Portia Costa - In the Flesh

“I wonder.” He didn’t look down, but his imperious brows quirked.

“I’m quite certain.” It was dangerous to be here with him. She had to get out. “Now, if you have nothing more to say to me, I’ll return to the ballroom.”

Whirling, she sped for the door, not waiting for an answer. She was close. Escape was in sight. She almost had her fingers on the key in its lock.

Ritchie’s hand closed around hers, enveloping it.

How had he moved so fast? And with no sound? Was the wretched man possessed of strange occult powers of bilocation or blink-of-an-eye speed?

“Stay, Beatrice. Let me make you an offer.” He turned her, his ungloved hand on her bare upper arm again. The hot feel of it sent strange sparks rushing through her veins, heading for her deepest, most responsive zones. She opened her mouth to say there was nothing he could offer, to lie in effect, but before she could, he went on in a low, hard voice. “If I can’t tempt you solely with my amenable personality or my prowess as a lover, perhaps I can offer you a more businesslike arrangement?”

It was difficult to breathe. And when she did, the gasps made her breasts rise and fall alarmingly in the low, newly stitched neckline of her dress. Ritchie flashed a glance downwards, and his lips parted on a gasp of his own.

“Please let me go, Mr. Ritchie. There is nothing you can offer that I want.”

“You’re a liar, my dear. Your eyes and your blushing face and the way you’re panting all tell me otherwise. But that’s by the by.” He narrowed his eyes at her, suddenly all ruthlessness, “I’m offering to pay your and your brother’s debts. Which are considerable and far more than you realize, by the way. I’ll also settle an annual sum of money on you both that will keep you comfortable for the rest of your lives.”

Beatrice’s mouth opened and closed, like one of the fish in the conservatory pond. She knew she looked foolish, but there were no words she could utter.

The debts were perilous, she knew that. Many were inherited from their late father, a dear man but a poor manager, who’d caused them to lose Westerlynne on his demise.

But other debts were more recently incurred. Charlie liked to think he was keeping things from her, but he was as good as using a lace handkerchief to mop up a swamp. Her offers of help in planning a stratagem were always brushed aside with mutters of “gentlemen’s business.”

There was no hiding what Ritchie wanted in return for his assistance. She knew it. And she knew he knew she knew. It was a transaction as old as time, and one could either shudder over it or accept it with pragmatism. Well-bred young women weren’t supposed to even be aware of such negotiations, but they could easily be discovered in sensational fiction and the rags like Marriott’s Monde were full of them. The ladies of the Sewing Circle whispered and giggled and chewed over such scandals of the demimonde with relish.

I’m standing at the edge a cliff top. One step and I’ll tumble over. Unable to prevent herself, Beatrice pressed her hand to her bosom. Surely her heart was thundering so much the palpitations were visible? But if I don’t plunge, it’s utter ruin for Charlie and me anyway.

How much worse could this be than losing everything? She knew she could survive somehow, get lodgings, and obtain some kind of modest employment. The idea of the typewriting machine ever intrigued her. But Charlie? For all his bravado he was more helpless and without a clue than she’d ever been.

“For how long?” She drew in a breath, narrowed her eyes and looked Ritchie in his eyes. “For how long would you … you require me?”

“Require you?” Behind those dark blue eyes, Beatrice imagined she saw the whirring cogs of some infernal calculating machine.

“Come, Mr. Ritchie, we both know that it’s nothing so noble as an engagement or marriage that you’re offering in return for your largesse. If it were, you’d be all kisses on the hand and tender words and a request to present yourself to my brother and I for tea.”

“You’re very astute, Beatrice. I like that. I see we can proceed.” His hand loosened on her arm, and with a twist of the wrist, he drew the back of it across her chest, his knuckle trailing across one breast and lingering lovingly against her nipple through her dress and corsetry.

Even through the layers, the way he circled the little crest of flesh was demonic. Her nipple puckered, though he was barely touching it, and again, ripples of sensation surged through her body, centering between her thighs. Was she such a sensualist, a woman so easy that even the tiniest of caresses could work her into a frenzy?

Is that really such a very bad thing?

The question was relevant. The boundaries of her beliefs and her values were shifting and metamorphosing. She was no longer the woman who’d arrived here tonight.

It was time to call the arrangement by its name.

“For how long do you require me as your whore, Mr. Ritchie? I’ll enter into an agreement with you, but I insist on a finite period of time. After that, I’ll simply forget you ever laid a finger on me.”

Still stroking her breast, he laughed. It was a strangely young, happy sound and as he threw back his head, his white teeth glinted in the lamplight.

“You’re very wise to set conditions, Beatrice. If I was selling my body for money, I’d do exactly the same.” Then he lunged closer, his breath on her neck as he whispered in her ear, the scent of his shaving lotion coiling in her brain. “But I’m not sure you’ll be able to forget my fingers quite so easily. Would you like a little demonstration?” It didn’t seem that he needed an answer. Reaching for the fullness of her skirts, he began hauling the heavy mass of them upward again. “A little sample of what we might expect … for you and for me.”

He planted a hard, hungry kiss on the side of her neck, and then went at her skirts with his whole attention, lifting all the layers of petticoats so he could get both hands under them. French faille and lace, cotton and linen, all rumpled like an ocean of haberdashery, but Edmund Ellsworth Ritchie was clearly a master mariner in those waters.

I should stop him. It’s too soon. Too great a liberty.

He intended yet more than he’d already achieved, she knew that, but within moments, she was holding up her skirts to help him while he slid his fingers into the vent of her drawers.

Thanking providence she’d chosen an open undergarment this evening, for ease when wearing a multiplicity of petticoats, Beatrice bumped backward against the door. It was hard and uncomfortable against her upper spine, but she barely felt it.

All she could think about, all she could feel, every last thought and notion in her head—all were subsumed to the demands of her aching sex. She moaned out loud when Ritchie found her with his fingertips, effortlessly parting the silky curls and reaching the heart of the matter. Her hips churned when he settled on the little button of flesh there and began to manipulate it in a slow, lazy rhythm.

Her petticoats fell over his arm as he touched her. Beatrice could no longer hold on to them, only on to him. She flung her arms around his neck, gripping hard, as if he were her rock in a wild sea and she would drown if she didn’t maintain her purchase. Her legs worked and kicked, her hips rocked and jerked and circled. But still Ritchie fondled her, not missing a single beat.

One long groan issued from her throat, the sound so bizarre and unusual to her own ears that it could have been the cry of a ghoul or some other phantom.

“Do you touch yourself often, Beatrice?”

No! No gently bred woman should admit to that!