This must be what Mr. Nightshade had meant by needing to lose my maidenhead before providing pleasure to men, because he was breathing heavily in my ear, the slap of our skin loud in the bedroom.
I drifted in and out of consciousness as more liquid filled me, running down my thighs now, feeling more relaxed than I ever had in my entire life, and I slept in sticky, luxurious pleasure.
And then some time later, I was woken with the ice cold shock of my guardian’s words.
“Now, of course, we will have to be married.”
CHAPTER 3
Deliverance
Ijerked upright even though my head was pounding.
“What?Why?You were just helping me remove my maidenhead for another man.”
He raised an eyebrow. “After you seduced me last night, there is no option to preserve your virtue other than marrying you. And I am nothing if not an honorable man.”
“Iseducedyou?” I asked, horrified. “Surely–surely not–”
But as I tried to remember what exactly had happened, Mr. Gideon Nightshade was hauling me upright and I realized I was still in my dirty, black mourning dress from yesterday.
He was pulling me after him downstairs as I rubbed my eyes and tried to remember through the headache pounding spikes into my brain. Surelyhehad been the one who had suggested taking my maidenhead? I did remember unfortunately stumbling into his naked arms, but that had been an accident.
To my shock, the proceedings seemed to be already arranged down in the tavern, and the ceremony itself was a blur. The parson was a very dirty man who looked like he’d been hauled in from the fields, and he was protesting that he was unable to do the service, but my guardian did not take no for an answer, insisting through gritted teeth that he pronounce the words.
I did not even remember saying the words “I do,” before I was whisked away by Mr. Nightshade, and we were in the carriage again.
The last thing I saw of the Ploughman’s Lunch was a pretty red-haired barmaid waving her handkerchief after us, her lips looking plumped-up and swollen, and a strange wet spot on her apron.
“I’m so sorry,” I said sincerely to my new husband.
What on earth had I been thinking? I had acted very wrongly. It must have been that ratafia! Papa had been right after all. It had made me act like a she-devil.
What if he resented me? My guardian was a very important and powerful man and perhaps he would be angry at marrying a penniless orphan.
“But there was no call at all for you to do that. No one here knows us. I suppose what we did was very improper, but no one would know of our indiscretion.”
His dark eyes were inscrutable.
"Well, you are Mrs. Nightshade now," he said. “Be sure that you don’t spread your legs so easily for men who ask in future. Your cunny belongs to me now.”
There was a stinging, warm sensation between my legs at his words, and it was not quite comfortable to sit down.
“Despite this—unusual beginning, I promise to be a good wife to you,” I said.
My new husband’s eyes looked sardonic, and I couldn’t see what he found amusing.
“See that you do,” was all he replied, and when he brought out the newspaper I tried not to ask him all the thousand questions I wanted about my new life at Grayspires. But I couldn’t help the flicker of excitement in my breast.
I was amarriedwoman now.
In the afternoon, I got my first glimpse of the moors, passing from neat and tidy farmlands to something much wilder–grassy fields cut with sharp, jagged protrusions of stone and rock.
I gripped the window and let my eyes drink in my new home. But how far away was Grayspires?
I thought my new husband was asleep, but suddenly I felt a hard hand on my back, and he was pressing down on my waist and tipping up my bottom, knocking my thighs wide so he could have access to my very sore cunt.
There was no way to leave the carriage, but I had no chance to protest that he hadn’t even asked permission before his cock was buried deep inside my cunny.
