Wicked Torment (Regency Sinners 1) Read online

  His parents had died when he was six years old, after which he had to go and live with his uncle, Lord Soames Strong, his father’s younger brother. Strong had been an exacting and cruel guardian, often beating Darius for no other reason than he felt like it.

  Darius had felt nothing but relief when he was sent away to boarding school two years later. He’d had to go home for holidays, of course, but by that time, he had made his own “family” with the seven other orphaned boys who were still his closest friends. Occasionally, he even spent holidays with one of them.

  By the time Darius was fifteen, he had been big enough and strong enough to hit his uncle back. And he had, repeatedly, until the other man had ceased hitting out with his fists and took to verbally abusing Darius instead with snide comments about his parents and Darius himself. Even that had come to an end once Darius was one and twenty. The guardianship came to an end, and he took up the title of duke and the managing of his own finances and life. He never spoke to his uncle again.

  With hindsight, Darius realized the other man had been taking out his frustrations on the small boy who was heir to the dukedom Strong felt should rightly be his now that his older brother was dead.

  That hindsight did not lessen Darius’s hatred and disgust for the man who should have cared for that bewildered six-year-old boy but had instead chosen to show him nothing but cruelty and violence.

  In the years that followed his coming of age, Darius had become the cold and controlling man he was today.

  Darius sensed Bea, possibly because of her unhappy marriage, possessed a similar steely core, one that would not allow her to be controlled, by him or any other man.

  And while he had been lost in memories of his past, Bea had removed her gown and drawers and now stood before him wearing only her camisole. “You may keep that on if you would prefer it,” he assured her as he saw how self-conscious she was about removing this last garment.

  Her expression remained anxious. “Perhaps for the moment? Once I am…more at ease, I might remove it then.”

  “Of course,” he accepted lightly. “I will tie your wrists loosely so that you do not— Bea?” he questioned sharply as she turned to climb onto the bed and he saw the top of her bare back for the first time.

  A back that he could see was crisscrossed with a maze of silver scars.

  Chapter 7

  Her expression was stricken. “It is not as bad as it looks—”

  “Do not move,” Darius instructed harshly, his earlier promise of no consequence to this situation as he held Bea firmly in front of him with one hand, her back toward him. He used his other hand to slip the straps of her camisole down her arms before allowing the garment to fall to her waist.

  The scars, more than a dozen of them, covered the whole of her back down to the natural indent at the top of her buttocks.

  Darius could only stare at them, the tightness in his chest barely allowing him to breathe. “Who did this?” he finally demanded. “What did this?”

  Deathly pale, she glanced over her shoulder at him. The expression she saw on his face no doubt warned her against even attempting to evade answering him truthfully. “My husband with his riding crop.”

  “Dear God…” Darius muttered, knowing Hanwell must have struck her very hard and broken the skin to have left these scars on her back. “He whipped you in the stables for everyone to see?”

  She shook her head. “Right here, in this bedchamber.”

  Darius had never heard of anything so barbaric. A deliberate act of barbarism when Hanwell must have had the foresight to bring his riding crop with him into Bea’s bedchamber. “Why?”

  She gave a choked laugh. “I had failed to give him his heir.”

  Darius had expected an affair with another man at the very least. “And Hanwell whipped you for that?”

  Bea felt thoroughly humiliated at having Darius see the evidence of her failure as a wife. She had hoped—prayed—keeping her camisole on would hide the scars, but obviously it had not. Now, Darius had seen them and knew of some of her humiliation, if not all.

  She blinked back the tears and wrapped her arms about her bared breasts before turning to face him. “He felt justified—”

  “There is no justification for this. None,” Darius repeated fiercely, his eyes glittering with cold anger. “There were no children in Hanwell’s first marriage either, so he could as easily have been to blame for— No?” He frowned as Bea shook her head.

  “He has…several illegitimate children, born to him by women living locally.” Humiliated color burned in her cheeks. “Children I have made sure are well cared for.”

  “He bedded these other women during your marriage?” Darius lived his life by his own code, which might or might not coincide with those of Society, and very often did not. But his views on fidelity in a marriage were unshakable: a man did not show disrespect to his wife by taking a mistress or getting another woman with child. Under any circumstances.

  “Oh yes,” she sighed. “One of the children is less than two years old. So you see, it must be me who cannot conceive. Which is not a bad thing if the two of us are to… But perhaps you no longer wish to continue?” She chewed her bottom lip. “I know the scars are unsightly…”

  “They are not unsightly. Fuck! Fuck, fuck, fuck!” Darius stepped away from her, his hands clenching, one of them crushing the silk neck cloths, as he began to pace the bedchamber. “If Hanwell were here now, I would use my own riding crop on him and see how he likes it.”

  Bea kept that arm over her breasts as she pulled up the straps of her camisole. “If Charles were still alive, a situation would never have arisen in which you ever saw my scars.”

  “Then I am doubly glad he is dead!”

  So was Bea. The scars on her back were not the only ones she had suffered during her marriage to Charles, but the others were not visible to the human eye.

  Oh, Charles had been attentive enough during their first year of marriage, slightly less patient with her inability to conceive during their second. By the third year of her lack of providing him with his heir, he had taken to chastising her, either verbally or physically, for even the slightest misdemeanor. That last occasion was the only one which had left physical evidence of those beatings.

  The scars she carried inside her went much deeper.

  Her smile was self-derisive. “I will not think in the least badly of you if you would rather not…proceed, and wish to return to your own bedchamber.”

  “Oh, I fully intent returning to my bedchamber,” Darius assured her grimly.

  Bea’s disappointment was acute as Darius confirmed he was putting an end to tonight’s lovemaking. Perhaps to any more lovemaking at all…

  Not that she could blame him. Charles’ last terrible beating had left her in bed for over a week until her wounds healed. But the scars that remained, she could do nothing about. They would be there forevermore, an unsightly reminder of the end of five awful years of marriage.

  “And you are coming with me,” Darius added decisively. He bent down to place an arm beneath her knees and the other about her shoulders before lifting her against his chest. “I cannot make love to you in the room where you were beaten,” he announced as he carried her through the open doorway between their bedchambers and kicked the door closed behind him. He came to an abrupt halt. “Was this Hanwell’s bedchamber?”

  “It was.” She nodded. “But I had the room stripped and all the furnishings and décor changed after he died.”

  “You are comfortable in here?”

  “I am comfortable in here with you.” Bea clung to the stability of Darius’s bare shoulders as he strode across the room before putting her gently onto her feet beside the bed. Unshed tears stung her eyes as she gazed up at him. “My scars really do not repulse you?”

  “Of course they do not.” His eyes were glacial, his mouth a thin, uncompromising line. “They are physical proof of your strength and fortitude.”

  Bea saw he still
held the four silk neck cloths in his hand. “Do you still intend to tie me to the bed?”

  “No.” He held the scraps of silk out to her. “I intend for you to tie me to the bed and then explore and take me in whatever way gives you the most pleasure.”

  Her eyes widened, allowing the tears to cascade unchecked down her cheeks. “You would allow me to do that?”

  “I will not only allow it, I insist upon it.” Darius reached out to touch her wet cheek gently with his fingertips. “It is my wish for you to know not all men are such selfish bastards as your husband was.”

  Bea could not believe a man such a Darius Strong, the man she had called the arrogant Duke of Wolferton, would willingly and so completely give up his free will to her. It was not only humbling but touched something deep inside her, a place she had believed locked away and protected.

  It was her heart, Bea realized.

  She knew in that moment she was falling in love with Darius.

  Whatever this man’s reputation in Society might be, and that of his friends, even at his most dictatorial she had found Darius to be a man of honor. As for his lovemaking… She had never experienced anything like it. That he was now allowing her to render him immobile, giving her carte blanche over his body, filled her heart to bursting with emotion. For him.

  The realization not only struck her dumb but immobile.

  “Bea?” Darius prompted as she continued to stare at him. “If you would rather we did not make love but merely fell asleep in each other’s arms, that is also acceptable.”

  Bea shook herself out of her shocked realization. “I should very much like to make love to you and be held in your arms afterward. I— Such closeness would be another first for me,” she admitted huskily.

  It was easy for Darius to guess, now that he knew the circumstances of her marriage, that other first had been her physical pleasure, both yesterday and today. Damn Hanwell to the hell where he belonged!

  Darius’s thoughts and impressions of Bea had all undergone a complete change since his arrival at Hanwell Manor. Bea’s inner strength was formidable and gave her a beauty that radiated from within. She was no pampered and spoiled socialite indulging in a physical interlude, but a woman who desperately wished to know if there was pleasure in lovemaking rather than the physical abuse she had suffered throughout her marriage. An abuse she had survived. As Darius had survived his own violent childhood.

  The two of them were far more alike than Darius could ever have guessed before coming here.

  And to think he had almost given this opportunity of knowing Bea away to one of his fellow Sinners. Because he had believed Beatrix Hanwell to not only be plain but uninteresting.

  Bea was not in the least plain or uninteresting; instead, she was a constant surprise, complex, and in possession of a unique beauty most would overlook but which now intrigued Darius greatly. He had a feeling learning all there was to know about Bea would take a considerable amount of time. And Darius intended knowing her very well indeed.

  Which could prove to be problematic if it should turn out Bea was guilty of treason.

  Darius did not wish to think any more on that tonight. Bea was here, he was here, and they were about to embark on their relationship in earnest.

  “Bea.” He presented the silk neck cloths to her for a second time.

  She took them with a shy smile. “You will have to direct me in how to do this properly. I should not like to hurt you,” she said worriedly as Darius climbed on the bed and placed several pillows on top of each other at the top of the bed before lying down on his back, arms and legs stretched out toward the wooden posts at the four corners.

  Bea felt a warm shiver down her spine as she paused to take in Darius’s vulnerability. His perfect body was laid out as if in sacrifice. A body that was pure muscle, with that tempting vee of dark hair from his chest to the cluster of dark curls at the base of his aroused cock. The parting of his legs left the fullness of his sac completely unprotected.

  “Wrap the silk about each of my ankles first, not too tightly, and then tie it about the post.”

  “Like this?” Bea did as he had instructed, finding she did not dislike this sort of instruction at all. She very much enjoyed seeing Darius lying on the bed with his ankles firmly tied seconds later.

  “Exactly like that. Now tie my wrists in the same way,” Darius encouraged gruffly, feeling more exposed and vulnerable than he had ever allowed before.

  Bea gazed at him anxiously, as if she sensed some of his inner unease. “You are sure you are comfortable with my doing this?”

  “No, but I shall do it anyway.”

  She eyed him quizzically. “Why?”

  “Because I want you to trust me.” As he was trusting her, Darius realized. A trust he had bestowed on no other woman. “I believe I would enjoy it more if you removed your chemise and were as naked as I am, but otherwise… Yes, I am comfortable.”

  Bea did not hesitate to pull the chemise over her head before discarding it altogether.

  Darius turned his head to watch Bea as she knelt beside him on the bed to secure first one wrist to the wooden post backing onto the wall, before moving round to his other side to secure the other.

  Merely looking at her naked body caused his cock to pulse and become harder still. Her breasts were firm and uptilting, her waist slender, dark blond curls covering her mound. Her knees were slightly parted to maintain balance as she knelt on the bed, allowing Darius to see that her folds were glistening with the milky pearls of her arousal.

  Darius was not completely immobilized, of course. The silk was not tied so tightly he could not escape the binding if he so wished. But he was resolved not to do so. No matter what form of physical torture Bea visited upon him, he had every intention of withstanding it without complaint.

  The fact he was allowing her to do this at all still surprised him. He hated any feeling of helplessness, no doubt a lingering scar from his childhood, when he had been completely at the mercy of his uncle’s cruelty. Bea did not make him feel in the least helpless, and the pleasure on her face as she stood back to contemplate her own handiwork was payment enough for any lingering doubts Darius might have felt.

  She positively glowed with satisfaction as she moved to kneel on the bed between his parted thighs. “There is so much of you,” she said admiringly. “Now that I have you completely at my mercy I have no idea where to even start.”

  “I believe my cock would appreciate some attention,” he suggested helpfully.

  A wicked gleam entered her eyes. “Perhaps. Eventually. For now, I wish to touch and explore the rest of this magnificent body.”

  As Darius had already guessed, she intended to torture him with pleasure.

  And it was torture to lie there, completely at Bea’s mercy, as she ran her hands over the whole of his body, fingertips lingering here, lips kissing him there. All while she was completely nude and the perfume of her arousal saturated his senses.

  When she leaned over him to caress his shoulders and chest, her breasts remained just beyond the reach of his mouth. It was sheer agony to withstand Bea’s touch. Light pets against his skin to start with, but growing bolder and more confident as she gauged his reaction to those caresses.

  Her hair was silky against his skin as she ran her tongue moistly over his nipples before leaning forward to suck them, the rasp of her tongue sending pleasure straight to his cock. Darius had never realized before how sensuous it was to have a woman suck his nipples.

  Those breasts again, jostling against his thighs as she followed the silky vee shape of his chest hair down his abdomen. The curve of her bottom was fully exposed to him when she turned to explore his calves and feet.

  His poor neglected cock jutted up proudly toward his belly, leaking, begging for the attention Bea playfully refused to give it.

  “You have ticklish feet.” She giggled as he attempted to move his foot away from her hand but was prevented from doing so by the black silk about his ankle. />
  He groaned. “This is not the way I expected you to take your pleasure.”

  “What did you expect?” Bea moved back up the bed to kneel between Darius’s thighs. “Perhaps this?” She took his cock in her hand and began to stroke it the way she had in the garden earlier. A stroke up to run the soft pad of her thumb over the glistening top. “Or this?” Another stroke down, before she repeated the upward caress, her eyes gleaming with satisfaction as beads of pre-cum bubbled up to the surface.

  “There is an area, beneath my sac, which is— Yes, there,” he groaned as he felt her finger running along that sensitive area. “There is also a gland inside me which, when stimulated, gives me a pleasure unlike any other.” So much so, Darius sometimes envied Quinlan his sexual orientation.

  “Inside you?” Bea prompted curiously.

  “We will save it for another time.”

  “Inside your cock?” she persisted.

  “No.”

  “Can you possibly mean here?” That marauding finger pressed against the soft pucker of his ass. “Apparently so,” she said with satisfaction as Darius’s back arched off the bed. “Would you like me to—”

  “Not tonight,” Darius groaned, knowing he was too tightly strung, his release barely contained, and he would not be able to prevent himself from ejaculating if Bea once touched him in there.

  “But I should like to give you pleasure.”

  “Then lick my cock,” he invited between gritted teeth.

  “Mm.” She bent to lap up the beads of his pre-cum with her tongue, one hand continuing to stroke him, the other caressing that area beneath his balls.

  Darius tightly gripped the silk neck cloths binding him, shoulders tense and muscles bulging, a nerve pulsing in his jaw as he gritted his teeth to prevent himself from instructing her to take his cock in her mouth and suck it, hard. He needed— God, he needed some sort of relief or he was going to spurt all over her like some callow youth who had no control over himself or his release.