The Illicit Love of a Courtesan

Withdrawing her fingers from his, she made a final plea. “Please, do not acknowledge me again if I see you, my Lord. There can be no communication beyond tonight.” But something dreadful pierced her chest as she spoke, and perhaps it showed in her eyes because his lips fell to hers, the kiss deep and fulfilling, belittling her denial. And she knew he knew it, but she could not unsay those words, she had no choice but to walk away. He cannot save me, no one can. I’m already lost.

Setting her palms on his chest she pushed him away, turned from his grip and grasped the doorknob, refusing to look back.

Masculine conversation spilled from the adjoining rooms and filled the high ceilinged space as she crossed the hall, broken by the occasional trill of a woman’s laughter rising above the lower tones. She kept walking, ignoring the sound of a door slamming behind her, and the heavy tread of quick masculine strides hitting the floorboards.

Crossing into the first room she saw Lord Gainsborough seated at another card table by the far wall. He was waiting, watching. He rose. The men about him turned to follow his look, rising too. Her heart racing she took the few steps to where he stood.

Ribald jests and jeers greeted her from the male audience who were oblivious to the reality of his little welcome scene.

Refusing to cower she met Lord Gainsborough’s glare of accusation.

She’d angered him, yes, but she could see he was equally enthralled to think another man had taken her but yards from where he sat. She knew his sadistic lusts must have thrilled at it, while his need for control revolted.

A round of laughter rang from another room. The men about them turned back to their game. Gainsborough’s hand lifted.

As she heard the front door slam shut she felt the first strike across her face. The world about her tilted, time shifting to a slower pace as her vision hazed.

“Good God, Gainsborough, no need for that!”

“My God, man!”

A dozen calls of outrage echoed in her head. Reaching out blindly to stop her fall, she felt Lord Gainsborough’s painful grip catch her and haul her back, holding firm.

“Mind your own damn business!” his bellow rang. “Out of my way!”

Chapter Two

Maintaining his vigil on Gainsborough’s townhouse, Edward leaned his back against the iron railings of the park at the centre of Grosvenor Square. The cold air of the harsh frost seeped through his loose fitting heavy wool greatcoat and leather gloves.

Clapping his hands together briefly, he ignored the misty vapour of his breath rising on the cold winter air. Then he tilted the rim of his hat forward and folded his arms over his chest.

The property was a grand, lavish statement of the man’s wealth.

Well, Ellen had told Edward bluntly she was with the man for his money. In comparison to it, Edward was a pauper. Even if he’d been heir to his father’s estates not second born, he could not have matched Gainsborough’s wealth.

But why then had Gainsborough cheated?

Edward watched the man descend the steps from his front door, his wife fixed on his arm, his eldest daughter and grandchild in their wake.

For God’s sake, his daughter was a similar age to Ellen. It made Edward sick, the whole sordid bloody affair, including the part he’d played in it. When he’d woken the morning after with a thundering head, he’d thought it a dream, and then images and senses had merged into memories he couldn’t refute.

He was not his brother. He had no appetite for vice or excess. He did not drink, gamble, or idle away his time with women. He’d never paid for sex, nor ever would. He did not condone the immorality of it. Sex simply shouldn’t be for sale. Women threw themselves at him anyway. But none of those women had responded like her. Skill, he told himself in explanation. It was her living after all. But it was more than the sex. The woman had touched his insides—somehow—changed him— drugged him.

He was obsessed—addicted.

Lust, his brain delivered the single word to justify his feelings.

Lust? Yes, but … He thought for a moment but reached no conclusion. God. Who knew? He’d never felt like this before. He couldn’t think, couldn’t sleep, and couldn’t even bloody breathe without want of her. It was not him. His reputation leaned towards dull and staid.

He blamed his brother. Since Robert’s return life had become boring and Edward had been restless. It seemed the outcome was he had turned to all of his brother’s vices.

What am I doing here? She’d made it plain she was with Gainsborough by choice. She wouldn’t meet him. She’d given herself because Gainsborough had willed it.

But Gainsborough hadn’t willed her to say the man had swapped his cards. Protecting him was her choice. And every expression of her body as Edward had made love to her had told him she was lying. She wanted him. Her responses had been absolute truth.

That was the conundrum disturbing his sleep. She haunted him. He could not forget her.

Pushing away from the railings, his gloved hands curling to fists, he gave up his vigil as Gainsborough’s coachman called to the horses in the straps and flicked his whip, stirring the thoroughbred blacks into a trot. The strike of the horses’ hooves rang on the cobble, as did the iron rim of carriage wheels rolling into motion and the rattle of harness caught the frigid air.

Edward turned away. How easily he’d been tumbled from a confident man to an infatuated youth. But God help him, he could not just leave this, he wanted more of Ellen Harding. Three nights he’d played at Madam’s. Three nights there had been no sign of her. He’d hoped if he waited here, Gainsborough would lead him to where he kept his mistress.

And then what will I do?

His hands plunged into the pockets of his greatcoat, his legs slashing its skirt with long impatient strides. His eyes oblivious to the blue sky and people passing him in the street, his mind sifted through his spiralling thoughts.

He could not entice her away from Gainsborough with wealth. Edward did not even want to if he could. She’d said she wasn’t interested in anything else. Yet a wedge inside him refused to believe it. What had been between them had not been trade. Had it? God, the woman had got into his veins like a damn dose of opium. This infatuation was a curse.

It had felt right to hold her and touch her. And there was something seriously wrong about her relationship with Gainsborough.

Why did she help me if she’s happy with him? It couldn’t just be about money.

I shouldn’t have touched her. I should have asked her while I could.

He thought of his brother. He loathed lustful men. Yet he’d just proved he was no better. Twitching up the collar of his caped greatcoat to keep the chilled air from his neck, he walked on, walked away.

He’d find his cousin and some physical activity to consume his restlessness, boxing or fencing, or both. After tonight if he did not see her, he’d go home. Home? It wasn’t that anymore. Though, at least there his frustrated energy could be put to decent use, and he could forget about Ellen Harding. Robert wouldn’t turn him away no matter that they were at odds. It had been Edward’s decision to leave.

A pain lodged in his chest, beneath his ribs, as sharp as a stitch. His fingers pressed to it over his coat as he halted at the edge of the curb and a street-sweep shifted before him with a tip of his cap to brush the filth from the street for Edward to cross.

Edward withdrew a coin from his pocket and tossed it idly to the boy, who caught it in his grubby hand with a grin, kissed it, then slipped it into his pocket before lifting off his hat and nodding his thanks.

Edward turned away, a strong inexplicable sense of unease resting over him.

~

My dearest John, I think of you always, know that I love you and miss you, sweetheart.

Ellen signed the letter to her son, Mama, blotted the ink with sand, folded it and sealed it with a little melted wax, while her maid watched. Then she addressed it and kissed the seal, her heart aching as she did. She longed to see him. But that was not a possibility. She could not even consider it; if she stopped to think about him her heart would break, and so she tried not to. He was safe and that was all that mattered.

“Millie,” Ellen whispered, holding it out to her maid, “here, put it in your dress, not your pocket. If anyone asks, say you are going for threads and ribbons and bring some back in case they check.”

Millie accepted the letter, bobbed a curtsy and answered in a similarly soft voice, “I wouldn’t tell, Ma’am.”

With a sigh Ellen reached to grasp and squeeze Millie’s hand in silent thanks. “I know, Millie. I do not mistrust you.” Ellen let Millie’s hand go as a knock rang on the drawing room door.

Millie slid the letter into her bodice.

“Come in, Wentworth!” Ellen called to Lord Gainsborough’s butler—her jailer. None of the servants were her choice. She was no guest here, she was a prisoner, and therefore she was fortunate in Millie’s compassion. She did indeed trust her maid, but no one else.

“A letter.”

Ellen’s heart raced as she heard Wentworth’s statement as a question.

Millie bobbed another curtsy and Ellen realised Wentworth held a tray. It bore a letter.

Relief flooded Ellen.

Millie quickly disappeared, sweeping past the butler and then escaping out of the door.

“Thank you.” Ellen took the letter from the tray, knowing immediately what it meant. Gainsborough would call later.

Rising from her seat, Ellen’s eyes met the butler’s insolent, disparaging gaze, it spoke of revulsion not respect. He condemned her status and yet not the man who kept her. Her chin lifting, she dismissed him bluntly, “You may go, Wentworth.”

When the door shut she turned and faced her reflection in the mirror above the fireplace. The black and yellow stains across her cheek and around her eye had faded marginally, she could cover them, but the cut over her eyebrow would need to be hidden beneath her fringe. Millie would have to find a new style for her hair. The sigh of vexed frustration which tugged into her lungs, tweaked the bruising at her ribs.

Her fingers pressing to her side she took a more cautious breath and turned away from her image, looking past the swathe of the blue chintz curtain into the street beyond.

She often watched life pass by, like a canary in a cage. She could go out if she wished, none of them were afraid she’d run, but where was there to go?

Turning away, her gaze skimmed across the pale blue hues of the room, stopping to rest on the small vase of snowdrops which she’d picked in the garden that morning as she moved to sit in the armchair. Her mind reached back to the woods where she’d played as a child. Snowdrops carpeted the ground there, just like snow. She’d picked them then, once, when she was sixteen. But that innocent girl in the memory was alien to her. She had forgotten family, safety and home.

Returning her attention to the letter in her hand, her thumb slipped beneath the seal. The summons was for that night at nine.

She left the letter on the low table beside her chair and picked up her book. But her eyes did not lower to the page instead they drifted upwards to the plaster cornice bordering the ceiling across the room. She leaned back and her memory slipped back too, to Edward, as it often did, longing for something that could never be. Closing her eyes she shut out the folly of her thoughts, but she could not stop the hope from filling her heart. For the umpteenth time in days she wondered where he was, what he was doing now, if he’d thought of her?

~

As the doorman took her cloak, Ellen felt a shiver race across her skin. She had never felt so concerned about being abroad in Lord Gainsborough’s company. It was silly. She’d been his mistress for years. Her presence was expected and generally ignored.

The smoke of gentlemen’s cigars filled her lungs. The scent of brandy and musky cologne mingled in the cloudy overheated air. She lifted her fan, hiding behind it, her eyes focusing on the floor as she took Gainsborough’s arm and he began to walk across the room.

If Edward was here, it was better she ignore him.

She sensed a difference in Gainsborough tonight. She was being displayed, his trophy, but that was always so. Parading all about the room, he took an age to pick a table. Then he made much of sweeping back the tails of his evening coat when he sat, and once seated, he looked up at her before calling for his cards to be dealt. He was also keeping his eye on her more than was usual.

Ellen looked at the dealer’s hands, fighting the instinct to glance about the room, and watched Gainsborough’s cards thrown across the table facedown.

Gainsborough’s fingers caught hers and set them on his shoulder, in what Ellen could only read as an unspoken warning.

So that was his message—ownership. Edward was here.

A deep bark of laughter rang from across the room. Her muscles jarred in a sharp spasm, making her jump.

He was.

Gainsborough’s fingers pressed over her hand in another warning. He’d chosen the table for the best proximity to make a statement to Edward. She could virtually hear Lord Gainsborough’s body yelling, ‘she belongs to me.’

Edward laughed again.

Stealing a single glance over her fan, Ellen saw him. He was leaning back in his chair, smiling. She had tried to carve every detail of his features in her memory four nights ago, but Edward in the flesh was more magnificent than the image she remembered. His reality captured her breath.

He looked up, his gaze meeting hers across the room. She looked away.

She could hear his voice above the general hum of male conversation, but she could not make out the words. He laughed again, a deep ringing, reckless and carefree sound.

God, I am a fool. In the hours since they’d parted she’d analysed every touch, every word, a thousand times, over and over, building a house of cards from her hope—a house on sand—it had no foundation. This was the truth.

He doesn’t give a damn, and nor should I!

She sold herself to men. He’d bought her. Perhaps not with money, but none the less his deal with Gainsborough had been a purchase of sorts. The only difference was skill. A skill which spoke of the number of women he’d already bedded.

I was just one more.

She tried not to listen to Edward anymore and concentrate on Gainsborough’s game, unsuccessfully. She felt sick. Was he laughing at her? About her? Had he spoken of the things she’d let him do?

A footman offered her a flute of champagne from a silver tray.

Lord Gainsborough must have ordered her a drink and she’d not even heard.

She lifted her hand from Gainsborough’s shoulder and accepted it, nodding to dismiss the footman. Her fingers gripped the narrow stem and she brought the rim of the glass to her lips, looking at Edward.

He’d leaned in to say something to his friend, his hand on the other man’s shoulder, but that sixth sense which seemed to stretch between them must have whispered. His gaze turned to her.

She looked at Gainsborough’s game, drinking the champagne. The bubbles caught in her throat, making her cough.

Lord Gainsborough looked up.

She offered him a taut smile, setting the glass down on the table at his elbow.

He caught her fingers and pressed them firmly back on his shoulder.

Her other hand lifted her fan and fluttered it beneath her chin.

Unable to resist, her eyes darted back to where Edward sat.

He was leaning over his hand of cards, light dancing in his dark eyes, as the man beside him, she now recognised as the one he’d spoken to the other night, smiled and made some comment. When Edward looked at his friend he saw her watching.

She looked away.

“You have me, I’m done.” Edward’s words carried over the other voices easily, louder than before.

Glancing towards him, Ellen observed him throwing his hand of cards onto the table.

He rose, his eyes turning to her as he moved in her direction.

She looked away and prayed he would not approach. Surely he would not be so stupid. She’d asked him not to speak to her again.

Her heart pounding, she pretended to fix her gaze on Gainsborough’s cards while in the periphery of her vision she followed Edward’s movement.

He walked past her, barely a foot away and said nothing, not a word.

Tears stinging her eyes, she increased the motion of her fan.

He couldn’t speak to her, she’d told him so herself. But he had not even acknowledged her presence, and it hurt.

She lifted her hand from Gainsborough’s shoulder, leaned forward and whispered, “I am in need of the retiring room, my Lord.”

His gaze spun to her and his hand caught her wrist. The grip was painful.

“Do not take over long, Ellen, I will send one of the women to look for you, if I must.” The threat in his eyes mirrored his words. He did not trust her.

She was not going to find Edward. She just needed solitude to master her emotions.

“Yes, my Lord.”

He let her go.

She walked away, snapping shut her fan and then holding it to her chest. Her heart thumping, she weaved a path through the tables, twisting and turning, making her way through the crush of drunk and over eager men who watched the games, ignoring the hands that stroked her bottom or grazed her breast.

For a respectable woman they would part like the red sea for Moses. For a harlot, like her, they deliberately blocked her way, and often only a sharp elbow in their ribs or a shove would move them.

Normally she ignored their uncouth leers. She knew what she was, what to expect but tonight she felt vulnerable and violated.

Forcing her way through the last of the crowd she reached the hall and found the corridor leading to the women’s retiring room, the same corridor she’d been led through four nights ago.

She passed the door to the room where she’d given her body and soul to a stranger and fought the potent memories it stirred. She did not wish to remember it any more.

The retiring room was empty and leaning back against the door she struggled to control her emotions.

What is wrong with me?

“For goodness sake get a grip, Ellen.”

Her heart racing and her soul aching, she took her weight from the door and turned to the small cheval mirror on a table. A stool stood before it but she didn’t sit. Instead she leaned forward, rested her palms on the tabletop and faced her reflection. The painted woman who looked back was like a china doll, fragile and hollow. She felt inhuman.

God, help me. There is nothing left of me anymore. Where are all your high and mighty, airs and graces, now? I am no better than a Whitechapel whore, panting after a man for his looks and prowess. Disgusted with her image she stood and turned away. She’d come to terms with the poor hand fate had dealt years ago—her body belonged to men and they exploited it. But Edward hadn’t used her—she’d been his yearning accomplice. She couldn’t hide behind the myth she’d spun for sanity’s sake anymore. She couldn’t pretend circumstance had prostituted her. She could no longer claim to have been forced. She’d prostituted herself for Edward Marlow.

Tears in her eyes, she wished he had not come to the club or played cards four nights ago. He’d made her life so much harder. Too hard.

She slowed her breath, fighting tears. Crying would only stain her make-up. This was her life. She’d learned to live it before, she could learn again. She had no choice.

When she left the room, feeling defiant, she walked briskly, her posture rigid and her chin high.

In a moment, hands gripped her arm and covered her mouth, muffling her scream as she was pulled sharply back into the shadow beneath the stairs.

“Hush,” Edward’s deep tenor rumbled in her ear.

Relief and recognition ripped through her—memories.

He pulled her across the narrow hall into a room, shut the door, pressed her back against it and kissed her. It was a searing and possessive kiss. Her fingers sank into his hair greedily holding his mouth to hers, oblivious to anything but him as his hands gripped her waist.

Edward broke the kiss, pulling an inch away. She met his gaze and saw desire. It matched hers. She did not deny it. She wanted him. For a moment they simply stared at each other as she breathed in the air he breathed out. His breath smelt of brandy, sweet and sharp.

A brace of candles lit the room behind him, their flickering gold light playing on his hair and skin.

They were in Madam’s private parlour, the room where they’d made love. Sex. This thing between them was purely physical.

His thumb brushed her cheek. “Why the powder, Ellen, you had no makeup the other night?”

Unable to hold his gaze her vision focused on his neckcloth and she tried to move away afraid he would see her bruises, shifting sideward and seeking to distract him. “You should not be here, Edward.”

But his hand gripped her shoulder and his eyes traced across her face as she looked back. She knew he could see the marks and her fingers clasped the doorknob behind her.

“He hit you.” It was an incredulous statement, etched in disbelief; spoken in the voice of a man who would never hit a woman. Aggression burning in his eyes, she saw his pupils flare as the cause of it clearly dawned. “Because of me! I’ll kill him!” His words were as vicious as a physical blow and reaching around her he grasped the doorknob, his fingers closing over hers.

She pressed back against the door, refusing to move and braced one hand against his chest. “No!” The justifiable ire in his eyes, made the restriction about her heart tighten a notch. Righteous anger only made him more handsome. “He’ll kill you before you could touch him. He has too much power, Edward. There is no winning against him. Leave it. Please. It is not your affair. I don’t ask it of you.”

He knew nothing about her. He could not wish to fight for her. She could not let him. She could not bear it if he failed. She did not want him dying for her.

Defiance shone in his eyes, but then, as her words visibly sank in, she saw another understanding dawn. He let go of the doorknob and his hand braced her cheek, his thumb resting against the barely hidden bruise by her lip as his gaze reached into her. “That is why you are with him isn’t it? Because you have no choice? I can give you choice, Ellen.”

Her eyelids dropped. She couldn’t bear the promise in his eyes. I wish you could—but you are not my saviour. I cannot endanger you on a selfish whim. Shaking her head, she opened her eyes. “Edward, you scarcely know me, whether I am with him by choice or not, I am still his. You will only make it worse. Please, just go, before he finds out we have spoken. There can be nothing more between us.”

His expression hardened in denial and his gaze bored through her eyes into her soul. “Give me your address and tell me how I may see you. Then I will go. I shan’t take, no, for an answer, Ellen.”

Footsteps rang beyond the door and Ellen’s heart skipped into a sharp allegro. Without thinking, she answered, “Wood Street, near St James, number four. But you cannot call upon me. My servants are Lord Gainsborough’s. I only trust my maid. Please, speak to no one of this.”

“Send me word then, through your maid, and tell me when I may see you. Contact me at White’s so your communication will not be traced to me.”

He leaned forward and kissed her after he’d spoken and she could not deny him; she could not deny what she felt. Her fingers gripped his nape and then slipped into his hair, pulling him closer. She wanted him. She wanted him for more than just sex. She wanted him because he cared.