His Countess (Victorian Decadence Book 3) Read online

  “It’s my pleasure, my lord. I was just about to order tea, would you care for some?” she asked as he bowed over her hand.

  His full, dark pink lips curved in a smile that was so wicked her body heated. “I should adore some tea.”

  Alys nodded to the hovering Bingle, who shut the door while wearing an openly worried frown.

  “I do hope you’ll forgive me for coming up to London without your invitation, my lord, but I hoped to meet you before the Season went into full roar.”

  His heavy lids lowered over eyes that were celestial blue, in keeping with his heavenly appearance. The expression in those eyes, however, was the farthest thing from angelic that she could imagine.

  “I’m so pleased you took the time and made the effort, my lady.” He glanced around the room with a slight curl of his lip. “I feel I should offer an apology for the state of my hospitality.” His sneer shifted into a grin. “Although I suppose I can hardly be held responsible as you arrived before I could do much to make any changes.”

  His gentle admonishment was enough to leave Alys in no doubt as to whether his beautiful mouth held fangs.

  She felt her neck and face heat. “I shall not trespass long upon your hospitality,” she said stiffly.

  He chuckled. “Oh do forgive me if I gave you the impression you were not welcome. I daresay I shan’t commence repairs until I’ve had time to thoroughly investigate the state of affairs here. So you shan’t be in anyone’s way.”

  Alys could see by the amused twinkle in his eyes that he knew exactly how offensive he was being. What a loathsome, odious, mushroom.

  “I have no desire to remain in London,” she said truthfully. “I came regarding my imminent occupation of the Dower House.”

  “Yes, I seem to recall reading that. In rather a bad way, is it?”

  “Yes, my lord. It was last occupied in my husband’s grandfather’s lifetime by one of his sisters, a spinster who remained there until her death.”

  “And this is what you propose to do?”

  Alys blinked. “I beg your pardon?”

  “You wish to remain in this cottage until your death?”

  Alys could scarcely believe the man. “That is my right, my lord.”

  He held up both hands, the smirky smile she was already coming to dislike curving his full, shapely lips. “Please, I meant no offence; I’m merely concerned with your future.”

  A disbelieving laugh slipped out of her before she could check it. “Oh? How kind of you.”

  He appeared not to notice her sarcasm and smiled. “You’re welcome, my lady. You see, I count your care as one of the duties I’ve inherited. Think of me as standing in the way of brother to you—” he paused at her unladylike snort. “I can see that notion amuses you.”

  It actually revolted her, but that would be impolitic and unwise to point out.

  “Or perhaps you prefer to think of me as a . . . cousin?” he said when she didn’t respond.

  Alys didn’t want to think about him at all, but she had little choice. “A cousin? Yes, well, that is stretching matters, but is not an entirely unbelievable fiction.”

  “I’m so glad we can agree on something.” His lips seemed to thin slightly and Alys realized she needed to be very, very careful with this man.

  “In any event,” he continued. “What I was trying to say—not very successfully, it appears—is that you may inhabit the house—Foxrun, is it?—for as long as you wish. I will doubtless begin evaluating the properties for repairs at some point, but my initial examination gives me reason to believe the tenant dwellings are what require my immediate attention.”

  Alys’s eyebrows lifted.

  “I can see that such a practical assessment surprises you.”

  She opened her mouth to deny it—to say what surprised her was that a man like him would even consider such mundane matters—but he answered his own question.

  “I’m shocked at the neglect these people—now my dependents—have suffered, my lady. I’m determined to improve as many of their, er, hovels as possible before the beginning of winter.”

  Alys had to bite her tongue. She agreed with him entirely, but she couldn’t help feeling as if he were blaming her for the wretched state of affairs at Foxrun.

  The door opened and Bingle himself arrived with the tea.

  “Thank you, Bingle,” she said after he set the tray down on the table.

  Alys felt the weight of Lord Taunton’s eyes on her as she prepared the tea, her movements clumsy and stilted. That was, she suspected, his intention.

  “How do you take it, my lord?”

  When he didn’t immediately answer, she looked up to find him wearing that unsettling smile. “Any way I can get it, my lady.”

  Alys stared, and he laughed.

  “Black and strong,” he amended.

  The glint in his sky-blue eyes made her shiver. It would be good, she decided, to take herself back to Foxrun—to run back to Somerset—at the earliest opportunity.

  ☐ ☐ ☐

  Gideon shifted on the luxurious leather of his carriage seat as he considered the woman he’d just left behind. Lord, what a superior bitch! For all that she’d been sitting in his bloody house—uninvited, by the way—she’d certainly had no problem looking at him as if he were a pile of shit she’d stepped in.

  So, this was his predecessor’s wife? Gideon had met her type times beyond counting when he’d worked as a bank clerk for three dreadful years. Well, now he didn’t have to lick her slippers or take whatever abuse she felt like dishing out. Not that he’d ever been particularly good about toad-eating those who’d attempted to show him his place. His place? Ha! His place was that bloody falling down pile she’d been resting her precious arse in without his permission. Gideon smirked as he recalled her stunned reaction to his own brand of haughtiness.

  Gideon considered himself an expert in two areas of life: machinery and sex. And the prissy countess had found him about as sexually arousing as a piece of agricultural equipment. That, in addition to her cool, condemning stare, had pushed him toward incivility faster than he would have liked. But she’d asked for it, and he’d given her what she feared: the boorish behavior of an insufferable cit. So at least now she had good reason to loathe him.

  Gideon was accustomed to women staring at him, but not with such open condemnation. Still, as much as she’d disliked him he’d still felt her eyes roaming his toggery: a gray suit that fit like a second skin, the fabric tight over his chest, shoulders, and crotch—all magnificent parts of his body he enjoyed putting on display.

  For all that she’d frowned as if she’d just eaten something unspeakably sour, Gideon found her quite pleasant looking. Perhaps a bit thin by his standards, but he’d liked her tiny little waist and tightly corseted bosom. Yes, at first appearance Lady Taunton had exactly what appealed to him: a thick, glossy auburn rope of hair she’d coiled around her head like a crown and eyes the color of coal dust ringed with an unexpected white gold.

  Her mouth was overlarge for her heart-shaped face and her plump lips were just the sort he liked to kiss and fuck. That upper lip—a true bow-shape—paired with a plump little pillow of a lower lip was pouting and wicked. With her rather adorable snub nose—and without her sour expression—she was a sensual beauty with a sweet body that even her hideous mourning dress could not hide.

  And that was another thing—why was she still in mourning? Beeky said the last earl died over a year ago? Had she been so in love with her dead husband that she would sequester herself in her Dower House and dry up?

  Gideon hadn’t met many aristocrats since leaving Oxford, although he’d fucked plenty of their wives: bored women who gave money away to artists and causes and looked for something or somebody to make their tedious existences worthwhile.

  He felt a self-mocking smile twist his lips at the thought—those women weren’t really so different from Gideon in that regard.

  Although he hadn’t known Taunton, he’d seen the man
at a debauch a few years ago. It was one of those Roman bacchanals so many bored peeresses like to throw. The parties were masked—or at least they started off that way—so the women could invite riffraff like Gideon without their husbands finding out.

  He’d gone to the bash with his business partner, Smith—back when Smith was still fun. Gideon had found the party a bit flat and had gone looking for Smith after a few hours. He’d found him balls-deep in the Earl of Taunton’s arse.

  The earl had looked terrified at being caught, but Smith being Smith—which was to say utterly unpredictable and out of control—had smirked, not pausing his savage pumping for even a second while he invited Gideon to join them and avail himself of the earl’s mouth.

  Gideon had demurred. Not because he had anything against fucking men—he rather enjoyed it, in fact—but the pale, bloated Taunton had not appealed to him.

  So, that had been his only meeting with Taunton.

  Gideon knew that having sex with other men didn’t mean a man didn’t also enjoy women. So he supposed it was possible that Taunton had gone home to his castle in the country from time to time and swived his prim little wife silly.

  But something in the woman’s face and posture made him doubt that. No, if he’d ever seen a woman who needed a proper fucking, it was the Countess of Taunton.

  Not that he would be the one supplying her with that service—as much as he wouldn’t mind. But even if she didn’t already loathe him, it was unlikely they’d see each other again for a long, long while. In fact, he’d wager a hundred pounds on her going back to Somerset before the month was out, once she realized he wasn’t going to pour money into the Berkeley Square house just for her comfort.

  He smirked. No doubt she’d hoped for a town respite from tatty old Foxrun.

  Foxrun. Good God, what a stupid name. Perhaps he’d change it to something less idiotic. Gideon’s Folly? He snorted.

  In any case, he’d not leave the pretty young countess cold and homeless. Gideon wasn’t a complete arse, just a partial one. He’d make sure enough money was spent on Foxrun to keep the place from falling down around her ears, but he certainly wouldn’t make any effort to fix up her little widow’s roost until he’d seen to more important matters.

  He’d not been taunting her when he’d said he’d repair or rebuild or replace—whatever the hell was necessary—to get the farms back in working order. It wasn’t that he believed they’d ever earn enough to pay for the bloody place, but it was a matter of pride that his farmers not live in squalor.

  But all that was something he could think about some other time; Gideon found he was throbbing for some feminine company. He rapped on the roof of his carriage and the panel opened swiftly.

  “Yes, my lord?”

  Gideon couldn’t help grinning at the title. Would he ever get accustomed to hearing it without getting an erection?

  “I’ve changed my mind about going to Number 14,” the club he owned with his partners, and where he’d planned to do some boasting. “Take me to Miss Victoria’s.”

  “Yes, my lord.” The panel slid shut and Gideon adjusted his cock, which had become half hard not at his title, but at the thought of Victoria.

  She was his newest mistress and he’d not paid a call on her in weeks. But something about the haughty Lady Taunton suddenly made him want the nubile brunette fiercely.

  He didn’t know why that was, because the two women looked nothing like each other—aside from them both being dark haired. While the countess barely came up to his shoulder Victoria was a strapping wench not much shorter than Gideon.

  And unlike Lady Taunton’s dainty curves, Victoria was voluptuous. Lastly, Victoria was extremely submissive—a characteristic he demanded from his women—while Lady Taunton had silently blazed and chaffed at his pointed reminders of her dependence on him.

  Gideon was smirking at the memory of his countess-baiting when he remembered that his young, long-legged mistress wouldn’t know she now belonged to an earl. He grinned; she’d be tickled.

  At barely twenty she was the youngest and most recent of the three women he maintained. He’d all but given up on finding another mistress when he’d seen her at the Birch Palace—a whorehouse that catered to peculiar tastes, most of which Gideon possessed.

  If you liked to whip or be whipped or watch or be watched—it didn’t matter, you could find whatever you desired and likely discover some entirely new vice at the Birch Palace.

  Although Gideon had to admit he was finding it increasingly challenging to come up with a sexual act that he’d not already tried at least once. He experienced an odd pang at the thought that life no longer held the limitless possibilities it once had.

  Thinking about the Birch Palace inevitably made him think of his partner, Edward Fanshawe, the only man Gideon knew who even came close to being as big a whoremonger as himself. But even Edward had slowed down now that he’d married. Not because his wife made him slow down. No, indeed. The new Mrs. Fanshawe—an up and coming painter—was a woman who embraced her husband’s tastes and desires as much, if not more, than he did.

  Indeed, the last time Gideon had seen Nora had been at the Birch Palace, where Edward had—surprisingly—invited him to participate in his birthday gift to Nora.

  Gideon stiffened—in the best way—at the memory of that evening. The new Mrs. Fanshawe was no great beauty but she had a potent sexuality and a submissive nature that made Gideon hard just looking at her—and that was with her clothing on.

  It turned out that Nora’s fantasy—being tandem fucked by two men in public—had, ultimately, been Gideon’s responsibility because he’d been the one who’d taken Edward to a favorite brothel of his in Glasgow when the two men had last been there on business.

  It had been plain to see how much the public fucking had aroused Edward that first night so Gideon hadn’t been surprised when Edward had gone back the next night, and the next.

  But it hadn’t been until Edward invited Gideon to the Birch Palace that he’d learned what else Edward had liked so much in Glasgow.

  Gideon still couldn’t decide what stunned him more: that Edward had invited Gideon to fuck his wife while he watched—and God had that been divine—or that Edward had had his cock pierced in Glasgow.

  Gideon shivered just thinking of how painful such a thing must be. Still, he had to admit he admired the look of the big silver bar in Edward’s thick crown. He also suspected it offered superlative stimulation for one’s lover. It was tempting to visualize his own, more than respectable, prick sporting similar jewelry, but he would never be able to do it, not even if he had a woman like Nora to use it on.

  Gideon spread his thighs on the soft leather seat, gently massaging his balls as he thought about that night. He’d not wanted to ask Edward why he’d chosen Gideon to share in such an erotic intimacy, but he’d been unable to resist.

  Edward had shrugged, but his eyes had been hard and jealous. “Nora wants you.” His mouth had twitched into a grudging smile that had never reached his eyes. “She says you’re pretty.”

  For the first time in decades, Gideon had blushed. To tell the truth, he found Nora Fanshawe a bit unnerving with her confident sexuality and utter devotion to Edward’s pleasure. But he’d been as flattered as hell that she’d chosen Gideon.

  “We’re here, my lord.”

  Gideon had been stroking himself without considering the results and the front of his trousers were damp and wrinkled. He grinned as he hopped out of the carriage. His pants would soon be puddled on Victoria’s bedchamber floor, so it hardly mattered what a mess they were.

  Gideon was halfway up the steps of her smart townhouse when the front door opened and Gordon Loring, the husband half of the couple he’d hired for Victoria’s comfort, stood in the entryway.

  “Mr. Banks,” he said, his eyes flickering nervously.

  “What is it?” Gideon demanded, suspicion blooming in his chest. “Is she gone out?”

  “Er, no, sir, not gone. That is,
well, she has company.”

  Gideon pushed past him and took the stairs two at a time. He heard them before he saw them because Victoria hadn’t bothered to close the door to her—no—their bedchamber.

  “Oh, yes, please! Harder, Harold! Harder!”

  Gideon crossed his arms over his chest and leaned against the doorframe as he watched a naked hairy arse pumping into his soon to be ex-mistress. The man—Harold, apparently—still wore his shoes and trousers. Hell, he still wore his coat. Only his hat and cane lay over a chair beside the door.

  His thrusts were jerky and artless and it was clear to Gideon he was fucking for his own release rather than his lover’s pleasure. Victoria was carrying on in a theatrical manner and making—Gideon realized with some irritation—the same noises she made when he was plowing her.

  Well, there was a humbling thought for you.

  It was less than a minute before Harold thrust into Victoria one last time and grunted, his buttocks spasming as he jerked, filling Gideon’s erstwhile mistress with his spend.

  Gideon began clapping.

  Both actors yelled and scrambled to get off the bed, their limbs tangling so completely they slid to the floor with a crash.

  Gideon tilted his head to see around the bed to where they lay thrashing on the floor.

  “Goodness, that looked like it hurt,” he observed.

  Victoria was the first to her feet, her beautiful face a mask of horror, pushing down her diaphanous skirts but forgetting her bodice was still shoved beneath her full, lovely breasts.

  “Oh—oh, Gideon! I didn’t expect you—”

  He threw back his head and laughed. “No,” he said, shaking his head. “I should think you didn’t, darling. And who do I have the honor of hosting in my house—in my bedroom? Harold, I know that much. Harold who?”

  Harold—an extremely young fellow, Gideon now saw—fumbled with his trouser buttons, his cheeks—the ones on his face—a dangerous shade of red. “Just what the hell—”

  Gideon lifted a staying hand. “Now, now, Harold—such language in the presence of a lady.”