My Naughty Minette (Properly Spanked Book 3) Page 13

  Arlington barked out a laugh. “He’s got you there.”

  Warren tugged crossly at one of his cuffs. “Wait until you marry, Arlington. You’ll have the worst time of any of us, deservedly so, after all your taunting and holier-than-thou lecturing, which amounts to nothing whatsoever, since you’ve never actually had to wrangle a wife.”

  “Let’s go join the ladies in the library,” Townsend said, cutting in. “Otherwise I fear we shall come to blows. Will the lot of you be staying for dinner?” He frowned, glowering at each of them in turn. “You’re invited if you can manage not to snap off one another’s heads.”

  *** *** ***

  Minette gawked, staring over Josephine’s shoulder at a spare drawing of a lady sandwiched between three astoundingly virile gentlemen. “What is she doing?” Minette asked. “Why is her head down there?”

  Josephine giggled. “Oral pleasures.”

  “Oral pleasures? It looks like a lot of work to do with one’s tongue.” Minette held the book closer, but she still couldn’t figure out where the lady’s tongue actually was.

  “There are all sorts of things one can do with one’s tongue during love play,” said Aurelia, as Josephine dissolved in more laughter.

  “And gentlemen expect this? To be caressed by their wives’ tongues?” Minette was rather taken aback by the drawings in Lord Townsend’s collection of erotic books. She wasn’t inexperienced. She wasn’t a virgin, and she’d been kissed more than once, but she was puzzled by just about everything she saw.

  “Gentlemen enjoy a great many things that would surprise you,” said Aurelia. “Josephine, I wish you would stop giggling. This is important. If Minette is to capture August’s attentions, she must—”

  “Must what? View the most perverse collection of leaflets and sketches in the world? Honestly, Aurelia, where did Townsend procure these?”

  Aurelia gave a sigh. “It’s probably better not to ask. And don’t think Warren doesn’t have a collection like this also. Sorry,” she added as Minette shuddered.

  Minette knew her brother was no celibate—Josephine’s giggling testified to that—but it was difficult to imagine him, or Josephine, or Townsend and Aurelia, or anyone participating in these carnal and abandoned acts. She turned the page, to find a couple teasing one another’s sexual parts with ostrich feathers. The lady’s expression was one of transported bliss. The gentleman stood ready to impale her with his massive shaft. Had August’s been that grotesquely large?

  “Are all gentlemen made this way?” she asked, pointing at the protuberance. “So thick and distended?”

  “They exaggerate the size in these books,” said Josephine. “Just as all the women are tall and voluptuous to an extreme.” She looked at Minette in puzzlement. “I thought you would know... Well, I’m sure it’s none of my business, but I thought you and August had already...”

  “We did, once,” said Minette with a sigh. “But it was dark, and I don’t remember it very well. I mainly recall that it felt quite wonderful for some time, and then all of a sudden hurt very awfully. I’m certain he didn’t mean to hurt me, but he’s not, you know, small, as small as perhaps a man ought to be, and so it was quite a squeeze to fit.” She buried her flaming face in another book. How was she to entice her husband when any thought of sexual congress made her stammer and blush?

  “It gets better,” said Aurelia. “The first time is always an awful squeeze. But then you become used to that filled-up feeling and it comes to feel rather grand. Did he touch you other places, and make you feel warm and excited?”

  “Oh, yes.” Minette’s cheeks were about to catch fire. “He knew just what to do. He was so much more confident than me.”

  “Well, he’s had more practice,” Josephine said with an unladylike snort. Aurelia gave her a silencing look, which Minette very much appreciated. She didn’t like to think of August’s other women, women like Esme, who were more sensual and experienced than Minette could ever hope to be.

  “I think our encounter must have been awful for him, because he hasn’t touched me since,” said Minette.

  “Oh, my dear,” said Josephine, stroking her hair. “It has nothing to do with you, and everything to do with August’s mixed-up feelings about you being a sister. Warren isn’t helping, I’m sure, hovering over you like a protective hawk. August will do his duty eventually, and when he does, he’ll be sorry he held you at arms’ length for so long, because you are warm and beautiful and accepting and perfect.”

  “Yes, and you won’t need to depend on a repertoire of lewd tricks to capture his heart.” Aurelia turned to the next page, featuring another thrusting, exaggerated organ being serviced by an eager—and naked—servant girl’s mouth. “I mean, they are nice tricks to know, and it’s good to be informed, because men enjoy all sorts of abandoned things. Ladies too. None of it is wrong.”

  “No, none of it is wrong,” agreed Josephine. “As long as you and your husband enjoy it.”

  On the next page, an amply figured woman sat on a gentleman’s face, while she stroked another woman’s quim. The man’s thing was sticking up, thick and swollen, with drops coming out of the tip, and the one woman was pinching the other’s breasts. “The thing is...” Minette narrowed her eyes at the drawing. “I don’t understand how any of this makes babies.”

  Josephine erupted in another bout of laughter, so Aurelia was obliged to clap a hand over her mouth. “Josie, hush. Do you want them to come and discover us? We ought to put all these books away. Townsend doesn’t mind me looking at them, but I’m supposed to ask his permission first.”

  “Put them away?” cried Minette. “But I still don’t know how to make August want me.”

  “Oh, goodness, you didn’t expect to learn that in these books.” Aurelia took her hand. “Listen, dear. Marriages take time to sort out. You mustn’t believe it’s some lack in you that—”

  The door swung open, and four gentlemen, including her husband, entered the library. All four regarded them, huddled on the floor around the open cabinet, with piles of bawdy volumes and drawings spread out in a scandalous display.

  Townsend grimaced as if he meant to look stern but couldn’t quite manage it. “Why, I believe the ladies have stumbled across my private collection of books.”

  “You keep them in the library?” asked Warren.

  “You said they were talking about babies and nurseries,” August accused. “And here they are, leafing through your illicit novels.”

  Aurelia hurriedly closed up the books and collected the drawings into a pile. Minette thought one of them ought to speak, and make some excuse, but what excuse could they make? They were handily caught in the act.

  “Is that what those were?” said Josephine, pretending surprise. “Illicit novels?”

  “Josephine Bernard!” snapped Warren. “Don’t make it worse. It’s obvious what the three of you were doing.”

  “Reading?” she said in an innocent tone.

  “Help me put them away,” Aurelia hissed to her friend.

  Minette could say and do nothing. August glared at her from across the library. You’re not to look at any more volumes of a lewd sort. It’s not proper for a lady. He’d said that to her yesterday, and mere hours later, she was caught in the act. It was only that she’d confided to Aurelia and Josephine about her visit to Esme, and the instructive books that August had taken away, which led Aurelia to reveal that Townsend had just such a collection of books, although Townsend’s books were more numerous, more visually oriented, and much more explicit.

  “I don’t think we’ll be staying for dinner,” said Warren, scowling at her and Josephine both. Minette might have pitied Josephine, who was surely going to be punished when they returned to Park Street, if she was not so fearful of punishment herself.

  “I don’t think we’ll stay for dinner either,” said August in a hard voice. Blast.

  The Duke of Arlington watched all of this with haughty amusement. Minette had always liked Arlington, and wished he would intercede on their behalf. Couldn’t a duke tell a couple of earls what to do? Perhaps forbid them to spank their wives?

  From the look on Lord Townsend’s face, Aurelia was in for it too.

  “I apologize for the reprehensible smut your wives have been exposed to,” said Townsend. “Aurelia, why on earth did you get it out?”

  Aurelia slid a look at Minette. Please, please, don’t tell him it was my idea. But otherwise her friend might be blamed.

  “It was my fault,” said Minette quickly, before Aurelia could speak.

  “No, it was not,” Aurelia insisted. “I suggested it. It was my fault.”

  “It was my fault,” said Josephine. “It was entirely my idea. Neither of you is to blame.”

  Arlington threw back his head and laughed. “It’s not the end of the world, chaps. So they were looking at some ribald drawings. All of us have done the same. Sometimes a lady’s curiosity can get the best of her, eh?” He winked at the three of them, looking so much like a piratical Viking that Minette smiled.

  Her smile faded as August’s frown deepened and he crossed his arms over his chest. Minette wished she might go home with His Grace rather than her husband, who looked very irritated indeed.

  “I didn’t even know you were here,” she said to him, with a touch of sullen pique.

  “I’m here,” he said. “Now, stand up and tell your friends goodbye. We’re returning to Barrymore House.”

  Minette took Aurelia and Josephine’s hands, squeezed them and whispered “I’m sorry.” She got to her feet, smoothing out her dress so she didn’t have to look at her brother as she walked to her husband’s side. All of this was terribly embarrassing, but surely not as awful as what was to come.

  Chapter Eleven: Disturbed

  They arrived home in the midst of some crisis with August’s father. Lady Barrymore was crying, the servants were running around trying to be helpful, and Minette was ordered to go to her room.

  “Why can’t I help too?” she asked. “Why am I always sent away?”

  “Do not anger me further,” her husband said tightly. “Go.”

  And so Minette went, slinking upstairs in shame. This was not at all how she had pictured a marriage to August, and nothing she tried seemed to make things better. All she wanted was a smile, an affectionate glance. Something besides lectures and sharply spoken orders to go to her room.

  When he came to her an hour or so later, she searched his features for any tenderness, any husbandly regard at all, but there was nothing. Only irritation. She stood and faced him with her back to the wall.

  “Well?” he said by way of greeting. “What have you to say about your activities at Townsend’s today?”

  She clasped her hands in front of her. “I’ll begin by saying that I’m completely finished looking at lewd engravings. The lot of it is outrageous and not helpful to me at all. Why, some of it is patently ridiculous, not that I’m criticizing Lord Townsend’s tastes—”

  “I told you already that you were finished looking at it,” he said, cutting her off. “Don’t you remember?”

  Oh dear. She took a deep breath. “Yes. I do remember you telling me not to look at any more naughty books. I can’t explain why I disobeyed you. Perhaps because I’ve always been curious to a fault. I don’t deny it, and it’s gotten me into cartloads of trouble over the years.” She took a step sideways as her husband approached her. “But I regret very much going against your command. I’m terribly sorry that all your gentlemen friends, including my brother, came upon the three of us behaving in such an unladylike fashion and looking at such...unladylike...” She dug in her heels as he took her arm. “Such unladylike literature,” she spit out. “From now on, it’s nothing but tracts on moral philosophy and...religion...and household management for me. Oh!”

  She tried to resist as he pulled her to a nearby chair, but he was far stronger, and all too handily she found herself turned over his lap. He pushed her skirts up, exposing her bottom to the cool air. “Oh, please, I’ve said I was sorry.” His thighs felt hard and unforgiving against her stomach. She reached to brace herself against the floor. “Please, I wish you wouldn’t spank me.”

  “Last time you disobeyed me, I promised the next time you wouldn’t be able to sit down.”

  “But...oh...oww! That will mean an awfully long and hard spanking.”

  His only answer was a growl.

  Minette cried out as his palm rained down on her bottom. She had believed the paddle must hurt more than anything on earth, but she’d been wrong. His hand was large and firm and hard, and he walloped her in such a steady fashion she could barely catch her breath. The pain quickly mounted to an unbearable burn. She squirmed and tried to pull away, but he wrapped an arm about her waist and cinched her against his thighs.

  Now she couldn’t move an inch, couldn’t do anything but kick her legs in helpless torment. “Oh, please. Ouch! That hurts! I’m certain you wouldn’t want to leave me bruised.”

  “Hush and stop kicking.”

  Stop kicking? How was she to do that in the midst of this awful pain? “I did not even enjoy looking at those books,” she wailed. “You’re punishing me for something I’ll definitely never do again.”

  “I’m punishing you for being disobedient, and embarrassing me in front of my friends.” The spanks never stopped as he scolded her. He reddened the sides of her buttocks, the center, the bottom curves, over and over until her whole backside felt on fire. “I’m going to tell my brother,” she said in desperation. “If you don’t stop, I’ll tell Warren.”

  “Warren is busy blistering Josephine’s bottom right now, just as Townsend is doubtless spanking Aurelia. Because of you, I might add. You earned this spanking and you’re damned well going to take it. Now keep your hands down, and if you kick your legs again, I’m going for the paddle and starting over.”

  Minette realized she’d dug her fingers into August’s leg. She put her hands back on the floor but it was impossible to lie still as he punished her backside. Her whole arse ached with a stinging, wretched pain, but it wasn’t as bad as the pain of knowing he disapproved of her so thoroughly.

  “Please stop. Please, I’ll do anything, if you’ll just stop being angry. I’ll do anything you ask, if you’ll just...” Love me. Even in the throes of her pain and panic, she didn’t dare say it. She didn’t dare ask for his love because she was terrified of him saying no. “Ow. Ohh. Please, I want to be a good wife. I can’t bear this. I don’t want you to hate me.”

  His hand stopped. The arm at her waist loosened. She bit back a sob, afraid to look up at him while she was in this state. The throb in her bottom seemed to beat along with her racing heart. “I don’t hate you,” he said gruffly. “Why would you say such a thing?”

  “I know you didn’t want to marry me. I know you don’t want me for your wife.” She could barely speak through the emotion choking her throat. “I know you wish for a different wife, but if you’ll only tell me what to do, I’ll try to be... I’ll try to be whoever you want. I’ll be whatever you want if you’ll only tell me. Because I don’t know!”

  His palm rested heavily across her bottom. Her skin was so heated from the punishment that his hand felt cool. With an abrupt movement, he lifted her and put her on her feet. She was relieved at the respite, but somewhere along the way she had completely lost her composure. She fought for breath, for calm, as she gazed into his eyes. He looked stern and displeased as ever.

  “I’m sorry,” she said. “I only want everything to be all right between us, and I don’t know what to do. I wish I could be a pleasing wife, so you aren’t always frowning and sending me to my room. That’s why I talked to Esme, and Aurelia and Josephine, and looked at those books. I don’t want you to see me as a child.” Her voice rose in anguish. “I want to be your proper wife.”

  His hazel eyes narrowed as he leaned forward in the chair. “You think if you learn lewd sexual acts you’ll be a proper wife?”

  “Perhaps.” She rubbed her bottom through her skirts. “I don’t want you to see me as a sister, or some naughty child to spank over your lap. I want to entice you. I don’t want you to go to Esme for...those things.”

  “I won’t go to Esme anymore,” he said, leaning back again. “Now that she’s met you, she’s fallen in love with you like everyone else and told me to find my pleasure elsewhere.”

  She let out a shuddery breath, staring at the fine knot in her husband’s cravat. “I could give you pleasure if you’d let me. If you could bear to...” She couldn’t look him in the face. “I’m sorry it’s me you had to marry. But maybe, if you closed your eyes...”

  “Minette, please.” His voice sounded so tortured and miserable that tears filled her eyes.

  “I’m not a child,” she said through the blurry haze. Desperation made her bold. She thought of the drawings she’d looked at, the voluptuous women and the thrusting men. There had been spanking in the books too, with whips and birch rods. Was her husband one of the men who became aroused by such things? She’d take any arousal she could get. She put her fingers on the buttons of August’s breeches, and he didn’t stay her hand. Beneath the fabric, she could see the burgeoning outline of his manhood.

  She said a silent prayer to the god of well-meaning wives, and freed the first button from its loop.

  *** *** ***

  August felt curiously out of breath. Not from the spanking. He could have spanked her another hour, and probably should have, but then she had begun to sob, and speak of him hating her.

  God, he’d made Minette believe he hated her. It was a horrible thing.

  He hadn’t been paying attention. He’d been so caught up in his own crises and misgivings that he hadn’t considered how his actions would seem through her eyes. She thought he hated her. Now she was leaning over him, undoing his breeches, and he felt too guilty to make her stop.

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