Chloe gave Beatrix’s hand a gentle pat. “A little healthy rivalry never hurt any man.”
“Indeed?” Benedict raised one dark brow at his wife. “The moment you try that with me, you will once again find yourself over my knee with your skirts thrown up and your drawers down so that I can enjoy spanking your delightful bottom.”
“Benedict!” Her cheeks having become a fiery red, Chloe now sounded scandalized at having her husband talk of such intimacies in front of his sister.
But not so scandalized as to indicate Benedict hadn’t already done exactly as he described. Indeed, his use of the word “again” implied that he had.
Beatrix felt color heat her own cheeks at the memory of James having done most of that to her at the Blackbornes’ ball. But she could not stop herself from imagining how much more intimate that spanking would have been if James had thrown her skirts up and pulled down her drawers so that he might spank her bared flesh.
Even the thought of it once again caused her breasts to swell and tingle and between her thighs to grow uncomfortably damp and aching.
“Beatrix?”
She glanced up to find Chloe eyeing her speculatively. Beatrix’s cheeks instantly blazed with guilty heat.
“Oh. Oh.” Her sister-in-law’s lips mimicked the sound the second time.
“Oh what?” A clueless Benedict frowned as the two women exchanged a glance, embarrassment on Beatrix’s part, knowingly teasing on Chloe’s. “What the devil are the two of you—” He broke off, eyes wide as he stared at Beatrix. “Has James already spanked you?”
“It was not so much a spanking as… Well, it was more of a… He did not…” Beatrix stopped speaking before she made the situation worse.
“Did this spanking occur before or after the Blackbornes’ ball?”
She really wished her brother would stop repeating the word spanking. It brought forth such arousing memories for Beatrix, she was growing damper inside her drawers. “During. But as I said,” she continued as Benedict looked ready to explode, “it was not a spanking such as you described.” Oh God, now she was saying that word too, and it was causing her nipples to engorge, and ache even more than they already were.
“Did his hand make contact with your bottom?” her brother demanded to know.
She winced. “Yes.”
“Bare or covered?”
“I was fully covered by my gown and drawers,” she assured primly.
“I need to have words with that young man—”
“Oh, please do not,” Beatrix pleaded. “I am sure he fully believed I deserved to be spanked.”
“Going on the behavior you have decided upon for while you are in London, I am sure you did too,” Benedict drawled. “It is not my intention to chastise him, but to share with him that, as just described, the spanking will be enjoyed so much more by the both of you if he lifts your gown and pulls down your drawers first.”
“Benedict!” She stared at him in horror.
He shrugged. “If I am to be a part of helping James to see the error of his ways in fully appreciating you as a whole person, then I see no reason why I should not enjoy doing so. That being the case, I believe it is time for our afternoon…sojourn to our bedchamber, my dear.” He gave his wife an inviting smile as he held out his arm for her to take.
“Of course, my love.” Chloe rose to place her hand on the sleeve of his jacket. “All this talk of spanking has made me feel very much in need of…lying down.”
Beatrix had absolutely no doubt as to what her brother and his wife were about to do with the rest of the afternoon.
Leaving her free to think of seeing James again this evening at the Shaftesburys’ dinner party.
And to wonder if she might fabricate a reason for James wishing to spank her again, this time with her skirts raised and her drawers down…
Chapter Five
“Not feeling brave enough to venture out onto the Shaftesburys’ terrace this evening?” a familiar voice murmured behind Beatrix.
She turned to face James, having bristled at the underlying mockery she could hear in his voice. “We shall be eating dinner shortly.” The Shaftesburys’ guests were lingering to chat in the sitting room before dinner was announced.
“Afterwards, perhaps,” he dismissed. “Unless you have grown soft since coming to London?”
“I have not,” she denied stiffly, knowing James was aware of the walks she had often took on Benedict’s estate in Surrey. He had accompanied once or twice during his visit there.
To say James looked handsome in his tailored black evening jacket and fitted trousers, his linen snowy white, would be a serious understatement. The jacket fit him like a glove, emphasizing the width of his muscular shoulders and chest, and the leanness of his waist and hips. He wore some sort of complicated arrangement of white at his throat, adorned with a single diamond pin.
Tonight, he looked every inch the elegant and wealthy—and very eligible!—Earl of Ipswich.
Beatrix’s hands felt damp inside her gloves as she wondered if she had perhaps been foolhardy in turning down James’s proposal in favor of first having him see her as a fully desirable woman and his equal.
What if, while she was attempting to have James see those things, he should meet someone else he was more attracted to than her?
Worse, what if he fell in love with someone other than her?
Ultimately, Beatrix knew if that should happen, then their love for each other was not meant to be.
“What are you thinking about?” He tilted his head down so that he could better see her expression. “Whatever it is seems to be making you sad.”
She was feeling sad at the thought of James falling in love with another woman and her having to be a witness to his changed allegiance. Perhaps she ought—
“Dinner is served,” the announcement by the Shaftesburys’ butler interrupted her doubts.
“Shall we?” James held his arm out for Beatrix to take before escorting her into the dining room.
There were twenty
