Page 8 of How to Lose a Dowry in Three Bucks
And that’s when the carriage’s wheels slowed as they pulled into the portico attached to his townhouse.Damn and blast, he thought, wishing they could play their erotic, torturous game forever.
As Matt handed Sophia down from the carriage, he deftly removed her glove and surreptitiously placed her hand over his leaking, clothed cock.
“It’s big,” she whispered so the coachmen wouldn’t hear as they drove away. Mrs. Simonet was already making her way into the house. They had just a few moments before this improper interlude would descend into something far more ruinous.
“I got hard watching you,” he confessed, honesty appropriate in this moment.
She moved her hand over him until it proved tortuous. Matt gently plucked her hand off and tucked it in his arm while they walked into the house.
If this were an experienced woman with no fear of men, he’d have told her to lock her door tonight if she didn’t want a dangerous giant to visit her bed. It would have given them both an erotic thrill, but it felt unseemly because of the disclosures she’d made about her mother’s history.
When Matt bade her good night at the bottom of the stairs, he realized he needn’t say anything; her alert, aroused face showed she knew he wanted to take her.
He needed to take himself off on some contrived estate business, or Miss Stafford would find herself pinned and filled in ways she couldn’t even understand right now. Perhaps if he attended to some ongoing canal work in Bouldon, she’d turn twenty-five, convert her dowry, and wisely flee his house in the meantime.
Matt had a sinking feeling it wouldn’t go according to plan, but he resolved to try it anyway.
Chapter 6
By the time Peverelreturned to London one week later, Sophia had assumed he was never coming back. For days, she’d felt ashamed — she thought he’d fled to an estate on some spurious mission because he was mortified at being seen dancing with a dowdy spinster, then engaging in what could only be described as a lewd moment outside his townhouse.
A lewd moment she very much enjoyed, which made his rejection sting all the more.
And then something cast Matthew Bohun from her mind completely: the disastrous birthday visit to her grandfather’s solicitor.
She’d assumed triumph and even wore fresh flowers from the earl’s backyard garden to the meeting. Perhaps, away from the danger and scrutiny of society, she might finally bloom.
But when an assistant showed her in to see Mr. Wortley, her request to convert the dowry, as stipulated in the will, seemed to surprise him.
You see, the will, well, it provides for the unlikely conversion to an annuity, yes, but only in cases of complete unmarriageability,he’d said.
Your clerk told me — in writing — that reaching the age of twenty-five without having been married would satisfy that clause,she replied, trying not to grow hysterical.
The small man had looked at her over his glasses, his expression not unkind.
My dear, this is not the time of Romeo and Juliet, no matter what young Smithers thinks. Twenty-five years of age is not disqualifying for an heiress of your magnitude. No court in the land would rule you unmarriageable, even if you attempt to dim your light, Miss Stafford. I would be remiss to release the funds.
It was a blow. This man had not only denied her the most elegant solution to the problem of her safety, but he’d also indicated that her attempts to remain unnoticed were transparent to at least one man.
She’d ripped the flowers apart in the carriage, blaming them for the solicitor’s insights and blaming their owner for leaving her so very alone in the darkest moment of her life. Before hereyes, future horrors flashed, and by the time she returned to the Peverel townhouse, a mighty headache had taken hold.
Sophia took to her bed, refused food, and watched the door in fear.
***
When someone knocked on the door three days later, Sophia didn’t bother responding. And then she realized the knocks came from a connecting door and not the hallway.
“Who—”
The door burst open, and there he was, his hair disheveled as if he’d just come in from a ride. Sophia should have felt fear — this was precisely the incursion she feared, was it not? — but her heart rose at the sight of him.
“I leave you mere days and receive reports you’ve taken to your bed and have been refusing food. Did you miss me so very much?”
Sophia sputtered, aghast that he might interpret her blue devils as somehow related to his absence. Without her realizing, he’d taken the opportunity to slip a dressing gown over her chemise. He was lifting her from the bed when Sophia stilled him with a hand to his chest.
“What’s this about?” she asked, her eyes wide.
“Mrs. Simonet wrote to me. An express. The housemaids are in an uproar over your uncleaned room. Staff are very hard to secure these days, I’ll have you know, and I won’t have you depriving me of help simply because you missed me desperately.”
