Hey All - I've not posted in a while and decided to post a little free story for you all. The first chapter is below I hope you all enjoy it and let me have any feedback you have. All being well I will post a new chapter every week.
Shara
Chapter One
He pressed the full length of his body against her. The hard length of his erection nestled against her stomach. Georgetta looked into his eyes, and gasped at the raw need reflected back at her. This could not be happening. The man of her dreams wanted her. She bit her lower lip and agonised over her next decision.
He’d courted her, done everything right, but now did not want to wait for them to be married. His expression, of need and want, urgently rang loudly in her ears. She couldn’t shake the gossip about the tun of his roguish behaviour. She knew her plain features and average body didn’t attract the kind of man who would make the most modest of women swoon.
Georgetta had been unwilling to acknowledge the salacious rumours about Drake only courting her to secure her fortune. Now it would seem these rumours were true. He would compromise her and use blackmail of her lost virtue to restore his coffers.
Her prospects of a husband maybe bleak, for she had lost count of the number of seasons she’d attended, but she would not allow him or any man to use that against her. She would rather be a dried up old spinster than succumb to the whim of this man.
It had not escaped her notice that his eyes always sort out the red haired beauty from the North. His harsh angles softened, he almost appeared wistful upon looking at her. Inwardly, she sighed. Did any of it matter? Just for one night Georgetta ached to feel loved and cherished. She needed to feel, to know the hard plains of a man’s body pressed against hers, hot and sweaty in the throes of passion.
She shook her head. No, none of it was worth it. If she didn’t give him the fortune she was so convinced he wanted, the embarrassment and humiliation bestowed on her parents would kill her mother. She, herself, would be permanently exiled to the country and if lucky would be married to a local land owner who mayhap had not heard of her ruination. No, as the Earl of Wellsley’s daughter, her station demanded more.
A shiver ran down her spine, and it had nothing to do with the chill of the night but the light brush of his finger tips caressing her cheek. Laughter infiltrated her thoughts. Another couple had wandered out on to the patio previously unnoticed. Drake attempted to push her further into the shadows, but Georgetta was not going to allow him to hide her in the darkness of the night like some guilty little secret.
“No, I will not be forced into something I am not ready to commit to. Let me pass Lord Winston.” She forcibly whispered and placed a gloved hand on his chest to halt any further movement.
He held her hand in place with both his. “Can you not feel the way my heart beats for you? The need to have you is driving me to distraction.”
A blush tinged her cheeks. She so wanted to believe the sugar coated words he fed her, but age and experience had taught her to be more cautious. Too many gullible women had fallen for the likes of men of Drake Winston’s calibre. She pulled her hand away and skirted around him.
“It would be nice to have the luxury for one night to believe the words you choose to bestow upon me, but I do not fool myself, Sir. I know I am not a desirable woman. Nor am I marriage material for a man such as you. I beg that you would kindly leave me be.” Georgetta’s heart beat harshly in her throat, swallowing became difficult. She turned to walk away from him. Tears stung her eyes. The despair at being used, assailed her.
A hand gripped her arm and spun her around. Disorientated, she teetered briefly before she fell against the hard wall of his chest. Before she had chance to disengage her herself, his arms clamped her to him and held her rigid.
“What devilry is this you accuse me of, Good Lady?”
Georgetta refused to meet his gaze, the agitation in his voice far too evident for her comfort. She pulled back in a vain attempt to free herself from his grasp, but he held fast and any further endeavour would only bring on the attention of others.
“It is no devilry, Sir, only the truth I speak,” she spoke through gritted teeth.
He took her further into the shadows, amusement etched in his voice, “Feisty. I always knew there to be untouched passion amongst the prim and proper façade you like to portray. ‘Tis that passion I long to experience, to immerse myself in. To revel in the soft downiness of your very womanly curves, to find all the untapped treasures you choose to hide. You are truly a woman of worth, one who deserves to be cherished.”
His hand made circular movements against the small of her back. The brief touch sending a burning heat to her very core, Georgetta’s breath hitched.
“Desist in your flowery words, for they do not move me. I am not a woman to be easily led. I do not lay with a man because he flatters. I will not be toyed with.”
“Ah, is it you think I toy with your affections? That I seek to besmirch your name?”
His manly scent surrounded her. Her head swam at the very dominance his presence held over her. Strong arms still encased her body, gentle caresses sought to soothe away her fears. The air thinned and she tried to clear her mind from the devastation of his nearness.
“Answer me woman!” His abruptness sent her reeling. Never had he used this intonation before. His impatience bordered on anger and brought to mind the very reality of his dangerous reputation. She held rigid, denying the way his body’s proximity engulfed her senses.
“Do not speak to me in such a manner, Sir, for I am not a servant to be ordered at whim. Now unhand me and lets’ not partake in these childish games any further. We are both too long of tooth to suffer such pretences.” Iciness infused her words. She hoped it would be enough for him to release her and desist in his endeavours. He grasped her chin in his hand and lifted her face to meet his.
“You think me some child. Someone who would partake in wasting time on a venture and fail, then little do you know me woman.” Pure savagery evident at her accusation, “For I have never embarked on anything deemed futile. I would advise you hold your tongue before I am forced to show you how ‘childish’ I can be.”
“Then you admit that you are a part of some folly with my emotions.” His hand still held her face and he lower his head to a mere breath away from hers.
“I admit to no such shenanigans and you would do well to cease your babbling, woman. For it is only the fact that I hold you in high esteem, that I do not take you over my knee and paddle your lush behind, for your accursed claim.” Her gasp at his words broke through the otherwise stillness of the night.
“You would not dare do such a thing.”
“I most certainly would. Never before have I let a woman speak to me in such a manner. How is it I allow you too, hmm?” His lips whispered against her ear, and trailed down her neck sending shockwaves of delicious heat through her veins.
Georgetta’s mind clouded, she couldn’t think straight. Her body wracked in feeling and urges she’d never before dreamt of. Desperately, she tried to bring herself back to the matter at hand. What had she been about to say to him?
“Hmm, Georgetta why do you think I allow you to treat me this way?” His breath across her skin sent fissions of electricity down her spine. Goosebumps broke out on her heated flesh. Think, Georgetta, think. You cannot allow this man to distract you. She bit back a moan of sheer pleasure as he delicately nipped her skin.
“You wish something from me I am not prepared to give.” She bit her bottom lip, startled at how husky her voice sounded.
* * * * *
Drake inhaled, wallowing in this enigmatic woman in his arms. The heady scent of Jasmine assailed him and his cock twitched. He shifted his stance in an attempt to alleviate the way his breeches rubbed. How could it be? Why did this plain, average woman affect him so?
“Ah, Georgetta, you will give me all I desire and sooner than you mayhap think.”
The taste and smell of her were driving him insane with want. He desired nothing more than to lift her gown and plunge into her warm silky depths. Raw need and lust for her burned through to his very soul. He convinced himself that she’d bewitched him.
“I will give thee nothing.” She pushed against his chest and freed herself from his hold. He shivered at the loss of her body against his.
“What foolish talk is this? You know my intentions towards you. I have been nothing but honest. Have I not courted you in all matters correct for this last month?” Bemusement and anger were barely restrained.
“You have courted me proper, when it suited you to do so. But I know truly where your heart lies and it is not with me. So I beg of you again, leave me be, I will not be a pawn in your games.”
Drake ran a hand through his hair. She drove him near insane with this incoherent drivel. He grabbed her wrist before she had a chance to escape him.
“What do you mean ‘when it suited me’? You know where my heart lies.” If he didn’t hunger for her, the way a parched man craves but one drop of water then he would not persist in pursuit.
“You insult me Sir, with your assumed naivety of my intelligence. I may be dried up, with little chance of a husband of worth. But I would much rather be in my current situation then taken by a man such as your self for nothing more than my fortune. Now will you not release me and neither one of us will speak of this again.”
She tugged at his hand, with a look of hope etched on her face, that he would release her. He could not and would not free her from him. To do so would mean he would abandon the last vestige of his heart. His childhood and debauched past had closed him off from feeling anything but inconsequential emotions. His father’s ailing health and the knowledge he would soon be Earl, had led Drake on a quest of a wife.
One who would perform adequately within her assigned duties and would not impede his lifestyle. Being his last attempt at proving he had become a son of worth, he never thought he would find a woman who would entrap him. Her words of lost fortune and self-deprecation echoed around his head. Nothing of what she said made any sense to him.
“I will not release you, not until you explain your words.”
“Very well, if you insist, but I had hoped to save some of what is left of my pride.” He watched her shoulders slump and her very life and soul seemed to vanished on an exhaled breathe. “I have it from a reliable source that you do not seek to court me for myself. Not that I would blame you in any way, I know I am not anything to look at and a woman men of your status deemed dowdy. You seek to discredit me and then stoop to blackmail to replenish your lost coffers. For I, above most, cannot afford to lose what little face I have in society as it is.”
Drake reared back and dropped her arm. He could not have been more stunned if someone had taken him on the blind side with an uppercut. Coffers? He had not lost his fortune, quite the contrary his coffers were expanding greatly, due to secret business dealings.
“I see that my babbling, as you call it, was not off the mark. I would thank you greatly if you did not seek to keep my company any longer Sir. Tis bad enough I have already been made a fool of, without further damning myself to ridicule.”
Paralysed. Drake couldn’t move, couldn’t speak. A probe darted through his mind in search of a logical response to her statement. Georgetta moved away from him, back to the light of the patio doors and the ballroom beyond. He reached for her, but too late. With as much gusto as he could muster he beseeched his voice to work.
“Georgetta! It is…”
She stopped walking and looked back at him over her shoulder. He held his breath and waited. He could see dampness on her cheek. Crying, this strong woman cried and he had caused it. Pain racked his chest, the pit of his stomach hollowed. Nothing matter any longer.
“Please my Lord, do not tarry with me any longer, it can be of no further benefit to you. The night is still young and your red-haired beauty still awaits you.”
Rooted to the spot Drake couldn’t move or speak. Red-haired beauty, what in god’s name did she mean? And who could be spreading such vile rumours about him and a so called lost fortune?
Anger overflowed, releasing him from his trance. He marched toward the ballroom with no other thoughts then to find the culprit and convince Georgetta of his innocent. He’d be damned if he were to let some blaggard let the only woman he truly had feelings for, evade him.
