Her Virgin Duke

By Nicola Davidson

Nicknamed Humdrum Tun by society, Bennett Innsworth, Duke of Tunbury is stuffy, awkward, and alas, still a virgin. The festive season is looking bleak—until he loses a wager and must spend an evening at London’s most hedonistic pleasure club.
Delilah Forbes has long reigned as the city’s Mistress of Sin, and when the infamous duke visits her club, she’s soon eager to introduce him to sizzling passion. But even as lust becomes more for two lonely souls, they know a duke and a madam can’t have forever after. Or can they?

Please note this book contains explicit language and sexual content.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Nicola Davidson
• Release date: Feb 4, 2021
• ISBN: 9780473562465

Nicola Davidson

USA Today bestselling author NICOLA DAVIDSON worked for many years in media and government communications, but hasn’t looked back since she decided writing erotic historical romance was infinitely more fun. When not chained to a computer she can be found ambling along one of New Zealand’s beautiful beaches, cheering on the All Blacks rugby team, history geeking on the internet, or daydreaming. If this includes dessert—even better!Nicola's books have appeared in USA Today, NPR, and Entertainment Weekly.Find Nicola online: Twitter (@NicolaMDavidson) Facebook (Nicola Davidson – Author) Instagram (NicolaDauthor) or her website www.nicola-davidson.com

Book preview

CHAPTER 1

London, early December 1815

"P lease don’t do this. Choosing a bride from a list of names is a terrible idea. It’s so…so cold ."

Bennett Innsworth, Duke of Tunbury, sighed as his younger sister Judith’s fervent words shattered the peace in his library. Last summer she had married her forever love, and while he’d once craved the same joy for himself, now he knew better. When ladies looked at him they didn’t see the dashing hero of their dreams or a seductive bedfellow, just a lofty title held by a man who took his duties so seriously that he’d been nicknamed Humdrum Tun. The moniker stung, but then facts often did. He was just so damned reserved and awkward, possessing none of the charm and droll wit that most ton men effortlessly displayed. Besides, who else but a noble daughter would accept the burden of being his duchess? She would need to manage multiple households, act as his hostess for political dinners, undertake charitable works, help him navigate the viper pit known as Polite Society, and tolerate his attentions long enough to birth an heir and spare.

Not exactly easy tasks, even for a coronet and substantial allowance.

It is eminently sensible, he replied. All five ladies on the list hail from ancient families, are the right age, and have excellent manners.

Judith scowled as she paced the room. At only a few inches shorter than his own six feet, those legs covered a lot of ground. "The same could be said of most Thoroughbreds. Don’t you wish to at least like your future wife?"

I’m sure we’ll rub along tolerably well. I can’t expect more than that.

Poppycock, she snapped. You deserve the kind of happiness I share with Preston. Grand passion, not an empty existence with a near-stranger.

Bennett gritted his teeth. No one wants grand passion with Humdrum Tun. Anyway, duty is infinitely more important than love, as my trustees advised—

"Former trustees. Former. Must I remind you that the splendid soiree I organized back in October was actually your twenty-fifth birthday? When you at last escaped the gilded legal cage? Obviously my ‘happy freedom day’ banner should have been the size of a castle, rather than a mere drawing room wall."

Damn it, Judith—

Ten years, Bennett, she flung back, tossing her head so sharply that a lock of brown hair escaped her chignon. They might look alike, but were opposites in temperament. Ten bloody years those monsters manipulated and punished you, dictated where you went and what you did…all in the guise of managing your finances. I’ll never understand why Papa named them in his will. Ever.

Because they were honest men. Upright. Didn’t cheat me out of a single penny.

Bah. Those old windbags cheated you out of confidence. Happiness. And now they want to slither back and start again, this time in the guise of helping you find a wife—

Enough, he said firmly.

Judith blamed his predicament on the trustees appointed because he’d inherited as a minor, but the real problem was—and always had been—him. Never would he become the assured and capable duke others expected him to be. He certainly didn’t have a plethora of friends, bulging social calendar, or beautiful mistress. For God’s sake, he was still a virgin.

Thankfully that remained a secret. Everyone assumed that even Humdrum Tun had coaxed or bribed at least one lover into bed; that he knew how it felt to have a woman beneath him, her ragged moans loud in his ear as he thrust deep into her welcoming wet heat. Ha. Truth be told, it was difficult to envisage carnal pleasure outside of a poem or etching. All he could hear in his mind were his trustees telling him such acts were unbecoming of a duke. Shameful. Unseemly. Hell, he didn’t even pleasure himself because he’d been told so often it was wrong.

He just needed to accept he was Humdrum Tun: the greatest ducal disappointment in the history of the realm.

Bennett, said his sister, her tone softening, You’ll find your forever love, I know it. But don’t marry a stranger you feel nothing for. Please. Not when it’s just a few weeks until Christmastide. That would be an affront to God—

To his great relief, a sharp knock sounded, and a footman peered around the library door. Beg pardon, Your Grace, but Lord Fletcher is here about the horse race.

Send him in, said Bennett. Do excuse me, Judith, but I am shortly to receive a winner’s purse.

Bite the guineas, she replied. They are from that unspeakable wretch Flatulence, after all.

You must stop calling Fletcher that.

Why? He is a windbag heir…oh, don’t give me that pained look. I’m going! But think about what I said. Good day, brother.

With that, his sister swept from the room in a flurry of bright yellow skirts. Shortly afterward, Fletcher sauntered in looking entirely too jovial for a man suffering a loss.

Bennett frowned. My lord. You appear to have forgotten the winner’s purse.

The slender, blond-haired viscount, eldest son of his trustee Lord Hurst, smirked. Alas, Your Grace, I am the bearer of bad news. Your horse ran a distant fourth; I have the confirmed results here signed by the official.

Very well, Bennett agreed reluctantly. How much do I owe you, then?

Oh, I don’t want money, said the other man, his eyes gleaming. I’m requesting a favor instead.

His stomach churned. A better man would have stood firm rather than be goaded into accepting a wager with this cretin. While their parents always encouraged a friendship, Bennett had never liked the popular viscount. Since joining the Prince Regent’s Carlton House set Fletcher had grown even more obnoxious; now he drawled rather than spoke, drank to excess, and treated his wife shabbily. But if Bennett gave him the cut direct, or even unleashed a long overdue right hook, it would only start a scandal and society gossiped enough already.

A favor? And what might that entail? Bennett asked, with great trepidation.

Nothing too daunting, old chap. I’m considering membership at Delilah’s Temple. I’d like you to go there tonight and tell me if it’s worth the exorbitant cost.

Delilah’s Temple?

Bennett sucked in a breath. Bloody bastard Fletcher knew he blushed and became tongue-tied in social situations, especially ones involving ribald conversation or women. Naturally the favor would be visiting the most hedonistic pleasure club in the city, owned by the notorious Delilah Forbes, a widow from Cheapside who now reigned supreme as London’s Mistress of Sin. Such a lark, sending him into a den of debauchery to be humiliated, after which he would endure the wrath of his trustees for bringing the dukedom into disrepute.

I can’t, Bennett blurted, his damned annoying cheeks beginning to heat.

Why not?

Er…surely Lord Hurst would disapprove.

The viscount’s face hardened. My father need not know. Unless you are reneging on our wager? I’d hate to have to share that tidbit around town.

Christ. Bad enough to be gossiped about, but called dishonorable as well? Father would turn in his grave.

Of course I’m not reneging, Bennett replied slowly. I…ah…received an invitation to inspect the premises some time ago, so will visit Delilah’s Temple and provide a full report.

Excellent! I’ll return in the morning. Not too early—you’ll need time to recover after a night of drunken depravity, eh Tun? Fare thee well, said Fletcher, waggling his fingers and whistling a jaunty tune as he departed the library.

Trying not to shudder, Bennett unlocked his desk drawer and withdrew the gold invitation he’d hidden beneath a pile of legal documents. Really, it should have been thrown away years ago, but sometimes he pretended he was the kind of bold and lusty rake who frequented an establishment like Delilah’s Temple. Usually, he shoved the invitation back in the drawer, because torturing himself was unproductive.

Not today, though.

You can do this, he muttered. It’s an easy quest. Just Humdrum Tun trying to use an expired invitation for a full tour of a pleasure club without being seen.

Good God.

Delilah Forbes loved the Temple. Had built it from nothing, created a sanctuary where patrons could discreetly, safely, and consensually explore their wickedest fantasies, and made a fortune so large she would never spend it in her lifetime.

But what nourished had also consumed these past five years. Between the relentless drive for business perfection and suppressing her own desires to manage those of London’s wealthiest each day from dusk ‘til dawn, she’d quite lost herself. It was time for a different adventure, a different life outside this luxury cage. Recently she’d come to terms with a buyer, and while Temple staff and her friends supported the decision, her banker had wept for a week.

He still looked utterly woebegone today.

Delilah stifled a chuckle as she lounged on a chaise in the lavish private parlor where she attended to employee matters and interviewed prospective members. My offer of a fresh handkerchief still stands, Mr. Kelly, but may I add this is the month of Christmastide. A time to give thanks and be joyful.

The dapper silver-haired gentleman sighed. You have ever been my joy, Mrs. Forbes; never have I met a soul with such talent for turning penny into pound. But then you proceed to break my heart and give large sums away. You built a schoolroom, two soup kitchens, and that accommodation for widowed mothers…

All causes close to my heart, she replied firmly.

Indeed they were. After her father was killed in a warehouse accident, she and her mother had been left in dun territory. While Mama worked long hours as a seamstress, more often than not they’d gone hungry in their cold, damp rented room. By a stroke of luck Delilah had met and married Archie Forbes, a prosperous widowed mercer, but less than a year of marital bliss later he’d fallen from his horse as it attempted to leap over a fallen tree branch. Then her exhausted, weak-lunged mother had succumbed to a fever. All alone, with her tears run dry at the staggering losses and a modest bank draft from Archie’s family in her reticule, Delilah had sworn to make her own luck. So she’d sewn a fancy gown, coaxed a loan from Mr. Kelly,