The Christmas Courtesan (A Gentleman Courtesans Novella), page 1
The Christmas Courtesan (A Gentleman Courtesans Novella)
The Widows Four Book 1
Victoria Vale
Copyright © 2021 by Victoria Vale
Cover Art by: Midnight Muse
All rights reserved.
No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.
Contents
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Epilogue
The Gentleman Courtesans
More by Victoria Vale
About the Author
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Chapter 1
London, 1818
“Come now, ladies. You cannot possibly believe those ridiculous rumors. Male courtesans in London? Why, the very idea is preposterous!”
Lady Miranda Hughes glanced up from the pink rosette she’d just embroidered onto her sampler. The other women gathered around her morning room had given up their work as talk of Christmas festivities was lost in favor of something far more scandalous. Dropping the sampler and needle into the work-bag at her feet, she reached for her empty teacup.
Mrs. Maud Portemaine continued her tirade against the latest piece of gossip mentioned during their weekly tea and needlepoint session.
“No man is desperate enough for funds to make himself a kept man,” Maud insisted, staring at them over the rim of her round spectacles. She was all hard angles and sharp features, though from behind her lenses one could make out a pair of pleasing blue eyes, framed by wispy tendrils of chestnut hair fallen free of her coiffure.
Miranda issued a sarcastic snort while refilling her cup. “Half the men of the ton are desperate for money. Why do you think the heiresses are always the first to be snapped up every Season?”
She could attest to that herself, as a large dowry had offered her several opportunities for an advantageous marriage. Now that she was widowed, there were fewer suitors lining up to court her—though Miranda could offer no complaint. She liked her freedom, and thanks to a generous dower’s portion could maintain her lifestyle for the rest of her days.
“Most of them do not wish to marry, anyway,” offered Lady Mary Caulfield, selecting two iced cakes from the silver tower between them. The blonde curls at her temples bobbed when she sat back in her chair and took a tiny, ladylike bite of her cake. “Why wed an heiress if you can warm one’s bed and still earn yourself a fortune?”
Maud sputtered, goggling at Mary in astonishment. “Honestly, Mary … the things you say!”
“She isn’t wrong,” Miranda replied. “I cannot see why it should bother you to know they exist, Maud. If a woman can become some man’s mistress and earn herself a king’s ransom in the process, I do not see why a man cannot do the same.”
“They don’t exist,” Maud insisted. “It’s just a silly rumor.”
“Lady Banbury told me she had an affair with one,” chimed in the fourth of their tight-knit group, Mrs. Joan Durbin. She was dark-haired and high-spirited, her left cheek showing a playful dimple when she smiled.. “Why would she lie?”
“Oh, pish!” Maud grumbled. “Lady Banbury has every reason to lie. She is in debt up to her eyebrows and tries to pass her paste jewelry off as the genuine thing.”
“It was before her difficulties,” Joan retorted. “And I believe her.”
“So do I,” Mary said. “I find the whole thing so fascinating! The men have had their fun for so long, while telling us to mind our manners, keep silent, and stand in their shadows. As if we do not have wants and needs of our own.”
A sensation nearly forgotten slithered through Miranda’s middle, reminding her how long it had been since she’d experienced pleasures of the flesh. It was the one part of her marriage that hadn’t been lacking, as her husband had been a man of healthy appetites who didn’t balked at teaching her the mechanics of intercourse. It might be shameful of her, but it was the only thing she missed about being someone’s wife. Outside the bedroom, she and Lord Hughes hadn’t known one another at all.
It had been her hope that the birth of their child would bring them closer together. But, while Lord Hughes had doted on their daughter, he had remained distant from his wife—as if his blood connection to little Ursula resulted in a camaraderie he could never share with Miranda.
“Hear, hear,” Miranda murmured, raising her cup.
Maud puckered her lips as if she had just tasted something tart. “Miranda, I am surprised at you. I would expect such talk from these two—”
“Do you like my sampler?” Joan chirped, a wicked grin spreading over her face.
She revealed the figure of a nude man with nothing but an ivy leaf covering where his manhood should be—thereby proving Maud’s point. Mary giggled into her teacup while Miranda fought back a smile.
“But not from you,” Maud continued, giving Joan a chiding look.
“Surely you haven’t been widowed so long you’ve forgotten what it’s like,” Miranda argued. “Our husbands might be dead, but that doesn’t mean we have to be.”
“I vow, Maud, it’s almost as if you’ve turned into an old prude overnight,” Mary said with a scoff. “I think it would be fun to indulge in an affair … for the sake of appeasing curiosity if nothing else. Don’t you want to know what it might be like with someone else—someone you wouldn’t have to marry to swive?”
“But to pay for it like some kind of … like …” Maud waved a hand through the air, lips moving as she searched for words but apparently found none.
“When my dear Roddy died, he told me to use my inheritance for whatever might make me happy,” Mary said, a hint of sadness creeping into her voice. Unlike Miranda’s polite but distant union, Mary’s marriage to the Earl of Rodingham had been a love match.
“I am certain he didn’t intend for you to spend the money on … on whores,” Maud retorted.
“They aren’t whores,” Mary argued. “They are courtesans. There is a difference, dear.”
“If they even exist, which I am certain they do not,” Maud fired back.
Joan’s expression grew smug as she bent to retrieve something from her own work-bag. Miranda’s eyes widened, Maud gasped, and Mary murmured, ‘I knew it’, under her breath as Joan held a crisp, white calling card aloft for their inspection. Two large letters were printed on it in a decidedly masculine script, with bold swirls gracing the edges.
GC.
“Where did you get that?” Mary whispered, almost as if speaking too loudly would make the card disappear.
“Lady Banbury gave it to me,” Joan replied, passing the card to Miranda for inspection. “Apparently, you can only meet with the proprietor if you present this card to the modiste, Madame Hershaw—hers is the shop in Cavendish Square, you know. According to Lady Banbury, you offer her the card and say you’re looking for a special type of gown … something to be worn in the evening. When she asks what you have in mind, you say you wish to impress a certain gentleman, and what you need must be unlike anything any other woman in London possesses. When you wear it, you wish to feel like the most ravishing woman in all the world. You tell her you want it made of red satin.”
Miranda passed the card to Maud, while Mary went to the edge of her seat, her rapt attention fixed on Joan.
“Then what?”
“Then, she ushers you into a secret back room, where the proprietor of the agency meets with you to make the arrangements. It’s all very secretive. They only accept new clients by referral … that card given by a client to a trusted friend.”
“Oh, poppycock!” Maud exclaimed as Mary finished her inspection of the card and handed it back to Joan. “Don’t you think if any of it were true, we would have caught wind of it before now? Scandal is the lifeblood of the ton, so I cannot fathom something like this has been going on for any length of time without someone finding out and exposing them.”
“Hmm,” Miranda mused, absently reaching for a scone. “Actually, when you think of it, the fact that they operate in plain sight is ingenious. The women who consort with these courtesans have everything to lose by allowing this information to fall into the wrong hands. Of course they have kept it a secret. Any woman who would think to go spreading the tale … well, she’d ruin her own reputation in the process, wouldn’t she?”
“Precisely,” Joan agreed.
Maud waved them off and returned to the sampler in her lap. “I still say it’s all some sort of prank. A lady is likely to turn up at Madame Hershaw’s and receive nothing more from her inquiry but an expensive gown she’ll never wear.”
“Well,” Mary said, drawing the word out as she glanced from one lady to another. “There is only one way to know for sure, isn’t there?”
Joan’s eyes went wide. “You aren’t honestly suggesting I try to hire one, are you?”
“You do have one of their cards,” Maud pointed out. “What are you doing with it if you have
Staring down at the card as if afraid it might bite her, Joan shrugged. “I hadn’t decided one way or the other. Lady Banbury offered it to me, but I’ve been carrying it about for weeks, too afraid to do anything other than look at it.”
“It’s settled then,” Maud declared with a decisive stab of her needle. “You’ll go to Madame Hershaw’s and find out whether the rumors are true and then report back to us.”
“Me?” Joan protested with a gasp. “But I couldn’t possibly! Lord Vaughan and I are making progress toward becoming more than acquaintances. I think he will make an overture soon, and if all goes according to plan, I’ll have a lover at nothing more than the cost of a few lowered necklines and flirtatious smiles. I nominate Mary. She’s the most adventurous of us, after all.”
Mary choked on a sip of tea and suffered through a coughing fit while Maud pounded her back. “Oh, but I am nowhere near ready to take a lover. It is too soon.”
Miranda’s heart ached for her friend, who had been widowed for two years yet was not ready to move on from Rodingham. What must it be like to love someone that deeply? She feared she might never know.
“I think the most skeptical of us should undertake the investigation,” Mary added with a sly glance in Maud’s direction.
Maud gave a defiant tilt of her chin. “I think not. If this agency truly exists, I wouldn’t be caught within sneezing distance of a single one of those courtesans.”
Joan turned to Miranda with a wicked smile, the calling card extended from her fingers. “I suppose that leaves you. You’ve yet to take a lover since Lord Hughes, God rest his soul. Surely you do not intend to die an old, shriveled up widow?”
Miranda stared at the card, the printed letters and swirling scrolls swimming before her eyes. Of course it had occurred to her that widowhood meant independence. However, it was difficult to shrug off years of seminary school etiquette and the strictures of a society that kept young debutantes ignorant to the realities of intimacy and pleasure. She had been fortunate to have a husband who took the time to ensure she enjoyed the marriage bed, even if he neglected to give her his attention outside their chambers.
Despite having built a fulfilling life for herself—one in which she followed her own whims and found camaraderie with such dear friends—Miranda could not deny the needs she’d been ignoring. Marriage had awakened passions in her that now went unfulfilled. While she had been fond of Lord Hughes, the foundation of their union had been based mostly on their compatibility in bed. Having him warm and heavy on top of her … she missed that, more than she was willing to admit.
“No, of course not,” she replied, realizing the three women were silently awaiting her response. “I just … well, the opportunity to take a lover has not yet presented itself.”
“Ahem,” Joan mumbled, thrusting the calling card into her hands. “It would seem that opportunity has just knocked on your door.”
“If anyone found out, she’d be ruined,” Maud stated.
“No one will find out,” Mary countered. “If other ladies of the ton can get away with it, then Miranda can, too. Besides, she doesn’t actually have to hire one of them if she doesn’t want. If nothing else, she can simply confirm whether the stories are true. What she does from there is entirely her business.”
Miranda scoffed. “You say that now, but the minute I inform you I’ve taken to keeping a paramour, you’ll want all the details.”
“Only if you wish to divulge them,” Joan replied. The sly look on her face told Miranda she’d be hounded persistently until she told every scandalous detail.
Miranda studied the card with a sigh, excitement stealing over her. As a younger woman, she had never been daring. Her upbringing had made a perfect, polished lady out of her—assuring her future as the wife of a baron.
If ever there was a time for Miranda to shed the girlish notions imposed upon her in her youth, it was now.
Tucking the card neatly into her work-bag, she smiled. “Ladies, I think a visit to Madame Hershaw’s dress shop is in order. I have a need for something in red satin.”
“What do you mean my dowry is gone?”
Roger Thornton watched his younger sister transform from serene girl to vengeful hellion with the utterance of only a few words. Their elder brother, Lord Angus Thornton, held both hands defensively before him as if sensing Emily’s oncoming tirade. Roger could hardly blame her, as safeguarding the family fortune—including an impressive dowry for their only sister—had been one of the duties passed down along with the title of viscount. True to form, Angus had proved as abominable at this as he did just about everything else. His only recommendation was his striking looks, which in this situation proved of help to absolutely no one.
“Now, Emily,” Angus began, backing away as she advanced on him with fists clenched. “I can make it right; you just have to give me time.”
“Time?” she exploded, throwing her hands up in exasperation. “There is no time! Lord Lovett has made it clear he intends to request my hand in marriage. Do you mean to tell him he’ll be receiving an impoverished bride once he does?”
“If he truly cares for you, he’ll want you without the dowry,” Angus said with a little shrug.
“The man needs an heiress, you dolt!” Emily screeched. “Of course he cares for me, but there is more than love to consider here! Lovett doesn’t have the luxury of thinking with his heart. Do you think he would have given me the time of day if he didn’t know I would come with a dowry large enough to get him out of debt?”
Angus opened his mouth to reply, but Roger came to his feet and the motion silenced his siblings. One would think he was the eldest, the way they both deferred to him. If only he truly was the firstborn; their lives would be so much easier.
“Tell her,” he commanded, slowly, succinctly.
Angus flinched as if Roger has struck him. “Such matters are not—”
“You owe her that much,” he interjected with a wave of one hand. “Explain yourself.”
Swearing under his breath, Angus paced away from them, hands on his hips. Emily looked to Roger with a furrowed brow, a silent question in her eyes. He shook his head to indicate he had no idea what their scapegrace brother had done with the money—though he could make a few guesses.
When Angus faced them again, he wore an expression they both knew well: one of apologetic shame. Roger clenched his teeth and awaited what would undoubtedly be a pitiful string of excuses.
“I was assured the venture was a sound one,” Angus rushed out in a single breath. “The money would be doubled, and I only wanted to improve our circumstances. I intended to return it with no one the wiser once I’d made it back.”
“You used my dowry to dabble in speculation?” Emily cried. “Angus, how could you?”
“I thought it was a sure thing.”
“There is no such thing in matters of speculation,” Roger snapped his ire beginning to rise. It should hardly surprise him that Angus had done such a thing, though he would have thought his brother above pilfering their sister’s dowry. Apparently, Roger would have been mistaken.
Emily sank into the nearest chair and buried her face in her hands. “Oh, God. I’ll never make a match now … not with Lovett, not with anyone.”
Roger gave her shoulder a consoling squeeze while offering Angus a withering glare. “It isn’t so bad as all that.”
“It is,” Emily insisted. “Everything is absolutely ruined!”
Fits of female hysterics usually made Roger uncomfortable, but this was his baby sister. He felt more like a father to her than he did a sibling, considering he was twice her age. He had been eight and ten when Emily was born, and the death of their parents thrust him into the role of unofficial head of the family. It didn’t matter that Angus had inherited the title, or that he controlled their finances. Roger was the practical one, the one Angus and Emily came to when they needed advice. The loss of three stillborn babes between himself and Emily had left a wide gulf between them in years, though his affection for her created a powerful bond. To see her weep made his stomach twist itself in knots.
