A surge of hope raced through me. His lordship had also done me a great service. I was now Lady Carlton and as such, I was included in the dalliances and nuances of British society. I sensed a new arena would open up to me as an intimate member of the royal set, where I could speak my mind without being rebuffed, where I could meet famed personages and learn from them, where I could delve into politics and the arts and explore them without fear of reprisal. Something I couldn’t do in New York because we were considered nouveau riche and were not invited to society soirees.
Tense, I prayed my line of reasoning would keep my husband from violating me. Whatever his choice, I must remain strong. It wouldn’t be easy to recover from such a sexual betrayal of my innocence, but I must if I were to survive. If I couldn’t give completely of myself to a man, my heart, my soul, I wanted no man—
Until I met Shintaro. Then I couldn’t get enough of his masculine sexual energy, him stroking me, licking me, touching the back of my neck with his strong hands, coddling my breasts, rubbing my nipples, nuzzling my belly, slapping my buttocks, thrusting into me…his heavy breathing, his sensual grunting expressing his pleasure, though it took many months for him to reveal his spirit to me, his hopes, his dreams. For the way of the warrior demanded he keep those feelings hidden, though at times I’d see them flicker in his brooding black eyes when he looked at me, like an elusive wind blowing restlessly in the dark recesses of his samurai soul.
I couldn’t stop breathing hard, panting. But that part of my story must wait until that enchanted time when the samurai and a maiden chanced to find each other in a hidden valley in the land of the shoguns. First, being a part of this world was something I wanted, wanted it dearly, and it all hung on the next few words tripping off the tongue of my husband, Lord Carlton.
I shivered, though the heat from our bodies dripping with sweat from arousal and need warmed the room with intensity. He raised his eyebrows and snorted, as if spewing fire from his nose announced he was in control of my fate. Finally he loosened the bindings holding me down.
“You’ve won, my dear wife,” he said coldly. “For now.”
Then he left me to revel in my triumph. Alone.
I lay back as the leather restraints fell from my wrists, the sudden relief coursing through me and making me lose control of my pubic muscles and bringing me the pleasure I had fought so hard to repress. I didn’t try to stop it when the tension in my lower body reached a crescendo, experiencing spasmodic contortions. I thrust out my belly, rocking my hips and buttocks as I writhed from the probing of phantom fingers pleasuring me…
Arms aching, chills making me shiver, I pulled myself to my feet, fighting back nausea and the light-headedness that seemed to overwhelm me as I dragged myself back to my rooms. I opened the door and was nearly inside when I heard my husband’s voice beckoning the two prostitutes to rejoin him. Giggling, squealing and the sound of the flogger hitting its fleshy mark echoed in the hallway. I turned and to my relief, no one followed me.
My emotions spent, I collapsed atop the pure white eiderdown and sank into its virginal folds, then wiped the sweat from between my breasts with the torn silk of my wrapper, the fine threads unraveling between my fingers. I had seen a new side of my husband tonight, one that disturbed me. James was impetuous, disquieting, illusive, and I sensed a desperate need within him to assert himself upon women.
Yes, I had won, but how long would he keep his end of the bargain?
I didn’t trust him, but one thing I knew for certain: I wouldn’t allow him to dominate me, mentally or physically. From this moment on, whatever unpleasantness I might experience with my husband, whatever actions he might take to rouse my emotions or disturb my sense of reasoning, I would fight back.
I would endure.
3
Mayfair, London
Six months later…
Since assuming my role as Lady Carlton, I have developed an intense dislike of the smell of freshly polished leather, the tangy odor rutting up my nostrils like tiny maggots eating away at my brain with their sorriest secrets.
His secrets. Women. Floggings. Tempestuous howls. As if the cheeky maid who caught his lordship’s eye relished the sensation of being skinned alive, a practice best served by a skilled master, according to a slim tome I found in the library called The Misadventures of Molly Pearlbottom.
Quite a bawdy read and one I recommend highly, a story that will instruct you in the delights of spankings and whippings, where Molly uses her role as a submissive to dominate her master to pleasure her. Confused? Read it and you’ll see what I mean. I can’t bring a book of that nature into my home, you insist. You bought my book, didn’t you? But that’s different, you say, you’re a member of the peerage, albeit tarnished around the edges with the venial sin of being Irish. I understand your concerns, dear lady reader, so I shall exercise my writing skills in hopes of re-creating a scene for you from the novel that will please you and make you swoon. You’re not a novelist, you sputter, smirking. What is a novel but a memoir with the names changed? I believe I’ve reached the point in my writing where you toss the rules out the window and follow your instinct (and your nose, if you’re writing a sex scene) and let it happen. So, in accordance with the memory of what I read on that stormy afternoon in Lord Penmore’s library with the steady sound of rain beating on the roof and moisture seeping between my thighs, and what I’ve since learned about the delicate art of bondage from a true master, I will re-create a chapter in the life of Molly Pearlbottom.
The licentious goings-on still make me sigh…
Molly Pearlbottom, daughter of the town vicar, had one aspiration in her young life: to be flogged by the dashing Lord of Malworth Hall. He was taller than any man she’d ever seen, and his world was one of aristocrats and power, strappings and aggression, strength and domination. Every time she walked by the great manor house, she daydreamed about being bound and nude before his approving eye, then wrote about it in her curly handwriting in her copybook. All the other girls in the village had received their share of whippings and spankings by the roguish lord, who dutifully followed the family tradition of all the lairds before him. Every third Wednesday of the month, precisely at noon, he chose a willing recipient of his silver-handled, blue riding crop from all the girls who lined up under the great oak tree on top of the hill. Dropping their drawers and turning their bare backsides toward him, they all wondered, Who would be the lucky lass today? Her ivory-smooth bottom smarting from delicate pink welts rising up on her skin like fresh blossoms, her flesh quivering with delight, her squeals and whimpers signaling a secret code of pleasure?
Not Molly. Her father kept her so busy on Wednesday afternoons washing down the rectory with soap, a brush and a pail of water, she never had the chance to find out. Fervent, irrational, her father allowed her no leeway, overwhelming her with chores. She had no opportunity to assuage her hunger for whippings and the pursuit of her secret pleasure.
Until today.
The Honorable Horace Pearlbottom had been called away from his vicarage to London in light of a fiscal emergency (funds liberated from the church bank account for a new organ that never materialized had not struck the right chord with the church elders) and he had not yet returned, sending Molly into a gleeful tizzy. Today was the third Wednesday of the month…
…and so it was this innocent found herself bound and tied to iron rings embedded in the hard belly of the towering oak, nude except for her Sunday