Her Gilded Prison (Daughters of Sin 1)

It’s where they ended up, regardless, in a tumble of petticoats and half-buttoned breeches, exhausted, spent and unable to move.

In the silence all he could hear was their ragged breathing. It was a full few minutes before she struggled out from under him to lie against his side and whisper languidly, “Oh, Mr. Cranbourne, you are so much more the athlete than my frogspawn, Archie. You can be my houseguest anytime.”

Sir Archibald. Stephen froze. Sir Archie was in the next room, or as near as made no difference. How long had they been gone? How long before he’d come searching for his missing wife...who’d disappeared in the wake of his missing houseguest?

“Don’t trouble yourself, Mr. Cranbourne,” she whispered silkily, as if reading his thoughts. “Archie will be snoring by now. He can’t stay awake beyond midnight. Not much sport for poor me. Won’t you stay another day?” Her tone was cajoling. “Perhaps we could do this again tomorrow.”

His pulse skittered like a nervous schoolboy’s. He’d like to do it again tomorrow. He’d like to do it again every day. He gazed down at her with desperate fondness. No woman had ever wanted him like Lady Julia. In that moment they were as star-crossed lovers. Impulsively, he said, “You must come away with me.”

She cocked her head. “Come away with you? Where to?”

The ludicrousness of his words was brought home to him—he had no home. The army had been home for years. His father had departed this mortal coil when he’d been a boy. His mother had died when he was eighteen. In the time since then he’d drifted, making do on his paltry allowance of four hundred pounds a year. Good fortune had favored him on a few occasions at the horse races but he’d been burned and he’d learned his lesson.

Oh God, his wager!

She must have seen his panic. Leisurely she extended her hand, fondling his balls so that he hardened instantly, despite himself.

He closed his eyes, hardly able to believe that this lovely woman wanted to do this all over again with him.

After years as a young boy spent dodging his mother’s creditors while their well- connected friends dwindled, followed by a series of unexceptional liaisons while in the army, Stephen had been conscious of his shaky foothold on society’s ladder.

Tonight in the arms of Lady Julia, he’d been admired as a man and embraced by quality. One day he would be a viscount. In two short weeks his world had expanded, offering him unlimited horizons.

In a burst of adolescent daydreaming, he imagined pulling her up in front of him on his white charger as Sir Archie grasped ineffectually for its mane. Stephen the conqueror had claimed Lady Julia as his woman.

He was conscious of her reaching down to adjust her garter.

He glanced at her. She did not wear the love-limpid look he’d expected.

“Let’s see what that spider’s up to, shall we?” Her tone was matter-of-fact, her smile bright before she tickled him playfully under the chin. “If you’ve won the wager, I think I deserve a present, don’t you?”

He blinked, his throat dry. This was not how it was supposed to be in the aftermath of grand passion.

“Come, Mr. Cranbourne, let me smooth your hair and put you in order. That’s right, now... Goodness, we were awfully near the drawing room, I hadn’t realized. I hope Archie doesn’t mind. You’re right—if he suspects he’ll be awfully cross with me.” She put her finger to her lips. “Our secret, eh, Mr. Cranbourne?” Her eyes danced with seductive allure but this time Stephen didn’t respond. Couldn’t. He had no idea what to think.

Archie turned as Stephen entered the drawing room. “Ah, Cranbourne... Sorry, old fellow, but you owe me rather a few monkeys.” He beckoned to him from the escritoire.

“There’s the old chap, still loyally by her side.” He pointed. “Admittedly, she tried to best him.” There was gloating in his tone. “But he soon had her in order. As I maintained before, the male is the superior species, in every sphere.”

From his chair by the fire, the earl of Barston nodded gloomily as he corroborated his host’s pronouncement. “Sorry, old chap.”

It took a few seconds for the meaning of his words to sink into Stephen’s fuddled brain. He shook his head as if to clear it, picturing the mismatched spider couple. “But...I’ve seen it time and again. A male that tiny always becomes prey to its mate. I saw the way she moved. She was preparing to attack just as I was leaving.”

“You were gone quite some time,” Archie said, pointedly before resuming his mournful expression. “So unless you want to watch the two of them smelling of April and May until the morning?” He indicated the apparently honeymooning arachnid couple, yawning.

Barston was already snoring gently, his head rising and falling on his chest from each breath.

Lady Julia stroked Stephen’s arm, murmuring words of comfort. “Poor Mr. Cranbourne. Still, you’ll probably win that and more as soon as you take up residence with your rich relations. Perhaps you can ask your uncle for an advance on your inheritance.”

Stephen looked down at her face, pert with bright assurance. His stomach flip- flopped. He truly was all at sea. “I...I don’t see what choice I have but to ask Lord Partington,” he muttered, assessing the parlous state of his finances. His new coat was, literally, the most he’d outlayed on anything.

Sir Archie raised his half-drunk whisky. “Or perhaps you’ll find yourself in parson’s mousetrap allied to Lord Partington’s lovely daughter, Miss Araminta. She comes with a sizeable dowry. You could be wed before the season’s over and then it won’t matter how long His Lordship kicks around on this mortal coil.”

Lady Julia gave a snide laugh and said under her breath, “Designing little minx, that one.” When Stephen turned startled eyes upon her, she added unrepentantly, “I’m surprised you look at me like that. Miss Araminta caused quite a scandal last season. Had to be shipped home early, though it’s not my place to gossip about what crimes she may or may not have been guilty of.”

“Indeed not, my dear,” her husband cut in dryly, “in view of your own clever ploy in getting me to the altar.”

Lady Julia dismissed this with a toss of her head. “I’d say you are a marked man, Mr. Cranbourne. Why, Miss Araminta told me with her own lips that she intends to be mistress of the Grange, the home she grew up in.” She tittered. “At the time, her cabbage-headed cousin Edgar was her father’s heir, so of course her wish was implicit upon marrying him, and you never met a greater ninnyhammer.”