Taming the Wilde (10 page)

“No!”

“Miss Wilde...” his voice went deep with warning. “It is nothing I have not seen before and it is quite essential that I take this precaution for your own sake. So you can submit to a brief inspection, or I can convince you in another fashion.”

“You are a horrid bully... a....”

“Enough,” he said. “Lay on your stomach.”

I turned reluctantly and winced as I felt him raising my skirts with a slow and gentle touch. It wasn't until his fingers reached the ties of my undergarments and loosened them that I made a small sob of frustrated anger. I wished to simply be let alone and there I was with my most intimate flesh being bared to the monster's eyes. I could feel the cooler air against my heated skin, and his hands so close to my womanhood that he could have moved only slightly and performed most indecent acts.

“The cane struck deeper than I anticipated,” he said heavily. “Though the skin is not broken, which is most fortunate. The next time I beat you, it will be on the bare. I cannot continue to risk injury to your tender hide.”

“There will not be a next time.”

There was a rumble of humor in his voice as he restored my undergarments to their correct place and secured the ties, dressing me as if I were a doll. “We have many months yet to pass on this voyage and you, my spirited angel, are unlikely to pass all of them in a state of grace.”

In my pained and embarrassed state, I recoiled at his use of a very personal term. “I am not your angel,” I scowled out of the depths of the blanket. “And I will thank you to not be so familiar.”

“Not so familiar? I am the only man to have ever imparted any discipline to your person,” Roake said. “We are familiar whether you like it or not.”

“It is an ill distinction, Master Roake,” I said, throwing back the blanket so as to give him the full benefit of my scorn.

He smiled at me, entirely unconcerned by my wrath. “Are you a sore loser, Miss Wilde?”

“I am a very sore loser, as it happens,” I replied, unable to resist the play on words in spite of the pain. “And it is all due to you and your tricks.”

“Ah, I see,” he said, leaning against the far bunk and bracing himself with his long legs stretched out shoulder width in front of him, his arms folded across his chest in a rather dominating manner. “You do not appreciate the invasion of your territory.”

It was my turn to make noises of irritation. “What nonsense are you talking now?”

“You prefer to be the trickster, Miss 'I cannot read',” his lips twisted with wry amusement at my expense. “But you do not like to be tricked yourself.”

“My tricks do not hurt like the blazes. My tricks do not cause flesh to welt.”

“No, your spoiled temperament and biting does that.”

Somehow I was losing yet again, this time in a verbal duel. Master Roake kept the upper hand so effortlessly that I was beginning to think the absolutely unthinkable: that it might be I who was in the wrong on this occasion.

“Do not worry Miss Wilde, you have not yet learned how to gracefully take a thrashing you earned. I imagine it is quite a novel experience. It will become easier over time as you become more accustomed to the notion of consequences.” He flickered a rather rakish wink in my direction and left me quivering in yet another novel fashion as he walked away, so utterly certain of his rectitude that mine had crumbled all about me.

It is not easy to find rest when one has welts impressed across one's tender flesh. Suffice to say the night after Roake made free with the cane on my person I slept fitfully, my dreams filled with images of a tall man wielding a rod of fire. In addition to the dreams, which were torturous enough of their own accord, I was woken many times when I inadvertently rolled onto my back and reignited the burning sensations with the weight of my body.

To make matters worse I seemed to be suffering from some kind of nervous condition that made the flesh between my thighs quiver. It was a condition exacerbated by the slightest touch and when I put my hand between my legs to soothe myself I found my flesh slick with moisture.

Naturally I was compelled to explore this sensation, and found that my breath soon came in short gasps as I moved my thumb lightly over the tight bud at the apex of my softest lips. Still I could not exorcise Roake from my mind as I played the images from our duel and the subsequent punishment over in my mind, pressing my flesh harder, thinking I might be able to banish him from my thoughts by reaching a climactic peak.

Frustratingly my own moisture made it difficult to achieve that aim, my fingers could not take purchase and slid over and past my sensitive spots without the necessary pressure. I had become my own sensual torturer and my self-explorations had lead to a full flush of arousal. I tingled from the very top of my head to my toes and thought I might go mad if I could not release the energies that were so pent up.

Only by pinching at my nipple and applying a similar grip to the wicked bud between my legs was I able to finally come close to climax, the rocking of the ship an aid to disguising my movements as I urged my hips forward in the darkness. I felt both shameful and wanton, but I could not stop myself. I needed release, even though the movement of my hips made punished skin pull tight with a deep ache. It was pain and it was pleasure. It was all things at once as my tortured nerves finally sung with one note and my breath came in a long muffled gasp. Finally I sank into the embrace of sated sleep, just a half hour before the guard roused us all from our beds.

I was both exhausted and ravenously hungry when compelled to leave my small blanketed haven. I could have slept for many hours more, but the week had begun anew and with it, lessons. I might have succeeded in banishing Roake from my mind for all of half an hour, but it would be a short reprieve for I was required in his cabin for our customary morning meeting.

The journey to Master Roake's cabin was not an easy one. The welts from the cane had stiffened in my short sleep and I was rather bruised.
  I knocked at his door and he answered in his shirtsleeves, swinging the portal open with a broad smile that sent a flash of guilt shooting through me. For a small moment I supposed that he might have some knowledge of what I had been doing in my bed, but I quickly dismissed it, pushing my sins out of mind as he beamed down at me with what seemed to be genuine pleasure.

“Good morning Miss Wilde,” he greeted me, handing me cup of hot sweet tea as I entered his chamber.

“Thank you.” I sipped at the brew and gave a deep sigh of pleasure. “That is perfect.”

“Come. Sit. Eat.”

“No thank you,” I demurred, retiring to lean against the wall of his cabin, bracing myself with my shoulders as the room rolled gently with the motion of the ship.

“I take it you are not in a sitting condition this morning,” he said, glancing in my direction as he tied his hair back with a thick velvet bow and donned an overcoat.

“Not exactly.” I could feel myself blushing. I wished I could hide my embarrassment, but it was impossible to do so.

“The results of loss are often unpleasant.” He spoke with casual disregard that sparked my ire.

“I think you just enjoy beating women.” I half hid behind my brew, letting the steam obscure my eyes.

“What makes you say that?” He turned and regarded me with a faintly smirking look, folding his arms across his chest in a way that made my innards start quivering all over again.

“It is plainly clear.”

“It is no such thing. I could just as easily say that you enjoy being defiant.” He paused for a moment and gave me a searching look. “Or perhaps even that you enjoy being beaten.”

“I most certainly do not.” The tea slopped as I made my indignant reply. The very idea. Enjoying being beaten. It was ludicrous. Ridiculous. Fantastical in the extreme.

“You certainly seem to put yourself in the line for discipline often enough,” he said, sitting before his desk and handing me a saucer full of sour milk. I wrinkled my nose then supped at it. It was tart, but I supposed it would be nourishing.

“During our most recent encounter I thought I was going to get out of trouble, not into it,” I reminded him.

He settled down to his breakfast with apparent gusto, but not before making another jest at my expense. “Ah Miss Wilde, you strike me as a woman who is incapable of getting out of trouble,” he said before drinking deep of his tea.

Looking back over my life whilst he consumed his vittles, it seemed that he was correct. The thought made me morose. “True enough.”

“Do not look so sad,” he said, examining himself in a looking glass and brushing stray crumbs out of his whiskers. “Good things are ahead.”

“Good things? I am on my way to a penal colony, sir.”

“Redemption can be found in the strangest places.”

“Perhaps for you, Master Roake. For people like myself life is a spiral to the grave.” With that one short sentence I made myself vulnerable in a way I had not before. I had displayed a part of myself that I usually kept hidden and the moment I opened my mouth I wished I had not for he looked at me with an expression that made me more uncomfortable than any other – pity. I averted my gaze from his and pretended to be entirely absorbed by the dregs of my tea as silence stretched between us and became strange.

“Perhaps the good book will bring us some hope,” Roake murmured, opening the Bible that always sat at the right hand side of his desk. He began to read apparently at random. I did not listen as well as I should have until I heard a passage I did not recall having heard before.

“Jesus said unto them, Verily, verily, I say unto you, Before Abraham was, I am. Then took they up stones to cast at him: but Jesus hid himself, and went out of the temple, going through the midst of them, and so passed by.”

Forgetting my cares for a moment, I smirked at the Lord's methods of escape. “If only I had thought to hide myself and go out of the prison before being loaded on this cruise to hell.”

He closed the book and gave me a wry, toe-curling look. “Please tell me, Miss Wilde, that you are not intending on turning our heavenly father into a justification for misbehavior.”

“I am fairly certain that Jesus is a heavenly brother, not a father. God is the heavenly
father and Jesus is his son and we are all god's children, ergo...”

“Enough Miss Wilde, you are quickly growing impertinent.” He pretended to speak harshly, but I saw the gleam of good humor in his eye and I fancied he had chosen the passage quite deliberately because he knew it would tickle my sensibilities.

We passed the rest of the time before schooling began discussing theological points of interest in a discussion that became quite lively. I forgot about much of the physical discomfort I was in as I pressed Roake over some of the finer points of the Apostle Paul's letters and he expressed some quite outrageous views as to fig trees. In conversation I quite forgot myself as a convict and prisoner – and he seemed to forget his assigned role with equal grace.

When it came time for us to depart for lessons I found myself sad that our conversation had to end. I fancied he felt the same way, for he grew dour and stern before my very eyes as he rested his hand on the door handle and glanced towards me. “Very well Miss Wilde, shall we continue this divinely inspired tragicomedy below decks?”

“Of course Master Roake, lead the way,” I said with a small curtsey, similarly assuming the role of dutiful assistant as we made our way out onto the deck of the Valiant to do our duties in the eyes of lord and man.

* * * * *

From becalmed state to high winds, the weather changed from one extreme to the other in a very short period.  At first the sailors were pleased to be underway again, prisoners too, for fears that we would run low on provisions and have to eat one another in order to survive had been flung about in overly dramatic and entirely inaccurate fashion on the prison decks.

Unfortunately with high winds came wilder weather and more than once the Valiant rode stormy seas, tossing about like a spirited stallion. Totally at the mercy of the weather we were sometimes confined below decks for weeks at a time and on particularly severe days there were no lessons at all for it was impossible to learn anything whilst one was clinging to any solid object to avoid being tossed across the room like a rag doll. Though I could barely admit it to myself, I missed Master Roake's presence. I had become accustomed to seeing him each morning and being around him for a great part of the day. Whilst we were confined to the prison deck I did not see him at all.

I was not the only one experiencing anguish during our confinement below decks. Life was quickly becoming more complicated for poor Lizzy. We were almost halfway through the voyage and she was beginning to grow larger, large enough that there were many snide comments and plenty of gossip regarding her condition. We both defended her honor vigorously but it was an uphill battle and ultimately a losing one. By the time the seas calmed and routine was restored Lizzy was called to account for her condition, which had been reported many times by snappish women consumed with petty ideas of morality.

It was a matter of grave enough concern that the captain himself was involved. When she was summoned to see him Lizzy took my hand and would not let go until I consented to accompany her. I agreed readily, for I had every intention of making good on my promise to be there for her no matter what.