Surrendering to the Baron (A Steamy Regency Romance Book 7) Read online

  Surrendering to the Baron

  By Georgette Brown

  Surrendering to the Baron

  by Georgette Brown

  Copyright © 2018 by Wind Color Press. All Rights Reserved.

  Cover art by The Killion Group.

  Table of Contents

  Title Page

  Copyright Page

  READER ADVISORY

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  Surrendering to the Baron

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  OTHER TITLES BY GEORGETTE BROWN

  READER ADVISORY

  Please note that this novel is very steamy with many extended scenes of a scandalous nature, more so than my other works, though not nearly as naughty as the version told by Em Brown.

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  Surrendering to the Baron

  By Georgette Brown

  Chapter One

  LEOPOLD SPENCER, THE FIFTH Baron Ramsay, felt the blow in his groin, as if one of the steeds currently rounding the straightaway had kicked him in the bollocks. He lowered his field glasses and tried to address his friend with calm. “Where is it you say our wives are staying?”

  “Château Follet,” Charles responded a little louder over the noise of the grandstands. “Or some demmed Frenchie name. By Jove, the Turk took that turn well! I think my judgment of horseflesh can finally rival yours, eh?”

  Though the Royal Ascot meeting was the purpose of the day for Leopold, with the Gold Cup yet to follow on Ladies’ Day, a more important matter now held his attention captive. Charles knew not that Château Follet was also known by the name of Château Debauchery, or he would not have spoken of the place with such indifference.

  “Your wife, Diana, told you this?” Leopold asked.

  “Yes, she was rambling away, as wives will do, about which shops and millineries they would patronize whilst in London. Dreadful dull matters that can only interest the fair sex. I told her that, with enough changing of the horses, she could make the trip to town in one day, but she thought the journey might prove too taxing for your wife. Said that this Château Follet was the perfect place to spend the night—possibly two, as she is well acquainted with the lady of the house.”

  The impish little vixen. Leopold felt his groin tighten. It surprised him little if Diana, his cousin, knowing full well her husband never listened to her with more than half an ear, should deliberately flaunt the name of Château Follet, a den of debauchery where men and women engaged in pleasures of the flesh. He had not thought Diana would return there after marrying Charles. Though Leopold had always enjoyed his visits to Follet, he had forsaken the place after marrying Trudie two years ago.

  Good God. Trudie. Was she aware of what transpired at the Château? It was too incredible that his shy and awkward wife should know of, let alone venture into, such a place. The wicked wantonness there would surely horrify her.

  Of a sudden, he recalled an unremarkable conversation between them at the breakfast table a fortnight ago, when Trudie had announced that she and Diana wished to travel to London to purchase fabrics for the latest fashion plates.

  “As—as you and Charles will be at the races,” Trudie had said, the pitch of her voice higher than usual, “we ladies will have a bit of our own fun in town.”

  He had nodded and politely inquired where they were staying and the length of their stay, though, in truth, he had been more interested in returning to his newspaper at the time.

  “I—we—Diana has arranged the, er, particulars.”

  She had not met his eye and was instead fixed upon applying a fifth coat of jam to her toast. Trudie had none of the guiles that many others of her sex perfected. Her eyes of cornflower blue, often wide with naiveté, could hold no falsehood. She was artless, a quality the late Mrs. Spencer had often extolled in recommending Trudie Bonneville to her son. The eldest of three, Trudie was also responsible and sensible. Leopold respected all these traits.

  And found them rather dull.

  But perhaps Trudie was not as sensible as he would have thought. They had been married two years, though, as his mother and hers were the best of friends, he had known Trudie since she was in leading strings.

  When he had gone off to Eton and then Oxford, he had seen little of her during her maturation into a young woman. Nonetheless, as she still possessed the rounded cheeks of her childhood and appeared no more comfortable in the attire of a woman than she did in the lace-frilled gowns her mother used to always adorn her with, he saw the same girl who would hide behind the sofa with a plateful of biscuits, unaware that the powdered sugar masking half her face betrayed what she had been about.

  He never would have selected Trudie for himself—she was middling in appearance and wit—but it was his mother’s dearest wish before her death to have the two families united.

  “I think your luck has taken a turn for the worse, Leo,” Charles said with a nudge. “Your horse has fallen half a lap behind.”

  Leopold looked out over the tracks. His steed did appear to struggle, but losing a hundred guineas was hardly important now. He cursed himself, for, as he reviewed the days prior to his departure for Ascot, to be followed by his wife’s departure for London the following day, he now saw that Trudie had been ill at ease all those days. She had hardly looked him in the eye. Though she was prone to fidgeting, as if the pins in her gown poked her constantly, she could hardly sit still at the dining table. She ate quickly and often asked to be excused.

  The greatest evidence of her nerves, however, lay in her favorite pastime, the pianoforte. Trudie excelled at the instrument and could play for hours. He knew her to be attempting a new concerto—the one in C Major by Mozart, he believed—but she had been unable to play through pieces that she had mastered years ago.

  Her odd behavior had not attracted his notice at the time, but now he viewed it with great foreboding, for why would she display such disquiet lest she well knew what Château Follet was about?

  He had not thought to hear its name again, though Diana had once teased him, suggesting that the four of them could have a ribald time there, but he had quickly quelled such a notion. Trudie was far from comfortable in the bedchamber. Their wedding night had been quite the disaster for both of them. He had been as gentle as he could, and she had tried to contain her cries, but it was evident to him that she took no pleasure in their congress. He had hoped, after the initial pain, that subsequent attempts would prove more agreeable to her, but she had looked ready to leap from the bed at his every touch.

  She would never engage in any of the activities at the Château Follet. Surely Diana, one of her dearest friends, knew this? The two women talked often, and their sex had a habit of leaving no subject unturned.

  But then why were they headed to Follet? What could Diana intend but to make cuckolds of him and Charles? He knew Diana to be discontented in her marriage, but would Trudie acquiesce to adultery? He would not have thought it possible,
but as he reflected on the past sennight, she had been behaving with all the indications of a guilty conscience.

  Granted, he himself had not been faithful in the last year, though he did not brandish his affairs as Charles did. He was not a poor husband, in that he never spoke a harsh word to Trudie and always treated her with courtesy and kindness. She knew as well as he that their marriage served to satisfy their families. Their mothers had crafted their engagement at their births. The Bonnevilles had wealth, and the Spencers had breeding. Both families benefited from the match.

  The excitement of the crowd rose, with Charles cheering loudly, as the horses came into the final lap. Leopold glanced at Charles, wondering if he should inform his friend of the need to depart Berkshire immediately to rescue their wives. Charles would be livid and want to lock Diana in her chambers, perhaps more cross at being pulled away from the races than at his wife’s infidelity.

  Leopold decided he could fetch the two women and bring them home himself. The responsibility to inform Charles would then rest appropriately with Diana.

  It was a good day’s journey to Château Follet, but if he departed within the hour, he could arrive before the women had to spend the night.

  Charles leaped in triumph as the horses crossed the finish line. “Damn me, the Turk won! He won!”

  After celebrating with the fellow beside him, who had made the same fortunate bet, Charles turned back to Leopold. “Here now, I know your horse finished down the field, but you look as if you lost more than a hundred quid. The day is young. You may recoup your losses yet. Lest your wife overspends her allowance, eh? I know Diana will with hers.”

  Leopold managed a grim smile. “I shall have to take my losses for the day. I fear I have neglected a matter that, upon reflection, requires some urgency to resolve.”

  Charles stared at him. “Eh?”

  “Make my bets for me while I am gone and keep the winnings if there are any to be had.”

  Knowing this to be an offer Charles could not refuse, Leopold took his leave. He ought to trust that Trudie, once she realized what Château Follet was about, would turn upon her heel in an instant to seek safer shelter. Surely Marguerite Follet, the proprietress, would see that Trudie was not a suitable guest.

  But he could not risk it. And, perhaps, locking one’s wife in her chambers might yet prove an appealing option.

  Chapter Two

  LEOPOLD PACED THE ANTEROOM of Marguerite Follet’s boudoir. Little had changed since last he had stayed at the Château Follet some years ago. Despite a palpable nostalgia for the place, he was far from happy over the circumstances that currently compelled his presence. The roads to Château Follet had been favorable, and he had made good time, but throughout the journey he had felt the impending cuckoldry in the depths of his loins. Diana may not have provided specifics to her description of the château, but she could not have expected to conceal its purpose from Trudie. Given his wife’s recent behavior, it was more than likely she had agreed to the affair. Leopold had inventoried all the men Trudie knew. None appeared the obvious offender. If she had been unfaithful, she had hid it well, though he had never known her to be deceitful till now. He knew the hypocrisy of condemning Trudie for her faithlessness when he himself entertained a mistress, but her choice of the Château Follet for her tryst riled for reasons he could not name.

  “She should not be here,” he insisted to Madame Follet after being admitted to her room.

  The proprietress stood in her negligee while a chambermaid assisted with her toilette. Though his senior by many years, Madame Follet wore her age with grace and elegance, aided by eyes that sparkled with vigor, a smooth and pale complexion, and a trim figure. She narrowed her eyes at his hasty speech.

  Recalling his manners, he quickly bowed and kissed her hand. “Your pardon, Madame. Comment allez-vous?”

  “Leopold Spencer,” she remembered, her gaze sweeping over him with obvious appreciation of what she saw. “Je vais bien. Now, of whom do you speak?”

  “My wife.”

  She raised a brow. “You are not arrived together?”

  “She came without my knowledge.”

  “Lost the reins to your wife, have we, Lord Ramsay?”

  He bristled.

  “Rather a surprise,” she continued as she examined the different pairs of stockings offered by the maid. “I remember you as quite the dominant.”

  He had fond memories of Château Follet but, for some reason, had not thought to bring his mistress here.

  Marguerite lowered her lashes. “As you know, we’ve plenty of leashes here.”

  “My marriage is not that sort of arrangement,” he said, though the thought of clapping a leash on Trudie was not wholly objectionable, especially if she were inclined to run off on wild and irresponsible ventures.

  “How unfortunate. I know not your wife, but she must be the flaxen-haired young lady who arrived with your cousin?”

  “Were they accompanied by anyone or did they rendezvous with another guest?”

  “I am not aware of their plans, mon chéri.”

  “I want them sent home.”

  “Lord Ramsay, you may take up the mantle of master with your wife as it pleases you, but do not require my intervention.”

  “They know not what they are about. This is no place for Trudie,” he maintained, and began to pace once more.

  She looked at him sharply. “I invite all manner of women to enjoy themselves here.”

  “I meant no offense, Madame, but I think my wife to be entirely naïve as to what transpires here. Château Follet is beyond her.”

  Marguerite sat down at her vanity and began applying her powder. “A bold insistence by someone caught unawares of his wife’s whereabouts.”

  “Trudie is the last person I would expect to find here.”

  “It would seem that you do not completely know your wife.”

  A muscle tightened along his jaw.

  She looked at him through the mirror. “If you mean to rescue your wife from the treachery of Château Follet—”

  “Madame, you must know I have only fond recollections of my time here, but Trudie is...inexperienced.”

  “If you wish to claim her, I shall not prevent you. But the hour is late and you have but arrived. My groomsman Jacque is at your disposal, and there are many guest chambers available. I invite you to make yourself comfortable. You are welcome to stay the night—or two. I do believe Diana and your wife are staying at least two.”

  At least two? he nearly bellowed. Instead, he said with comportment, “I am honored by your invitation but, regretfully, I cannot accept.”

  “Are you so certain the women will go with you?”

  “I cannot force Diana to leave with me, but I will take my wife.”

  “And install her under lock and key so that she never returns?”

  Leopold squared his shoulders. He had not yet pondered that possibility. A proper scolding should dissuade Trudie from ever considering a second visit to Follet...but what if it did not?

  “Madame, will you not explain to my wife—”

  “Certainement no. You would ask me to criticize my own residence?”

  “I beg your pardon! That is not what I intended. I only meant that you could, with your vast experience, dissuade Trudie and convince her that she would find Château Follet most unsuitable.”

  “But I know not your wife. And I will say to you what I said to an overbearing marquess last week: that I find it rather selfish of you to deny her the pleasures that you have partaken readily of here at Château Follet.”

  Her words jolted him, especially when he had considered himself quite magnanimous for not condemning his wife her infidelity. His intention in coming to the Château was to protect Trudie.

  Marguerite softened her tone. “Given your absence from the Château, perhaps you should consider making up for lost time. It would please me much if you chose to stay.”

  She held out her hand, a clear signal of dismissal
. He pressed his lips to her hand. There was little to be done but accept her offer for the moment.

  Ensconced in one of the guest chambers, he dismissed Jacque soon after the groomsman had assisted him out of his coat and boots. He went to the sideboard and poured a glass of brandy. He finished the beverage rather quickly, then poured himself another. He gazed at the painting on the opposite wall. Scantily clad nymphs, many with their nipples showing through their thin garments, danced with satyrs in a forest setting.

  He settled into an armchair facing the four-post bed. His last time here, he had a lovely maiden tied between those posts, moaning and writhing with delight to his bedchamber skills. His surroundings and the brandy sank in, warming his blood. A shame he would not be able to partake in the events of the Château. But his mission was clear.

  It was unfortunate that Marguerite was not willing to accommodate his request. Who better than the proprietress herself to convince Trudie of the inappropriateness of the Château? And she would have spared Trudie the embarrassment of facing her husband, though he took some gratification at the thought of witnessing his wife’s mortification. Surely she would think twice about deceiving him and running off to places such as the Château Follet!

  Now he had no option but to remove Trudie from the château himself. If he marched himself into her chambers, she would be too surprised and shamefaced to protest. But, as he had voiced to Marguerite, there was no guarantee that Trudie would not simply return at a later time.

  He glanced at the longcase clock opposite him. The hour was indeed late. He had no affinity for traveling at night, and it would be too dangerous for a woman. He could claim his wife now, before any of the evening’s activities took place, but he admitted a growing curiosity to know the extent of her infidelity and whether she would truly consent to the debauchery here. He could not imagine Trudie would tolerate the wanton exhibition and forays into debauchery when she could ill handle the overtures of her own husband, but it had been over a year since he had approached her. Perhaps it was best to keep a furtive profile and depart on the morrow. He could keep an eye on Trudie to ensure her safety and discern who her possible paramour might be.