The Seduction of Viscount Vice
by Nicola Davidson
Copyright © 2017 by Nicola Davidson. All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce, distribute, or transmit in any form or by any means. For information regarding subsidiary rights, please contact the Publisher.
Chapter One
London, 23 June 1814
One more. Just one more question about his lack of a spouse, and he would put his fist through a fucking wall.
Gritting his teeth, Lord Iain “Vice” Vissen continued his social rounds of the secondary ballroom at Fallen, the exclusive London pleasure club he co-owned with his closest friends Lord Sebastian St. John, known as Sin, and Lord Grayson Deveraux, known as Devil. Sin managed the staff and Devil all the financials; but right from the start, Vice had managed the floor. He produced and performed in the sexual shows and themed balls, and also ensured every club member’s comfort and enjoyment. Yet even as this evening’s Midsummer Night pagan extravaganza appeared a tremendous success, for the first time he wished he were anywhere else, just to escape the meaningful looks and pointed interrogations.
It never used to be this bad. But with Sin marrying his beloved Grace, then Devil and his estranged wife, Eliza, blissfully reconciling, now half the fucking ton had turned their matchmaking gaze on the lone straggler of the trio: Vice. The grande dames weren’t even treacle-coating their comments anymore. He was a too-dedicated bachelor. Too inclined toward liaisons of a short duration. Worst of all, too raw and hot-blooded—which actually meant just too Scottish.
Ha. The plaintive wail of the delicate Sassenach. Scots were warriors. Always had been, always would be. That was fact. And until his dying day, no matter what soil he stood on or the company he kept, he would never dishonor the Highland blood that flowed strong and true through his veins. If it meant he never found his one special lady, well, that would have to be that. Besides, it wasn’t like his special lady existed anyway. Wellborn, marriage-minded women tended not to set their cap at men who cared little for politics or war, craved the applause and admiration of theater roles, were painfully detail-obsessed perfectionists, and oh yes, loved frequent bouts of public fucking.
Soul-deep happiness was for a lucky few. And that number did not include him.
“Vice! Yet another triumph of party perfection, darling. How do you do it?”
Startled out of his musings, he bowed to a masked countess possessing ample curves, a come-hither smile, but regrettably, ebony hair. Blondes, brunettes, and redheads he would—and did—enjoy with abandon both onstage and off. But if she had black hair, or worse, black hair and sky-blue eyes, he wouldn’t bed her for all the guineas in England. The last thing he wanted was any memory of the past, and what a mindless, trusting fool he’d been as a younger man.
“Well, my dear.” Vice took the lady’s hand and brushed his lips over it. “I am always inspired to outdo myself by a beautiful woman. But this evening is far from perfect, unfortunately.”
“Poppycock,” she simpered. “It couldn’t be improved upon.”
Laughably incorrect. The urns weren’t quite in a straight line, the right-side bonfire had two more orange silk flames than the left, there were four silver cake forks with a faint smudge, and the sugar-dusted apple tarts still weren’t on the damned dessert table. “If you insist. I must say, I can’t see how his lordship ever lets you out of the bedchamber looking as delectable as you do. Never seen such a naughty, er…”
“Rose fairy,” she purred. “But not naughty, sweet as honey on the tongue.”
Honey. Dessert. Apple tarts. Christ Almighty, why weren’t they out on the table? It was literally impossible to find good staff in London. He might as well do everything himself.
“Hold that thought.” Vice squeezed her hand. Perhaps once he’d resolved the dessert matter, he could break his ebony-hair abstinence. The countess had claws, and he was more than ready for a rough, hot ride. “I’ll return shortly, but I have an issue I must see to. Don’t leave and break my heart, now.”
Expertly weaving his way through the crush while smiling, shaking hands, and kissing cheeks, he finally found Nell. The sprightly, no-nonsense lady had been Grace’s maid-companion and now assisted with event preparation. She directed staff with the nerve and bark of a general, and he quietly adored her.
“Nell, if you could stop ogling naked men for a moment, where the hell are the apple tarts? I specifically ordered them out a quarter hour ago!”
The silver-haired woman smiled calmly. “Well, well, if it isn’t the bear with a burr in its paw. You really should—”
“If you say find a wife, you’re gone. Unemployed. Out on your rump.”
“I was going to say visit the toy room, get some oil, and uncork your bottle. You’re far too on edge, poppet. Besides, I’m hardly going to judge anyone’s unmarried status, am I?”
Vice scowled. Bloody woman, bringing truth and logic to a sentiment fight. “Perhaps. But every part of me is primed to perfection and in fine working order. Unlike your staff.”
“I don’t know what your complaint is. The apple tarts are out. I held the door for a footman carrying them myself.”
“Then why, pray tell, aren’t they on the dessert table?”
“What?” Nell glanced over at the refreshment area and frowned. “Oh. Wretched temporary staff. They never work out. I’m surprised you hired a beginner like Murray for such an important event.”
“What are you blathering about now? I never hired any temporary staff for tonight, beginner or otherwise.”
“But the footman…he said you did. As a favor to a friend. He was outfitted in our livery.”
Vice froze as every hair on the back of his neck stood at attention. “Really?”
“Yes, really.” The growing anxiety and anger on Nell’s face spelled doom for the lad if she caught him. “Why, that little bastard. Swindled his way in good and proper, then.”
“Indeed,” he said slowly, his tone belying the fury surging through his body. “So we have a spy in our midst. Do you think from the church, perhaps a reformer? An heir attempting to win a bet? Or something more sinister?”
“Hmm. The lad had a cockney accent, but that could have been false. He was fresh-looking, no jaw shadow or brawn to speak of. Rather tall, perhaps up to your chin. White wig, blue eyes. Perhaps spying on someone’s behalf?”
“I see. Well then, I guess it is time for me to corner our wee intruder and ask him a few questions.”
Nell folded her arms and shook her head. “Pah. String him up, you mean. Or dip him in syrup and stake him atop an ant hill.”
“Lady, your mind is a dark and frightening place. If I were thirty years older, I’d propose immediately.”
Her lips twitched. “Cease your blathering and go. I expect a full report.”
Vice nodded and strode away.
Ducking into an antechamber, he reached out and slid his fingers beneath a nondescript candelabra resting on a small side table. With a faint click, a door opened and he leaped up the narrow stairs two at a time until he reached a small room, unfurnished except for a stool and a telescope. After swiftly fitting the telescope to a carefully carved-out space, he began to scan the ballroom.
“Where are you, you pox-ridden parasite?” he growled, his gaze leaping from footman to footman.
Rage bubbled like a volcano ready to erupt. The sanctuary of Fallen had been breached. And the cunning alley rat wearing a uniform sewn in the house livery suggested a great deal of forward planning: a close study of fabrics, trim, and style. No way in hell was this a prank or a protest by some militant churchgoer…
Vice’s search came to an abrupt halt.
There.
Nell’s description had been sufficiently detailed, bless her. The bastard in question hadn’t set down his tray of apple tarts on the dessert table as ordered. Instead, he ambled around the ballroom offering them to guests, the perfect cover to spy. Was he employed by one of the scandal sheets? There did seem to be a certain watchfulness about him, his gaze resting too long on both the guests and his surroundings.
Well. He’d be getting a story, all right. The story of how a scrawny lad disguised as a footman had invaded Fallen, was discovered, and had ended his night in an East End alley with two broken legs. It wouldn’t matter what excuses or bribes he offered. Vice had heard them all from whining aristocrats who had scaled balconies and trees, worn fake masks, even pretended to be laborers just to get inside.
Fallen was a haven for its owners and members, a place to enjoy every pleasure in absolute luxury, safety, and discretion. And no way in hell was anyone, let alone a sniveling, wet behind the ears, fucking Englishman, going to get away with violating that.
The lad had been clever and lucky so far.
But his luck was about to run out.
…
She was playing the role of her life.
Smiling in triumph, Mairi MacNair barely resisted the urge to dance a solitary reel. Her bold and reckless plan to disguise herself as a Fallen footman—and discover firsthand what made the legendary English pleasure club the best—had succeeded. After weeks of traipsing behind real footmen to observe their mannerisms and livery, crouching behind trees or pretending to clean carriages just so she could spy on the lavish Portman Square townhouse, she could report back to her employer, Yvette du Bois.
One month ago, they had arrived from Paris because Yvette’s popular gentleman’s club, Worldly, was being elbowed out by newer, richer, and better-located competition. They had planned on reopening the club here in London as soon as possible. Unfortunately, Mairi’s discoveries could mean delays. The stories they’d heard didn’t begin to describe the reality of Fallen; the establishment owned by three men appropriately named Sin, Devil, and Vice was pure elegance and splendor. Thick Aubusson rugs lined the hallways, the walls were done in cream silk, and the paintings looked like they belonged in a museum. As for this Midsummer-Night-themed ball, it was as professional as any theater production she’d seen: an enchanted forest with deep green foliage, giant silver urns of flowers, silk-flamed bonfires, and a raised dais displaying two velvet-covered gold thrones.
But her efforts would be worth it. Yvette had promised a handsome reward for detailed information. No longer would Mairi be desperately lonely, always behind the scenery attending to props and costumes like she had for ten years at the previous Worldly. No longer would she be stifled, forced to obey the house rules that insisted she be an invisible nobody. Instead, she would be the leading lady, strutting around in wickedly scandalous costumes, seducing the audience into lauding her with bouquets and applause and coins, experiencing the heady rush of being pleasured in public. But most of all, if Worldly was a magnificent success, her debt to the woman who had saved her life would finally be repaid.
“My lady? Will you have some more champagne?”
Mairi almost stumbled at the question, then laughed at her own foolishness. Of course the other footman wasn’t talking to her. He thought she was a lad. They all did. Not only was her livery an exact replica, her uncommonly tall, slender figure made the disguise even more believable. Besides, she had discarded her title long ago. Airs and graces neither paid the bills nor kept a stomach full, and they were rather superfluous for a Scottish earl’s ruined and forgotten daughter.
“Ooooh, is that one last apple tart I see?” said a high-pitched feminine voice. “Come here, boy, let me divest you of it.”
Inclining her head, Mairi walked over to the enviably curvy and dark-haired woman dressed as some sort of fairy. “Here you go, ma’am. Fresh from the kitchen and right nice.”
“My favorite,” the woman said with a sigh, snatching it up and taking a large bite.
“Is there anythin’ else I can do for you?”
“Well, you could share a little gossip about Vice. There’ll be a coin for your trouble.”
Damnation.
Panic flared. Though she’d spent countless hours sewing her costume and spying on footmen, she knew few intimate details about the three owners. The talk in Paris had been mostly club-related—the startling level of erotic excess, the variety, the secret membership list, and the glamor. All things greatly appreciated by the French. “Er…not sure what you mean, ma’am.”
“Don’t be coy. I’m not spying for the scandal sheets, and I’m not angling for a wedding ring. I already have a husband. What I want to know is the man behind the nickname. I believe Vice is finally going to be mine later this evening, and it must go well. What does he enjoy besides fucking onstage? Perhaps toys as Sin does, or being caned like Devil?”
Mairi’s lips twitched. People were ill-informed to use words like puritan and frigid and dull when describing the English. “I am…not at liberty to say.”
“Bah,” the woman said with an irritable sigh. “Off you go, then. Someone else will know all about that strapping Scot.”
“Have a pleasant evenin’,” Mairi said, before lowering her head and hurrying toward the kitchen entrance. She didn’t have all the information she needed, but if Vice was Scottish, it was time to flee. Under no circumstances could she bump into a man who might know—
The thought disappeared in a rush of terror as a large hand clamped over her mouth and something unforgiving and metallic jammed harshly against her side. A pistol!
Mairi struggled hard against her assailant as she was dragged into a side room, but whoever it was might have been made of cast iron for all the good it did. “Lemme go, ye clunch-headed dandiprat!”
“So, the alley rat speaks. But I would advise you to drop that fucking appalling false accent, laddie. It is only irritating me further, and I’m already itching to put a bullet in you.”
She froze.
After ten years absence, the pure lilt and burr of the Highlands would steal anyone’s senses. But her sudden dizziness and frantically thundering heart signaled far more than a yearning for home. She knew that strong, deep voice. But it couldn’t be him. It couldn’t be.
“Dunno what yer talkin’ about, sir.” She kept her gaze resolutely on the floor as her mind turned to mud. “Just tryin’ to do me job and I bloody well get grabbed.”
In the blink of an eye, she was shoved hard against a wall, the pistol muzzle buried in her ribcage. “I warned you about the accent. Now. You have precisely one second to look me in the eye and tell me who you are and who you are working for. Begin.”
Oh God.
Mairi shuddered, tears burning her eyes as an agonizingly familiar scent tormented her senses. Heat, and the light sweat of physical labor. Whisky. An herbal-blend cologne. The delicious combined fragrance that had enveloped her just once before—the day she deliberately surrendered her virginity to the young man she’d loved beyond all, but was forbidden to have. The young man she had used to end an unwanted betrothal and then abandoned.
“I…er…” she mumbled as long-suppressed memories clawed her mind. The cornered young lady she’d been, willing to do anything to escape her fate. A sweet and awkward viscount, two years her junior, who for some unknown reason thought her the most beautiful woman in the world. The way he had kissed and stroked her for hours, gaining in confidence and expertise. Learning how to make her come again and again, before settling her onto a soft woolen rug and filling her completely as the sun warmed their naked skin. He was even bigger now—unlike most men, a good head taller than her—with broad shoulders and chest, muscled thighs outlined to perfection in tight breeches, and a steely strength she could feel in the powerful grip that trapped her.
“Fucking answer me, laddie.” His hand slid up past her collarbone to encircle her throat. “And it better be…Christ! I’ll be damned. You must forgive my lapse in manners. Fucking answer me, lass.”
His grip had loosened, his tone softened, and yet she knew the danger had magnified tenfold as her lack of an Adam’s apple revealed another level to the deception. Now her only hope was to somehow brazen it out, to hide the regret and sheer longing twisting her stomach into knots. This would truly test her potential stage mettle.
Mairi took a deep breath, lifted her head, and looked him straight in those captivating hazel eyes. “Hello, Iain.”
…
He couldn’t think. Couldn’t breathe. And he was probably hallucinating.
Staggering back a step, Vice threw the uncocked pistol down and rubbed a hand across his face. But the tall, slender figure of Lady Mairi MacNair remained in front of him.
“Mairi,” he said hoarsely, unsure if he’d be able to utter anything coherent beyond her name. Fierce, wild joy surged through his body. She was alive. The only woman he’d ever loved hadn’t died in Paris as her parents had claimed. She was here, in his home, and even more beautiful than he remembered.
In breeches and a wig, dressed as a Fallen footman.
The truth hit him like a bucketful of ice water. He’d loved her beyond reason; Mairi had used him. He’d proposed; she’d skipped away to the continent without a backward glance. He’d mourned her death for years; she’d been hale and hearty the whole bloody time.
Fucking lying, scheming witch.
Taking a long, slow breath so he didn’t shake her for what she’d done, Vice instead raised an eyebrow. “You look…surprisingly well for a dead woman, my lady.”
Mairi grimaced. “Don’t call me that. I discarded my title over ten years ago, and I’m sure I don’t have to remind you how that came about. But I am sorry I neglected to thank you for your superior efforts in freeing me from the worst engagement in history.”
Her cool, calm demeanor when he felt so volatile damn near shredded him, but somehow Vice managed a careless shrug. “A fuck is a fuck. I was hardly going to say no to finally ridding myself of the virgin cap. Just would have preferred to know the plot ahead of time—that you had no intention of marrying me, either.”
“Iain. Surely you cannot be holding a grudge. My midnight escape saved you from a terrible mistake. You barely even knew me.”
“No,” he said bitterly. “I didn’t. Not at all, as it turned out. And you may call me Vice, or my lord.”
“Really? But Iain is such a fine Scottish name.”
“No one calls me that. Ever. Not even my mother or sister nowadays.”
Mairi laughed, yet her gaze was wary. “I did. Each time I saw you. Perhaps you don’t remember that. But I bet you do remember how loudly I screamed it when you made me come over and over in that clearing by the creek.”
Of course he remembered. It had been the most incredibly pleasurable and satisfying day of his life. But it was so typical of a coldhearted trickster like Mairi that she spoke of that rather than expressing any kind of sorrow or remorse about the shocking aftermath.
Then again, only a damned fool would even hope for such a thing.
Vice scowled. “Stop bloody talking. Unless you are going to tell me what you are doing at Fallen dressed as a footman in our livery.”
It was as if he hadn’t said a word.
“We were such fast learners together.” She reached up to tuck a lock of his shoulder-length auburn hair behind his ear. “Mouths…fingers…tongues. Oh, that tongue of yours. I was so wet. So very ready when you took me.”
His cock surged, straining against his breeches. Christ. He was a damned Bedlamite when it came to her. After everything that had happened, the long, empty years that had passed, how the hell could he still want her so much? Mairi was nothing but pure fucking poison.
“I don’t remember,” he snapped.
“Oh, I’d wager you do, my lord of detail. Now, I can’t quite recall how many times you had me…was it three or four?”
Four. Each time more exquisite, more wildly uninhibited than the last. “If you are quite finished—”
“And these days you co-own the most notorious and exclusive pleasure club in England, and the continent, for that matter. Quite a step for a lad from Perthshire. I’m sure it’s a remarkable story, so why don’t you tell me all about it?”
Vice glared at Mairi. This would be so much easier if she’d changed in the last ten years. But even wearing slightly ill-fitting breeches and a white wig covering her ebony curls, she was perfection. It was those eyes. Huge blue pools, like the deepest loch, framed by thick dark eyelashes. Or perhaps it was her plump rose-pink lips. Or those long, long legs. But any which way, none of that mattered when she was a fucking spy, trying to seduce him into spilling all his secrets, and he hated her for it.
“I’d rather,” he said lightly, picking up her hand and brushing his lips across her knuckles, “hear about this livery of yours.”
Her forehead creased in confusion. “Livery?”
“Darling. I admire your distraction techniques, I really do. But spying is just not on.”
“Spying?” said Mairi with a brittle laugh. “What a thing to say.”
“Forgive me, but I’m struggling to think of an alternative explanation.”
“Perhaps I merely wanted to see Fallen for myself.”
“You could have made an appointment to see me,” he said easily, relieved to the core that her armor was cracking. Perhaps now he could get some answers.
“I didn’t bloody well know you were Vice!”
“And you’re wearing our livery and breeches.”
“I happen to like breeches,” she snapped. “Gowns are beastly things, designed for discomfort. Stays are worse.”
Unbidden, his gaze dropped to her chest, then her hips and lower. God knew what she had stuffed in the front of her breeches to resemble a flaccid cock, but her backside was just as perfect as it ever was. A ripe peach, high and firm. He couldn’t stop his hand from sliding over the slight curve of her hip and behind to caress it.
Mairi inhaled shakily, and he glanced up to see pure lustful yearning on her face.
Smiling to himself, he let his other hand drop so he grasped her hips. His thumbs rubbed light circles across the tops of her thighs, making her quiver.
“So,” he said, “tell me more about the breeches. I’m 100 percent in favor; legs and a backside like yours should never be hidden by a gown.”
“I’m…” she whispered. “I’m sorry.”
“Wh—”
Pain exploded in his groin, and he dropped like a stone onto the floor to curl up in a gasping ball of agony. She’d fucking kneed him in the balls!
“Mairi,” he croaked, fighting the urge to vomit. His hand flailed to grab her foot as she nimbly leaped over his prone body toward the door. “You—”
She paused briefly and turned her head. “I really am sorry. But I’m not at all in the mood for questions, Iain.”
Then she fled the room at a sprint, turning left toward the kitchens. The next thing he heard was a maid asking where the fire was with a screech, and Mairi replying something about a serious dildo emergency because they’d run out of scented oil. If he didn’t want to hurl her into the Thames, he might have laughed.
Damned witch.
She might have bested him today, but he would find her. And he would get all the answers that had been eluding him for ten fucking years.
She’d thrown down the gauntlet, and hell yes, he’d taken it up.
This was war.
