Sinful Seduction by Kate Benedict Page A

cracked and creased from constant re-reading, there had been nothing. No doubt he had found someone from his own class at one of the garrison balls. By this time his little fling with his mother’s maid was probably nothing more than an amusing tale to tell his fellow officers.
    Lady Georgina was still jerking angrily at the bell-rope when Maggie entered her room. ‘About time too,’ she snapped. ‘I have been ringing for you this past ten minutes, you idle baggage. Do you think I have all day to wait till you deign to appear?’
    â€˜No, m’m,’ muttered Maggie, bobbing a curtsey with downcast eyes. ‘Sorry, m’m, it won’t happen again.’
    Mollified, Lady Georgina nodded. ‘Good, now hurry up and dress me, girl. Lord Edward and I are attending luncheon with his cousin, Sir Francis, and I want to look my best.’ She looked at her reflection in the glass and simpered. ‘Sir Francis admired me too, when I was a girl. Why, if Lord Edward had not asked for my hand first, who knows what might have happened?’
    If Maggie thought Sir Francis had had a lucky escape, she wisely refrained from saying so. Instead she went to the mahogany wardrobe and began laying out dresses for her ladyship’s consideration, and the bed was piled high with discarded gowns before she finally chose one of bilious yellow satin, with so many flounces and furbelows it looked like a wedding cake.
    â€˜Tighter, girl, tighter,’ she panted as Maggie tugged on the laces of her corset. ‘My waist must be no more than a hand span.’
    Chance would be a fine thing, Maggie thought wryly as she hauled even harder. It would take a miracle to whisk away the years of overindulgence. ‘Hand span’ indeed. It would need a man with bloody big hands to get round that waist!
    By the time she’d finished, Maggie was panting as well - and Lady Georgina could barely breathe. So much displaced fat oozed out over the top of her stays that she looked as if she had two bosoms - one at the back and one at the front! Still, Lady Georgina seemed pleased with the effect, so Maggie hurried to fetch her layers of petticoats and tie on her bustle before she changed her mind.
    â€˜My dress now, girl,’ she ordered imperiously, so Maggie eased the yellow satin carefully over her mistress’s head, settled the folds of heavy material over the underpinnings and began to do up the interminable buttons at the back. Even with the stays pulled to their tightest, this was an effort. Finally, much to her relief, she was finished. Only her hair to do and her jewels to fetch and madam would be ready.
    Maggie had barely done when Sir Edward strutted in. Lady Georgina lumbered to her feet and gave a graceless twirl. ‘Well?’ she asked coyly. ‘What do you think? Will I pass muster?’
    â€˜Delicious, my dear, absolutely delicious,’ he said heartily. ‘Good enough to eat.’ Maggie shivered; his words might have been for Lady Georgina, but his cold eyes were fixed on her and she felt naked again beneath his leering gaze. Luckily her mistress noticed nothing. ‘Bring my fan, girl,’ she ordered. ‘The one with the ivory handle and yellow ostrich feathers.’ Relieved to have something to do, Maggie scuttled off to fetch it.
    When they had both gone, her ladyship clinging to her husband’s arm like a portly galleon being escorted by a dumpy little tug, Maggie collapsed on the bed beside the discarded dresses and blew out her cheeks in a gusty sigh of relief. Thank God for Lady Georgina. She might not be the easiest of mistresses, but at least while she was around she was protected from the master’s unwanted attentions.
    A man might keep sleep with a different whore every night and keep as many mistresses as he liked - provided everything was swept discreetly under the carpet. Even Lord Edward would not dare flout convention by fornicating with his