To Tame A Countess (Properly Spanked Book 2) (16 page)

He cleared his throat and signaled for the dessert course. Now was not the ideal time to recall heated, intimate adventurings with his wife. As the footmen dashed off with the dinner plates, he heard familiar male voices from the hall. It seemed his friends Lord Augustine and the Duke of Arlington had finally returned from Bath.

“There’s no need to announce us, old chap,” said August to Shelton, the butler. “He knows who we are.”

Warren heard Shelton’s quiet tones, saw the butler heroically trying to impede August and Arlington from intruding on their dinner.

“It’s all right,” said Warren. “Let them come. We’re just finishing dessert. Would the two of you care to join us?”

His friends accepted the offer, and tucked into an assortment of sweets and cakes as they seated themselves beside the women. Such goings on were typical in his bachelor household, but Warren could feel the subtle disapproval of the servants at this careless etiquette. There was nothing to do for it. Once his friends were back in town, nothing would stop them from coming to see him. August was a dark and brooding sort of rogue, while Arlington seduced the ladies with impeccable manners and rakishly tousled golden-blond hair. They doubtless wished to invite him out for the night, so they might make their usual rounds of debauchery.

“Good evening, Minette,” said Arlington to his sister. “I trust you’re well?” He regarded Josephine in her ruffled ivory gown. “Is this one of your little friends?”

Warren glared a warning at Minette before she could explode with all the news of the previous week. “Arlington, August, I’m pleased to introduce my new wife, Lady Warren.”

Both men turned to stare at him, mid-mouthful. He supposed the news must come as a shock. Now that they understood the lady was not part of Minette’s menagerie of friends, they sat up straighter and ceased shoveling poppy seed cake down their throats. A blush crept up about their ears.

“I did not hear you had married,” said August. “Congratulations.”

“Yes, indeed.” Arlington’s voice sounded almost normal. “Felicitations to you both.”

An awkward silence settled over the table. Arlington was the first to recover and politely address his wife.

“We are honored to make your acquaintance, Lady Warren. Tell us, where did the two of you meet?”

“At Lord and Lady Baxter’s home in Hertfordshire,” Josephine replied, staring down at her plate.

Warren could see Minette practically in flames to say something. He shook his head at her with another warning glance and offered the agreed upon explanation for their marriage. “We took a great
tendre
to one another at the Baxters’ house party and decided to wed at Chapley by special license. It was only a short time ago.”

“How wonderful,” said August. His dry response communicated that he didn’t believe that explanation in the slightest.

“Lady Warren has traveled all over the world,” Minette finally burst out. “She is the Baroness Maitland also. She’s just returned to England after oh so many years, and we’re already like sisters.”

August glanced at Minette in amusement. “I’m sure you are.”

“Maitland?” said Arlington thoughtfully. “Aren’t his holdings in Oxfordshire too?”

“They’re very near to mine,” Warren said with a nod, “and they’re my wife’s holdings now, since the tragic death of her parents in India last year.”

August and Arlington offered condolences and shoveled in more cake, while Josephine blushed, and Minette made puppy dog eyes at August. Her infatuation with the brusque, dark-haired man was a running joke, although August was kind to her about it.

“Minette,” Warren said, when her mooning grew uncomfortably obvious, “if you and Lady Warren have finished, perhaps you would like to retire to the drawing room for a bit of tea.”

The gentlemen stood as the ladies took their leave. He could tell Minette would have preferred to stay, but a subtle arch of his brow had her flouncing out with one last lingering smile at August.

The door had barely shut when August braced his arms upon the table and scowled at him. “What on earth? Married? We were barely out of town a week.”

The servants brought port, which Warren poured for his friends. “Sometimes a week is long enough. Sometimes one day will do the trick.”

Arlington thrust a hand through his thick golden hair and took a drink. “You might have warned us. Sent a note round or something.”

“Yes,” agreed August. “I nearly toppled over when you said ‘here’s my new wife,’ and her just sitting there like a shiny little dove. For God’s sake, you should have come with us to Bath.”

“And done what? Fawned over some actress who’s slept with everyone and their brother? I have a sister to marry off, you know. There are always single gentlemen at the Baxters’ gatherings.”

August snorted. “One less, now.”

Arlington held up a hand to head off a spat. “You just took us by surprise, old man. First Townsend and now you. That’s two out of the four of us, leg-shackled. What’s the world coming to?”

“The both of you can sod off. I had no choice, as it happens.”

“No choice?” said August. “What do you mean?”

“I mean, it was me, or the blasted Earl of Stafford to ravage her fortune. What was I to do?”

August and Arlington looked at each other. “Was it as grave as all that?” August said. “I’m sorry to hear it.”

“You played the hero then.” Arlington tsked in sympathy. “At such a price.”

Warren shrugged, tracing the swirling pattern carved into the arm of the chair. “I got married, that’s all. You and August will have to marry too someday. We’ve played at rebelliousness and dissolution for a long time, and it was fun, but it’s not reality. We’re all only sons and we all have a duty to get heirs.”

His lecture did nothing to alleviate the somber mood at the table. He poured them all more port.

“She’s not so bad, anyway,” Warren said, picking up his glass. “I could have done worse, like Lord Rowley’s chit with the horse face, or that brainless china doll that August will have to marry.”

“I’m not offering for Lady Priscilla,” he said with a frown.

“Your father believes otherwise, and so does hers.” He cut off his friend before he could argue. “The point is, it’s done and I have to make the best of the situation.”

“Peace, friend,” said Arlington. “You did the right thing. It only takes some getting used to, you know? The notorious Wild Warren, a married man.”

“Neither of us was very happy about it. Baxter pressed the match.”

“Hard luck,” said August. “But things will work out. Remember how Townsey and Aurelia didn’t want to marry? Now they make everyone sick, the way they fawn about and gaze at one another.”

“Rather the way Minette gazes at you,” Arlington said out of the side of his mouth.

“I’m throwing a ball here weekend after next,” Warren announced. “I wish both of you would come and lend an air of respectability to the proceedings.”

Arlington flicked a look at August. “You’re looking to the wrong chaps for respectability but if you want us here, we’ll come, eh, Augustine?”

“Wouldn’t miss it,” he said in the tone of a martyr being led before lions.

“I should explain there was a bit of a to-do at the Baxters’ that necessitated a quick wedding. I’d like this ball to silence any gossip about forced marriages and inappropriate behavior.”

“Inappropriate behavior?” Arlington’s brows rose. “On whose part?”

“Mine, of course,” he answered impatiently. “Baxter caught me with Josephine in the woods. Alone.”

“Bet he didn’t like that,” said August.

Warren shrugged. “It gave him the excuse he needed, and honestly, it felt good to put Stafford out of the running. He planned to squander Josephine’s inheritance and stash her in Bedlam if she complained.” Warren tipped back the last of his port.

“Stafford and those rings,” said August with an eye-roll.

“I gather he’s not invited to the ball,” said Arlington.

“He’s the goddamned reason for it. He’s been spreading nasty gossip about me and Josephine, like any weak, pathetic man would.” A feral sense of protectiveness infused Warren’s voice. He had come to care for his wife’s well-being, stubborn and moody as she was. Again, August and Arlington exchanged glances, half-ironic, half-concerned.

“We’ll keep an eye out for him then,” August said. “And plant him a facer when he crosses our paths.”

“I’d appreciate that.”

Arlington reached in his finely tailored coat to extract an even more finely crafted gold watch. “It’s getting on, August. We ought to head out.” He turned to Warren. “I don’t suppose you’d like to go to the club with us, and Pearl’s afterward?”

Warren thought a moment and realized he didn’t want to go anywhere but upstairs, where he might molest his wife’s luscious body for several hours. “I think I won’t tonight, gents.” He forced a sigh. “But I hope your adventures prove entertaining.”

“Towns and now Warren,” August groused, shaking his head as he walked to the door. “It’s spreading like some disease, wouldn’t you say, Arlington?”

The duke grinned. “Something like that. And you’ll be the next one infected, if Lord Colton has his way.”

August’s voice echoed down the hallway. “I’ll not marry Lady Priscilla. I’ll find some way to get out of it.”

Arlington turned back to Warren before he left. “You’re a good man,” he said. “I commend you on your selfless act, even though I suspect it was not entirely selfless.”

With those words, and another waggish grin, the Duke of Arlington received his hat and gloves from the butler and followed the Earl of Augustine out the door.

As Minette predicted, hordes of callers descended on the Warren household after the first ball invitations were sent, sometimes four or five parties at once. Lord Warren made Josephine sit with him in the grand parlor, and relate over and over how they had fallen in love at Lord Baxter’s house party, and how blissfully happy they were. If she complained about it, or said the wrong sort of things in company, he took her upstairs and spanked her bottom until it smarted to sit down.

Meanwhile, planning for the ball continued. Josephine overheard the servants muttering about the size of the guest list—five hundred confirmed and counting. Five hundred? The idea of it filled her with terror. She wished some natural disaster would happen before the appointed night, some cyclone or monsoon to deliver her from her fate, but English weather was nothing like Africa’s or India’s. Josephine thought of running away, at least until after the ball, but where would she go? And how? Even if she could flee to Maitland Glen, it was a hollow wreck of a place not fit for inhabitants, and Lord Warren would only fetch her and make her come back.

At night, he spent hours in her room, distracting her when she fretted about the ball. “There will be too many people,” she complained, to which he replied that the Warren ballroom easily held one thousand. “I don’t know how to dance,” she’d cry, and he’d say something low and sensual like, “Let me show you this dance I know. You do it lying down.”

And then he would strip her naked, and caress her, and do things that swept away her senses. Sometimes he tied her to the bed, which seemed designed for that very purpose with lots of sturdy spindles. He caressed her everywhere, her breasts, her quim, her backside, her shoulders, the sensitive hollow beneath her ears, her nape, her hips. He traced her ankles, her calves, and the spaces between her toes. “You’re all mine,” he’d whisper. Once she was aroused to a fever pitch, he would invade her body in all types of positions, in all types of ways—fast, slow, hard, soft, backwards and upside down while she clung to him and mewled in helpless pleasure.

She suspected such activities weren’t proper, but he guided her into them so deftly that she never thought about stopping him until after the salacious acts were in progress, and her body quite engaged in the heated magic of his attentions.
Next time
, she would say to herself.
Next time I will resist him.

But she never did.

In preparation for the ball, a French dressmaker was called to make alterations to the embellished sage gown she’d acquired from Minette, and to consult with “milord’s new
comtesse
” on what other gowns she might like to order for her season’s wardrobe.

The appointment did not go well.

Madame Lafleur insisted she must have Josephine’s selections right away, as the season was already in progress. Minette tried to help, but Josephine felt pressured and uncooperative, and snapped at Madame that none of the gowns in her fashion plates looked like anything she might wear anyway. It was rude of her, and when Warren began to glower and clear his throat, she knew she had earned herself a punishment. After that she grew positively churlish, and her husband’s eyes promised a great deal of retribution indeed.

Directly after dinner he sent her up to her room. As she sat pouting and waiting for her husband to arrive, a maid tapped at the door and brought in a silver covered plate to set on the table by the bed. “By Lord Warren’s instructions,” she said, bobbing a curtsy. The girl blushed hotly and would not meet Josephine’s eyes.

By Lord Warren’s instructions indeed
, thought Josephine. She lifted the cover to see what he had sent up for himself. More cakes? An after dinner pudding? What she found instead was a redolent and freshly peeled root of ginger, one end of it carved into a bulb and feathered at the tip. She stared at it in puzzlement, wondering what he meant to do with raw ginger, then turned to find him entering the room.

“Leave it alone,” he said. He paused to remove his coat and waistcoat, then approached her in his shirtsleeves. “Do you understand why I’m not pleased with you, Josephine?”

“Yes,” she said, wishing she might burrow beneath the bedcovers and disappear.

“Yes what?”

“Yes, my lord. I understand why.”

“Turn around.”

She obeyed, and felt his fingers tugging at the back of her gown and then the laces of her stays. She felt horribly guilty and vulnerable at times like these, when he stripped her and made preparations to punish her.