Read Online Night of Pleasure by Delilah Marvelle - Free Book Online
Authors: Delilah Marvelle
Tags: Erótica, Romance, Regency, Historical Romance, Victorian, eloisa james, courtney milan, Julia Quinn, Delilah Marvelle
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capable of putting any man into governmental power. He had held that golden chalice of esteem since 1810, after he had turned a sizable investment of half a million into an astounding two million. It wasn’t planned. After getting drunk one afternoon, he signed papers he shouldn’t have, letting his broker overinvest in the wrong stock. Fortunately, it resulted in the largest payout the stock exchange had ever seen. He’d been investing in stocks and large parcels of land all over New York City and the world ever since, growing his sizable fortune one crisp dollar at a time until it came to be what it was today: eighteen and a half million.
Ever since her father’s financial assets had more than tripled over the years, everyone’s interest in her had tripled over the years. Men from all over the world had been calling on her father in a desperate effort to appeal for a matrimonial arrangement that might put Grey assets into their lint-filled pockets.
But her father, bless his dear misguided heart, was determined to marry her off to a mere third generation viscount in desperate need of money. Her father was deeply sentimental. He had adored his now deceased friend, George, the former viscount, and wanted their families to become one. He had always claimed the Banfields were the definition of happiness and perfection and what a family needed to be.
She respected her father’s sentimentality, but knew happiness and perfection was a matter of opinion. Her father claimed to have had the perfect marriage. Yet almost every silk wall in their house had to be repeatedly replaced over the years from all of the objects that had been smashed against them. He and his wife ruthlessly argued about everything for years.
Until the woman died.
Clementine remembered that night. Her mother’s sobs and shrieks could be heard throughout the house, much like the year before and the years before that, as her father had quietly assured Clementine yet again that there would finally be a brother or a sister for her to hold. He assured her that out of the countless babes that had been lost this one would survive and allow them to create the happy family they always deserved.
Her father had been overly hopeful. Neither the babies or the happiness had survived. And though it was ghastly to even whisper it, Clementine was glad her mother didn’t survive. She had never liked her mother. The woman was cold in both mind and heart and had wobbled around pregnant year after year, bitterly blaming her father and the rest of the world for the fact that she was a woman. Was it part of life for a woman to get married and get pregnant? Yes. Yes, it was. Could a woman aspire to be more than a wife and a mother? Yes. Yes, she could.
She simply had to plan for it.
Thunder cracked overhead, causing Clementine to jump against the cushioned seat of the carriage. Her heart skidded, and, for a gasping moment, she was crawling beneath the breakfast table as a brick came crashing through the window of their New York home.
She hated the feeling of having her emotions amplified.
At least here in London no one knew who they were. Her father had no political affiliation with the Whigs or the Tories or Parliament itself. That made her like the idea of London very much. No one was going to try to kill them for supporting the wrong political party.
Not that she was going to stay in London long enough to care.
She glanced toward the blackened sky beyond the windows. Large drops of rain slowly splattered and tapped against the glass. Within a few breaths, the window was smeared from a deluge and the cobbled street they rode on became a blur of water spraying everywhere as people draped their coats over their heads and darted beneath building doorways.
Tightening her gloved hold on the beaded reticule set in her lap, Clementine glanced toward her father.
His horsehair top hat was pushed back from his dark brows as he casually angled the leather bound book he was
Ever since her father’s financial assets had more than tripled over the years, everyone’s interest in her had tripled over the years. Men from all over the world had been calling on her father in a desperate effort to appeal for a matrimonial arrangement that might put Grey assets into their lint-filled pockets.
But her father, bless his dear misguided heart, was determined to marry her off to a mere third generation viscount in desperate need of money. Her father was deeply sentimental. He had adored his now deceased friend, George, the former viscount, and wanted their families to become one. He had always claimed the Banfields were the definition of happiness and perfection and what a family needed to be.
She respected her father’s sentimentality, but knew happiness and perfection was a matter of opinion. Her father claimed to have had the perfect marriage. Yet almost every silk wall in their house had to be repeatedly replaced over the years from all of the objects that had been smashed against them. He and his wife ruthlessly argued about everything for years.
Until the woman died.
Clementine remembered that night. Her mother’s sobs and shrieks could be heard throughout the house, much like the year before and the years before that, as her father had quietly assured Clementine yet again that there would finally be a brother or a sister for her to hold. He assured her that out of the countless babes that had been lost this one would survive and allow them to create the happy family they always deserved.
Her father had been overly hopeful. Neither the babies or the happiness had survived. And though it was ghastly to even whisper it, Clementine was glad her mother didn’t survive. She had never liked her mother. The woman was cold in both mind and heart and had wobbled around pregnant year after year, bitterly blaming her father and the rest of the world for the fact that she was a woman. Was it part of life for a woman to get married and get pregnant? Yes. Yes, it was. Could a woman aspire to be more than a wife and a mother? Yes. Yes, she could.
She simply had to plan for it.
Thunder cracked overhead, causing Clementine to jump against the cushioned seat of the carriage. Her heart skidded, and, for a gasping moment, she was crawling beneath the breakfast table as a brick came crashing through the window of their New York home.
She hated the feeling of having her emotions amplified.
At least here in London no one knew who they were. Her father had no political affiliation with the Whigs or the Tories or Parliament itself. That made her like the idea of London very much. No one was going to try to kill them for supporting the wrong political party.
Not that she was going to stay in London long enough to care.
She glanced toward the blackened sky beyond the windows. Large drops of rain slowly splattered and tapped against the glass. Within a few breaths, the window was smeared from a deluge and the cobbled street they rode on became a blur of water spraying everywhere as people draped their coats over their heads and darted beneath building doorways.
Tightening her gloved hold on the beaded reticule set in her lap, Clementine glanced toward her father.
His horsehair top hat was pushed back from his dark brows as he casually angled the leather bound book he was
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