Mistress of Darkness: Dredthorne Hall Book 2 Read online

  “Oh, Gwen,” he murmured. As she leaned forward and put her hands on the bed, his back arched over her. “Yes, that’s it.” He kissed the nape of her neck. “My sweet, Gwen.”

  His fingers slid through her netherhair and to her already wet opening, spreading her as a new heat blossomed under his deft touch. Slowly he circled the pearl of her delight in a slow rhythmic motion, making her clench as her hips tried to follow his movement. Over and over she moved with him, brushing the erection in his trousers with her bare bottom. As fire blazed into her belly, Robert grunted. She could feel his hand behind her, unbuttoning his trousers.

  Then, when she thought his clever fingers would finally drive her mad, the engorged dome of his cockhead pushed against her opening. Her nipples puckered against her chemise, as her hands bunched the cloth on the bed so hard she thought she might tear it.

  Her hips bucked backwards, trying to urge him inside her. He timed his thrust so perfectly that she almost cried out, but instead bit her lower lip. Her opening fluttered wildly around him as he pushed his hard length into her core. He withdrew and thrust again, then again. Gripping her mound as he massaged her pearl, he pulled her back to him, their bodies thudding together.

  “Oh, yes, Robert,” she gasped.

  He thickened inside her just as she bore down on him with a clench so savage she thought it might rend her in two.

  “Ah!” he groaned, as passion exploded within her, flooding into her belly, her nipples, and to her very fingertips.

  Wild fireworks of ecstasy burst behind her closed eyes, as he jerked inside her, and flooded her with his seed. Over and over she milked him, their bodies perfectly slotted together, rocking in time. He jetted again, his chest heaving against her back, as he held her tightly against him. Only after some moments did they manage to quell the aftershocks of their quick coupling. Exhausted, she fell onto the bed, and Robert with her. Gently, he lifted her up onto the mattress so she could lay on her side. He lay behind her, cupping her body with his.

  Again his lips found the side of her neck. “I love you, my dear Gwen,” he murmured against her skin.

  “I love you, too,” she murmured.

  He sighed then, and she heard the utter contentment that she felt. They lay like that in languid silence, until the faint sounds of servants’ voices and carts being wheeled drifted up from below.

  “It’s time,” he said, getting up from behind her.

  As he buttoned his trousers, she stood and straightened her skirts.

  “One more thing about Miss Wilson,” he said. “There is the matter of the jewels that she left behind. I believe it would only be proper to offer them to you as compensation for the suffering that Christopher caused.”

  Astonished, she stared at him. “They’re worth a small fortune.” She shook her head. “I’m afraid I cannot.”

  He’d been brushing something from his coat sleeve, but stopped. “What? But she had no family–”

  She held up her hand. “I cannot take them, but I will accept them on my sister’s behalf, as her dowry. She deserves to find a man who appreciates her and will take care of her.”

  Though he didn’t seem pleased, he nodded and went to the door, “As you say then. They shall be Regina’s.”

  “But Robert?” she said.

  He stopped with his hand on the doorknob. “Yes?”

  “I wonder if you would still be willing to marry a penniless woman who simply adores you?”

  “Gwen,” he exclaimed, rushing back to her. He picked her up at the waist, beaming up at her. “You have made me the happiest of men.”

  She cupped his radiant face with her hands. “It’s only fitting, since I am the happiest of women.”

  Without another word, they raced down the stairs. As she suspected, the carts and coaches were all loaded. Robert locked the entry and then helped her into their waiting carriage. As he settled into the seat next to her, she looked back at the hall.

  Dredthorne’s curtain-shrouded windows seemed to be watching them, like dark, unblinking eyes. It stood like an impassive sentinel as the last of the daylight faded and an evening breeze rose to scatter the dead leaves around its steps. As the carriage departed, the chill wind rose higher and Gwen could swear that it carried with it a sound—like soft, muffled sobbing.

  Sneak Peek

  Mistress of Sins (Dredthorne Hall Book 3)

  Excerpt

  CHAPTER ONE

  A familiar shriek from outside the sitting room made Jennet Reed set down her tea cup and watch the door, resigned to the knowledge that it would soon fling open. Outside the window providing pale sunlight for her morning tea, curls of dying leaves drifted past on a brisk October breeze. All around Reed Park the gardeners would spend the day clearing out the last of the sparse garden beds and gather bulbs for winter storage. Since rising early usually allowed Jennet to enjoy her cozy spot alone for the first hours of the day, she felt rather annoyed.

  Rapid footsteps followed the cry, and then Margaret Reed entered with the speed of a woman being hounded by an angry mob. Short, plump and swaddled in a pink velvet dressing gown, she clutched a crumpled paper, which she waved like a flag of frantic surrender.

  “Oh, Jennet, oh my dear.” Her mother’s loose silver-blonde ringlets bobbed wildly around her pale face as she hurried over to the settee, enveloping it with her violet scent. “I found the most detestable missive in amongst the notes and cards that came yesterday. We will be cursed.”

  “Again?” Jennet drew Margaret down beside her and took the note from her trembling hands. She read over the brief, unsigned message before she looked into her mother’s terrified pale blue eyes. “Mama, this is an invitation. Someone wishes me to attend an All Hallows’ Eve masquerade at Dredthorne Hall.”

  “It says that a curse will be cast over us.” Her mother stabbed a finger at the paper. “Unless you go to that monstrous place on that evil night, where I am sure you will be murdered, and I left to die in my old age, bereft and alone.”

  “Nonsense.” That pronouncement caused Margaret to burst into tears. Jennet sighed and searched for her handkerchief.

  Allowing her mother to weep for a few moments seemed judicious; Margaret had always been highly-strung and easily distressed, and after an uneventful month likely needed the respite. Once Jennet heard the first hiccup of abating sobs she gently mopped up her mother’s tears and made her a cup of too-sweet tea. Then she tackled the contents of the note.

  “No one wishes us ill, Mama,” she assured Margaret. “Curses are not real, you know this. Mr. Branwen explained that to you in great detail when we broached the subject with him.”

  “What could a vicar know of the misery that haunts our name?” her mother demanded, wringing the now-damp handkerchief. “Has all of his family died while still young? Did he lose his dear Papa even before he was born? Was he abandoned at the altar on his wedding day?”

  And there, Jennet thought, was the story of her life in just three questions. Aside from her and her widowed mother, all of their family had died, most of them in their prime. Margaret never cared to be reminded of the reckless, stubborn streak every Reed possessed along with the family’s auburn tresses and green eyes. That tempestuous flaw had contributed to those early demises, including her father’s. He’d gone off to die fighting the French only a few months after marrying and impregnating Margaret.

  Eighteen years later . . .

  No. Jennet would not think about the most ridiculous chapter in her own rather dull saga. She had sworn never to waste another moment thinking about that bounder, that scoundrel, that deceitful, heartless beast of a man.

  “Mama,” she said, using a firm tone she usually reserved for cheeky footmen and over-curious villagers, “We are not being cursed. I daresay it is a joke in poor taste, nothing more.”

  “Who would do such a monstrous thing?” Margaret demanded.

  “Someone who wishes me to attend so that I might amuse their guests.” Jennet already suspected j
ust who that might be. “I imagine they wished to make the invitation seem appropriate to the occasion.”

  “By cursing us?” her mother shrieked, and then pressed her hand to her brow. “Oh, this will end me now, surely. My head pounds with such violence. Where is Debny? She must send for Dr. Mallory before it is too late.”

  Since they had reached the second act in Margaret’s hysterics, Jennet eyed the door again. Her mother’s lady’s maid came in a moment later, as Debny knew to wait in the hall until she heard her name needed. With the skill of much practice she coaxed Margaret upstairs to her bed chamber. Her assurances of a soothing tisane, a headache powder and a summons for the village doctor did much more than Jennet could to calm her mistress. Their housekeeper then came in to apologize for leaving the post unattended; she had been in the kitchen going over the week’s menus with their cook.

  “Do not blame yourself, Mrs. Holloway,” Jennet said as she folded the invitation and tucked it in her reticule. “Mama hasn’t been distressed for at least a fortnight, so she sought an excuse. Do ask Cook to prepare some light broth for her luncheon, and keep the herbals brewing until the doctor arrives.”

  The housekeeper nodded as she handed over the rest of the post. “I beg your pardon, Miss, but the butcher’s lad mentioned that the Tindalls returned from London yesterday.”

  “That is welcome news.” And a chance to escape her mother’s latest bout of agitation, Jennet thought as she rose from the settee. “Please have Barton to ready the rig.”

  After looking in on her mother, Jennet changed from her morning muslin to a dark green walking dress, and donned a brown hooded wool cloak. While not as fashionable as a spencer jacket, the cloak would keep her warm on the chilly drive over to Tindall House. Margaret would scold her for dressing and driving herself, but Jennet preferred self-reliance over playing the genteel lady. Besides being cursed and jilted at the altar, she had now reached a spinster’s age of seven and twenty. No one besides her mother much cared what she did.

  Going to the Tindall estate gave Jennet time to enjoy the palette of autumn, which had painted most of Renwick in myriad fiery colors. The fields remained green, and patches of white and purple heather daubed the hillsides, but the trees had gone crimson, gold and apricot. Some of the largest oaks and ashes looked as countless tiny flames blazed from their branches . Despite the damp chill of the morning air, Jennet preferred this time of year to any other in the countryside. Summer’s bounty had been harvested, and the snows had yet to arrive. It seemed the perfect season.

  That was why you chose to marry in October, so the church could be adorned in autumnal splendor, to match your garnet hair and witch’s eyes.

  “I did not marry,” Jennet told the errant thought as she guided the horse up the winding drive to her friend’s home. “I am not a witch.”

  You bewitch me, a deep voice chided from her memory.

  Once more Jennet saw herself in her wedding gown, standing in the church while a younger Mr. Branwen comforted a noisily weeping Margaret and hundreds of guests whispered and stared at her. She had been like a pillar of salt, frozen for all eternity halfway to an empty altar where her marriage would not be taking place. Later she would feel the humiliation, the despair, and the deep and abiding hatred of the man who had so thoroughly ruined her. In that moment, however, all she could think was how she had never anticipated this, not once. She believed she had been loved as much as she had loved.

  Never again.

  • • • • •

  Buy Mistress of Sins (Dredthorne Hall Book 3)

  Dedication

  For Mr. H.

  Copyright

  Copyright © 2020 Hazel Hunter

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, organizations, or persons, living or dead, is coincidental.

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