Total pages in book: 91
Estimated words: 86167 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 431(@200wpm)___ 345(@250wpm)___ 287(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 86167 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 431(@200wpm)___ 345(@250wpm)___ 287(@300wpm)
“Oh, yes. I must send an answer soon.” Now he was the one avoiding her gaze.
“It’s been set for the week before Christmas, at my grandpapa’s manor in Cairwyn.”
“So I heard. That will be picturesque.”
“It will be cold,” she said, laughing. “But I wish you would come. Your parents are coming, and the Lockridges and Warrens. I believe your gentlemen friends will travel with us too.”
“I’ll think about it,” he promised, though he didn’t look very excited.
Lisburne Manor was a cold, unforgiving castle in winter, but the scenery was exquisite, and the extended Welsh side of her family all lived thereabouts.
“I’m surprised Fortenbury agreed to marry in Wales,” he said after a moment. “He’s a Hampshire man through and through.”
“Papa presided upon him to agree,” she admitted. “Because I truly wished to be married in Wales, as my parents were. I feel happiest there, and it will help avoid…well…gossiping in Oxfordshire or London.”
His deep hazel eyes softened as he regarded her. He knew the history of her three failed engagements, and what such gossip would be about.
“I’ll try to come,” he said again, without much conviction. “Are you excited to be married?”
“Of course I am.”
Well, she was, mostly. She wanted children and a home of her own, and the Marquess of Fortenbury seemed steady enough. “Perhaps if you come, you can play the chapel’s old harpsichord for my processional. Or play piano at the reception afterward. My Welsh family is wild for music and dancing.”
“Your Welsh relatives are wild indeed.”
He grinned, perhaps remembering past visits to Cairwyn with her brother. Oh, she wished for August to come. She’d ask her papa to apply the same sort of pressure that had convinced Lord Fortenbury to marry her there.
“Thank you very much for my lesson,” she said, standing and wincing slightly as she straightened. “I’ll see you again next week.”
“I look forward to it. And please, Lisbet, practice, would you?”
His smile was teasing, warm. It made her shiver a little inside. It was only a game, this thing between them, and harmless, she supposed, since she would probably stop taking lessons from him once she married. A few more weeks…
“I will practice,” she promised, half meaning it. “In fact,” she added with her own teasing grin, “I shall be reminded to do so every time I sit down.”
Chapter Two
Matters of Love
August returned to the music hall once Elizabeth and Larissa were gone. Another spanking doled out. Someone would catch them at it one of these days and he’d have some real explaining to do. He ought to end their piano lesson arrangement, or at least refrain from spanking her at every one of them. She was his friend’s sister, and betrothed to be married in a couple months besides.
But he wouldn’t end the lessons. He didn’t wish to, not until she was wed to that dull stick Fortenbury. Their weekly meeting gave him something to look forward to as the days began to shorten and the winds carried a stronger chill.
He sat at the piano and leafed through music he might give his pupil in the few weeks they had left, music that was intricate and difficult even if she practiced—and she would not practice. He started to play a short piece, imagining how she might muddle through it. The thought of her mistakes, the faces she pulled as she hit wrong note after wrong note. Her wide green eyes as she turned to him, guilty…
He laughed aloud, all alone in his music hall. The servants would think him mad if they overheard.
He switched to a different piece, a challenging piece he’d been working on to distract him from the boring country days. He could go to London for the rest of fall and stay through the winter, but there wasn’t much to do in town, was there, when everyone was gone to the country? His closest friends, once his partners in crime, had all settled down into family life with their wives and young children.
He had no wife or children, only a mistress he visited infrequently, since she wasn’t as fun as the rollicking girls at Pearl’s Erotic Emporium, who enjoyed wild coupling and spanking activities. His mistress could seduce him to the seventh height of heaven when she put her mind to it, but she did not enjoy disciplinary games as he did.
As Elizabeth did.
How shocked he’d been that first time she’d suggested he punish her. He would always remember her uncertain expression, how stammering and sweet she’d been when she’d uttered the words. Perhaps you might teach me a lesson…
Of course, one never knew what might come out of Lady Elizabeth Drake’s mouth. She was doggedly unpredictable. Her mother, the Duchess of Arlington, had purportedly been a wild Welsh maiden in her youth, though she and the duke had raised three proper, normal daughters before Elizabeth, and married them well. Elizabeth was to marry too, if Fortenbury survived the betrothal period, as three other unfortunate candidates had not.