For the Earl's Taking

  FOR THE EARL’S TAKING

  LISA TORQUAY

  2012

  Photo: Passion – James Griffin Illustration – www.jamesgriffin.org

  Sarah Barrow is fresh from the countryside to find a job as a servant in Lord and Lady Hawkmore's London house. Upon meeting the impossibly handsome Earl, she feels inexorably drawn to him.

  The instant Hugh lays eyes on Sarah, he feels a gut-wrenching attraction for her. He gets so taken with her that he forgets his position, his cold marriage and his need to produce an heir. But society conventions prevent him from making her his mistress. All he can do is have clandestine volcanic nights with her.

  Sarah is not a pushover, even though she has to remain meek to keep her job. Destiny will set in, changing her life dramatically.

  Sensuality level: sensuous, sizzling.

  PROLOGUE

  Her eyes snapped open in the dark of the night. A step in the wooden stair. Him. Her heart skipped a beat and went into overdrive. Not fear. Not apprehension. Her blood raced in her veins. Another step and her breasts peaked. Coming up, as he did almost every night. As she waited every single night. The steps reached the top. She gulped oxygen into her anxious lungs. The door opened and fire melted in her centre. As it always happened since he started coming, those months ago. He brought her a piece of paradise. A taste of sweetness. A relief after each hard working day.

  As the door came ajar, a candlelight lit her wide-open dark brown eyes. She moistened her lips and forgot them half apart. All she could do was lie there, looking. Paralyzed with overwhelming sensation. Fierce expectation. Like every night. For those months. But tonight…tonight it’d be…

  “Sarah…” His grave silken voice covered the darkness as a soft blanket. His tall frame cut against the doorstep of her cramp servant lodging. “Sarah, I need you.”

  His manly grave murmur extracted another flow of melting desire through her middle. She saw the candle move to the small shelf beside the door, as it closed soundlessly. He neared her.

  “Please, let me…” His voice sounded like honey in her ears. In the dimness of her tiny bedroom, she saw his hands go to his fine evening trousers.

  “Yes, my lord.” She breathed out so softly that it felt more like a caress in Hugh’s ears. His desire went to mindless level.

  What the hell did he ask her about? Her boss, the Earl of Hawkmore and she, his downstairs maid. No nobleman asked a mere servant anything. They commanded. They demanded. They seized. Anything. Everything. They took whatever they wished. They were entitled to. They were titled, period.

  He jerked his trousers urgently open, revealing his hard bulky member. A member that would come looking for her, only her. Not his designed wife, never the countess. His cool, highly born, arranged-marriage wife. There was something about the woman lying on that cot. Something that pulled him to her. That kept her in his thoughts, in his blood. Kept him on fire. And he could not help coming up stairs, climbing it for his desire, climbing it for his release. For his damnation, his salvation.

  He bent one knee on the hard cot mattress as he unbuttoned his shirt. She looked at him. Hunger in her eyes, parted lips. And his blood ran in his veins like lava. He wanted to set a house for her. He wanted to settle her as his mistress. He would do that. To hell with his peers’ opinions! He could not live like this anymore! He could not live with the trail of hot rush that she left behind every time she passed by him on her chores. Heaven and hell to have her around all day. He felt like dragging her to his chambers every single time his eyes met hers.

  Sarah saw him pull the rough coverlet from her bonny body. Not lush with curves. Her worn chemise hid her plum-like breasts. They peaked firmly under his stare. She gazed him, imprinting him in her memory, as always. But tonight would be the last of it. The last for her. The last ever. Sadness bubbled inside her, but she pushed it back. She would not cry. Not in front of him. She could not go on like this any longer. Specially after…

  Hugh undid her nightcap and pulled it from her sparrow-wing brown sleek hair. It spread over the hard pillow; it reflected the candlelight in reddish strands. His black-as-pitch eyes hovered over her bonny figure. His hand lifted her chemise. His other knee bent in between her legs.

  Sarah’s eyes caressed his jet-black shiny hair, his lean chest, visible through his open shirt. He, the most handsome man she’d ever had the pleasure to look at; his straight proud nose, his square stubbed jaw, lips the colour of his skin, his piercing eyes. His eyes always looked at her as if they belonged to a lion ready to pounce and devour her. They invariably drew a shrill of excitement from her.

  His strong body came over her receptive person. She bent her knees to cradle him. The smell of him, sandalwood soap and man, assailed her. His hand crept under her gown and held her small breast, caressing it. Her head bent back and she sighed with pleasure. She embraced him under his white shirt, palming the muscles of his back, pulling him to her.

  This accounted for too much for him. Her sweetness, her receptiveness. He could not wait any longer. His thick hard member glided into her smoothly. Moist and hot there. He tried to suppress a grunt, but it came out anyhow.

  Sarah kept on sighing with pleasure as he moved in her, deeper and deeper, as she moved towards him, closer and closer. She melted more with each move. He thrust harder, faster. She held him tighter. Their thoughts blurred, the world disappeared, the night engulfed them. The explosion of pleasure overtook them. Sarah bent back, locking her mouth so that she would not shout her pleasure to the whole Victorian mansion. Hugh grunted in his throat as he spilled his desire deep in her. He fell on her. Both of them breathless.

  CHAPTER 1

  A couple of months before, 1860.

  Hugh entered his library, distractedly reading the paper. He wore tailored black trousers and white shirt. He disliked cravats and avoided them as much as possible.

  He pushed the door open and heard a gasp. He lifted his eyes from the paper. A maid, in the middle of a curtsying. She looked at him with startled dark-brown eyes. She wore a standards maid’s uniform: dark dress and white apron and cap. He registered her bony figure under the uniform, the brownish hair that the cap allowed out.

  “You must be the new downstairs maid.” He spoke to her downcast eyes.

  The girl nodded shyly, while fidgeting with her fingers. “I-I’ll finish here afterwards, my lord.” She said to the floor.

  Hugh Cheston, the Earl of Hawkmore had been used to lower classes people acting subservient to him. It’d been happening since his cradle days. No surprise there. He never thought it pleasant, though. Fear being very different from respect and he definitely preferred the later. “Look at me when talking to me, girl.” He commanded.

  Hesitantly, she lifted her gaze, shoulders hunched, hands clasping each other. Her fearful dark-brown eyes met his blacker than black ones. As their stares meshed, something churned inside him. A ripping wave that cut him from head to toe. He inhaled, inflating his chest, lifting his head in a regal posture, much like he’d been defied. He felt like she looked in his very depths.

  “What’s your name, girl?” He asked covering up his impressions.

  “Sarah, my lord, Sarah Barrow.” Sarah could not bear staring at him. And she could not bear tearing away either. A slow heat settled in the pit of her stomach and it spread fast. He looked as the most striking man she’d ever put her eyes on. Early thirties, possibly, looking from up his six feet three, jet black shiny hair and a face so fine it could not be real! And his eyes, oh, his eyes! So dark and piercing! They were pinning her to the spot.

  “Oh, yes. I remember Lady Hawkmore mentioning you.” He said in his cut-glass accent.

  Sarah had the dubious pleasure of meeting his wife. Adelaide
Cheston, she heard, a duke’s daughter. Sarah’s impression had been of an arrogant and frivolous woman. But she could not be sure, she’d just arrived from the countryside, where people used to be usually uncomplicated.

  “Yes, my lord, I started yesterday.” His eyes still piercing her, making her feel uncomfortable.

  “I see. You may leave now.” Either she left the room or Hugh would be eyeing her all day without knowing why.

  “Yes, my lord.” Her eyes fell to the expensive carpet. She curtsied briefly and walked past him in haste.

  As she passed him by, his body reacted. It felt like a sharpening of his senses, an alertness that had not been there before. He could smell her, a sweet scent unlike any soap. A strange wish to follow and smell more of it crossed his body.

  The door closed hiding his exhaling act. He sat at his desk still staring at the door. Long minutes passed before he went back to his newspaper.

  Sarah left the library lightheaded. Her body sensed his as she walked past him and it felt like an invisible force attracted her body to his. She reached the servants’ quarter and leaned against a wall in a corner to catch her breath. She entered the kitchen and Mrs Talcott came to her with a long list of chores that’d keep her busy all day long.

  London buffeted as such a new and alien place to Sarah. She’d arrived a couple of weeks before, coming from Northampton area. She’d lived with her old aunt in a humble village until she decided she needed to make a living for herself. She’d been orphaned when her parents died both of tuberculosis a little before her sixteenth birthday, seven years ago. Her paternal aunt took her in. Sarah felt glad to help her sell the cakes she made around the neighbouring villages. The earnings weren’t enough for both and Sarah figured she’d have to go on her own. She left with a heavy heart, but her aunt assured her that she’d be fine and that Sarah would be welcome anytime.

  Thus, she picked her few belongings and took the mail carriage to London with a simple recommendation letter from her village vicar. Her aunt’s neighbour had a daughter who worked in London, and could help Sarah. When Sarah met Mary at a tavern, Mary said she’d heard that the Hawkmore house looked for a maid. And there she stood, having just met her intriguing boss.

  “Sarah!” Peter, the carriage driver shook her from her reveries.

  Her eyes snapped to him and she smiled distractedly. “Oh, Peter, hello.” A medium-sized blond-haired young man, about her age, he appeared quick-witted and made her laugh at every turn.

  “Come on! It’s luncheon for us, miserable souls!” He blinked jokingly at her.

  Hugh needed an heir and a spare, as they used to say in the Ton, he thought while he walked his Victorian mansion corridors. He had been married for almost a year and it still had not happened. Visiting his wife’s chamber figures as a chore he had not been eager to perform. Theirs had been an arranged marriage. Both their families had agreed that it would be a good match. There being no reason to go against the match, his duty to continue his old lineage weighed on him.

  He just came back from his club. He got in his chambers and stopped short in front of the connecting door. As all his peers, he sought pleasure outside home. He himself counted as someone very fond of outdoors sport, like riding or playing polo, fencing. He had had mistresses before he got married, but he had not taken any after that. He rasped her door. And he wondered…

  The majority of his friends took mistresses, either married or not. They settled their women in their own houses. Prominent women, to be sure. Actresses, famous courtesans, opera singers, not to mention the forbidden affairs that married ladies from the Ton offered. But he, Hugh, had been so busy running his life that a mistress had not been an issue. And he had not been interested in any woman in special of lately.

  The connecting door opened slowly. A view of the new maid’s face flashed in his mind for no apparent reason; a skip in his heart. And then, he glanced at cool sapphire eyes.

  “Oh, Hugh. Good evening.” Adelaide had her wheat hair falling in a thick tress over her shoulder. The hauteur in her voice.

  When she came out, she had been the belle of the ballrooms across the ton. A line of suitors crowded her dance card. Hugh had not been one of them. He did not feel guilty to admit that he regarded her with indifference. Certainly reciprocated. Of course she looked very beautiful at twenty, with her delicate face, her fashionable dresses and her expensive jewellery.

  “Good evening, Adelaide.” He nodded his head politely. She wore a silk sky-blue negligee over her silk, equally blue nightgown. It became her lush body, which did not appeal to him.

  “I gather you want to perform your marital duties tonight.” Expressionless eyes on him, she caressed her long wheat tress. He had been going about these…duties weekly, if she had not her cycle. This heir thing, she knew, and she did not expect any more than that. Wives existed to be respected. They did not exist to be lusted after, this served for whores and courtesans.

  He faltered. Marital duties. Depleted. Cold. Meaningless. What happened to him? A woman had to be only a woman, same anatomy. The…mating stood as the usual thing, no change, no novelty. It would bring him some kind of release. The new maid’s face flashed in his mind again. He begun to be annoyed with this.

  “I’m just checking if you’re alright, Adelaide.” Skipping his responsibility in the process. “I haven’t seen you all day.”

  “Oh, I rode a carriage in the park with Lady Stratton in the morning, before we went shopping for ribbons and had luncheon at her town house.” She said matter-of-factly. “I had tea with the dowager duchess of Bedford in the afternoon. We had no appointment for this evening.” Her ramrod spine and uplifted chin told the tale of her blue-blooded family.

  “That’s right. I visited the club.” His hands slid into his pockets.

  “Good for you. But the season is approaching and we’re having a full schedule, as usual, you know.”

  “Of course.” Social life remained precious for Adelaide. She loved all the pomp and ritual that surrounded it. They were bound to attend together, naturally. He understood it as part of the game and accepted it without question. But social duties did not list as exactly his cup of tea. He wondered what he really enjoyed about his life.

  They stared at each other for a couple of seconds. He shrugged slightly. “Good night, Adelaide.”

  “Good night, Hugh” She closed the door, without a sound.

  He turned, walked to his bed and pulled the cord for his valet.

  As he lay in his bed, he thought what the new maid did at that moment.

  Sleeping like a log, no less. Sarah had gone through all the tasks given by Mrs Talcott: sweep the floor, dust the carpets, clean furniture, doors, windows from the inside and other minor errands. Being just her second day at her first job as a maid, she ended the day utterly exhausted. She had used to help her aunt clean their small cottage, but nothing had prepared her for this huge city home. So, by the time her head finally found the pillow, her mind’s eye visualized her handsome boss and shut down.

  Sarah slept alone in her cubicle of a room. All the other maids slept in pairs, but they counted odd numbers, so Sarah used alone her double cot alone. The maids liked to sleep in pairs because it gave them a chance to chat a little before bedtime.

  Weeks passed by and Sarah begun to get used to her daily routine. She got acquainted with the house staff and she found enjoyment in the results of her hard work.

  But seeing Lord Hawkmore everyday ate at her mental sanity. His powerful frame and his manly attractiveness shook her insides. Every time she saw him, it felt like she had a shock from lighting. If she crossed with him through the corridors, he would dart her his dark piercing gaze, as if he could read her through and through. She would blush; downcast her eyes and hurry away. But when her eyelids fell at night, the image of him would come clear as water and her brain would weave incongruent fantasies. These counted as unfamiliar feelings. And she did not have a clue as to how to deal with them.

  H
is role, her boss. An earl. She had been hearing the other maids’ stories about lords misusing maids, as if these girls existed as mere pawns. The poor girls were used for those lords’ physical needs. If they fell pregnant they got put out by the wives or those children would be raised under the shadow of the real heirs, with disastrous consequences. Sarah wanted none of it for herself. But this seemed like a good job, a fair pay and she needed it.

  Hugh felt no better. He could not count the minutes to see her go about her work. And he dreaded it. His guts churned with some alien reaction every time he set his eyes on her. His body would have the strangest impulses, like pulling her to a desert corner and touching her. His hands itched to touch her, just her hands or her forearm. But the need of physical contact with her became more and more overwhelming by the hour.

  Maybe he should find a mistress with whom he’d be able to fulfil these strange needs. He had no interest in anyone though. His mind and his body kept tricking him with a bony, plain-faced maid. If he so much as vented to take a downstairs maid as his mistress, he’d be the Ton’s laughingstock. Maids were for lords’ momentary urgencies. No nobleman took them seriously, unless they wanted to be regarded as fools. And these saucy gossips would never be kept away from the ballrooms. He would not throw his centuries-old family name to the rats.

  CHAPTER 2

  Sarah cleaned the library, admiring the thousands of books in its collection. She’d learned to love books. She went to her village parish school, led by the vicar’s wife. Being a quick study, Mrs Taylor took her student under her protection, in the girl’s thirteenth birthday. Mrs Taylor taught her the rudiments of Greek and Latin and together they read the classics, learned sciences, geography and mathematics. Sarah loved to study. There were always new horizons to be uncovered. Her fascination with the books enchanted Mrs Taylor. The vicar’s wife showed more disappointed than Sarah when the girl, at sixteen, had to move to her aunt’s upon her parents’ death. Even though Sarah could not formally further her education, she would constantly exchange missives with Mrs Taylor about books and the discussions they evoked.