CROSSED IN LOVE, ANTHOLOGY

REGENCY LOVE AND LAUGHTER SERIES, BOOK 1

PATRICIA RICE

Crossed in Love

Patricia Rice

Copyright © 2017 Patricia Rice

Book View Cafe, June, 2017

First Publication:

“Deceiving Appearances,” Full Moon Magic Signet 9/92

“Fathers and Daughters,” A Regency Valentine, Signet 2/91

“Lady Invisible” Mammoth Book of Regency Romance, Robinson Press, 2010

“The Borrowed Groom,” A Wedding Bouquet, Signet Regency 5/96

All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce this book, or portion thereof, in any form.

This is a work of fiction. Any references to historical events, real people, or real locales are used fictitiously. Other names, characters, places, and incidents are the product of the author’s imagination, and any resemblance to actual events or locales or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

Published by Rice Enterprises, Dana Point, CA, an affiliate of Book View Café Publishing Cooperative

P.O. Box 1624, Cedar Crest, NM 87008-1624

http://bookviewcafe.com

ISBN 978-1-61138-697-4 ebook

Without limiting the rights under copyright reserved above, no part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form, or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise) without the prior permission of the copyright owner.

Please purchase only authorized electronic editions, and do not participate in or encourage electronic piracy of copyrighted materials. Your support of the author’s rights is appreciated.

Thank You.

CONTENTS

Author’s Note

Deceiving Appearances

Fathers and Daughters

Lady Invisible

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

The Borrowed Groom

EXCERPT - Mad Maria’s Daughter

Get a Free Patricia Rice Book

About the Author

Also by Patricia Rice

About Book View Cafe

AUTHOR’S NOTE

Category-size Regency romances reached their peak in the 1990s. At that point, I had been writing full size historical romance for a decade or more while working full time at my accounting career, raising two teenagers, and renovating a 70-year-old house. I didn’t have time to squeeze in more books, even small ones, but I loved writing the Regency novellas my editor asked me to include in her various holiday editions. I’ve included three of them in this anthology, along with a short story I was asked to do for an enormous book with some of the best Regency writers of the day. Who wouldn’t want to be in such stellar company?

All but the short story have been reissued in various e-book anthologies over the years. This is the first time they’ve all been together in one edition. I hope you enjoy a quick trip down memory lane!

DECEIVING APPEARANCES

Originally published in Full Moon Magic, Signet 9/92

Admiring the image in the shop window of the well-dressed gentleman in gray top hat and velvet-collared cloak, Peter Denning straightened his broad shoulders. When the image did the same, he smiled, cocked the hat to a rakish angle, and proceeded onward.

Despite the expensive tiepin, the absurd silk scarf dangling about his neck swung as he walked. He felt a trifle foolish tucking a bit of stick beneath his arm as the other gentlemen on the street were wont to do, but his side-whiskers were neatly groomed and his Wellingtons gleamed. He was satisfied that he had achieved the image of the perfect gentleman that he had set out to portray. He was no such thing, but there was no need for the world to know that.

It was not that he meant to defraud the society in which he walked. He had as much wealth and more as the young gentlemen in the club to which he turned his feet now. Unfortunately, that wealth had not come about from the opportune demise of one of his relatives.

His mother had been a lady’s maid who had never seen two coins to rub together in all her life. His father had had the courtesy to marry her before disappearing from their lives, but that had been the extent of his involvement in Peter’s affairs.

No, the wealth that paid for a well-appointed apartment in Mayfair, a valet who had naught better to do than see to his master’s newly acquired wardrobe, and a rig and four that ate their worth in expensive feed had come from hard toil.

Not to mention a certain shipping venture that had generated unexpected profits. Denning grinned to himself as he pushed open the elaborately carved door. A servant who had shirked his duties rushed forward filled with apology, bowing and scraping as Peter handed him his cane and hat.

After all those years on the sea in the company of men who ate, slept, and breathed in their own filth, he was finding it pleasant to return to the cultured confines of an orderly society, one that he had only been able to admire from afar before he went to sea.

He was learning to conquer these outer appearances very well. He had grown up on the estate of a wealthy lord, listening to the speech of his betters, cultivating their accents even more than his mother had. His mother had encouraged him, hoping one day he would find a position in the household for himself and so secure his future.

But Peter had grown into a great strapping lad with ideas of his own, and bowing and scraping before effeminate lords and their vain ladies had not been among them.

But he’d had his stomach full of sea now, and it was time to turn his mind to new pursuits. He had every confidence that he could achieve whatever goal he set himself, but this particular pursuit seemed to be dragging out to tedious lengths and prospects weren’t looking good.

Denning sighed as he took his usual table, acknowledged the salutes of several of the younger gentlemen with whom he had spent time, and ordered his meal. He knew he would be joined shortly by several of the young idlers, and before the evening ended, he would have tried his hand at cards, downed a bottle of port, and no doubt toured one or more of the brothels near Haymarket.

The gentlemen considered him a rare good sport, a dab hand at all the rigs, and an easy touch for a bit of the ready when needed. He could whistle the days away in idleness forevermore if he wished.

But he hadn’t been bred for idleness, and as entertaining as the company might be, it didn’t ease the ache of loneliness. Denning had returned to England to discover his mother dead and himself alone.

He had spent years at sea imagining a cozy cottage in England with his mother keeping warm by the fire and a laughing wife in the doorway waiting for his return, with curly-haired children at her knee. He hadn’t thought it would be difficult to find the woman of his choice once he had a home and a bit of savings to offer. He had never imagined returning with great wealth and the complications that would ensue.

Sipping at his glass of port and cutting into his beefsteak, Peter attempted to avoid the ennui that haunted him, but he could not find a successful diversion for his thoughts. Great wealth should have opened all the doors that had been closed to him in the past, but he was discovering that there were doors behind doors and that breaching them was tedious business.

The gentlemen accepted him for what he was as long as he had the coins to keep up with their play, but the ladies were entirely another story. He was caught between two worlds with this charade he acted, and he was beginning to doubt that he had set the right course when he had donned his expensive clothes and knocked on the doors of society.

Coins opened that first set of doors and appearance allowed him to remain in those outer circles. To reach the inner sanctums where the ladies resided seemed impossible without the right credentials, and he couldn’t manufacture those as he had his image.

At the same time, he had no real dealings with the layers of society to which he had been born. His wealth, appearance, and speech placed him outside their world, and any female servant would only look at him with suspicion did he ask to call. It was an awkward situation at best, one that Peter felt certain he would conquer with time, but it left him restless and alone while he sought the solution.

As he finished his meal and his second glass of port, Peter was joined by two younger gentlemen eager to attend a prizefight on the outskirts of town. His tilbury was required to carry the light-skirts they meant to accompany them, and they gallantly offered to acquire a third for Peter’s use. Contemplating that evening of entertainment, he shook his head and bowed out with an excuse of other plans.

It wasn’t a complete lie. The plan he had in mind didn’t include the tilbury or horses or loose women. The plan he had included a warm study, a good book, and the painting he had acquired last week. The more he thought about it, the more eager he became to seek that source of comfort.

Setting out on foot for his apartment, Peter conjured up the image of his first artistic acquisition with satisfaction. Had he been told while lying in his bunk at sea that one of the first things he would do upon obtaining riches was to buy a piece of oil and canvas, he would have laughed himself to the floor.

But that painting had called to him from the first moment he had set eyes on it. He was well aware that the great houses of the land had such paintings scattered haphazardly across their walls and stacked in their attics and buried in closets, and few were paid any attention no matter what their resting place. He couldn’t describe a single one of the oils that had adorned the house where he had attained maturity.

But this painting hanging in a shop window had leapt out at him, caught his eye in such a fashion that he had to return the next day to be certain it was still there.

And he had returned again the day after that. He had never set foot inside a gallery of art in all his life. He hadn’t even been certain one could buy a piece of artwork like that or if it had just been hung for the appreciation of all. But on the third day, he had pushed open the gallery door and walked in.

He had acquired the canvas at an amazingly low price for the amount of satisfaction it brought him. He knew nothing about the cost of art. In all likelihood they had named an absurd price in hopes of obtaining half that, but Peter had merely signed the bill and walked out with the package and not questioned the cost in the days since. For all the money he had thrown away in gambling and drinking and whoring, not one cent had brought him the contentment of that painting.

Arriving at his flat, Peter dismissed his valet for the evening. He retired with a bottle of madeira to the study he had purchased complete with books. Settling into his desk chair, he admired the framed canvas on the wall before him.

The lamp lit below it cast the oils in murky shadows, but he knew every line and color by heart. Not that there was a wide range of colors. Almost the entirety of the background was filled with the broad gray stone walls of some substantial country mansion. The walls could only be seen from behind a forest of trees, shrubbery, and climbing vines, but the darker greens seemed to blend into the very nature of the building until, after a while, it became difficult to detect where nature ended and man’s work began. Peter delighted in discerning new and previously unnoticed quirks in the house’s exterior: the griffin on the lintel, a child’s toy in a window, a shutter painted with a rose in the corner.

But the artwork he appreciated most in the picture had naught to do with house or grounds and all to do with a fleeing fairy figure in the forefront. In broad daylight the figure all but disappeared into the landscape of trees and overgrown shrubbery, but by night, with the lamp at just the right angle, she flew wild and free through that landscape, moonlit hair streaming in long cascades down a back as slender and feminine as any he had ever seen.

That figure fascinated him. She held her arms up in glorious embrace of the night, head flung back, face turned toward the moon that couldn’t be seen anywhere in the portrait. And the face! Peter moved from his desk to the wall to better observe the delicate features.

She shimmered with moonlight even from this proximity. Her skin seemed to sparkle with silver. Large, almond-shaped eyes danced with a darkness that made his blood shiver. Perfectly formed rosebud lips turned upward in a smile of welcome that stripped him of all pretense and left him longing for more. He ached to reach out and touch her, to know the warmth of that welcome, to feel at home in that house with rosebuds on the shutters and toys in the windows.

How just one painting could bring him so much happiness and so much misery was beyond Peter’s ability to reason. It represented everything he wanted while disguising it all in shadows and mockery. There were times when he had drunk enough that he thought it might be best to destroy the canvas, to slash it from top to bottom and heave it from the window into the night. And there were other times, like now, when he only wished he could step inside the painting and became a part of it.

Imagining being another shadowy figure in that forest of trees, one toward whom the lady was running, Peter smiled and lifted the canvas from the wall. He was not only growing maudlin, but fanciful.

Perhaps the painting was a sign that he had chosen the wrong place from which to make his entrance into society. The country house and the trees called to him. He had always enjoyed the country as a boy. He could remember fishing in wide ponds, hunting in rolling fields, tumbling down snowbanks in the winter. The country was a good place to raise children. Perhaps the women were easier to meet and less arrogant in their requirements in a solitary place such as the one in the painting.

Setting aside his whimsical fantasies, Peter pried at the back of the painting with his pocket knife. Perhaps he could find some clue as to the house’s origins. Much of everything in this world was for sale. It would be amusing to locate this place and see if anyone would accept an offer for it.

The protective backing peeled off without a great deal of trouble, revealing a blank canvas and some spidery writing in one corner. Peter carried it to the lamp on the desk and tilted the frame until the light caught on the words and played them back to him: Lady Honora Chelsey, Rosebud Cottage, near High Wycombe

Peter sat down in his chair and studied the name with a sense of satisfaction. Perhaps he had just found a home.

Several days later, Peter pulled up the collar of his redingote against the drenching downpour and cursed his moment of whimsy. He didn’t think it snowed in October in England, but the sharp chill of the wind certainly made it seem a possibility. He was beginning to think his soaked gloves and coat might be a little warmer should they freeze into solid walls.

And currently, he didn’t give a damn where Rosebud Cottage might be or even High Wycombe. He would settle for a warm inn and a cozy fire and a return to London in the morning.

His fancy city horses objected to the rutted roads and muddy puddles of this rural outpost. The leather seats of his expensive tilbury would no doubt rot into tatters before the night was over, if the delicately balanced wheels did not fall off first. He would not only return to London as soon as he could find a road that might lead in that direction, he would sell the damned painting at the first break of dawn. Imagine a grown man falling in love with a bit of oil and canvas! He had to be out of his bloody mind.

Thinking he saw a gleam of light further ahead, he urged the horses faster, and as if they sensed a dry stable and grain, they surged forward, their long legs breaking into the matched strides for which they were famous.

A second later, the steeds squealed in terror, raised up on their hind legs in frantic disobedience, and the light carriage skidded off the muddy road. It hit a stone and broke a wheel, throwing its occupant head over heels into the hedgerow as the wind howled gleefully through the trees.

“Shhh, Hodges, you’ll wake him,” the slight figure beside the bed warned as the manservant entered with a steaming kettle of water.

“Don’t b’lieve the wrath of God would wake him right now,” Hodges grumbled as he poured some of the water into the basin, mixing it with the cold already there. “If I’m any judge of head knots, that one’s going to be sleeping for a while. You’d best rest and let him be.”

Cecily used the warm water to remove more of the grime from the stranger’s mud-splattered face. Now that she could see his features she thought them very nice, if a trifle out of the ordinary. Drying now, his thick black hair was springing up in unruly curls. His short side-whiskers framed a square face with a determined chin that had just a touch of a cleft to it. His eyelashes were short and blunt, as were the fingers on the hands beneath his soaked gloves.

But it was the slight scar on one side of his mouth that drew his lips up in a perpetual half-smile that fascinated her. Combined with the weathered lines around his eyes and the exotic bronze of his skin, that half-smile gave him a rakish appearance that she had only read about in books.

“Do you think we ought to add more coals to the fire? He still feels chilled.” She took the heated cloth to his hands to stir the blood there. He had rough hands, a workman’s hands, for all that he had been dressed in the best of London fashion. She smiled as his fingers curled reflexively beneath her touch.

Hodges gave the unconscious stranger a grumpy glare and turned to toss another piece or two on the grate. “Them animals of his are like to eat us out of house and home, and now you’ll have us using the last of the fuel to keep him warm. I say we check his purse to see if he will be properly appreciative.”

Cecily sent the man an admonishing look. “Now, Hodges, we are not so desperate that we must resort to thievery. I’m certain the gentleman will be happy to reimburse us once he recovers.”

“Well, he’s not likely to be paying you for your time in fretting over him. I’ll linger a whit and you get some rest. I’ll come fetch you should he wake.”

Cecily smiled at that, and Hodges admired the increasingly infrequent sight. When she smiled, her thin little face lit up from within, and any fool could see that she was a beauty. But puddles of worry still lingered in her eyes, and the smile slipped away as quickly as it had appeared. He cursed the world in general as she once more became the brown little wren fussing over the blanket covers and wringing at the wash cloth.

“If rest were all it took, I would rival the Toast of the Season. I’ve had naught but rest for too long now. I’ll sleep a little here and wait for him to wake. You’ll have to rise first thing in the morning to see if the river is down enough to fetch the physician. So go on with you. I’ll be fine.”

Hodges gave the overtly masculine stranger a look of suspicion, then returned his glance to the young woman beside the bed. In the drab brown round gown with her hair pulled beneath a cap and held with pins, she looked like some frumpy old-maid servant. He growled at the thought, but he supposed she was safe enough. The blighter wasn’t likely to rise from that bed anytime soon.

Cecily breathed a sigh of relief as the manservant left, then settled back in the comfortable chair and studied the stranger once again before she closed her eyes. Living alone as she did, she was given to odd fantasies, but none was so odd as this. Even her imagination had never conjured up a handsome, wealthy stranger practically crashing into her doorstep. If only she had some fairy dust. . . .

Peter suppressed a groan at the hammer pounding his head when he tried to move. He couldn’t remember ever drinking enough port to give him a head like this one. There had been a time in Antigua when he had entered into a little altercation with a sailor twice his size. . . .

He tried to raise his hand to his head to see if it could be moved by other means. The motion stirred thin sheets and a cotton blanket that had no place in his memory. Worst of all, it brought about the realization that he was wearing a shirt with arms longer than his. Had he shrunk overnight?

Not daring to contemplate that possibility or the alternative that there was a man somewhere nearby who was bigger than he, Peter located his hand in the billowing sleeve. He carried it to his aching head and pushed his empty skull sideways to determine if there might be some indication as to where he might be.

Once he discovered that he had his eyelids squeezed closed, he recovered from the shock of total darkness and pried them open. The first sight of his new abode included a flickering candle and a slender maid curled in the corner of an overlarge chair.

That wasn’t so terrible a sight. Relaxing, Peter closed his eyes again to relieve the pain and let the scene play along his eyelids. His mind’s eye found a maid’s prim white cap, a glimpse of soft brown hair, and an almost painfully thin face innocent with sleep. Raised as he had been, he was familiar with households that believed their servants could live on bones and gruel. It irked him that he was in the hands of such mean-spirited people, but he was in no condition to reprimand them.

Succumbing to the pain, he returned to the realms of sleep.

Some time later, Peter woke again. The room seemed noticeably warmer, and he struggled against the blankets before coming awake enough to remember his surroundings. Perspiration formed on his brow as he fought for a breath, then opened his eyes to the still night air. This time he didn’t need candlelight to see the slim white figure hovering over him.

Odd, but he had thought his keeper wore brown. He closed his eyes and opened them again, but the pale figure remained, leaning over him with concern. Delicate moonlight tresses streamed over her shoulder with the movement, and Peter felt a shock of recognition.

The image in the portrait. His head pounded and his breathing was strangely weak, but he managed to search the lovely features he had memorized from the painting. The dancing eyes lit with laughter at his perusal, and she drifted away, her thin gown flowing around her as she stepped from reach and almost out of his range of vision.

He tried to speak, but his voice was a hoarse rasp, and she was gone before the words emerged.

When next he woke, it was to the tender ministrations of the little maid. A cool cloth cleansed his fevered brow, and Peter sighed his appreciation. At the sound, she gasped and nearly whipped him with the wet cloth, but when he opened his eyes, she had composed herself again.

“Good morning. Would you care for a cup of broth?”

He rather thought being pitched into a snowbank might be more enjoyable, but the croak that came out didn’t deny or confirm her question. Frustrated, he glared at her, and she solemnly looked back.

“Hodges has gone to find a physician. I don’t doubt that you’ll have a most virulent cold from your experience. I don’t know how long you lay in the hedgerow before we found you, but you were quite thoroughly chilled. I think a little broth will do you good.”

As his body began to register the demands of the wine he had drunk with his last meal, Peter could only nod in hopes that she would quickly leave in search of the promised soup. She gave him a suspicious frown, then bustled out, leaving him blessedly alone to search for the chamber pot.

By the time she returned, Peter’s head felt as if it would fall from his shoulders, and the raggedness of his breathing warned that her dire prediction had come true, but his lower regions were vastly relieved. He struggled with the lengths of shirtsleeves covering his hands and wondered at the size of the monster that must once have inhabited this garment. With effort, he found a reclining position that allowed his head to remain intact. When the maid returned, he even attempted a smile.

She didn’t smile back but efficiently made a place for herself at the side of the bed and held a spoon of broth to his lips. “You must drink this all down. When Uncle Quincy had the pleurisy, the physician said he must have lots of liquids. And the meat juices will strengthen you.”

Peter made a face, and she inserted the spoon when he opened his mouth to protest. Since he could produce few sounds other than grunts and groans and croaks, he surrendered the battle and allowed the admittedly tasty broth to go down.

“You must tell us if there is someone we might notify of your accident. I would not have anyone worrying about your whereabouts.”

As Peter shook his head to indicate there was no one, he felt a momentary return of depression. He could have died out there on that road, and there would have been no one to care. All that grand wealth he had accumulated would disappear into the pockets of some lawyer or government official in vain attempts to locate his heirs. It made one feel exceedingly small.

Instead, he concentrated on the determined young woman forcing liquids down his throat. Her accent bothered him until he began putting two and two together. Although her accent had the polish of his, her clothes were too drab and out of fashion to belong to a lady of quality. Yet they were of good cloth, and her hands bore none of the signs of physical labor.

A kitchen or upstairs maid would have work-roughened hands, and even in the best of houses she would not wear clothes of this fashion or speak in polished accents. But a lady’s maid wearing the cast-offs of her mistress and with no chore more difficult than laundering her employer’s linens could very well fit the bill.

Satisfied he had solved the mystery, Peter reached to squeeze the maid’s hand when she set the bowl aside. She looked shocked at first, then offered a brief, haunting smile as she smoothed a cool hand over his fevered brow.

“You’re quite welcome, sir. Now you must sleep until the doctor arrives. He might have some medicine to ease the aching in your head.”

Well, so much for his attempt at seduction. Closing his eyes and insanely smiling to himself, Peter followed her instructions.

When next he woke, it was to the shadows of twilight and the sight of a giant monster stalking the little maid. With a throat-wrenching cry, Peter swung back the blankets and tried to leap to the rescue, only to discover he hadn’t the strength to stand. Grabbing the bed for support before he could collapse into a humiliating heap on the floor, Peter watched through bleary eyes as the little maid gave a cry of concern and ran to his side, while the monster merely glared at him.

He had at least diverted the creature’s attention, Peter thought grimly as he allowed the slender woman to boss him back into bed while the giant lingered in the shadows, forcing obedience with his presence. Perhaps he would be flung back into the hedgerow if he refused the maid’s orders. This certainly was an unusual household, but he was in no position to complain.

“Whatever made you leap up like that?” More shaken than she would admit by the stranger’s sudden transformation from bed-ridden patient to large man in a thin nightshirt, Cecily fussed over the covers and ignored Hodges’ glowering visage. “Are you hallucinating? I understand people with high fevers suffer from deliriums. Would you like a cool cloth for your brow?’’

The stranger grimaced as if in pain when Cecily touched her fingers to his forehead. He really was quite warm. She had the oddest notion that he had meant to come to her rescue when he leapt from the bed. She really had been alone too long with her books if she could think such a thing, she mused ruefully. A tentative smile curved her lips as his eyes opened, and she finally saw that they were gray.

“Ask him what made the carriage crash.” Hodges remained in the shadows, but his voice was deep and husky and penetrated the gloom with the sound of thunder.

Their patient turned his head to follow this sound, then attempted to rise to a sitting position. He shook his head in denial when Cecily tried to help him. Frowning, Hodges stepped forward, lifted the man’s shoulders, and shoved pillows behind him.

The stranger didn’t look properly appreciative, but after sipping from a cup of water Cecily offered, he attempted some reply. “Spooked,” was all he could croak.

That one word seemed to explain everything to this odd pair, Peter noted as they exchanged glances over his head. He thought he heard the monster whisper “the lady,” but the maid shook her head in warning.

“That is only superstition, Hodges. A rabbit no doubt ran across the road. You said the horses were high-strung expensive animals.”

Peter watched in amazement as the giant’s expression turned mulish, but he did no more than step back at the young maid’s rebuke. The man called Hodges could have picked her up and swung her through the air without any effort, yet he seemed to regard the slender young woman with respect. The lady had to be powerful indeed if her maid could command that much authority.

“He’s here ‘cause of the lady, there ain’t no doubt in my mind,” was all the giant manservant said in reply before retreating toward the door.

The maid ignored this parting retort and dipped the cloth in the wash basin. Peter meant to halt her, but the feel of the cool cloth against his brow was better than he had expected, and he closed his eyes and relaxed beneath her gentle hands.

“Name?” he croaked, straining his sore throat to do so.

He opened his eyes in time to see the shy smile in hers.

“Cecily,” she replied. “And yours?”

“Denning.” There, it was out, his ignominious ancestry. He didn’t suppose there was a Denning anywhere in the history of British bluebloods. Stripped of his clothes, he couldn’t even pretend to be what he was not. The maid would in all likelihood report his commonness to her ladyship and he would be out on his ear by morning.

Instead, she merely reapplied the cold cloth and in that solemn owl-like way of hers—although he thought he saw the dance of laughter behind her blue eyes—and asked, “Denning who? Or is it which Denning? Ought I to know the name?’’

Incredible. Peter relaxed and stretched his long legs beneath the covers. It just might be possible that he would live to see the day again. “Peter.”

“Very good, Mr. Denning. Are you certain there is no one you might wish to notify of your mishap? Surely someone is expecting you?”

He knew better than to shake his head in reply this time. With increasing ease, he replied, “No one.”

“Well, I’d best not make you talk too much. Hodges says the physician was out, but he has left a message for him to call. I don’t like him very much,” she whispered conspiratorially, as if fearful the manservant would hear her. “He’s always wanting to apply leeches, loathsome creatures.” She shivered and made a face. “But I wouldn’t want you to be dreadfully ill because we didn’t do everything to help you.”

Peter caught her slender wrist and forced her to meet his eyes. “No leeches!”

The worried expression between her eyes instantly cleared, replaced by a reassuring look of agreement. “I’ll not let him bring them into the house.”

Satisfied, Peter drank the cup of broth and fell asleep before he could discover more about this odd establishment.

When he woke next, it was the middle of the night.

The candle on the stand had guttered out, and he could discern little but the stream of moonlight through the uncovered windows. The cursed clouds must finally have cleared away, he decided as he tried to determine what had made him wake.

It was then that he saw the movement, the elusive shimmer of silver followed by the scent of roses that he remembered from the previous night. Eagerly, Peter turned toward the movement, and she appeared before him, even more beautiful than he recalled.

She was tall and slender, with a winsome smile that made a man want to fall at her feet. Her hair was caught in smooth ropes and held by strings of pearls tonight, and he wished she had left it flowing as before. He wanted to reach for her, but he was quite certain this was the lady of the house, and he had no right to offend her.

“Hello,” he whispered, then cursed himself for such an uninspired greeting.

She nodded, then glanced at the slight figure sleeping in the chair beside the bed. Peter noted the young maid then, and he smiled at the thin face so innocent in sleep. There was nothing of the owl to her now. She was almost pretty in repose without that solemn look of concern imprinted upon her brow.

He turned back to the lady, and she smiled approvingly. Then, tugging at his bedcovers to smooth them, she stole around the end of the bed and disappeared into the shadows behind Cecily where the door was located.

Oddly disappointed that she did not speak, Peter again glanced at the maid, and feeling unexpectedly tender at her constant watchfulness, he relaxed and slipped back to sleep.

“Hodges, you are making entirely too much out of nothing.” Garbed today in a gray wool with just a touch of black banding to frame her pale face, Cecily took the breakfast tray from the servant’s hands and placed it on the bedside stand.

“It was the lady what spooked them horses and brought him here, and you can’t say nothing to make me feel different.” Stubbornly, Hodges remained where he was. “He’s the one what will save the house. Just see if he ain’t. The lady wouldn’t fail us.”

“Oh, Hodges.” Cecily pushed a straying strand of hair back from her face, revealing the lines of worry upon her brow. “The painting is gone. There is nothing else we can do. It was our last hope, and even if I didn’t want to sell it, I would have. It’s too late now. I think fate is telling us that this is the end. I’ll have to see the estate agent when the roads clear.”

“Chelseys have owned this house since it was built. The lady won’t let it go. You know that as well as I do. You go to that agent and we’re like to find the place in flames before you return.”

Having woken to the thunder of Hodges’ last words, Peter looked from one stubborn expression to the other and wondered if now was the time to intervene. His fever had receded enough to enable him to realize the giant was a man and not a monster, but he still seemed terrifyingly dangerous to the slip of a female who defied him so persistently.

“Where is the lady?” he threw into the breech before Cecily’s angry reply could leave her tongue.

Both stubborn faces turned toward him, and Peter nearly laughed at the conflicting emotions replacing their earlier anger.

“You saw her!” Hodges responded triumphantly.

“She’s not here,” Cecily answered at the same time.

The two glared at each other like brother and sister, and Peter had to pound his own pillows into an upright position.

“Who is she?” he asked again, as long as they were providing answers of a sort.

“Lady Honora,” Hodges answered defiantly.

“Well, she is here. I saw her last night.” Peter lifted a challenging brow to the young maid, who slapped the breakfast tray down before him.

“You couldn’t have. I was here all night and didn’t see a thing. Now eat and stop this nonsense.”

“You were sleeping,” Peter politely pointed out. But the coffee smelled too fragrant to resist, and his interest in this quite insane argument was waning. For all he knew, he was ensconced in a house full of Bedlamites. There was no need to starve while they argued.

“You were delirious.” Cecily’s curt tones ended the argument.

Peter couldn’t resist giving her a challenging look. “Am I so beneath the lady’s notice that she wouldn’t show curiosity in my appearance on her doorstep?”

That sent her into a fluster and Hodges almost grinned. “Lady Honora knows everything that goes on,” he said when it became apparent that Cecily wouldn’t deign to give a reply. “You be sure to tell her how good we took care of you the next time you see her.’’

Cecily threw him a black look and stalked out. Peter was sorry she had gone. Now that his head felt more its normal size and his throat worked again, he would have liked to spend more time talking with her. It had been a long time since he had enjoyed the company of a well-brought-up young woman, even if she were only a lady’s maid. The good Lord knew he had no reason to look askance at conversing with a lady’s maid.

“They don’t feed her enough,” Peter said conversationally when the dour Hodges offered no more insights.

“She’s been ill.” Hodges flung more coals on the fire and stirred the embers, “Another winter like the last and she’ll not likely survive.”

That startled Peter. But before he could question, the servant lumbered for the door, and the forbidding lines of his face warned against interference.

As he ate his breakfast, Peter heard the sound of children playing on the lawn, and his heart felt a little lighter. Perhaps this wasn’t so strange a household as he had thought. Sun poured in the large windows, illuminating the mellowed wax of the old rosewood furniture. Better able to appreciate his surroundings today, he admired the coziness of the old-fashioned wallpaper and the delicate Queen Anne styles. An embroidered tapestry of a rose garden hung on one wall, and it was almost as good as looking out on a bright spring day. If he had to near break his neck and chill himself to the bone to arrive here, it was worth it to be inside a home again.

He looked up eagerly at the recognizable patter of Cecily’s feet in the hall. He hoped she wasn’t too angry at their earlier disagreement, if it could be called that. She was an intriguing little thing, and he would like to know her better.

She seemed to have returned to her normal self when she joined him, if this unsmiling owl-like creature was her normal self. Peter gave her a smile and she seemed startled, but she returned a ghost of a smile as she removed his tray.

“I heard the children on the lawn. How many people are in the household?” Peter inquired by way of making conversation.

The tray slipped and nearly dumped the empty coffee cup to his lap before Cecily righted it. Nervously, she set the tray back on the stand and tried to wipe up small spills with the cloth from the wash bowl.

“Children? You heard children?” Not waiting for him to answer, she hurriedly continued, “There used to be many. Brothers and sisters and cousins, all laughing and playing when they weren’t fighting and screaming. You know how children are. But everyone’s gone now. It seems quite odd to be the last.”

Peter stared at her in growing horror. She was mad. She had to be. Was that the illness Hodges had spoken of? Such a lovely young woman, and quite out of her head. He had just heard the children on the lawn and wondered about them, but she spoke as if they were all dead or blown to the four corners of the earth. He watched as she stood at the window overlooking the lawn.

“Where did they all go?” he asked cautiously.

“To war,” she answered sadly. “One way or another, war and violence were responsible. Why must men always fight? What makes them think it is a grand and glorious deed they do when they march off to kill other men? Have they no notion of what they do to themselves and those they leave at home?”

Thinking of his own escapades and the mother he had left behind, Peter shook his head. “No, they don’t. Men think that everything will stay as they had left it. It isn’t real until you’re in the midst of it and suddenly realize that you may never see home again.”

Cecily swung around. In the morning light, his square, blunt face wasn’t exceedingly handsome, but his eyes were wide and honest and filled with a pain similar to her own. Hodges’ old nightshirt looked ridiculous on him, but he had a stature to overcome that flaw.

She had seen his fancy frock coat and waistcoat and frilled shirt and knew he would pass as a gentleman of means on any street in London once he was dressed. Like this, though, she could see that he was a gentleman of character as well.

“I don’t understand how men can be so blind. Surely they must know that bullets kill and swords maim. Do they think their deaths won’t matter to those of us at home?”

Peter wasn’t at all certain what this conversation was about, but he could tell the topic was one that she had brooded about for a long time. There wasn’t anything he could say to relieve her mind, though.

“They think they are protecting their way of life. I wasn’t in India or Afghanistan, but I understand the enemies’ armies weren’t exactly polite to those they conquered. Men fought to keep their women and their homes from suffering that fate.”

She looked impatient. “Forgive me if I find that utter nonsense. The Sikhs didn’t fight to protect their women. They fought to gain power. The army fought to regain that power. Men can give a thousand pretty reasons for war, but it always comes back to the same thing. I’ve studied the wars of history, and they all have the same basic motive. One man thinks he’s better than another and tries to prove it by breaking the other man’s neck.”

A well-read lady’s maid. How unusual. And exciting. Peter regarded her with approval. “And how would women do it differently? If someone threatens to come over and steal your chickens and take over your house, how would you stop them?”

A half-smile tilted her lips as she contemplated this question. “I think I would be inclined to let them. When they grow tired of arguing with Hodges and tracking down chickens that won’t roost and patching crumbling walls, they will beg me to take it back.”

Peter laughed and held out his hand to gesture her into a chair. “Stay, and help me solve the rest of the world’s problems.”

She shook her head and started for the door. “You must rest. I have been selfish in taking up your time. Hodges will come fetch your tray.’’

She was gone before he could protest. The sound of the children was gone too, and the sunshine had somehow dimmed. It was damned depressing talking to a ghost that wouldn’t light for more than a minute. Maybe he ought to go in search of the elusive Lady Honora.

That thought lasted only long enough for Peter to rise and try to find the chamber pot. His legs were like blanc mange, and he had to grasp the bed and pull himself back into it when Hodges barged through the doorway.

The manservant gave him a glance of disapproval, flung back the covers so Peter could climb back between them, and reached for the tray without saying a word.

Determined to find out more about this household, Peter stopped him before he could make good his escape. “Where are my clothes, Hodges?”

The giant gave him a wary look. “You just proved you ain’t in no shape to get up. They’ll come back when you’re ready.”

“I want them near in case I am ready and there’s no one around,” Peter insisted.

“I’ll bring up your bag. You could use a shave.”

With that curt dismissal, the giant strode out.

Cursing his helplessness, Peter wished he had a book, only to discover someone had thoughtfully left one on the chair beside the bed. Determined to overcome his weakness, he once more tackled the task of standing up, this time falling back to the bed with the coveted book in his hand.

He was sound asleep before he could read more than the title: The Family History of the Chelseys.

When he woke next, the book was gone, and from the tight-lipped frown on the little maid’s face, Peter could surmise who had taken it. He was certain now that he had somehow stumbled across the Rosebud Cottage of his painting, but there were still moments when he thought he might have hit his head too hard and be dreaming.

He hadn’t expected Rosebud Cottage to still exist. He’d had the impression that the painting was quite old. Only whimsy and melancholy had sent him searching for a memory. But the book and the lady’s name almost proved he had woken up inside the painting. Perhaps he ought to begin wondering if he could ever get out.

He found his overnight bag with his change of clothing on the chair and his razor and shaving soaps neatly laid out on the stand. He sent Cecily a wary look as she bustled about with a feather duster. He wasn’t about to perform his ablutions with a female in the room, even if he did realize he must bear a close resemblance to a hedgehog.

“Hodges tells me you’ve been ill.”

She looked startled, but whether at the fact that he addressed her or the mode of his address, Peter couldn’t tell. He watched in satisfaction as she stopped her dusting. He might have little experience in talking to the gentler sex, but he was learning.

“That was last winter. I’m very well now, thank you.”

He studied her peaked face and the shadows under her eyes and wondered how she must have looked when she was ill. As it was, he could see vestiges of prettiness— especially when she smiled—but little more than the glimmer of blue in her eyes or the occasional blush of pink on her cheeks. He shook his head in disagreement.

“You need to be resting, not working night and day. And you should be the one eating good stout broths, not me. Your lady is no friend to allow you to work yourself into nothing.”

She almost smiled at that and came to test his head with her cool hand. “I have all the rest I need, whenever I want. I’ll be fine, thank you. You’re the one still running a fever. I don’t know what became of the physician. Should I send Hodges after him again?”

The touch of her soft fingers brought back memories of childhood, of warm beds and fevered nights and his mother’s tender hands caressing his brow. Peter hadn’t thought of those days in years, but this place was returning it all.

He would have to speak with Lady Honora one way or another. It didn’t seem likely that she would part with the cottage, but he could at least sound her out. And then he would hire her lady’s maid and feed her until she was well again.

“It’s just a cold. I’ll be fine without any quack hovering over me. Is there any chance that I might see Lady Honora and thank her for her hospitality before I go?”

Amusement danced in Cecily’s eyes as she removed her hand to straighten the bed covers. “I’m certain she’ll stop by if she’s interested. She’s a very fickle lady.”

That slander caused Peter’s eyebrows to raise, but he wasn’t in a position to argue. She could quite possibly be right; he just preferred to think of the lady as perfect. “I’m sure she’s busy,” he answered agreeably. “Is she a widow?” That would explain the children and the lack of any mention of a gentleman on the property.

“Yes, how did you know?” Laying aside any pretense of dusting, Cecily perched in the window seat, enjoying the heat of the afternoon sunshine.

“I’ve not heard a man about the house, and with the children and all. . . .“ Peter admired the picture she made in the window. She wore a pale blue gown today, and though she was still too slender to be healthy, she possessed a feminine delicacy that he could appreciate.

Still, she was no match for the Lady Honora. And if the lady was a widow with a ready-made family, all the better for him. There had to be some way he could come to know the lady better.

“And, yes, the children.” Cecily nodded knowingly. “This house was made for children. Lady Honora believed they ought to be brought up in the country, and she had her husband build this cottage just so she could be with the children as much as possible, even when she accompanied the earl to London on business. The attic is littered with rocking horses and toy soldiers and dolls. The cottage is a child’s heaven.”

An earl. So much for his prospective hopes. The widow of an earl wouldn’t spend time in his company, although she had certainly seemed friendly enough those times he had seen her. But a woman who loved children undoubtedly would be kind to injured strangers. Peter struggled between desire and common sense.

“I would like to see more of the house. If the rest is as charming as this room, it must be lovely. Will you take me on a tour sometime?’’

He wasn’t certain if he imagined it or not, but a bleak shadow seemed to cross Cecily’s face. A moment later she rose from the seat and picked up her duster. “There is little more to see. You must rest for now. Uncle Quincy’s pleurisy got worse when he tried to rise from bed too soon.”

He wasn’t any feeble Uncle Quincy, but he was in no hurry to be thrown from this extremely pleasant situation, either. Peter nodded obediently. “Might I have something to occupy my mind if you will not linger to talk with me? The book that was here earlier, perhaps?”

“Lady Honora must have dropped it,” Cecily stated flatly. “I cannot imagine why else it would have been here; it’s extremely dull reading. I’ll see if there isn’t something more to a man’s tastes.”

Peter could think of any number of things more to a man’s tastes than a book, but he rather thought it might be impolitic to mention them. That wouldn’t stop him thinking about them, though, and planning some means to put them into action.

Once Cecily had returned with a tome on the hunting activities of Sussex and left again with a busy air, Peter swung from the bed and sought his land legs again. After months at sea it had felt much like this to walk on land. He hadn’t realized a meager knot on the head and a fever could drain a man’s stamina so.

His breathing was still ragged, but whatever miracle brew the little maid had been feeding him seemed to be working. He could manage to stand without collapsing, and with a little effort, he could reach the window and look out.

There was little to be seen from this viewpoint. The sun had disappeared behind a cloud bank, and the children had vanished with it. The stretch of grassy lawn before the dense wilderness of trees seemed rather brown and neglected, but it was October, and he supposed by October lawns must don a wintry appearance. He had little experience of nature save for the sea, and it had been a long time since he had been in England in the fall. Still, the signs of neglect caused him to wonder along another angle.

Quite often noble houses had few funds to support them. Running a half-dozen estates and a high lifestyle rapidly depleted cash reserves. Could it be that the earl had died leaving his widow without the funds necessary to support their children and various households? That could explain the seeming lack of other servants besides Cecily and Hodges, the lawn’s neglect, and even the parsimony of meals.

That might even explain to some extent Cecily’s inexplicable tirade on men and wars. Perhaps the earl’s heir had gone off to war and died and his estates had been left to a distant relative. Only this cottage might not have been entailed. It was an intriguing possibility, one he would like to explore.

He returned to bed with dreams of wooing and winning the Lady Honora, his mind circling the multitude of means to accomplish his heart’s desire. He was a determined man, one who seldom let go of a goal without accomplishing it. A little lack of experience didn’t deter him any.

Before he could open the pages of the book that Cecily had brought to him, Peter closed his eyes and fell asleep with a myriad of ideas dancing though his head.

When next he woke, Peter had the distinct impression that it was late afternoon. The room had grown dimmer with the winter light fading into the west, but it was still light enough to discern the shapes of furniture and the presence of a shadow flitting about the far side of the bed.

He felt groggy from the nap, but any presence at all was of interest to him, and he turned eagerly in hopes of meeting the lady of his dreams again.

She didn’t disappoint. She was always lovelier than he remembered, her smile soft and welcoming, her face a portrait of moonlight as she leaned over and caressed his hair. He didn’t feel the same sense of home as he had when Cecily touched him, only a mere ruffling of his hair, but it was enough to satisfy him for the moment.

“Lady Honora, I’ve been eager to meet you.” Peter struggled to right himself while still preserving his modesty. He remembered he hadn’t taken advantage of his shaving kit, and he cursed.

She held a finger to her lips and gave him a wickedly mischievous smile.

Peter glanced toward the doorway, half expecting Cecily and Hodges to appear, but he didn’t hear a sound in the hall. Still, he understood her warning. Whatever was going on in this household, the Lady Honora wasn’t supposed to be here.

“I’d like to thank you more properly for my care than I can from a bed. May I call on you once I am up and about?” he whispered.

She clasped her hands in evident delight, then blew him a kiss. Picking up her skirts, she glided toward the doorway. Reluctant to let her go, Peter called after her, “Can’t you stay a little longer?”

The forlorn smile she offered when she turned back to him nearly broke his heart, and then she was gone, and he was alone again.

Punching his pillows into place and reaching for a candle, Peter cursed his own inadequacy in dealing with ladies and the unfairness of life to keep this one from his quarters. He knew that she was all a man could ask for in a woman. Somehow, he would have to set his sights on acquiring her.

And that meant getting up from this bed. It was all very well and good to lie about and pretend to be an invalid just for the pleasure of being pampered, but he obviously wasn’t going to accomplish anything more by it. He needed to find out all he could about the Chelseys and Rosebud Cottage and Lady Honora. With the right information, he could set his course.

When Cecily next entered their patient’s chambers, Peter was sitting in the chair by the window wearing garments retrieved from his bags and fully shaved for the first time in days.

She gasped at his appearance. She had not imagined him quite so. . . She was at a loss for words as she met steady gray eyes and noted a chin set with determination. He was a large man, dwarfing the delicate chintz chair in which he rested. She was used to Hodges, but this was different, and she feared to approach him.

“You should not be out of bed yet,” she scolded, setting his tea tray on the table by the bed, avoiding physical contact. Just his overt masculinity was disturbing to an unfathomable degree.

Peter glanced at Cecily and felt this painting-world he inhabited slip to a different angle. He had never tried to imagine the inhabitants of the stone cottage in the oil. He supposed he would never have tried to picture the servants if he had. And he definitely would never have pictured one like this. He would have imagined them all to be a jolly, healthy lot, laughing and carefree, perhaps. Lady Honora had much to explain when he finally had a chance to pin her down. He had the insane urge to pull Cecily into his lap and cradle her in his arms and promise her everything would be all right.

“I would like to see the house, if you would not mind,” was all he said.

Cecily wiped her hands on the apron she had donned before carrying the tray up the stairs. “I don’t think you’re strong enough yet. Perhaps tomorrow.”

Peter’s gaze was deliberately devoid of all emotion as he met hers. “I will need to leave on the morrow. Are my horses in good repair?’’

Did he mistake, or did disappointment flicker behind the shadowed blue of her eyes? If so, she hid it in her nervous fussing with her apron.

“They are quite well, and Hodges has had your wheel fixed, but you will find you are not strong enough to manage a rig. You will damage your health and possibly the animals if you try to take them out on the morrow. Is there some pressing engagement that you must leave so abruptly?”

“I believe I have something that belongs here. I would like to fetch it and return it.”

Startled, Cecily dropped the apron. “Something that belongs here? How is that possible?”

“I cannot say. Perhaps you can tell me.” That seemed almost an accusation, and Peter was surprised by his own words. He hadn’t meant to say any of that at all. To mention the painting was to give it up, and he was strangely reluctant to do so. But matters had come to a standstill, and he was desperate for some means to shake himself free from this dream world and progress on with the real one.

“If I go outside, shall I find a griffin on the lintel and a rose on the shutters? It is too late in the season for roses on the south wall, I suppose, and it would be too much to ask to find toys in the window. . .  .”

Cecily dropped to the bed and stared at him as if he had taken leave of his senses. “The painting. You have the painting. How can you?”

“By walking into an art gallery and purchasing it.”

“But we never sold it.”

Her words sounded as much an accusation as his. Her incredulity was almost an insult. Peter wished he had the strength to rise and shake the truth from her, but his best weapon now was surprise. He had certainly accomplished that much, but her defenses were excellent. Accusing blue eyes focused on him, and he felt compelled to defend himself.

“Nevertheless, I bought it. If you do not care to give me a tour before I go, I shall request it of Lady Honora when I return. I can’t say why, but the house fascinates me. I came this way just to find it.”

Cecily rose with an almost frightened expression. “The lady. Oh, no, that can’t be. It’s not possible. There is a very sensible explanation for all this. I’m certain it was the appraiser. It had to be the appraiser. He saw the painting and found some way to steal it. That’s all there is to it. We must go to the magistrate and report him. I’ll find Hodges. He’ll ride into town. . . .

Peter stood up and tried to halt her as she walked toward the doorway in a daze, but he merely succeeded in causing her to look up with eyes like bruised violets that made him flinch. He wanted to gather her into his arms and reassure her that everything was all right, but he couldn’t see that anything was wrong. If the painting had been stolen, he meant to return it. What was there in that to cause fear?

“If the painting was stolen, I shall report it when I return to town. If you are concerned that I’ll not return it, I shall give you my direction. You may send the law after me if I do not return immediately. There is no need to trouble Hodges.”

Cecily stared at him as if he were a total stranger. “I cannot believe you have the painting,” she murmured before hurrying from the room.

She repeated those words to Hodges when he inquired if something were wrong when she came down the stairs in a state of shock. It took a moment before her reply sank in, but though he looked equally stunned, he recovered with a happy grin.

“The lady came through, she did. A wealthy nob he must be. I’ll go up and get his direction. We can’t sit about idle and wait for the lady to do all the work. You might ought to find one of those pretty frocks of yours. The lady means him for you, no doubt.”

Cecily’s horror widened her eyes until she saw the humor in it, and her eyes crinkled with laughter. “Oh, Hodges, you cannot mean it! Wouldn’t poor Mr. Denning be terrified if he knew your plans! You said yourself he must be rich as Croesus to own thoroughbreds like those. Why would he saddle himself with a disintegrating cottage in the country and a sickly invalid when he could have his choice of any home or lady in the world?”

Hodges frowned his disapproval. “This is not just any cottage and you’re not just any lady. He should be honored to be chosen. Perhaps I ought to break one of his legs so he has to stay long enough to appreciate what he will be gaining.”

Cecily broke into gales of mirth, steadying herself against the kitchen table and finally collapsing into a chair when she took another look at the fearsome frown on Hodges’ rugged visage.

“Oh, you dear man, whatever would I do without you? I cannot remember laughing so in ages.” She wiped her eyes on the corner of her apron. “Break his leg, indeed! I doubt that even Lady Honora would consider that. Although if it was indeed she who caused the accident, she came quite close. Ahhh, Hodges, if only fairy tales came true, I could kiss him and he would turn into a prince and carry me away to his palace, or he would wake me and I’d find I was living in one.

“But I’m all grown up now, sir, and I know fairy tales are for children. So if you’ll forgive me, I’ll make his royal majesty his supper, and we will hope that he does have the painting and is honest enough to return it. If the appraiser is correct, it should bring enough to mend the roof and still leave enough to live on for a little while longer.”

Hodges puffed up into an irate caricature of himself at this heresy. “That’s just exactly the kind of thinking that brought all this down on us. The lady don’t want us to sell the painting. Don’t you see that? She brought you a rich nabob so you won’t have to. He’s a right enough fellow. It wouldn’t hurt you none to turn him up sweet.”

Still laughing, Cecily rose and bobbed a simple curtsy. “Yes, sir, right away, sir. The way to a man’s heart is through his stomach, is it not? Let me fetch him one of my fabulous stews, and all will be well.”

Hodges frowned as he heard her chuckles floating through the hall as she headed toward the cellar. He supposed it was a good sign that she was laughing again, but he wasn’t one to sit and wait for something to happen. Somehow, he had to take matters into his own hands.

Peter was pleasantly surprised by the differences in the maid’s appearance when she returned with his evening meal. She was smiling, and the laughter lit her eyes to a glorious blue as she set his tray beside the chair. She had changed into a simple frock of striped challis with traces of lace about the bodice and hem that he heartily approved of. He didn’t know much about women’s fashions, but this gown was feminine enough to catch his eye and hold it long enough to discover that the little maid had a handsome figure.

But he wasn’t one for dallying with the servants, and he kept his hands to himself as she lingered for a while in his presence, questioning him about London and his family. Her voice was soft and cultured and somehow soothing, and he was quite certain he would be content to listen to it all day were he not impatient to get on with his plans.

“’Tis a pity you did not come in a grand carriage,” she said almost mockingly at one point. “You could take Hodges and me into town with you to retrieve the painting and save yourself having to return.”

“I will be happy to take Hodges with me on the morrow if you are concerned about the painting, but I have every intention of returning,,” he replied stiffly.

“A busy gentleman such as yourself cannot have much interest in a country cottage once you have seen it. When you are strong enough, Hodges will take you about. That should satisfy your curiosity.”

“It is not just curiosity.” Peter wondered at this, but he trod boldly on. “Is there some reason why I cannot make the acquaintance of Lady Honora before I go?”

“Lady Honora knows where you are,” Cecily answered airily. “She will find you if she wishes. But I contend that you are not strong enough to take the stairs yet. You may as well resign yourself to a few more days’ rest.”

Irritated, Peter set aside his empty plate and rose to his full height. Cecily was not really diminutive but seemed frail in comparison to himself, yet she did not flinch when he stood before her. She met his eyes boldly, almost with defiance, and before he quite knew what he was doing, Peter reached for her.

Her lips were warm and sweet, almost intoxicatingly so. He shifted her slender weight closer and she swayed easily with his will, blending into his arms as if she belonged there. Her kiss pierced him with a longing so deep he almost forgot himself. When her hands crept to his shirt, Peter was jarred back to the present by a very real and pressing desire, and he was thankful he had thought to dress for supper. It would have been most embarrassing to have this encounter wearing only Hodges’ nightshirt.

But remembering where and who he was, Peter set Cecily back from him, although he could not quite bring himself to release her waist. His hands easily encompassed her slimness, and he realized how frail she was. Yet the eyes that stared back at him were not afraid. They searched his with a wonder that made his insides shake.

“I am sorry. I did not mean to insult you.” He was the one ill at ease. He supposed in his younger days before he left home that he had kissed a few maids, but since then his encounters with females had mainly been of the commercial sort. He wasn’t certain what was expected of him with the gently bred kind even if she were naught but a servant. He knew what his body wanted, but he was horrified at even considering treating her that way.

“I am sure there was no insult intended,” Cecily whispered before stepping out of his hands and toward the door. “I had better go now. Hodges will be up later to see if you need anything.’’

“Wait. . . ” But she was gone before Peter could halt her.

He supposed that was the way it should be. If he had persuaded her to give him a tour of the cottage there would have been more opportunities, more dark corners and beckoning nooks where he would be tempted to put his hands on her. Perhaps the ladies of society were right in barring him from their doors. He wasn’t quite civilized yet. He hadn’t realized it would be this difficult to keep from offending innocent women.

Yet she hadn’t seemed offended. That gave him enough confidence to meet Hodges’ suspicious glare with equanimity when he returned later for the supper tray. Peter thought the little maid had liked his kiss, and he grinned at the manservant. It was good to know his uncivilized ways weren’t entirely unattractive. Now if only he could track down the elusive Lady Honora . . . .

He waited until he was certain the house’s inhabitants had all gone to their beds. He had slept for days now and felt no need of sleep as he sat beside the lamp and listened for any signs of life. Convinced that all was well for his midnight adventure, Peter checked the wick of the lamp and set out to explore.

His legs were weak, but they held him steady as he touched the dark walls and started down the hallway to his right. This wasn’t how he wanted to see the cottage, but he felt compelled to show his ability to do so. Lying in bed having dreams of living inside a painting was too disconcerting. He meant to prove that he was in a real house with real people, that he had somehow stumbled across Rosebud Cottage by accident and not fallen into delirium.

Kissing Cecily had proved her reality. Peter wanted to try it again, almost hoped he would stumble across her room, but he knew that would be beyond the bounds of proper behavior. He remembered well the rich scoundrels who had seduced the maids in his former home, leaving them with dreams of grandeur and babes in their bellies. He’d be damned certain his intentions were honorable before he touched any innocent, be she maid or lady.

The door to the next room was wide open, and he lifted his lamp to inspect it. A massive bed of Elizabethan proportions dominated the room. He could see little of the draperies other than that they must once have been velvet. They appeared moth-eaten in this light, and there seemed to be no other furniture to add to the room’s doubtful comfort. Peter suspected the bed remained only because it was too large to move.

Almost unwillingly, his feet carried him onward. He wanted the house in his painting to be filled with light and laughter and carefree happiness. But every sign indicated that this place was falling into disrepair. A piece of plaster crumbled in his hand as he rested against the wall, and his toe caught and tripped in a bare place in the carpet. The next room was draped in holland covers, but it appeared to be a nursery. The rocking horse was covered with dust, and it emitted a mournful squeak when he set it to rocking.

Peter didn’t want to see this. He brushed a cobweb from a shelf of children’s books and studied the titles with tears in his eyes. He was a grown man, a rough sailor who had seen the worst the world had to give, but he remembered a schoolroom with books like these and his envy of the children who had owned them. His own children would someday have every book that money could buy. But he wanted the children in this house to delight in these volumes. Why didn’t they?

Jerking himself from the contemplation of children he did not know, Peter returned to the hall. He wasn’t certain what he had proved to himself, but there seemed little point in going on. He was beginning to feel like an intruder. The place was odd, but he couldn’t be certain how much of it had to do with his fevered dreams and his fanciful desires. If this truly were reality, he was behaving unforgivably. He turned his feet in the direction of his room.

That was when she appeared. Caught by surprise, Peter stared as the lady hurried from a room at the far end of the hall. There was something in her haste to give the impression of fear, but her expression was implacable as she lifted her skirts and started down the stairs. In the dim light he could be certain of her features but little more. She seemed to carry the light of the moon with her, for she had no lamp or candle, and the rest of her was lost in shadow.

Feeling her fear as if transmitted through the air, Peter hurried after her. The congestion in his chest was clearing now, but he was still short of breath by the time he traversed the entire hall and reached the stairs. He just caught a wisp of white going through a doorway at the far end of the downstairs hall as he set after her.

He could not imagine what would cause terror in the middle of the night when all else was asleep. Perhaps one of the children had become ill, but already he was dismissing his fantasy of laughing children inhabiting these halls. They must have been neighboring children he had heard. That this house was empty he realized as he rushed after Lady Honora.

The musty stillness of the house enveloped Peter as he gasped for breath at the bottom of the stairs and forced himself on. He needed to cough, but the sound would no doubt bring the plaster crumbling down around him. He half expected to run into cobwebs and perhaps large rats, but the hall was amazingly unencumbered. The plank floor beneath his feet rattled and groaned upon occasion, but he was moving too swiftly for it to sound too loud.

Raising his lamp, Peter burst into the front room he had seen the lady enter, only to discover Cecily standing wide-eyed and frightened in the circle of light from his lantern and hers. Her hair tumbled around her white-clad shoulders in a cascade of chestnut curls that amplified the intensity of her enormous blue eyes, and he was aware of the slenderness of the shoulders beneath the nightdress.

His gaze fell to the shape of her thinly covered breasts, and he felt the same shock of desire he had experienced earlier. But before he could act on impulse, she raised the book in her hands to her breast as if in protection, and Peter was returned to reality,

“Where is she?” he demanded.

Cecily stared at this figment of her imagination that she had conjured with her dreaming. He was more than she remembered, more than she dared dream after the kiss they had shared, and the restlessness that had brought her down here stirred. His dark curls covered his collar in a most ungentlemanly fashion, and she longed to touch them. She noted that his shoulders strained at his coat in a manner even the best Bond Street tailors could not contrive. His weathered face was almost fierce as he faced her, but she had seen the laughing tenderness there, and she was not afraid.

“Who?”‘ she asked simply. She didn’t dare risk testing his forehead for fever under these circumstances, with the tension rippling between them, but she feared his illness had returned with the overexertion of the day.

“Her ladyship, of course. She came in here. Something must have frightened her. Surely you saw her?” Peter was beginning to doubt his senses as Cecily stared back at him with incomprehension.

“I. . . I just came in.” She ought to say more, but his expression was so intent that she began to be afraid. Perhaps something was wrong. Something was always wrong. She shivered and watched him for a signal as to how to proceed.

Peter searched the corners of the room with his light, finding the various doors and windows and frowning. It was a room made for openness, as if it had no secrets to hide. But the number of draped exits made it easy to conceal a hasty departure. He turned his lamp back to Cecily.

“Something frightened her, I’m certain of it. I want to search the rest of the house, starting with the outside. I don’t want to leave you here alone. Let me take you back to your room and you can lock your door.’’

That seemed like quite a sensible thing to do if this madman meant to roam the house in search of the invisible. Cecily lifted her nightshirt and hastened toward the door to the hall.

Her gesture struck Peter as frighteningly familiar, but he didn’t dissect the feeling. He could almost sense an air of panic in the house, as if it waited for him to discover the menace. Catching Cecily by the waist when she didn’t leave swiftly enough, he nearly carried her up the stairs, the urgency preventing him from enjoying the closeness of her supple form.

At the top, she headed toward the room at the end of the hall, the one the lady had emerged from earlier. Puzzled, he halted.

“This room?” He held up the lamp at her nod and threw open the door. The pale light revealed a femininely appointed chamber of elegant proportions, obviously that of the lady of the house. The covers of the bed were turned down as if someone had just departed from it. The light caught on a small bed in a far nook, and he nodded in understanding. The maid slept with her mistress.

“Lock the door. Do not open it unless you hear me or the lady. One of us will come to tell you when everything is all right. Where is Hodges?”

She told him. Peter waited until she shut and locked the door before he returned to the stairs. He wouldn’t find the manservant yet. He sensed whatever was wrong was outside the house, and it would be better if Hodges was indoors with the women.

He wished he could be certain that both women were inside the house. Lady Honora seemed to be amazingly capricious. If she was afraid of something, why would she seek it alone? It did not bode at well. Could the lady be mad? Was that why Cecily looked at him strangely whenever he mentioned her mistress? That would be just his luck.

Unbarring the front door, Peter stepped into the still night air. No wind tripped the treetops or howled about the chimneys. The rain of his arrival had left the ground damp and soft, and an autumn chill permeated his bones as he advanced onto the lawn. Turning around, he could scarcely see the shadow of the house, but he knew it was the same one as in the painting. He had memorized those rambling lines down to the last detail, and now he had stepped outside of it.

Oddly enough, he didn’t feel the cold as he stared up at the steep tiled roof, finding the tiny dormer with the circular window, tracing the curve of the rounded chimney down to the bend of the roof over the upper line of windows. The toy had sat in that one on the left, and he greatly suspected that was the same room where he had been earlier, the one with the rocking horse, and the dust-covered books.

His gaze drifted to the ornamental lintels, but in the darkness he couldn’t find the griffin. But there were traces of rose canes scraping against the stone on the side wall and shutters that would undoubtedly reveal rosebuds were he to run his hands over them. The picture had showed them as being painted, but he was quite certain they were carved as well.

That certainty depressed him. He was in grave danger of losing his mind in this place. The air was as calm and peaceful as it was in the painting. Peter half expected the moon to come out and reveal the laughing lady running through the woods with her arms held out. No wonder Cecily had looked at him as if he were losing his senses. He no doubt was.

But he had seen the lady and known her fear. It was as simple and as complicated as that. If he could only find the wretched witch, he could satisfy himself that he wasn’t totally moonstruck. But there wasn’t any sign of her in the gardens or on the lawn, and he was certain that he wouldn’t find her again this night.

Reassuring himself that no thieves lingered in the shadows and no smoke drifted from any windows, Peter returned to the house. His strength was waning, but he made himself methodically go through the downstairs rooms, throwing open doors and checking windows. He couldn’t hear any snores from Hodges’ room off the kitchen, but he left the man alone. There was no point in making a fool of himself in front of everyone in the house.

For it was becoming increasingly obvious that Cecily and Hodges and the lady were the only ones in the cottage. Not a curious head peered out of any of the rooms. Not a peep was heard from overhead as he rattled about, making enough noise to wake the dead. Had there been children, Peter felt certain they would have been down about his feet by now. The children were gone, just as Cecily had said.

The melancholy that had driven him to the reckless dash across the countryside in search of this place now descended again as he climbed the stairs. All he had succeeded in doing in his impetuous escapade was to unhinge his mind and endanger his health. He coughed, a great racking cough that threatened to tear up his insides and spew them to the floor.

The door at the top of the stairs flew open and a creature in white flew out. For a moment, he thought it was the lady again, but Cecily’s slender shoulders were soon beneath his arm, and she led him back to his chamber. He smiled at the f soft tresses beneath his rough hand. Daringly, he ran his fingers up and down her arm, showing her he didn’t need this support but thanking her anyway. She gave him a slanted look that warned of her disapproval, but Peter only grinned and lurched toward his bed.

“Perhaps I’ll wait a day or two before I leave, after all,” he murmured as he fell into the soft protection of the featherbed.

“I’ll send Hodges to help you undress,” she replied unsympathetically.

“No, don’t disturb him. I’ll manage. Get yourself out of here, cara mia, and lock your door before I do something we’ll both regret.”

Cecily gave him an uncertain glance. She didn’t think he possessed the strength to do anything untoward, but she resisted the urge to lean over and brush the curls back from his brow. She had the quite unreasoning fear she might kiss his cheek while doing so. She backed toward the door without asking him what “cara mia” meant.

Coughing, Peter forced himself from the bed next morning before Hodges could appear with his morning water. He hadn’t bothered to strip off more than his coat and waistcoat the previous night, and he was well aware of his wrinkled appearance when the manservant entered with the pitcher.

Hodges poured hot water into the bowl and began stropping the razor, giving Peter a meaningful look as he did.

Feeling his collar tighten around his throat, Peter sank into the nearest chair before he realized he wasn’t wearing a collar. His cravat still lay in pristine condition in his bag where he had left it yesterday.

He submitted gracefully when Hodges did no more than approach him with a shaving brush and soap. The huge man was amazingly deft, and Peter was contemplating offering him the position of valet in place of the whining creature he presently paid when the giant rumbled something that made Peter’s muscles knot.

“You’d best not be already married if you know what’s good for you.”

The razor stroked upward beneath his chin, and Peter tried not to gulp.

“What has that to do with you?” he asked with a bravery he wasn’t certain he felt.

“You’ve been fooling around with my Cecily, and I won’t have it.”

The razor scraped carefully over his jaw and Peter unclenched it long enough to ask with surprise, “She’s your daughter?”

The giant stepped back and stared at him with incredulity. “Are you daft, man?” Then, frowning, he returned to his work. “You just keep your hands off’n her lest you got a vicar with you.”

That wasn’t a half-bad idea if Peter gave much thought to it, but the image of a silvered figure in the moonlight kept haunting him, and he couldn’t forget the mischievous laughter on her lips and the bold welcome of her eyes. The idea of Lady Honora of Rosebud Cottage still obsessed him, even after the prior night’s debacle.

“I’ll try to remember that,” he replied. He felt the increase of pressure against his skin and knew he was tempting the man, but Peter wasn’t one to run scared. He meant to stand and fight for what he wanted.

Sensing that, Hodges returned to his work with efficient precision. When he was done, he cleaned off the utensils and left without another word of warning.

Rubbing his hand over his smooth-shaven chin, Peter decided it was time to leave whether he felt like it or not.

By the time Cecily arrived with his breakfast tray, he had succeeded in tying his cravat and donning his waistcoat and almost appeared a proper gentleman once again. She watched him warily as he reached for his coat, but when he made no move toward her, she advanced into the room to set the tray on the table.

“I thought you were going to wait a day or two.”

He almost imagined wistfulness in her voice, but her expression was as serene and determined as the lady’s had been the night before when he was certain she was quite frightened out of her mind.

“I think it would be wiser if I left now. I’ll be back, you know. Shall I bring a magistrate with me so you may discuss the theft of the painting?”

She looked at him askance, then returned to arranging objects on the tray to her satisfaction. “Inquiries should be made, I suppose. If the painting is the one that is missing, I shall report its return to the local magistrate. You needn’t trouble yourself.”

“Cecily.” Peter came up behind her and caught her when she swung around too rapidly and unbalanced herself. He gripped her arms and studied her face before releasing her. “I must talk with Lady Honora. Just once. I ask for no more than that. Can you not arrange it for me?’’

Disappointment followed by brief disdain flicked across her eyes and was gone. “I am not a magician. Return to London and your wealthy friends. If you purchased the painting, I suppose you have no real obligation to return it, but I would ask, in return for the favors we have done you, that you do so. I trust you’ll have a safe journey.”

She was gone before he discovered the courage to stop her. He had handled things very badly, Peter decided as he pushed the food around on his tray, but he wasn’t at all certain where he had gone wrong. Should he not have had the presumption to ask to see the lady of the house? But he was quite certain she had encouraged him to call again. What was wrong with bidding her farewell?

There was no use in worrying about it now. He wanted to see the cottage in the broad light of day. He wanted to make certain that this wasn’t all a dream. And then he wanted to return to London for the painting and a little more information about the Chelseys of Rosebud Cottage. Primed with that ammunition, he could return and find some way to make his offer.

For despite its ramshackle condition, he fully intended to buy the cottage and make it his home.

Peter found his horses and gig waiting for him late that afternoon as he carried his bag outside. He gazed back at the house in the sunlight, admiring the simple angles and curves and the whimsical eccentricities that so delighted him. A shadow flickered in an upper-story window, and he waved, uncertain who was watching but hoping it was her ladyship. He longed to see her again, but that would have to wait now. Perhaps he could arrange to be dreadfully ill again upon his return. He rather enjoyed the pampering attention of the ladies of Rosebud Cottage.

He set the horses to their paces, but he wasn’t long in discovering that Cecily was closer to right than he cared to admit. The cool wind burned his aching lungs and his arms grew weak much faster than he had thought possible.

Disgusted with himself, he halted at an inn and promised himself he would arrive in London in time to make inquiries at his club on the morrow.

But when the next day came, he was stiff and sore, and the final leg of the journey was an excruciating experience that brought him to his bed and kept him there when he finally reached his own lodgings. His whining valet was of little or no use as a nurse, and Peter tossed and turned with the return of the fever and visions of the ladies of Rosebud Cottage.

The painting haunted him. He continued to see the stark terror on the lady’s face as she raced down the stairs to some unknown disaster. The quiet panic of the disintegrating household stayed with him. Enormous blue eyes in a frail face beseeched him, and he couldn’t sleep, couldn’t rest, while the mystery remained unsolved.

Still weak some days later, Peter stumbled from his bed, certain that he would never recover until he returned the painting to the cottage. The fever had dissipated and he was stronger, but there were still things to be done before he could leave.

With grim determination, he set out to meet with some of his friends from the club, gaining the use of their extensive libraries. With perseverance, he tracked down family histories until he discovered the one he wanted: The Family History of the Chelseys.

When he was done, he was thoroughly confused. Studying his Wellingtons, Peter tried to put together the book’s contents with the facts he knew, but the gap between loomed wide. True, the book was written in a prior generation and there was no mention of the present generation. And there was an earl with a wife with the name of Honora—during Cromwell’s time. Rosebud Cottage itself dated back to that century. But although there seemed to be enormous numbers of descendants, and even an earl or two among them, no female descendant had ever been named Honora afterward.

Peter studied the date of the publication and attempted to guess the lady’s birth date. There had been no mention of the cottage in the last generation discussed. The Chelseys had seemingly gone on to other things, dispersed across three continents. It did mention some descendants still living in High Wycombe, none of them with the name of Honora. The last mention of the cottage was during the Rebellion of ‘45 when the resident at that time had hidden an escaped soldier and later went on to marry him. A similar incident was briefly hinted at in a later period, but the gentleman involved was a highwayman and the book provokingly passed over him. It was a romantic history, but offered no explanations of the current residents.

Returning the book to the shelf and thanking his host, Peter set out for his own lodgings—to find a man in uniform waiting for him.

Peter stared at the hostile soldier in disbelief, turned to his sneering valet, and returned his questioning gaze to the intruder. The man was as large as himself and heavily armed. The rigid disapproval in his expression did not foretell easy explanations.

“Peter Aloysius Denning?” the statue inquired. At Peter’s nod, he continued, “Only son of Matilda Brown Denning, late of Lord Emory’s household?” At his second nod, the soldier announced, “You are under arrest.”

That made about as much sense as anything else he had encountered this last week. Gesturing toward his study, Peter suggested, “Perhaps we could sit down and discuss this? I wasn’t aware there was any reason for my arrest.”

The soldier produced a notebook and scanned the pages. “Theft of a valuable painting. Suspicion of robbery. Suspicion of other unspecified criminal acts. The county magistrate wishes you brought forward to explain the charges.”

Lady Honora. Peter pinched his eyes closed and hoped that he was dreaming. When he opened them again, he knew he was not. Impatience had appeared in the soldier’s expression.

“The painting and the receipt for it are in my study. If you would be so good as to accompany me, we can retrieve them and return to High Wycombe with explanations. The other charges will have to be clarified. I cannot remember stealing anything more valuable than a kiss.”

His nonchalant attitude as he led the soldier to the painting left the man momentarily nonplussed. Peter’s ability to remain calm in the midst of a storm had saved his life more than once over the years. He strained to retain it now, although anger was a harder emotion to control than fear. Ordering the insolent valet to remove the painting from the wall, Peter opened his desk and rifled through the papers until he found what he wanted. The fact that a soldier stood over him with a gun in his hand and a sword at his side did not ease his fury.

“Let us go at once, then,” Peter said arrogantly, pocketing the paper and indicating with a nod of his head that the soldier was to take the framed canvas. The confusion on the man’s face gave Peter some satisfaction. He was accustomed to giving orders and the soldier was accustomed to taking them. The man carrying the warrant for his arrest obediently took the burden under his arm.

When it became apparent the man had arrived by mail coach and meant to return to the country by the same means, Peter balked and ordered his rig brought around. He had no intention of being transported like a common criminal. He meant to arrive in High Wycombe as a gentleman and face down Lady Honora with the same high-handedness that she had used to obtain his arrest.

Once his captor became convinced that Peter was coming willingly, the man relaxed enough to divulge some of the incidents leading to the arrest. To Peter’s disgust, he learned the soldier was no more than the son of the magistrate, currently home from duty and called into service by his father. The tale of the stolen painting from Rosebud Cottage had led to suspicion about other recent thefts in the area. The final blow had come when the magistrate himself had been held up by a highway robber the night before Peter had left the cottage. The coincidence was somewhat damning, but Peter was confident he could put an end to the charges—until the man mentioned the quite thorough investigation his father had already conducted.

Peter urged the horses to a faster pace as the soldier revealed he knew about his prisoner’s ignominious birth and mysteriously acquired fortune. So much for ever acquiring Lady Honora and Rosebud Cottage. He would be a condemned criminal in the eyes of those people for the rest of his life simply because of his birth. Damn, but he might as well never have come home.

Night was upon them before they reached the outskirts of High Wycombe. Ignoring any suggestion that they stop for the evening, Peter whipped his horses into a faster stride, sending them down paths he scarcely remembered from his last visit. Let them scorn his birth and his means of rising above it, but he refused to linger under suspicion for one moment longer than was necessary. He’d start tearing their house of cards apart as soon as he produced the painting, and he would stomp upon the debris before the night was over.

What hurt most was that the inhabitants of Rosebud Cottage could turn against him this way. For the first time in years he had felt as if he were home, as if he had found friends and family. It had been a foolish notion, but sufficient to make him want to return for more. Returning as their prisoner hadn’t been what he’d had in mind.

Rather than following his captor’s directions to the magistrate, Peter lashed the horses down the drive he remembered to Rosebud Cottage. The dark shadows of trees laced both sides of the road, and the heavy clouds above kept anything but an occasional peek of the full harvest moon from slipping through the darkness. He was only thankful that it wasn’t raining as a cold wind pierced his coat and caught his hat, almost tumbling it to the ground. He didn’t need any more accidents like that last one.

Despite his knowledge of the danger of the road, Peter was almost caught by surprise again by the figure running through the woods. He could see it darting among the trees, dodging shadows, picking up slivers of moonlight as it ran directly toward the path his horses were taking. He caught his breath and hauled on the reins, his heart pounding as he recognized the illusion. Lady Honora.

Just as in the painting, she was fleeing through the woods, her flimsy gown flowing in the cold autumn breeze, her face silver with the moonlight. Only this time there wasn’t welcome in her eyes, but fear. It didn’t make sense, but Peter responded immediately, halting the horses and leaping to the ground to the furious shouts of the man who was to hold him prisoner.

Peter vaulted the hedgerow and ran in the direction where he had last seen the elusive image. A bullet whined over his head, but he ignored it, taking a path through the neglected grounds. He felt none of the weakness of his illness, only the panic that seemed to permeate the air as he raced toward the woman who in all probability had sent to have him arrested.

He barely had time to open his arms and catch her when she collided against his chest, her breath coming in short pants as she shivered and clung to him for support while she gathered her strength.

“Peter! They’re waiting for you back at the house. You have to run. They think you’re a highwayman. Please, don’t dawdle! Run.”

She lifted her face to his, her long hair streaming in a cascade down her back, her blue eyes wide with terror as they met his. Her blue eyes. Cecily.

Feeling his breath catch in his throat, Peter crushed her against him. She had come to warn him. That was all that mattered now. Forgetting all else, he gathered her shivering body close, warming her with his own. Feeling her frailty in his arms, he couldn’t fight the overwhelming sensation of coming home, and protectiveness swept over him. Bending his head, he found her lips with his, and he filled with joy as she responded with passion.

But then she tore away, and stared at him with fear. “There isn’t time! Please, you have to leave. I’ve tried explaining to them, but they won’t listen.”

The magistrate’s son found them then, a formidable frown on his wide brow as he stepped through the underbrush, gun raised and sword sparkling in the moonlight. “Miss Chelsey,” he remarked with surprise as Cecily darted in front of Peter, protecting him with her back and her widespread arms.

The name sent a ripple of shock through Peter, but he merely encircled her waist with his arm and lifted her to his side. It had been Lady Honora running through those bushes; he would swear it. But it was Cecily he held in his arms, would continue holding in his arms if she would let him. Sending her delicate but thoroughly outraged face a bemused look, he returned to the matter at hand.

“I don’t like ambushes, Acton.” It had taken some time to persuade the soldier’s name from him, but Peter employed it with purpose now. “I’m not your highwayman and I’m not a thief. I’d suggest we ride quietly to the house and that you stay in front of me to prevent any hasty actions. I’ll not have the lady endangered by some overwrought farmer looking to be a hero.”

He spoke as if he were the one carrying gun and sword and not the man who wielded them. The young man looked from Peter to Cecily in confusion, then nodded reluctantly. “We’d best walk, then. Hodges can fetch the rig.”

They marched up to the front door in procession, Acton in the lead, Peter following, pushing Cecily behind him when the first man appeared out of the shrubbery. He sensed the presence of others, heard the nervous whinnies of horses, and cursed the audience. He wanted Cecily to himself, to hear her explanations, but it was far too late for that.

The men filling the empty corridor of Rosebud Cottage carried ancient weapons, but deadly for all that. Peter moved among them with assurance. He had grown up among men like these, lived among them as a sailor. Fear was the only thing to fear at such times. Finding Hodges, he glared at the man angrily.

“See Miss Chelsey to her room, then fetch my rig. You’ll find the damned painting in there.” He turned to the soldier. “Now, where is your father? I’ll have some explanations of this mob frightening an innocent young woman in her own home.”

Even though all must know he was not of the aristocracy, they bowed to his commands as if he were. Peter had learned in childhood that appearance was everything at times. He knew how to wield his well.

But once faced with Lord Acton, appearances didn’t matter at all. Hair still dark despite his years, his lined face reflecting weather more than age, the magistrate came to his feet and met him on an equal level. Piercing eyes looked him over ruthlessly, then returned to focus on his face with.

“I thought you might persuade my son, Charles, to come here first. Using Miss Chelsey as a front for your unlawful actions is the work of a blackguard, sir. Stealing her most valuable possession is the work of an animal without a conscience. I’d see you hanged now were it not my duty to uphold the law. Charles, lock him up. We’ll see to his trial in the morning.”

Before Peter could speak, a small hand circled his arm, and Cecily was beside him. He meant to push her aside, but she dug her fingers in and spoke before he could do more.

“It is all a mistake, Lord Acton. He has returned my painting, just as promised. Hodges was hasty in reporting its theft. And it is only your desire to catch a thief that makes you claim Mr. Denning is the highwayman. He could not have possibly been the man to rob you. He was with me that night.”

A gasp went up around the room, and even Peter narrowed his eyes and gazed down into her innocent expression. “Cecily, I’ll wring your neck for this,” he murmured, pushing her aside before turning back to the magistrate.

“She is lying to protect me. I would prefer to prove my innocence in some other manner. If you will guarantee that I will see a fair trial, I will be happy to accompany you. But there will be need to call other witnesses and obtain statements from my former employers, and these things will take time. If you mean to hold the trial in the morning, then you may as well go ahead and hang me tonight.”

A hint of admiration appeared in the older man’s eyes. “I would have hanged you for stealing the lady’s painting, but if she is prepared to drop those charges, I will have to spend some time investigating the others. However, I don’t feel it is appropriate for you to remain here while I do so. Miss Chelsey, I will take the gentleman with me, but you can be assured that he will be safe until such time as the charges against him can be proven.”

“Lord Acton, if you do not have these men removed from my house at once, I cannot guarantee their safety. You know how these old houses are.” Cecily gave a chillingly sweet smile and the men who saw it glanced nervously. “And Mr. Denning has not yet recovered from his illness. I see no reason for him to go out again in the cold night air. He will remain here, with me. Unless you are prepared to press charges, I don’t think you have a choice in this matter.”

A shutter slammed against a wall, causing everyone jump. The various lanterns around the room flickered in a wayward breeze from out of nowhere. Cecily continued to smile, clinging to Peter’s arm, while the men shifted from foot to foot, mumbling about haunts. Even Lord Acton appeared perturbed.

“Cecily, I have known you since you were a child. You won’t frighten me with your ghost stories. In memory of your parents, I cannot in all good conscience allow you to remain alone in this house with any man, let alone one who could be a thief and a murderer.’’

There was a thud and a scream from the hall, but Cecily remained unmoved. “That was just the brass urn on the sideboard. When the wind blows in a certain direction, it falls over,” she explained to Peter, who was beginning to look amused. Turning back to the magistrate, she continued their conversation. “I think you overlook the fact that he has spent nearly a week with me already. I can only be ruined once, I believe.”

That was the last straw. Peter wrapped one arm around her waist and placed his other hand over her mouth, looking to the startled magistrate as he did so. “I rather suspect she’s something of a witch, my lord, and as this is All Hallows’ Eve, she probably needs to be restrained, but if appearances are all that concern you, I can assure you I mean to do the right thing by her as soon as possible. Otherwise, I rather suspect that painting will land on my head and break my neck before I can get back to the city.”

Cecily struggled against his side, and Acton looked torn between rescuing her and gladly handing her over to any madman who could hold her down. Another gust of wind doused half the lanterns and sent the iron chandelier overhead to squeaking ominously. Even the magistrate glanced upward, and said nothing as the men around him began to edge out of the room.

Hodges loomed in the doorway, painting in hand, glancing scornfully around as men dodged past his towering frame.

“Miss Chelsey is a lady of breeding,” Lord Acton said, remaining in place beneath the swinging chandelier. “I will not see her seduced and shackled by a common sailor and a possible criminal.”

Peter felt the nip of Cecily’s teeth beneath his palm, but this was his argument, and he didn’t give her the opportunity to speak. The word or two he meant to exchange with the lady would happen in private.

With a wry nod, he indicated his wiggling captive. “Does this look like seduction to you? The lady and I have our disagreements, but I will do nothing against her will. Nothing,” he emphasized. “My name and reputation are honest ones, or were until you came along. I came by my wealth through hard work and good fortune, and if you object to that I am sorry, but it is not you whom I wish to marry. That choice is the lady’s.”

Peter winced as the lady’s sharp teeth bit into the base of his palm. Two of the many salon doors slammed shut, sending all the remaining men in the room scuttling for the hall except for Lord Acton.

That gentleman looked uncertain as he watched the irate flash of Cecily’s eyes. With most of the lamps and lanterns doused, the room had descended into shadows. The squeaks of the chandelier and shrieks of old wood in the wind increased.

Peter adjusted his grip more comfortably. “Stop biting me, Cecily, or I will hand you over to Hodges.” He gave that gentleman a warning look that meant a meaningful discussion would follow.

Then he glanced up as if just noticing that the house seemed ready to explode around them and turned a nonchalant gaze to the magistrate. “I’ll no doubt have to fight Miss Chelsey’s ghosts and goblins until I can persuade her, but you are welcome to stay and chaperone if you wish.”

The urn apparently toppled from the sideboard again, and Peter grinned as the magistrate jumped. Even Cecily ceased wriggling to give him a suspicious glare. Only Hodges seemed to find the abnormal sounds unsurprising. Lord Acton’s son appeared in the doorway, a worried expression on his square face as he waited for his father to leave.

The magistrate cleared his throat, looked to Hodges and his son, then questioned Cecily directly. “Are you sure you would not prefer to come home with me, Miss Chelsey? I had not realized this place had become so unsafe.”

She waited for Peter to uncover her mouth and then replied quite clearly, “The cottage has been here a few hundred years, it will stand a few hundred more. You need not worry on my account.”

The wind already seemed to be dying down. Hodges lit a branch of candles, and they flickered and grew brighter, revealing a well-worn but inviting salon. Acton looked around and nodded, then gave Peter a stern stare. “If I find out those charges are true, I’ll see you hang, young man.”

“No doubt someone deserves to, but not me. Please call again in the morning and I will give you a list of witnesses and references. You will see that I was too weak to even manage my cattle halfway to London.” Peter flung Hodges a cold look. “If someone had just had a little patience, none of this would have happened.”

Beginning to understand the inference, Acton also turned a cold glare to the manservant. Then, with a few lingering formalities, he departed with his son, leaving the trio in the old house to their own confrontation.

Peter released Cecily and she leapt from his arms, placing her hands on her hips and glaring. “You’re both insufferable. I have half a mind to sell this place and find myself some nice little modern house somewhere peaceful, where I don’t have to put up with insufferable servants and guests.”

The wind gave one final shriek through the gables then settled into a gentle rustling through the heavy draperies. Peter pinned Hodges with a look. “Out,” he ordered, “or she’ll have the house splintering around us.”

The giant nodded as if fully understanding the warning. “I’ll not apologize. It’s been a week or better.”

“I was sick in bed, you fool.” Peter’s tone wasn’t as harsh as his words. When Cecily gave him one of her “I told you so” looks and started around him, Peter caught her arm and jerked his head at Hodges. “You’d better find some way of getting those valuables back to their owners. You won’t be needing them any longer.’’

Cecily gasped, but Hodges nodded and walked out, leaving the pair of them to fight it out alone.

“Hodges wouldn’t do something like that!” she protested at once, walking from Peter and toward the dying embers of the fire.

“For you, he would do anything.” Peter followed her, taking the poker from her hand and throwing a handful of coal on the ashes. “Tell me about Lady Honora.”

That startled her. Instead of moving away again, she felt his forehead. “You are not feverish.”

Peter caught her hand and held it between his, gazing down at her searchingly. Her eyes were almost feverishly bright, and a hint of color stained her cheeks, but otherwise she appeared the same docile nurse who had lightened so many of his days. “No, I am not feverish. Actually, I believe I have just come to my senses these last hours. Will you find it very difficult to think of me as a husband?”

Cecily turned her head away and answered the easier question. “I told you that Lady Honora was the one who had this cottage built for her children, so they could be closer to their father when he was in London. It was a long time ago, back before Cromwell’s reign. They were Catholics, you see.”

Peter led her to the chair nearest the fire, sat down, and pulled her into his lap. The feel of her small rump against his thighs stirred more primitive desires, but he persisted. “Go on.”

Cecily sent him a strange look, but seeing the determination in his jaw, she settled against his shoulder and continued. “The earl fought against Cromwell’s armies. You know your history. It was a lost cause. The earl was seriously wounded in battle, but he escaped and returned here. Unfortunately, there were soldiers following him.” Cecily pulled from Peter’s arms and leapt up to go to the huge, faded carpet in the room’s center.

Before Peter knew what she was doing, she jerked back a corner of the carpet, revealing a sagging square of floorboard beneath. Even in the dim light he could see that one section was different from the other.

“She hid him down there. It had been obvious for a long time that such a hiding place might be necessary, and Lady Honora had it built with the cottage. Family history has it that she had just pulled the carpet back in place and gone upstairs to comfort the children when the soldiers arrived. Not knowing the earl had returned, the servants had them wait in here while they sent upstairs for her.”

Peter could still see the hauntingly vivid image of the woman floating down those stairs, her expression calm but panic flowing from her like perfume. That had been what Lady Honora must have looked like, but he still couldn’t make himself believe he had seen a ghost. She was too vibrantly alive to be dead.

Cecily threw the carpet back down and settled in a chair beside him. “The story says that she greeted the soldiers, told them she had been informed of her husband’s death, and when they refused to believe her and threatened to burn the house down around her, she merely asked if she might get the children and servants out first. I’ve tried to imagine what it must have been like, knowing your husband was lying injured and possibly dying beneath your feet, while you invite an army to burn the house down around his head. She must have been an incredible woman. Had to have been, because the soldiers believed her and walked out, leaving the cottage and everyone in it unscathed.”

As she talked, Peter had the feeling that the Chelsey family must have included a number of incredible women through the years. He remembered the tale of the woman who had hidden the soldier in ‘45. And the one who had hidden the highwayman. Now he understood how they had done it. And Cecily, delicate, fragile Cecily, had raced to keep him from encountering Acton and his ambush. Even more, she had managed to keep this crumbling cottage together on her own, from sheer willpower alone, he suspected.

“Do the Chelsey women make it a practice to hide their loved ones from the law?” he asked when she fell silent.

Cecily’s lips tilted slightly in amusement as she read his meaning and met his eyes. “History has it that Lady Honora protects those who will protect her home.’’

“But you don’t believe in ghosts,” he stated flatly.

“I don’t believe in ghosts.” She stood up, forcing him to do so also. “And now I believe it is time to get some rest. I am sorry you had to suffer the humiliation of Acton’s arrest on my account. I had no idea that he would take the reported theft so far. I will not blame Hodges for reporting it. He is extremely loyal and thought you were taking advantage of me. I shouldn’t think he was guilty of highway robbery, though.”

“He was not in his bed that night,” Peter informed her gently. When she still seemed intent on leaving, Peter stopped her escape by the simple expedient of standing in front of her. “Cecily, I meant what I said earlier. I have no background, but I have an honest name and enough wealth to keep you comfortably. I hope you can bring yourself to consider my suit.”

Cecily flushed, then looked away again. “You are only saying that because you feel obligated. We both know that is nonsense. Do not press me on the matter anymore.”

Peter wanted to catch her in his arms and persuade her with kisses, but he could see the excitement had drained her, and he would not heap more distress upon her; he moved aside to let her pass.

The clouds broke as she drifted from the room, and she walked through a patch of moonlight from the window. He could see quite plainly that she wasn’t the silvered shadow from the painting, but a flesh-and-blood woman with a haunting beauty he was just learning to recognize. He didn’t want to think of a future without her in it.

But Peter let her go without protest. Quietly, he checked the latches on the windows and doors, noted that the brass urn seemed to be quite securely attached to the sideboard and went up to the room he had used the prior week.

Despite the furious emotions of the day and the physical exhaustion that usually made it impossible for him to relax, Peter fell asleep upon hitting the soft pillow of his bed. After only a week in this place, he felt at home here. Perhaps someone who hadn’t known a true home in years found it easy to adopt any semblance of permanence. And Rosebud Cottage provided more than a semblance of permanence. Centuries-old timber creaked over his head as he drifted into sleep, and he thought of the sounds as music to his ears.

He wasn’t at all certain what woke him later. The wind had died and the moon had fallen lower in the sky, creating dancing shadows through the uncovered window. Peter woke with a start, certain that someone was in the room with him.

He found her waiting in the corner, watching him with a fond smile. He still couldn’t believe that she was a ghost. He couldn’t quite make out the pattern of her dress, but he knew nothing of women’s fashions anyway. Whatever she wore suited her; she moved with the same gentle grace as Cecily did as she drifted out the opened door.

He knew he had closed that door before he retired, but the doors in old houses were notorious for not fastening tightly. Jerking on his trousers, Peter followed Lady Honora into the hallway. There was no panic in her tonight. Even as the house rested, so did she appear calm and at peace. She seemed quite alive to him, beckoning with a smile that made his throat dry and his loins tight. He could easily follow a woman like that to the ends of the earth.

Instead, he followed her to the doorway at the end of the hall, the one he had once carried Cecily through. The door fell open, but when Peter thought he had caught up with her, the lady was gone. To his astonishment, he found himself standing before the draped bed where Cecily slept, and even as he watched, her eyes fluttered open to find him there.

It was then that he understood. He didn’t know how he understood, but he did. The same look that had been in the lady’s eyes was in Cecily’s now as she looked up at him and made no protest at his appearance. When he sat down on the bed’s edge and reached for her, she came to him easily, sliding into his arms as if she belonged there. Her kisses were inexperienced, but her passions were not. Peter groaned and clutched her against his naked chest, resting his chin against her head to keep from dishonoring her further.

“One of your names must be Honora,” he murmured against her hair, trying not to feel the pounding of her heart through the thin nightdress. She was slender, but not as fragile in his arms as he had imagined. He could feel the strength in her embrace as she wrapped her arms around him.

Cecily looked up then, studying the square line of his jaw, trying not to flush at the sight of his wholly improper state of undress. “How did you know?”

“A lady told me.” Unable to resist any longer, Peter returned his mouth to the parted surprise of hers and placed his claim.

Cecily never noticed when the covers between them tumbled to the floor. The dream she had been having for so many long nights had finally come true, and she felt more alive than she had for her entire life as she felt the solidity of Peter’s warm flesh against hers. Tomorrow, she would wonder what had drawn him here. Tonight, she would take what he had to give.

She shuddered with rapture as the warmth of his fingers closed over her breasts. It was as if she had always known it would be like this, and her hands caressed his hair and held him in her arms as their bodies learned what their souls already knew.

And the old house sighed and chuckled and settled contentedly on its foundations as the lovers discovered each other and themselves. The moon drifted to bed, leaving the warmth of darkness to cover them.

FATHERS AND DAUGHTERS

First published in A Regency Valentine, Signet 2/91

“I would like your permission to marry your daughter, sir.” Lord Edward John Chatham stood nervously before the older man’s desk. From his immaculate white waterfall cravat to the elegantly tailored dove-gray pantaloons tucked correctly into a pair of gleaming Hessians, he was every inch the proper young gentleman. A thick head of burnished brown curls cut fashionably to fall forward over his forehead did not disguise the bleakness of his eyes as he watched the other man turn his back on him and walk away. The fact that he had been offered neither brandy nor a chair spoke ill for his hopes.

“I’ve been expecting this, Chatham.” A small, slender man, Henry Thorogood opened a drawer in a nearby cabinet and withdrew a sheaf of papers. As an astute businessman who had turned his family’s dwindling estates into a profitable and lucrative career, Thorogood was always prepared for every eventuality. The neat study in which they stood bespoke his natural orderliness. He threw the papers on the desk. “Your vouchers, Chatham. Do you have any idea of the sum total of their worth?”

“Considerably more than you bought them for, I wager,” Lord Jack replied wryly, acknowledging Thorogood’s shrewdness in obtaining large discounts on practically worthless pieces of paper. Some of those vouchers had been so long outstanding that his creditors would gladly have taken a ha’penny on the pound.

“Enough to have you called before the court, in any case.” The older man remained behind his desk. The Thorogoods were an old and respectable family, but no title attached to their name, and Henry’s immersion in trade had tainted their welcome in the highest echelons of society.

Lord Jack, on the other hand, was the son of an earl and younger brother of an earl, the current holder of the title, in direct line to the succession, and an eminently eligible bachelor.

The young man paled at Thorogood’s threat, but he remained steadfast, clenching his hands at his side. “I realize I have overspent my income for some time, but I have already given up my expensive habits and begun to pare down my debts. Except for repaying what you hold there, my allowance from my late father’s estate is sufficient to keep Carolyn comfortably, if not quite in the style to which she is accustomed. She understands and has no objections to the modest life we must lead.”

“You have already spoken to her? That was unwise. She is much too young to know her own mind. You should have known that of all the wealthy young girls available to buy you out of penury, my daughter was the least suitable. I have no intention of further financing your extravagance at my daughter’s expense.” Thorogood’s voice was harsh and cold. “You will stay away from Carolyn or I shall have you in debtors’ prison so fast your family will not know where to find you.”

Or even care, the young man acknowledged to himself. His elder brother had more debts than anyone could repay, but no one dared charge an earl with unpaid bills. He was on his own, as he had been since his father’s death, when he was still a schoolboy. Lord Jack’s jaw tightened.

“I love Carolyn, sir, and I have reason to believe she returns my affections. I will repay those debts in time. You need settle nothing on Carolyn. I will keep her on my income. We will be able to live comfortably in my mother’s dower house in Dorset. She will come to no harm at my hands, I assure you.” Although he spoke with confidence, Jack was beginning to relive the doubts that had plagued him ever since he had realized his idle pursuit of an heiress had become something much different. He meant every word he said, but he couldn’t help remembering Carolyn’s youthful innocence. Did she have any idea what a modest life in Dorset meant? How long would it be before she grew restless and bored, deprived of the extravagances her wealthy father had led her to expect of life?

“She will come to no harm at your hands because I will not allow you to lay hands on her!” Thorogood shouted. Resolutely he pressed his point. “I will call my daughter in here and you will tell her before my face that you will not see her again. In return, I will not call in your debts. Should you so much as show your face at my door, however, I will hand your vouchers over to the magistrate. Do you understand me?”

Jack heard and understood. Beneath his fashionably pale complexion he turned a shade grayer, but his eyes hardened. “I understand you are destroying your daughter’s life as well as my own. As you say, she is young and perhaps will recover. For myself, as long as you hold those vouchers, there is no hope for me. If you truly wish me to leave, I request a loan so that I may set about finding a means of repaying those debts.” And of returning to Carolyn—but he did not say those words aloud; they held his last flickering hope of a life worth living.

The older man looked at the younger contemptuously, seeing the request as a bribe to ensure his silence. There were very few ways a gentleman could turn money into wealth without land and still remain a gentleman. The loan would be wagered at a card table in a mad attempt to win it all back and would never be seen again. If that was what it took, so be it. Henry nodded tersely. “You will sign a voucher for the sum.”

Curling his fingers into his palms and feeling his plans crumble to bitter ashes, Jack waited for the servant to fetch Carolyn. They had known each other only a few brief months. Perhaps for her it had been a carefree lark, part of the experience of coming out into society. For him it was much more, but he had been careful not to let her see how deeply she affected him. He had never known such quiet, kind affection and cheerful joy as she had brought to him. It should be enough to treasure these few months of happiness they had shared. He tried to fix a careless expression on his face as he heard the light patter of her small feet in the hall.

She floated into the room, a brilliant expectancy upon her face as she smiled at Jack. Her smile faltered as she met an unfamiliar cold barrier in his expression, but she did not hesitate. Clothed in pale green gauze and ribbons, her light brown hair piled artlessly above a slender throat and velvet eyes, she advanced to kiss her father’s cheek. In her hand she carried what appeared to be a red paper-and-lace heart. She turned and gave Jack another reassuring smile.

“Lord John has something he wishes to tell you, my dear.” Henry rested a comforting hand on his eighteen year-old daughter’s shoulder. He had five daughters and no sons. Their mother had died giving birth to the youngest just two years ago. Carolyn had been his right hand and biggest comfort during these last two years of grief and chaos. He would not surrender a gem such as this to a man who would not appreciate or care for the gift. The temporary pain he was about to inflict could in no way measure the misery of a lifetime of poverty and depravity. Someday she would understand that.

Carolyn turned to Jack’s irregular but handsome features. She knew the story behind the crook of his once-patrician nose, knew the tiny scar above one arched dark eyebrow had been earned during a childhood tantrum, knew he had inherited the Chatham pugnacious jaw and his mother’s sharp Spanish cheekbones. She knew him with all her heart and soul and was ready to give the words that would allow her to share his life forever. The promise appeared in her smile as she waited for him to speak.

“Carolyn, I just wished to tell you that I am going away and won’t be able to see you again,” Lord Jack said.

She continued staring at him as if he hadn’t spoken, waiting for the words that would surely follow. The red-and-white heart in her hand crumpled a little beneath her fingers.

Steeling himself, telling himself it was for her own good, Jack tried again. “Your father has refused to give me your hand. I cannot keep you in the manner to which you are accustomed.”

That, she understood, and the light returned to her eyes as she turned to her father. “That does not matter, Papa! You must know that I have no care for silk gowns or balls or jewels. I should love to live in the country and will be quite content attending village affairs rather than London society. I know you mean well, Papa, but you must see that I love Jack too much to allow so small a thing as money to stand between us.”

Henry turned a threatening look on the paralyzed young man. “Tell her, Jack. Do one decent, manly thing in your life.”

Realizing he was being asked to cut his own throat, Jack threw the older man a murderous look, but as Carolyn turned questioningly to him, he ruthlessly whipped out the knife. “You don’t understand, my dear. My debts are such that I would have to sell my home to pay them. Your father refuses to give you a dowry if you marry me. Without your dowry, we cannot marry. I must seek my fortune elsewhere.”

Twin spots of color tinted Carolyn’s cheeks as she absorbed this self-serving speech, and the blue of her eyes hardened to a more crystalline color similar to his own. “You are saying you courted me for my dowry? That you only meant to save yourself from debt and never meant any of those promises you made? That your pretty words were nothing but lies?”

Jack said nothing, but remained stoic as she wielded the knife he had given her. Carolyn could by turns be pensive and gay, serious and flirtatious, but never had he seen her in a temper. At his lack of reply, her anger seemed to boil and explode, heightening her color, making her eyes more vivid, but not once did it remove the ladylike melodiousness of her voice.

“They were all lies, weren’t they? The courtly gestures, the sweet flattery? Did you go back to your friends and laugh at how easily I fell for them? Did they wager on how soon you would woo my wealth? All those promises. . . ” Her voice broke and her eyes glittered with unshed tears when he did not deny her charges.

To compensate for her lack of words, she stalked across the room to stand in front of him and waved the fragile confection of red and lace before him. “I don’t want to know how much my father had to pay you to do this. You must have realized I would have run off with you anywhere. I loved you. Loved you!” Her voice cracked again, but temper had loosed her tongue. “Fool that I am, I believed your lies! I gave you my heart, and you had no idea what you possessed. You will never know now. No one will ever know. I’ll not be such a fool ever again.”

Before his stony gaze she ripped the paper heart in half, then tore it again and again until it was in tattered pieces on the floor at his feet. She flung the last few bits at his snowy cravat. “There’s my heart. See what good it does you now.”

Carolyn stormed from the room, her store of reserve depleted by the tantrum she had never indulged in to such extremes. She slammed the door, rattling the precious Meissen vase on the hall table, and halted in the shadowed doorway to compose her face and hastily wipe away her tears.

Even as she stood there, she heard her father’s low voice through the door. “I’ll have the money for you on the morrow. I’ll send my man around. I don’t want to see your face here again.”

Shuddering with dry sobs, she raced toward the stairs, no longer caring who saw her. It wasn’t just a lovely valentine lying in torn pieces at the feet of the man behind her, but her heart. There would never be any repairing it.

Behind the closed door, the tall lord bent to pick up the flimsy pieces of paper heart that he had not deserved. He could see snatches of the fine penmanship of the child he had loved on the pieces as he gathered them. In his own heart, he knew they would never be whole again.

Grimly he pocketed the torn valentine, nodded curtly at his nemesis, and strode out, his long legs carrying him away as quickly as the laws of physics and nature allowed.

“I cannot get it to look lacy like the picture.” Frustrated, Blanche threw down the tattered paper amongst the scraps already littering the library table. An unexpected ray of sun gleamed through the open curtains, catching her golden hair in a coronet of light in this dusky corner of the library.

Smiling at the sight, Carolyn set aside her book and rose to see what task her younger sister had set herself now. Pale brown hair arranged unfashionably in a simple chignon, she looked over her sister’s shoulder.

Blanche glanced up in relief as Carolyn took up the misshapen piece of paper. “It is not at all like what you and Mama used to make. I thought I could follow the instructions in this magazine, but it is not the same. Show me how to make it lacy.”

Carolyn held the tattered valentine, glanced at the magazine, and drawing on the strength she held in reserve for just such occasions, sat down and picked up the scissors and a clean sheet of paper. “You have to cut the heart first, if I remember correctly.”

Blanche watched in silence as the plain square of paper shaped itself into a heart finely threaded with intricate designs and elegant scrollwork. Breathing a sigh of happiness, she eagerly took up the scissors when her sister laid them aside. “It is beyond everything, Lynley!” Her newly discovered grown-up manner briefly vanished to use this childhood appellation. “Will you make one for George?”

Carolyn carelessly set the beautiful lace heart aside. “George would not know what to do with it. For whom are you making a valentine?” Hoping to encourage her sister’s confidences, she lingered to help fold the paper correctly and to pencil in cutting lines. Blanche had come out during the Little Season last fall, but she had shown no preference among the many suitors who swarmed around her.

“Why, for the first bachelor to appear at my door on St. Valentine’s Day, just like the magazine says!” Laughing eyes lifted to meet her older sister’s. “Why don’t you make one too? Wouldn’t fussy old George have a proper fit if you gave a card to someone else?”

“He is Lord Hampton to you, child. He would swallow a maggot if he ever heard you talk so. And one does not play childish tricks on her suitors. The marquess would have every right to be peeved should I start handing out love notes to someone else.”

Instead of being chastised, Blanche laughed at her sister’s admonition. Five years her senior, Carolyn still managed to combine her motherly advice with just enough humor to keep the camaraderie of their sisterhood lively. “I think you should have married when you were my age, Lynley. You have grown as crusty and dull as old Lord Hampton. You deserve each other. I can see the two of you on your wedding night. He will bow stiffly at the waist and offer you his arm to take you to bed, and you will make a deep curtsy and ask, `Are you certain this is proper, my lord?’ and the two of you will debate it until dawn.”

“Blanche!” Equally mortified and amused at her eighteen-year-old sister’s unruly imagination, Carolyn bit her tongue and began improving the lacy confection she had created. “You should not be thinking such things. Besides, Lord Hampton and I are not officially betrothed. If you are going to do that properly, you must learn to make smaller cuts.” She pointed the tip of her pen at the offending design in her sister’s hand.

Blanche shrugged and reached for a new sheet of paper. “Everyone knows you will be as soon as his curmudgeon mother comes back from the Continent. And it’s about time. You are twenty-three, Carolyn. Gossips will have you on the shelf. And just think what grand balls you can have when you are Lady Hampton! I think I shall have another Season just so I might meet all the noble gentlemen I have missed this year. Then, when I have found a duke or a marquess, we will both be able to bring out Alice and Jane. Why, with such high connections, we should find them princes, at least. Then they can introduce Penny to society, and she shall have to marry a king.”

Carolyn smiled at these high-flying flights of fancy. “I cannot think of a prince I would allow in the same room with Alice and Jane, and while I will admit not having consorted with many kings, I daresay they will all be a trifle derelict for Penny. At the tender age of seven, she may have difficulty finding a king who will play at patty-cake and hobbyhorse with her.”

Blanche made a rude noise that one of her suitors would find quite startling from so demure and innocent a miss. “You didn’t used to be so prim, Lynley. I remember when you first came out and you and that fellow with the broken nose made up the most horrendous tales to tell when you knew I was listening. Whatever happened to that gentleman? He was quite fun. Much more the thing than stuffy old George.”

Proud of her hard-won self-control, Carolyn smiled and laid aside her pen and valentine. “We both grew up. Now, if you need no further—”

A gentle rap at the door signaled an intruder, and Carolyn greeted the footman bearing a card.

“The gentleman’s come to see Mr. Thorogood, Miss Carolyn.” He held out the card for her inspection. “He asks that he be made known to the ladies while he waits.”

When Carolyn’s expected reply did not come, Blanche looked up in time to see her sister’s face turn pale and her lips compress in a manner she had not seen in years as she stared at the card in her hand. Before Blanche could inquire as to their visitor’s name, Carolyn regained her composure. “Tell the gentleman we are not at home,” she announced firmly.

Blanche gave her sister an odd look. Carolyn very seldom stood on ceremony with their visitors. She was friendly to young and old alike. Who could this be that she would refuse him? Smitten with curiosity, Blanche waited for Carolyn to return to her reading, then excused herself to disappear down the hallway after the footman.

Garbed in a heavy sable-lined cloak against the January cold, the gentleman waited in the salon doorway. As the servant repeated his message, the man bent his top-hatted head in acknowledgment and removed himself to the privacy of the salon until the master of the house could see him.

Curiosity thoroughly whetted now, Blanche slipped into the small family parlor behind the salon. The connecting door between the rooms had not been recently used and creaked as she pulled it ajar, but a quick glance told her the noise had not disturbed the stranger from his pondering. He evidently did not mean to linger long, for he had not surrendered cloak or hat but held them on one arm as he stared at a porcelain figurine on the mantel. She could see by the dim light that his hair was sun-streaked and his complexion weathered, as if he were one of her father’s ship’s captains, but his richly tailored clothes were of the finest cut and not those of a poor seaman. The sable cloak alone bespoke his lack of commonplaceness. When he finally turned at the entrance of a servant, Blanche barely concealed her gasp of surprise. The man with the broken nose!

She had no opportunity to learn more. The visitor followed the servant out and up the stairs to the master’s private study.

Five years older, Henry Thorogood still retained his slender build, although there was now a hint of a stoop to his shoulders and threads of gray in his dark hair. Lord Edward John Chatham observed these alterations as he entered the book-lined study. Little else had changed in these last years, in this room, at least. He wondered at the refusal of the ladies of the house to see him, but his had been a whimsical gesture at best. Thorogood could have remarried by now; his new wife would not know his name. Carolyn’s younger sisters were not likely to remember him. He could not expect to find Carolyn unmarried and still in her father’s home after all these years. He may have hoped desperately, and been tempted to find out what he could, but business came first.

With the self-assurance of an older, more experienced man, Jack seated himself without his host’s permission. He noted the older man’s brief look of surprise and the trace of amusement in the lift of his brow, but he had only one purpose here and he was eager to get on with it. He waited for Thorogood to take a seat before he spoke.

“I have come to repay my debts, sir. I have brought the sum of the loan, plus interest. You will need to name me the amount due on the vouchers you bought.”

Thorogood appraised the sun-darkened stranger seated across from him. In the years since their last encounter he had not forgotten the arrogant young lordling; in fact, he had had good reason to remember him. The changes wrought by the years were dramatic, but he would have recognized those stony gray eyes and that arrogance anywhere. Lord John had come into his own, it seemed. The question remained, had his character improved with time?

Ignoring his visitor’s demands, Henry responded with coldness. “I will not accept tainted money. I have not heard of your brother’s estates improving or of any of your family dying and leaving you a fortune. I would know from whence your payment comes.”

Jack made an elegant sneer and withdrew a large purse. “Thank you for your confidence, but my money is honestly earned. You may speak with my superiors in the East India Company. It is not tainted, that is, unless you consider trade a taint. I don’t believe you are in any position to quibble about that. Name me the sum I owe you.”

Thorogood weighed the bag of coins in his hand as he contemplated the young lord. Lord John would be nearing thirty now, not young any longer, actually. Whatever he had been doing, it had taught him a new authority and assurance that the callow spendthrift had not possessed. He propped his fingers together in an arch and named a sum that would have made royalty flinch.

Jack gave him a look of disgust. “That would more than cover the full sum of the original markers plus interest at a rate to make the shylocks cringe. If you think that is what I owe you for five years of my life, you are sadly mistaken. I will pay it, but I will have every marker I ever wrote in return. Should any more turn up at some future date, I will return them to you for payment.”

Henry concealed his surprise with a brief nod. “I did not anticipate immediate payment. You may pay it as you are able.”

Chatham rose abruptly. “I will give you a draft on my bank today if you can present the vouchers. I will not have your threats hanging over my head any longer than is necessary.”

Fully astounded, Henry opened the drawer where the markers had been kept all these years. Something in the way Lord Jack had phrased that sentence gave food for thought, but he would savor it later. He would step cautiously for now. He wondered if the careless name the young man had gone by in his youth still applied. “Lord Jack” no longer suited this imposing stranger.

The transaction completed, Jack threw the sheaf of papers in the fire and watched them burn before striding out without a polite word to his host. Five years of waiting for this moment had left him expecting an elation he could no longer feel. The deadness inside remained even with the burden of all those old debts lifted.

He needed to seek some new stimulation now to keep his spirit from dying entirely.

Only recently arrived in London, he’d not had time to seek out old friends. With his business accomplished, he felt ill-at-ease and restless. It was time to rejoin society and see how his reputation had fared over the cleansing solution of time.

Jack walked into White’s and found little different in the decor other than a mellowing of age. Perhaps the faces behind the newspapers were older, the youths behind the gaming tables seemed younger, he knew fewer than he had expected, but on the whole, the changes were slight. He strolled toward the group in a corner of the back room, using his leisurely pace to identify vaguely familiar features. One of their number looked up and gave a whoop of recognition. Jack grinned at this irrepressible greeting. Peter’s hair might have retreated slightly from his sloping forehead, his yellow waistcoat might be tighter over his paunch, but the cheerful beam of his round face remained unchanged.

“Chatham, as I live and breathe! Back from the dead, old boy? Have you come to haunt us in these dismal corridors?”

They drew him back into their circle without reproof, either glad of this diversion on a dull day or unaware of his fall into trade. Jack ordered drinks, joined in the genial jesting, and tested the waters. Many of their former number were not evident in this gathering place. Some younger, newer faces watched his homecoming with disinterest or an eagerness to be amused but he found no disdain. Yet.

Settling into a comfortably upholstered chair, Jack turned the conversation away from himself and encouraged gossip about those faces among the missing. In this time-honored fashion he learned how little things had changed beyond the names and the faces.

“And Beecham? Has his father stuck his spoon in the wall and left him all those barrels of gold yet?”

A slender young toff with a diamond stickpin waved his hand lazily. “The old Judas will never die. Last I heard, he was swearing to leave everything but the entailment to some young niece. Beecham’s out courting her right now. She’s a Friday-faced female if ever I saw one, not even been presented yet.”

“The last lot of lovelies seem sadly lacking compared to those when we first came down, don’t they, Harrison? They’re all so demmed. . . green, somehow,” Peter completed his sentence weakly.

General laughter ensued at this assessment, but it gave Jack an opening to the topic closest to his well-concealed heart. “And the Incomparables of all these years past? Where are they now? What of our number have shackled their legs for beauty?”

This regenerated the conversation as they sought to remember the reigning toasts of other years and who had carried them away into marital bliss or discord as the case might be.

Peter summed it up best after a fevered discussion. “They’re all married and surrounded by whining brats is what they’re doing. Seems a demmed shame to waste all that loveliness.”

The gentleman with the stickpin shook his head in disagreement. “Not all. The Tremayne wench married some ancient baronet with a pot of gold, who popped off a few months later. She’s sitting in splendor over on St. James’s now, entertaining lavishly. I hear Bulfinch has been dipping his pen there.”

Peter brightened at a renewed memory. “And the Thorogood eldest, what was her name, Jack? You used to be smitten with her. She’s leading her young sister around this Season. She ain’t never been wed that I know of. I’m surprised she ain’t wearing caps by now, though she’s still a lovely lass.”

Before Jack could respond or even untie his tongue and allow his heart to drop from his throat after the shock of this news, Harrison made a deprecating gesture. “Hampton has her claimed. She’s a smart one. She hung around for a title to remove the stench of trade. Wait and see, she’ll have that brood of her father’s married off to the cream of the crop as they come along. Watch your legs, men, they’ll be in her trap before you know you’re caught.”

Jack peeled his fingers from the arm of the chair and reached for his glass. “George still unwed? He’s older than any of us. How did the little Thorogood snare him?”

“He ain’t snared yet. There’s been no announcement. I wager it waits on his mama’s approval, but if he don’t come up to snuff soon, the chit will have her comeuppance. The ladies are raising eyebrows at his marked attentions without a ring on her finger. I daresay that devilish father will force the matter soon enough. Hampton was a fool to dabble in those waters. Thorogood’s a shark.”

Jack heard the stem of the glass crack beneath the pressure of his fingers. Forcing himself to relax and look bored, he rose and prepared to depart. “Maybe someone ought to warn Hampton what he’s getting into. Good night, gentlemen. It’s been entertaining, but there’s a certain little lady who’s expecting me.”

He walked off and was gone before they realized he had never explained what he’d been doing these past years.

“No, don’t add the gold pins, Blanche! They are very lovely, but you will have to save them until you’re older. The pearls will do fine. You will be prettier than any other girl there.”

“Fustian!” Blanche glared in the mirror at her reflection. “I shall look a simpering idiot like all the rest. Why can I not wear cloth of gold like yours? You look like an angel just down from heaven. I look like a frumpy mushroom.”

Carolyn smiled at her sister’s nervous starts. Admittedly, virginal white tended to be tedious, but the extravagant gauze and lace of Blanche’s ball gown were not exactly the common touch, and the lavender sash and embroidery enhanced her slender charms daringly enough. She would be a sensation, as usual, but she would not be persuaded.

“I don’t have wings and you’re not edible. You already have more suitors than you need. I don’t know what you’re worried about. Is there someone special you wish to impress?”

Carolyn’s practicality always put a damper on any nervous hopes. Swinging around to observe her sister’s elegantly draped gown, Blanche offered a reluctant smile. “No. I just thought it might be a pleasant change if I could be as beautiful as you. Your suitors are so much more interesting than mine.”

Carolyn laughed. She had not spent half the attention on her own preparations as she had on Blanche’s. She had bidden her maid merely to loop gold twine through her upsweep, added a chain of silver and gold to her throat, and, wearing a gown she had worn the year before, called herself ready. Admittedly, her maid had teased a few loose tendrils into curling about her ears and shoulders, but they did that normally enough before the evening ended.

She had no illusions about the men she would meet tonight. They had been attending her over five years now, and she was as heartily bored with them as they were with her. At one time or another, as fortunes waxed and waned, one or another of them would grow amorous and make an offer, but she had learned how to let them down lightly.

Among the older set, proposing to her had become a game of nothing ventured, nothing gained. Wagers had been won or lost in earlier years. Lately, there were few takers on a sure thing. Few had any interest in being rejected in an attempt to remove her from the shelf.

That was why Hampton’s suit had caught everyone by surprise, Carolyn knew. He had been an eligible parti on the Marriage Mart for a decade but had never shown any interest in the favors waved before his nose. Wealthy, titled, and young enough to be considered well-looking, he made many a young girl weep with envy when he escorted one of society’s more mature widows onto the floor. The gossip about his misalliances with these more worldly women was discreet. He never gained the epithet of rake, for he seldom spared a second glance to the innocent.

His studious courtship of Carolyn had the haut ton all agog and puzzled her as well. She was neither worldly nor a widow. Not a hint of scandal attached to their relationship except in the fact that the courtship had lasted a good six months without an announcement. That in itself was a record of sorts. Hampton had never courted any woman, young or old, for that length of time, and Carolyn had never allowed any courtship to go on so long without a firm rejection. Wagers once more were rife.

Well aware of tongues flapping, Carolyn did nothing to encourage the wagers. She concentrated on seeing that Blanche was properly attended.

George Hampton’s suit did not interfere with her goals, and aided it in many ways, so there was no reason to discourage him. She was well aware he had finally decided he needed an heir and had settled on her as older and more mature than the fresh crop of young innocents on the Mart. His less-than-romantic courtship caused her no pain. If she agreed to his proposal, it would be because she had decided she wished a family of her own, and he was wealthy enough for her not to fear he wanted her for her dowry. It seemed a good, stable way of venturing into the treacherous waters of matrimony.

But Blanche was still filled with romantic illusions, and Carolyn had no desire to remove the misty film of fantasy from her sister’s eyes yet. The time would come when the more objectionable suitors were weeded out and Blanche began to realize that marriage was a financial proposition and not a romantic one. For now, let her believe in love. It might happen. Even fairy tales came true upon occasion.

Blanche and Carolyn entered the ballroom that night on their father’s arm. As a wealthy widower, Henry Thorogood was much sought after himself, and he had no difficulty in amusing himself while keeping an eye on his two beautiful daughters. Still, he relied on Carolyn to act as chaperone for Blanche’s high spirits. She was quite capable in dealing with over-ardent young gentlemen.

Thorogood watched her through half-lowered lids as she smilingly refused one notorious rake and deflected a debt-ridden young lord with a request for some punch. Carolyn had learned propriety too well. Her natural happiness had become something much less animated, an artificial facade of smiles and gentle words that fooled the rest of the world but not her father.

Sipping his drink, he watched Carolyn’s smile fade in weariness as she was momentarily left alone. The daughter he had known from infancy had been exuberant in her joy, passionate in her beliefs, dramatic in her sorrows. She had wept and laughed and infuriated alternately, until her eighteenth year. That was the year she had grown up, and he had not seen that girl again. As dutiful and pleasant as this new woman was, he rather missed the tempestuous girl. His eyes narrowed as he observed the two young men approaching her now.

Instantly aware that she was being watched, Carolyn raised her head with a renewed smile at George Hampton’s approach. Garbed in sober black tailcoat and pantaloons, his immaculate cravat a masterpiece in simplicity, his stride one of noble arrogance and authority, he looked the part of wealthy aristocrat. He seldom smiled, but she sensed a pleased look on his face as he caught her eye.

In idle curiosity, Carolyn turned her gaze to the man at the marquess’s side. She knew George frequented White’s and several other of the gentlemen’s clubs, but he seldom introduced her to his male friends. She wondered occasionally if it was out of embarrassment because he had attached himself to a female without title whose wealth came from trade, but she did not let the question concern her much. He made a pleasant companion and they got along well enough. Still, she couldn’t help wondering about the stranger.

At this distance Carolyn could tell only that George’s companion was unfashionably weathered in a startlingly attractive manner. His rather longish brown hair had light streaks from the sun, and his eyes seemed much lighter than the rest of his bronzed face. His gray swallow-tailed coat fit unfashionably muscular shoulders, and his tailored matching trousers did not hinder his long, eager stride. Dressed for comfort more than style, he exuded a self-assurance she found compelling. Unnerved by this sudden unexpected attraction to a stranger, she raised her gaze to search his face as they approached. Shock brought her hand to her middle, and the blood rushed from her face.

Her plight did not go unnoticed by the newcomer. Cold gray eyes swept over her without demonstrating any emotion, lifting in dark acknowledgment at accepting that he was the cause of her distress. At his side, Hampton seemed oblivious of her lack of response as he introduced his companion.

“Do you remember Chatham, Carolyn? I daresay he was before your time. He’s been in India practically since you were in short skirts.”

Carolyn managed a weak smile and extended her hand. “I am not so young as that, my lord. I remember Lord John from my first Season.” As his callused brown hand closed around hers, she wanted to jerk away, but that would be demonstrating a childish emotion she no longer felt. She forced a pleasant expression.

“He’s a bit out of touch with the current crop of lovelies. I told him you would be happy to surrender a dance or two and introduce him to a few suitable misses. That sister of yours might be just in his style.”

Carolyn’s aghast expression went unnoticed by the nobleman pleased with his helpfulness.

Jack read her dismay and refused to release her hand. “I believe the musicians are beginning a waltz, Miss Thorogood. You were reluctant to try it when last we met. Shall we?”

With her intended standing by affectionately rewarding her with his smile for her compliance, Carolyn had little choice but to follow Jack onto the dance floor. She remembered a time when she had stubbornly refused to indulge in the decadent dance sweeping the fast set, even when the man she loved offered to teach her. After he left, it seemed scarcely a point worth defending.

She had been waltzing for years now, but defiance returned with just the touch of Jack’s hand. She wanted to stomp her foot and slap him and tell him to behave. It would have been apropos back then when he had been whispering sweet nothings in her ear all night. Such behavior now would be singularly inappropriate.

“You cannot kill me with looks, Carolyn. Smile and put a pleasant face on it before someone remembers old gossip and reminds George.” Jack slid his arm around her slender waist with the possessiveness of familiarity, swinging her effortlessly into the steps of the dance as he spoke. “You’re more beautiful than I remember,” he added, searching her face when she did not respond.

“And you’re more arrogant,” she retorted. Under the intensity of his scrutiny, she felt a flush staining her cheeks for the first time in years. Her fingers itched to smack him, but his long masculine physique held her firmly, and the familiar sensations she had not felt in years swarmed alive and well through her rebellious body. He could hold her like this for the rest of the night, and not a muscle would stir in protest.

“I see your temper has not cooled with the passage of time. I suppose you are the one who refused to see me yesterday. I did not expect to find you still in your father’s house. I thought you would be married by now.”

She hated the speculation in his eyes. The arrogant fool was wondering if she had waited for him. She would disabuse him of that notion, if only she could find her tongue. “I have grown more fastidious with age,” she gritted out between clenched teeth. She could feel the heat of his hand even through his glove and her gown. She hated him for reminding her of sensations better forgotten.

“So it seems. George is quite a catch. You cannot fear he is a fortune-hunter. When do you set the date?”

He asked that agreeably enough, and Carolyn glared at him with suspicion. He seemed taller than she remembered, but then, George was nearly her height and she was accustomed to dancing with him. The white flash of Jack’s teeth against his sunburned face irritated her, and she answered with as much aloofness as she could muster, “We have an understanding that suits us both, my lord.”

“An understanding? How formal that sounds. Has he kissed you, Carolyn, or is that not part of the agreement? It would be damned hard to court you for long without stealing a few kisses, particularly for a man of George’s rakish inclinations. How much longer before that understanding leads to something else, Carolyn? I’d like to lay my wagers on the winning side.”

Rage rose in her, a blinding rage that made Carolyn want to scream and shout and kick and cause a scene right here in the middle of this elegant dance floor. Jack had always been able to rouse her ire with a word or a wink, but he had always appeased her quickly afterward. The memory of those tender scenes added fuel to the fires of anger. His insults this time would receive no response from her.

“You have become an insufferable boor, Jack. It is lucky for us that my father intervened in time.”

Carolyn’s haughty disdain made Jack furious, and at the same time, her words pierced him like shards of hell. Five years he had worked and waited, abstaining from society, from the luxuries of civilization, from everything he had ever known, just so he might come back and look her in the eye once more.

He had been prepared to find her happily married with babes around her feet. She deserved that. He would never have wished her unhappy. But he had never imagined her like this, cold and bitter and haughtier than any princess. Something wasn’t right here, and he’d be damned if he would let her slip through his fingers again without knowing why.

He ignored her harsh words. “When George spent hours raving about your pleasantness and agreeableness, I thought he’d got the wrong sister. Agreeableness is not what I remember most about you. I can see you haven’t changed, so who is this Carolyn that George is talking about?”

His spiteful remark deserved no reply, and as the dance ended, Carolyn dropped his hand like a hot coal. She turned stiffly in search of George and grew tense at the sight of Blanche waiting at his side, watching her and Jack. When Jack attempted to take her elbow to lead her back, she shook him off.

“Stay away from Blanche, Jack. I’ll not have you spoiling her life.” She could have added, as you spoiled mine, but she would never admit that out loud.

He sent her a sharp look if he had heard her unspoken words, but she met his gaze stonily. He turned his gaze to her sister waiting beside Hampton and shook his head. “By Jove, it’s hard to believe we were ever that young. Are you certain she ought to be out of the schoolroom?”

Carolyn flashed him a look of irritation. “She’s eighteen.” Just as she had been when she had fallen head over heels for this unscrupulous rake, but again, she left the words unsaid. He knew them as well as she.

Had she turned to see Jack’s face, she would have seen the fleeting look of pain he could not conceal, but she was hurrying ahead of him. He would not allow her to leave the floor unescorted, but followed in her wake.

Once, Carolyn had looked at him with the same wide-eyed dewy look as her sister possessed now. His heart pounded, not for the young girl, but for the memory of the girl he had known. Blanche’s glorious smile was nearly the same as Carolyn’s had been, but the eyes were more cautious. She distrusted him much sooner than the young Carolyn had. Jack wondered what she knew of him, but suspected it was only curiosity that kept her gaze in his direction.

He felt Carolyn’s tension as the introductions were made. Even George looked at her with interest when she made no pleasantries but insisted that she and Blanche must repair to the powder room. The demure woman Jack had observed from across the dance floor earlier had lost her composure, and the war of emotions in Carolyn’s expressive eyes was plain to see for all who looked. Fortunately for her, George was blind to the nuances of female expressions.

Politely, Jack made his excuses and departed before he could drag Carolyn off to a corner and shake her until he received explanations. If he needed time to gather his scattered wits, so must she.

Carolyn watched with a sob in her throat as Lord John’s proud back retreated. How could he be even more incredibly handsome and wicked than she remembered? She had never known him for the devil that he was until that last day, but she had just seen him looking at Blanche in the same way he had once looked at her. He wouldn’t! Heaven help her, but she would kill him with her bare hands if he so much as held Blanche’s little finger. Surely he was not so beastly arrogant as to believe he could win this second round by using her sister?

By the time she arrived home that night, Carolyn’s head pounded with the thunder of her memories and fears. For nearly five years she had maintained her composure, playing the part of doting older sister, loving daughter, and society maiden. For five years she had refused to think of Lord Edward John Chatham.

Just as she had thought herself fully recovered and prepared to consider marriage from a more sensible viewpoint, he’d reappeared like some demon straight from hell. What was wrong with her that he could still make her feel like this after all these years? She hated him. How could he stir her into this writhing agony of need and chaos and uncertainty after all he had done?

It wouldn’t do to ponder the thought too long. Soon, George’s mother would return from the Continent, and they would obtain her approval, and Carolyn would be wedded and safe. With both her father and George to protect her, Blanche would be out of Jack’s reach. There were too many other girls on the market for Jack to try his hand at another Thorogood.

Still, as she drifted off to sleep, Carolyn could not keep from dreaming of warm gray eyes and long legs striding eagerly toward her. So light those eyes had been, almost as if illuminated from within when they gazed on her. She felt them even in her sleep, warming her to the marrow.

When the enormous bouquet of impossible roses arrived early the next day, Carolyn nearly refused to accept them. Jack had been given to extravagance, even when he hadn’t a ha’penny for food. She knew they had to be from him, but telling herself that there was some chance that George might have grown sentimental, she read the card. The words “I need to see you” had scarcely grazed her mind when she heard Jack’s voice in the doorway.

“I told the servant not to announce me. I didn’t want to be turned away again.” His wide shoulders filled the salon doorway. The expensive tailoring of his deep blue frock coat emphasized the breadth of his chest and the slimness of his hips in their tight pantaloons, and Carolyn had to force her gaze to his sun-bronzed features. That was no relief, for the dizzying lightness of his eyes made her throat go dry, and her fingers longed to caress the blond streaks in his burnished curls.

The footman disappeared, leaving Carolyn clinging to the roses. Jack properly left the door open, but they both knew there was no one but the servants to hear them, and they would not interfere. She tried to pry her tongue from the roof of her mouth as she measured the astonishing knowledge that he was here, in her house, in the same room with her after all these years, but she couldn’t shake her disbelief. She felt as if she were still dreaming.

Dressed in a frail muslin of sprigged lavender, her hair tied in loose curls at the crown of her head, she had the grace and the startled velvet eyes of a gazelle. A hint of lavender scented the air around her, speaking of springtime and wildflowers and the beauty of an English rose. Jack could not tear his gaze away, and all his carefully prepared speeches disappeared in a misty haze of yearning. For five years he had dreamed of this. He still could not believe he was so blessed as to find her unmarried. His hands actually shook as he reached to set the roses aside.

“We need to talk, Carolyn. I have so much I want to say to you, I don’t know where to begin. I caught you by surprise last night. I’m sorry. I didn’t mean those things I said. I had been listening to George sing your praises until I wanted to plant him a facer. That’s why we have to talk. I want another chance, Carolyn. Will you listen?”

She flushed hot and cold hearing that deep, seductive voice again, feeling it wash over her with lingering promises of passion. She hated him for doing this to her again. She was old enough to know better. He had no right to come here and disturb her life all over. She wouldn’t let him. She steeled herself against the impassioned plea of his voice, refused to see the pain and hope in his eyes. He deserved to suffer for what he had done. It was her turn to hand out pain.

“Leave, Jack,” she told him coldly, meeting his eyes without flinching. “If I never see you again, it will be too soon. If you ever dare perpetrate this underhanded trick again, I will have the servants bounce you out on your ear. You may take your vulgar flowers with you when you go. Try them on some poor cit who is desperate for a title. Don’t ever try them on me again.”

She swung around and started for the far door. Stunned, Jack could utter no word of protest. In all these years of envisioning this scene, he had never imagined the coldness of her reception. Too many hot summers, he thought wryly as he felt the chill of the unheated room. He heard the door close after her, and still he could not move. He kept waiting for the blessed numbness that came with time, but it eluded him. He shook as if with fever.

He had expected anger at worst. Carolyn could be docile and patient and loving and understanding, but when she felt threatened, she retaliated with a temper that left scars. He could still feel the sting of her words from that night they had parted. They had lingered under his skin like some insidious poison for years. Those torn pieces of heart she had thrown at him had bruised as if they were stone, but her words had caused permanent damage. He had feared she would never forgive or forget, but never had he thought it would be like this.

She had meant it when she said he would never know her heart again. The woman who had just left this room had no heart. That was what he had sensed missing last night. All that loving, trusting innocence he had known had disappeared, bricked up behind a brittle facade of composure and disinterest. The Carolyn he had known had ceased to exist.

Aching as if with cold, Jack turned and retraced his steps to the front door. The roses lay forgotten in the icy salon.

Blanche watched as her older sister paced the library, ostensibly in search of some volume of verse appropriate for the valentine they were making. It had been days since the ball where the man with the broken nose had made his appearance, but Carolyn’s complaint of the headache had kept them confined indoors ever since.

Blanche had little reason to object, since her suitors were overflowing the salons with their flattering lies of missing her, and flowers spilled over the furniture as reminders of their attentions in her absence. The social whirl was amusing, but she had spent most of her life in her father’s country home and knew well how to entertain herself without need of constant attention. Her concern was more for Carolyn.

Blanche had learned nothing about Lord Edward John Chatham from discreet inquiries of her callers, but she had found his abandoned flowers and note in the salon the day after the ball. That Carolyn had refused to appear in public ever since was serious cause for concern. She had never seen Carolyn troubled or discomposed.

The time Alice had fallen from the tree and broken her arm had thrown the entire household in an uproar, but not Carolyn. She had directed servants, comforted Alice, and had everything calm before the physician arrived. Even their mother’s death had not caused this withdrawal from family and friends. Carolyn had grieved terribly, but she had been the mainstay of the family throughout that tragic period. She had not bolted herself behind closed doors and refused to come out.

“Perhaps I shall write a poem of my own,” Blanche suggested to divert her sister’s attention from pacing. “Am I allowed to make personal allusions in poetry?”

Carolyn clamped her fingers into her palms and pulled together her distraught nerves. She was being ridiculous. After what she had said, Jack would never cross their portals again. There really was no cause for concern. Blanche was a sensible girl beneath her frivolous romantic fantasies. She would listen to reason should the opportunity be needed. Mouthing these platitudes to herself, she forced a serene smile.

“What personal allusions can you make when you don’t know to whom the card will go? An ‘Ode to His Shining Eyes’?”

Blanche grinned in appreciation of this sign of Carolyn’s returning humor. “I can refuse to come down until someone meeting the description arrives. It’s only the first man I see that day that counts. I shan’t have to see anyone if I don’t wish.”

“Horrible child, that takes all the fun out of it. What if we had no servants? You would have to answer the door and accept the first man who entered.”

“I should sneak around and see who it was before I answered. If it was someone unacceptable, I should just pretend I was not at home. I’ll not give my favors for a year to a man with no wit to appreciate them.”

“You are spoiled beyond redemption.” Carolyn inspected the lacy creation of ribbons and paper that Blanche had painstakingly put together. “It is quite good without a poem. Do not give them any ideas.” She set the heart down and squared her shoulders. “It is a pleasant day. Would you care to accompany me for a stroll in the park?”

Blanche shuddered at the thought. Carolyn’s idea of pleasant weather was a day without rain. Never mind that icicles still hung from the eaves. And stroll translated as a fast gallop on foot through deserted lanes at a hideously early hour, when there was no one to notice them. It did not strike Blanche as a particularly elegant way to spend the morning.

At Blanche’s blunt refusal, Carolyn shrugged and went in search of her wrap. She had been confined inside for too long. She needed exercise to disperse these nervous fits and restless urges. A bruising horse ride would be more suitable, but that was not permitted in the crowded city parks and streets. A brisk walk would be just as beneficial.

Fetching her resigned maid to accompany her, Carolyn wrapped in a blue velvet pelisse lined with fur and set out.

The last patches of snow were disappearing into the grass, and icicles dripped rivulets from bare tree limbs. Ice patches glinted in the sunlight on the Serpentine, and Carolyn turned her mind to the beauty of the day. It felt good to stretch her muscles and breathe fresh air again. She had been quite childish in hiding from the ghost of her imagination.

A bright red ball bounced across her feet, nearly causing her to trip, but she was adept at eluding childish objects. With four younger siblings underfoot, she had learned to keep a tremendous store of patience. With a smile at this simple pleasure, she turned to find the runaway ball and return it to its owner.

With the object in her gloved hand, she sought the youngster who had thrown it. To the side of the road and down a slight embankment stood a tiny figure garbed head to foot in warm furs and velvet, her pitch-black hair streaming out from a fur cap framing a tawny face. She held back shyly, not willing to come forward to retrieve her toy from a stranger.

“Shall I throw it to you?” Carolyn offered.

When the girl nodded, Carolyn tossed the ball toward her mittened hands. They caught the ball with an adeptness that signaled the child had frequently played this game.

As the little girl smiled and clasped her ball, a dark figure unfolded from its relaxed position against a tree trunk and came forward. “Thank the lady, Amy.”

The voice smote her with the swiftness of a rapier, and Carolyn instinctively stepped backward. “Jack!”

Only then did the top-hatted head lift to peruse her. Gray eyes shuttered, and a leather-clad hand reached for the small shoulder of the child. “Carolyn.” He nodded warily.

An awkward silence fell, of which the child showed no awareness as she held out the ball. “T’ank you, m’lady,” she lisped carefully. “Will you play?”

As shaken by Jack’s presence as by the dilemma of the child’s appearance, Carolyn could make no reply. Dazedly she tried to orient herself, to find some perspective to approach the situation, but she could not. She only waited in bewilderment for Jack to rescue her.

Caught unaware, Jack, too, had difficulty surmounting a meeting that he had never anticipated. He had never intended to keep Amy a secret, but there had been no opportunity to mention her. His fingers squeezed his daughter’s shoulder reassuringly as his tongue summoned some form of polite introduction.

“This is my daughter, Amy. Amy, say hello to Miss Thorogood.”

As the two exchanged shy greetings, Jack regained some of his assurance, and he glanced around. “Are you with someone, Carolyn? Surely you did not come out here alone?”

Briefly puzzled by this return to the mundane, Carolyn glanced around for some sign of her maid. “Florrie was right behind me. I do not know where she has got to.”

Knowing Carolyn’s galloping idea of a walk from old times, Jack shifted his daughter to his shoulder and climbed up the small embankment to the path. “There are still some dangerous patches of ice. We’d better look for her.”

Somehow, it seemed perfectly natural to be walking along at Jack’s side, his shoulder marching at the same height as her eyes, blocking half the view, but without disabling her in the least. She knew his sharp eyes would find Florrie first, and she need only concentrate on watching her step, since his arm was occupied keeping his daughter in place.

His daughter. How peculiar to think of Jack with a daughter. He must have married soon after he left London, to judge by the age of the child. Perhaps he had had someone else with a wealthy dowry waiting behind stage in case his first offer fell through. It pained her still to think these unkind thoughts of Jack, but she had to face reality. She had known he was in debt and would have to leave London. Now he was back and seemingly in funds again. There simply was no other explanation.

“That must be Florrie over there on the bench.” Jack pointed out a woebegone figure in heavy wool and bedraggled bonnet. The maid looked up, but she made no move to rise, and her expression became even more pitiful.

Carolyn broke into a quick stride. “Florrie! What has happened? I only just missed you. Why did you not cry out?”

By the time Jack trotted up, Carolyn was already kneeling in the mud, ruining her pelisse and walking gown as she examined the maid’s outstretched ankle. She glanced up as Jack set his daughter down and crouched beside her.

“She has twisted her ankle pretty severely. It’s beginning to swell. I must get her home.”

“My carriage isn’t far. Will you be all right waiting here? You won’t be too cold?”

His concern did not seem in the least feigned. Perhaps that was why she had believed in him so thoroughly all those years ago. He should have been an actor on the stage.

Carolyn quelled the haughty words. Florrie needed help. She had no right to question from whence it came. “I’ll be fine. Why don’t you leave Amy with us? You could fetch the carriage more quickly that way.”

Jack helped her to rise and glanced from Carolyn to his daughter’s trusting gaze. He had never left Amy with strangers before. He and her ayah and Mrs. Higginbotham were all he had trusted with the child. But this was Carolyn. He nodded in agreement.

“I’ll be back shortly. You’ll take cold if you don’t have a dry gown soon.”

He strode off, leaving Carolyn to stare after him with perplexity. Why should he be worried if she caught cold? She turned her straying thoughts back to her injured maid and the curious child. She had no business trying to read Jack’s mind.

By the time Jack returned with the carriage, Carolyn and Amy were laughing, and even the maid smiled at their antics. In her love for pretty and exotic objects, Amy had apparently charmed Carolyn out of the long, arched feather that had adorned her bonnet, and it now stuck absurdly from Amy’s furred cap. They both looked like naughty children when Jack jumped down, and he couldn’t help but laugh at their expressions.

“Had I dallied any longer, she would be parading around in your slippers with your pelisse flung over her shoulders and dragging in the mud behind her.” He pretended to pinch Amy’s nose, and the child laughed with the trill of a little bird. “She is dreadfully spoiled. Now, thank Miss Thorogood for playing with you and let me help Miss Florrie into the carriage, there’s a good girl.”

The pride and love on his face were plain to see and could scarcely be part of his theatrics. Carolyn felt a tug inside that she dared not recognize, and she turned away from Jack’s uneven features to help Florrie to her feet.

Had it not been for Carolyn’s father, that little girl could have been her own, and Jack would be looking at their child like that. It would not do to think along such lines. It was over and done and best forgotten.

Jack held Carolyn’s hand no longer than it took to help her into the carriage. He kept the conversation general as they drove the short distance to the Thorogood residence. Never once did he give any indication of the severed relationship between them. Carolyn was grateful for his discretion but left uneasy by it. He behaved the perfect gentleman. Could his disguise be so thorough?

He handed Florrie over into the care of one of the footmen who ran down the stairs to open the carriage door. He bowed over Carolyn’s hand in parting, and he made no attempt to cross the portal from whence he had been barred. Carolyn stared after his departing carriage in something akin to shock. She had spent these last days thinking of him in terms of a devil in tailcoats. She could not twist her thoughts to consider him as a knight-errant.

The next day, however, she gladly accepted the call of a Mrs. Higginbotham and one miss Amy Chatham.

The child was garbed in layers of velvet and fur, as she had been the day before. Her hair had been pulled back in a coronet of braids and her hat no longer bore the swooping feather that had adorned it on parting yesterday. Mrs. Higginbotham held her hand as she grimly plowed into the salon. Carolyn held her breath, fearing the powerfully built matron might sit on the tiny child when they both attempted to occupy the same love seat.

“Good morning, Amy. Did you find a better hat to fit your feather on?” Carolyn offered the shy child a smile.

“That is the reason we are here, Miss Thorogood.” The jarring accents boomed from the matron’s massive chest, vibrating several figurines on the table. Carolyn tilted her head in curiosity to better observe this natural phenomenon.

Satisfied she had her hostess’s attention, the woman continued, “His lordship insisted that his daughter thank you for the gift of the feather. She is much inclined to take things she admires, and he hopes she has offered no harm to your apparel.”

Carolyn heard this with mild astonishment. Too well-bred to show her amusement at the woman’s artificial attempts at elegance, she nodded and turned her attention to the child. “I thought the feather much more becoming on you than on me, Miss Amy. I used to have a doll that liked to wear hats. Do you have one like that?”

Dark eyes lit with delight, and she nodded with a shy smile. Before she could say a word, her companion intruded. “The child has far too many dolls, in my opinion. Her father spoils her, and she does not know her place. I’ve not had much time to take the matter in hand, but I assure you, it will be accomplished in time.”

The woman’s encroaching self-importance was a source of amazement, but Carolyn had met her sort before. It was interesting how people with no claim to name or fortune could adopt an immense snobbery when they came in contact with people who possessed accomplishments. Perhaps it was a means of hiding a feeling of inferiority, but in this case, the child was suffering for it. Carolyn permitted herself a small frown.

“Miss Chatham seems singularly well-behaved to me, Mrs. Higginbotham. I have four younger sisters, and not one of them ever behaved so properly on a formal call at her age.” With this mild reproof, she returned her attention to the child, who had withdrawn her smile at the sounds of discord. “I would be pleased to have you to tea one day, Miss Chatham. My younger sisters are in the country, and I miss them. I should enjoy having your company. Would you like that?”

Again the dancing lights returned to the little girl’s huge dark eyes, and a smile illuminated her brown face. Before she could utter a word, Mrs. Higginbotham rose in a grand flutter of shawls and lace.

“You are too kind, Miss Thorogood, but I cannot let such a one be foisted off on respectable company. I came only at her father’s insistence. We would not think of intruding again. Good day to you.” She sailed from the room with Amy in tow.

Visibly annoyed now, Carolyn held her temper in check until her guests had departed, then contemplated sitting down and sending Jack a scathing note on the unsuitability of his choice of governess, if governess she were. By the time she reached her desk, however, common sense prevailed, and she set the pen aside. She had given up any right of interference in Jack’s life the day she had thrown him out of the house. He would only ridicule any message from her.

The memory of her anger at the encroaching Mrs. Higginbotham and her concern for the timid child returned when next Carolyn next saw Jack. It was inevitable that she see him again. She could ban him from her own home, but not from every house in London. A seemingly wealthy, eligible bachelor was welcome anywhere he went. That he would attend many of the same events as she was a foregone conclusion.

She looked absurdly sophisticated, Jack observed as Carolyn drifted across the music room, exchanging pleasantries with half the ton in her path. He could remember when she was just a charming girl with a delightful smile to single her out from the legions of young lovelies. It was hard to acquaint that young girl with this elegant young woman with her head held high and a polished smile affixed to her face, but he had seen glimpses of the girl the other day in the park. He pondered that anomaly as he realized he was actually Carolyn’s goal in crossing the room.

“It’s good to see you again, Miss Thorogood,” he intoned as he bowed over her hand.

Concentrating on her purpose, Carolyn tried not to notice that Jack looked at home in any environment. Gold and jewels glittered at throats and wrists all around them. Diamond stickpins, gold watch fobs, and pearl shirt studs adorned the formal attire of all the gentlemen. In simple black with nothing more glittering than his pristine cravat and intelligent eyes, Jack still appeared the part of arrogant nobility.

“I’d like a word with you about your daughter, my lord,” she said boldly. When his dark brow rose a fraction, she refused to retreat. “I know it is not my place to interfere, but you must admit that I have some experience with young girls, and you do not.”

He nodded in acknowledgment of that. In truth, he could do little more. The faint scent of lavender and wildflowers enveloped him, forcing him to concentrate on keeping his hands at his sides and his eyes on her face, when it seemed much more natural to sweep her into his arms. Even focusing on her face wasn’t helpful. He had reason to remember the passion and promise of those rose-pink lips. Unlike calculating young maidens, once Carolyn had given her heart, she was lavish with her affection despite the fact that there was no formal engagement. She had trusted him.

When Jack made no further effort to encourage or reject her observations, Carolyn cautiously phrased her complaint. “This Mrs. Higginbotham seems somewhat overbearing for a child as timid as Amy. In fact, I wouldn’t be surprised if Mrs. Higginbotham isn’t the cause of her timidity.”

That elevated his attention to a more respectable level. Jack straightened from his casual position against the newel post to take Carolyn’s arm and lead her toward a quiet alcove. When he had settled her on a backless velvet-upholstered settee, he frowned down at her.

“I could not bring Amy’s ayah out of India. Mrs. Higginbotham had only just lost her husband, and she offered to accompany me and care for Amy on the journey home. She has been indispensable. What rackety notions have you got in your head now about that proper lady?”

His harsh words brought an equally caustic reply. “She is no lady. She’s an encroaching mushroom intent on crushing your daughter into a nonentity for some obscure reason. I cannot know anything about your household, but Mrs. Higginbotham seems prepared to rule it. She as much as said that you spoil Amy and she will not allow it to continue.”

To Carolyn’s surprise, Jack’s expression grew weary and unhappy instead of angry at this declaration. Rocking back on his heels, he stared at the garish painting over her head before replying. Aware that a room full of people could watch their every action, he kept his words curt.

“Amy is not legally my daughter. I daresay Mrs. Higginbotham has taken it upon herself to protect society from such scandal. I will have to speak with her.” He held out his hand and gestured to the room behind them. “I can feel your father’s eyes burning a hole in my back. Perhaps we should join the others?”

Carolyn reluctantly placed her gloved hand in his and stood beside him. He smelled faintly of sandalwood and some musky scent that was all his own, and again that feeling of comforting familiarity at his size and strength swept over her. Other men tended to make her nervous and uncomfortable when they stood this close. Not Jack. Never Jack. He fitted beside her as neatly as her glove fitted her hand. It was a most depressing thought.

“I did not mean to cause anyone trouble,” she murmured as they stood there, unwilling to return to the milling crowd. “But Amy seemed to be such a sweet, eager child. When we are in town, I miss young Penny. I thought it would be fun for Amy as well as Blanche and me if she came to visit. Mrs. Higginbotham informed me in no uncertain terms that that wouldn’t be permitted. If those were your orders, I shall understand, but Amy seemed disappointed and intimidated.”

Jack sighed and squeezed her hand before he realized he should no longer be holding it. He released her but made no effort to lead her back to her father. “Perhaps Mrs. Higginbotham is right. I cannot believe your family would approve of your associating with a half-Indian child from the wrong side of the blanket. It isn’t done. I’ll have to move her to Dorset, but she has been so frightened by all these changes in her world, I couldn’t bear to send her away just yet.”

Heat flared in Carolyn’s cheeks as she realized the intimate admission Jack had just made. No gentleman ought to admit to illegitimate children or mistresses before a lady. Carolyn would have been shocked if any other man had said it. The shock she felt now had little to do with his scandalous admission and more to do with imagining Jack going from her arms to some stranger’s. She couldn’t find her tongue to reply, and he glanced down at her with curiosity.

“Have I offended you? I thought you were already so furious with me that nothing further I did could offend you more. I apologize if I spoke out of turn.”

Carolyn forced her tumultuous emotions into control and offered a brittle smile. “I’m not offended. Perhaps my pride is. You did not lose much time finding a mistress, if I’m any judge of a child’s age. I shouldn’t be so surprised, but even after all these years of knowing what you are, I find I am. But I do not blame the child for the father’s faults, and neither will my family. She is welcome in our home at any time.”

The smallest inkling of hope gnawed at his insides as Jack gazed into Carolyn’s flushed and averted face. She spoke with more sophistication than the young girl he had once known, but the raw emotions couldn’t be entirely concealed by her poise. The frozen tundra he had met with earlier wasn’t quite so thick as he had believed. Amy had warmed a hole through it in a single meeting. What would it take to melt the whole and discover the truth beneath?

If he wanted truth, he had to offer honesty. This wasn’t the place or time, but he might have no other. Touching her elbow, Jack guided her toward the refreshment table. He kept his voice low, bending his head closer to her ear. For all anyone knew, he could be speaking sweet flattery.

“Carolyn, I have never been more than a man, never claimed to be. Perhaps I cannot fit the perfect ideal you have made of your father, but he has only somehow been more discreet than I am. Until you give me permission to speak as a lover, I cannot defend myself further. Should that time ever come, I will tell you all you wish to know of Amy. In the meantime, I can only thank you for your concern for her welfare. I am glaringly aware of my faults, and I doubt that forgiveness is possible, but I would cry friends, if only for Amy’s sake.”

She had forgotten how Jack could erase all transgressions with his smooth words. In the same few sentences he could raise her ire and soothe her ruffled feathers. He was quite right, actually. He should not be talking to her of Amy’s origins, but to suggest there might be a future time when he had that right was above and beyond all else. She ought to slap him right here in view of everyone, but his mention of Amy’s need for friends diverted her anger. Obviously, if he loved no one else, he loved his child.

There was no triumph in Jack’s eyes. They glowed with a strange intensity as he awaited her reply. His anxiety seemed only for Amy.

She nodded. “If you can tame the dragon lady, I would have Amy come for tea. I know she is much too young, but little girls like to play at being grown-up. She will learn to get on in society that way.”

Jack caught her elbow to swing her around to face him. “I thank you, Carolyn, but she is not likely to be part of society. Surely you must see that.”

She met his eyes coolly. “If you legally adopted her, she would be accepted, but that is your decision. All I can do is entertain her for a few hours a day.”

Jack stared into Carolyn’s porcelain face, willing himself to see there what he wanted to see. Amy needed a mother. How many women would accept him knowing they would have to accept his bastard daughter, too? He had thought briefly of finding Amy a loving family willing to raise her as their own, but he had not been able to bring himself to look for one. Now here was Carolyn telling him to adopt her. Surely she knew that would be condemning him to a life without a wife, Amy to living without a mother?

He made a slight bow of acceptance. “Send around a note as to a convenient time for you. I will make certain that she is there.”

Amy arrived at the time designated, the feather perched archly over her tiny nose from a bonnet otherwise decorated in roses. Her guardian dragon sniffed as Carolyn greeted the child.

“His lordship said I might leave her here while I do some shopping.” The disapproval on her face was more than apparent.

Carolyn dismissed her without a glance. “She will do quite nicely with us. Thank you, Mrs. Higginbotham.”

Without a backward look, she led Amy to the library, where Blanche waited.

At the sight of Jack’s small daughter, Blanche exclaimed in surprise, threw Carolyn a swift look, then knelt to remove Amy’s bonnet and cloak. The little girl gazed at Blanche’s blond curls with awe and obediently stood still under her ministrations.

“It is a pity our Penny is not here to play with you. I’m certain you would get on tremendously.” As protective as Carolyn of her younger sisters, Blanche easily accepted this new arrival. Carolyn had only mentioned that the child seemed timid and perhaps a little frightened by her new surroundings.

Once freed of her outer garments, Amy wandered to the table where Blanche had been working. Scattered bits of paper and pens and scissors covered the leather working surface, and her gaze fastened on the elaborate valentine. “What’s that?”

Carolyn laughed. Jack had mentioned that the girl had a penchant for lovely and exotic objects. To a child’s eyes, that lacy red-and-white confection would seem quite exotic. She helped Amy into a chair at the table. “That’s a valentine. It’s a gift to someone you love on St. Valentine’s Day. Would you like to make one?”

To Blanche’s amusement, her prim-and-proper older sister sat down at the library table and proceeded to instruct a four-year-old in the intricacies of valentine making. She had not seen Carolyn so animated in years. Whatever was going on here, it was good for her.

Blanche rang for tea to be brought in the library. If she remembered correctly, four-year-olds preferred sweets with their instructions.

Over the next week, Amy came to visit several times. Sometimes they persuaded her to listen to a story or go for a carriage ride in the park, but mostly her fascination led to the glorious array of ribbons and pretty papers scattered across the library table.

Dissatisfied with her first attempts, Blanche continued to make more and more elaborate creations, and Amy’s awe at their extravagance did not cease. Under Carolyn’s tutelage, she painstakingly constructed one of her own. In showing the child what to do, Carolyn created a card for the first time since she was a child of Blanche’s age.

Jack sometimes accompanied his daughter to the door, but in recognition of Carolyn’s earlier threats, he declined to enter. Carolyn stubbornly refused any invitation, although when they met at social affairs, she spoke with him of his daughter’s progress. Since often this was in the company of Lord Hampton, Jack could not put a favorable construction on their new relationship.

She kept him firmly in his place, but Jack could not resign himself to believing he had arrived to find her still unattached, only to watch her marry another. He consoled himself into thinking it was only a matter of biding his time.

Time ran out one frosty February day. The unsettling news that George’s mother was on her way home from the Continent was superseded by a more immediate calamity. Jack came home to a household in an uproar and two physicians in the nursery. In near-hysterics, Mrs. Higginbotham cowered in a corner, exhorting the physicians alternately to take care and to do something.

In a trice, Jack pushed between the maids and doctors to find his daughter lying limp and pale against the sheets. Hiding his terror, he knelt beside her bed and touched his hand to her smooth forehead. It burned with fever.

With a stricken look, he turned to the elder of the two physicians hovering in the background. Jack could not speak, but the medical man replied to his expression without need of questions.

“The child was overexposed to the cold, and I suspect she has eaten something while outside that does not agree with her system. She has been vomiting steadily until now.”

A murderous anger began to build as Jack turned his gaze to Mrs. Higginbotham and the two nursemaids he employed to look after one small child. The nursemaids chattered in tandem, making it impossible to decipher a word. He focused his ire on the massive woman cowering in the comer.

Realizing it was a matter of self-preservation, Mrs. Higginbotham drew herself up to her full height and presented the woeful tale in the best light she could.

“She took my sewing scissors and cut up the frontispiece of one of your books in the library, mangled it dreadfully, she did. I caught her when she was cutting the lace off one of her gowns. She’s badly spoiled, m’lord, if you’ll forgive my saying so. I thought to teach her a lesson, so I sent her to an empty garret to reflect on her bad behavior. She weren’t there no more than an hour or so.”

Her composure was slipping badly, and with it, the artificial elegance of her speech. Jack continued to stare at her grimly, determined to have the whole tale before he ripped the nursery and everyone in it to tiny pieces.

At his silence, the woman took a deep breath and continued, “When Maisie went up to fetch her for her tea, she wasn’t there. We looked everywhere, we did. There’s not a bit of furniture in that room. She couldn’t of hid. She just up and disappeared.”

Since the garret she referred to was icy cold and accessible only by the back stairs, Jack found nothing mysterious in this. He was not blind to Amy’s less than-obedient nature. She wouldn’t have stayed in that dull, cold room for long, and he doubted that there was a key to be found to fit the lock. Given the opportunity, she would have slipped back down the stairs. Where she had gone from there was anybody’s guess.

“Where did you find her?” he demanded curtly when it became apparent the woman would not willingly volunteer any more information.

“Begging your pardon, m’lord,” one of the maids interrupted when Mrs. Higginbotham seemed unable to reply. “Timmy followed her footsteps in the snow. They got kind of confused in the park, he said, and he came back to get some others to help him. They said they found her by the far gate. She didn’t have no coat nor nothin’ on just her wet dress,” she amended at the furious blaze in Jack’s eyes.

The fury was as much for himself as for the servants. He had brought the child to a strange climate to which her small body wasn’t adapted and that she had not learned to fear. He had left his only daughter in the care of thoughtless servants and a woman he had been warned did not approve of or even like her. He had selfishly not made any attempt to find Amy a better situation, not wanting to admit that he couldn’t take care of her, not wanting to be parted from the one creature on God’s earth who loved him for himself. And this was what he had brought to her.

With a strangled cry, Jack gathered Amy into his arms and ordered everyone else out. She would be well again, if he had to pour his own life’s blood into her.

When Amy didn’t appear at her appointed time the next day, Carolyn was curious and disappointed. She had grown fond of the child and enjoyed watching her blossoming with care and attention. Oddly enough, the news that George’s mother would arrive in London next week did not excite her so much as watching Amy master the scissors and paper to cut an almost perfect heart. Reporting this progress to Jack seemed more consequential than speculating as to whether the dowager marchioness would consider an insignificant but wealthy chit as wife material for her son.

Unable to curb her curiosity and concern, Carolyn sent a maid around to inquire as to the reason for Amy’s absence. When the maid returned with the news, Carolyn picked up her skirts and headed for the stairs.

“Send word to Nanny that I have need of her fever medicine, the recipe for the cold posset, some of those dried herbs we picked last summer for steaming, and perhaps the purgatives. Just tell her what you have told me. She will know what to do.” The instructions streamed behind her as she hurried down the stairs.

Carolyn had nursed her four sisters through all manner of childhood illnesses. She knew what Amy needed. Since Blanche was from home at the moment and her maid had to get word to Nanny at their country estate, it seemed expedient to go alone. The only consequence she had in mind was seeing Amy back to health—until she found herself in front of the door to the town house Jack had taken for the Season.

Carolyn experienced a momentary qualm, but when the door opened to reveal a frightened Mrs. Higginbotham standing in the hallway beyond the doorman, her resolution firmed. She announced herself and stepped across the portal without giving the servant time to refuse her entrance.

“Where is Amy?” she demanded of the startled matron. The woman in all rights belonged in the nursery with her charge. Such scandalous breach of duty ought to be reprimanded. Jack certainly ran a loose household.

“She is ill in bed.” Mrs. Higginbotham drew herself up defensively.

“I wish to see her.” Ignoring the challenge in the woman’s eyes, Carolyn started for the stairs. The nursery would have to be upstairs. She would find it for herself if necessary.

“You can’t go up there!” Scandalized, Mrs. Higginbotham lurched after her.

Carolyn blithely sailed upward. “Just tell me which room. I’ll find my way. You needn’t concern yourself further.”

“You can’t go in there!” the woman repeated with slight variation. “His lordship’s in there!”

It had truly never occurred to her that Jack would be in the nursery with his ill child. Her own father had probably never seen inside the nursery doors, but he’d had a wife and daughters to see to the care of his younger children. There hadn’t been any necessity for involving himself personally in childhood illnesses. Still, the thought of Jack sitting at his daughter’s bedside sent Carolyn’s heart pounding, and she hesitated.

A door at the end of the hall opened and a nursemaid emerged carrying soiled linen. Without another thought, Carolyn hurried in that direction. Mrs. Higginbotham beat a hasty retreat.

Carolyn halted in the doorway to get her bearings. The room was lavishly decorated in flowered wallpaper and sprigged-muslin curtains and a narrow canopy bed in blue velvet. Toys stood on shelves everywhere, and an alcove to the side was obviously intended for the maid’s cot. It looked undisturbed at the moment. The only signs of life were near the bed.

Her gaze fell on Jack’s haggard face. He had drawn a rocking chair from the fireplace to the bedside and rested with eyes closed and his head against the high back. Lines of weariness etched his handsome face, and his rumpled clothes bore the certain signs of having been slept in. He retained none of the self-assured, polished demeanor with which he met the world. His dark curls stood on end as if he had been raking his fingers through them. His immaculate cravat had been pulled loose and flung aside, and a day’s growth of beard bristled along his darkened cheeks. Carolyn bit her lip against a sudden surge of longing and turned her gaze to the bed.

She caught her breath at sight of the pale, motionless figure beneath the covers. Amy looked so tiny and defenseless, and only the spots of fevered color on her round cheeks gave any indication of life.

Her gasp brought Jack’s eyes open, and he stared in disbelief at Carolyn’s elegant figure posed in the doorway. She had not disposed of her pelisse or muff, and her cheeks still bore the fresh color of the cold outside. He fixed his gaze on her terrified eyes, and denying the relief flooding through him, said, “Carolyn, you have no business here. You must leave, at once.”

She ignored his words. Unfastening the frog at her throat, she laid her pelisse and muff on a nearby chair. It was easier if she kept her gaze on the child and not the haunted man rising from the chair. “You need some rest. Find something to eat and lie down for a while. I’ll sit with her.”

Jack clasped her arms before she could go closer. “For God’s sake, Carolyn, go home before someone finds you here.”

Heat swept through her from the love and anguish she found in his eyes. She had never experienced anything quite like this before, and she resisted the desire to fall into Jack’s arms and hang on for dear life. She was disappearing into his eyes, and the feeling terrified and thrilled her. Nervously she looked away again, and recovered her strength as she remembered her purpose.

“I’ve sent to Nanny for her basket of nostrums. They seem to be more effective than most of the medicines the physicians use. We’ve certainly tested their efficacy often enough. Go rest, Jack. I’ll come to no harm sitting here. And I do have considerable experience at nursing children.”

Jack clung to her arms, staring down at her bare head with despair and hope. She had no right to be here, but he needed her desperately. Just her presence had brought a return of hope. He felt the strength of her resolve, knew the magnitude of the character behind it, and knew beyond any doubt that if anyone could nurse Amy to life, it would be this woman. But in allowing her to do so, he would almost certainly be destroying her life. Unless . . . .

He let the possibility of that one exception wash through him like a soothing balm. If she still cared, if she could possibly choose. . . He daren’t let his thoughts wander to the borders of the impossible. He hadn’t had any sleep in thirty-six hours. He was merely dreaming with his eyes open.

“I’ll have Mrs. Higginbotham come up. Then I’ll send for your carriage. You can’t stay.”

Carolyn gave him a brisk look, pulled from his grasp, and removed her gloves, all traces of wavering gone. “You would do better to send that woman packing. If it eases your conscience, send one of the nursemaids up. We’ll need a constant supply of fresh water. Has the cold settled in her lungs?”

Jack was too weary to fight both Carolyn and himself. He felt singularly helpless staring at the lifeless features of his daughter night and day. He had no notion of how to go on. Carolyn did. He grasped the offer.

Within minutes he had explained what happened, what the physicians recommended, and the results, or lack of them. Carolyn sat beside the bed as he spoke, touching her fingers to heated cheeks, avoiding looking too closely at the man behind her. He had been right when he had said he was just a man. Seeing him like this brought all her foolish fancies home. He was suffering in a way she had never experienced. The lordly rake she had condemned, the gentle lover she had worshiped—both were only small facets of his character. Men weren’t so simply defined with a word or two. She had a lot yet to learn. Perhaps her father had protected her too well.

She felt him hovering behind her, fearful of what would happen should he leave his daughter unguarded for even a moment. She touched a hand to his sleeve, daring to meet his eyes just this once. “Go, Jack. You have done everything humanly possible. The matter is in God’s hands now.”

He needed to be reminded of that. Nodding, he pressed her fingers. Not daring to say more, he left in search of a maid.

Telling himself he would nap only a few hours, Jack collapsed, still dressed, on a guest bed near the nursery. When he had fully recovered his faculties, he would decide what to do with the obstinate Miss Thorogood. She would certainly be missed by dinner. He had no illusions that she had told anyone where she was going, or she would have been prevented. Somehow, he would have to find a way to spirit her back into the safety of her own home. When he woke.

It was nearly midnight before he opened his eyes again. It took a minute to recollect why he slept in a strange bed with all his clothes on. He hadn’t been that drunk in years. When the memory came, it was with a rush of pain and fear, and he hastily swung his legs to the floor.

Amy’s room was lit by a branch of candles. In their flickering light he watched Carolyn wring out a cloth in a washbowl and gently place it over his daughter’s forehead. A worried frown lined Carolyn’s brow as she worked, and he could see that she was biting her lip. In fear, he turned to observe Amy.

His daughter was tossing restlessly. As he approached her bed, he could see the fine sheen of perspiration on her small face. Even as he watched, he heard her low moan, and the bottom seemed to fall out of his stomach.

“What is wrong? What can I do?” he whispered hoarsely.

Carolyn glanced up at him in relief. “Her fever is rising. We must keep it down. Call some of the servants and have them bring up snow to add to the washbasin.”

Jack looked at the empty cot where the maid should be and shook his head in disbelief. Where in hell were his servants? Furiously he went in search of a maid. His daughter could be dying, and they all lay cozy in their beds. He would fire the lot of them on the morrow.

He forgot his temper a little while later as he cuddled his unconscious daughter on his lap while Carolyn applied the cold compresses to her brow. Amy seemed to lie quieter in his arms, and he felt better holding her close. She was so damned small and helpless. She needed him to protect her, and he hadn’t done a very good job of it. Perhaps this was God’s way of telling him he didn’t deserve love. He’d certainly failed the child’s mother. And Carolyn. He looked up to watch the grim lines of worry on her lovely face.

“I meant to send you home hours ago,” he murmured more to himself than to her.

“I wouldn’t have gone.” Carolyn packed the latest bowl of snow into a cloth. “You needed sleep, and Mrs. Higginbotham is useless. I’m afraid I yelled at her.”

The idea of yelling at that redoubtable matron had never occurred to Jack. He lifted a surprised brow at this delicate lady beside the bed, gently applying compresses, and wondered what other secrets she hid. How much did he really know of her, after all?

“Did you yell at the maids too? I thought I specifically assigned them to helping you while I slept.”

“They’re sweet, but they haven’t a brain between them. Mrs. Higginbotham dismissed the one who spoke up earlier, and she told the other to go on to bed. Then she went off to bed herself.” Carolyn offered a small grin. “I gave her her marching orders, but she didn’t seem to think they were final.”

“Did you, now?” Jack leaned back against the wooden headboard and made Amy more comfortable in his arms. Carolyn’s proximity and the faint scent of wildflowers soothed him. Under other circumstances, they would have aroused him, but not when his daughter lay ill in his arms. He just needed Carolyn’s reassuring presence to let him know all would be well. “You’re developing quite a nasty temper, my love.”

Carolyn didn’t give him a second glance at this endearment. She’d heard his honeyed words before. She had yet to see proof of them. “I’ve always had a nasty temper. You just never came across it before.”

“I think I’ve encountered it once or twice of late, and I remember a particularly brilliant tantrum that haunted my worst nightmares for years. Had you shown Mrs. Higginbotham that fury, she would be out of the house by now.”

That caused Carolyn to meet his gaze. In this light, she could discern little of Jack’s expression, but what she saw made her vaguely uneasy. His light words had a peculiar intensity. Ignoring his reference to another time, she stuck to a safer subject. “I’m sorry I did not let my tongue fly, then. She is your servant, so I held back.”

Amy stirred in his arms, and Jack returned his gaze there, brushing a strand of ebony hair from her dark complexion. “Mrs. Higginbotham will have to go. I just didn’t know how to go about interviewing governesses or nannies. I don’t know very much about children, I suppose.”

Carolyn sat in the rocker and replied softly, “You know how to love them. That is what counts most.”

At the gentleness of her voice, Jack relaxed, and closing his eyes, leaned back against the bed. “I don’t know what I would have done these last years without her. She is the only softness, gentleness, that I know. I hold her, and she smiles at me with all the love and trust in the world. I needed her faith to keep from losing mine.”

Tears came to her eyes, and Carolyn had to look away from the man on the bed. He was so large sprawled across the child’s narrow mattress, but he looked perfectly natural. She wondered how many nights he had sat just like that, rocking his infant daughter to sleep. “Her mother?” she heard herself asking.

Jack didn’t look up. His mouth tightened into an ironic curve. “If you wish more evidence to cast me aside, that tale ought to do it.” When she made no reply, he shrugged and continued. “The poverty in India is excruciating. Many times worse than you see on a London street. Servants can be had for the offer of a roof over their heads and food in their bellies. I was saving every brass farthing I could put a hand to, so I led a very simple life, two rooms and one old ayah to look after me.”

He felt Carolyn rise to change the soaking compress, but he didn’t open his eyes. He would have this story told and done with. There would be no more illusions between them. “With nothing better to do in the evenings, I was drinking heavily. I won’t go into details of what life is like down there, but drink kills a lot of us. I suppose my ayah feared losing her lucrative position, or perhaps she sought a second income or a measure of comfort for another. Whatever her inscrutable reasoning, she brought a young girl to me one night when I was half out of my mind.”

Jack opened his eyes to watch Carolyn’s expression at this revelation. He was going far beyond the bounds of propriety to speak these things, but he wanted Carolyn to know all that he was. He had fooled her when she was younger, filling her head with romantic fantasies while concealing the harsher side of his life. It had been an act of desperation at the time, just as the truth was now. Perhaps he was older but no wiser. Carolyn’s expression told him nothing, and he took that as permission to go on, though he felt as if he were cutting his own throat once again.

“She became my mistress. There is no polite way to state it. I had no intention of marrying her. She filled a place in my life that was empty, but we scarcely spoke the same language. She was young and ignorant and became pregnant immediately. It made her happy, so I suppose that was what she wanted. She knew it would give her a position of comfort for the rest of her life in my household. That’s the way things are done down there.”

Carolyn made a small noise that sounded almost like a sob, but he couldn’t stop now. It all had to be said. “She died shortly after giving birth to Amy. It was only then that I learned my mistress was also my ayah’s daughter.”

A soft exclamation indicated Carolyn heard and understood, but she made no other reply to this tale of Amy’s origins. It was a tawdry tale, at best. He could have done as so many others had and left the child behind, but just as he had been unable to send the old woman and babe away at birth, he could not do it four years later. With a sigh, Jack snuggled his daughter closer, clinging to her warmth.

“You took the child from her grandmother?” she asked, still looking for a reason to condemn him.

He shook his head. “She was stabbed in the marketplace one day. Amy has no one but me.”

Carolyn shuddered at the horror of such a life. “I’m glad you told me,” she offered once she recovered her composure. She hoped he couldn’t see the tracks of her tears. The thought of his loneliness in that horrible place of exile and the mother willing to sacrifice her child to a life of infamy rather than allow her to starve tore at her heart. She was glad he had saved Amy from such a life. “Will you adopt her?”

Jack looked up and caught her eye. “I think that depends on several things,” he answered slowly. The telltale blush did not rise to her cheeks, and he saw only curiosity in her eyes. His hopes plummeted, but he clung fiercely to their remains. “Yes, I will probably adopt her.”

Carolyn did not understand the sharpness of his words, but she was not given time to consider it. Amy began to shake and moan, and perspiration poured freely from every pore, drenching her night shift. There wasn’t time to do anything but act.

Afraid to expose her to the chilly night air, they wrapped her in blankets until she lay still once more. Then, removing wet garments and finding dry ones, they returned to the previous routine of applying compresses. Within the half-hour she was shaking again. Steadily they worked throughout the night.

Shortly after dawn the kitchen sent up tea and toast, and Jack sent for the nursery maid and Mrs. Higginbotham. The maid arrived and applied herself to changing the linen, giving the master and the lady surreptitious looks in the process. Both looked haggard but vaguely triumphant. The little girl seemed to be breathing easier.

Mrs. Higginbotham didn’t arrive until an hour later. She gave Carolyn a smirk and turned her full attention on Jack. His rumpled clothes of two days before set her aback, but the snarl on his face made her quail. She turned to the offensive. “I beg your pardon, my lord, but I was told in no uncertain terms that my services weren’t required. I will be more than happy to sit with the child while you get your rest. You shouldn’t have the burden of nursing an ill child. I’m certain you have much more important things to do. Shall I ring for your bath to be sent up?”

Jack’s lips tightened, but he held his temper with remarkable aplomb. Carolyn admired his performance. She would have scratched the woman’s eyes out. More important things to do, indeed!

“We’ll no longer be requiring your services, Mrs. Higginbotham. I will speak with my secretary when he arrives, and he will advance you six months’ salary. I would like you to remove from the household before day’s end.”

The woman stared at him in astonishment. “On what grounds, my lord? Have I not cared for the wee one like one of my own, dressing her in all that is fine and seeing that she is properly instructed in conduct? I cannot be blamed that her kind cannot learn simple obedience. I have done my utmost to teach her.”

Jack rose to his full threatening height and the woman stepped backward. “Out, Mrs. Higginbotham, before I lose my patience. I recommend that you do not seek any other position requiring understanding or compassion, for you have none. Leave us, at once!”

He practically roared this last, and the woman gave a squeak of alarm and rushed to the door, throwing Carolyn a malevolent look in parting.

Jack collapsed into himself, but a sound from the bed returned his attention there. Amy sneezed, then opened her eyes. “Papa?” she inquired weakly as he scooped her into his arms.

Jack’s shining eyes and radiant smile returned tears to Carolyn’s eyes. Touching her hand to the child’s cheek and ascertaining that it was considerably cooler than before, she felt relief flood through her and felt the same in him. They needed no words of understanding.

“Nanny’s basket will have arrived by now,” she murmured. “I will go home and fetch it.”

Jack’s smile faded. “Not yet, Carolyn. Wait until I can come with you. I would not have you face the consequences alone.”

She had not given much thought to consequences. She had possessed the freedom to come and go at will for some years now. Her father trusted her to do the proper thing. In all probability, he did not even know she wasn’t at home. She offered Jack an uneasy smile. “That isn’t necessary. My maid is the only one who knows, and she won’t talk. You needn’t worry.”

Amy’s fit of sneezing, followed by her hungry complaints, distracted them both. Jack became frantic when she cried and spit up her toast. Carolyn soothed him and the child, offering apple juice and tea laced with honey and slicing the toast up into soft, buttery strips dotted with cinnamon. Between Jack shouting orders at an army of servants racing up and down the stairs and Carolyn patiently doctoring the food to suit an invalid, they succeeded in getting the first decent meal into Amy that she’d had in days.

Their triumph did not last long. Just as they got Amy into another clean gown and asleep, a roar in the lower hall warned that still another hurdle awaited. They exchanged glances at the familiar fury. Carolyn’s father had discovered her whereabouts.

She paled at the unexpectedness of this visitation, but held her head high as angry strides approached. Not daring to compromise her further, Jack kept a respectful distance as the door burst open.

Henry Thorogood took in his daughter’s wrinkled walking gown and weary expression, Jack’s rumpled clothes and defiantly protective air, and the tiny child lying curled beneath the covers. The vulgar message that had brought him flying here had no basis in fact; he knew his daughter too well to see anything else in this scene but what it was. He concealed his relief and turned his furious gaze on the young man who had so successfully turned his comfortable world inside-out.

“I will see you in my study in one hour, Chatham. Come, Carolyn, we will go home.”

Carolyn looked from one man to the other. Had they been tomcats, they would have their backs arched, their hair on end, and they would be spitting. That was an odd way to picture Jack, and she threw him a second look. His fingers were curled around the chair back while he engaged her father in a duel of glares. The tension mounting between them was too electric to bear. Silently she picked up the pelisse and muff she had thrown over the chair the day before and walked out of the room.

Angry shouts echoed up and down the hallways, vibrating through the normally sedate Thorogood household. Blanche sent her sister a speculative look as Carolyn sat reading in the far corner of the library. Carolyn’s air of indifference didn’t fool her this time. She looked like one who hadn’t slept in weeks, and the book she held was upside-down. Something was going on, but no one had given thought to informing Blanche.

Carolyn didn’t seem surprised when the footman came to fetch her. She shook out the warm yellow skirts of the wool gown she had donned, wasted no time tidying her loose arrangement of curls, and proceeded out, as if walking to her execution.

Her father at least had the decency to leave them alone, Carolyn observed as she entered the study to find only Jack waiting. He had that haunted look on his face again, but his eyes were warm as they took in her appearance. He made no attempt at an improper embrace, as he might have in earlier years, but Carolyn felt his desire to do so. She was grateful for his restraint.

“How is Amy?” Although she had left the child little more than an hour ago, it seemed much longer. She would hear this news first, before the argument to follow.

“Sleeping when I left her. Your maid brought the basket of remedies. I thank you for your concern.”

His formality indicated uneasiness. Carolyn could understand that. Her father could have that effect on heads of state. Nervously she took a seat and clasped her hands in her lap. “You needn’t look like that, Jack. He doesn’t bite.”

Jack made a wry smile. “I wouldn’t swear to that. He’s in the right of it, though. I have compromised you beyond repair. I’m obliged to offer for you.”

She had hoped he would phrase it a little less bluntly. It would be soothing to her injured feelings to hear him mouth a few of the pretty phrases he was so good at saying. Just for a little while she would like to cling to the illusion of those long-ago years.

Her smile matched his as she replied, “I am obliged to refuse.”

Jack’s shoulders slumped and he turned to play with the candlesticks on the mantel rather than reveal his expression. “You cannot, Carolyn. That Higginbotham woman is spreading word far and wide. I could slit her throat, but the damage will already be done.”

She had not expected that. Carolyn contemplated her alternatives, but her ability to think straight had flown out the door when Jack entered it. She shook her head in hopes of freeing it from cobwebs. “We can deny everything. I’ll not be forced into marriage.”

“I knew you would say that.” Bleakly he turned back to face her. “Can you not even consider it, Carolyn? Would it be so horrible a fate? I’m quite wealthy now, you know. I can support you in any manner that you choose.”

Carolyn rose and gave him a cold glare at this insult. “What does wealth have to do with it? I would have married you when you were penniless, but you preferred gold to me. Go wed your gold, Jack. I’ll not have any part of your lies.”

She swung to leave the room, but he stepped forward and caught her wrist, his face a mixture of despair and desperation. “Is it George? Do you love him? I will go speak to him today and explain all that has happened. If you love each other, this misunderstanding can’t come between you.”

Carolyn gave him an icy look and refused to reply until he dropped her wrist. “Explain what you wish to whomever you wish if it eases your conscience. Good day, Jack.”

She swept out in a trail of lavender and wildflowers, leaving him bereft. The fury in Thorogood’s expression when he returned did not ease Jack’s pain. He had lost her. The terrible emptiness that followed this realization could only be filled with silent screams of anguish.

Despite her lack of sleep, Carolyn did not find rest easy that night. She couldn’t erase the look in Jack’s eyes when she refused him. Surely he had not expected her to agree after what he had done to her? What did he stand to gain by offering now?

Amy. That thought came instantly to mind. He needed a mother for Amy. That much was obvious. She must have filled him with confidence when she had so foolishly taken the child under her wing. Instead of pretty words, he meant to woo her with his daughter.

Why did that notion not ring true? She was quite experienced enough by now to know when she was being manipulated. She had no more romantic illusions. George, at least, had the sense to treat her as an intelligent human being capable of making decisions without having to be wooed and won with silly words and gestures. Would Jack ever consider her in such a light?

That thought made her even more restless, and she got up to put on her robe and pace the room. George’s polite note had only said that Jack had been to see him and that he understood all. What did he understand? Did he understand that she needed the reassurance of his presence, of hearing his voice say the words? Obviously not. Jack had, or he wouldn’t have been so quick to go to George to explain it. Had it been Jack she had been considering instead of George, he would have been at her door within the time it took to receive the message. Jack had never stinted her in his attentions.

Nor did he now. There was another bouquet on her dressing table with a note telling her how Amy fared. She had nearly cried when she had seen it. All day she had felt isolated. Her father wasn’t speaking to her. George’s stilted message hadn’t helped. And no one had come to call. Only Jack’s thoughtful note bringing news of his concern had broken her loneliness.

She was mad to be thinking like this. In a few days George would be escorting her to the usual social functions, the gossip would subside, and everything would be back to normal. Why should she place any consequence on a few flowers and kind words? Jack had always been lavish in his attentions. That was just his way. It didn’t mean anything.

But, may the heavens preserve her, she wanted it to mean something. She wanted to know that bouquet meant he cared for her. She wanted to know he offered for her because he loved her and didn’t wish to be parted from her again. She wanted to believe that he had come to her that day after the ball to explain his undying love and the misery he had suffered in those years apart, the same misery she had suffered and was suffering still.

Flinging herself weeping on the bed, Carolyn sought comfort in repose. Only in her dreams could she believe that the warmth in gray eyes and the eager caress of browned hands meant something more than selfishness.

The days that followed slipped away like the steady drip of the icicles outside the windows.

Carolyn retreated inside herself just as Blanche remembered her doing those years ago during her first Season. Back then, she had at least continued to attend social functions, although with an icy brittleness that displayed little pleasure. This time, Carolyn refused to go out at all, putting a severe damper on Blanche’s own social life. It was St. Valentine’s Day, a day for lovers! Something drastic had to be done.

The litter of paper and scissors and a crudely cut heart on the library table made Blanche smile in anticipation. Checking surreptitiously to be certain Carolyn was nowhere to be seen, she completed the larger card with a few pen strokes, added the one Amy had made, wrapped both in a length of vellum with a scribbled note, and summoned a footman. The gentlemen who had appeared at their door earlier this day weren’t lovers, just men playing at games. Her romantic heart hoped she had made the correct surmise in sending this particular valentine.

Jack opened the slender package in his study, where he was working over long-neglected correspondence. The sight of the two lavishly decorated cards brought back such a painful memory that he nearly threw them aside as someone’s idea of a malicious joke. But the crudity of the one card caught his interest, and he picked up the message accompanying it.

After reading the brief note, he studied the two hearts. Both were made with loving hands, one pair childish and uncoordinated, the other talented and gentle. He remembered well the poem inscribed inside the larger heart. He remembered the occasion when he had last quoted it. His hands shook and tears sprang to his eyes as he read it again. Surely, after all these years, she would have forgotten so silly a verse had it not meant something to her? Why, then, would she not say the words to his face?

Pondering this peculiarity, Jack took the smaller heart in his hand and went up the stairs to where a recovering child was wreaking havoc with her impatience to be out of bed. At the sight of him, Amy leapt from beneath the covers to hold her arms out and bounce upon the bed.

Her joyful cry of “Papa” brought a smile despite his weariness, and Jack caught her up in a hug, careful not to crumple the paper in his hand. When he set her down, he presented the childishly beautiful card with a flourish.

“Do you remember this?”

Dark eyes lit with excitement. “Lynley helped me! It’s for you.”

“Lynley?” Jack sat on the edge of the bed and smiled at the childish name for so gracious and lovely a woman as Carolyn Thorogood. As Amy pointed out the card’s many and varied features, he could hear Carolyn speaking in the voice of his daughter. Loneliness and a desperate need for her company welled up inside of him. He could not keep on living this half-life. Something had to be done, but he had run out of ideas. How did one go about wooing someone he had courted once, only to slam a door in her face? What he had done was unforgivable. How could they ever go back to that time again?

Something Amy was chirping caught his ear, and he turned his attention back to her. “What was that, love? Lynley said what?”

“Don’t break it, she said,” Amy gave him a look of disdain at his lack of attention. “You got to keep it forever and ever and ever,” she admonished in a tone that reflected the adult she mimicked.

Don’t break it. Jack thought of the torn pieces stored all these years in an ivory music box of his mother’s. He had carried that broken heart halfway around the world with him as a reminder of how low he had fallen. If only he could put those torn pieces back together again and start all over.

The vague stirrings of an impossible idea came to mind, but nothing was too impossible to try in this desperate gamble for a love he had lost and wished to win back again. Giving Amy a kiss and thanking her with a hug for his beautiful valentine, he rose and went in search of the music box.

Many tedious hours later he had pasted and pieced dozens of torn bits of lacy paper on a large sheet of vellum. Giving the ragged result a wry look, Jack admitted to himself that his chance of winning this gamble with such feeble backing was slim, but it was all he had.

Forgetting cloak and hat, he set out into the fast-growing darkness of the winter streets, gripping the forlorn fragments of an old valentine. He carried no roses or candy or trinkets as a proper valentine lover should. Instead, he carried his heart in his hand.

When notified she had a visitor, Carolyn refused to see him, as she had refused all visitors this day. She didn’t have the heart to exchange witty sallies with friends or suitors on the state of her love life on this day for lovers. Tomorrow, maybe she would venture out again. George had been remarkably silent this past week, but the combination of the scandal and his mother’s arrival would explain that. He had sent another reassuring note, but it hadn’t reassured. She hadn’t even finished reading it.

The footman returned some minutes later with a large bit of paper on his salver. Carolyn gave him a look of irritation for thus interrupting her morose thoughts, but she took the awkward message he offered. Her eyes widened in surprise, and she rose to carry it to a brighter lamp to better peruse what she wouldn’t believe she was seeing.

Carefully pieced and pasted back together was the valentine she had created five years ago for the man she had meant to marry. The faded ink still bore the words of the poem Jack had written for her when he had asked if she would marry him, the same poem she had written on the valentine she had left downstairs in the library, remembering the words as if it had been only yesterday when last she heard them.

Tears poured down Carolyn’s cheeks as the feelings of that long-ago time flooded through her, unlocked by this tattered heart that Jack had so painstakingly recreated. He had kept it all those years. Why?

Without a word to the waiting servant, Carolyn swept out of the room and half-ran to the front salon, where visitors waited, the tattered valentine clutched in her hand. She had to see him face-to-face, to hear his reply. She had to know why he had kept this shattered heart for all these years. And why he had put it back together now.

Jack glanced up as she ran into the room. His weathered face had a lined and harried look to it, and there was a wariness in his eyes at her abrupt entrance, but he moved toward her as steel draws toward a magnet.

“Why?” She waved the forlorn heart beneath his nose.

He didn’t need to understand the question. The answer was in his heart. “Because I love you. Because I’ve always loved you. Throw it back in my face if you will. I deserved it then. I’ve worked hard not to deserve it now, but that’s for you to decide. I can’t bear this loneliness any longer, Carolyn. I’ve worked and waited these five years in hopes of winning at least your respect, but what I want is your love. Can you ever forgive me and start anew?” He was not too proud to beg, but he desperately wished he dared take her in his arms while doing so. The cold air between them chilled his heart.

Carolyn stared at him in disbelief, not daring to believe the words. He had destroyed her with just such words before. She couldn’t let him do it again. Her gaze faltered at the smoky gray intensity of his eyes, and she dropped it to the valentine in her hand. She smoothed the crumpled paper.

“I can’t. How can I?” she murmured, almost to herself. “You sold my love for money. It’s gone. There can be no love where there is no trust.”

His heart ached, and he finally gave in and reached for her. Whether he hoped to prevent her escape or pour his love into her, he couldn’t say, but the contact was electric. They both jerked with the jolt, and Jack couldn’t have moved away if his life depended on it.

Holding her arms, he poured out his feverish response. “I paid him back, Carolyn. I paid your father back every cent I ever took from him. He was right. I had no right to ask you to share a life of penury with a careless spendthrift. I do not condone his methods, but he did what he had to to protect you. I didn’t take his money in exchange for your love. I never wanted his money. He gave me no choice. Please understand that, Carolyn. Turn me away if you will, but not without understanding that I have never stopped loving you, that everything I have done has been for love of you.”

Carolyn wanted desperately to be enfolded in Jack’s embrace, to accept his words unquestioningly, to feel his strong arms around her and hear his heart beat beneath her ear, but she had learned her lesson at his hands too well. She shook her head blindly, refusing to meet his eyes.

“I heard you that night. Father paid you to turn me away. Don’t lie to me anymore, Jack. I can’t bear it.”

Jack felt anger for the father who had allowed her to continue to think these things all these years, even after the debt was repaid. But the plea in Carolyn’s voice called to him, and he gently pulled her into his arms. He rejoiced when she made no effort to fight him. The scent of lavender wafted around him, and he inhaled deeply. He could easily spend the rest of his life drowning in that fragrance.

“I’ve never lied to you, my love. Please believe me. Every word I’ve said is true, although I once said them cruelly to drive you away. I didn’t want you wedded to a man lounging in debtor’s prison. I didn’t deserve you then, and I knew it. Your father’s ultimatum made it clear to me. I hated him for making me face the facts, but he gave me the opportunity to redeem myself, and I took it in hopes of one day being able to look you in the eye again. The money he offered was a loan, my love. I repaid it with interest. You may ask him if you have doubts.”

Carolyn tried to make order of her swirling thoughts, but enveloped in Jack’s arms, she could only drink in the radiant heat of his body and the ecstasy of his hard strength beneath her hands. She didn’t wish to think of anything else.

She didn’t need to think of anything else. A door slammed, and her father’s harsh voice exclaimed, “What is the meaning of this? Damn you, Chatham, haven’t you caused enough scandal—must you create more?”

Carolyn jerked and would have fled Jack’s arms, but he held her firmly, entrapping her in his protective hold as they both faced her father together.

“If you’ll excuse me, sir, I am asking your daughter to marry me. I do not believe I need your permission anymore.

“You do not need my money anymore, is what you mean! She refused you, Chatham. I’ll not see her made unhappy. Get out of here before I call the constabulary.”

Carolyn straightened at this threat, and without a second thought to her words, she answered her father’s fury. “Jack will leave when I want him to. If you throw him out, I go with him. You tore us apart once before, but I’m older now and know you are not infallible. Had you but trusted my judgment then, we neither of us would have had to suffer all these years. This time, the choice is mine. You cannot force it.” She felt Jack’s arm tighten around her, and this time she allowed herself to lean into his embrace.

“Shhh, Lynley,” Jack whispered in her ear as her father’s face grew ashen. “Save your temper for another time. I’m a father now too, and I know what it is like to protect a daughter. It is easy to think the safe thing is the right thing. No one wants to take chances with the ones they love.”

Carolyn turned eyes brimming with love up to Jack’s face, and her smile was one of joy and acceptance. Her words, however, had the ring of a woman who had set aside childish fancies. “You are not my father, John Chatham. If it’s marriage you want, you had better learn I am no longer a gullible child to be swept away by your facile tongue. I can fight my own battles, thank you.”

The warm chuckle in her ear made her heart quake. “Anyone who can simultaneously rout Mrs. Higginbotham and capture my daughter has my full respect, my love. I do not doubt your abilities. It is your temper I fear.”

With a loud throat-clearing to remind them he was in the room, Henry Thorogood interrupted what could easily have become a rather intimate exchange. “I cannot leave the room unless I know a formal betrothal has been formed.”

Carolyn turned her smile from Jack’s loving gaze to her father. “Leave the room, Papa. Jack may talk with you later.”

She felt the joy rocketing through the man holding her as her father glared and stomped out. She wasn’t certain what she had done, but in her heart, it felt right. She turned her gaze expectantly back to Jack.

“I love you, even if you are as spoiled and obstinate as Amy.” Jack’s mouth curved as she moved more fully into his embrace.

“Don’t forget bad-tempered and willful,” she reminded him, standing on tiptoes to reach his lips with hers.

“And mine.” Firmly, Jack covered her mouth with his, drawing her into his hold so she could have no uncertainty as to what he meant.

“I never said yes,” Carolyn gasped some minutes later when he gave her time to gulp for air.

“Yes you did, five years ago. It’s been a long betrothal, my love. Shall we make it a hasty wedding?” Jack held her eyes with desperate intensity.

“Will you explain to George?” Carolyn asked, postponing her acceptance of this joy Jack offered her with open hand. She still could not quite believe it. She needed time.

Jack smiled. “I’ve already explained to George. He’s a very understanding man. He’s willing to let you choose.”

“He’d give me up without a fight?” she asked in mock incredulity.

“He knows I’ll put him six feet under if he stands in my way. Give me a date, my love.”

“Christmas,” she said firmly.

Jack bent his head closer and spoke inches from her lips “Try again.”

“Easter,” she murmured, rising to the temptation.

And as that holiday was little more than a month away, Jack said, “Done,” and closed the compact with a kiss.

Although the sun shone and the guests wore their spring pastels for the occasion, the ebony-haired flower girl wore red velvet. The four blond bridesmaids, one only slightly older than the flower girl, wore white lace and carried valentine roses as the bride walked down the aisle that balmy Easter Day.

When the ceremony ended and the groom’s sun-darkened face bent to take the kiss he had earned from his shining bride, he gave no hint of surprise as their audience broke into gales of laughter rather than happy tears.

There at the foot of the altar two dancing cherubs in white and red cavorted to the sweeping swells of organ music, heedless of the solemnity of the occasion. The bride smiled into the groom’s eyes, and the look they exchanged bespoke the distinct possibility that another cherub would be on the way before year’s end.

LADY INVISIBLE

CHAPTER 1

First published in A Mammoth Book of Regency Romance, Robinson Press, 2010

Cotswolds, 1816

“It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a single man in possession of a good fortune must be in want of a wife,” quoted Mrs. Hagel, the vicar’s wife, reading from the novel on her husband’s desk.

Ill at ease, Major Lucas Sumner stretched his shoulders against the confinement of his civilian attire. He had hoped Reverend Hagel might be available for consultation. He did not remember the vicar’s wife being quite so. . . enigmatic. . . in her younger days. They’d both grown up here among the rolling hills of Chipping Bedton, but Lucas obviously had been away too long. He must adjust his military sense of order to village idiosyncrasies.

“My fortune is a major’s pension and a small inheritance,” Lucas corrected. “I am in want of a wife because I have a daughter in need of a mother.”

Mrs. H—Lorena, as he’d known her—waved a careless, plump hand. “The extent of your fortune does not matter these days. The village has lost most of its available young men to war and to the city and to marriage. You can have a choice of ladies, from fifteen to fifty, I daresay. The task is to find the right one.”

“Well, yes, that is why I thought I would consult with Edgar—”

“Edgar did not grow up here as we did,” Lorena admonished. “My husband has a worthy, virtuous mind, but not necessarily one connected to the realities of life. Women are far better at matchmaking than men.”

Lucas granted that possibility. He’d married in haste as a young man, and the result was currently uprooting daffodils from graves in the churchyard, if he did not mistake.

With an apology, he rose, pushed up the vicar’s study window, and shouted, “Verity! Stop that at once. Where is your aunt?”

His seven-year-old hoyden waved a bunch of yellow flowers and dashed off. Lucas could only hope it was in the direction of his much put-upon sister.

“I have a lot to account for in this life,” he said, striding back to the chair. “Verity’s mother died far too young, and I’ve neglected my daughter’s upbringing. Now that the war is done and I’ve come home, it’s time I fine a mother for Verity who can teach her to be a lady and turn my bachelor household into a home.”

Lorena nodded and consulted the list she’d evidently drawn up in anticipation of his visit. “Jane Bottoms is still unmarried. She’s a bit long in the tooth, but a very respectable, proper sort.”

Lucas tugged at his neckcloth. He remembered Jane. Thick as a brick, they used to call her. “My daughter needs someone a little more—”

Lorena cut him off, as she seemed to do regularly. “Yes, yes, of course. Verity would tie her to a tree and forget about her. How about Mary Loveless? She’s a bit plump and her mother tends to dictate. . . ” She caught Lucas’s eye and hurriedly looked at the list again.

Impatiently, Lucas snapped the paper from her hand and scanned the names. “Harriet Briggs is still unmarried?” he exclaimed in amazement. “How is that possible? She’s the squire’s daughter and had a dozen beaus before I left, but she was much too young to be interested in any of them.”

Lorena crossed her plump hands on the battered desk. “She is still not interested in any of them. She has not changed since the child you remember. You need a mature, proper lady to teach your daughter manners. Harriet is totally unsuitable.”

This time Lucas was the one to interrupt. “I remember her as a spirited little thing. Perhaps she was a bit of a tomboy riding to the hounds because her father never told her no, but she could argue intelligently. Verity needs a smart woman to guide her.”

Lorena vehemently shook her head. “Now that her mother has passed on and all feminine influence is lost, Harriet has become quite impossible. Rumor has it that she called off two perfectly respectable arrangements while she was in London, even though her looks are nothing to brag about.” She shook her head and cut herself off. “Her father has refused to give her another season.”

Lucas conjured a mental image of Miss Harriet Briggs the last time he’d seen her, when she wasn’t quite sixteen. He had been twenty and sporting his newly purchased officer’s colors. He’d been home to say farewells to family and strutting about in hopes his new uniform would impress the ladies.

The squire’s daughter been sitting on the doorstep of one of the village houses, showing a youngster how to feed a baby pig. She had not been impressed by his uniform but had appreciated his aid when the pig had squirmed free. They’d had a rational discourse on the care and feeding of abandoned farm animals, a conversation that he could not imagine having with any other female of his acquaintance.

Hope surged, despite Lorena’s warning. His household was in dire need of the discipline a lady could bring to it.

“She must be twenty-three or four by now?” In the eight years of his absence Harriet should have grown into her lanky limbs at least. Lucas didn’t think he’d care for a skinny woman, although a mother for Verity should be more important than attractiveness.

Well, perhaps not, or he’d have hired a nanny. So he needed a wife who appealed to him, as well as a mother for Verity. Doubt crept in at the seeming impossibility of that task. Perhaps he should have gone wife hunting in London.

His sister should not have to deal with Verity while he danced through society looking for a bride. There had to be someone local, who would want to live here and raise his child among his family.

“Harriet should be a good age for looking after a child.” A man of action and decision, Lucas rose from the chair. “I don’t think anyone younger would be up to the challenge.”

Lorena looked harassed. “No, really, Lucas. Don’t be foolish. I do not wish to speak ill. . . Look, here is Elizabeth. She’s an extremely attractive young lady. . . ”

Having made up his mind—and worried that Verity would be digging up the dead next—Lucas was already half way out the door when Lorena leaped up, waving the list. “And Mary Dougal! Mature, quiet, and very lovely. . . ”

“I will consider them all, of course,” Lucas said, making his bow, although he privately thought Elizabeth to be a simpering ninny and Mary Dougal to be a pinchpenny prude. Verity was a bright child. She needed a disciplined woman up to the challenge of taming her. And a patient one to ease them into their new domestic routines.

“I told you not to climb the trees!” he roared after departing the vicarage. He crossed the cemetery in long strides to where his sister stared upward in dismay. He could see the bright blue of his daughter’s gown several limbs from the ground. “Come down from there at once, you little monkey.”

He nearly had failure of the heart when Verity’s small foot slipped and missed the branch below her. Without a second’s thought, he swung up on the lowest limb, heedless of his best trousers, caught Verity by the waist, and lowered her to Maria.

“I have three of my own, Lucas,” his sister called back. “I cannot do this much longer. You should hire a circus trainer.”

“I am amazed you did not hire her out to a zoo before this,” he said in exasperation as the child took off running before he could climb down. “Does she never speak?”

Maria shrugged and followed Verity across the church lawn at a slower pace. “She can talk if she must. Mostly, she does what she wants rather than ask, because she knows she’ll be told no. I have three young boys. It’s all I can do to keep up with them. I hate to burden you, Lucas, but now that you’re home safe and sound, she’s your responsibility.”

“I agree. And someday I hope to repay you if possible. You have been a saint, and I don’t know what we would have done without you.” He caught up with Verity when she stopped to pet a shaggy mutt. She was no longer a toddler for Lucas to heave over his shoulder and carry off as he had the few times he’d been home when she’d been younger. He’d missed almost her entire childhood.

“Your safe return is payment enough,” Maria promised. “If you never go to war again and can provide a home for Verity, that will ensure our happiness.”

Lucas thought of his sister’s request as he knocked at Squire Briggs’ door the next afternoon. Now that Napoleon had been routed, he would not be going to war again, but that meant he had no other purpose.

His father had died before Lucas could attend Oxford or obtain any type of training. Other than the cottage and the lot it sat on, he had no lands of his own. The only trade he knew was soldiering. It was a problem he must solve after he found a mother for Verity.

Before setting off on his visit to the squire, Lucas had his hair properly barbered. He also had his old cutaway coat with the broad lapels brushed and pressed. And still he squirmed like a raw lad on the brink of courtship.

He had been far too young to have encountered Squire Briggs regularly before he’d left for war, so he didn’t know the man well. The unfamiliarity of civilian life threw him off balance, forcing him to recall that he had earned his major’s stripes and fought battles far worse than the encounter ahead.

A maid led Lucas inside to a fusty parlor in dire need of a lady’s care. He frowned over that. Even if Lady Briggs had been deceased for some years, should not Miss Briggs have directed the servants in cleaning? Or at least replaced the cat-tattered pillows?

Cat hair was everywhere. He declined the maid’s offer of a seat.

Lucas liked to do his own reconnaissance and had made several inquiries before setting out on this call. From all reports, Squire Briggs was a hearty man who loved his horses and his hounds. His lands were fertile and well-tended, and his tenants spoke well of him. Lack of funds or servants did not explain this lack of order.

The tenants had spoken well of the squire’s daughter, as well, but with a degree of caution. Lucas trusted that was out of respect, but Lorena’s warning rang in his mind.

He heard the squire roaring at a rambunctious hound somewhere deeper inside the house and smiled to himself, thinking taming a dog was very much like taming Verity. He’d nearly broken his neck falling over her this morning when she’d darted out from under a table on her hands and knees.

“Sumner!” the squire boomed as he entered the parlor. “Good to see you home, lad! Major now, ain’t ye? Made the town proud, you did. Shame your father is no longer about to brag on you.” He pounded Lucas on the back and gestured toward the door. “C’mon back to m’study. We’ll have a bit of brandy and celebrate your return.”

Brandy was an excellent idea. Lucas thought he needed fortifying before he explained his presence. He was starting to think he should have sought out Harriet first, but he’d forgotten the protocol, if he’d ever known it. How did one woo a lady without going through her parent? He was no dab hand at courtship.

Outside, several hounds gave voice at once, and a woman shouted sharp commands.

The squire ignored the commotion, reaching for a decanter on a dusty tray. Cat hair seemed less prevalent here, Lucas noticed. An ancient basset lay sprawled and snoring in front of the empty grate.

“You’re a military man. What do you know of hounds and hunting?” the squire inquired, handing Lucas a glass.

“A great deal, as it happens, sir. I’ve spent the better part of these last years on horseback, chasing enemies wilier than foxes.”

Outside, the dogs howled louder, and a screech resembling a brawl between penned pigs and enraged hawks ensued. The woman’s shouts escalated.

Lucas had begun to wonder if he shouldn’t investigate, when Briggs threw open a sash of his double study window and shouted, “Harriet, get them demmed hounds back in the pen where they belong and shoot the peacocks!”

Lucas blinked. Things had changed mightily if one shouted at young ladies these days and ordered them to perform a stable hand’s duty.

In coming here, he’d had some vision of a benevolent, ladylike Harriet gliding into the room carrying a tea tray and somehow divining why he’d called. After all, Lorena had said he was an eligible catch, and the squire’s daughter was the most eligible female around. The purpose of his call should be obvious.

Perhaps he should have listened a little more closely to Lorena.

A childish shriek raised the hair on the back of his neck. Lucas dashed to the other window and threw open the second sash.

“Dashitall, Harry, I told you to get them hounds back in the barn!” the squire was shouting in frustration while Lucas scanned the grounds for the origin of the childish scream. “We’ve got a guest! You need to get back in here.”

A pair of peahens and a cock flapped around three baying beagles, who were racing around the base of an oak as if they’d treed a squirrel.

Surrounded by the circling hounds and birds, a slender female in honey-colored riding habit, with the skirt scandalously rucked up to reveal her tall boots, and her jacket missing, smacked the snout of the nearest dog. Lucas couldn’t hear what she was saying, but the animals crouched down and wagged their tails in anticipation of some treat.

The wildly colorful birds scattered to alight on various bits of shrubbery.

The young lady turned her uncovered head upward to study the tree’s branches, and Lucas’s gut lurched. His gaze followed hers.

The child he had thought he’d left securely at his sister’s house was instead perched on the lowest limb of the oak, swinging her toes and watching the dogs, probably with interest, if he knew his daughter. The earlier scream had been for effect. Verity was fearless.

“Verity Augusta, climb down from there this instant!” Lucas roared, heedless of the squire’s startled reaction.

“That your young one?” Briggs asked. “What the devil is she doing in my tree?”

“As if I know what goes through her mind,” Lucas muttered, pulling his head back in the window. “I’d best pry her down and take her home.”

“Harry can do it.” Briggs stuck his head back out the window again and roared, “Harriet, bring the girl inside to her papa.”

The half-dressed lady sent her father what appeared to Lucas to be a look of exasperation, before crouching down to scratch the hounds and sending them scampering toward the kennel.

Verity, on the other hand, climbed to her feet and appeared to be considering the next highest branch.

Lucas didn’t think shouting at the females had put a dent in their behavior.

If he’d had an undisciplined soldier who disobeyed him like that. . . .He’d already confined Verity to quarters without result, and he couldn’t court martial her. And he’d never resort to whipping. How did one command loyalty and obedience from a female?

As if in answer to his guest’s unspoken question, the squire poured their brandies and handed Lucas one. “Never understand women. Contrary lot, don’t know what’s good for them. Don’t suppose you’ve come to take Harry off my hands, have you? Good girl, but damned if I can make her see sense.”

Lucas took a healthy swallow of his drink. Did he need two contrary females on his hands? He thought not, but he was a man who required information before making a life-altering decision. Discipline could be instilled in anyone, eventually.

This wife-getting business was more difficult than he’d anticipated.

“After all these years, I can’t say that I know Miss Briggs well,” Lucas replied circumspectly. “It would be a pleasure to become reacquainted.”

Briggs snorted again and leaned back in his chair. “I offered a handsome dowry, told everyone that she will inherit all I own someday, and she still garnered only two offers in London. And she turned those down. Take her off my hands, and you’ll be the son I never had.”

Studying the lady’s attire, Lucas suffered an uneasy notion that Harriet wanted to be the son her father never had.

CHAPTER 2

Harriet Briggs tilted her head back to admire the small girl straddling the oak branch above her head. “The dogs didn’t frighten you, did they?” she asked.

The child shook her mop of orange curls vigorously. “I like trees.”

“And is there some reason you like this particular tree?”

The child didn’t answer, but Harriet had a strong suspicion the reason stood in her father’s study window. Tall, broad-shouldered, and wearing his bottle-green swallow-tail coat as if it were a military uniform, the gentleman had arrived only shortly before the child. Both had walked, so they could not live too far away.

Harriet had seen the child in church on Sundays with Maria Smith and her brood of boys. She’d been told the girl was the boys’ cousin, but Harriet and Maria were a decade apart in age and never close, so she didn’t know more than gossip.

As far as Harriet knew, though, Maria’s only sibling was Lucas Sumner. She tried to find a resemblance to Lucas in the child’s oval face, but it had been too many years since she’d seen her childhood idol. She was long past the age of believing in human deities anyway. Children developed foolish fantasies, and she was firmly grounded in reality these days.

Blifil, the lame kitten, suddenly tumbled from the boxwoods, chasing after Partridge, her tame squirrel. The squirrel dashed up her skirt and into the tree, much to the child’s startlement. Harriet prayed the girl didn’t fall before she got her down.

“Do you have a name?” Harriet asked, ignoring her father’s bellows from the window. Really, he ought to know by now that she wouldn’t shout back like a field hand.

“My name is Verity. You’re Miss Harriet, aren’t you?” the child asked, proving she was observant for her age.

“I am. If you climb down from there, we can have tea and biscuits. Do you like kittens?” She swept Blifil from the ground before he could follow the squirrel.

“My papa will make me go home if I climb down. He told my Aunt Maria he needs a wife to take care of me, and I want to see who he picks.”

She stopped there, as if that said everything. Which it did, Harriet supposed, fighting a shiver of expectation and annoyance. Lucas had always been smart. He would seek out the wealthiest available woman in the neighborhood before looking at the less eligible or the more beautiful. She was simply surprised he wasn’t looking in London instead of Chipping Bedton.

She supposed she would have to watch the last of her childhood illusions crumble. Major Sumner had to be able to see her from the window, so she was probably missing the show already. Would he bluntly express dismay at her unseemly attire and ragged manners? Or bite back his thoughts and just tighten his lips in disapproval over a mature young lady who displayed such inappropriate behavior? She had little entertainment anymore, so perhaps she could drum some up at the major’s expense.

“I’ll tell your papa you’re my guest so he can’t send you home,” she told the child. “I’m a bit peckish and would like a sandwich with my tea, I believe. Do you think I might help you down?”

The child considered the suggestion, then finally nodded. “I climb like a monkey, my papa says.” Before Harriet was prepared, Verity caught the branch she sat on and swung her feet loose.

Dropping the kitten, Harriet tried not to gasp in terror as the girl trustingly fell into her arms. Harriet had watched her creatures perform dangerous acrobatics, but she’d never endured the terror of a human child risking death in such a manner. Major Sumner had his hands full with this one.

Staggering slightly as she lowered the child’s chunky body to firm land, Harriet suffered a brief glimpse of what it must be like to love and care for a precious, fragile life. It was difficult enough tending to a wounded pet. She didn’t think she could tolerate seeing a child hurt.

Really, she had nothing to worry about. She need only meet Lucas, let him see how utterly unsuitable she was, and go about her merry way. Her father and the tenants and the animals needed her. She had a very full life without an annoying man providing obstacles, objecting to everything she did or wanted. It was not as if she needed a man for anything. And she already had one yelling impossible orders all day long. She certainly didn’t require another.

Taking a deep breath to settle her racing pulse, she swung Verity’s hand and was smiling when she entered the study where the men waited. Her confidence faltered a little at sight of the tall, immaculately dressed gentleman virtually filling the furniture-stuffed room.

Lucas Sumner had grown from lanky lad to a huge, square-shouldered man with shadowed eyes that had seen too much suffering. Harriet’s soft heart nearly plummeted to her toes. She could ignore laughing, handsome men. She could not ignore wounded ones.

“Thank you for rescuing my obstreperous daughter, Miss Briggs. I must take her home, where she belongs.”

A small hand clenched Harriet’s. The child very properly did not argue, but Harriet knew how it felt to be invisible. She tickled Verity’s palm while nodding pretend agreement. She would give Major Sumner one more chance at a little empathy.

“I have promised Verity tea and biscuits,” she said in her politest hostess tones. “Perhaps we could retire to the parlor and have a bite before you must leave?”

“No, she’s not capable of sitting still,” he responded dismissively. “I would not ruin your rugs with spilled tea and crumbs. It’s a pleasure to make your acquaintance again, Miss Briggs. Perhaps another time?”

Ah well, such a pity that he was a blind fool like all the others, but then, attractive men often thought they owned the world. And society allowed them to continue thinking that.

Harriet supposed it was naughty of her, but she would like Verity to recognize that she was not lacking in any way. She was simply being a child, and her father was simply being. . . well, a stiff-necked man.

At her father’s curt dismissal, Verity tugged her hand free and fled the room. Major Sumner uttered an impolite word and stalked after her.

Harriet blocked his path. Giving the major a warning look, she called after the fleeing child, “If Invisible Girl will wait outside the front door, I will follow shortly. I do not break promises!”

The front door slammed. She hoped Verity was bright enough to listen. And be curious.

“I promised Verity tea and biscuits. Now I shall have to walk with her and explain they’ll have to wait for another day or she will think I’ve lied to her.” Harriet pasted a sweet smile over her irritation.

The glowering gentleman appeared prepared to bodily remove her from his path, and her smile grew more challenging.

CHAPTER 3

Lucas did not know what to make of the annoying Miss Briggs. She walked alongside of him without a coat to cover her thin lawn shirt. Even her disheveled lace jabot did not conceal her plump bosom. Her riding skirts and boots allowed her to take long strides that matched his, proving she was not so demure as her pursed lips and silence would lead him to believe.

She had a veritable cloud of frizzy mouse brown curls that she had made no attempt to tame or cover. She had not really grown out of her gangliness either. Her limbs were long and ungraceful, but her waist was small, and she curved in womanly places as she had not as a fifteen-year-old. He supposed, in an evening gown, she would reveal far more than this unconventional costume did. He could not quite put a reason to his shock. . . or attraction. She was as undisciplined a hoyden as Verity and not at all the polite sort of female he’d envisioned.

Perhaps he should have visited a dolly-mop or two in London before returning to the village if his idea of luscious womanhood was this defiant filly.

As they strode along the village lane, Verity scampered behind the stone fences and hedgerows, just out of sight but following closely, as she must have earlier when she’d trailed him here. His daughter was far too clever and bold for her own good.

The silence grew awkward. Lucas sought for some means of breaking it, but he did not have much experience in conversing with unattached females. He had rather hoped for a businesslike transaction. Courting was another matter entirely—provided he wanted to court a woman who defied him before they even exchanged greetings.

“Do you prefer rural society to London?” he asked, wincing at his stilted tone.

“I believe I prefer animal society,” she responded without inflection.

Perhaps he should have listened to Lorena. Miss Briggs was not a comfortable companion, at the very least. Just a little annoyed that she ignored him to keep her eye on Verity, he released some of his frustration.

“Pets cannot talk back?” he suggested with a hint of sarcasm.

She shot him a sideways glance but whether of surprise, appreciation, or distaste, he could not discern.

“Animals do talk back, if only one listens. Rather like children, actually.” Her small boots kicked up dust on the rutted dirt lane.

“Children aren’t supposed to talk back. They are too young to offer intelligent observation and must be educated.”

She made a rude noise that startled him. He was very much out of touch if ladies these days made uncouth sounds instead of pouting prettily.

“I have not been back in the country long,” he admitted cautiously. “Perhaps I am missing the nuances of your reply.”

She bestowed a laughing look on him. “What would you think if your batman snorted at your priggish assertion?”

He’d definitely been around men too long. Her laughter stirred his interest more than a little, despite her insult. “I would think he needed his pay docked,” he responded tartly. “Would you take that attitude from a kitchen wench?”

“I would if she was speaking about something of which she knew more than I did,” she said.

There was the spirited girl he remembered, although he’d rather forgotten that she had a tart tongue to match her intelligence. But she was wrong if she thought a child ought to be allowed to talk disrespectfully to her elders.

“Invisible Girl shouldn’t climb trees,” Harriet abruptly called as Verity headed for a low-hanging apple branch. “Trees make her visible.”

Verity darted back into the cover of the hedge.

Now he was more than intrigued. “Invisible Girl?” he inquired.

She shrugged. “Women and children are expected to be invisible. That works for some of us. Not all.”

“Expecting Verity to behave is not asking her to be invisible. There is a reason discipline and authority are required,” he objected. “If my men didn’t follow my command, they could put themselves or others in harm’s way.”

“Provided your command was correct,” she argued. “You do not allow for independent thinking.”

“Not while I’m the one responsible for what happens! That’s the entire point of being in charge—to know what is best for those relying on my expertise and knowledge. Verity cannot simply run unchecked about town, not acknowledging anyone’s authority but her own.”

“She is a child! She cannot be expected to respect the authority of someone she barely knows. And who barely knows her! Have you even tried to understand your daughter, Major Sumner?”

“I shouldn’t have to understand her, Miss Briggs,” he declared. “She should simply obey the adults in her life until she’s reached an age of reason.”

Miss Briggs gave him a look of incredulity, emitted another rude snort, and climbed the turnstile to join Verity in the field. Together, they ran laughing in the direction of the village.

Lucas didn’t think his suit was going very well. Perhaps he should consider plump, henpecked Mary after all. He marched down the lane, realizing this was the first time he’d seen Verity laugh since he’d returned home. He tugged uncomfortably at his neckcloth.

Striding down the lane after Sunday dinner, Harriet knew she’d behaved badly earlier this week. And she’d done so deliberately, rejecting Major Sumner before he could reject her. She’d seen the disapproval in his eyes, let it raise her temper, and then she’d goaded him into behaving like a military high stickler. Which he was, or at least, he had been. That did not mean he was a bad man, just one accustomed to certain behavior.

The kind of behavior a child could not follow. Nor Harriet, for all that mattered, but that did not mean Major Sumner was wrong. It just meant that he and his daughter would have a very hard time of it, if someone did not intervene.

She was probably not the right person to do so, but who else would? The other unattached ladies in town simply whispered to each other behind their hands, wearing their best bonnets in hopes that Major Sumner would notice them. As if he was likely to notice a bonnet full of roses and birds! They’d do better to wear stiff military caps to make him feel more at home.

Mary had taken him a basket of muffins. Jane had taken him a pie. The child and Major Sumner would not go hungry, at least. But Verity would be ignored and feel even more like an Invisible Girl.

Verity was the only reason Harriet was marching down the lane this fine Sunday April afternoon, carrying a basket containing an adorable black-and-white kitten that would create havoc in Major Sumner’s orderly household. Perhaps he needed to be reminded—as the other ladies would not—that he was not the only person in his home.

She supposed she ought to apologize for her earlier behavior while she was at it, but she was not so certain on that matter. She had, though, dressed carefully for church this morning. If Major Sumner had noticed, he had not given a sign. He’d been too busy trying to keep Verity behaving like a proper major general.

So Harriet was taking the liberty of calling on the child this afternoon, while still wearing her Sunday sprigged muslin. She’d even tamed her hair to stay inside her bonnet, except for a loose curl or two. She wore her gloves and kid slippers and looked as much like a lady as she possibly could, so Major Sumner would have no reason to disapprove of her disreputable untidiness and set off her temper again.

Perhaps she might show him she could be proper, if she must, but neatness had never been overly important to her. She’d kept the family housekeeper on even though Agnes was half blind and unaware of the damages Harriet’s pets caused. Harriet preferred her pets and Agnes to orderliness. If the major wanted tidy, he should court Mary Loveless and her overbearing mother.

Nor could she compete with pretty Elizabeth or sweet-tempered Jane. Harriet was plain. Sometimes, when she did needlework, she even wore spectacles. And no man had ever called her sweet. So all Harriet could hope was that if she looked respectable enough, Major Sumner would allow her to be a friend and help with his daughter.

She had ascertained that Lucas had returned to his father’s old cottage on a small lot between her father’s farm and the village. His father had been the town physician until his death last spring. Harriet had often visited his home with her father’s tenants. She was familiar with the two-story cottage.

The lilac by the front door needed trimming, but it would bloom wonderfully in another month. Harriet rapped the knocker. Before anyone could answer, a childish shriek of fear and a masculine shout of panic erupted from the yard behind the house.

Setting the kitten basket on the doorstep, she lifted her Sunday skirt and raced past a few bedraggled jonquils and a struggling peony, around the corner, and to the old stable.

Seeing no one in the yard, she followed the sound of angry shouts into the stable—where Verity hung upside down from the rafters with a large harness around her waist, in peril of slipping out on her head at any moment.

If it was not so terrifying a situation, it would have been funny. How had the child ended up swinging like a trapeze?

The rafter was tall and Verity was short. Major Sumner stretched between the ground and his daughter’s head, barely keeping her from falling but unable to grasp her sufficiently to lower her to the ground. Hence the furious shouting. Men despised helplessness.

There was no point in explaining that a little girl did not know how to grasp leathers and climb back up from whence she’d fallen, as her father encouraged her to do. Tucking the back of her skirt into the front of her petticoat, Harriet hastened up the ladder into the loft as she often did at home.

“If you tug the strap, she will fall!” Lucas warned from below. “And you are likely to fall with her.”

“I know my limitations,” Harriet retorted, stripping off her gloves. “Verity’s coming down. Stand under her and grab for her shoulders.” She found the buckle the little imp had wrapped around the beam and carefully undid it, hanging on to the leather with all her strength. “Verity, reach for your father because I cannot hold this for long.”

Verity shrieked. Lucas yelled. And the harness whipped from her hands, leaving a burned streak across her palms. Shaking, Harriet closed her eyes, too terrified to see if she’d killed them both.

Verity began weeping loudly. Probably frightened out of his mind, Lucas scolded. Not the best of reactions for either, but at least she knew they were alive. Opening her eyes again, Harriet attempted the ladder, only now realizing how very unladylike she would appear with her stockings and garters exposed.

A strong arm caught her waist and lifted her free of the ladder. “I’ve got you. Let go.”

She did, and Lucas swung her to the ground, while keeping a tearful Verity tucked under his other arm. The man’s brains were in his brawn.

She liked the feel of his brawn a little too well. Shaking now that the incident was done, she wanted to bury her face in his big shoulder and weep out her fear as Verity was doing.

Lucas had apparently removed his frock coat after church and was in only waistcoat and shirt. She could smell his shaving soap and the manly aroma of his skin. While she fought back tears, he held her a little longer than was necessary, steadying himself as well as her.

Apparently realizing that fact at the same moment as she, he released her waist, but then remained uncertain what to do with the hysterical child he’d so rudely tucked under his other arm.

“Verity, sweetheart,” Harriet murmured, still shaken but unable to resist a sobbing child. “Give over.” She slid her arms around the girl and lifted her away from Lucas. “Verity, you terrified us. You have no idea how much it hurts your father when he thinks you’re in pain or danger. He can’t cry as you do, so he has to yell and shout.”

Lucas snorted rudely, as she had once done, and Harriet shot him a retaliatory look. He rubbed his hands through his already disheveled hair, like a man who had reached his last tether.

Verity flung her skinny arms around Harriet’s neck and buried her runny nose in the pretty sprigged muslin. Too rattled to care, Harriet rocked her and patted her on the back as if Verity were a babe. Her arms ached with the weight, but Lucas had not yet learned to comfort his daughter. Someone must teach him.

Calming down enough to learn his lesson, he lifted Verity from Harriet’s arms. “You scared me out of ten years’ growth, child. Whatever were you doing up there?”

Verity sniffed and rubbed her nose on his waistcoat and finally wrapped her arms around her father’s neck long enough to stop sobbing. Harriet thought perhaps she ought to sneak out now that the pair were learning to get on, but she was interested in hearing Verity’s reply.

“I wanted to be big!” she wailed. “Davy said he stretched his arms big by swinging on ropes, so I wanted to swing!”

CHAPTER 4

“Oh, dear.” Miss Briggs snickered and turned away, as if to depart.

Holding Verity in one arm, Lucas caught his savior’s elbow with his free hand. His heart still hadn’t stopped attempting to escape his chest at sight of his daughter hanging upside down in danger of breaking her neck.

If Miss Briggs had not come along, he would have had to learn to fly. He’d never seen a more level-headed, courageous lady, and even if she was a tart-tongued hoyden, he needed her. Verity needed her.

“Don’t go.” He tried not to plead, but he could see disaster written on his future unless he kept this woman with him. “We haven’t thanked you. I don’t suppose it’s proper to invite you in for tea.” He hated being uncertain but he was too overwrought at the moment to care. He just didn’t want her to go until his heart stopped pounding in his ears.

“I think it might be a good idea for Verity to go inside and wash up and lay down for a little while. Keeping up with her cousins is very tiring.”

Davy was one of Verity’s older cousins. Lucas caught the lady’s implication. He’d left his baby girl to compete with three older male cousins. His fault. Everything was his fault. It was up to him to undo what he had wrought.

“We will be just a minute,” he told her, looking for some way to persuade her to stay. “There is some pie left. We can eat it under the tree, where everyone can see we are very respectable.” He started for the house, trying not to notice as Miss Briggs brushed her skirt and petticoat back where they belonged.

She had long, lovely legs.

And shapely arms that cuddled a child the way he wouldn’t mind being held.

He wondered if Miss Briggs might ever rest her head against his shoulder as Verity did. That wasn’t a proper or respectable thought.

“I don’ wanna take a nap.” Verity hiccupped on her protest.

“Just lie down and rest your eyes a little,” Miss Briggs said soothingly, matching Lucas’s stride with ease. “And if you’re good and rest long enough, I’ll have a surprise waiting for you in the kitchen.”

“A surprise?” Verity lifted her damp cheeks. “For me?”

“Yes, just for you. Are you big enough to run upstairs and wash and take off your dress or do you need help?”

“I’m big enough!” Verity pushed off Lucas’s shoulders and wriggled to get down. When he let her go, she raced ahead of them.

“I’ve never seen her hurry so to take a nap,” he said wryly. “I hope you really do have a surprise for her.”

“You’ll hate it, but I do. She needs to feel she’s important, so I brought her a kitten. Learning to take care of a pet will teach her that others rely on her, and that she’s very important, indeed. But you’ll have to put up with the mess.”

“You’re laughing at me,” he said accusingly, steering her toward the tea table his mother had set up beneath the beech tree.

“Perhaps, only a little, because I’m still quaking in my shoes. She could have been killed!” Miss Briggs wailed, almost collapsing into the chair he held for her.

“Exactly my thought twenty times a day. Wait here, and I’ll bring out the cups and things, after I see Verity into bed. Did you leave the kitten in front?” At her nod, he made a mental note to fetch it. He doubted Verity’s ability to take care of a kitten, but his heart warmed that Miss Briggs had thought of her.

He could foresee cat hairs in his future, but Verity was more important than tidiness. Somehow, he must learn to rearrange his priorities.

His daughter had already stripped off her grubby and ruined Sunday dress and was splashing cold water as if she were a duck at play. Lucas scrubbed off some of the grime on her face and hands and watched her climb between the covers, before returning downstairs to the kitchen and setting on a kettle of tea. He supposed he should have done that first. He needed to hire a maid to think of these things, but it seemed awkward unless he had a wife first. He missed his batman.

He had imagined a sweet little woman ordering his household about, one who smiled cheerfully and arranged for delightful meals to appear on the table and puttered about keeping order, until it was time for her to come up to his bed. He could see now that his imagination was considerably rosier than actuality, rather like his youthful idea of war.

Life had a habit of not living up to his expectations. He could not even live up to his own. In the military, it had been relatively simple to follow orders, understand his men, and take action. Women, on the other hand, were a mysterious universe he might never comprehend. How did he persuade one he needed her without sounding desperate?

Remembering the kitten, he stopped at the front to pick up the basket. It smelled of lavender and sported pink ribbons, and a little black nose pushed aside a gingham cloth. He hoped it was a male cat or he’d be outnumbered.

Carrying basket and tea tray, Lucas geared up his considerable courage to approach the intrepid Miss Harriet Briggs. He needed a wife who could rescue children from barns more than he needed a lady to look pretty and make tea. He simply had to find some way of asking her.

Harriet thought about running and hiding before Lucas returned. Just the fact that she was thinking of him as Lucas instead of Major Sumner spoke much of the familiarity of her thoughts.

She had no mirror and couldn’t straighten out the frizzy mess her hair had become when the pins loosened in her climb. She shoved as much as she could inside her bonnet, then discovered she’d left her gloves in the barn. Her hands were bare, revealing her broken nails and dirt from the leather. She was an unmitigated hoyden, just as her father claimed.

Fine, then, she had nothing about which to worry. Major Sumner would not be interested in anyone as indecorous as she, so she could simply sip tea and discuss Verity’s welfare.

She hurried to rescue him from tea tray and kitten as soon as he appeared. She couldn’t help her heart from making an odd leap at the sight of the big strong man biting his lip while attempting to balance tray and swinging kitten basket at the same time. Even though he’d properly donned his Sunday cutaway coat and looked beyond dashing, the self-confident major wasn’t quite as intimidating or perfect in domesticity.

She had already dusted off the old table and now used the gingham from the kitten basket to cover it before she set the tray down. “Is Verity all settled in?” she asked nervously when he hovered too close, forcing awareness of how large he was. He’d lifted her from the ladder, while holding Verity! Her heart did another little jig.

“I think she was frightened enough to be glad of a moment alone.”

“She’s a bright child, with a strong imagination. Once you learn of what she’s capable, you’ll enjoy her company, Major Sumner,” Harriet said stiltedly. She’d been to London and had learned to make polite small talk with gentleman about the weather and the music and the company. She’d never had to pretend restraint in the village. Until now.

“Please, call me Lucas. I am no longer in the army, and after this episode, I would like to call you friend, if I might.”

She nodded and poured the tea, aware of how ugly her hands looked. “I am Harriet, although everyone calls me Harry. I fear my name is as unladylike as I am.”

“Ladylike is not a quality useful in dealing with Verity, I fear.” He sat uncomfortably in the small wrought iron chair. Even the teacup looked frail and useless in his hand.

Harriet winced at his unintended insult and sipped her tea. She was good at caring for animals but not so quick at witticism. Still, she tried. “Real ladies would not be so inclined to ruck up their dresses and climb ladders,” she agreed with innocence.

He nodded. “That is precisely what I mean. Action and quick thinking is what is required around Verity. Polite manners and pretty dresses are irrelevant.”

Thinking polite manners might prevent her from dumping the tea over his head for implying she wasn’t a lady because she could think, Harriet bit back an impolite retort. “I daresay ladies are irrelevant on all counts,” she agreed maliciously. “They are merely decorative, are they not? Rather like stained glass windows. Perhaps they should be left in church.”

He looked startled. Instead of replying, he apparently made a hasty reassessment of their exchange. “I did not mean to imply—”

“Oh, no need to apologize.” She waved away whatever he meant to say. “I’m aware of my shortcomings. Instead of sitting prettily in my parlor, I climb in haylofts and trees. I shout at dogs. I crawl about in henhouses. I will never be considered decorative, by any means!”

“As you say, decorative is for churches. I’d much rather see a woman who isn’t afraid to help a child or an animal.” He said it uneasily, as if afraid he was walking into a trap.

“One who argues,” she suggested, listing her many flaws. “And speaks up for herself. You do not prefer polite, pretty ladies who demurely nod their heads and make men swoon with a smile.”

“Exactly,” he said, apparently pleased that she understood his requirements. “I hope I am not being too forward. When I went to your father, it was because I remembered you with fondness and hoped to press my suit. But Verity. . . Verity does not make it easy for me to court in a traditional manner. You are a woman of exceptional understanding. I would like to call on you, if I might be so bold.”

“You wish to call on a woman who is not a lady, one who argues and rudely rucks up her skirts and isn’t remotely attractive enough to be decorative?” she asked in feigned astonishment, raising her eyebrows. “I think not, sir. You may call on me when Verity needs rescuing again, perhaps. Until then, I give you good day.”

Ribbons bedraggled from being crushed by an unthinking military man, Harriet rose from her chair, and head held high, sailed from the yard with bits of straw stuck to her crumpled muslin.

CHAPTER 5

Dropping his best visiting coat over a chair, Lucas rubbed his aching head. After an hour of listening to Miss Elizabeth Baker and a few of her dearest friends prattle in high-pitched voices about London fashion and the best teacakes, he was ready to stick his head in a bucket to clean out his ears. He was evidently not meant for feminine company.

He stared morosely out the kitchen door at the fields separating his cottage from the Briggs estate. He wished he understood the feminine mind. He’d thought he and Miss Briggs had reached a level where they could talk honestly. He’d hoped. . . .

But she’d thought he was insulting her, when he thought he’d been showering her with fevered compliments and his genuine delight at finding a sympathetic ear. He had porridge for brains.

He’d sent round a note of apology. He’d asked the vicar to put in a word for him. He’d spoken to the squire himself. But nothing had worked. They muttered platitudes about Miss Harriet coming around in her own time. But she was never at home when he called.

He sighed as he watched his daughter climb the back fence to gather wildflowers from the field. Verity apparently had a passion for flowers. He didn’t know one from another. A woman could help Verity grow a garden. He didn’t even know where to acquire seeds.

Perhaps he could ask Miss Briggs where one went about finding flower seeds. He could help Verity collect a bouquet, tie a ribbon about it, and deliver it as a peace offering. Or gratitude for the kitten wrecking the furniture. Verity adored the creature.

He could practice a few compliments, although he felt a fool telling her she had eyes the color of the sky and skin soft as silk. She did, but he didn’t know how to say that.

After spending an hour in the company of the village ladies, Lucas knew of a certainty that Miss Briggs was the only local woman who met his needs, all his needs. He could hire a maid to clean cat hair. He could not hire an intelligent, desirable wife, one who could keep up with Verity and not drive him mad with inanities.

He saw no reason to give up on the woman he wanted, if all that parted them was his thickheaded pride and her damnably sensitive feelings. He would not have made major had he given up and simply obeyed orders instead of thinking for himself. Which was what Miss Briggs had been telling him—although he had difficulty applying such leadership to women. He’d learn.

The day was warm and there was no sense in making his laundry more difficult by dirtying a coat while hunting flowers. With no one about to see him, he abandoned his coat and followed Verity into the field.

Verity looked up in surprise when Lucas leaned over to pick a daffodil. She laughed in delight when he handed it to her. Together, they wandered deep into the field and a wooded area, collecting a ragged assortment of blooms that might make a lady smile. Maybe.

“Do you think we should put a ribbon around these and take them to Miss Harriet?” he asked when Verity seemed to be tiring of the game.

She nodded eagerly. Lucas was about to lift her on his shoulders and carry her back to the house, when he heard an impatient shout. He might be a thickheaded oaf, but he recognized Miss Harriet’s voice.

It was coming from the pasture where the Briggs’ tenant farmer had only just loosed his bull. Did she realize that?

He shoved the bouquet into Verity’s hands. “Take these back to the house and put them in water. I’ll bring Miss Briggs to visit shortly.”

He didn’t have time to wait and see that she obeyed. He took off at a lope around the fence, racing in the direction of the Briggs’ estate. He had a feeling Miss Harriet was much like Verity, often climbing into situations from which she could not easily be extracted.

The one he found her in caused him to stumble in horror.

The redoubtable Miss Briggs had climbed over a stile on the far side of the field, in apparent pursuit of a puppy. While she was scolding the terrified hound, a ton of beef on the hoof pawed the ground and swung its massive head back and forth behind a bush, where she could not see it. Even the puppy could sense the danger and cowered on its belly amid the grass.

Lucas would strangle the woman if he did not have failure of the heart first.

He had no weapon other than himself. Trotting alongside the fence, he sought to distract the bull from the woman in unfashionably shortened riding skirts. He waved his arms to catch the animal’s attention, and when that was not sufficient, he climbed the fence and sat atop the rail, roaring curses.

Astonished, Miss Harriet looked up at his odd behavior, then turned to follow his gaze. Her eyes widened as she glanced behind her to the bull pawing the ground.

Lucas nearly fell off the rail when she grabbed the pup. The bull snorted and lowered his head at her motion.

“Don’t move!” he shouted at her. “He’s just looking for an excuse to attack.”

“I can’t very well stand here for the rest of my life,” she retorted, holding the wriggling pup.

“It will be a very short life if you move.” Too furious and terrified to be polite, Lucas leaped off the fence and began running around the bull’s rump, away from Miss Briggs.

The bull swung its head in his direction, bellowed, and charged.

Running for his life, and Harriet’s, Lucas raced across the corner of the enclosed field, reaching the hedge on the other side with the bull’s hot breath breathing down his neck. Grabbing a hawthorn branch that gave beneath his weight, he vaulted across the wizened limbs—into a mud puddle on the other side of the hedgerow.

“Major Sumner, Lucas!”

He heard Harriet’s panicked shouts as he tried to catch his breath after having knocked it out. Mud puddles were softer than the ground, but not by much.

Dainty ankles exposed, she climbed the stile, her expression gratifyingly concerned. He wanted to shake her until her teeth rattled for being so careless, but the frightened tears streaking her cheeks dampened his temper. And in the end, she had listened to his orders and stayed still.

Thankfully, she’d used her excellent head to go against his less than clear orders and escape the field the minute it was safe to do so. Dazed, he wondered if he could appoint her to be general of his household. But that wasn’t what he wanted either.

Setting the pup on the ground, she held out her hand to help Lucas up. “I am so sorry, Lucas. You are so brave! I had no idea. . . .”

She was a mess in grubby wool and tousled curls. She was an angel of concern with tears flowing down her cheeks as she offered him her bare, broken-nailed fingers.

He grabbed her hand. Admired her slender form in tawny yellow. Wanted to drive his fingers through her wild curls.

And tugged the hand she offered, yanking her into the mud wallow with him.

“You could have been killed!” he shouted. “Do you never look where you are going? Does it never occur to you that you might be more important than a damned animal?”

She spluttered, shoved her hands against his chest, and glared down at him. “What do you care? I’m just another nuisance who won’t fall in line and behave as I ought!”

He rolled her into the grass beside the mud wallow and swung over her, propping himself on his hands so he could trap her until she heard him out. “I don’t need a field sergeant! Or a decorative piece of church plaster. I need a woman, one who understands Invisible Girls and is willing to put up with Impossible Men. I need a soft woman who cuddles children and lets me pretend I’m useful. I need a woman who looks beautiful with mud in her hair and straw on her hem. And you’re the only damned one I know who fits the bill!”

She blinked, and her heavenly sky-blue eyes stared up at him in wonder. “Me? I am not beautiful. Or decorative,” she reminded him.

“Decorative is useless. Decorative sits about collecting dust. Beautiful is alive and glittering with sunshine and smelling of roses. Don’t make me speak poetry because I don’t know any.”

“I think you just did,” Harriet murmured in awe, watching the passionate play of expressions across Lucas’s strongly masculine face. She had not thought him capable of feeling anything. She had been wrong. He looked like a man in torment. In wonder, she daringly touched his jaw.

His head instantly descended to cover her lips with a kiss that heated her blood in ways she’d never known possible.

When he finally came up for air, his eyes glittered with triumph. “Marry me, Miss Briggs. Show me what I’ve missed all these years.”

Left breathless, she could scarcely gather her thoughts. “I am outside more than I am in. I am not much at supervising the laundry and housekeeping,” she warned, even though she wished to bite her tongue. “And if you are in the habit of dripping mud, I suspect you have a great need for both.”

“I suspect between the three of us, we can use an entire village of servants,” he countered. “I can command the housemaids to clean and you can command the stableboys to muck, if that is your preference.”

“I like animals and children,” she added, heart in her throat, fearful she would drive off the one man she’d ever wanted. “I will look after them before I look after the house.”

Undeterred, he planted kisses across her face. “If you will think of me and Verity as your pets, I will come courting properly. I can buy you candy. I have a bouquet for you back at the house.”

She shook her head, put a finger to her lips, and glanced sideways.

Lucas followed her gaze.

Clutching the ragged bouquet, Verity waited in the shrubbery until they noticed her. Then, holding out the flowers, she said, “Will you marry us, Miss Harriet? We love you.”

Weeping, Harriet flung herself into Lucas’s arms and let him reassure her that finally, finally she had found someone who loved and understood her, and not her dowry.

“We love you, Miss Harriet,” Lucas repeated softly, hugging her as she had longed to be hugged. “Will you love us back?”

And she nodded fiercely, speechless for possibly the first time in her life.

THE BORROWED GROOM

First published in A Wedding Bouquet, Signet Regency 5/96

The dusky light from the high church windows created an aura of stillness through the stone nave. Melanie savored the quiet, the dusk, the scent of lighted tapers, and the small bouquet of wild roses she had wrapped in her handkerchief before entering the church. She didn’t think Jane would remember flowers, but weddings ought to have beauty.

Already seated in her dark pew, she watched as the two elegant gentlemen paced the nave, and she sighed contentedly. She refused to envy her lovely older sister’s good fortune in capturing a man like Damien Langland. With her beauty, wit, and vivaciousness, Jane could grasp the world by the hand and dance with it. Surely, after marrying that old man for her first husband, she deserved a handsome young man for her second. It didn’t matter a whit that Damien, Earl of Reister, had always been the next best thing to penniless. Jane had fortune enough for both of them. And Damien not only had a title and looks, but he also possessed intelligence, character, and the kindness not to scorn his fiancée’s crippled sister.

The wooden bench made Melanie’s hip ache abominably. She should have brought a pillow but she had thought the service would be quick. She didn’t know what was keeping Jane. Surely she knew Melanie’s absence would be discovered soon and their parents would go looking for her. She was flattered and more than a little surprised that Jane had even thought to ask her as witness knowing how difficult it was for Melanie to escape their parents’ doting care. She understood Jane’s secrecy, though. Their parents had prevented this marriage once before. A penniless earl wasn’t good enough for their diamond of a daughter.

Melanie shifted uneasily again and noticed the gentlemen glancing at the closed church doors. They had arrived fashionably late. Jane was even later. Only Melanie had arrived on time. She hadn’t relished hurrying up the aisle with her clunking cane. The vicar had assured her she could remain in her pew throughout the service. She didn’t literally have to stand up with Jane, just witness the ceremony.

The vicar in his vestments excused himself to see to a parish matter, assuring them he would return as soon as he saw the carriage arrive. Melanie couldn’t blame the man for tiring of standing idly between these cold stone walls when the sunshine beckoned outside. She cast a worried glance to the anxious groom who had taken to staring at a sunbeam through the stained glass window above the altar.

The earl’s best man pulled out his pocket watch and whispered something to Damien. The earl stopped his staring long enough to check his own watch and shake his head. He wouldn’t leave yet. Melanie gave a sigh of relief. Damien wasn’t the faint-hearted sort. He would trust in Jane. Idly, she let herself drift into daydreams of herself as bride. A husband like Damien could take her to London, show her the sights, introduce her to people who would appreciate her character and not scorn her disabilities. A husband would give her freedom.

As the hour grew later, Melanie became as increasingly nervous as the groom, who now paced back and forth in front of the altar. In his cutaway frock coat and tight pantaloons, with the long tails of the coat flapping, Damien made an elegant figure as he strode back and forth. She couldn’t imagine why Jane tarried so long. She worried some accident had overcome her between here and London. She worried their parents would discover Melanie’s prolonged absence and come after her.

Occasionally, it had occurred to Melanie to wonder if her parents’ suffocating concern for her had more to do with their embarrassment at having a lame daughter than any real anxiety for her welfare. Most days, she shut off those ungrateful feelings. Today, her fear for Jane’s happiness made her resentful of her father’s refusal to allow Melanie to go anywhere.

She didn’t really think her father would prevent Jane’s marriage a second time. After all, Jane was thirty years of age now, an independent widow. Surely this time she could marry for love and happiness. Melanie didn’t know why Jane had insisted on this secrecy, or involved Melanie in it, knowing the disaster that would happen if their father found she had left the house without his knowledge. It was almost as if Jane wished the worst to happen.

Melanie breathed a sigh of relief at the sound of a carriage on the drive. And then she had the panicky thought it might be her father after all. He could still interfere with the marriage. Or he could just drag Melanie away before Jane arrived.

She had never done anything on her own in her life. From the day she had contracted the fever that had left her left leg withered and weak, her parents had hovered over her every movement. They had never returned to London, choosing to send Jane to an aunt for her Season rather than leave Melanie by herself in the country. She had never gone to London, or any farther than the village church. She had no life of her own, no friends other than those from the village thought suitable by her parents. She had wealth enough for a hundred people and nowhere to spend it since her parents saw to her every material need. She ought to be grateful, but she was twenty-five years old and as frustrated and rebellious as any adolescent.

Melanie’s hands tightened around her walking stick at the thought that the carriage’s arrival might signal an end to this precious moment of stolen freedom. It took only a moment to react to a lifetime of frustration, bringing Melanie to her feet without shyness. Damien had seen her limp before. Though five years older than she, he had visited their neighboring estate often enough that she needn’t hide from him. As she limped into the aisle, he cast her no more than a worried look when others often looked away to hide their repulsion or embarrassment. His best man gave her a friendly smile as he hurried to the church doors to escort the bride.

“Damien!” Melanie whispered urgently, catching the earl’s nervous attention. “It sounds like my father. I will have been missed by now.”

He looked momentarily alarmed, no doubt remembering the last occasion he’d had the audacity to ask the wealthy baronet for his daughter’s hand. Sir Francis respected only wealth, and the Earl of Reister had none.

“Where can Jane be?” she whispered with concern, accepting his arm to help her up the step to the raised area before the altar.

“No doubt enjoying herself too much somewhere to break away,” the earl replied bitterly. “Do not harbor any romantic illusions about this affair, Miss Melanie. Your sister and I have been old companions for too long.”

At the sound of loud voices outside the door, Melanie feared the worst. The worried look the other gentleman sent their way after he peered through the leaded glass confirmed her fears.

For this past hour or more she had sat here idly dreaming how it would feel to stand beside a well set-up gentleman like the earl and to share vows sealing them for a lifetime. It really didn’t matter to her if the earl’s flaxen hair did not curl rakishly like her daydreams, or if his classically bridged nose had a hump in it. Appearances meant little to her. She craved companionship. She craved freedom. She craved a life of her own. The Earl of Reister represented all that—only he belonged to Jane.

Almost. The earl’s friend slipped out the door to delay the family longer. No doubt her father raked the poor vicar over the coals for not notifying them at once that their poor, lame daughter had wandered loose, unaccompanied. What in heaven’s name did they think could happen to her in a church?

Outside her own anger, Melanie felt sympathy for the man beside her, dressed in his finest blue frock coat with his cravat gleaming white and elegantly starched and folded. She had always thought him handsome, but then, she admired any man who could talk to her without averting his eyes. She felt his arm stiffen beneath her fingers and knew he braced himself for the tongue-lashing to follow. She could curse Jane for her thoughtlessness. Damien deserved better. She wished she could borrow him for just a little while. Jane had so much, and she had so little . . . .

The instant she thought that, a notion of such amazing audacity overcame her that Melanie nearly staggered beneath the impact. Her father would deliver a scathing tirade no matter what they did. Why not gain some advantage for both of them out of it?

She had never uttered a bold thought in her life. She thought them all the time, but she never had anyone to speak them to. She knew she could say them to Damien. He was too devastated at the moment to scold her.

She clutched her bouquet of roses against his arm and tugged a little to gain his attention again. She saw him dart a look to the side door and knew his desire to depart, but he wouldn’t desert her to the hands of her parents. Damien wasn’t that kind of coward.

Gathering her courage, Melanie whispered, “We could walk out there now and pretend the service is already over. I think if you slip the vicar a few coins, he will keep quiet. My father is very clutch-fisted when it comes to charity. The vicar knows I had to contribute my own funds for the church roof.”

Damien looked at her, but he didn’t seem to comprehend. He wasn’t a stupid man. He just didn’t see things the same way she did. She’d had lots of experience developing devious means of escaping her father’s authority. The elegant Earl of Reister had never done a devious thing in his life. She had no doubt whatsoever that this secretive marriage was all Jane’s idea.

“We can pretend we’re married, Damien,” she explained impatiently. “We can go into London and look for Jane. My father can’t stop us if he thinks you’re my husband. I’m of age.”

“Melanie Elaine Berkeley! Have you lost your wits? If you go into London with me without benefit of vows, you will ruin your reputation. Devil take it, woman! No wonder your father keeps you on such short strings if that’s the way your mind works.”

She took no offense. Damien had always treated her like a little sister, scolding her deservedly more than once. She shrugged off his protests.

“What is a reputation for but to catch a husband?” she asked carelessly. “They’ll never let me marry. So what is the purpose of maintaining something of no value? If society scorns me, how would I know while locked up in the library staring out at the lawns day after day? I just want a little freedom, Damien. You needn’t shackle yourself to me for life. I’m not quite as wealthy as Jane, but I have enough to pay your ticks, I daresay. While Jane was spending her allowances, I was saving. I’m willing to share.”

She saw a wild look of hope and incredulity flare in his eyes, and she knew she’d finally captured his interest. “Just imagine walking out of here with me on your arm. My father’s face will fall clear to the ground. He’ll turn too purple to speak.”

A chuckle escaped the earl’s compressed lips at the picture she painted, but he immediately followed it with a frown. “Of all the irresponsible behavior—”

“You need the blunt, don’t you?” she pointed out inexorably. “And I want to see London. I don’t care how long we get away with it. I just want to see parliament, and the libraries, and a museum or two. And Hatchard’s. Maybe Elgin’s marbles. Anything, Damien. I’m quite desperate.”

He stared at her a moment or two, absorbing the despair that must have driven her to such a plea. Melanie wasn’t spectacularly beautiful like Jane, but she wasn’t hard to look upon. Her plain nut-brown hair couldn’t compare to Jane’s glorious blond tresses, but their features were similar, except Jane’s lips always smiled and laughed while Melanie’s often pulled tight with pain. Her lips quivered now while she waited for his answer, but not with laughter.

“If you mean what you say, Melanie Elaine, I’ll marry you in truth,” the earl answered fervently, covering the hand holding the roses with a strong brown grip. “Let’s depart before your father rips James into shreds.”

Melanie felt she could float down the aisle on winged feet. She heard angels sing and church bells ring as they solemnly proceeded through the empty church as if it were filled with well-wishers weeping happily. She couldn’t have felt more married had the special license had her name on it instead of Jane’s. She was going off to London with the Earl of Reister!

The scene outside dampened some of her joy, but Damien had learned a few things in the years since he’d last encountered the baronet, she realized. He took control of the situation immediately.

With a firm air of authority, he placed Melanie’s hand in the care of James. “See my lady to the carriage, please, James, while I speak to Sir Francis.”

The vicar gaped. Laughter lit his friend’s eyes as he bowed over Melanie’s hand. Sir Francis went so purple he couldn’t speak, just as Melanie had predicted.

In that brief, shocked silence, Damien turned to the vicar, pressing a small pouch of coins—the last to his name—into the vicar’s hands. “I’ll take care of her properly,” he promised with an urgency he hoped the other man understood. “The lady has told me of her love for this church. We will return often. If you ever have need of anything, you must let us know.”

The man was shrewd enough to know a bribe when he saw one, but cautious enough to check on Melanie first. When she threw him a kiss and waved before climbing into the carriage, the vicar pocketed the coins and nodded. “I’m certain you’ll do what’s proper, my lord. I’ve never known you to do elsewise.”

“Proper!” Sir Francis shouted, finally coming to his senses. “This young pup knows nothing of proper! That’s my daughter he has there! My little Melanie. He hasn’t a twig to light on and he thinks he can take care of a young female of her delicate constitution—”

“Melanie’s constitution is about as delicate as Jane’s,” Damien interrupted rudely. “It’s her leg that’s damaged, nothing else. I’ll not cosset her, for she doesn’t want it, but I’ll see her safe and happy. They aren’t always the same things, you know.”

Without waiting for any reply, Damien strode off in the direction of the waiting carriage. He’d borrowed it from another friend, the upkeep of carriages much too expensive for his hollow pockets, but it made a good appearance now. He could still hear old Francis screaming as he climbed in and James shut the door behind him. There wasn’t a damned thing the old man could do this time.

It felt good to know he’d bested the surly old goat for a change. With a smile of exaltation, Damien sat back against the squabs and turned to share his pleasure with the dainty woman beside him. As the driver took up the reins and the carriage lurched forward, he found himself looking into vivid violet eyes instead of pale blue ones. Staggered at the immensity of what he had just done, Damien wondered what in bloody hell he’d got himself into now.

“I meant what I said about marrying you.”

Melanie turned her gaze from the thrilling melee of carriages, horses, carts, and wagons threading through the London streets back to the man who had remained stoically silent most of the journey. She gave him an understanding smile and reached across the aisle to pat his arm. “You’ll marry Jane, just as you wanted. I’m certain there’s a good reason for her delay. Shall we stop at her house first and see if she’s in?”

“It’s four of the afternoon, Melanie. If she’s in London, she’s driving in the park. She has her own rig. I don’t think it wise for us to take a closed carriage into the park right now, still wearing all our travel dirt. You’d never escape the scandal. As it is, there is some chance we can keep this quiet if Jane will take you in.”

Melanie wondered if perhaps Damien was ashamed to be seen with her. She had worn her best rose-bedecked bonnet and a cunning sprigged muslin that draped her figure rather nicely, she thought, but she was well aware she looked as wilted as the roses in the seat beside her. She nodded agreement to his decision not to go to the park, but before he could give the driver directions, she disagreed with his second notion.

“Jane never invited me to visit, my lord,” she said quietly, hoping a soothing voice would make her refusal go down easier. “I would not wish to intrude where I am not wanted. I have a house of my own. My aunt left it to me. I asked the solicitor not to let it this year. I had hoped to find some way to see it for myself. Now seems an excellent opportunity.”

He’d moved to the seat across from her to give her more room as they journeyed. Now she wished he hadn’t. The position made it much too easy for her “husband” to glare at her.

“You’re near as wicked and deceitful as your sister,” he declared. “If I hadn’t happened along, who would you have chosen as victim?”

She understood that he was uneasy about his role in this charade. She didn’t know how to reassure him. The enormity of the city passing by their window overwhelmed her. Would she be able to get about by herself?

“I’m not certain,” she answered honestly. “If I could have learned to handle the ribbons, I could have taken myself off, I suppose, but father wouldn’t hear of my learning any such thing. I thought of bribing one of the stable boys to borrow the carriage and take me here, but I feared my father might have him transported or some such. Besides, they’re all terrified of him; they would never agree. But I would have found some way. I am determined to see something of the world before I retire to knitting stockings for Jane’s children for the rest of my life.”

“That certainly wouldn’t keep you busy for long,” Damien responded dryly. “Jane isn’t particularly fond of children. I can’t imagine she’ll want many.”

Melanie gave him a surprised look. “Jane couldn’t help it if George was too old and ill to father more than one child. I’m sure she’ll be happy to give you an heir or more. I’m looking forward to meeting Pamela.” She sat eagerly upright at just the thought of meeting Jane’s only child.

Damien shook his head and regarded her strangely. “When was the last time you saw your sister?”

Indignantly, Melanie replied, “She writes every chance she gets. She tells the most amusing stories! I can’t wait to see her again. What time do you think she will return from the park?”

Damien leaned forward and tapped her forehead with his finger. “You aren’t listening to me, sugar plum. When did you last actually see your sister?”

He had already given the driver directions to her own home, so Melanie didn’t resent his attitude. Men had to feel as if they had the upper hand once in a while. Still, she squirmed before giving him the answer he wanted.

“Well, she must visit her in-laws at Christmas because of Pamela,” she hedged. “And she never did have a fondness for the country. She swore she’d never return once she escaped.”

“You haven’t seen her since she married, have you?” he answered for her, leaning back against the seat with his hands on her walking stick as if it were his own.

“But she writes,” Melanie protested. “I know all about sweet little Pamela and how she looks just like Jane. It is just as good as visiting. Better, since I don’t have to listen to her argue with our father.”

Damien nodded and glanced out at the street they now traversed. Melanie could see tall stone homes adorned with expensive windows and iron fences to keep out the uninvited. This street had considerably less traffic than the others they’d traversed. They passed a stately barouche with an elderly lady being helped into it by a footman in scarlet livery. Even in her inexperience, Melanie realized they had reached a wealthier part of town.

“We’re almost there, I think,” Damien murmured, not looking at her. “Will you have servants in residence?”

“The caretaker and his wife. We can hire some tomorrow.” She watched him anxiously. “You do know how to hire servants, don’t you? I have no notion at all.”

He finally sent her that warm smile she remembered so well. “You’ve left your wits to let, gosling. I’ll see if I can borrow someone’s chambermaid for the night so you can pretend you have some sort of chaperonage. I’ll come back around in the morning, and we’ll talk of hiring a real companion for you then.”

Alarmed, Melanie stared at him. “You’re not staying? You’ll leave me alone with complete strangers? You can’t do that, Damien Langland.” She hesitated instantly, realizing of course he could do that. They weren’t really married. She’d let her daydreams get the better of her. A feeling of mixed resentment and fear welled up within her as she realized Damien had no obligation whatsoever to continue this charade. Fear was a great motivator, however. Shrewdly, she asked, “Have you somewhere to go? You must have thought you would be returning to Jane’s.”

She caught the earl’s bleak expression before he carefully shuttered it behind his gentlemanly demeanor. If her lameness had taught her nothing else, it had taught her to sit quietly and watch how people really felt. Damien was in hot water right now. She sensed it immediately.

“I have friends. You needn’t worry, Melanie. I’ve been on my own for quite some time now. I fend for myself.”

Melanie set her lips and ignored this foolishness. “Well, I haven’t and I can’t. Come in with me now so I don’t look a complete ninnyhammer. We’ll send someone around to Jane’s house to see if she’s there and what she wants us to do. If she’s not there, there’s no reason we can’t continue this a little longer. I can’t get about London on my own, and it is rather senseless for me to come all this way and not see the sights. Couldn’t we pretend just a little longer, Damien?”

As the carriage halted before a stately town house, Damien gave her a long, thoughtful look that made her shiver in her shoes. She’d never noticed how long-lashed and brown his eyes were until they seemed to penetrate her very soul. She feared he wouldn’t very much like what he saw there.

“Melanie, you are twenty-five years of age and perfectly cognizant of what will happen shall I stay here with you. Jane left me standing at the church today, so I owe her no obligation. No one knows of our betrothal. We never announced it. I am perfectly free to marry you. Since, as you have obviously surmised, I am in dire need of the ready, I am more than willing to marry you instead of Jane. Actually, had I thought of it sooner, I might have sought you first, but Jane knows the way of things and you’re an innocent. I hate to tar you with the same disillusionment that we suffer. After spending some time in London and in my company, you may wish you had never come. I would not tie you or your dreams to someone of my ilk if it can be prevented. If I go into that house with you now, I go in as your husband, with all the accompanying folderol. I will allow you some time to decide if this is what you want, and if you choose otherwise, we’ll find some way to get you free of both me and your parents. But I warn you now, I will spend these next weeks trying to persuade you that we should wed in truth. I have sunk just about as low as a man can go, Melanie. I’m quite capable of seducing an innocent at this point.”

Melanie felt a momentary frisson of alarm at the warning tone of his voice, but then she looked up and saw Damien’s familiar face—neither threatening nor seductive—and she relaxed a little. No man would want her for a wife when Jane was available. He was just being gentlemanly as usual. She managed a smile and took back her walking stick. “That sounds quite enticing, Damien. Shall we begin?”

A shadow of a smile curled his lip, and he shook his head at her obstinacy, but he climbed down from the carriage and helped her alight.

When the caretaker opened the door, Damien caught Melanie’s waist in a strong grasp, stooped to catch her behind the knees, and literally swept her off her feet to carry her across the threshold. So totally startled by his action that she nearly dropped her cane, Melanie managed to grasp it with one hand while clinging to Damien’s strong shoulders with the other. She had never thought of Damien’s greater height and weight in comparison to her own smaller stature. The manner in which he casually carried her into her own home made the differences terrifyingly clear. It was a good thing she wasn’t afraid of Damien.

As it was, he left her so breathless she couldn’t speak to the astonished servant stepping back from the door. Damien had to do the honors.

“We realize we have caught you unprepared, but my lady needs to rest and wash after her journey. Some clean linen and hot water, if you would. We will make amends later.” He spoke courteously but with firm authority, never doubting that the poor man could produce what he wanted without question or complaint.

Marveling at the ease with which he took command, not only of her house and her servants, but herself, Melanie grew restive in Damien’s hold. He declined to put her down but carried her up the stairs, following the caretaker to a room adorned in Holland covers. By this time, the caretaker’s wife had appeared, taken in the situation, and started stripping back the linens.

“We were not apprised of your arrival, Miss Berkeley,” the woman said breathlessly, hurrying to ball up the huge sheets and remove them to the hallway, “or we would have hired staff and had all prepared.” She sent them a look of curiosity over her shoulder.

Once Damien set her down, Melanie could speak again, but he spoke for her. “Miss Berkeley is now the Countess of Reister. You need not apologize for lack of preparation. We will see about staff in the morning, or if you know of a few willing to come in this evening, send around for them. We will fend for ourselves for now.”

Melanie watched in amazement as he drove the servants out, leaving her alone in a strange bedchamber with this man who had suddenly begun acting suspiciously like a husband. Wide-eyed, she watched as he turned to her. She watched for an amorous or determined glint in his eyes, remembering his warning all too clearly. It had never occurred to her that Damien might take advantage of the situation to do that to her. She didn’t think any gentleman had any such inclination toward a cripple like herself. An odd feeling crept through her midsection as he inspected her with hooded gaze.

Then he nodded, gave a smile of approval, and indicated a delicate blue velveteen chair. “Sit, gosling. I’ll not woo you yet, although I admit, I felt quite possessive carrying you up those stairs like that. Is that how a husband feels, do you think? You roar so loudly sometimes, I thought you much stouter than you are. You’re a veritable feather.”

She gave this ingenuous monologue a look of suspicion, but took the chair offered so he might sit. “Don’t you begin treating me like some fragile piece of porcelain,” she warned him. “I am quite stout. It is just that my one leg is weaker and slightly shorter than the other. It tires me to walk any distance hobbling about like that.”

He took a large wing chair across the fireplace from her and regarded her through narrowed eyes. “A horse’s gait can be corrected with the proper shoes. I see no reason we cannot do the same with people. You’ll have to see a modiste first thing in the morning. You have no clothes. We’ll find a bootmaker at the same time.”

Melanie brushed aside the mention of boots but smiled with delight at the idea of new clothes. “I will have my choice of the latest London fashions! That hadn’t occurred to me. Oh, Damien, do you know the very best modiste? Or will Jane? I want to feel like the best dressed female in all London. The Countess of Reister ought to be, don’t you agree?” Then reining in this pleasant fantasy, she added, “Should you go ’round to Jane’s now? We really can’t continue this silliness until we know what happened to her.”

“I know perfectly well what happened to her,” Damien replied dryly, “but I shall go around and verify it for your sake. Have a bit of a rest, and I’ll see what your caretakers can do about summoning up some food. Do they have a household account?”

From that, Melanie quickly deduced that bribing the vicar had cost Damien his last coin. For a proud man, that must be an embarrassing circumstance. She nodded toward the reticule she had left on the night table. “The grocers and such send the bills to my solicitor for payment. I don’t believe the Harrises have much coin. I certainly have enough for a meat pie or two. I had hoped to find Jane a pretty present in the village, but I got away too late.”

Nodding curtly, he rose and emptied the reticule into his pocket. “As a fortune hunter, I soon must become used to this, but for now, I shall just relish the thought that I am spending Jane’s wedding gift on something that we will appreciate more than she would.”

He walked out, leaving Melanie with little opportunity to find words of reassurance. She ached for the pain he must feel, finding some similarity with her own. In a way, they were both handicapped, but Damien’s disability crippled his pride more than hers. She had grown accustomed to pitying looks. He never would. She must find some way to help him stand on his own, as she did.

Damien watched with amusement as his new “wife” exclaimed over the multitudinous bolts of cloth set before her. She behaved as if he had just given her Christmas a hundred times over. Silks and satins, velvets and muslins lay scattered around her chair in a rainbow of colors, and still she squealed with delight each time the modiste brought forth a new one. He hadn’t known spending someone else’s money could be so pleasant.

He knew himself for a cad and a bounder, an unscrupulous fortune hunter with every intention of trapping this enchanting innocent in his web. He’d thought he’d lowered himself as far as he could go by persuading Jane she would make an excellent countess, that the title would add to her prestige. He and Jane were two of a kind, predators in the society that fed them. He had come to loathe her as much as he loathed himself, but he needed the money and she was the quickest way to it. To substitute Jane’s innocent sister for Jane was the most caddish thing he could do, but it was too late to turn back now. Jane had escaped his net. Melanie wouldn’t.

He rationalized his actions by telling himself he would do everything in his power to make her happy, but he knew ultimately, he would destroy that happiness. It couldn’t happen any other way. The reason he needed Melanie and her money would be the very thing that destroyed her.

Still, he would give her what he could, while he could. She had time to run away. The one thing he wouldn’t do was take her to his bed until the vows were said. He could seduce her with a million little lies, but not the final one. He would return her whole to her parents if she chose against him. Unless he behaved like the cad he was, he didn’t think she would go against him. Melanie had a loving heart. She would have him.

As they left the modiste and headed for the bootmakers, she looked up at him anxiously. “Should we check at Jane’s again? Perhaps she has had second thoughts and returned home.”

He’d told her Jane had left for an extended stay with a friend in Hampshire. In reality, he’d returned to his former rooms and found a message in Jane’s furious scribbles calling him every name in the book and some he hadn’t heard before. Some bastard had obviously revealed his little secret ahead of schedule. Damien wondered who hated him that much. Or perhaps the fates worked against him, as they always had. He wondered how to keep the apostles of fate away from Melanie. Keeping Jane away from Melanie wasn’t any problem. She’d gone to Hampshire just as he’d said, only the friend she went with wasn’t female.

“Jane may send ’round a note when she returns,” Damien answered doggedly. “I have sent the appropriate announcements to the papers of our marriage. Your father will be expecting them. I daresay you’ll hear from Jane then.” It took every ounce of his pride to keep from asking her to marry him in truth again. He didn’t know what Jane would do when she discovered her little sister had fallen into his clutches.

“It’s so unlike Jane.” Melanie fretted beside him. “Are you quite certain the note was in her writing? Perhaps someone has abducted her to keep her from marrying you. I know she must still love you. I just cannot understand this at all. Are you sure we shouldn’t wait a while on those announcements? She will simply be devastated if she sees them before we have time to explain.”

Damien leaned forward and tipped her chin upward so she met his gaze. She had the most amazing heart-shaped face, with wide violet eyes and the sweetest lips when they weren’t pursed with concern as they were now. He wondered what she would do if he kissed her. He had no wish to diminish his prospects by rushing his fences. He merely brushed his thumb reassuringly over her bottom lip and watched it tremble. Good. She wasn’t immune to desire.

“You have not seen your sister in ten years, sugar plum. I assure you, Jane knows precisely what she is doing. We meant to marry this time around for the same reasons we meant to marry the first time: my title and her money. I don’t like to hurt your dreams, Melanie, but love is not a commodity easily traded in society’s market. Should you and I marry, the trade is the same one, only perhaps I can earn my way a little better with you since I can also trade experience. Jane never needed that.”

She gave him one of those shrewd looks that reminded Damien all too uncomfortably of her papa, and he removed his hand from her chin, sitting back in his seat. He knew she’d led a sheltered life. Her parents had seen to that. He just kept forgetting that innocent face disguised an all too creative mind.

“You are trying very hard to name yourself cad, Damien. A true cad wouldn’t, you know. You ought to be whispering loving sentiments and stealing kisses about now. I’m certain I’m as susceptible to both as any other maiden.”

He laughed. He couldn’t help himself. He wanted to hug and kiss her and tell her he never was such a fool as to try to get past her. But he was, and he would, and she just made it that much more challenging with remarks like that.

“I shall do just that, if you wish, my lady. I aim to please. Shall we visit the bootmakers first or just repair to the park where I shall start on those kisses?”

“The bootmakers,” she announced firmly. “I wish to be quite splendid before you’re seen about with me.”

By the time they returned to the house late that afternoon, Melanie felt quite drained. She refused to acknowledge her exhaustion to Damien who had become more pensive as the day wore on. She knew she had spent an enormous amount in just a few short hours, but she thought it vindicated a lifetime of saving. He really shouldn’t worry. She had more than enough for herself and whatever debts he’d run up. She supposed they should have gone to the bankers first, but the temptation of new clothes had diverted all good intentions. Besides, she kept waiting for her father to appear, roaring over his discovery of their lack of marriage lines. Or for Jane to come back and fall at their feet to plead her love and apologies. She just really couldn’t believe all this was happening and wanted to grasp every opportunity as it was offered.

A groan from Damien made her look up from her ruminations to discover where his thoughts had strayed. When she saw he’d covered his eyes with his hand, she glanced out the window.

Strangers sat on her doorstep. Not elegant strangers, although she couldn’t imagine even Damien’s rakish friends stooping to sitting on a doorstep. These men wore round hats and garish waistcoats and smug grins as the carriage approached. They very much seemed to be waiting for them. Melanie sent Damien a questioning look.

“The cent percenters,” he groaned. “They’ve come to collect already. Someone at the papers must have tipped them off. I’m sorry, Melanie. I’d meant to fob them off a while longer so you wouldn’t need to see them.”

“Oh, you mean loan sharks!” She looked out the window with curiosity at the smug, smiling faces grinning up at them. One man had a nose that looked as if someone must have battered it extensively. Another had a decidedly ugly red scar down the side of his face. Despite their smiling exteriors, she feared these were very rough men, indeed. “Well, I suppose it’s too late to visit the bankers. You will have to tell them to send their bills ’round to my solicitor in the morning.”

Damien gave her a look of amazement. “You don’t even know the extent of my debt. Why should you pay what you do not owe for someone who isn’t really your husband?”

“Do you gamble?” she asked with upraised brows.

“With what?” he asked dryly. “With my life, with my good name, with my family’s reputation? Yes, I do that. But with money? I haven’t any.”

“Then once these debts are paid, we’ll have only our living expenses, won’t we? It seems fair trade to me. Your time must be worth a great deal, and I mean to claim a good lot of it while I can.”

“You make me feel lower than a snake’s belly,” he growled, flinging open the door. “Stay inside while I clear this lot away.”

With a few curt words he had them scattering. Damien had a very forceful way about him when called upon, Melanie noted with almost as much satisfaction as trepidation. She had always thought of him as something of an elegant rattle, but he’d changed these last years. She’d encountered him once or twice in the village when he visited his family, but she’d not really noticed the changes until now. When he returned to lift her from the carriage, her heart did a strange little flip-flop inside her chest.

“I’m sorry to have embarrassed you like that, Melanie. I meant for your first day in London to be special.”

He didn’t murmur the words softly and sweetly in her ear but announced them coldly, as if by keeping his distance he could pretend they came from someone else. She thought he meant them. He just didn’t want to admit it to himself. She didn’t know what to make of that, so she ignored it all.

“I can’t remember ever having more fun,” she said sincerely as they entered the house. “I feel like a fairy princess with a dashing prince for escort.”

He gave her a flicker of a smile as he helped with her pelisse. “Perhaps you ought to just keep me about for storybook time and pretend I’m not here otherwise. We might rub along quite well that way.”

She frowned as she tried to determine the meaning behind that. She knew her own parents went their own ways most of the time. The only time she ever saw them in the same room together was when they entertained, or at dinner occasionally. They each had their own friends and pastimes. She had neither. Perhaps that’s what he was telling her: he had friends and interests that he would pursue when she didn’t want him around. She supposed she couldn’t expect him to always be at her beck and call.

She didn’t have time to dwell on this discovery. Mr. Watson, the caretaker, had hurried up to take their walking sticks and Melanie’s pelisse. “The others are awaiting your convenience, my lord, my lady. Where do you wish to see them?”

Melanie blinked, unable to comprehend this request, but Damien seemed to have no problem. He gave her a concerned look and asked, “Do you wish me to do the hiring? You look as if you need a rest. Just tell me how many you want and I’ll do what I can, but you’ll have to choose your own personal maid.”

The servants. Of course. Mr. Watson had called in staff. She really didn’t wish to have to make these decisions now, but she couldn’t make Damien do it all. Besides, she needed to learn the duties of a wife. Running a household was one of them.

She nodded reluctantly. “Just give me time to freshen myself, and I will join you.”

Mrs. Watson had stripped off the covers in the salon. Melanie found Damien there a little while later. Damien sipped at tea while perusing a list of staff the caretaker had provided. He looked up at her entrance and smiled, but she saw a lingering look of concern behind his eyes. She wondered if her appearance made her look haggard, or if something else bothered him.

“Is it an enormous undertaking?” she asked, taking a chair beside the tea table and serving herself.

“An expensive one. I should not think we’d need half these people.” He handed her the list.

We. He’d said we, as if he truly thought of them as a couple. Melanie danced a quiet little jig in her head while pretending to study the list. It seemed quite reasonable to her. She handed it back to him. “I cannot say I have a good grasp of my worth, my lord, nor do I have a sound understanding of my future income. I just know that my trust allots me more than I have ever been able to spend, and the cost of these few people will not change that to any degree. I should think it our duty to employ the less fortunate and keep them off the streets.”

Grimly, he rang for Watson. “I think we had best visit your bankers as soon as possible. You cannot go along in complete ignorance forever.”

She wanted to ask him what he knew of investments and such, but Watson showed in the first maid, and they had no time for further privacy. The only thing she accomplished in the next few hours was to make certain her own personal maid was young and cheerful and nothing like the elderly termagant she’d left behind who reported everything to her parents. Since Damien assured her he had managed to keep his own valet over all these years, she relaxed and watched him question the rest of the staff. She really would have been lost without him, she decided, as he turned away a handsome young footman who gazed on her with interest. She would have hired the fellow for his jolly smile.

Before the next person could enter, she whispered across the tea table to him, “Why did you turn him away? He seemed quite a nice young man.”

“Because he worked for Lady Douton last,” Damien answered enigmatically, ticking off one more position on his list.

“That is a fault? I should think that meant he had experience.”

Damien looked up with a sigh of exasperation. “Melanie, I’m not about to explain the deviations of an evil-minded woman to an innocent such as yourself. Just leave it understood that the man had ambitions above and beyond his duties as footman.”

She didn’t understand, and she didn’t like being treated like a simpleton, but she realized he protected her because she was a maiden and not a wife. Wives apparently had a great deal of understanding of the world simply due to whatever the marriage act entailed. Melanie had only vaguely wondered about that in the past because she had long since given up any dreams of becoming a wife. Now entire new horizons opened before her. Damien said he would have her as a wife. She still didn’t quite believe him, but the possibility existed for the first time in her life. She might actually learn the secrets of the marriage bed. The thought so amazed her that she scarcely noticed who Damien hired after that.

When the room cleared of the last potential servant, Damien turned and gave her another of his concerned looks. “I’ve exhausted you, haven’t I? I should have sent you to your room to rest.”

Finally waking from her trance, Melanie shook her head. “No, not at all. I am just learning that freedom involves a great deal of responsibility. I had never thought about it clearly.”

He gave her an approving smile. “Some people never learn that, I fear. They live for the moment and ignore the results of their actions.”

She thought he might be speaking of Jane, but she didn’t want to hear a word against her sister. She knew Jane had always been the tiniest bit selfish, but their parents had made her so, doting on her as they had. But Jane had never hurt anyone. She just knew how to enjoy herself more than Melanie did. She couldn’t find a flaw in that.

Damien stood and helped her from the chair. She found herself standing much too close to him, but he didn’t back away as was proper. He continued holding her hand and looking down at her with an expression she couldn’t quite read.

“If the modiste delivered that gown as promised, would you care to go to the theater with me this evening? I’ll send one of our newly hired footmen to a friend of mine for his box seats, if you’d like.”

Any thoughts of exhaustion vanished. With a cry of delight, Melanie hugged his neck. As she limped hurriedly from the room to check on the gown, Damien watched her leave, a look of sadness haunting his eyes.

“Last night was the very best night of my life. I have never seen anything so absolutely marvelous,” Melanie said with satisfaction as she sat back upon the carriage squabs the next day after Damien had paid off his debts.

Damien gave her an indulgent look as he took the seat across from her. “You have never been to the theater in your entire life,” he reminded her. “You are scarcely a fair judge.”

She pouted playfully. “Then you shall have to take me every night to a different production so I might become one. Shall we go to the Drury tonight?”

Damien shook his head. “After the announcements appear in the paper today, you will find your drawing room deluged with callers and invitations. We will be the current gossip sensation. I think an evening of rest is called for while we choose our next battlefield carefully.”

Melanie’s eyes widened. “Invitations? I don’t know anyone yet. I haven’t been presented. I haven’t had a come out. Why would anyone send invitations?”

Damien just continued to shake his head at this ingenuousness. “You really do have crackers for wits, don’t you? Perhaps I ought to find a place in the country and abscond with you there. Perhaps if I keep you to myself for a while, you’ll see what an eminently wonderful husband I will be.”

“You are already an eminently wonderful husband, albeit a borrowed one. Jane is the one with crackers for wits. Surely once she sees the announcements she’ll return and all will be right again. I just hope it takes a few days for the papers to reach her. I really am enjoying this much too much.” She gave him a look of inquiry. “However do you mean to explain to the world that actually Jane is your countess and not me? Perhaps we ought to stay out of society until it is all straightened out. You could say the papers made a misprint.”

“If I were not content to have you as my countess, I would not have put the announcements in the paper, Melanie,” he informed her firmly. “You may deny it as much as you wish, but in the eyes of the world, you’re mine. You need only say the word and we’ll make it so in the eyes of God, also.”

“Faradiddle,” she said tartly as the carriage drew to a halt in a narrow city street. “You cannot take a cripple as wife. I cannot dance or ride or do any of those things your countess ought to do. I’m just being shamelessly selfish while I have the opportunity. I’m perfectly aware you’ll return to Jane the moment she snaps her fingers. I’ll quietly disappear from the picture when that time comes.”

Exasperated, Damien didn’t open the carriage door but glared at her. “If you have so little confidence in me, what are we doing at your solicitor’s? You will have a hard time explaining that to him when Jane returns and you turn me over to her.”

She scowled at him. “You’re not a pet dog. You said you would help me learn about my investments. He’s much more likely to answer questions from you than from me. We’ll just brush it off as a jest by bored nobility later. Who is he to argue? He works for me.”

He didn’t try to explain that she played right into his hands every time she introduced him to another person as her husband. He ought to feel more remorse at trapping her so callously, but as he sat before her solicitor’s desk a while later, he decided his trusting wife actually needed someone like him to look after her.

With incredulity, Damien flung the list of investments back on the desk and slammed his palm against them. “She is not making enough interest on these to stay ahead of rising costs! At this rate, you’ll have her living off assets in a year or two. Devil take it, man! You’ve got her invested like an old lady of ninety-three.”

The bespectacled man behind the desk squirmed, cast a glance to Melanie who merely watched the scene with interest, then returned his attention to the Earl of Reister. “Of course, we always understood. . . ” He squirmed some more, then looked again at a radiantly healthy Lady Reister. “Her father always made it plain. . . Well, we thought the lady an invalid, my lord. And since she never spent what she earned, it seemed unnecessarily risky to invest in anything but certain income.”

They’d thought her at death’s door. Grimly accepting that explanation, Damien stood and pulled Melanie up with him. “I’ll expect you and your banker in my office by tomorrow with a better plan of action than this. I have a few suggestions of my own I will make at that time. The lady will need to live off her income in the future, so keep that in mind.”

The solicitor coughed into his hand as they prepared to depart. Damien turned and raised a questioning eyebrow.

“Ahem. There is the matter of the marriage lines, my lord. We will need them for confirmation that the lady’s fortune is now in your hands. There are transfers to be made, you understand.”

Damien gave a curt nod, placed a hand at Melanie’s waist, and steered her out. He’d known the subject would arise. He had just hoped it could be postponed for a while. The awful danger of this scheme tumbling down on his head still loomed. Melanie might not realize it, but this charade rested on a house of cards that could blow away with any gust of wind. He wondered how he would persuade the archbishop to change the name on the special license he still carried in his pocket.

Melanie glanced up at him uncertainly as they entered the carriage. “Does that mean we can’t change the investments until we have the marriage lines drawn?”

“You would do better to look at it another way, gosling. Once I persuade you to the altar, everything you own becomes mine. Are you ready to run back to your papa yet?”

She stared at his blank expression with concern. “This gets very complicated, does it not? I’m of age. If we tell him we left our marriage papers with my father, will he let me sign the transfers until he receives them?”

“Not if you insist on saying you’re married. I’ll just go over with him the changes I want made, and you can make them if you decide to heave me out. I think I can earn my keep in the meantime just by increasing your return on investments. I wouldn’t have thought your father would have been so bumble-headed.”

Melanie shrugged. “The fortune came mostly through my mother’s family, and he paid it little mind. He gave Jane a generous dowry when she married in addition to her own fortune.” She gave him a wry smile. “Marriage papers or not, I don’t think he’ll do the same for us. It’s not as if we asked his permission or anything.”

“I’m sorry, Melanie. Your generous act of saving me from myself will cost you more than you can understand. I wish I knew how to make myself a better man for your sake.”

She gave him an appraising look. “I wonder how I should go about improving you? You are already dangerously good-looking. Any more so, and I would have to fear fighting off all the ladies in London for you.” She ignored the way his eyebrows rose in surprise. “You take no exception to my lameness. I have yet to find a man capable of that particular piece of goodness. You are not a gambler or wastrel that I can discern. You are intelligent and not a coward. You have dealt very well with my domestic and financial problems. In what way could I improve you, sir?”

He was grinning now, laughing at her, she supposed, but she could not slight on honesty. Other than the fact that he wanted her beautiful sister, she could not think of a better man for husband.

“All right. You have me convinced. If you will not have me, I shall go into the marriage mart believing I am superior to all others. I will not need Jane. I shall no doubt find wealthy women aplenty ready to throw their fortunes at my feet.”

“Don’t be facetious,” she returned, disgruntled. “I am only saying we are in this equally. Neither of us is perfect.”

Since she had absolutely no idea how imperfect he was, Damien kept silent. When they returned to the house, he helped her inside, then departed to go about some long-neglected business. Knowing he had no right to the money in his pocket, he still went off with a lighter heart than before.

Melanie welcomed the opportunity for a few hours of her own. Accustomed to loneliness, she didn’t know how to act with so many people about and so many things to do. As she took off her hat, a maid rushed in to ask if she wished all the covers in the house lifted, or if she wished some of the rooms closed off for now. Declaring boldly that she would have all the covers lifted, she limped up the stairs to her own chambers. She would like to see some of the ancient fabrics changed in there, but she hesitated about redecorating those rooms first. If she truly entertained the fantasy of marrying Damien, they would share the master chambers at the other end of the corridor. Now that she’d directed those rooms uncovered, it would look odd if she didn’t see to them first. The servants would expect them to have adjoining rooms.

That thought made her exceedingly nervous. With the intention of overcoming her foolish fears, Melanie made her way down to the dark back chambers where maids were already dusting and polishing and sweeping. Someone had decorated the master’s room in heavy browns and golds that faded with too much light. For that reason, apparently, they’d kept the draperies drawn. She ordered the draperies pulled back and the windows opened to air out this room while she inspected it.

If they were truly married, she’d ask Damien how he would like the room furnished. They could go out to the warehouses together. But if he had no intention of staying, it would be foolish to waste money on changing anything. She would never use this room on her own. The huge bed on the raised dais alone intimidated her. Or perhaps the thought of what must happen on that bed to make a marriage scared her.

She had no illusions about her lameness. Damien had had her fitted for a boot that would keep her from limping quite so much. She appreciated the gesture, but it did not undo the fact that the leg in question was twisted and ugly. Men didn’t like taking ugly women to bed. She supposed Damien might do it for the necessary heir if they married, but then he would find someone whole and perfect with whom to spend his time. She didn’t think she could bear that.

No, better that she find Jane and bring the two estranged lovers together. She just hoped Jane would be forgiving when she discovered what Melanie had done.

She informed Mr. Watson that she would not be at home to visitors today. She had no desire to meet perfect strangers without Damien at her side. She didn’t know if she ought to meet them until the matter of Jane got straightened out. She had only envisioned the freedom of seeing London. She had never dreamed of entering society as a countess. Her one act of rebellion had landed her into hot water deeper than she had ever dreamed.

But she wasn’t yet ready to give it up. She hadn’t seen all of London yet. She hadn’t gone driving in the park. She wanted to see the opera and the circus. Perhaps Damien would take her to Hatchard’s when he returned. If she only had a few days to enjoy this freedom, she would squeeze in everything she could.

She didn’t even bother to go down and inspect the cards that had arrived while she hid on the upper floors. They were Damien’s friends. He could decide what to do with them. She happily made lists of changes she wished to make in her new home.

When Watson actually came upstairs to knock on her sitting-room door, Melanie glanced up from her desk with surprise. “What is it, Watson?” She’d already approved the cook’s menu, directed Mrs. Watson to the rooms she wished cleaned first, and given orders for the dinner hour. What else could they possibly need of her?

“There is a personage at the door, my lady,” Watson intoned formally. “She insists that she must see you.”

Melanie’s hand instantly went to her hair. “Jane? Has Jane come?” She wished more of her new gowns had arrived. She wanted Jane to see her as a sensible adult, not the child she remembered.

“I don’t believe so, my lady. She says her name is Pamela, and the hackney driver is awaiting payment.”

Pamela! Pamela was just a baby. This couldn’t be. Surely Pamela was with Jane. Or her nanny. Or someone besides a hackney driver! Thoroughly bemused, Melanie started to leap from her chair, and caught herself on the desk when her weak leg wouldn’t allow such a hasty movement. Cursing softly, she emptied some coins from the desk drawer where she had placed them this morning, and dumped them in Watson’s hand. “Pay the driver, Watson, I’ll be there directly.” She let him take the stairs at a faster pace than she could manage.

When she finally arrived in the foyer, a child of immense girth wearing a straw hat with ribbons streaming down her back watched her from small eyes lost in a pudgy face. Melanie could only stare. Surely this. . . exceptionally large child could not be Jane’s precious little baby.

“You must be my Aunt Melanie,” the child stated with satisfaction. “I have come to live with you.”

Melanie thought she might sink to the chair beside the hall table to catch her breath at this declaration, but she thought better of it. The child didn’t look scared, but surely adults shouldn’t show weakness at moments like this. Taking a deep breath, she asked, “Where is your nanny, Pamela?”

“Oh, I got rid of her a long time ago,” she said with that same satisfaction. “And I told the maid that I received a letter from you asking me to come. Mama read me your letters. You do want me to come, don’t you?”

Oh, my. Oh, dear. Melanie looked helplessly to Watson, who remained as stoic as ever, seemingly not heeding this conversation at all. She glanced back at the child who didn’t look at all like the lovely Jane of her memory except for the long blond curls. Despite the child’s much too adult complacence, she sensed a certain wariness behind those small eyes now. Without another thought, Melanie offered her hand.

“Why, of course. I have wanted to meet you for ever so long now, just as I’ve said in my letters. Let us go up and find you a room, and then we shall have a nice coze over tea, shall we?”

She could practically see the miniature giant fight back an expression of relief as she nodded haughtily and took her offered hand. When Melanie used her cane to help her up the stairs, the child looked at her with interest. “Mama said you was a cripple, but you have a stick to help you walk. Does it have a sword in it like Lord Aberdeen’s?”

Leave it to a child to consider a handicap as something excitingly innovative. Melanie bit back a smile and answered seriously, “No. One needs two good feet to fence with a sword. How did you know to come here?”

“I heard the maids whispering that Lord Reister had married Mama’s sister. When he came to call, I went down and took his card. He’d scribbled this address on the back. I showed it to the driver, and he took me right here,” she answered proudly.

Alarmed at the precociousness of a child who could only be. . . Melanie tried to count back. Nine? Surely not already. Jane always spoke of her as an infant. But she’d been married ten years ago. . . Shaking her head, she returned her thoughts to the child now following her down the corridor. “That was a very dangerous thing to do,” she warned in her sternest voice. “Ladies never go out by themselves. Hackney drivers might sell them to the gypsies if they catch them alone. Don’t ever, ever do that again. Do you understand me?”

She could see obstinacy welling up in Pamela’s face, but Melanie refused to back down. She didn’t know who had responsibility for raising this entirely too clever child, but someone had to put a firm foot down. “I want your promise, Pamela. If you’re to stay with me until your mama returns, you have to listen to what I say. Even grown-up ladies daren’t go out in the city by themselves. We could have lost you. Do you know how unhappy that would have made me? I’ve wanted to meet you forever, but what if the gypsies had stolen you before I could?”

“You could have come to meet me sooner,” she answered defiantly, her bottom lip stuck out. “Nobody comes to visit me.”

Melanie handed the child into a chair in her sitting room, then rang for a maid. “One is supposed to wait until invited before visiting. Your mama knew I couldn’t come, so she didn’t invite me. Would you like some tea?”

The child’s face brightened immediately. “Oh, yes, please. Will we have little cakes? I love the ones with thick frosting Cook makes.”

Cakes with heavy frosting were definitely not what this child needed. How could Jane let her eat so inappropriately? Or had Jane even noticed what her child ate if she was not there to supervise the meals?

Not wanting to think a thought that sounded too much like something Damien might say, Melanie ordered the maid to bring up some lemonade and watercress sandwiches.

Pamela’s expression immediately grew mutinous. “I wanted cakes. I don’t like nasty old watercress. And I like tea with lots of sugar. And cream. Nanny says cream is good for the complexion.”

“Sugar is bad for the complexion. It makes it all spotty. And my cook doesn’t know how to make cakes because I can’t eat them. We shall have strawberries for dessert if you eat your sandwich all up.”

Torn between the desire to have her way and curiosity at the lady who couldn’t eat cakes, Pamela wiggled restlessly in her chair. “Why can’t you eat cakes?” she asked.

Good question. Lying to a child wasn’t as easy as she thought. Frantically, Melanie tried to come up with a reasonable answer that wouldn’t pull her deeper into a web of deceit.

“Because if she gets too fat, she won’t be able to climb the stairs,” a voice from the door responded. “Hello, Pamela, what brings you here?”

The child in the chair brightened perceptibly, turning to peer around the chair’s wing to investigate the newcomer. “Damien!” she cried happily, leaping from her perch and rushing to meet him.

With ease, he caught all six stone flung at him, whirling the child up in his arms before depositing her back in the chair where she belonged. Amazed at the lordly gentleman so at ease with the difficult girl, Melanie sat back and watched as Damien placed both hands on the chair wings and trapped Pamela between them.

“Now tell me what you are doing here. Did your mama bring you?”

Pamela immediately became belligerent, crossing her arms over her chest and glaring back. “No, and the gypsies didn’t sell me either. I’m going to stay with Aunt Melanie. She told me I could.” She didn’t even look at Melanie for confirmation.

Neither did Damien. He merely stared disapprovingly at the child. “That is very good of your Aunt Melanie, but she doesn’t know what a spoiled little brat you are. If you’re staying here, you will have to behave yourself. You’ll do exactly what your Aunt Melanie tells you, or I’ll personally paddle your little bottom.”

“You would not dare!” she shouted back. “My mama said she would shoot your brains out if you take one hand to me, Damien!”

Shocked, Melanie could only stare. Damien had no right to punish the child, although admittedly, the child needed firm guidance of some sort. But Damien’s behavior was no less shocking than Pamela’s. She’d never heard a child talk to an adult so. And how could she possibly have heard Jane say such a horrible thing?

“Then if you want your mama’s protection, you can go right back to her,” Damien informed her. “I will not have any spoiled brats in my house.”

Deciding this was the point where she ought to interfere, Melanie interrupted, “I’m certain Pamela isn’t a brat, Damien. She just misses her mama. Now have a seat, do. We’re just about to take tea.”

Damien straightened and gave her a glare. “You have no idea. . . .”

“I’m certain I will soon enough,” she interrupted before he could continue. “Pamela’s nanny has apparently left her with a maid, so she is more than welcome to stay with us until her mama comes home. You can show Lord Reister how well you behave, can’t you?” She asked this last of the child who clearly absorbed every word said.

“If you feed me cakes,” she declared promptly.

“Strawberries,” Melanie reminded her. “And perhaps Lord Reister will take us to Astley’s. I have always wanted to see a circus.”

Distracted by this happy thought, Pamela bounced in her seat and sounded almost like an excited child as she bombarded them with questions while eating the dreaded watercress sandwiches. Damien raised a puckish eyebrow but complied with the undertaking, although he consumed almost everything on the tea tray in the process. Watercress and strawberries did not appease a hungry man.

Once they finished tea, Melanie sent her niece off to a hastily prepared room, sent a footman to inform Jane’s servants where the child could be found and to fetch some clothing, and rose from her seat to follow Pamela to see that she got settled. Damien stood in front of her, blocking her path. She looked up at him with surprise.

“I can’t think of another woman in the world who could manage that obnoxious child so well, or who would even take the time to bother,” he said, with almost an air of puzzlement. “Do you have any idea at all what you have let yourself in for?”

Melanie bit her bottom lip and looked skeptical. “I’m afraid a great deal more than I am able to handle.” She turned a defiant look to him. “But I could scarcely do less, could I? She’s just a child, Damien. A shamefully neglected one, I fear to say, I don’t understand Jane at all.”

“No, someone as good as you wouldn’t,” he murmured.

Then before she had any notion what he was about, Damien pulled her into his arms and kissed her.

Too utterly surprised to protest at first, Melanie was quickly caught by the myriad pleasures of Damien’s embrace. She leaned against his strength, absorbed the masculine scents of tobacco and shaving soap, and fell headlong in love with the sensation of his lips pressing along hers. Before she knew what she was doing, she circled his neck with her arms. He rewarded her with a low groan as he lifted her closer against him, and his tongue stroked the seam of her lips. Before she could part them in an exclamation of excitement, he stiffened and set her carefully back to the floor.

“I apologize, Melanie. I should not have done that. As much as I wish to convince you to marry me, I don’t want you to feel as if you must.”

Dazed, she gazed into the stark lines of his face, searching for answers that neither of them possessed. “If marriage means more kisses like that, I think you’ve convinced me,” she answered somewhat breathlessly. “I had no idea, Damien. . . .”

Lifting one eyebrow, he grinned a trifle rakishly. “That good, am I? Behave yourself, and I’ll give you another for dessert.”

Laughing shakily at his ability to take such a soul-racking moment and reduce it to a jest, Melanie stepped away from his dangerous proximity and picked up her walking stick. “Then we shall have to have dinner half a dozen times a day,” she replied, striving for the same light tone. She didn’t think she was very successful.

Damien stood straight and tall as he watched her stride away, her weak foot dragging only slightly. Only when she was out of sight did his shoulders sag, and he crumpled into the nearest chair.

She had taken in Jane’s obnoxious child without a qualm. Drawing a shaky breath, Damien wished for a cigar and a glass of port right now. He needed to do something to calm this wildly escalating wave of hope. Of course she would take in Jane’s child. Jane was family. She would feel obligated to help family, no matter how much she despised the burden. He’d rather thought of his “wife” as a helpless child herself, but she wasn’t. Lord, after that kiss, he couldn’t convince himself she was a child anymore. She was more woman than Jane would ever be. More woman than he deserved.

He closed his eyes and tried to concentrate on his plans to seduce her and sweep her into marriage, but he couldn’t get any further than the feel of her slender waist in his arms, the warm, eager pressure of her lips on his. The realization that she knew no other man but him in that way made his lungs constrict with the burden of responsibility. She would be completely, wholly his. He’d never possessed anything untarnished and complete before. He’d scarcely known his drunken father. His mother’s memory faded into the distant past. He’d had to put his home out to let when his father died because he couldn’t afford the upkeep. He’d lived off that small income and his wits ever since. He had nothing. Melanie could give him everything.

If she never learned of his reprehensible past.

That didn’t seem very likely. He could try to keep the truth from her until the vows were said, but then he fully meant to present her with the facts in all their dismal glory. That was one of the main reasons for his decision to sell his title in marriage. He didn’t need just the money. He needed to establish a real home, a place to live, with a woman to run it properly. He would be the first to admit that Jane made a mighty poor bargain in that department, but he didn’t have a great deal to trade beyond his title. The possibility of obtaining someone like Melanie nearly took his breath away.

She still thought of herself as inferior to Jane. He would have to show her otherwise, then perhaps he could convince her that he really, truly wanted her for his wife. He felt as if he grabbed for the stars, but a man couldn’t be blamed for trying when they seemed so close at hand. She thought her lame leg put her beyond the pale, but he didn’t see her lameness at all. With specially constructed shoes, she could even learn to dance if she wished. He didn’t ask for perfection in bed either. He needed forgiveness and understanding and a great number of other things, but he didn’t need perfect physical beauty. He, above all others, knew the uselessness of beauty.

He didn’t know if he was adequate to the task. He’d spent the better portion of his life idling it away in pursuit of pleasure like the rest of society. He couldn’t do that any longer. He had responsibilities he meant to uphold. If it meant waiting on Melanie hand and foot, he would do it. The odd part was, she really didn’t know how much she could demand of him right now. She had some strange idea that they were equals. Sooner or later, events would dissuade her of that notion.

“I heard you got shackled, Reister, but did you have to grovel for a cripple with a kid? Even the fair Jane would be better than that.”

Melanie gave the man credit for not intentionally saying the words loud enough for her to hear. They just unfortunately fell into a lull in the crowd noise and some trick of their surroundings sent them wafting her way. She couldn’t imagine why a fop like that stood outside with the noisy throng entering Astley’s, but she didn’t pretend to understand the whims of society. She just muffled a gasp when Damien caught the man by his starched cravat, hauled him to his toes, and nearly throttled him.

Avidly studying the food vendors noisily selling their wares to the crowd, Pamela noticed none of this. To divert her own attention as well as the child’s, Melanie signaled for an orange vendor. Surely an orange couldn’t hurt anything but the front of her niece’s dress.

When Damien finally caught up with them as they pushed into the amphitheater, Melanie pretended she hadn’t noticed anything, but he caught her elbow in a tight grip and whispered in her ear, “I apologize for the scene. I keep meaning to curb my temper, but there are times. . . .”

“You needn’t explain to me, Damien,” she answered without inflection. “I realize I have asked a great deal of you. I do not wish to be a burden to your conscience as well. Do not change yourself for my sake.”

She had to find some way to distance herself from him. He had wreaked chaos with that kiss, but it had been a thing of the moment, some spontaneous action that he couldn’t control, like his temper, no doubt. She wouldn’t allow herself glorious dreams of love and happy-ever-after. Damien would do as he pleased, and so would she.

Beside her, Damien fell silent. She had tried to release him from any obligation to defend her, but he didn’t seem particularly pleased about it. She didn’t like being at odds with Damien. With curiosity, she watched his stony expression as they took their seats.

“I heard what the man said, Damien. I am a cripple. You needn’t take his head off for stating the facts. You are kind to pretend that I am the countess you deserve, but you needn’t, you know. Anytime you wish to call off this charade, I will understand.”

Damien exploded. She couldn’t put it any other way. He slammed his hands down on the seat in front of them, clenched his fingers into his fists, and bit back a reply with such difficulty that his jaw muscles strained from the effort. He leaped to his feet, and still clenching his hands in fists, glared at the crowd rather than at her.

“I will fetch some lemonades and be back directly.”

Melanie gaped, but she said not a word as he strode off into the crowd. She would never understand the male mind, she decided, as the first horses rode into the arena and she turned her attention to the performance.

Damien sat on the other side of Pamela when he returned, pointing out the clowns dancing in the wings, explaining how the riders did their tricks, agreeing that she needed a pony of her own if she wished to learn to ride properly. He would really make a wonderful father, Melanie thought sadly. And for just a moment, she felt a bitterness that Jane had all the luck.

But she let the excitement of the performance and Pamela’s enchantment sweep away the bad thoughts. How could she feel bitter when she was having the most exciting time of her life? She would have these memories to cherish forever. She could even allow herself a little hope. Perhaps now that she had reached London, her father wouldn’t have the power to drag her back home, even when it became obvious that Damien belonged to Jane and not to her. She thought Damien might help her stay.

He remained silent on their return journey when Pamela fell asleep in his arms. In sleep she did not seem so much a giant as a lonely little girl, and Melanie pushed the blond curls back from her childish brow with affection.

“You would be a better mother for her than Jane,” Damien said from his corner of the carriage.

Startled, she glanced in his direction, but the carriage lantern only sent his face into shadow. “Jane needs to remarry and settle down. A child needs two parents.”

“I agree a child needs two parents. Jane isn’t even one. I’d thought she might change, but I made a very large mistake. I think Jane realized that before I did.”

Puzzled, Melanie tried to find the meaning behind his words, but it was late, and she was tired. She shook her head. “I don’t understand you at all, you know.”

He sent her an enigmatic look over the head of the sleeping child. “Don’t call yourself a cripple anymore, Melanie. You are far less crippled than most. Your flaw is just more obvious than others.”

“Is that what is bothering you?” she asked with relief. “You can’t catch me by my cravat and shake me when I call myself names. It must be very frustrating.”

He raised his expressive eyebrows. “I’ll find other ways of stopping that sharp little tongue, my lady. Beware.”

The thought of just how he might do that sent a pleasurable shiver down Melanie’s spine. She met his gaze boldly, and felt the stir of something sensual below her middle when Damien’s gaze drifted to watch her mouth. He was trying to seduce her, just as he’d said!

She really thought she would like to be seduced. When would she ever have another opportunity? So with more courage than sense, she smiled back, and let her own gaze drop to his mouth.

He didn’t touch her. He couldn’t, not with his hands full of Pamela. But by the time the carriage stopped, Melanie felt warm all over just from the things his gaze spoke. When a footman rushed to take Pamela, and Damien lifted Melanie from the carriage and carried her to the house, she felt more than warm all over. She felt she might turn into steam.

He returned her to her feet at the top of the stairs so she might see Pamela settled into her room for the night, but Melanie found Damien waiting for her in the sitting room when she returned. He had a bottle of wine and two glasses in his hands.

“Will you share a drink with me before we retire?” he asked politely, but she didn’t think there was anything polite about the look he gave her. He made her feel as if she wore a daring evening gown, or nothing at all.

“If I do, what do you mean to do with me?” she asked without shyness. Damien had never said anything to discourage her from speaking as she thought.

He filled the glasses and handed one to her. “Kiss you, probably,” he replied in the same tone as she used. “I fully intend to employ what is usually the woman’s ploy to trap a man. I’ll flirt and tease and drive you to want more, but I’ll refuse until you agree to marry me.”

Melanie’s eyes widened as she sipped the wine and absorbed his message. He wouldn’t seduce her completely. She could encourage his kisses and still remain a maiden. She found the thought somehow stimulating. She had no understanding of the marriage bed, so she feared it. But she understood kissing.

A few minutes later, with Damien’s wine-flavored breath mixing with her own, Melanie decided she didn’t know anything about kissing either, but she was more than willing to learn. She stood on tiptoe and wrapped her arms around him and let him play with her tongue again. Desire shot through her veins, and she nearly lost her balance. Only Damien’s strong arms kept her from falling.

He trailed his kisses from her mouth to her ear to give her a chance to recover. “There’s more I can teach you, sugar plum, but I think I’ll make you wait another night. I want you eager and anticipating each step of the way,” he murmured against her ear.

“You plan on telling me in advance how you mean to seduce me into marriage?” she asked with a laugh, not moving away from his hold. Her breasts felt oddly full yet somehow deprived as they rubbed against him.

“I don’t want to be a complete scoundrel.” Damien raised his hand to release some of the pins holding her hair, capturing a tendril between his fingers. “I may be a gazetted fortune hunter, but I’ll be an honest one.”

“It’s not honest if you truly want Jane and I’m just a substitute,” she pointed out. “I think we’d best send Jane an urgent message to return home.”

“Do that,” he answered, visibly annoyed as he stepped away from her. “If calling Jane home is what it takes to convince you that I am not a complete imbecile, then do so. I’ve made my choice. It is up to you to make yours.”

He left the room, taking the bottle of wine with him.

Utterly amazed, afraid to believe a word he said, Melanie stared at the closed door until her knees folded and she had to sit down.

Damien Langland, Earl of Reister, declared he wanted her for wife and not the glorious Jane. Something did not ring at all true here, she just couldn’t figure out what it was. She would have to wait for Jane.

In the meantime, he left her longing for something she didn’t understand except to know that she couldn’t have it.

“’Tis a pity a man of such noble countenance and title must be reduced to marrying an unfortunate cripple for money. I suppose she can claim no family, either?” the voice behind Melanie asked haughtily.

“Her father is a country baronet, but exceeding wealthy. Lady Morgan is her sister. Reister will survive,” the second voice replied dryly. “They all do somehow.”

The women moved on, leaving Melanie sitting on the park bench observing the overhanging leaves of a maple in front of her. She supposed the women hadn’t seen her. She doubted they would recognize her if they did. They just gossiped as all society must gossip. They meant nothing by it.

They just left a hollow yearning behind. Melanie knew she was no match for an Earl of Reister. She had never held any such illusions. Damien deserved a beautiful woman like Jane on his arm. Pamela needed a father like Damien. Had she truly ruined his chances at having the countess he deserved?

She watched as Pamela ran and chased a hoop with some other children by the river. Melanie had brought one of the younger maids along so she might keep up with the child better than she could. With a little exercise and a proper diet, Pamela would be lovelier than Jane one of these days. Why had Jane neglected her only child so that she thought of food as her only pleasure?

It didn’t make good sense. Since she had allowed her dreams to drive her to the altar with Damien, very little made any sense at all. She had made a childish decision and found herself burdened with adult responsibilities. She had thought to help Damien out of an awkward situation and help herself in the process. Instead, she had unwittingly trapped him as well as herself. But he appeared not to mind while she spun dizzily, not knowing what she dared to ask.

She carried the pain of the women’s scorn with her as they left the park. Damien wished to introduce her at a grand social occasion, but Melanie couldn’t do it. She would wait for Jane. She wanted Damien and Jane to be happy. She didn’t want to feel responsible for destroying their lives. She wasn’t at all certain anymore that could be arranged, but she’d have to try.

She found her men of business just exiting the study when she returned to the house. They took off their hats and bowed to her as if she truly were a countess, and Melanie had to smile at her own playacting.

“You are very fortunate to find a man of intelligence like the earl, my lady,” the banker declared boldly. “He will double your fortune within the year, mark my words.”

She didn’t know what to do with the wealth she already had, but she supposed Damien knew how to spend it. She had never thought paying his debts a bad bargain, but he seemed determined to square them somehow. She smiled in agreement, not knowing how else to respond. She watched as Watson let them out, then turned to find Damien in the doorway, studying her.

“I have more business to attend,” he said formally, as if they hadn’t exchanged passionate kisses the night before. “Will you ride with me in the park this afternoon when I return?”

She didn’t want the whole world to despise him for his unfortunate “marriage,” but she hated to refuse him anything. “Isn’t a traveling coach a little unfashionable for the park?”

“I had to return that one to its rightful owner. I thought you might enjoy a landaulet. I know of one for sale. I hoped you might like to try it out.”

Melanie’s spirits rose at the notion of owning her very own carriage. She watched him anxiously, not certain how to take his toneless suggestion. “Do you think you could teach me to drive?”

This time, a smile lightened his demeanor. “Not a landaulet. You will need a driver for that. But once you’ve decided how you mean to go on, we might find something a little smaller for you.” He frowned as she bounced with delight. “You will still have to take a tiger with you. You cannot go about alone.”

“I will! I will, I promise. But if I could just learn quickly—”

He caught her hands and stilled her bouncing. “You cannot learn quickly enough to avoid your father should you choose to denounce me. There are still some things you have to face.”

That still didn’t bring her down completely. She envisioned many happy days before her father learned anything. And now that she was happily ensconced in her own home, perhaps he could do nothing at all but rant and rave. Even Jane might teach her to drive.

“Denounce you! As if I would ever do such a thing. Where do you come up with these words?” she asked, standing on her toes to kiss his cheek. “I shall love you dearly for the rest of my life.”

The Earl of Reister held a hand to his cheek long after his innocent “bride” swept happily to her room.

The ride in the park had been a glorious success, Melanie concluded as she sipped her morning tea and perused the stack of invitations that had assembled on the hall table these last few days. She knew she didn’t have herself to thank so much as the modish carriage gown of luscious peach with the flattering neckline that made Damien look at her as if she truly were a peach ripe for eating. And of course, sitting in that lovely landaulet with the plush velvet seats, no one could see her hobble, so perhaps she almost did look good enough to be Damien’s countess. He’d showed her off proudly to everyone they met, and his friends seemed to greet her graciously. Perhaps she wouldn’t be so very bad for him, after all.

Of course, that was last night talking. Melanie sat back dreamily and remembered how he’d held her as they sat on the love seat. He’d talked of the future of steam engines, if she remembered correctly, not precisely a romantic topic of conversation, but one she’d found as intriguing as he did.

He’d told her how he’d like to invest in a company that had produced a particularly workable engine suitable for moving wagons of coal, but by that time, she’d been listening more to the sound of his voice than the actual words. Damien’s hands had taken to straying, and the occasional kiss to the nape of her neck or the lobe of her ear had her tingling in more places than she’d thought possible. He hadn’t undressed her, but she’d wanted him to before the evening ended.

She blushed at the indelicate dreams that had flourished in her sleep. Damien had a way of making her feel as if she were the only woman in the world for him. She knew she wanted to believe that so strongly that she could easily fool herself into accepting him. She wanted to accept him. She wanted to ask him to take her back to the church and the vicar and repeat the vows in truth. But she wasn’t a foolish child anymore. She knew Damien hid things from her. She knew Damien wanted her for her money. She wasn’t quite certain that Damien still loved Jane, but she found it hard to believe that she would make an adequate substitute. She needed to know the truth, and she thought Jane would have it.

So while Damien went out on his mysterious errands of business and Pamela slept in her bed upstairs, Melanie perused stacks of mail addressed to the earl and countess and indulged in daydreams.

The clock had only struck the noon hour and Pamela had just come down dressed for another romp in the park when Watson announced callers. She had left standing orders that they were not to be at home to callers, so she understood that these were not the usual type who left their cards and passed on to the next house on their list. She lifted an inquiring brow as she’d seen Damien do.

“Lady Morgan and Sir Francis Berkeley to see you, my lady. I put them in the yellow drawing room.”

Jane and her father, together! Oh, my. That didn’t bode well at all. Jane and their father did not get along at all. The fact that they came together raised clarion calls of alarm. Nervously, Melanie glanced down at her new morning gown, removed a scone crumb, adjusted a ribbon, and pushed herself to her feet. She hadn’t quite learned to adjust to the higher heel of the new boot Damien had the cobbler make for her, so she held her walking stick as usual. She gave an anxious Pamela a reassuring smile, as if Jane’s appearance here was perfectly natural.

“Shall you come down and make your curtsy before your grandfather, my dear? Or would you rather wait in the library and read a good book until your mother calls for you?”

The worried look didn’t go away. Pamela glanced at the door as if ready to bolt, but she bit her bottom lip and said politely, “I shall wait in the library, if you do not mind, Aunt Melanie.” She sent Melanie an apprehensive glance. “You will not send me away, will you? I will behave, I promise. I shall not even chase away a governess if you wish to find one.”

Melanie found that an extremely odd sentiment, but too worried about her own problems, she didn’t pursue it. She pressed a kiss to her niece’s hair and sent her off in the company of the young maid. She would prefer to have the explosion over with before she brought the child into her grandfather’s company.

She almost had the rhythm necessary for keeping her new shoe in line by the time she reached the yellow salon. Clutching the walking stick but not relying on it, Melanie allowed Watson to open the door for her, and she did her best to glide in without a hitch to her step. The two people waiting for her didn’t even seem to notice.

“Melanie! My baby sister! I’m so dreadfully sorry I have got you mixed up in all this!”

The woman rushing toward her in no way resembled the young girl who had so eagerly departed the country for the city sights ten years ago. Jane’s lithe young figure, creamy complexion, and bounteous curls had somehow matured to a caricature of that long-ago image. Powder and a hint of what appeared to be rouge created the complexion. The curls had an oddly brassy shine which did not precisely duplicate the health and vigor of youth. But it was the figure that held Melanie speechless. Jane’s once perfect hourglass figure now more resembled their father’s stout barrel shape. Melanie blinked and allowed herself to be wrapped in the suffocating envelope of French violet perfume and Jane’s arms.

“You poor baby! We’ll get you right out of here. I cannot believe that man! Of all the cruel, callous, despicable—” The tirade threatened to continue, but Melanie pulled herself away, casting a glance to her father.

“Hello, Papa. What brings you here?” She had the frightening notion that she knew, but she refused to admit anything. He had only to ask the vicar, and the vicar would have to tell him. She dreaded the disappointment she expected to see in her father’s eyes, but she was prepared to stand up to him. She would tell him that she and Damien planned to marry as soon as they had the license. Unless Jane protested he belonged to her. That thought made her tremble.

“I’ve come to take you home, child. I’ll not allow any daughter of mine to be slandered by the likes of that young cur. If he were worth anything, I’d have the law on him now. As it is, I’ll just make it so hot for him here that he will have to flee to the Continent for the rest of his born days.”

She didn’t like the sounds of that at all. Nervously, Melanie bit her bottom lip much as Pamela had done earlier. Her father’s side-whiskers quivered as he spoke, not a good sign at all. Reminding herself that this was her home, she took a seat in the yellow damask chair nearest her. She would hold out much better if she didn’t fear her legs would crumble under her.

“If you speak of Damien, he is my husband, Papa. If you drive him to the Continent, you drive me with him.” She thought she said that very well. The fury rising to her father’s eyes did not confirm her opinion.

“He is not your damned husband! Do not give me that faradiddle, girl! He is a fake, a scoundrel, a fortune hunter who has ruined your good name and made us laughing stocks in front of all society. Were I not too old, I’d call him out and have done with him entirely. Now call your maid to pack and we’ll be gone from here.”

Knowing better than to argue with her father in one of his tirades, Melanie turned her attention to the sister she hadn’t seen in ten years. “Do you wish me to call for Pamela? I’m certain you must have worried about her, but I didn’t know if my message had reached you.”

Jane gave an impatient huff and threw herself into the nearest seat. “The child is a trial. I think she’ll be better off in the country with you. You can take her with you when you go. I don’t know why it didn’t occur to me before. Ring for some refreshments when you ring for your maid, will you? I declare, I’m quite exhausted by my exertions. I cannot believe you have done such a thing as to run off with Damien. Papa’s quite right. He’s a thorough scoundrel. When I read the announcement in the papers. . . ” She rolled her eyes and shook her head as if the effort to continue was too much for her.

“You left him standing at the altar,” Melanie reminded her, making no effort to summon anyone. “That was very badly done of you. If you did not want him, you should have told him so to his face.” She found herself growing angry in Damien’s defense. How could they call him names like that when he was the only man she’d ever met who had treated her as if she were a real person and not a broken doll to be kept hidden? If anyone were to blame for her current situation, it was herself.

Outrage identical to their father’s rose in Jane’s eyes. “Do you know why he wanted to marry me? Do you?”

Melanie shrugged. The reason seemed quite obvious to her now. She didn’t think it included beauty or love. “For the money?” she suggested.

“For the money, yes!” Jane screamed. “So I could raise his bastard child because he didn’t have the money to support her. Your charming earl already has the woman he wants. She just doesn’t have the money he needs.”

Melanie thought the blow of those words must have pounded her into the seat. After that, nothing else seemed to quite register. She didn’t remember calling a maid. She didn’t remember ordering her bags packed. These things just miraculously happened until she found herself bundled into her father’s traveling coach with Pamela, rumbling down the road out of London.

She thought she’d left a lot of things undone, but she couldn’t quite recall them now. She was still trying to come to terms with the notion of Damien having a child and a woman he couldn’t marry because he couldn’t support them. The pieces fit awkwardly. She’d known he had secrets. She’d known he needed money. He’d made no pretense of that. He had made small objection to taking in Pamela when she supposed another man would have raised an uproar. That made a little more sense now if he expected her to raise another woman’s child. She just couldn’t believe Damien would do that to her without telling her.

And she couldn’t believe Damien had made such sweet love to her while keeping another woman behind her back.

It did not seem quite credible, but then, it hadn’t seemed credible that the Earl of Reister would take a plain spinster with a crippled leg as his bride either.

Melanie felt sick as the carriage churned down the road to the house she’d lived in all her life, the prison she had so briefly escaped. She had known her freedom would be brief, but she had expected to turn Damien safely over to Jane. She hadn’t expected this. She hadn’t expected this at all, and she didn’t know how to handle it.

Across from her, Pamela still looked worried as she watched the passing scenery, but the child remained blessedly silent. The notion that she would have Jane’s child to raise helped relieve some of her anguish. She wouldn’t be entirely alone. She would have someone who needed her.

She supposed she’d had a narrow escape, that Jane had saved her from a dreadful mistake. She just wished she could make her heart accept that as her brain must. She had played the part of foolish, idle dreamer, allowing Damien to seduce her as he’d said he would. She just couldn’t believe his kisses could lie so well.

Damien held the precious bundle in his arms, watching a milky breath breathe in and out of tiny bow lips, occasionally caressing a tiny silken curl. He’d given his heart at first sight of her, opened himself up to the onslaught of emotions he’d denied the better part of his life. Because of this tiny bundle, he’d learned to love. It made him feel awkward and vulnerable at times, particularly now that he’d been stricken twice by this malady, but it made him strong in ways he’d never been strong before. He didn’t know how to deal with the emotion very well. No one had ever showed him how to express it. But he knew the iron courage it gave him when it came time to protect the women he loved. He needed it now, as he prepared to open his heart and let it bleed before the one woman he wanted more than any other.

He closed his eyes and gave a silent prayer as the hackney pulled up in front of Melanie’s town house, the town house he prayed she would share with him and this innocent bundle he held in his arms. He had thought to wait until he had her bound safely to him before giving her this evidence of his perfidy, but he found he couldn’t do it. He loved Melanie too much to treat her that way. He loved his daughter equally. The battle to protect her first had been a strong one, but he didn’t think he could live with himself if he sacrificed one love for the other.

The way Melanie had taken in Pamela had given him hope. Surely she couldn’t reject this innocent child, despite the ignominy of her origins. He knew Melanie too well to believe that. The woman who couldn’t leave him standing at the altar or starving in the streets, the woman who would take in an obnoxious child she didn’t even know, that woman couldn’t deny a babe in arms. He counted on that as much as he counted on his own ability to make Melanie the happiest woman alive once she accepted him with all his faults and flaws.

Nervously, he carried the infant into a strangely silent house. The child’s wet nurse straggled along behind him, gawking at the grandeur of her new surroundings. With a strangely pattering pulse, Damien took the steps two at a time. Watson appeared in the lower hall before he reached the top.

“Lady Reister has gone, my lord,” he intoned, eyeing the young nursemaid askance.

Damien’s heart sank. He recognized that tone of voice as well as he recognized the man’s disapproval. Whatever Watson had learned this morning, the sight of the child and nursemaid had confirmed it. Slowly, he turned around and walked back down the stairs.

“Where did she go, Watson?”

“With Sir Francis and Lady Morgan, my lord. They left orders for the house to be closed up and the servants turned out. I believe Sir Francis mentioned selling.”

Ah. He had something the old fraud wanted after all. Watson wouldn’t want to leave his comfortable position. He’d no doubt padded the payroll with half his relatives. He might disapprove, but the servant would do whatever necessary to keep this house open. Damien smiled cynically.

“Thank you, Watson. In my wife’s behalf, I countermand those orders. You will keep the place open and staffed. I greatly fear my wife has been abducted by well-intentioned fools. She will have need of you when we return. Send for her maid. I want her to travel with Miss Snipes here. I’ll send around for the coach directly. Send one of the footmen for my horse.”

Damien snapped out the orders curtly, as he made a mental list of all he would need to do. He’d had the world in his hands just hours ago. He wouldn’t let it escape again without a fight. He didn’t know what Jane had said to Melanie to make her flee like this, but he could very well imagine. She wouldn’t get away with it.

He hated to drag a child and a nursemaid across country roads in pursuit of a dream, but he couldn’t leave them behind. Melanie had to see the truth with her own eyes, not wait until he carried her off and brought her back here. He wanted her to come willingly, with eyes wide open. He patted the pocket with the newly acquired special license in it. He wanted her full agreement this time.

He rode ahead of the carriage, leaving its lumbering gait well behind as he raced his horse past fields and meadows on the course toward home. Home. The house he’d inhabited as a child had never been a home. He’d vowed never to raise a child of his as he had been raised, but that had been when he’d never had any intention of having children. Now that he had one, the vow became even more important. A child needed two parents, Melanie had said. He could amend that somewhat. Children needed parents who loved them, who gave them the attention they needed. He didn’t want to fail at that, but he might. Melanie wouldn’t. And Melanie could keep him from failing too.

Damien didn’t even have to repeat that refrain as the miles rolled beneath him. Melanie filled him. She had seeped into his soul and stayed there. He could feel her in every fiber of his being. He didn’t know how it had come to pass, but Melanie could save him. He had to save Melanie first.

That’s how Damien looked at it as he rode up to the front door of the country manor he’d known since childhood. He’d used to ride up here to court Jane in his heedless youth. He thanked God he’d failed at that as he’d failed at so many other things over the years. He refused to believe he could fail at his current mission. He couldn’t let all that life and loveliness that was his Melanie languish behind those cold doors and dark draperies.

He pounded the knocker and pushed past the butler when he asked for his card.

“Where’s Melanie?” he demanded. “Where is my wife?” The butler stared at him blankly. “The family is not at home to callers, my lord.”

So the blamed man recognized him, Damien thought coldly. Good. Let him see the Earl of Reister breathing fire and fury. “I’m not a caller, man, I’m family. If you do not tell me where my wife is, I shall tear the place down until I find her.”

The butler stepped back passively. “I’m sure I cannot say, sir.”

“Fine then. Stay out of my way.” Roaring Melanie’s name, Damien stormed down the hall, flinging open doors right and left. The library, she had said. She spent her time in the library, staring over the lawns. The library must be in the back of the house or she would be out here now. Melanie wouldn’t ignore him. “Melanie!” he shouted at the top of his lungs. She would hear him. She would come running. It would just take her a little time.

He found a second passage leading to the rear of the house. He ought to remember where the blamed library was, but Jane hadn’t spent much time there. Neither had he, for all that mattered. Where did one hide the blamed library?

He was aware of heads peering around doors and peeking down stairs at him as he rampaged through the silent corridors. He didn’t care. He needed Melanie. He needed to explain. He needed to make things right with her. Even if she didn’t want him, he had to explain. He wouldn’t have her thinking badly of him, or of herself. He knew that was what it was all about. Jane had said something to make Melanie doubt herself.

A familiar figure darted from the shadows at the rear of the hall. Too round and too large for flitting, the child merely pointed at a closed door and slumped on an antique boot bench by the side door. Damien blew Pamela a kiss and threw open the door indicated.

With draperies drawn, the room held only dusky shadows. Gradually he made out the floor-to-ceiling shelves, most of them half empty. Sir Francis didn’t spend much time reading, nor had his limited selection of ancestors, Damien suspected. No one used this room, he knew instantly from the uncluttered library tables to the unburned wicks in the lamps—no one but a lonely woman who escaped into her own fantasies amid its dreariness.

He stalked to the drapery-covered windows. He didn’t yell anymore. He would never yell at Melanie. Or maybe he would, occasionally. She had a stubborn will that needed opposition once in a while. But he could think of much better ways of opposing that will than by yelling.

Gently, he drew back the drapery hiding the window seat. She slept curled against the window frame. Tears sprang, unwelcome, to Damien’s eyes. He wanted to pick her up and carry her out to the carriage that would arrive shortly, take her away from here, and never come back. But she wasn’t a child like the one he’d held in his arms a few hours ago. She was a woman grown. She was entitled to make her own decisions.

“Melanie?” he spoke quietly, not wanting to startle her.

Her lids flickered, and her glance first went to the window. Perhaps he should have climbed in the window after her, Damien thought with amusement. That’s what a gallant knight would do. He wasn’t any gallant knight.

Then she woke more fully and looked up at him as if she’d expected him there all the time. “Damien,” she said flatly.

“Not Sir Lancelot, I’m afraid,” he apologized, jerking back the drapery so the sun flooded the dismal room. “But I’ve come for you anyway. You should have waited. I didn’t want you to have to face your family alone.”

“They’re my family. I have nothing to fear from them.” She watched him with curiosity now. She sniffed delicately as he sat beside her. “You smell of. . . ” She tried to put a name to the odor she no doubt would have difficulty associating with him.

“Babies,” he supplied the word for her. “My daughter spit up on me on the way to the house. I didn’t exactly have time to change when I found you gone.”

He loved the way those lovely violet eyes widened with surprise. In some ways, she was still a child. He thought that might be a good thing when it came to raising children. One needed to think like a child sometimes.

“Your daughter?” she asked, not coldly, not with condemnation, just asking explanation.

Damien took her hand and traced the delicate lines of her palm. “I thought I made it clear that I’m a cad without scruples. I’m sure Jane confirmed it for you. I had every intention of doing the same thing to you that I did to her. I was afraid if you found out before we were wed, that you would turn your back on me. I couldn’t afford that. I was willing to do anything for my child. Her name’s Arianna, by the way. She’s three months old today.”

“Arianna.” She stared at him blankly. Damien knew he was doing this badly, but he didn’t know any other way. He didn’t want Sir Francis running in here shouting before he’d had time to explain. He had to pour out his heart as fast as he could.

“I was bringing her to you when you disappeared. I couldn’t lie to you, Melanie. I didn’t want our married life to start out on a lie. I gambled my daughter’s future for yours. But I lost before I had either. I’m not only a scoundrel, I’m a failure at everything that meant anything to me. I can see why you would turn your back on me. But don’t turn your back on yourself, Melanie. Give yourself a chance. Go back to London. Call yourself countess. I won’t contradict you. I can find a small place in the country for Arianna and myself. I’ve seen enough of London to last me a lifetime, but you deserve more than burying yourself here and wasting away. Find someone you can love. You deserve that. You deserve far more than I can offer you.”

Tears streamed down her cheeks, and Damien had the ridiculous impulse to kiss them away. He held himself back, though. He had to. If he ever had her in his arms again, he would never let her go. Love might have given him courage and strength, but he was only human. He wanted her too much to let her go. Right now, she wasn’t his, so he could find the strength to hold himself back somehow. He’d forget all reasoning once he held her.

“You’re doing it again, aren’t you?” she asked, spoiling the coolness of her tone with a small hiccup at the end. “You’re calling yourself names. Shall I grab you by the cravat and shake you?”

He managed a smile at the thought. “I could think of much more pleasant things to do if you’d like to grab my cravat, but if shaking me makes you happy, please do. I deserve far worse than that.”

“Oh, stop it,” she said crossly, starting to swing her legs down from her perch only to discover he blocked her way. “You can’t seduce me anymore, Damien Langland. Babies don’t come into this world by magic. Where is Arianna’s mother? If you truly want to take care of your daughter, you will marry her mother. The three of you can live just as easily as two in some cottage in the country. Perhaps you could take a position as someone’s bailiff. Or I could give you a commission for taking care of my investments. There are any number of alternatives besides shackling yourself to a wife you don’t want. You ought to be quite glad Jane left you at the altar. She’s become a terrible harridan since I saw her last.”

“She was always a terrible harridan,” he answered mildly. “I just had the strange notion that money would make life easier. I know better now. And if you won’t have me, I’ll accept your offer to make a commission on your investments. I’ll gladly swallow my pride for Arianna’s sake. But I want you. Perhaps I didn’t make that clear enough. I don’t want any other woman but you. Arianna needs a mother, but I need a wife more. I suppose, if you are happier looking for someone more honorable, I could learn to live with that. I might even find some comfortable farm woman to teach Arianna all those things about love that you already know. But it won’t be quite the same as having two parents who love each other. Would you care to live in a cottage with us? I really don’t need the town house or the carriages or such. I just need a wife, a lovely wife, a loving wife who understands I’m not perfect but loves me anyway. Do you think you could ever love me?”

She clenched her hands in the muslin of her skirt and looked out the window again. “Arianna’s mother? Why can she not give you these things?”

“I’m not doing this very well, am I?” He sighed. “Arianna’s mother is a”—he sought for a polite term—”a soiled dove. She took off after Arianna’s birth. She knew I couldn’t keep her the way she wished to be kept, and she’d found an old man who would. Of course, he wouldn’t keep the child. I’ve spent everything I had finding a wet nurse and providing them with a place to stay. It’s extremely expensive living in London. I had no notion how much it took to raise a child. I had to borrow from the cent-percenters when Arianna ran a fever, and I had to hire a doctor and buy medicines. I’ll find some way to pay you back over time. Now that I have those debts off my back, I’m certain I can find a place for us where my income can support us. For that alone, I owe you. I will gladly do anything to see that you have the life you want, Melanie. Just tell me what you want.”

She jerked her leg away from where his hand so casually rested upon it. “You can’t make me whole again, Damien. You can’t make me the kind of countess you deserve. You’ll need an heir someday, and as much as you may protest now, I’m certain I’m not the woman you would choose to provide one. I mixed you up in my foolish dreams and made a hash of everything. I’m sorry I’ve caused you such confusion, but I won’t go back to London and pretend to be your countess any longer. You need one in truth. Tell them I died, if you wish. Tell them the truth, if you prefer. And find a lovely mother for Arianna, one who will love you for who you are and not for your blasted title. You have a lot to offer, Damien. Don’t sell yourself cheaply.”

Damien suffered a brief flare of anger, and he clutched his fingers into his fists. He controlled it, however, when he saw the streaks of her tears. Catching her chin with his hand, he made her face him. “I don’t want to sell myself cheaply. I want to sell myself to you. I’m the one who’s making a hash of it. I love you, Melanie. That’s what I’ve been trying to tell you. I couldn’t lie to you because I love you too much. You have no idea how easily I could get an heir on you, if you wish to be crude about it. If it makes you happy to hide your leg, then hide it for your own sake, but not for mine.” Boldly, he jerked up her skirt to expose two stockinged limbs sprawled across the pillows of the window seat. He ran his hand up the withered one, contrasting the brownness of his skin to the whiteness of her stocking. “You have nothing to hide from me.” He kept his hand on her leg but met her eyes. “I want you as my countess in all sense of the word. I want you in my bed, Melanie. I want you to bear my children. I need you to save me from everlasting damnation. Marry me, Melanie.”

The library door slammed open, revealing a furious Sir Francis wielding an ancient battle-ax and a bevy of stalwart footmen carrying cudgels and muskets. The baronet’s roar of rage filled the room as he discovered the Earl of Reister with his hand up his daughter’s dress.

“You bastard! You son of a fiend! You bloody damned—”

Melanie brushed her skirt back down and leaned over to wrap her arms around Damien’s neck. “I think I’ve borrowed Damien long enough, Papa. I want him for my own now. Do you think we might ask the vicar to do it proper this time? I want flowers and my family there. And Pamela can be my flower girl.” She turned a loving look to Damien, who sat still and watched the armed footmen warily. “Will you need time to ask your friends?”

As he saw the way his little devil had brought her father and his army to a standing halt, Damien relaxed and wrapped his arm around her waist. “What if we just ask your father to stand up for me this time? If the vicar isn’t busy, we can have the business done by evening. I’ll pick the flowers personally.”

A maid ran down the hall crying, “There’s a carriage, sir. There’s a carriage and a baby!”

Damien sought her eyes questioningly, and Melanie smiled back. “Let us go meet your daughter, my lord. Perhaps Pamela would hold her while we take our vows.”

Sir Francis and his army of footmen stood back, gaping, as Damien helped her to her feet and the couple glided through their ranks without a hitch, looking for all the world like expectant parents as the sound of a crying baby wailed through the previously silent corridors.

As they reached the astonished baronet, the Earl of Reister placed his arm around Melanie’s shoulders and held his hand out to her father. “I want to thank you for raising such a beautiful daughter. I hope I can do half so well as you have.”

Melanie pinched him for this conceit, and Damien laughed. He was a scoundrel, no doubt, but there was no reason he couldn’t be a charming one.

As if she read his mind, she whispered, “One more whopper like that, Damien Langland, and I’ll make you change your daughter’s nappies.”

“May I still have kisses for dessert?” he whispered back.

The look she gave him in return made him thankful he had a license in his pocket. He didn’t think this groom could wait much longer for his wedding night.

EXCERPT - MAD MARIA’S DAUGHTER

Regency Love and Laughter Series, Book 2

Copyright © 1992, 2009 Patricia Rice

First Publication: 1992

Book View Cafe, 2017

To purchase: Mad Maria’s Daughter

Clutching her reticule in her lap, Daphne watched the growing darkness beyond the carriage window. It had been kind of Lord and Lady Lansbury to loan the use of their carriage to take her to her aunt’s. But then, everyone had been so kind and sympathetic—once she had announced she was leaving. And relieved. She shouldn’t forget how relieved they were at the departure of someone as unpredictable as Mad Maria’s daughter.

Daphne bit her lip and tried to retrieve her straying thoughts from the debacle that had capped her stay in London. She was almost at Aunt Agatha’s. There seemed no purpose in stopping for the night despite the driver’s protests. He could travel on to the Lansbury estate in the morning. The carriage had to come this way anyway. The Lansburys had merely been offering a minor kindness, after all.

Clutching her gloved fingers, Daphne wrestled with the twin devils of ingratitude and cynicism. She could have taken a post chaise like anyone else. She was lame, not helpless. She was not even incompetent and certainly not mad. She was actually quite intelligent. Not that anyone cared. Biting her lip, she watched the road to her voluntary exile go by.

In a society that demanded perfection, she lacked the essential requirement. She supposed she looked well enough. Friends and family had assured her that her brunette curls were just as they ought to be, that her features were quite well-formed, even to the point of prettiness and past.

They even claimed that her eyes were a most extraordinary green, and if they seemed a trifle hazy and mysterious at times, that was more to her account than not. The fact that they were her mother’s eyes created the problem. Part of the problem, she had to admit. The rest of the problem she created herself.

Daphne fought back tears and forced her chin up. She had been green enough at first not to realize why the young gentlemen passed her by for silly, less presentable girls.

Oh, there was always someone’s kind relative to bow and ask if they might fetch her some punch or to exchange meaningless gossip through a dance set or two. She was never left to feel alone and neglected, but she was seldom asked for more than one dance, either. Once was daring enough. Twice would have been foolish. After all, what if she took leave of her senses in the middle of the dance floor?

Not that her mother had ever committed such a social solecism. She had been very polite about her madness. If her effervescence sometimes reached the heights of hysteria, or her dismals became black whorls of discontent, no one paid them any mind. That was just Maria. Charming, ever-maddening Maria.

Even her suicide had been committed with exquisite care to make it look an accident. It was only by pure, horrible chance that she had been discovered.

Daphne closed her eyes against that long-ago pain. She could remember her mother as sweet and smiling and ever gentle. Why could society not remember her that way, instead of as the lady who had driven her carriage off a cliff one dark night, in full view of her only daughter?

The period of mourning for her mother had long passed, but the ton continued to look at Daphne askance, waiting for her to show signs of her mother’s instabilities. They found them all too frequently in the sharp lash of Daphne’s temper, her cool withdrawal when anyone approached the subject dominating their minds, and in her inability to be one of the crowd.

The members of the ton would nod their heads sagely and give each other knowing glances, then treat her to saccharine smiles and insipid pleasantries until they could make their escape. After all, who wouldn’t be unstable after such an experience?

At times, Daphne felt as if the ton resented being reminded by her presence that the world outside their hallowed halls was not a perfect one. Perhaps if they knew how imperfect she was, they would turn their backs on her completely.

As it was, Daphne had persisted, refusing to believe all of society could be so shallow and thoughtless as to disregard her because of her mother’s tragedy. Besides, she had no where else to go, naught else to do unless she wished to play the part of sheltered invalid in her father’s house. And then she truly would go mad.

For four long years she had determinedly beat her head against society’s thick walls. Now, she had given up. She would not go back.

Gazing blankly out the uncovered carriage window, Daphne tried not to imagine what her future would bring. Like any other young girl, she had set out in society with the dream of finding a young man who would understand and care, someone she could share her thoughts and her life with.

She certainly hadn’t set any higher goals than that. Considering her lameness, it mattered little to her if the man of her dreams was perfect. She had a secure competence from her mother’s estate, not a wealthy one, but sufficient for a comfortable life. She didn’t require great wealth. She didn’t even need a title. Her father was only the younger son of a relatively obscure north country title. Titles meant nothing. But she had expected to be found pleasing by someone, somewhere. It was not as if she were a complete antidote.

But, as it turned out, apparently she was. After four years on the Marriage Mart, despite the kindness of all her relations, she had received only that one proposal, and it had been an insult.

Albert wasn’t the sort her very protective relations would normally allow near—another reason he’d asked for her hand while in public view. Bankrupt and twice her age, his offer had been made out of desperation. If that was the best she could do, she was better off unmarried. Society could pity her little more for her spinster state than it already did for her mother’s death.

Her maid snored, jolting Daphne back to the present. Aunt Agatha’s house couldn’t be far. They had just come through the village a little while ago. She had forgotten how steep this road was as it wound down to the riverbank. Or perhaps she had never known. She had probably been just as soundly asleep as her maid the summer she traveled here with her father.

The world outside seemed darker. Daphne looked up, trying to tell if clouds were covering the moon that had just risen. From the varying shades of darkness, she surmised the bank down to the river was overgrown with trees. The road appeared to travel along the river a little way before the bridge. She would have to ride here one day and investigate. It ought to be lovely on a sunny day.

If Aunt Agatha would allow her to ride. Dropping back against the seat in disappointment, Daphne had to consider that possibility.

With her brother’s reluctant assistance, she had escaped her father’s home because he had insisted on watching her every minute, forbidding her the stables, insisting that she be accompanied each time she ventured out of the house, all but ordering her to remain inside for fear she would be lost to him as her mother had been. She had been unable to tolerate the restrictions. If he had written Aunt Agatha with those same orders, would she obey?

Her mother’s relations in London had been more understanding, but that had been London. She had been accompanied everywhere by cousins and footmen and maids.

The size and sounds and smells of the city had intimidated her, and she had accepted the fact that a lady could not travel alone, so she had not protested the restrictions there.

But the country was different. She used to love solitary walks with nature, and she had learned to ride as soon as she could walk. She did not wish to abandon those pleasures to please her grief-stricken, anxious father.

For all that mattered, she didn’t see why she couldn’t learn to navigate the streets of London just as well as a garden path, if only people would leave her alone to walk at her own pace.

There had been so many exciting things around her, places she would have liked to linger, people she would like to know, but she was limited to those her family chose to visit. Now that she was older and more sure of herself, she had come to resent their constant vigilance. She was not likely to go berserk or collapse in the middle of a busy street if she stumbled.

But she would never have the opportunity to explore London now. If she and Aunt Agatha rubbed along well, she would in all likelihood spend the rest of her life in splendid isolation in the rugged wilds of Devon.

Relatively speaking, of course. She had heard of the mountains in Scotland and Wales, and learned of the magnificent scenery of Europe and America from her tutors, but unaccompanied, she wasn’t destined to see them. So she really ought to make the most of this rough bit of coast and moor. She and Aunt Agatha would have to come to an understanding.

A shout outside the carriage shocked Daphne from her reverie. She grabbed the strap as the carriage swayed and pitched forward. What on earth was the driver doing?

Fear spiked through her at the horses’ neighing protests as the carriage rocked and the wooden brakes screeched. Had the bridge gone out? Had a wheel broken?

The instant the carriage reached a full halt, Daphne shoved open the door. Behind her, her awakened maid wailed a protest, but she wasn’t sitting here and waiting for someone to inform her that they were about to fall off a precipice.

Memory sent a frisson of fear through her, but she refused to retreat in the face of her cowardice. The shouts outside sounded like several men. Had there been an accident?

The dark shadow of a horseman veered close to the Lansburys’ elegant landau. Cast in darkness outside the carriage lamps, he presented an otherworldly appearance. The specter made a gentlemanly bow and doffed his hat.

“What is happening? Has there been a mishap?” she asked before climbing down.

“I have only come to relieve you of a few baubles, my lady, and any coins you might have in your reticule. Consider it a contribution to charity, if you will, and you will soon be on your way.”

Thieves! That was impossible in this day and age. Highwaymen had been long banished to. . . The wilds away from London where there was little or no law—Daphne finished the thought belatedly. Still, she could not just give up her entire quarter’s income at his request. She reached to shut the door again.

At that moment, a shot rang out down the road, and a scream of warning vibrated the night air. From a distance, someone shouted, “Soldiers!” and closer to hand, the mounted highwayman muttered, “Damnation, a trap!”

Before Daphne could pull the heavy door closed, he leaned over, hooked his arm around her waist, and hauled her over his knees.

She shrieked a terrified protest. Her maid wailed in a piercing soprano. The highwayman merely kicked his horse and sprinted off into the darkness, one hand holding Daphne in place.

“Cease the caterwauling and you’ll be safe,” he ordered as the horse leapt a hedge and dashed through a clearing between the trees. “Continue, and you’ll live to regret it. I mean only to keep you hostage until the soldiers are gone.’’

Daphne fell silent, more from lack of breath than obedience. The horse’s rough gait jarred knees against ribs, and to her utter humiliation, she clung to a very masculine leg from a very intimate position. Still, she felt as if she would slide off at any moment.

She strained to detect any sound of pursuit, but her blood was throbbing in her ears and panic clouded her senses. Never in all her years had she been subjected to this kind of ill treatment, and to think, she had thought he sounded a gentleman!

They splashed across a river, soaking her woolen traveling gown at the hem and spraying water up the back of her heavy pelisse. She shivered as the icy water soaked through, and the horseman adjusted her more comfortably.

“Not far now. You’ll be fine.”

Daphne scarcely considered his promise reassuring. What did the highwayman consider to be fine? She was already soaked, cold, and humiliated to the marrow of her bones. She couldn’t wait until she had breath to release the outrage choking in her throat.

The smell of his boot leather filled her nostrils, and she became aware of other scents besides that of damp vegetation. The faint scent of bay rum mingling with masculine perspiration confused her. Did highwaymen wear bay rum? It was an odor that choked the ballrooms of London, but out here in the desolate countryside it had an almost pleasant scent. Perhaps it just reminded her of civilization.

The horse reared abruptly, and the thief chuckled as Daphne’s fingers dug into his leg and creased his trousers. A hard arm lifted her with ease and slid her to the ground just as a shrill whistle in the distance cut the air in a vague resemblance to a bugle’s all-clear.

He released her in obvious response to the signal. “My men should be safely away by now. You’ll find a short walk down this path will lead you to a cottage where a very kindly widow and her servants live. If you’ll hand over your trinkets, I shall leave you alone.”

Now that her feet were back on solid ground and the breath was returning to her lungs, Daphne stared up at the immensity of man and beast and the old, familiar anger struck again. She had promised to control her temper, and she had honestly tried, but this was more than any one person should have to bear.

“You can’t do this! This is an outrage! How dare you desert me like this! You must take me back to my maid and carriage at once. You cannot leave me out here miles from civilization. What kind of gentleman do you purport to be to thus treat a lady?”

The highwayman leaned over in the saddle to study her. He had been quite prepared for her to faint and weep and plead for mercy. This mixture of rage and haughtiness from one so delicate caught him by surprise, but the fury underlying her words held something else. If she were afraid of him, wouldn’t she use her anger to run? What kind of woman would demand that a thief linger to return her to her maid?

“The carriage is further than the cottage, miss. Did you enjoy our ride so that you wish to repeat it?”

The taunting mockery of his words drew blood into her cheeks, and Daphne had to clench her fingers to restore proper decorum. “I am not familiar with these woods, sir. I could be lost for days. If you will not return me to the carriage, you must take me to the cottage.”

She said it as firmly as she could manage through chattering teeth. The icy river water was responsible for only a small part of her chill, she feared.

Beginning to lose his patience, the highwayman leaned over to wrap his fingers around the gold locket at her throat. “Are you so rich you have forgotten how to walk? Then you won’t mind if I relieve you of this feeble trinket. I daresay Lansbury was too smart to bait a trap with real jewels.”

Daphne smacked at his gloved hand and stepped backward. Her foot slipped on the damp moss and her weak knee betrayed her. The aching cold of the river water had done its damage, as she’d feared.

We hope you have enjoyed this sample of

Mad Maria’s Daughter by Patricia Rice

To purchase:

Mad Maria’s Daughter

GET A FREE PATRICIA RICE BOOK

FREE Rebellious Sons Book!!

If you haven't claimed your free copy of Wicked Wyckerly , now's your chance.

Get your copy here!

Thank you for reading Crossed in Love.

I am an independent author, so getting the word out about my book is vital to its success. If you liked this book, please consider telling your friends, and writing a review at the store where you purchased it. Reviews help other readers find books. I appreciate all reviews, whether positive or negative.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

With several million books in print and New York Times and USA Today’s bestseller lists under her belt, former CPA Patricia Rice is one of romance’s hottest authors. Her emotionally-charged contemporary and historical romances have won numerous awards, including the RT Book Reviews Reviewers Choice and Career Achievement Awards. Her books have been honored as Romance Writers of America RITA® finalists in the historical, regency and contemporary categories.

A firm believer in happily-ever-after, Patricia Rice is married to her high school sweetheart and has two children. A native of Kentucky and New York, a past resident of North Carolina and Missouri, she currently resides in Southern California, and now does accounting only for herself. She is a member of Romance Writers of America, the Authors Guild, and Novelists, Inc.

For further information, visit Patricia’s network:

http://www.patriciarice.com

http://www.facebook.com/OfficialPatriciaRice

https://twitter.com/Patricia_Rice

http://wordwenches.typepad.com/word_wenches/

http://patricia-rice.tumblr.com/

ALSO BY PATRICIA RICE

The World of Magic:

The Unexpected Magic Series

MAGIC IN THE STARS

WHISPER OF MAGIC

THEORY OF MAGIC

AURA OF MAGIC

CHEMISTRY OF MAGIC

NO PERFECT MAGIC

The Magical Malcolms Series

MERELY MAGIC

MUST BE MAGIC

THE TROUBLE WITH MAGIC

THIS MAGIC MOMENT

MUCH ADO ABOUT MAGIC

MAGIC MAN

The California Malcolms Series

THE LURE OF SONG AND MAGIC

TROUBLE WITH AIR AND MAGIC

THE RISK OF LOVE AND MAGIC

Historical Romance:

The Rebellious Sons

WICKED WYCKERLY

DEVILISH MONTAGUE

NOTORIOUS ATHERTON

FORMIDABLE LORD QUENTIN

The Regency Nobles Series

THE GENUINE ARTICLE

THE MARQUESS

ENGLISH HEIRESS

IRISH DUCHESS

Regency Love and Laughter Series

CROSSED IN LOVE

MAD MARIA’S DAUGHTER

ARTFUL DECEPTIONS

ALL A WOMAN WANTS

Mysteries:

Family Genius Series

EVIL GENIUS

UNDERCOVER GENIUS

CYBER GENIUS

TWIN GENIUS

TWISTED GENIUS

ABOUT BOOK VIEW CAFE

Book View Café Publishing Cooperative (BVC) is an author-owned cooperative of over fifty professional writers, publishing in a variety of genres including fantasy, romance, mystery, and science fiction. Since its debut in 2008, BVC has gained a reputation for producing high-quality ebooks. BVC’s ebooks are DRM-free and are distributed around the world. The cooperative is now bringing that same quality to its print editions.

BVC authors include New York Times and USA Today bestsellers as well as winners and nominees of many prestigious awards, including:

Agatha Award

Campbell Award

Hugo Award

Lambda Award

Locus Award

Nebula Award

Nicholl Fellowship

PEN/Malamud Award

Philip K. Dick Award

RITA Award

World Fantasy Award

Writers of the Future Award