Nola Read online

  Now she felt herself completely helpless against his superior strength - as she knew she was - and she knew that if she resisted too much her bottom would only become just that much sorer. She was on her back, facing him - for which she was eternally grateful, she supposed - with her legs spread, receiving her husband in what she was certain was a completely unacceptable fashion or position... Her beautiful blue and gray brocade skirt was in a heap around her waist, and she knew that everyone at the dinner table would know beyond a shadow of a doubt exactly what her husband had been doing to her moments before they went downstairs.

  Yet, somehow, the blasted man made her love everything about every single thing he did to her - even the punishments, damn him! She looked forward, all day, to his return, partly because he made her feel so alive. He rarely censured her anywhere but their bedroom, and they - and her father in law - had indulged in some very lively discussions on wide and varied topics, and he didn't seem to discount her opinion because of her sex - or because of their fleshly relationship. He met her points with counterpoints, or nodded his head sagely when he agreed with her.

  She was beginning to like him, and that was the last thing she wanted. Nola wanted to nurse a healthy resentment against the man because of the things he made her do in private, and yet he was managing to worm his way into her affections as easily as if he treated her with every deference in their marital bed, which had never been true, even from the beginning.

  She longed for something that she feared would never be hers - love, and true affection for and from her husband.

  He was saying something about how she should behave this evening, since the Reverend was coming to dinner, and Nola knew she should have been listening, but she just couldn't. He was doing it to her again, as always, not letting her resist him as a proper wife should have resisted her baser responses, lying quietly beneath him while he did... whatever it was that he needed to do, enduring it and surviving it, but most certainly not enjoying it as she did, in the wild, irrepressible manner he encouraged.

  Tears - which she hadn't shed in their marriage bed, unless she was being spanked - came unbidden and slid, seemingly unnoticed, into her hair. She closed her eyes and several more escaped, even as her body began to gather and tighten.

  "Are you listening to me, Mrs. Sawyer, or do I need to hurt you in order to get you to pay attention to me?" he grumbled, leaning forward, pressing himself even further up inside her as he did so, his thumb and forefinger pinching and pulling her left nipple as he continued to ram himself up inside her.

  Nola's eyes flew open. "No, I'm listening."

  "What did I just say," came the hoarse, disjointed question.

  Her one consolation in their physical relationship was that it seemed that he couldn't remain untouched by it, either.

  It was so hard to think when he was doing this to her - the combination of the pain and the pleasure wiped away any semblance of intelligence she'd ever pretended to until it was over. She never seemed to become blase at all about any of this - despite the fact that her body welcomed him wetly every time, it was still always a startling thing to feel him inside her, to feel how he made her stretch for him each and every time, every nerve ending tingling with anticipation of the ecstasy she knew he was going to bring her to.

  "You said for me to be quiet and not to argue with the Reverend; that it would be unseemly." Her response was a lot like his - full of heavy breathing and so disjoined it was almost unintelligible, but it was the best she could do, especially when he tugged her nipple out as far as it could go, pinching it as tightly as he could then letting it slip slowly out of the vice like grip of his forefinger and thumb until she screamed with it, then reaching down to grab her hips and pull her hard up against him, arranging her legs over his elbows and leaning his entire considerable weight into her with each thrust.

  "And you'd better, or you're not going to sit down comfortably for a week," he barely ground out, unable to keep himself from quickening his invasion, following the dictates of his body rather than his mind yet careful to make sure that she arrived, screaming and moaning and panting at the top of her lungs just before he let himself go.

  When he'd guided her down the wide staircase into the huge, paneled receiving room, with its maroon velvet drapes and textured wall paper, tastefully arranged Louis XIV furniture and ornately frescoed ceiling, he was secretly reveling in her rosy cheeks, and the fine, almost imperceptible sheen on her creamy skin. He'd put both of those there. Introductions weren't necessary, since the Reverend had been the one to marry them, so he installed her on a settee and went to get them both an aperitif.

  Her behavior was exemplary for the first half hour of the evening. She was much quieter than usual, but he knew that that was because he had hurried her downstairs directly after they'd both climaxed, and she was really still in the midst of her recovery from a monumental orgasm.

  Sometimes he caught her shifting in her seat. Louis' furniture was certainly beautiful, but it wasn't made for comfort, especially the comfort of a woman whose privates were quiet possibly still contracting. He was of a mind to pick her up and perch her on his lap, which he knew wouldn't be any more comfortable, but would have been a helluva lot more fun for him, if only in just the "startle and outrage" factor from the Reverend, but she was spared that fate when Beakman came in to announce that dinner was served.

  Her behavior at the dinner table, however, was an entirely different matter. It seemed that between the receiving room and the dining room, she recovered enough of herself to engage in a series of escalating arguments with Mr. Playfair, regarding the role of women in society. His little wife - when she forgot what she'd been told expressly not to do - had a mind full of modern ideas, whereas the Reverend had a mind full of musty, but tried and true, platitudes, and neither one of them was going to back down.

  "A woman deserves the same exact rights as a man!" Nola proclaimed loudly, banging her hand down next to her plate and causing the expensive imported wine in ornate Waterford glasses to jump. "She should be able to vote, own property, and remain unmarried without fear of the excoriation of the old frumps in society." She was leaning over the table, very near to standing up if it wasn't for her devoted husband's hand on her shoulder, looking directly in the Reverend's eyes as she spoke.

  The Reverend was already almost apoplectic from their previous discussions, and he followed suit, his exquisite roast duckling with baby carrots and chives in aspic completely forgotten, so much so that Father had to lean forward and rescue it, lest Mr. Playfair's shirt end up slathered with most of his meal. "It is a woman's lot in life to be submissive to men - first her father, and then her husband. She should be meek and mild and quiet and do her duty by having children. Being a wife and mother is the highest goal a woman should ever aspire to - she was created to be a helpmate, to bear children, and take care of her husband - "

  "She can raise the next male generation who will rule the world but she can't be trusted to vote, Reverend?"

  The two of them were practically nose to nose over the dinner table, until Brandon forcibly retracted his wife back into her chair, making her land on the hard seat with a bit of an unladylike "oof". She glared at him and he glared right back at her, raising his eyebrow in what should have been enough of a warning, but apparently wasn't. They went at it several times over dinner, and each time, as he reeled his surprisingly rabid wife in, he glanced over at his father, who was doing his best to suppress his out and out glee at the situation, but not managing very well.

  His grandfather was doing an even worse job. He was out and out laughing at the both of them. Of course, he was mostly laughing at Nola's outrageous notions, but that was okay. He could be forgiving.

  His father, however, shared the same glare he gave Nola, only it worked much better on her - such as it was - than it did on him. He wasn't going to spank his father later. But he was most definitely going to spank his wife.

  Nola knew that she was in trouble. She knew it as sure as she knew the next course was going to be fish, and, of course, it was. Salmon, as a matter of fact, with a lovely, light herb sauce, served on a Royal Doulton bone china platter. She sat as prettily - and as comfortably as she could - and enjoyed the meal, deciding - after the fact - that discretion was the better part.

  She was in deep, deep trouble. Her husband was sitting next to her, fuming none too quietly, and occasionally reaching beneath the table, where no one could see, and squeezing her thigh without the slightest hint of gentleness. She had to congratulate herself, though. At least the Right Reverent Whatzizname was still alive. Sometimes, when she heard men talk like that, she just wanted to rip their heads off. She knew that wasn't a particularly ladylike or feminine impulse, but it was there in her brain just the same.

  It was funny that discourse like that made her so angry, and yet her husband - who was most certainly going to spank her silly as soon as they got back to their bedroom - didn't - much, anyway. At least not to the extent that she truly wanted to kill him.

  She'd mellowed towards him to a certain extent. When they were courting - that few short months - she had been relatively neutral towards him. It had appeared that he was her fate, regardless of what she might have wanted, and she knew she was going to do the typical, hypocritical thing and get married to him. She couldn't not do it; her parents were over the moon, and she knew that by doing so that they would be set for the rest of their lives. She had begun to understand those things that other women had already confronted - family obligations.

  If there had ever been a time when she was going to kill her husband - so far - it was just after they'd married, and it was entirely due to what he did to her in that big bed he insisted that they share. If he'd been what she thought of as a normal husband - let her have her own room, come to her only occasionally to perform that strange ritual.

  And then she had become as addicted to it as he was - and it was all she could do to bear the shame of it. It seemed the more he did it, the more she wanted him to do it.

  That was her cross to bear, despite the unenlightening conversation she'd had with Wilde, she didn't really feel any better about what went on between them between the time she retired and dutifully kissed both her father and grandfather in law good night and kissed them good morning the next day. Nola was quite sure the two of them knew - or worse heard - exactly what was happening between herself and her husband every single evening, and sometimes two or three times a night.

  Chapter Five

  This evening wasn't a lot different from their usual - except that she had to be nice to the Reverend when he left, in hopes that her husband might take pity on her. She snorted a little to herself. Unfortunately that wasn't likely to happen.

  The Reverend was not particularly gracious, taking it upon himself to lecture her regarding her place as Brandon's wife. It was actually Alexander who guided him out the door almost forcibly, as he railed and quoted the Bible about what was her place in this world simply because she had the misfortune to be born a woman.

  That thought - as well as her contemplation of her own hypocrisy in marrying for anything but love - managed to depress her more thoroughly in a matter of minutes than she had been in her life. She was suddenly crestfallen and almost slumped, kissing her husband's father and his grandfather good evening with what little affection she could muster, and turning to the stairs knowing that he was going to be up there shortly, and she was going to be begging him to stop... and then begging him several minutes later not to.

  She was already undressed when Brandon entered the room, sitting with a copy of "Bleak House" by Dickens in her lap, resting against pillows to read. When he came in, she got up, and for the first time in their marriage, she reversed their usual roles, acting as his valet and helping him undress. He eyed her closely, saying flatly, "This isn't going to get you off the hook, you know."

  "I know."

  She wasn't simpering about, she wasn't sucking up. She was just doing the very wifely thing and helping him get ready for bed. Of course, he slept in the nude so she didn't need to get out a sleeping gown for him, or that might have been laid across the bottom of the bed.

  He caught her wrist when she came back from hanging up his pants. "Are you all right?" It was the first time in his life that he'd ever really cared about the response to that question. Really cared. She wasn't acting at all like herself, and he didn't like it. She was so much more subdued than usual. He'd expected to come up here to their bedroom and have to chase her around the room like he'd had to on occasion. But not this time. The change had come over her while they were still downstairs, seeing the Reverend out, and he'd been ranting about what how she should behave as a good wife, and that was pretty much exactly the opposite of how she usually behaved.

  Surprised at his question, she snuck a look up at him. "I'm fine."

  She was most definitely not fine, and he didn't like her this way at all. Her face was flat, completely lacking in its usual animation. She looked older somehow, and intensively unhappy, and he was amazed to realize that that mattered to him.

  Brandon had skated through life, never really being touched by much of anyone else. His mother had died when he was young, and he'd never really worried much about how anyone else was feeling, or what anyone else thought.

  But Nola was his wife - the woman he'd be spending the rest of his life with. She would be the mother of his children, and he was beginning to realize that he didn't want her to be miserable with him. He knew he had pretty much wrangled her into the marriage - what woman's family was going to allow her to decline a marriage offer from a man such as him - the one the papers all called the most eligible bachelor in the country.

  He'd known that she was a free spirit of sorts - that she had some pretty unusual ideas about woman and men. Brandon was no babe in the woods about women - they'd been throwing themselves at him, or had been thrown at him by their families - since well before he was of age. He'd had Ms. Hughes and her family investigated from top to bottom by the Pinkertons, and also by some connections that were much less above board. It wouldn't do at all for there to be any sort of a scandal in connection with his wife or her family.

  And there wasn't - even considering that she'd narrowly escaped arrested at several pro-suffrage rallies.

  With the exception of her questionable relationship with Everest, and her questionable thoughts and practices about women's suffrage and some questionable opinions about men and marriage in general, some of which had been even been published in small pamphlets distributed at suffrage rallies - in other words, except for the feelings of the woman herself, Brandon had absolutely no problem with her family at all. They were, essentially, exactly as Roger had portrayed them in his quick summary at the ball when she'd originally attracted him.

  And yet, knowing what she thought about marriage and men, he still let the situation pressure her into marrying him. He'd known she wouldn't run, that she wouldn't tell him "no" when he'd asked from one knee, flashing both his mother's huge ten carat diamond and also his grandmother' smaller, more demure one carat. He'd given her both when she said yes. She'd worn his mother's as her engagement ring, but she'd never taken his grandmother's off her right ring finger since then, either.

  He'd wanted her. He still did, rabidly. Like an addicted who was constantly low on heroine or morphine. She was his drug. He never tired of her. Hadn't yet, anyway, and he was constantly at her. If she wasn't already pregnant, it wasn't for lack of trying in the least.

  He'd never been addicted to anything but making money, and he supposed that wanting and needing her all the time made him harder on her than he should be. He didn't mind needing to make money - there was much more of a concrete result there, and his innate business acumen had never let him down. Figures and numbers and balance sheets didn't lie, didn't play games, and didn't cry at certain times of the month.

  But need a woman? No Sir. That just wasn't right. He'd never needed much of anyone in his life, and he certainly didn't want to need this little annoying chit.

  She was wandering around the room as if she'd lost her last friend, and it was almost painful to watch. Finally, she came to stand in front of him. "So. Since I definitely disobeyed you about not arguing with our dinner guest," She made it more than obvious by her tone that she was using the term "guest" generously, "I wish you would just spank me and get it over with. I'm tired and I'd like to go to sleep." It was then that he noticed that she was holding one of his belts in her hands - even as they shook slightly. It was one of the ones he'd used most often on her bottom. She would know. If he wasn't already wearing one when he spanked her, and just took it out of his pants loops, then he made her go to his closet and fetch one.

  Brandon did his best to hide his surprise. No one had ever - on their own - brought him a belt with which to beat them. It was an interesting feeling. He took the belt from her and inspected it casually, while she began to bunch her skirts up around her waist - like they'd been before he'd brought her down to meet her doom - and lower her bloomers to her ankles.

  He stood up, the belt still in his hand, just as she was leaning forward over the edge of the bed, her body tense, obviously waiting for the first blow.

  But instead of feeling that first, God awful line of fire across her bottom, she instead felt and hear the coil of the belt hit the bed, then felt him lift her into his arms and carry her into the huge bathroom. When she'd first explored where she'd be sleeping for the rest of her life, Nola had been amazed by the size of the bathroom - it was easily the size of her whole bedroom at home. The fixtures were all gold, and the tub was extra large - it would have to be to accommodate her husband. That was where he put her, into the tub, drawing soothing warm water into it as he sprinkled some of her favorite bath salts in, and settled down next to the tub to dip his big hand, covered with a soft cloth, into the slippery water, and begin to wash her, more gently than he'd ever touched her before.

  -->