Captain Durant's Countess - By Maggie Robinson Page 0,1

whipped his women was no one she wanted to meet over the breakfast table at Kelby Hall. Or maybe he was the one being bound and beaten? She shuddered at the image.

“He’s a tall one, he is. Dark hair and eyes. Has a saber scar on his cheek, but other than that, I s’pose you’d call him handsome. He was wearing a yellow waistcoat, although I don’t guess he’s got it on now.”

She tripped over the rug at that news and arranged herself on the chair. “Thank you. See? I’m sitting.” Maris folded her gloved hands in her lap. “I don’t imagine there’s any reading material I might peruse while I wait?”

“Nothing the likes of you would enjoy, my lady. There’s a large library here, but the books are what you might call naughty. More pictures than words, if you take my meaning.”

In general, Maris was in favor of expanding her education, but perhaps not in this case. “I take your meaning very well. You’ve been very helpful, Mr.—?”

“Mick Fisher, at your service. Don’t make me sorry I let you wait, now.”

Maris crossed her fingers in the folds of her skirt. “I shall be the soul of discretion. Do carry on.”

She counted to one hundred after Mr. Fisher shuffled his bulk down the hallway, taking in her surroundings. The club’s furnishings were in the first stare of fashion. The carpet was thick and Turkish, the chair comfortably padded, the gilt-framed paintings lurid yet lushly executed. The house was remarkably still for a haven of vice. Maris had lived in the country too long to think that sexual congress, whether committed by humans or animals, was ever quiet.

But it was only two o’clock in the afternoon. Perhaps the society became noisier at night.

Maris had never been touched by her husband unless it was fully dark outside . . . and inside, too. Henry was as anxious as she to blow out the candles to prevent them both from seeing what was going on.

Or not going on.

Their marital bed had held little joy for him, but it was all so many empty years ago. She’d come to terms with her situation and was not going to let herself dwell on it. Maris was a woman of action now, and the stairs beckoned. Time was of the essence, in so many ways. Who knew when Mr. Fisher might be back to check up on her, or a footman would cross through the hall? Or, God forbid, that scandalously naked woman decided to parade along the Turkey carpet, her nipples sparkling?

Or how long her beloved Henry would live.

Maris practically ran up the steps to the next floor, minding the slippery marble. In her experience, when one wished evil on another, evil frequently had other ideas. She did not intend to fall when the object of her quest was so close.

Judging from the open doors she peeked into, she had found the bedrooms, and odd bedrooms they were. Yes, there were beds—rather giant ones that could hold the average family—but the rooms were fitted with equipment that would be more at home in a stable than a family home. The selection of crops and a variety of roping neatly tacked to the flocked walls was astonishing. Where the walls were not wallpapered, they were mirrored, and Maris moved swiftly so she would not glimpse her plain gray walking dress and pale-as-milk skin reflected on them. It had been much more important to focus on her brains than her nonexistent beauty since she’d attained her womanhood, and she generally gave mirrors a wide berth. It was enough she was clean and respectable.

Though respectability would not serve her well there.

When she came to a shut door, she paused. Did she dare knock, or just open it? She heard muffled noises behind the thick painted wood. A steady swish of something, and low groans a second after.

Disgusting. Whoever was in there deserved to be interrupted.

Maris turned the doorknob. Unlocked. She pushed the door open a fraction.

The first thing she saw was a man’s waistcoat draped over the back of a chair. Yellow, with what appeared to be giant orange chrysanthemums embroidered on the silk fabric. A vulgar waistcoat, entirely unsuitable for a decorated war hero, which she knew Reynold Durant was, for all his lack of duty to his new responsibility. He’d recently sold out and was rutting through London, all on her husband’s coin.

Another inch of open door showed a standing glass mirror angled toward the bed