of them was in attendance. He was about to ask that very question, when Eliza spoke.

“Good afternoon, Mrs. Reynolds,” she said softly. “After today’s events, I was not expecting to see you again.”

“I went to the jeweler,” Lynd explained, “but Bell was nowhere to be found, which raised my suspicions.”

Eliza continued listening to the recounting of the second half of the Reynolds’s plot with a heavy heart. While she was deeply grateful for the plan’s failure, she was painfully conscious that the hazard would not have existed if Jasper wasn’t determined to destroy Montague. How much of his energy was focused on that endeavor? Would she ever have all of him? Or was the largest piece of his heart given to the woman from his past whom Montague had destroyed?

And yet she had to take heart. He’d come to marry her and sent Lynd after Montague in his stead.

“Sometimes,” Jasper said quietly, “what looks too good to be true is precisely that.”

Lynd nodded. “It was wise of you to send the Crouches with me. Together we watched the street for close to an hour and we noted one hackney that was a fixture the entire time. Patrick walked by it and-aided by his tremendous height- was able to see Mrs. Reynolds waiting inside with a pistol in her lap. I sent Peter to fetch Bell so he could confirm the story she gave us. Bell didn’t know her, but apparently she knew enough about him, you, and Montague to create the perfect lure to draw you out. We brought her here to see what you thought of it all, having no notion her identity was false or that Miss Martin would know who she truly was.”

Eliza eyed Anne Reynolds with something akin to hatred, an emotion she’d never truly felt before. “Were you going to shoot Mr. Bond? Was it your intention to kill him?”

The brunette lowered the sodden kerchief she’d been sobbing into since learning of her husband’s demise and glared daggers at Jasper. “That isn’t his name. I have no notion what his given name truly is, but I can tell you his surname is Gresham. He is the son of Diana Gresham, who was a whore for Lord Montague until her death from a wasting disease.”

Jasper became so still it frightened Eliza. “Moderation would be wise,” he warned with dangerous softness.

“I know everything about you, Mr. Gresham,” Anne spat. “I told Mr. Reynolds to share what he knew with Miss Martin. After all, she’s the one who hired my brother-in-law to investigate your connection to Lord Gresham in County Wexford. ‘Tell her he isn’t what he says he is,’ I told him, but he insisted Miss Martin had only to believe you wanted her money to set you aside. He also feared rousing her concern if she was to learn he never recalled Tobias from Ireland. ’She might wonder what other orders I’ve disobeyed,’ he said. He should have listened to me.”

The explosive tension in the room was palpable. Eliza rushed to fill the void before Anne could ignite the situation further. “You wrote the threatening letters Lord Melville received.” It was not a question. “Why? What purpose did this all serve?”

Anne’s chin lifted and she looked away. “As if I would say anything further. I have done nothing wrong.”

“What of the incident at the Royal Academy?” Jasper asked with ice in his tone.

“Dear God. You cannot think we had anything to do with that! We are not murderers. I’ve had enough of this.” She stood. “You have no right to detain me.”

“I’ll be taking you in to Bow Street,” Bell said, rocking back on his heels. He was a short and slender man, almost delicate looking. “We’ll see if the magistrate agrees with you. ’Til then, sit down.”

“That’s an expensive cape you wear,” Jasper noted. “And sizable emeralds at your ears and throat. Either you came into your marriage with money, or Miss Martin paid your husband exceedingly well.”

Unaccustomed to noting such things, Eliza reevaluated the woman’s attire. Anne Reynolds’s ensemble did indeed seem far finer than Eliza’s own accoutrements. She looked at Jasper. “How? I manage my own funds…keep my own ledgers…”

“You do not deal directly with your tenants. Who collects the rents?”

“Mr. Reynolds.”

“Right,” Lynd said. “Is it possible what you believe you are charging and collecting isn’t what the tenants are actually paying to Reynolds?”

Eliza paled. “I suppose it’s possible, if he was clever enough about it.” Which she knew he could have been. She looked at Anne, who was also wan, if defiant. “If he raised the rents over time without my knowledge, or charged for miscellaneous items of which I wasn’t aware. We should ask Miss Chilcott and my other tenants. Dear God…they are all as much victims as I am.”

“That’s likely why Reynolds wanted Bond dead,” Bell said. “Once you had a husband to assist you, the embezzlement might’ve been discovered or Reynolds’ duties reduced. I’m sorry I didn’t believe you when you hired me, Miss Martin. Let that be a lesson to me in the future.”

Jasper remained deadly quiet and expressionless.

“This was to be my last Season,” Eliza said softly. “I intended to retire to the country with Melville, at which point a greater portion of my affairs would have been left in Mr. Reynolds’s hands. He and his wife were so close to achieving their aims that my sudden decision to marry Mr. Bond must have made them desperate.”

“If you marry him,” Anne said coldly, “you deserve what comes to you. At least Mr. Reynolds was concerned about building your wealth. Gresham, I am certain, intends to squander it.”

Eliza pushed to her feet, unable to bear any more. “I shall leave this matter to you, Mr. Bell. I’m confident you will apprise me of the necessary information.”

The Runner gave a curt nod. “Of course.”

“Mr. Bond,” Eliza murmured, which caused Anne to laugh. “Would you accompany me, please?”

“In a moment,” he said without inflection. “I’ll find you.”

Eliza made her egress on wooden legs, wondering if she would, indeed, be found, or if Jasper would now be lost to her. Perhaps he’d never truly been hers to begin with. For all their promises to be truthful to one another, it seemed they’d kept more secrets than they’d shared.

Jasper reached the top of the staircase and turned to the right, following the directions to Eliza’s room that Lady Collingsworth had given him. If the dowager countess thought it was inappropriate for him to ask for them, she gave no outward indication. Instead, she told him the parson was having a fine time with both the champagne and Lord Westfield’s witty discourse, and he’d agreed to stay as long as they wanted him to.

Inhaling deeply, Jasper lifted his hand to knock on Eliza’s boudoir door. As he waited for her to answer, he struggled against the feeling of being made of glass; he felt as if he might break at any moment. Perhaps it was the endless string of unexpected revelations that had him so unsettled. Or perhaps he was simply experiencing a bridegroom’s expected nervousness. He thought it might be terror over the prospect of losing something irreplaceable, but he didn’t have any frame of reference to be certain.

The door opened, and Eliza stood there. She was in a dressing gown, and her eyes and nose were red. He remembered when they’d first met, he’d thought her pretty enough but no raving beauty. He couldn’t comprehend that determination now. He was certain she was the loveliest woman he’d ever seen.

Stepping back, she made room for him to enter, then she shut the door quietly behind him.

Her rooms were decorated in the same hues of cream and burgundy as his own. He noticed that immediately, and took an odd sort of comfort in the similarity. He shouldn’t forget how alike they were in the most fundamental of ways. If only they could strip away their exteriors and bare that affinity…

“I should have told you-”

They spoke and ended in unison. Startled to have said the same thing at once, they stared at one another. He waited for her to speak first. After the day’s revelations, she deserved the opportunity to give him a tongue-lashing.

Her hands tightened the belt at her waist. “I hired Tobias Reynolds in the beginning, when I knew nothing about you. You said the connection between you and Lord Gresham would withstand greater scrutiny, and I told myself I was only confirming the claim before someone else had a mind to. But I recalled Mr. Reynolds from the task before he reported anything. I wanted you to be the one to tell me whatever you felt I should know, in your own good time.”

Jasper nodded and linked his fingers behind his back. “I should have told you about my mother. I knew I would have to, but I thought we had time-”

“We do.” She stepped closer. “All the time you need.”

“The time is now, Eliza. You should know me before you wed me. I couldn’t bear for you to turn away from me after you’re mine.”

“I cannot turn away. I love you.”

His eyes closed on a shuddering breath. “Eliza-”

“I don’t want you to say anything,” she interrupted quickly, “until after we are man and wife. I need to marry you with my heart, not my mind. I need to trust in my own instincts, over my reason, so I can make the changes necessary to be what you require, to be whole. I need you to know I accept you just the way you are, without reservation or doubt, so you can-God willing-someday grow to love me, too.”

Eliza was defying all of her routines, setting aside habits of a lifetime, deliberately making one concession after another…for him. She was determined to leave herself open to trusting him, even when everything suggested she shouldn’t.

“I love you,” she said again.

He looked at her. She’d taken a seat upon one of the settees with her hands clasped demurely in her lap. Insanely, that aroused him-the vision of her so controlled, when he knew how wild she could be in his arms. It was the way she revealed her deeper self when they were intimate, even more than the physical pleasure, that drove his sexual craving for her.

“I am undone,” he said hoarsely. “You rule me completely. I would do anything to possess you.”

Eliza’s hand lifted to her throat, her fingers wrapping around the graceful column. He crossed the room to her and caught that alabaster hand. Jasper pressed a kiss to the back of it, then moved to the tips of her fingers. He licked the end of the one that would bear his ring by the close of the day, and she shivered. Her lashes lowered and her lips parted on soft panting breaths.

Opening his mouth, he sucked the slender digit inside, swirling his tongue around it until a whimper escaped her.

The sound of surrender freed him from any restraint.

He reached down and opened the placket of his breeches with his free hand. His cock fell heavily into his palm, so thick and hard he fisted himself to stave off his hunger.

“Jasper.”

His mouth slid free of her trembling fingers. “I need you.”

Eliza fumbled with the belt at her waist. Jasper sank to the floor on his knees and pushed up her chemise, his hands rough with impatience. He caught her hips and tugged her down to his lap, her legs straddling his. The cleft of her sex pressed against the silky length of him.

He caught her nape in his hand, forcing her to look straight into his eyes. “I need to be in you.”

“Yes.” She grew slick with welcome due to the heat of his rut. She loved him like this, uncontrolled and lustful.

He shifted her, urging her up and then over him, the thick crest of his penis gliding along her slit and nudging her clitoris. She moaned and caught his shoulders, tense with impatience and greedy for pleasure.

When he notched himself at her clenching opening, she trembled. With a groan, he thrust, pushing his thickly veined cock deep into her.

“Eliza.” His arms tightened around her, crushing the air from her lungs and immobilizing her against him.

She clawed at his back, writhing. The heat of his skin burned through the linen and velvet of his garments.

“Please,” she begged, quivering around him. “Please.”

Jasper gripped her hips, lifting and dropping her. Working her onto his rigid length. Pumping her up and down. Grinding and screwing deep.

Eliza sobbed with the pleasure. “Yes!”

“I will addict you to this,” he promised in a dark, dangerously rough voice. “Addict you to me. Soon, you’ll seek me out in public, unable to wait another moment. You will lift your skirts and beg for my mouth on you, my tongue in you. In the extremity of your lust, you won’t care where we are. You will crave the taste of me. You will sink to your knees and service me with your mouth, sucking my cock until I spill into you, thick and hot and mad with hunger.”

She wrapped her arms around his shoulders, eyes closing as he surged repeatedly inside her. The feeling was incredible. She would never have enough of it. The stroking of the furled underside of his crown rubbed deliciously, finding her most sensitive nerve endings and setting them afire.

He slid inside her, deeply, filling her with the heat and hardness of him. Filling her with pleasure that made her arch wildly. His possession was indescribably erotic. As addicting as he threatened.

He withdrew, and she felt empty. He returned, and she bit her lip to hold back cries that would betray their actions to a multitude of guests.

But Jasper would abide no restraint. “Let me hear you,” he coaxed. “Let me hear how much you want this.”

His free hand cupped her thigh, opening her wider so that he could thrust deeper. Swiveling his hips, he worked her into a frenzy with ruthless skill, making her insensate with lust and hungry for more. Always more. As much as he gave her, it wasn’t enough.

Eliza gasped and dug her nails into the flexing muscles of his back. The horrors of the day created a sharp urgency. “Finish me.”

“Too soon,” he ground out, sweat dripping down his temple.

“We have forever to go slower. Don’t make me wait now.”

He crushed her to him. “I love you. Eliza…love you.”

She climaxed with a force that left her shaking. Jasper followed swiftly, his hips ramming upward with ferocious speed. She felt his climax building, felt the tensing of his muscles and the frantic heaving of his powerful chest. When he came, it was violent, his thick penis jerking inside her with every molten spurt of his seed. Her name fell brokenly from his lips until she kissed him, swallowing the sounds of his pleasure with unconditional love in her heart.

They were married an hour later. Aside from the parson, who was flushed and happy with drink, it was a somber wedding. If the stamp of Jasper’s passion was evident in Eliza’s appearance, no one said anything to her, and she was certain Regina would have.

Jasper’s hair was still damp when he said his vows. He’d sent the Crouches back to his home to retrieve fresh clothes, then bathed in a guest bedroom to save time.

Fewer than a dozen people witnessed the short ceremony. The celebration afterward was equally abridged, since everyone had been present for hours by the time the vows were said.

Eliza wore a new cream-hued satin gown with fine lace sleeves and bodice. It was cut and fashioned in the latest style, the first of many that would assist her transformation. She intended to enhance what beauty God had given her, using every weapon in her feminine arsenal to please her husband and deepen his love for her.

When the time came to retire, Jasper was relieved. Eliza led him to her suite of rooms with his hand in hers.

“I have something for you,” he said, when they were alone.

“Oh.” She bit her lower lip. “I did not think of a wedding gift for you.”

“You’re all the gift I need.” He reached into the inner pocket of his coat and withdrew a lady’s signet ring.

He held his hand out for hers, slipping the golden circlet onto the ring finger of her right hand. “It was my mother’s.”

Eliza looked up at him with luminous eyes. “Thank you.”

He nodded and shrugged out of his coat. “Would you care for a drink?” he asked solicitously. Having taken her body so peremptorily earlier, he intended to savor her now.

“No. I want you.”

Satisfaction surged through him. His chest expanded on a deep inhale. His blood thickened and flowed hotly. “Have you no reservations? No questions?”

“Why are you still talking?” She presented her back to him.

“Will you always surprise me?” He approached her and reached for the first button of her gown.

“Haven’t we had enough unpleasantness for one day? Tomorrow is soon enough to address the rest.”

He pressed his lips to her shoulder, grateful for her.

Her head turned, and her gaze met his. “If you’d gone to the jeweler’s today instead of Lynd…”

“Eliza…”

She pivoted into his arms, catching his mouth with her own in a fervent, awkward kiss. He caught her close, lifting her feet from the floor. Her slender arms wrapped around his neck, her fingers pushed into his hair in the way that never failed to inflame him.

“I want you naked,” she breathed, making his cock hard. “I want to touch you everywhere, and your clothing makes that impractical.”

“We cannot have impracticality in our bedroom,” he said, biting back a smile. Setting her down on the edge of the mattress, Jasper stepped back. He attacked the buttons of his waistcoat.

Eliza’s tongue traced the curve of her bottom lip. “Take your time.”

“You like to watch.”

“I like to watch you,” she amended. “You are everything I find beautiful, and sexual, and desirable.”

He had no idea what to say to that, how to tell her what her candor meant to him. He could only slow the process of undressing, maintaining eye contact with her, allowing her to see how much he loved her. When the last stitch was shed, he straightened and waited for her to tell him what to do next. He’d taken what he needed earlier, and she’d given it to him without hesitation. Only the second time in her life that she’d had a man inside her and he’d been too overwrought to show her the gentleness she deserved. Now, it was his turn to give her what she needed.

“I’m overdressed,” she said, toeing off her slippers. Her slim legs dangled off the end of the bed.

“What would you like me to do about that?”

“Undress me. But much more quickly than you bared yourself.”

Jasper set his hands at her waist and helped her off the mattress. He resumed his task of unfastening her buttons, working quickly. The wedding gown was set aside with reverence, but the sheer chemise and pantalettes were left to puddle on the floor. Enamored with her softly freckled skin, he wrapped himself around her, his arms tucked under hers and his knees bent to accommodate her shorter stature. With one hand cupping a breast and the other tangling with the dark red curls between her legs, he owned her passion completely.

She purred with pleasure, her head falling back against his shoulder. “I love your hands on me. They are so big and strong, callused and warm.”

“A tradesman’s hands.” He traced the delicately pink shell of her ear with his tongue.

“The only hands that will ever touch me this way.”

Scissoring his fingers, he parted the lips of her sex, exposing the hood shielding her clitoris. “Will I find you wet?”

She began to pant as he rolled her nipple between his fingers. Her stance widened in invitation for a deeper caress. “Yes…You linger in me from earlier.”

The thought of her drenched in his semen swelled his already heavy erection. He pushed his cock between her thighs, growling at the slickness that coated him.

“Let me,” he coaxed, urging her to fold forward over the edge of the bed.

There was a slight tension in her lithe frame. Then she relaxed and lay facedown, presenting the lush curve of her beautiful buttocks. He cupped them, squeezing their fullness.

Reaching between her legs, he urged her to pull one leg up and onto the mattress, her thigh perpendicular to her body, opening her completely. He cupped her there, too, possessively. “I love you.”

She rested her cheek on the counterpane and closed her eyes. “Say it again.”

He took himself in hand, notching his cockhead into the tiny entrance to her silken cunt. “I love you.”

With a slow roll of his hips, he pushed the fat crown into the fist-tight glove of her. Her fingers dug into the velvet and her low moan stirred his blood.

“My wife,” he breathed, pushing inexorably deeper.

Eliza arched her back like a cat, which caused the tiny little muscles inside her to squeeze him. The pleasure of those rippling embraces, the sensation of being lured deeper into her…A deep groan escaped him. Hunching over her, Jasper worked his cock into her with quick shallow judders, sliding through quivering tissues until he hit the end of her, refusing to risk either of them climaxing until they were completely connected.

Her breath hitched.

“So deep…” she slurred.

He withdrew a few inches, then thrust, going even deeper. She hugged him at the root, clasping his throbbing cock in liquid heat. Catching her by the shoulder, he held her in place and rode her with long, leisurely thrusts. His bollocks smacked against her damp cleft in a steady, erotic rhythm. Eliza whimpered with every weighty tap against her clitoris, her nails leaving visible trails in the counterpane, the curls around her face growing damp with perspiration.

When the pressure to blow grew dangerously high, Jasper would pause at the deepest point of her and grind, whispering soothing words as she climaxed around him. Sweat soaked his hair and matted his chest, a visible sign of the restraint required to remain rock hard and full to bursting to please her.

Time passed, and Jasper lost track of it, as he always did when he was with Eliza. He knew only that she came so many times her fingers no longer had the strength to clutch the counterpane, and the cries she made as the pleasure hit were weak-as-a-kitten mewls.

It was her hoarse-voiced “I love you” that finished him.

With his cheek pressed against her glorious hair and his arms wrapped beneath her, he filled her with hot, wrenching pulses of the lust that sprang from a deeper source. From a well of hope and love inside him he hadn’t known was there until she made him whole.