Read The Best Man's Bridesmaid Online
Authors: Raven McAllan
The Best Man's Bridesmaid (7 page)
She nodded. “With my life, my lord, or I would not have told you all I have. Peggy? We all took stage names, and Margaret is my middle name, as Isabella is Amanda’s. Why the act? Think for a moment. All girls, or young ladies of the ton. All bored. Betrothed and ignored, or on the shelf and ignored. How else were we to extend our education? And Amanda’s situation was worse than most. She knew she was to be betrothed, but not until she was five-and-twenty. Until a short time ago, she was not even aware of to whom she had been promised. So she was marking time, knowing she could not live her life to the full. I was loving my life at Chattels but supposedly affianced, albeit to a very absent fiancé. The others? Not my story to tell. I have had Amanda’s permission to divulge her part in this if I needed to.” She stood, moved to the table, and handed him the champagne to open. “All this talk has made my mouth very dry.”
“A kiss may help.” With a dexterity born of familiarity, he deftly twisted the cork. Then, with a flourish, he filled two glasses, took a sip, and kissed her, allowing the foamy drink to spill from his mouth to hers. “Better?”
She swallowed even as she wished it was some other liquid filling her mouth. “For now, yes,” she agreed. “Where was I? Ah, yes. So I was living here but taking part in La Bella Isabella’s entertainments. Innocent innuendo, to titillate and intrigue jaded palates. We had fun, the men had erections. I believe several mistresses and wives gave thanks to the foreplay provided by La Bella Isabella and Her Dancing Girls. As Peggy, I had enjoyed our brief interlude when you and Harry helped Amanda but knew I could not appear to you as her and keep our secrets. After that chance meeting…” She stopped at the look of mischief on his face and felt her pulse race. “No accident?”
Charlie shook his head. “I stopped so many coaches it was a wonder I was not taken for a highwayman.” He laughed, and Caroline giggled.
“Oh dear, ah well, shall I say when a certain man stopped my coach, looked inside, uttered the word ‘Peggy,’ and on my denial for a moment seemed unhappy, I was determined to get to know your likes and tastes. I felt so wanton as I offered myself to you in Peggy’s stead. After that night, there was no turning back. I confess from then on I made sure I was, shall we say, available to a specific man, who I am sure lay in wait for a dark coach and enticed the occupant to enjoy games and dalliances at his accommodation. And I so enjoyed such games and dalliances, I wept for the romance and marriage I knew I would not have.”
She gave him a smile full of sadness. So much so that Charlie could not help but hold her tighter, kiss her, play with her hair. His hands moved lower. She eyed them, and then her mood changed. Mischievously, she swatted them away. “No wandering hands,” she remarked provocatively and wriggled closer to him as she did so. “Or wandering any other part of you.” His penis began to swell against her thigh. “I discovered how to pleasure a man without taking him inside me,” she continued. “How to kiss and caress his body. How to hold him and rub him until he spilled his seed. But never did I take that final step. I swore to my gentle partner that the only man I would ever let penetrate me would be the one I loved. I did not think that my fiancé was he.”
“But you knew I was your partner?” Charlie asked as he held her close.
“At first no, for it was dark when we met. When I realized, well.” She shrugged. “How better get to know you. And in some ways know you I did. You did not recognize me. All you saw was someone to dally with. Why should you see anything more? My hair was bright, my complexion improved, my figure had lost its girlish roundness. You gave me so much, but also so little. In all those months, you still did not try to meet me, Caroline, your betrothed. I felt betrayed, betrayed by myself.” She shuddered. “For I heard the tittle-tattle about you and the beautiful Lady Bathurst and knew while you buried yourself in her, I would not allow you to bury yourself in me.”
“Oh, my love, can you forgive me? She is now history.”
Caroline nodded. “I hope you tell the good lady that, Charlie, and soon. Because to forgive you, I need to forgive myself also. I let this thing between us happen. So when Amanda decided it was time to stop, I stopped also. Plotted how I would meet you, get to know you better, and decide whether we would wed or I would stand firm and say no.”
“The lady knows it was over once I met you again. And?” He looked at her; his anxiety showed in his clouded eyes. “I could show you, with my hands and body, how much I worship you, desire you. But that, I realize is not enough. I could come inside you, make you cry out for me, make you beg for release, but I accept that also is not enough. I could merely tell you how I feel, let you notice how my body aches for your touch. I could go further and say how I want to experience my penis filling you, stretching you, until I come inside you. See your body rounded with our child. See that child suckle at your breast as I long to suckle. But would that be enough?”
She muttered under her breath.
“Your pardon, I did not catch what you said.”
“I said,” she repeated loudly, profoundly affected by his words, “that it is a good start.”
He laughed. “But there is more, before I suit my actions to my words. I could, and do, say I love you. More than anything or anybody in the world. Except perhaps a long-haired witch called Peggy who stole my heart and kept it safe.”
“That’ll do,” said Caroline with scant regards to grammar. “Now suit your actions to your words.”
He did.
Other Books by Raven McAllan
Available from
Breathless Press
The Baronet’s Blackout Bombshell
Teaching Teacher
-
Coming December 2012
Two Titles in the
Freaky Flashes
Anthology
“Spin the Bottle”
“That Special Feeling”
The Ladies of London Series
The Perfect Gift
-
Coming December 2012
The Wilder Wood Series
The Rogue Scandals Series
In
The Protectors: The Blood Bar Chronicles
anthology
To Stop a War
Available as a
Free Story
:
B
IOGRAPHY
Raven lives in Scotland, along with her husband and their two cats—their children having flown the nest—surrounded by beautiful scenery, which inspires a lot of the settings in her books.
She is used to sharing her life with the occasional deer, red squirrel, and lost tourist, to say nothing of the scourge of Scotland—the midge.
Her very understanding, and long-suffering DH, is used to his questions unanswered, the dust bunnies greeting him as he walks through the door, and rescuing burned offerings from the Aga. (And passing her a glass of wine as she types furiously.)