The Tainted Love of a Captain

He had beautiful eyes. They were his most notable feature. His hair was dark and his eyelashes and eyebrows dark and against those his blue eyes were a striking contrast.

He took hold of her hand, lifted it and pressed a kiss on the back of her kid glove.

Warmth rose in her skin, no one had kissed the back of her hand before. She pulled her hand free, bobbed a curtsey, which was silly, smiled and then turned away.

He would think her a fool now.

She glanced back. He was walking away with Ash at his side.

She held the hand that he’d kissed. She could still feel the heat of his grip as he’d held it. Her heart beat out the rhythm of a hammer strike once more. Tomorrow…

When she had written to ask him to meet her, she had not thought things through; she ought to have realised where it might lead. Yet perhaps she had known, really. She had wanted to know the handsome man and his dog with a desire that had become an obsession and she had dreamed of him. Now she pictured him in her imagination instead of seeing Mark when they did that.

Hush mind! She did not want to think of that. She would not think about it outside of the room in which it must be done.

But with Harry…

Do not think! She ordered herself. She would do it to preserve their friendship. She would do it because she enjoyed his conversation and she liked looking at him and playing with his dog.

When she returned to Mark’s house she found a reason to remain in her room until dinner and she hoped she did not have to go to Mark’s room later.

He did not ask for her.

~

Once Harry had completed his hours of duty, he let Ash run in the barracks’ yard, then took the dog to the stable. He left him there when he walked Obsidian out of the stall.

He had dreamed of Charlotte last night. But then he had not lain with a woman for a couple of weeks and the need to do so was flooding his blood. The sense of escape achieved was as addictive as it was to gamble or drink.

He patted Obsidian’s neck, then set his foot into the stirrup and lifted up, swinging his leg across the animal’s rump to take his seat in the saddle.

‘Where are you off to without Ash?’

Harry looked across the yard at Gareth, who strode towards him. A strange sensation tightened the muscle in his stomach. Fear. He did not want his plans for the afternoon disrupted, and yet—there was guilt too. An emotion he knew well. But it was a guilt he could not really explain. Perhaps it was because he wished to keep this secret and keeping secrets meant that there was a sense of doing wrong. ‘For a ride.’ Was all he said in answer. They all had hours when they wished to be alone, Gareth would not think it odd.

His friend nodded, then turned away.

Harry rose up from the saddle, gripping Obsidian with his thighs, urging the horse into a trot and then he rode out of the stable yard. Leaving the barracks and the army behind.

The inn’s groom took Obsidian as he had every other day, only today there was no Ash and Harry did not immediately leave the inn but walked inside to ensure there was a room available. He had not checked yesterday. There was.

He walked along the street, his heart pulsing faster than it normally would. She was not waiting for him on the corner. Yet it was better that he awaited her rather than her being left to loiter. It would have been awkward for her. As she had made him aware yesterday, she was not a street prostitute.

She appeared after about five minutes, walking quickly towards him. She lifted her hand and waved when she saw him. He lifted his hand and acknowledged her. His heart began to pulse harder, it had never raced at the thought of bedding a woman before. Or perhaps it had happened the first time, but that had been a long time ago.

‘Hello,’ she spoke first and smiled in a shy way.

Another undefinable emotion twisted around in his chest, aching not clasping. ‘Hello. Shall we?’ He lifted his arm, as he would have to a woman he’d asked to dance at a ball. She wrapped her fingers about it, gently holding his coat sleeve.

They walked the short distance to the inn in silence. He had no idea what to say.

When he opened the door of the inn for her, her hand let go of his arm and she walked in ahead of him. He did not stop to speak to the clerk, but directed her up to the room through the press of his palm against the curve of her lower back above where the skirt of her dress flared out.

He pushed open the door of the room. She walked in, then stopped about eight feet away from him. He locked the door, then faced her. ‘So…’ Where did he begin with this woman? With every other woman he’d lain with there had been no hesitation. They had agreed a payment or the price was already set by the club or the brothel and they had come to a room and begun.

‘I feel so awkward,’ she said, then laughed in a self-conscious way. But her laughter broke the ice that had settled over the moment.

A sound of humour escaped his throat too. He laughed at himself. ‘I do too. Isn’t that silly?’

‘Yes.’

‘I should have ordered food, or something to drink, chocolate for you…’ Why? They were here for one thing. This was being truly ridiculous.

She shook her head slightly. ‘I am neither hungry nor thirsty.’

God. He was both, but not for food or water. ‘Let us begin by removing our hats and gloves, shall we?’

He took his hat off and set it on a chest near the door, then stripped his gloves off and left them there too. When he looked back at Charlotte she was untying the bow of her bonnet. Her pale hands shook.

He had not even seen her hands naked before.

What a strange thought.

She slid her bonnet off.

He walked across and took her bonnet and gloves from her. Then carried them over to the chest to set them down beside his hat. She was watching him when he turned back. He smiled. ‘Will you take the pins out of your hair? It is a very pretty colour. I would like to see it down.’

She began pulling the pins out at once, her hand still trembling. He walked over there and helped, looking only at her hair, searching out the silver and pearl heads of the pins.

Her hair was such a vibrant copper colour and a mass of tight curls that tumbled on to her shoulders as the pins came free. He collected the pins in the palm of one hand. Then walked over and put them beside their other items.

Bedding a whore had never been like this. Charlotte engendered a need to be solicitous.

Yet he still wanted to be in the bed with her.

He turned and walked back, his hands lifting. He wanted to touch her hair. He held the curls and rubbed the strands between his fingers. The colour glistened in the sunlight from the window, changing as amber did when the sun shone through it. His gaze turned to her face and then his fingers clasped, closing about her hair, at her shoulders, as he leant to kiss her.

Her mouth opened as his did and her tongue reached forward to play with his while her hands came to the back of his head.

He pulled away and looked down at the buttons on the front of her dress, then began undoing them.

She started working the brass buttons on his coat free. Her hands were still trembling but they worked with the haste that he felt in his blood as he hurried too.

This was more like the encounters he was used to.

When she had undone his coat her fingers slipped beneath it and ran over his cotton shirt. The sensation was abrasive on his skin in a way that was arousing. It was the first time a woman had touched him like that while his clothes were on.

He undid her buttons to below her waist, then pushed her dress off her shoulders. ‘Help me take it off.’

She smiled in that shy way she had on occasion as she pulled her arms free from the sleeves, then he helped her get the dress over her petticoats.

‘Turn,’ he requested.

She did so, and then he undid the tapes holding her petticoats in place and once she was free of those and they were set aside he began unlacing her corset. She breathed heavily as he worked, sounding anxious as well as awkward. Yet she had kissed him just as any whore would kiss and unbuttoned his coat with a haste any whore might have.

When her corset was put aside he took off his coat and his shirt. She stripped off her stockings.

‘Take off your underwear and jump into the bed,’ he said as he sat down on the end of the bed to remove his boots.

A nervous sound escaped her throat that seemed to pretend laughter as she slid down her drawers and pulled her chemise off quickly, before lifting the sheet and blanket and slipping beneath them. Her body was pink with what he guessed was embarrassment. So odd for a whore.

She smiled at him with that essence of shyness as she held the covers up to her neck, no matter that it was a warm day.

He smiled too and continued smiling as he pulled off his boots, hoping to ease any anxiety she had. Then he stripped off his trousers, underwear and stockings all in one, so that he was naked too, before turning to find his sheath out of his coat. He slid it on, then smiled even more broadly as he climbed beneath the covers with her. The feeling in his chest was warm and full. It was no longer tight or painful. It was ready to know freedom and pleasure—with this woman.

He had never cared about it being with any particular woman before. But there was a sense of excitement that the woman would be Charlotte.

Her hand lifted to the back of his head and braced his skull through his hair as his hand reached to the place between her legs. He stroked her there as they kissed. He had never been selfish with women; he’d always ensured they had pleasure too. The experience was better for them both if that was the case.

~

Harry had dressed himself in something, but he had not immediately turned her on to her back and invaded her, neither with his body nor his fingers. He was just touching her, stroking.

His mouth lifted from hers then his head lowered and he kissed the edge of her breast.

‘What did you put on?’

He looked up. ‘A sheath.’

‘Oh. Why?’

His smile said she was being foolish and that she ought to understand. ‘To protect you from the risk of a child and us both from disease.’

She wanted to ask what disease, but he had thought her naïve for asking about the sheath and now was not the moment as his fingers continued to gently stroke the place between her legs.

Warm, nice, feelings skimmed through her nerves and across her skin.

He started sucking her nipple. That was done very gently too.

She shut her eyes, shutting out the room and the world as her fingers combed through his hair. Life had been cruel to her. But Harry… She had seen Captain Marlow and wanted to know him and this was her choice. For the first time in years she was doing something that was her choice, with no sense of persuasion or force.

His fingers slipped inside her and stroked, just as he’d stroked on the outside of her body. She let the feel of that, and only that, fill up her mind. Her fingers pressed into the skin and muscles on his back.

The emotions and feelings that rose from the points he touched spun like a whirlpool in a river. She had never felt such things when Mark touched her. When Mark touched her she felt cold and empty. But all those things were left in the room, in his home and pushed out of her thoughts.

She rocked up against Harry’s hand, enjoying every sensation, longing to feel them more strongly as his tongue pressed against her breast while he sucked her nipple and his fingers stroked in and out.

Harry’s lips lifted off her breast, pulling it as he sucked her nipple one last time, then his hands dented the mattress on either side of her.

She opened her eyes as he moved over her and her hands traced the contours under his skin, over his chest and arms, then settled on his shoulders as his gaze met hers.

When he pressed into her, it was done slowly, and still gently.

‘You are very pretty,’ he said as he began to move.

‘And you are very handsome.’

He smiled at her as he continued working. It was still nice, even with him inside her. He had sweetened it with gentleness. Enchanting sensations swirled through her lower body, gradually rising in intensity, grasping her attention. She did not think of other things as she did with Mark. It was impossible to think of other things with Harry.

Her fingers combed back Harry’s short hair, then trailed over his skin again, following the bulges of the muscles on his arms and his chest, as she rocked up against him, while he pressed into her with a slow enthralling pace.

With Mark it was always hurried and forceful, and often painful, but this… there was no pain, and no force—it just was. And it felt… beautiful. She had never thought she would say that about joining with a man, but he was even more beautiful without clothes and this was wonderful.

The feelings in her body spun higher, as though Harry’s movement whipped them up like a strap flicking at a spinning top. These feelings had risen from her stomach to her chest and were in the back of her throat and then they broke like a wave on the shore, frothing and washing out into her arms, her mind and her legs. She cried out with the pleasure of it.

Harry’s pace did not change, but his head lowered and he kissed her neck, her collarbone and her shoulder. She sighed and inside—writhed. The sensations danced through her continuously, racing over each other like waves tumbling on top of one another as she was thrown about in their white foam.

After a while, although she had no idea of how long because she had lost all sense of time, he clasped the back of her thighs and rolled on to his back, pulling her on top of him. Then his hands lifted and pressed either side of her head, his fingers curling into her hair as she knelt over him and he pushed up into her. His pace then was quicker and more powerful. Though even then he did not rush but moved in a way that seemed to focus on his pleasure. But the movement brought her pleasure too.

He turned again, tipping her on to her side.

It was like a sensual dance. Their arms and legs were all tangled up as they moved about the bed, in various positions that brought up different feelings inside her.

Harry knew how to do this in a way Mark did not and all the time her fingers ran over his skin, touching and appreciating as she looked at his beautiful eyes and face and her body grasped at every sensation and let wave after wave of pleasure wash over her.

Then finally Harry rolled her on to her back once more and pushed hard into her over and over, his pace quick and sharp, and then she felt his release throb inside her. Only it did not spill inside her, it spilled into the thing that he wore.

He withdrew from her body and lay on his back.

She rolled to her side and her arm reached across to hold on to him. The emotions still swayed inside her. ‘I have never enjoyed it before.’

He laughed. She could feel and hear the rumble of it in his chest.

‘How many men have you lain with, then?’

‘Only Mark.’

‘Colonel Hillier is the only one?’

‘Yes.’

‘Then how many years have you been with him?’

‘Seven.’

He breathed out a long breath, as though her answer had disturbed him. Then his hand rested on her head and his fingers began playing with her hair.

~

Charlotte sat up suddenly, her hand pressing on his stomach. The motion woke him.

Lord, he’d fallen asleep. ‘What hour is it?’ He sat up too, throwing back the covers.

‘I have no idea. I fell asleep.’

They had slept together, then. He walked over to fetch his pocket watch from his coat. ‘Six.’

‘Oh dear.’ When he looked back she was already hurriedly pulling on her underwear.

There was a jug of water and a washing bowl on a stand in the corner, he washed out the sheath and then began to dress.

She turned with her corset in her hand. He had only succeeded in putting on his underwear. ‘Will you help me?’

‘Yes. Turn around.’

She held her corset against her stomach as he threaded the laces at the back. It was far easier undoing the thing than it was doing it up. He had never done that before. When he’d left women before he had left them in a room in a bed or at the door, placing money on the bed or into their hand.

This was a very strange affair.

When he was done, she glanced across her shoulder. ‘Thank you.’ Then she stepped away and picked up her petticoats.

He attended to himself. Put on his stockings, then his trousers, then pulled on his shirt and tucked that into his trousers as she buttoned up the front of her dress. He was tugging on his boots as she came across the room to fetch her hair pins.

He slid his arms into his scarlet coat and then secured the buttons watching her, fascinated, as she deftly twisted her hair and then stuck pins into it to keep it up. Her hair was a magnificent colour. So bright. If it was dressed formally, as his mother’s and sisters’ hair was at times, she would stand out in any ballroom.

She picked up her bonnet, then realised he’d finished dressing and was watching her. She smiled with that hint of awkwardness and the shy nature that had been there before they’d used the bed. When she put on her bonnet and tied the ribbons her hands trembled as they’d done when she’d come up to the room. ‘I think I will be in trouble.’

He did not know what to say to that. ‘I’m sorry.’

‘It is not your fault we fell asleep.’

No. It was not. But it had been a very odd thing to do.

‘I must hurry.’ She walked past him and opened the door before he could reach it. Then she hurried on down the stairs ahead of him.

He breathed steadily, keeping the pace of his breaths calm, even though his heart pumped harder in an uncommon way as they walked through the inn and then out into the street. He walked as far as the corner with her, though she did not give him the chance to offer his arm because her steps were so quick.

At the corner she looked at him. ‘Thank you. I enjoyed it. Will we do it again?’

Lord… Will we do it again? The words echoed through him. ‘Yes.’ The answer came from his tongue without thought, but now it was spoken the thought followed, and yes… He wanted that. ‘I am on duty until the evening tomorrow, but the day after I will be free.’

‘Shall I meet you here at the same hour?’

‘Yes.’

‘Goodbye, then.’ She bobbed a ridiculous little curtsey at him.

‘Goodbye, Charlotte.’

She turned and walked away, hurrying once more. He watched her until she was out of sight. Then he returned to the inn to collect Obsidian.

Everything felt strange, different. Which was absurd. Sleeping with a woman changed nothing. Yet certainly he was calmer than he remembered being in a long while and his mind continually reflected on images and sensations from the time he’d spent with her, it did not recall images of war.

It had been different from any other encounter he’d had with a woman, though.

She had been… He did not even know how to describe it. Refreshing, certainly. But it was not that; it was the way she had performed, or rather not performed at all. When they had been in the bed she’d done nothing like a whore. There had been no sound, or movement, that had felt forced, acted or exaggerated. It had simply been what it was—the only honest encounter he’d ever had with a woman. And he had not even paid her, when he would have paid triple for the service she’d given him. He felt so relaxed.

Guilt pierced through his ribs with a sharp pain that resembled the sudden lance of the tip of a sword. He had not paid her. Ought he to have given her something? Yet she had not asked, nor acted as though she expected payment. But unlike the other women he had been with, she was in the constant care of one man. Kept. For Hillier’s attentions. For seven years… For seven years she had only lain with one, old, man.

The thought stirred strange emotions Harry did not care to define.

When he rode into the stable yard at the barracks, Gareth was there.

‘Hello.’ Gareth called out. ‘I have been looking out for you. Are you in the mood for a drink?’

‘Yes.’ Harry suddenly had a desperate need for a drink.

He dismounted, then walked into the huge block of stables with Gareth beside him.

‘You were a long time. You had me worried,’ Gareth stated as Harry undid the saddle’s girth strap.

Yes. He could not believe he had fallen asleep. With every other woman, when the deed had been done they had thrown him out through the door, their money earned, no matter how pleasurably.

‘I mastered a few demons,’ Harry answered. He had. Harry gave his friend a twisted smile as he took the bridle off Obsidian. He could tell Gareth, but he would not. He had a desire to continue keeping his liaisons with Charlotte a secret.

Gareth fetched a curry comb, so did Harry, and together they brushed Obsidian down as Ash watched from the corner of the stall.

Ash was at Harry’s heel when they walked back into the barracks. Harry stroked the dog’s ear. He ate in the mess room and drank with Gareth, using the liquor tonight not to blur the images of war but to blur his memories of Charlotte.

The liquor failed in its task. When he retired to his bed, thoughts and memories still flooded his mind. He saw money being set into women’s hands, by him, and recalled the tremble in Charlotte’s hands. He felt the movement of her body and heard her breaths. Then he saw her holding open the cigar box for him to take one and then he saw Colonel Hillier welcoming him into his home.

You have eyes remarkably like those of a woman I once knew…

He had probably done something foolish today.

Yet nothing in his thoughts or emotions cared if there were consequences.

Chapter 3

He did not take Obsidian to the usual inn on the day he had agreed to meet Charlotte and nor did he hire a room at that inn. It had probably been foolish to meet her at the usual inn he used, the inn most of the officers used. He ought to keep their association more discreet—she was under the protection of another man.

Instead, once he’d met her, he walked farther along the sea front with her and then led her into a quiet, narrow street. They walked along that, talking and laughing, then turned right, into an even narrower street. In that street he took her into an inn, where he’d hired a room.

The room was smaller than at the last inn. But on this occasion he had thought to order fresh lemonade for her and some small, sweet currant buns topped with icing.

She turned and smiled at him as she took off her bonnet and then her gloves. ‘The refreshments are a very nice gesture; it was kind of you to think of that. What is the drink?’

‘Lemonade.’

‘I have never had it.’

That was a ridiculous notion. Who in the world had never tried lemonade? He crossed the room and poured some for her. Then held out the glass.

She took the glass from him and sipped from it. ‘It tastes sour and sweet all at once.’ Her expression spoke of the difference between sour and sweet too.

His lips pulled up into a smile and then he laughed before picking up an iced bun. There had been no blushes or hesitation in her movements or her conversation today.

He took a bite of the bun, then held it out to her. ‘Here, eat this, it will reduce the sourness.’

She bit into the bun as he held it, then he let go and let her hold it.

‘Mmm. That is nice.’

He picked up another and ate it, then poured himself lemonade and drank the glass down. The lemonade brought back memories of his childhood home and that sense of love that came with thoughts of his family, which then brought back the vivid images of battles and their aftermath. God he hated the shame and guilt that attacked him with the bombardment of cannon shells.