Page 49 of The Baronet’s Bartered Bride

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

Henry Jock sat on a stool in the public room of The George, surrounded by a knot of men listening with fascination to his every word. The heavy exposed beams of the ceiling hung low over the room. The peat in the hearth puffed smoke and the scent of rich loam, which overpowered the odor of unwashed male bodies. Joseph caught the end of the tale as he made his way to the bar.

“—and by the time his lordship makes his way up on Blue Diamond, there he sees me, sittin’ in the stands with his lady, just as I said I would be. Thought he would try to strangle me with his bare hands afore the judges could hand out the plate.” The groom grinned.

His audience roared with appreciative laughter at this. Someone slapped Jock on the shoulder and ordered him another pint.

“King o’ Newmarket,” said another, shaking his head. “Shame about the stumps.” He looked morosely at Jock’s legs, dangling crookedly from the stool. “Damned shame.”

“Hasn’t hurt me with the ladies none,” Jock said, accepting the fresh glass of ale.

His audience roared and hooted exclamations of encouragement, accompanied by more back-slapping.

“I thought owners rode their horses in the big races.” Joseph inserted himself into the group without preamble, and with a dose of ill humor he instantly regretted. No sense bringing his blue devils on anyone else.

“Some do.” Jock nodded. “But my Marquess never had a good seat, as like to fall off as cast up his accounts, no matter how smooth the goer. So he promises me a share of the purse, and I takes it.”

Given the size of the prizes for a well-attended race, Jock would be a wealthy man, if he hadn’t gambled all his coin. Or spent it on doctoring.

“Surprised they let you keep your sticks,” Joseph said. “Would have thought the surgeon would have had ’em off you.”

Jock shrugged. “Sawbones thought I was for the earth bath so didn’t choose to squander his time. Turns out I pulled through.” He took a long draught of ale.

The other men moved off to form their own group, uninterested in the conversation now that it had taken a darker turn. Or unwilling to rub elbows with a man introduced as a baronet, part of the overclass they would mock and complain about amongst themselves. Joseph’s vault up the social ladder had shut him out of the company of those below.

He took one of the vacated stools next to the groom and stared glumly at the pint the barkeep shoved over the scarred and nocked countertop toward him.

“And I have to ask you to pay for that,” he remarked to Jock. “As you’re currently holding my purse.”

“Whyn’t ye upstairs tuppin’ your lady?”

Joseph scowled into his cup. “She’s not a lightskirt.”

“Doesn’t mean ye can’t have a good tumble. All the better if she likes ye some.”

Joseph tipped a long swallow into his mouth. He couldn’t recall the advice from his university days. Was ale not to be consumed after wine, or was the concern over stronger spirits? He didn’t care if he was sick as a dog tomorrow. He likely deserved it.

He supposed he was to chide Jock for talking about Inez as if she were a loose woman. He dragged a hand across the back of his mouth. “You think she fancies me?”

If he’d seen Inez, standing in that room gloriously nude with only her stockings and garters. A goddess come to earth to strike mortals blind with her beauty.

Or drive them blind with lust. And despair, once they knew they were unworthy.

Jock snorted. “Are ye blind, man? The lures that un’s been casting at you? She wouldn’t hear of going back to London without you. Me, I’d’ve stopped along the way to find a room in broad daylight for the two of us. Or a nice fresh hayloft would do as well.”

Joseph glowered at him. “She’s not—she’s…” Not a lady. She was a servant. She was the daughter of a whore, and he’d found her at a brothel. A rather infamous brothel, truth be known.

So why wouldn’t he simply take what she freely offered? Any red-blooded man would. The memory of her body gave him a cockstand again. The dark nipples tipping her generous breasts. The tuck of her waist and the flare of her hips. The pocket of dark curls in the glorious V between her legs. Just the thought of being inside her blotted every other scrap of sense from his mind.

He was going to spend in his breeches from the idea of her. How green could he be?

You’ve never been with a woman, have you? You don’t know what to do.

That wasn’t entirely accurate. He knew how it worked, the mechanics of the act. Of a certain there was pleasure. He could guess that from how much effort his friends and acquaintances expended in getting a female to lift her skirts and permit them that paradise.

It was just he was shite at it, and that was his curse.

“She is a woman under my protection.” He settled on that. One shred of gentlemanly dignity left to him. He was not a Reuben, not that, at least.