Their Master: A Steamy and Exciting Story of Love and Revenge. (Victorian Decadence Series) Read online

  Praise for Minerva Spencer & S.M. LaViolette’s

  THE ACADEMY OF LOVE series:

  “[A] pitch perfect Regency …. Readers will be hooked.” (THE MUSIC OF LOVE)

  ★Publishers Weekly STARRED REVIEW

  “An offbeat story that offers unexpected twists on a familiar setup.”

  (A FIGURE OF LOVE)

  Kirkus

  “[A] consistently entertaining read.”

  (A FIGURE OF LOVE)

  Kirkus

  Praise for THE MASQUERADERS series:

  "Lovers of historical romance will be hooked on this twisty story of revenge, redemption, and reversal of fortunes."

  Publishers Weekly, STARRED review of THE FOOTMAN.

  "Fans will be delighted."

  Publishers Weekly on THE POSTILION

  Praise for Minerva Spencer's REBELS OF THE TON series:

  NOTORIOUS

  ★A PopSugar Best New Romance of November

  ★A She Reads Fall Historical Romance Pick

  ★A Bookclubz Recommended Read

  “Brilliantly crafted…an irresistible cocktail of smart characterization, sophisticated sensuality, and sharp wit." ★Booklist STARRED REVIEW

  “Sparkling…impossible not to love.”—Popsugar

  “Both characters are strong, complex, and believable, and the cliffhanger offers a nice setup for the sequel. Readers who like thrills mixed in with their romance should check this out.”

  —Publishers Weekly

  “Packed full of fiery exchanges and passionate embraces, this is for those who prefer their Regencies on the scandalous side.”—Library Journal

  INFAMOUS

  "Realistically transforming the Regency equivalent of a mean girl into a relatable, all-too-human heroine is no easy feat, but Spencer (Outrageous, 2021) succeeds on every level. Lightly dusted with wintery holiday charm, graced with an absolutely endearing, beetle-obsessed hero and a fully rendered cast of supporting characters and spiked with smoldering sensuality and wry wit, the latest in Spencer’s Rebels of the Ton series is sublimely satisfying."—Booklist STARRED review

  "Perfect for fans of Bridgerton, Infamous is also a charming story for Christmas. In fact, I enjoyed Infamous so much that when I was halfway through it, I ordered the author’s first novel, Dangerous. I look forward to reading much more of Minerva Spencer’s work.”—THE HISTORICAL NOVEL SOCIETY

  Praise for Minerva Spencer's Outcasts series:

  "Minerva Spencer's writing is sophisticated and wickedly witty. Dangerous is a delight from start to finish with swashbuckling action, scorching love scenes, and a coolly arrogant hero to die for. Spencer is my new auto-buy!"

  -NYT Bestselling Author Elizabeth Hoyt

  "[SCANDALOUS is] A standout...Spencer's brilliant and original tale of the high seas bursts with wonderfully real protagonists, plenty of action, and passionate romance."

  ★Publishers Weekly STARRED REVIEW

  "Fans of Amanda Quick's early historicals will find much to savor." ★Booklist STARRED REVIEW

  "Sexy, witty, and fiercely entertaining."

  ★Kirkus STARRED REVIEW

  Praise for S.M. LaViolette’s Books:

  “Lovers of historical romance will be hooked on this twisty story of revenge, redemption, and reversal of fortunes.”

  ★Publishers Weekly STARRED REVIEW

  "A remarkably resourceful heroine who can more than hold her own against any character invented by best-selling Bertrice Small, a suavely sophisticated hero with sex appeal to spare, and a cascade of lushly detailed love scenes give Spencer's dazzling debut its deliciously fun retro flavor."

  ★Booklist STARRED REVIEW

  "Readers will love this lusty and unusual marriage of convenience story."

  NYT Bestselling Author MADELINE HUNTER

  More books by S.M. LaViolette & Minerva Spencer

  THE ACADEMY OF LOVE SERIES

  The Music of Love

  A Figure of Love

  A Portrait of Love

  The Language of Love

  Dancing with Love*

  The Story of Love*

  THE OUTCASTS SERIES

  Dangerous

  Barbarous

  Scandalous

  THE REBELS OF THE TON

  Notorious

  Outrageous

  Infamous

  THE MASQUERADERS

  The Footman

  The Postilion

  The Bastard

  THE SEDUCERS

  Melissa and The Vicar

  Joss and The Countess

  Hugo and The Maiden

  VICTORIAN DECADENCE

  His Harlot

  His Valet

  His Countess

  Her Master

  Her Beast

  THE BELLAMY SISTERS

  PHOEBE

  HYACINTH*

  THE WILD WOMEN OF WHITECHAPEL

  THE BOXING BARONESS

  CROOKED SIXPENCE BOOKS are published by

  CROOKED SIXPENCE PRESS

  2 State Road 230

  El Prado, NM 87529

  Copyright © 2022 Shantal M. LaViolette

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other noncommercial uses permitted by copyright law. For permission requests, write to the publisher, addressed “Attention: Permissions Coordinator,” at the address above.

  To the extent that the image or images on the cover of this book depict a person or persons, such person or persons are merely models, and are not intended to portray any character or characters featured in the book.

  If you purchased this book without a cover you should be aware that this book is stolen property. It was reported as “unsold and destroyed” to the Publisher and neither the Author nor the Publisher has received any payment for this “stripped book.”

  First printing November 2022

  10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

  Any references to historical events, real people, or real places are used fictitiously. Names, characters, and places are products of the author’s imagination.

  Photo stock by Period Images

  Printed in the United States of America

  Chapter 1

  A bead of sweat ran down Smith’s forehead and into his eye, but his hips, which snapped out a brutal rhythm, didn’t stutter or falter.

  Beneath him, the whore grunted, her body experiencing the involuntary contractions that heralded an orgasm. Her fourth, by his count.

  Smith smirked and fucked her faster, pressing the ball of his thumb against her swollen bud.

  She whimpered. “I’m—I’m—ahhh—”

  Her tight sheath rippled around his shaft, squeezing his cock hard enough to hurt, but he didn’t let up. Smith had told her—as he always told the whores he paid, male or female—to alert him when a climax was imminent. She’d not articulated the words, but he’d give her a pass.

  This time.

  And there would be a next time, he decided as he pumped into her slender body so vigorously that every muscle beneath her passion-flushed skin flexed as she struggled to absorb his savage thrusts.

  Her eyes were tight with pain at the depth of penetration and Smith could feel his crown bumping against something inside her, a phenomenon he’d experie
nced with some women in the past.

  Indeed, it had occurred the very first time he’d had sexual relations with a woman. He’d been sixteen years old and had chosen an older prostitute named Yvette, well-known for her patience with male virgins. Yvette had screamed like she was being murdered when he’d thrust inside her, weeping and causing an embarrassing scene, accusing him of puncturing her womb.

  Even all these years later Smith could recall his mortification.

  He’d stayed away from women for years after that, taking only male sexual partners for fear of repeating that disturbing episode. Not until he’d been a more secure man in his twenties had he taken a female lover. Fortunately, his second time had been nothing like the first. Indeed, it had been exactly the opposite. His cock had encountered the same soft barrier as before, but he’d driven the woman to ecstasy rather than tears.

  After two such contradictory experiences Smith had sought out a doctor with knowledge of the female reproductive system.

  The old doctor had roared with laughter at Smith’s naïve question. “You are not entering the womb—that would be impossible, even if you are endowed with a prick well above average. You are nudging something called the cervix. Cervical stimulation can provide pain, pleasure, or even both, depending on the depth and tilt of a woman’s pelvis.”

  “How can a man tell such things? So that he might avoid the wrong women.”

  “You can’t. At least not from a woman’s outward appearance. If you engage the services of an experienced working woman, she will know her own tolerances.”

  And so Smith always asked whores before engaging them, even though he knew the question—are you sure you can you take my longer than average cock?—made him sound like an arrogant idiot. It was worth sounding like an arse to avoid a wailing woman.

  The whore beneath him, Moira, had intrigued him with her response.

  “I have occasionally experienced pain,” she’d admitted in her cool, dignified way. Smith had been ready to dismiss her, but then she’d said, “And I liked it.” She’d smiled at him, the expression turning her rather plain, wholesome features into something wickedly alluring and sensual.

  If that hadn’t been enough to titillate him, she’d added, “The deeper and harder, the better.”

  Well.

  How could he possibly resist that?

  And so Smith had been giving it to her deep and hard for at least half an hour.

  She would be getting sore—no matter how much pain she claimed to like— and he was gritting his jaws hard enough to crack his teeth. It was time; his ballocks were heavy and aching to spend.

  Smith doubled his efforts, digging his fingers into her pale flesh hard enough to leave bruises. For the next week or more, she would remember tonight whenever she looked at her body, and she would think of him.

  Of this.

  Of now.

  He smiled fiercely as the last of her orgasm echoed through her body, and then he stopped thinking entirely and surrendered to pure sensation.

  ∞∞∞

  Moira Dunsmuir watched her client from beneath lowered lashes as he lay face-up on the bed, his eyes closed, his striking features slack. His olive skin was glazed with sweat, the taut V of his abdomen flexing with each breath. His body—free of any hair except the thick, dark thatch on his head—was as hard as iron.

  Before coming to Bernina’s, Moira had never shaved her body hair. But not only was it common among the whores who serviced Madame Cecile’s wealthy clientele, it was a requirement for anyone who wanted to work for Mr. Smith.

  Moira had known all about Smith’s preferences long before she’d met the man—long before she’d come to England, even.

  She knew he was forty-five, although you’d never guess it to look at his body. To be honest, it irked Moira that she couldn’t stop looking at him—especially his tremendous cock. Before engaging her for the evening he’d had the audacity to warn her about the size of his prick.

  “If you have experienced pain in the past, I would ask you to be honest and save us both any unpleasantness.” His heavy-lidded eyes had looked politely bored, as if he were discussing the weather.

  Moira had struggled not to laugh in his face. She would have believed him arrogant if she hadn’t already heard cock tales about him from several other whores.

  “I’ve experienced pain in the past,” she’d admitted.

  He’d nodded and begun to turn away.

  “And I liked it.”

  He’d stopped and then turned back to her, black velvet pupils swallowing chocolate brown irises.

  “The deeper and harder, the better,” she’d added.

  A tiny smile had curved his beautiful lips. “Why, how… delightful.”

  Despite her intentions, she’d been impressed when he’d undressed and exposed his erect organ. She had wondered, at first, if it was the lack of pubic hair that made him appear so prodigious. But after enduring the exquisite blend of pain and pleasure that came from such deliciously deep penetration Moira knew it was no optical illusion.

  It shamed her to admit that she wanted to use her mouth on him—just to see if she could take all of him. Actually, her desire didn’t just shame her, it disturbed her.

  Maybe what Moira’s mother—not that Moira had ever been allowed to call Marie Bardot mother—had always said about Moira was true: You were born to be a whore, Moira, you could not do anything else. Marie’s cold blue eyes had flickered dismissively over Moira’s less than impressive person as she’d delivered her verdict. You might not have inherited the Bardot good looks, but my blood runs strong and true through your veins.

  She’d smirked proudly when she’d said it, as if being the most recent generation in a long line of whores was something to crow about.

  Not until this moment, when Moira’s mouth was salivating to suck a man’s cock—a man who also happened to be the sworn enemy of her family—had she believed Marie’s words were true. Indeed, she’d always suspected that her mother’s cynical observation was more a reflection of her own carnal proclivities than Moira’s.

  It appeared she’d been wrong.

  How could her body want Smith while her mind hated him? What was wrong with her? Was she such a thoroughgoing whore that she welcomed any man to use her if he was attractive enough—even a man like Smith?

  Apparently.

  Moira tried to take comfort in the fact that she was not the only employee at Bernina’s to have fallen for Smith—or at least to have fallen for his magnificent physique and superlative skills in the bedchamber.

  It was a universal truth that whores discussed their clients with each other, dissecting their bodies and abilities (or lack thereof) with the cool detachment of accountants reviewing ledgers. The consensus at Bernina’s was that Smith was one of the few clients the whores claimed they would pay for bed sport.

  Moira had been skeptical, but now she knew it was true, and that knowledge infuriated her; Smith had given her more physical pleasure than any man she could remember. His body was like a tool—or a weapon—designed for fucking.

  Well, that was fine, because Moira’s body was designed for revenge. By the time Smith discovered just what her purpose was, it would be far too late for him to do anything about it.

  Smith’s eyelids lifted slowly, giving her time to school her features and gaze worshipfully at him, like a woman who’d just climaxed four times in the last hour.

  His full lips flexed into a languorous smile. “Thank you.”

  Moira had been servicing men for years and this was the first time she’d been thanked. How was she supposed to respond?

  He chuckled and reached out to stroke her hip. Only her strict training kept her from flinching away from his gentle caress, which was not the sort of touch she generally received—or favored, for that matter.

  “What?” he asked. “Has nobody thanked you for the use of your magnificent body before?” His thumb rubbed the thin, sensitive skin stretched over her pelvic bone.

>   Magnificent? Yet another first.

  She shook her head. “No.”

  “You’re a reserved, mysterious little thing, aren’t you?”

  Like any good whore, Moira had been trained to conceal any emotions other than admiration from the wealthy and powerful clientele she’d served over the years.

  But mysterious? No. She was about as mysterious as one of the bland tea biscuits the English seemed to love so much. Or at least she was bland when compared with her parents and her tall, elegant, and darkly handsome siblings.

  Moira looked nothing like the rest of her family. She was a throwback to her diminutive, Scottish grandmother—barely five feet tall, pale and freckled, and as curvaceous as a plank—a resemblance that embarrassed her statuesque mother and regal father.

  Smith pinched her already hard nipples, drawing a ragged gasp from her. “These are beautiful.”

  It was a night for firsts; in all her twenty-five years nobody had ever called Moira’s insignificant breasts beautiful—not even the men who’d preferred her exactly because she was so flat that she could convincingly masquerade as a young boy.

  She was stupid to be surprised at his words. After all, her boyish appearance was why her parents had chosen her to come all this way: because Smith preferred his female lovers to be androgynous.

  They had considered sending Moira’s brother Etienne, first—since Smith enjoyed the full spectrum of male body types, from over-muscled brutes to slight, dainty men—but Moira was the most expendable member of her family.

  Etienne wasn’t just beautiful; he was also currently under the protection of the Duc de Montaigne and earning their family a great deal of money. Etienne was also clever and managed all the bookkeeping for the family’s business, ensuring that the venerated Maison Bardot continued to prosper and maintain its much-vaunted reputation for producing the finest courtesans in France.

  There were no wealthy dukes lusting after Moira and she had no head for accounting, so she’d been sent to England to capture and bring home her family’s greatest enemy.

  Not that she’d done much toward that goal. She’d been in London almost eleven months and tonight was the first time she’d managed to get into the same room as Maximus Proteus Nicolaides, the real name of the man who’d spent the last thirty years of his life known only as Mr. Smith.