Seven bestselling historical romance authors offer seven sexy stories featuring dukes, lords, rakes, scoundrels…and the unforgettable heroines who bring them to their knees. These stories range in length from long novellas to delectable little bites.

“Unlocked,” by Courtney Milan

Elaine Warren has resigned herself to life as a spinster and a wallflower, but when Evan Carlton, the Earl of Westfeld, returns after a long absence, she’s afraid that he plans to torment her as he did before. This time, though, she vows to show him that wallflowers can fight back…

“When I Met my Duchess,” by Caroline Linden

Everyone expects the Duke of Wessex’s wedding to be the society event of the Season. But when the duke meets his future bride’s sister, he realizes he’s about to marry the wrong woman…and his wedding is about to become the scandal of the year.

“How to Catch a Wild Viscount,” by Tessa Dare

Luke Trenton, Viscount Merritt, returned from battle a changed man, but Cecily Hale won’t be pushed away. She has only a few moonlit nights to reach the real Luke…the wounded heart she knows still beats inside the war-ravaged body…or she could lose him to the darkness forever.

“One Starlit Night,” by Carolyn Jewel

Ten years away from Doyle’s Grange isn’t long enough for Viscount Northword to forget Portia Temple or their passionate adolescent affair. Portia, however, is about to marry another man…and Northword cannot help but interfere, with his words, his body, and the truths of his heart.

“Claiming the Duchess,” by Sherry Thomas

Clarissa, the widowed Duchess of Lexington, has two great loves: the reticent and reclusive Mr. James Kingston and her faithful correspondent Miss Julia Kirkland, whom Clarissa has never met. Now both Mr. Kingston and Miss Kirkland are due to arrive at Clarissa’s house—and Clarissa is about to find out that neither is as she has been led to believe…

“The Misbehaving Marquess,” by Leigh LaValle

Having awaited the return of her husband for half a decade, Catherine Raybourne, the Marchioness of Foster, has no intention of reconciling with her misbehaving marquess. But when he insists he needs an heir—immediately—she must confront her own lingering desires. Can she protect her heart while attempting to win his once again?

“Ruined by a Rake,” by Erin Knightley

Eleanor Abbington has always had a contentious and competitive relationship with Nicolas Norton. But when her uncle orders her to marry the man of his choosing, her old adversary becomes her only ally, and she may very well find herself…ruined by a rake.

A full table of contents is available at the conclusion of this collection. You can access it by clicking here.

For Elyssa Patrick

You’ve been there for me every step of the way.

I can’t wait for it to be your turn.

Chapter One

Hampshire, July, 1840.

IT HAD BEEN TEN YEARS SINCE EVAN CARLTON, Earl of Westfeld, last entered a ballroom. This one was just a moderately sized hall on the Arlestons’ country estate—a dance at a house party, not a great London crush. Still, standing at the top of the stairs he felt a touch of vertigo—as if the wide steps leading down to the dance floor were instead a steep slope, and the swirling pastels of evening gowns the rocks that waited below. One wrong step and he would fall.

This time, he had no safety rope.

He blinked, and the illusion passed. The figures at the foot of the stair coalesced into whirling pairs of dancers, not sharp crags. Everything was normal.

Everything, that was, except him. When last he’d been in polite society, he’d been its most ardent participant. Today…

His hand tightened deliberately about his cousin’s arm. She turned and gave him a quizzical look.

“Don’t look so hunted.” Diana, Lady Cosgrove, was resplendent in peacock-blue shimmering silk.

Evan had returned to England nearly fourteen months ago when his father had passed away. Since then, he’d been burdened with the details of the funeral and the estate he’d inherited. And, to be truthful, he’d dreaded the thought of reentering society. Foolish, that; enough time had elapsed that everything must have changed.

“You’ll see,” Diana was saying. “Nothing’s changed—nothing that matters, that is.”

“How enticing,” he said flatly.

She chattered on, oblivious to his unease. “Isn’t it, though? Don’t pull that face. You’ve been in mourning so long you’ve forgotten how to have fun. I must put my foot down: the great explorer will enjoy himself.”

He’d been a mountaineer, not an explorer, but there was no use correcting a trivial point of vocabulary.

Diana patted his arm, no doubt intending her touch to be bracing. “You were the most popular fellow in all of London. When last you were here, you dominated society. I wish you would act like it.”

Not comforting, the unquiet memories that brought to the surface. Evan looked out over the group. A large house party; but even with the addition of a few souls from the neighborhood, it was still a small ball. Of the nine or ten couples, only a handful were dancing. The rest were clustered in a loose knot on the edge of the room, punch glasses in hand.

The evening was young; only Evan felt aged.

When last he’d been here, he would have been the center of that crowd. His jokes had been the funniest—or at least, they had made everyone laugh the loudest. He’d been the golden boy—handsome and popular and liked by everyone.

Almost everyone. Evan shook his head. He had utterly hated himself.

“If it must be done, it’s best done bravely.” He drew himself up. “Let’s go join the throng.”

He took one step toward the massed group.

Diana pulled his arm. “Goodness,” she said. “Have a little care. Don’t you see who is present?”

He frowned. He could only make out a few faces. They blurred into one another at this distance, the bright silks of the ladies’ skirts contrasting with the dark, sober colors of the gentlemen’s coats. “Is that Miss Winston? I thought you were friends.”

“Next to her.” Diana would never have been so uncouth as to point, but she gave a little jerk with her chin. “It’s Lady Equine.”

Ah. Damn. He’d not let himself even think that dreadful appellation in years. But Lady Elaine Warren…she was the reason he had left England. His breath caught on a mix of hope and furious shame, and just as he had all those years ago, he found himself scanning the women for her, searching faces.

No wonder he hadn’t seen her at first. She made herself easy to overlook. Her arms were drawn tightly about her waist, as if she could squeeze herself into insignificance. Her gown, a pink so anemic it might have been white, left her muted in the crowd of bright colors. Even the pale color of her hair, twisted into an indifferent chignon, seemed to declare her inconsequential. It was only his own memory that made her stand out.

He kept his voice calm. “I suppose she isn’t Lady Elaine any longer. Who did she end up marrying?”

“Really. Who would wed a girl who laughs like a horse?”

He looked at his cousin. “Do be serious. We’re not youths any longer.” Even from this distance, Evan could see the ripe swell of her bosom. When she had come out at seventeen, she had attracted attention, her body mature beyond her age. He had noticed. Often.

She’d been entirely unlike all the other debutantes: not just in body, but with that laugh, that long, loud, vital laugh. It had made him think that she held nothing back, that life was ahead of her and she planned to enjoy it. Her laugh had always put him in mind of activities that were decidedly improper.

“I am serious,” Diana said. “Lady Equine never married.”

“You’re not still calling her that a decade later.” He wasn’t sure if he intended his words as a command or a question.

But he felt the truth with a cold, sick certainty. He could see it in the set of Lady Elaine’s shoulders, in the way she ducked her head as if she could avoid all notice. He could see it in her wary glance, darting to either side.

“Come, Evan. You wouldn’t want me to give up my fun.” Diana was grinning, but her bright expression faded as she saw that look on his face. “Don’t you recall? You said once, ‘I can’t tell if she laughs like a horse or a pig, but—’”

“I remember.” His voice was quiet. “I remember very well what I said, thank you.”

He only tried not to.

She’d never stopped laughing, no matter how he teased her. But when she had looked in his direction, her eyes had begun to slide over him altogether, as if he were nothing but an irrelevant objet d’art, and one that was of no further interest. Over the course of a Season’s worth of mockery, he had watched her draw in on herself until the vital stuff he’d lusted after had simply faded away.

“Don’t worry about her,” Diana was saying. “She’s nothing. There isn’t a man out there who would consider marrying a woman who laughs like the unholy marriage between a horse and a pig.”

“I said that.” His hands clenched.

“Evan, everyone said that.”

He’d run from England, ashamed of what he’d done. But whatever maturity he’d found in his travels abroad, he could feel it slipping now. It would be so easy to be the selfish swine who thought nothing of ruining a girl’s prospects simply because it would make him popular and make others laugh.

Diana watched him expectantly. One smile, one comment about Elaine’s whinny, and he would seal his cousin’s approval—and his fate.

He’d been right. There were rocky shoals below, and gravity was doing its level best to dash everything good he’d made of himself against the waiting crags.

Gently, he removed his cousin’s hand from his arm.

“What are you doing?” she asked.

“What do you suppose?” He bit off the words. “I’m going to dance with Lady Elaine.”

But she misunderstood the martial set to his jaw, because instead of looking worried, a sly, pleased smile spread across her lips. “Oh, Evan,” she said, touching his cuff lightly. “You really are too awful, baiting her like that. This is going to be just like old times.”

LADY ELAINE WARREN SCANNED THE WALLS OF THE BALLROOM. Choosing the place where she would spend the evening was always an exercise in delicacy and balance. It had grown easier over the years, as the leaders of fashion had found new, more interesting pastimes than making fun of her. She had a few friends, now—real ones. She might go entire evenings at a time without having to school her face to a pleasant, stupid blankness. All she had to do was choose her company wisely.

This house party was mostly safe—she’d interrogated her mother closely as to the guest list. None of her closest friends had come, but her remaining tormenters were absent. Her mother had wanted to attend to pass the time while her father was off overseeing his estates.

“It’s a beautiful room,” she said to her mother. “Why, just look at the carving on the paneling. The details are utterly exquisite.”

Her mother, Lady Stockhurst, looked puzzled and then peered at the wall. Like Elaine, Lady Stockhurst was tall and blond. Like Elaine, her mother was well-endowed, corsets barely containing her ample curves. Like Elaine, her mother was not respected at all.

If they pretended they were more interested in the walls than the dancing, there could be no disappointment.

“Why, Mrs. Arleston,” she heard behind her, “what a lovely gathering.”

Elaine stilled, not turning. She didn’t need to turn; she wasn’t being addressed. But she knew that voice. It was Lady Cosgrove—one of the women who still took delight in needling Elaine.

She leaned in to her mother. “You didn’t say Lady Cosgrove would be here.”

“Didn’t I, then?” her mother responded. “How remiss of me. I must have forgotten. Or maybe I never knew?”

Unlike Elaine, her mother somehow failed to notice how little she was liked.

“Let me introduce you to an old acquaintance,” Lady Cosgrove was saying.

The murmured introduction was too indistinct to reach Elaine’s ears. Instead, she smiled and nodded. “Never mind, Mother. It’s nothing.” And maybe it was nothing. So few of Lady Cosgrove’s compatriots were here. She wouldn’t continue to pursue her game without an appreciative audience, would she?

“Yes,” Lady Cosgrove was saying, “but do look—here’s another old friend. Why, Lady Elaine. How do you do?”

Elaine could not ignore so direct a query. She fixed her smile in place so firmly that her cheeks ached.

“Lady Cosgrove,” she started pleasantly. And then her gaze shifted behind the woman. Her hands grew cold. She stopped, mid-greeting, feeling as if she had just been struck. For just one second, her amiable expression slipped, and Lady Cosgrove’s grin widened to sharklike proportions.

But Elaine couldn’t force herself to beam in placid unconcern. Not through this.

She had fallen into a nightmare: the kind where she entered a ballroom wearing nothing but her drawers. She’d had that dream before. Soon, everyone would start laughing at her. And when they turned to her en masse, the people who pointed and mocked all wore the same face: a thousand incarnations of Evan Carlton—now the Earl of Westfeld.

She always awoke from those dreams in a cold sweat. She would succeed in coaxing herself back to sleep only by repeating to herself that he was gone, he was gone, he was gone, and she wouldn’t ever see him again.

But this horrid dream was real. He was back.

He was older. He was bigger, too, shoulders wider, his jacket unable to hide the ripple of muscles fit for a laborer. Back when he’d tormented her, he’d been almost scrawny. Faint lines gathered at the corner of his eyes, and he was dressed in sober browns. His hair was no longer tamed in the fashionable, sleek look that she remembered. Instead, he’d let the dark gold of his hair fall into tousled curls.

He stood too close to her—three full steps away, true, but even that seemed unconscionably near. Cold gathered in her hands and a knot formed in the pit of her stomach. She wanted to turn on her heel and run.

But she’d realized long ago that running was the worst thing she could do. Deer and rabbits ran, and the sight of their hindquarters usually only spurred the dogs to the hunt.

“Lady Elaine,” he said, giving her a stiff bow.

She had been Lady Equine for as long as she could remember. But now he was calling her by her real name and looking into her eyes, and it was almost as if he respected her.

He had always had deceptively compelling eyes—dark and fathomless. She felt as if she might glimpse hidden secrets if only she peered into those depths. He looked as if he were about to reveal some extraordinary truth, one that would explain everything.

An illusion, that. He was nothing more than a snake who could hold her spellbound in his gaze. As for the fluttering in her belly…that was nothing so mundane as attraction. Instead, Westfeld made her feel the vital, vicious pull of a might-have-been. Even after all these years, some foolish part of her believed that she might one day be respected. One day, she would not have to watch over her shoulder, constantly wary. One day, she could enjoy herself without fear that she would become the object of ridicule. If the Earl of Westfeld would treat her with respect—well, then she’d know she was safe.

She hated that he made her think that the impossible might be attainable.

Right on cue, Lady Cosgrove asked, “Indeed, Lady Elaine. How are your horses?”

Long years of training kept Elaine’s face unruffled. It was a triumph over both of them to curl her lips into a smile, to reach out one hand in polite greeting.

“Very well, and thank you for the gracious inquiry,” she said, ignoring Lady Cosgrove’s delicate smirk. “And do tell—how are yours?”

“Leave off the talk of horses,” Westfeld said shortly. He wasn’t smiling, not even a little.

“True. Westfeld has been all round the world,” Lady Cosgrove put in. “He could talk about more exotic creatures than pigs or ponies.”

Westfeld didn’t glance at his cousin. Still, his lips thinned further. “Don’t.” His voice was steel. “Besides, I spent most of my time in Switzerland. I don’t consider the alpine ground squirrel to be particularly exotic.”

“Don’t tell me you saw nothing exotic.” Elaine let a hint of breathiness invade her tone. “Didn’t Hannibal lead all his elephants into the Alps?”

At Lady Cosgrove’s befuddled look, Elaine felt her smile broaden, and she gave herself a mental point in this match.

“You see,” Elaine said, “I know all about foreign animals. I haven’t any need to hear from Westfeld on that score.” And with that, she laughed.

Laughter was an act of defiance, although these two would never understand it. Elaine knew her laugh was awful: high-pitched and so loud that people turned to stare at her. When she laughed, she snorted in the most indelicate manner. Her laugh had been the cause of their torment all those years ago. And so when Elaine laughed without holding back, she sent them a message.

You cannot break me. You cannot hurt me. You cannot even make me notice you.

“Yes,” Lady Cosgrove said after a telling pause, “I can see you’re quite the expert.”

“Indeed.” Elaine beamed at the pair of them. “I attended a lecture given by a naturalist just the other week. He had traveled all the way to the Great Karoo.”

“The Great Karoo?” Lady Cosgrove asked. “Where—never mind. The animals there must be different indeed. Do they snort? Or squeal?”

Elaine waved a dismissive hand. “It’s a desert. There aren’t many creatures that make their homes there.”

Still, she had pored over his sketches of giant, flightless birds. He had said that the creatures put their heads in the sand when threatened. Apparently they believed that if they couldn’t see you, you could not see them.

She hadn’t seen why anyone would need to spend nine months traveling to Africa to find specimens that hid from the truth. No; one had only to travel half a mile to the nearest ballroom.

She had been the butt of jokes for so long now that denial had become second nature to her. It didn’t matter what people said; if you pretended not to hear it, they couldn’t embarrass you. She need show no reaction, need have no shame. If you didn’t acknowledge what they said, you need shed no tears. And so she’d hid her head in the sand and locked away everything about herself but a pale-haired marionette of a lady. Marionettes felt nothing, not even when they were presented with their biggest tormenter of all time.

She smiled, this time at both of them—Lady Cosgrove and her petty jabs, and Lord Westfeld, who had not so much as cracked a smile the entire time since he’d returned.

“No,” Elaine said brightly, “there’s nothing in all the African continent that could be considered the least bit foreign.”

Westfeld was watching her intently. That abstracted look on his face had always heralded a particularly cruel remark.

Beside her, her mother tapped gloved fingers against her skirts. “Lady Cosgrove, Lord Westfeld—I do thank you for giving your regards. It has been so long since we’ve seen you.” Her mother paused, and Elaine could see her drawing in breath and doing her best to make polite small talk. “The stars. They’ll be bright tonight. Did you know the moon is almost new?”

“Indeed,” Lady Cosgrove said silkily. “Tell us more of the moon, Lady Stockhurst. You know a great deal about it.”

A muscle twitched in Westfeld’s jaw. “No,” he said. He looked surprised to have spoken. “No. I didn’t come here to… That is, Lady Elaine, I came here to ask you to dance.” He turned his gloved hand out—not reaching toward her, just offering it up. Incongruously, she noticed that his gloves were kidskin brown—not a fashionable color.

How odd. Westfeld had always dressed at the height of fashion.

Despite that lapse, she would almost have thought him handsome, if she let herself forget who he was. Since she’d last seen him, the lines of his face had grown harsher, more angular. She could almost pretend he was a different person.

But the passage of years had not dimmed her memory of how this form of recreation would proceed. It was the game of “let’s be kind to Elaine,” and it had been played on her before. Let’s invite Elaine to our exclusive party. Let’s invite Elaine to dance. Let’s make Elaine believe that we’ve forgotten how to be cruel to her.

The next step was always, Now that we’ve lured her into exposing herself, let’s humiliate her in front of everyone. She would have given up on society altogether, except that doing so would have left her mother alone and unprotected.

“You needn’t accept,” Westfeld said, so softly that only she could hear. “I would understand completely.”

And that was the hell of their jests. If she refused, he would know he had the capacity to hurt her. He would know that she feared him. He would win. And that was the last thing she wanted him to do.

And so Elaine smiled into the eyes of the man who had ruined her life. “But of course, Lord Westfeld,” she said. “I would love it above all things.”

Chapter Two

ALAS. LADY ELAINE DID NOT love dancing with him, Evan thought ruefully. She hated it.

Her hands were warm in his, even through gloves. She danced beautifully. She smiled the entire time. She also did not look at his face, not once. Instead, she concentrated her attention on the second button of his coat, even though she had to look down to do it.

What Evan needed to say to her was too important to be delivered cavalierly. But with talk so momentous on his mind, his skill for small conversation seemed to slip away.

Finally, he managed, “Your gown is lovely.” It was, he supposed, although he was hardly the judge of such things. Pink silk, large sleeves, a skirt so wide he might have tripped over it. Might still do so, if he didn’t watch his step.

Her gaze flicked up, and then back to his button, its touch on his face as temporary as a hawk moth flitting by a window.

“I’ve lost all sense of fashion myself,” he told her.

Her perusal of his coat became more marked, and too late, he realized what he’d said—he’d praised her gown, and then implied that he had no taste. It came out as the worst sort of backhanded compliment.

Lady Elaine raised her eyes to him. He felt a sort of shock travel through him as she did so. Her eyes were gray and luminous. She was smiling at him, but there was a knife-edge to her expression. “Indeed,” she said, her tone solemn. “I can’t recall the last time I saw a gentleman wearing brown gloves.”

A little bit of an insult in return. Good for her; he deserved it.

“All my gloves are brown,” he confessed. “It’s a habit remaining from my mountaineering days. If your clothing is too dark, it absorbs too much sun and you become overheated. If it’s too light, the dirt shows. I long ago abandoned fashion in favor of function.”

She raised an eyebrow in disbelief.

“It’s the truth,” he said. “Would you believe I still have my waistcoat pockets lined with mackintosh?”

“I hardly know what to think,” she said. “I cannot envision you as anything except an outright leader of fashion. You were always quite the dandy.” She spoke lightly, but he could almost hear the accusation underlying her words. He had been a useless fribble.

His hand tightened about her waist. “People change.” He had changed. “I wish I didn’t have to do this.”

Her hands tensed against him, and her face went as still as a deer sighted in the forest. But she didn’t flee. Instead, that smile of hers broadened.

“How ungallant,” she replied. “You did ask me to dance. And here you represent yourself as a gentleman.”

“You misunderstand,” he said. “I do not wish you out of my presence. I wish I had not made it necessary to say what I must. I am sorry.”

She had never flinched at any of his insults. But at his apology, she jumped.

“I am sorry,” he repeated. “You cannot know how dreadfully sorry I am.”

“Whatever for?” Her face was so guileless that for one instant he believed she might forgive him. But then her eyes widened slightly. “Oh, there’s no need to worry about that,” she said. “It’s quite easy to misstep in the waltz. You must keep time carefully—one two three, one two three—”

She was addressing his button once again. He hadn’t misstepped, the little baggage. Somehow, over the years, she’d developed the talent of delivering the most splendid snubs in that breathy tone of voice. She hid her claws behind that innocent demeanor. But, by God, she was insulting him.

And, by God, he liked it. He liked that the fire and zest he’d seen in her that first Season had not completely faded. He glanced down and his gaze fixed on the creamy skin of her throat. For just one second, he contemplated leaning down and setting his lips right there, on her shoulder. He wondered, not so idly, what she would taste like.

She was probably counting the minutes until the waltz ended.

He shook his head. “You know what I’m referring to. My conduct all those years ago was inexcusable. I cannot ask for your forgiveness, because I don’t see how I could merit it. But I must let you know I regret it.”

She fixed her eyes on him. “You know, Westfeld,” she said, in that same breezy tone that she always employed, “I have no notion what you could possibly be apologizing for.” Her eyes cut away. “In point of fact, I scarcely recall you at all.”

Ouch.

A hint of color touched her cheeks. “If you are perhaps referring to the last time we danced—”

Oh, hell. He didn’t want to think of that.

“—I assure you, I thought nothing of your inebriation. My father, Lord Stockhurst, says only a very weak fellow drinks to excess, and I am not so unkind as to hold your incapacity against you.”

He hadn’t been drunk, damn it. He’d been rude and boorish. And the venom in her words—coupled with that sweet, placid smile—answered his question. No, she wouldn’t forgive him. He could have guessed that from the start. As languorous as the waltz could be, she did not relax against him. The muscles of her back were tense and stiff against his hand. She was wary, as if she expected that at any moment he might savage her.

She had every reason to think ill of him. Yet, for all that, some errant corner of his mind paid avid attention to the pale pink ribbon threaded through the neckline of her gown. He couldn’t help but wonder what would happen if he were to pull on it. Would the gown stay up, or…

God. Ten minutes in her company and he was fantasizing about her breasts again.

He was a beast: there were no two ways about it. He had apologized to her. And if she hadn’t accepted it…he might well be a beast, but he wasn’t the sort of man who would make a lady feel uncomfortable just so he could have the satisfaction of obtaining false forgiveness. If she wanted to pretend that she’d never been hurt, it was not his place to gainsay her.

She was light on her feet, and her gloved hand in his made him feel a whole range of uncomfortable things, from the unquiet stirrings of his lust to a pained, wistful sadness.

Damn, but remorse could run deep. There was nothing to do about this one, though, and so he folded it up and left it inside him. If he lived his life with only this one major regret, he’d count himself lucky. The waltz came to an end. And if his hand covered hers a little too firmly as he escorted her back to her mother, well, there were worse ways to apologize.

“Lady Elaine,” he started to say, and then could not find a way to finish the sentence. He gave her a little bow, and slowly relinquished her hand.

“Lord Westfeld.” She turned to leave, and then stopped, her gaze darting to the figures before them.

Diana had seated herself in a chair near Lady Stockhurst. The two appeared to be engaged in earnest conversation. As Evan watched, Diana leaned forward and set her hand on Lady Stockhurst’s shoulder.

Next to him, Elaine’s breath sucked in.

Lady Stockhurst looked up. Her eyes brightened as she saw her daughter, and she made a beckoning motion. Elaine slunk forward, each step slower than the last. Above her shoulder, Diana caught Evan’s eyes, and she gave him a slow, dangerous smile.

No. Not this again.

“Elaine,” Lady Stockhurst was saying, “I have just been talking with Lady Cosgrove.”

No, no.

Lady Stockhurst brushed at her hair, and a smooth, pale wisp came tumbling free. “And guess what she said? She told me that everyone here was interested in my work—so very interested! She suggested I might deliver a lecture on the final evening of the house party. She’ll present the notion to Mrs. Arleston. What do you think?”

It did not take a particularly intelligent man to tell what Lady Elaine thought. She stared straight at her mother. At her side, her gloved fingers compressed into a fist.

Because if there was a bigger laughingstock in all the ton than Elaine, it was her mother—her mother, who seemed dreamy and insubstantial half the time, never quite aware of her surroundings, entirely unable to follow a normal conversation. Ten years ago, she’d been prone to lapse into the most incomprehensible discussions at the drop of a hat, on retrogrades and periodicity of orbits. It appeared that hadn’t changed, either.

“I was thinking of discoursing on my comet,” Lady Stockhurst was saying. “They did tell me I might be made an honorary member of the Royal Astronomical Society, if ever my findings were verified. Although they haven’t quite come round to that yet.”

Poking fun at Lady Stockhurst would give Evan about as much amusement as jabbing a puppy with a sharp stick.

But what was her daughter to do? She couldn’t very well say, “No, don’t give a lecture—they all just want the excuse to laugh at you.”

“That’s lovely,” Lady Elaine said. As she spoke, her eyes cut toward Evan, her glance sharp and unforgiving.

It didn’t matter what he wanted. How could he have thought to paper matters over with a mere apology? He’d left this behind, unfinished, all those years ago.

And now his old sins were returning to haunt him. This time, he wasn’t going to let them win.

“WASN’T THAT A LOVELY EVENING?” Lady Stockhurst, Elaine’s mother, hummed to herself as she moved about the tiny sitting room that had been allotted to them. She flitted like a butterfly, light and graceful. Like a butterfly, her interest landed on a silver-backed brush that lay on a chest of drawers. When she picked it up and turned it about, the light from the oil-lamp reflected off its surface into Elaine’s eyes.

Elaine winced and looked away.

“And you danced three times.”

“Yes,” Elaine said uncomfortably. “I did.” She sighed. “At least that’s three times better than the last ball.”

Her mother set the brush down with a click. “No, it is infinity times better, the ratio of naught to three being boundless. If you continue to attract dance partners at an infinite rate, at the next ball you attend, every man in all of England will ask you to dance.”

Elaine smiled. “You’re being ridiculous, Mama.”

Her mother frowned. “Yes,” she finally admitted. “It is rather optimistic to extrapolate a geometrical trend from two data points.”

Elaine sighed. Her mother was…well, she definitely wasn’t stupid. Lady Stockhurst probably understood more than half the Fellows of the Royal Society. On the subjects of astronomy and mathematics, she was the most discerning person that Elaine knew.

For just about everything else…while her mother was not stupid, she could be remarkably oblivious. A more attentive mother might have looked at Elaine and seen a daughter who had failed to find a husband after eleven Seasons. Any other parent would have realized that Elaine was a social failure. But Elaine’s mother looked at her daughter and saw perfection.

Elaine tried not to overturn her mother’s illusions too dreadfully.

“It is so nice that Westfeld is back.” Her mother traced a dark imperfection on the mirror and then inscribed an elliptical orbit around it.

“Mmmm.”

As she spoke, Lady Stockhurst marked the perihelion on her orbit and measured it with her fingers. “You know, I always thought he was rather sweet upon you.”

Elaine stared straight ahead. Out of the corner of her vision, she could catch a glimpse of the maid they had brought with them. Mary paused in the act of brushing her dress, her eyes bobbing up toward Elaine’s in an unspoken question.

Elaine looked away and chose her next words carefully. “Perhaps you overestimate. You thought Viscount Saxtony was interested, too.”

An annoyed wave of her hand. “And he was—if only he had not been so fickle as to marry elsewhere.”

“You said Sir Mark Turner was in love with me.”

“As well he should be, if he’s any notion what is good for him. You should make a fine couple—both blond and tall. He needs a wife. And you are both so popular.”

Elaine bit her lip. Sir Mark Turner was wanted everywhere because he’d been knighted by the queen. If Elaine was wanted anywhere, it was to serve as the butt of their jokes.

Lady Stockhurst smiled faintly, and smudged out the orbit she’d drawn on the mirror. “Did I mention I’m to give a lecture?”

“Yes.” Elaine shivered. Her mother would give a lecture, and everyone would snicker at her. Elaine had sat through those before—the snide whispers about how amusing it was to see a woman aping a man. It was hard for Elaine to ignore insults when they were directed at her personally. But it was excruciating to bite her tongue when those voices mocked her mother.

Still, her mother never seemed to notice. She would take their sarcastic jeers at the end as honest applause. Elaine alone would seethe on her mother’s behalf, furious and humiliated and unwilling to steal the brightness from her mother’s eyes by telling the truth.

“I’m glad we came,” her mother said with a decisive nod.

Elaine stood and walked to her mother, and set her arm around her shoulders. “I am, too,” she said. And she truly was. Her mother would enjoy it, and if she didn’t know, could it hurt her?

But her mother’s shoulders seemed thin and fragile. Lady Stockhurst was brilliant and confused and…and utterly dear.

“Tell me,” Elaine said, “surely you were not thinking of Westfeld in the ballroom. What did you have on your mind?”

It was the right thing to say. Her mother smiled immediately. “Yes, well. I was thinking that it is a matter of simple mathematics to determine the gravitational forces between any two bodies. Add in a third, however, and the equations turn to a mess. There were so many bodies in the ballroom—so many forces. One could not simply apply perturbations to project the future.” She shook her head briskly. “This is why people are so hard to understand. I cannot even estimate their gravitational pull.”

In spite of herself, Elaine smiled. Her mother would never figure out that her daughter was practically a pariah. She would never be able to fit the censure and laughter and insults that her daughter suffered into equations.

Perhaps that was why, after all these years, her love for her daughter had never altered. She was impervious to social reality. She saw only what she wished to see, and for that, Elaine loved her fiercely.

Her mother turned and walked to the door of her bedchamber. “I can’t wait to see what tomorrow brings,” she said in parting.

Elaine held her smile until her mother disappeared.

Lord above. The party would last another two days. Forty-eight hours with Lord Westfeld and Lady Cosgrove? It was going to be hell.

Chapter Three

IF DANTE HAD CHOSEN TO MAKE AN EXAMPLE OF EVAN, he could not have crafted a more particularized version of hell.

Evan had tried to warn Diana off Elaine—at first subtly, then more pointedly. The afternoon after the ball, Diana had spent a good ten minutes encouraging Lady Stockhurst while the other ladies subtly tittered into their gloves. And so Evan had taken her aside.

“Leave her alone.”

She pretended confusion at first. “Why, whatever do you mean? Lady Stockhurst loves to share her ideas.” A dimple peeked out on her cheek, and her eyelashes dipped down, as if she expected him to share in the joke.

Once, he would have. “That’s not what I mean. You’re doing this to humiliate Lady Elaine, and I’ve had enough of that.”

His cousin continued to smile, but her dimple faded. “I’m doing this for you.”

“I don’t want it. Cease. Immediately.”

Her face fell. He shouldn’t have felt like a cad for remonstrating with her, but he did.

He scrubbed his hand through his hair and tried again. “We started the game when we were children.”

They’d been cousins, growing up on neighboring estates, ignored by all but their nursemaids and tutors. And even though Evan had gone away to school, when he’d stayed there summers she had been his only companion. After their quiet, somewhat solitary childhood, they’d entered society together. The heady whirl of constant company had been overwhelming—frightening and fun and impossible, all at once.

He protected her. She protected him. Together, they’d been unstoppable.

Truly, someone should have stopped them.

He shook his head. “We’re not children any longer. There’s no need for this.”

She set her hand on his wrist. “You’ve been gone, Evan. You don’t remember what London society is like. They’re wolves out here, and it’s devour or be devoured in turn. If you don’t grasp your place in society, you’ll have it torn from you. Just like your Lady Elaine.”

“I remember perfectly well what London society is like.”

Diana’s eyes sparked, and she looked up at him defiantly. “Perhaps you think very little of me now, as I’m only a stupid, foolish girl who married an older man and stayed home while you were out exploring the world. But my husband is forever on the continent. It was a godsend for me when you returned. You are the closest thing I have to a brother, and I will not let you throw away your reputation or your good position in society, simply because you’ve got some antiquated notion of chivalry in your head.”

“There’s nothing antiquated about basic human decency,” Evan snapped.

“Listen to yourself! This is not who you are—this stodgy fellow, dressed in brown. I know you. You haven’t had a bit of fun since your father passed away. I did not drag you all the way to Hampshire so you could wallow in boredom.”

“I don’t mind a bit of amusement,” he said quietly. “But I no longer think that ruining a lady’s life is a reasonable way to pass the time.”

She shrugged one shoulder. But she didn’t understand, and she didn’t believe him. He could tell, because throughout dinner she needled Elaine with a constant stream of sly innuendo, and no amount of repressive throat-clearing on his part would cut her off.

Dessert was soured by the tiny barbs his cousin delivered. And when Evan and the other gentlemen joined the ladies once more after port and cigars, he could see immediately that she’d not let off her sport. Lady Elaine sat on a long divan, bracketed between Diana and her mother. Even if he hadn’t known Diana, there was a particularly hunted look in the lines around Lady Elaine’s eyes that told him everything he needed to know.

Someone suggested cards; another person a game of charades. The discussion continued, as servants handed out delicate flutes of dark-red wine punch, chilled until condensation collected on the glass.

It was Diana who stopped the argument, gesturing with her glass of punch.

“Please,” she said, “my cousin has not been in company at all. And I have been dying to have him tell of his adventures.” Diana smiled at him prettily.

“Do tell,” Mr. Arleston said. And like that, everyone turned to regard Evan.

“Lady Cosgrove makes it sound so interesting.” Evan settled into the cushions of the chair. “But I only did the usual, I suppose. I wandered a season in Italy, a summer in Greece. I spent most of my time in France and Switzerland, though.”

“Oh, Paris. I love Paris.” That, from Mrs. Arleston.

Evan had forgotten what it was like to be the center of attention, everyone watching him, waiting for his next words. People had a pull for him, and even though he’d vowed he wouldn’t do it, he felt some of that old energy return. “I passed through Paris on a weekend, but I didn’t stay. I spent most of my time in Chamonix.”

The knowing looks turned to puzzlement, and all around people leaned forward in their chairs.

“Chamonix is a town in the French Alps, near Mont Blanc.”

“Is it beautiful, then?” Mrs. Arleston was frowning. “I can’t quite imagine spending all my time in a small town.”

“It is beautiful,” Evan said quietly. “But it huddles at the feet of the highest mountain in the entire alpine region. I climbed Mont Blanc three times.”

“Three times?” Mr. Patton set one hand over his rounded belly and shook his head. “Once, I can understand. It gives you a dubious set of bragging rights, I suppose. But thrice seems to be the product of an excess of ambition.”

“First time anyone has ever accused me of that,” Evan replied.

The ladies in the crowd smiled and shifted.

“I thought of attempting the Matterhorn, but I prefer to remain among the living. But my accomplishments are not so many. In that time, my cousin has married and produced four children. Surely that is the greater achievement.”

Diana was watching him now with a curious stare, and she took a sip of her wine. “Good heavens. How long does it take to climb Mont Blanc?”

“Depending upon the conditions? Not much more than a few days of grueling work, across desperate traverses covered in snow.” He paused to let the desolation of the landscape sink in.

Across from Diana, Mr. Patton frowned. “Well, you’ve accounted for a week out of ten years. What were you doing with the rest of your time?”

Evan raised an eyebrow. “Preparing to climb Mont Blanc.”

“Preparing? For ten years? Does it take so long to buy rope and the like?”

Evan shook his head and bit back a smile.

But Diana burst in hotly, almost shoving her elbow into Lady Elaine at her side in her haste to speak on his behalf. “Mountaineering,” she lectured, “is quite dangerous, as anyone would know. There are…well, mountaineering moves that must be learned. Special ones. I’m sure we can’t understand the time that must be involved.”

His cousin had always had a hot temper—and while she might seem fickle to many, Evan knew that she was loyal at heart. She would defend him at all costs.

“And then,” Diana was continuing, “one must be quite particular about one’s gear. For there is not only rope to consider, but the boots, and the, uh, the special packs, and also the tampons.”

“Crampons,” Evan supplied.

“Crampons,” she repeated, without missing a beat.

“But in my experience,” Evan interrupted, “those who spend all their time making purchases and arguing about whether to use wrought iron or forged iron for boot-nails spend no time on the mountains at all. The most important part of climbing a mountain is not choosing rope, but learning to function as part of a team. You can’t go out by yourself. What would you do in a rockslide? What if you misstep on the edge of a cliff? If you cannot trust your compatriots, you risk death.”

“Nonsense,” Mr. Patton put in. “You only hear about those puny Frenchmen expiring in such gruesome fashion. A strapping English lord? The mountains wouldn’t dare kill him.”

“What an amusing thing to say.” Evan didn’t feel like smiling. “I would not be here, had not a puny Frenchman saved me.”

“Nonsense,” Patton repeated, but with less certainty.

“We were on a glacier.” Evan fixed his gaze on the man’s eyes. “I don’t know what you’ve heard of them, but they’re quite dangerous—every step is slick, and you can’t trust the surface beneath your boots. There are crevasses that are miles deep, covered by only the slightest crust of ice. One step, and you could fall to your doom.”

The ladies gasped. All of them, except Lady Elaine. Her gray eyes met his, as if she too knew what it felt like to plummet to her death.

“You try to be as careful as you can, but you never know if you’re walking on a shelf of ice. The ground beneath your feet could swallow you up at any instant. Entire parties have vanished. Like that.” Evan snapped his fingers.

Diana looked faintly horrified. “How do you guard against such a thing?”

“Pray,” he said shortly. “And you rope together, so that if one man missteps, his mates can pull him out.”

There were wise nods all around.

“But—” That was Lady Elaine, speaking for the first time. “But if you are roped together, would that not mean one man could drag you into a crevasse as easily as he could be pulled out?”

“Don’t be ridiculous,” Diana snapped. “If any one man falls, the others can surely pull him out. It’s a sound plan, and safe.”

Elaine pulled back.

“It is not safe,” Evan heard himself contradict. “It is d—that is to say, it is entirely dangerous. You see, if a man falls fast enough, he could jerk a companion off his feet before the other man has a chance to brace himself. If a shelf of ice collapses, it could take two men at once—and that sort of dead weight could pull a whole party into the abyss.”

Diana’s eyes widened. “What do you do if more than one man is pulled in, and you cannot retrieve them?”

“What do you suppose? There’s no choice in the matter. You cut the rope.”

Diana gulped more of her punch. “What? And send the ones who are dangling to their death?”

Evan gave a curt nod. “Yes. And you plan for it in advance. You practice on safe ground before you ever go onto a glacier, so you know exactly what your capabilities are as a team. You know when it is a choice between having one man fall and sacrificing the entire group.”

“How horrid!”

“The Bible got it wrong when it intimated that the valley contained the shadow of death. Death dwells in the high places.”

Everyone was listening to him now.

“So,” Diana whispered. “You nearly died. How?”

“It was just as I said. The ground vanished beneath my feet. I fell six feet in the blink of an eye and had the wind knocked out of me.”

“B-but your friends pulled you up, did they not?”

“My fall jerked Meissner off his feet, too. He was luckier—he caught the ledge, and was left dangling at the top, barely able to hang on. We had only one other man roped in—Dutoi.”

“Good Lord. It was a good thing you had practiced for such situations.”

“There had been no practice that could help,” Evan said. “We knew what we could manage. One man down, one man barely holding on…we couldn’t survive that. My weight was going to pull Meissner off the ledge, and when it did, all three of us would perish. We had tested it, you see.”

Diana sipped at her punch once more, and seemed surprised to find the glass empty. She gestured to a servant to refill it as she spoke. “What did you do?”

“What do you suppose I did?” Evan said. “I told them to cut the damned rope.” Nobody even flinched at that blasphemy in this mixed company, so rapt was their attention. “If I could have reached my knife, I would have done it myself. But it was in my boot, and I was at such an awkward angle… Those idiots nearly killed themselves, saving my life.”

Afterward, the three of them had never talked of it. But as soon as he’d been able, he had bought them a drink.

“I suppose there are worse things than owing a favor to a French aristocrat.”

Dutoi had not been an aristocrat. His father had been a bourgeois, a wealthy merchant. Meissner had been a commoner, too—the young nephew of some natural philosopher who lived in the Kingdom of Hanover. But he didn’t see any reason to try to explain that to these people. They wouldn’t understand how much he’d transformed.

“What a peculiarly intimate friendship,” Lady Elaine said. “To know that someone has the power of life and death over you.”

Or maybe…maybe one person would understand. Evan’s throat went dry. Her gray eyes met his, and he felt almost naked before her, as if she could see the extent of his transformation. As if she alone, of all women, had been given the power to comprehend who he had become.

“Outside of marriage,” Evan said, “it is the most intimate relationship a man can have.”

Diana giggled, breaking the mood. “Well,” she whispered, none too softly, “no wonder Lady Elaine shows such curiosity. She’ll not be finding intimacy any other way.”

Lady Elaine closed up, shuttering like a seaside cottage in the face of a storm. All sense of intimacy disappeared, as if she had recalled that he was her enemy.

But I’m not. I’ve changed.

“Diana,” Evan said in warning.

His cousin’s eyes met his in outrage, and a little spark of defiance ignited. She lifted her glass of wine punch to her lips one last time…and then, before Evan could intervene, held it to one side and quite deliberately tipped the contents onto Elaine’s lap.

The liquid spilled over her gown.

“Goodness,” Diana was saying. “How clumsy of me. I must have been quite overset at hearing that story. Westfeld is one of my dearest friends and—oh—” Diana burst into tears. Immediately, the crowd gathered about his cousin, soothing her, telling her to lie back and breathe deeply. Servants rushed to find the sal volatile.

Elaine was shoved unceremoniously out of the way. She stood and took two steps back. The pale blue of her gown was ruined by angry red. One gloved finger touched the stain, and her chin went up.

She was like a queen, Evan thought, utterly elegant even in her distress. She didn’t look at him.

Instead, Lady Elaine found her mother. And while Diana gradually let her false case of the vapors subside, Lady Elaine and her mother slipped out the door.

“There,” Diana was saying through a watery smile, “I believe I’ve got control of my nerves now.”

She caught Evan’s eye, and tried to give him a smile.

He didn’t return the expression.

“Westfeld, we can’t provide the same danger you faced abroad,” she said. “But still—is there not intimacy in fun and laughter?”

There was only one thing to do. Evan crossed to his cousin—once his dearest friend—and took her hand in his. He bowed over her.

For the entire party to hear, he said, “I’ve upset my cousin with my tale. I suppose that is my cue to bid you all a good evening. I’d hate to disturb your fun any longer.”

“But, Westfeld—”

Diana made him remember who he had been all too clearly. Hurting her would feel like cutting himself. But that was what he needed—to excise that person he had been. Perhaps that was why he leaned in closer and made no effort to moderate his words.

“If you’d been there that day,” he whispered, “I do believe you would have cut the rope.”

It was a cruel thing to say. She flinched, and he dropped her hand.

Still, he left the room without looking back.

Chapter Four

“WHAT A SHAME,” ELAINE’S MOTHER SAID, peering at the marred fabric. “It is such a lovely gown. Do you suppose it will stain?”

The pale blue had been one of Elaine’s favorites—the color of a winter sky. With that delicate lace edging the sleeves, it had made her feel like an icicle—cold and unmelting, no matter how hot the fires of gossip burned.

“A good thing this didn’t happen tomorrow,” her mother was saying. “It would have been so disruptive to my lecture.”

Behind her, Elaine felt her maid, Mary, pause, her hands on the laces of the dress. Mary had heard the whole story. And without Elaine having to say so, Mary had undoubtedly understood what it meant.

“Yes,” Elaine said. She’d meant to speak soothingly, but her bitterness came through anyway. “Because surely your lecture is more important than having a glass of wine punch spilled on your daughter.”

But her mother was as impervious to sarcasm as she was to sly innuendo.

“It is!” she said brightening. “I’m so glad you agree.”

Elaine had been holding all her emotion inside her so long that she was unprepared for the flare of anger that hit her—fierce and hot and unstoppable. “No,” she heard herself shouting. “No, it isn’t.” She whirled and Mary hissed, reaching for the laces that trailed loose behind her. “I have taken their insults and the innuendo and the glasses of wine punch for years. You never take me to task for my failings, but just once I wish you would notice that it hurts.”

Lady Stockhurst stared at her. “Elaine, you’re not getting put out over an accident, are you?”

“An accident?” Elaine turned from her maid once more. “Of course you would think it was an accident. Mama, they hate me. They laugh at you. Nobody likes us. Nobody.”

“But Lady Cosgrove is always so friendly.”

“She takes pride in humiliating you.”

“But how could I be humiliated? My lectures are quite erudite, and—”

“You humiliate me every day.” The words were out of Elaine’s mouth before she had even properly thought them. And there was no taking them back. Her mother turned utterly pale.

But the dam had burst, and there was no stopping the outpouring of anger.

“Do you know what I hate most about the lot of them downstairs?”

A confused shake of the head in response.

Elaine’s eyes stung and her vision blurred. “They make me hate you,” she said. “Sometimes. I hate them for it. I hate them. I hate them. But when they mock you, and you play into their hands so easily…sometimes it makes me hate you, too.”

“Elaine.”

She couldn’t say any more. She couldn’t let a decade of anger spill out of her lips. But she couldn’t stop herself either. Instead, Elaine turned blindly and flung open the door to the hall, striding furiously away.

She would not break down, she would not break down. But her dress was half undone, and the tears began to track down her face before she’d taken more than half a dozen steps. She stopped at the end of the hall, collapsing against the wall, and took great gulping breaths of air.

She’d held all her furious rage back for so long; why should it be so hard to contain now, merely because she’d realized she would live with it for the rest of her life? What difference would another half-century make?

The squeak of the floor nearby cut her tears off entirely. She looked up…and her heart dropped.

Of course. It wasn’t enough that they douse her in punch. Lady Cosgrove must have sent her cousin up to complete her humiliation.

For there stood Lord Westfeld himself.

THE LAST THING THAT EVAN HAD EXPECTED TO SEE at the end of the hall was Lady Elaine, with her gown falling off her shoulders, revealing the linen of her shift. She sat on the floor, curled almost in a ball, her fists clenched.

She was crying silently, choking back great sobs. Elaine never cried—at least she didn’t do so publicly. It made him feel that he was intruding on a painfully intimate moment, one that revealed more of her than the ivory of her chemise.

She glanced up, saw him—and gasped as if he’d shoved his elbow into her stomach.

But that moment of scalded shock passed. Her eyes narrowed, and she drew herself up in scorching fury.

“Lord Westfeld,” she said, “whatever are you doing here? Why, the evening is quite young.”

She tilted her head toward the stairs. The low rumble of voices rose up even now, faintly mocking to Evan’s ears.

“I found the company below not to my taste.”

He’d meant to reassure her, but instead she rolled her eyes and pushed to her feet.

“What will you tell the rest of them?” she asked almost conversationally. “Will you tell them that you found me in disarray? Will you and your cousin gloat that you finally broke me?”

She took one step toward him. If she’d had a knife in her hand, he suspected he’d have been bleeding already. But instead, the sleeve of her gown shifted and spilled down her shoulder.

“I told you I was sorry. I would never do anything to hurt you further.”

Her eyes widened. “Never?” She took another step forward and pushed the heel of her hand into his shoulder—not hard, but not gentle either. “You must think I’m stupid. And why wouldn’t you? I’ve acted the buffoon long enough.”

Her left hand rose and she gave him another little shove.

“All this time I’ve let everyone think that I’m easy game—that all you have to do is abuse me a little and you’ll have your fun. But I am done with that. The next time you push me, I will push back. What can I lose? It is not as if you could respect me less.”

“I never thought you easy game,” Evan protested. “In fact, you always seemed remarkably elusive.”

“Don’t lie to me. I let you hurt me every time. Every time I looked away. Every time I pretended not to hear your vicious remarks. There was never any cost to you when you hurt me.” Her face was beginning to turn bright pink in blotches. It should have been unbecoming, especially as her eyes were red with irritation—but by God, she positively smoldered.

“Not easy to insult,” he explained. “I thought you impossible to pin down, to unmask. To…to catch.”

“To catch? Whatever do you mean?”

She stood close to him, so close that he could have reached out and run his hand around the impressive curve of her bosom, sliding her sleeves from her shoulders as he did so. And at that uncertain twinge in her voice, all his reason shut down—all reason but the clean smell of her hair, the brilliant shine in her eyes.

And so he leaned in and kissed her.

She tensed in shock as his arms snaked around her. She was so hot against his lips—blazing hot—and soft all over. He had just an instant to savor the taste of her.

She wriggled away from him, glowering. “I see how this is. The poor little spinster—I’m so needy and desperate that you think I’ll surrender my virtue at the first opportunity.”

“No,” he breathed. He was the needy one, the desperate one. He needed to think, but his thoughts were slipping from his grasp. It didn’t help when her breasts lifted with every inhalation.

She put one finger on the edge of her wayward sleeve. “Well.” Her words were sharp, but her hand trembled. “Maybe I am.” And then she slid the fabric down her arm, exposing creamy skin.

His lungs were in agony. He couldn’t breathe, couldn’t think anything except—oh God, please keep going.

“Maybe I am desperate.” Her voice was low. “I have nothing to look forward to but decades of loneliness. Maybe all I ask for is one night of passion.” She glanced up at him through thick eyelashes. “Is that what I am supposed to say? I’m supposed to beg you for a night?”

“Yes.” The word came out before he could think better.

The corner of her mouth curled in distaste, but she didn’t draw back.

“I mean, no. I mean—” He wasn’t sure what he meant, but his erection was growing. He would mean anything, if he could just kiss her again.

“Maybe I am supposed to beg you to make a woman of me.”

“Hell.” Lust had always made him stupid. “You don’t have to beg.” His voice grew hoarse. “I’ve—look, I’ve always wanted you.”

Stupid he might be, but even he could tell that something was wrong. Her nose scrunched in an adorably pugnacious fashion and she glared up at him.

“Always,” she whispered, her voice silky. “Of course. How obvious. There is one little problem, isn’t there, Westfeld? I don’t trust you.”

“You don’t.”

“You see,” she continued, “I am very vulnerable—and you are not. Not at all.”

That brought another heated image to mind—this time, of how vulnerable he would be if he placed himself in her hands. Literally. He groaned, and tried to suppress the vision, but it was replaced by another—his kneeling before her, lifting her skirts—and another, in which she ran her hands all over him.

Not good. He needed to think with his brain, not his hardening prick. But she reached up and hooked her finger underneath her other sleeve, and all he could think of was her gown unfastened to her waist, her corset undone, and her breasts spilling out.

“Christ,” he swore aloud.

Remember: you hurt her. She doesn’t want you. She just wants to hurt you back.

“Here’s the way it is,” he said hoarsely, fumbling in his pocket for the key to his room. He turned the lock, opened the door. “I’m not going to ask you to come inside.”

The high flush of anger was beginning to fade from her face.

“At least not yet,” he amended.

He held his breath and strode into the room. He rummaged about in the dim light until he found the rücksack he’d brought with him. When he found it on the chest of drawers, he looked up. She stood in the hall, a foot from his door, watching him warily.

“You want me vulnerable?” He sat on the edge of the bed, pack in hand. “That’s easy enough to manage.”

He tossed the bag across the room. It landed on the floor in front of her and skidded to her feet. His evening shoes came off with little effort; the coat required a little more work, the fit being tight. But he undid his waistcoat buttons easily. He looked up from his task to see her watching in horrified fascination.

“What are you doing?”

“Making myself vulnerable,” he bit off. “Now open the rücksack.”

Her brows drew down at the unfamiliar word, but she bent and picked it up. She turned it around a few times before loosening the drawstring cord.

“What you’re looking for is on top,” he said. Was it too much to take off his shirt? He decided it was. Instead, he sat on the bed, watching as she gingerly reached in and removed a thick coil.

It was old habit that made him travel with rope—that, or some misguided desire for safety. That rope had saved his life more than once. She frowned at the heavy fibers and touched the ends, carefully waxed to prevent unraveling.

“There,” he said. “Want me vulnerable? Then tie me up.”

“Why?”

He shrugged. “You said you were curious. You said you wouldn’t trust me. Tie me up, and you can do with me as you please.”

And oh, how he wanted her to be pleased by him. Still, Evan had his own less pleasant suspicions about what she wanted to do to him.

She bit her lip, turned to glance down the hall. Moments passed while she seemed lost in contemplation. And then slowly she came forward. She pulled the door almost shut behind her and then paused, her fingers resting on the handle, as if waiting for him to spring forward. There was a strange quality to her movements, purposeful and yet uncertain. She didn’t speak as she advanced, did not say a word as she wound the rope in a loop round his left hand.

“That,” Evan said as she completed the knot, “is an excellent version of a middleman’s noose.”

She looped the rope to the left post of the bed, and then pulled the rope taut.

He felt a hint of nerves, and continued. “So-called because when three men are roped together, it’s the knot you’d tie to secure the man in the middle.”

She wound the rope around the post to his right, her mouth set in a grim line.

“Don’t worry.” He flashed her a smile. “We shall be just fine with only the two of us. No need for a third.”

Her head bowed, and her loose hair spilled over her face, hiding her expression. But the knot she tied round this wrist was tighter, her hands jerking the ends of the rope into place.

He really couldn’t move much at all, just wiggle his arms a little and twist his hand about. He hadn’t thought she would tie him quite so tightly. But when he shifted, the friction of the rope burned against his skin.

He wanted her to trust him. And for one brief second, she leaned over him, her hair brushing his throat. She could touch him anywhere, and he’d not be able to do anything about it. Her throat contracted in a hard swallow.

But she lifted her head and looked him in the eyes.

“And what,” she asked quietly, “do you think I am going to do now?”

He was scarcely capable of thinking at all.

“Well,” he said, “I can tell you what I want you to do. I want you to kiss me.”

Her pupils dilated.

“I want you to run your hands under my shirt. I want you over me. I want to taste you, and I definitely want to be inside of you.”

“Do you?” Her voice shook.

“If I’m to list the things I want, I want to own your quiet possession,” he continued, “and drive the wariness from your eyes.”

She swayed just a little at those words.

“But you didn’t ask me what I wanted. You asked what I thought you would do.”

“And what do you think I will do? Do you think I will kiss you? Touch you?”

He smiled at her. “No. I didn’t really think you had planned to lose your virginity to me over a wine spill. I think you are planning to walk out that door, leaving me tied to my own bed.”

Her eyes widened and she took a step back. “If you knew, then why did you agree?”

He couldn’t even shrug properly. “You wanted me vulnerable. I suppose I owed you that much.”

“No.” She shook her head violently. “No. You can’t trick me into this. I know how you are. You’ll pretend to be kind. All the while, you’ll coax me into exposing myself, and once I do—”

“And what if I don’t?”

She didn’t hear him, though. She paced away, and then turned back to him, her cheeks flushed once more. “It is not going to be easy for you, not any longer. I am done being the butt of your jokes.” She glared at him.

“That much,” he said quietly, “I can safely promise you.”

“I don’t know why I ever feared you.” She gave him a wintry smile. “You always were a bit slow around me. And…you always did watch my bosom. If I had realized you were so easily led years ago…” She shook her head. “But never mind that.” She took the last steps to the door and then opened it. “Good night,” she said.

The door shut behind her.

Evan inhaled night air and pulled at his arms. There was barely any give in the rope. He was burning from head to toe. But it was not just the fire of want that he felt inside him.

He turned his hands in his bonds, feeling the fibers rub against the naked skin of his wrists. He didn’t bother to try to break free. The rope he used could hold more than two thousand pounds; he’d always insisted on good gear. For all that he wanted to swear in sheer frustrated lust, he felt a grudging smile play over his lips.

Damn, but she was good. He hadn’t actually supposed she could tie a knot—but she’d surprised him. She had always surprised him.

Ten years ago, during that awful first Season of hers…

But remembering what he’d done was enough to rob him of all enjoyment of the evening. That thought was less comfortable than the ropes that bound him. Still, he twisted his left hand about and got to work.

Chapter Five

ELAINE EASED OPEN THE DOOR to their small upstairs sitting room once more.

The lights had been doused and nothing but navy-blue shadows awaited her. Her mother must have gone to bed and sent Mary away. Elaine sighed and fumbled with her gown in the darkness. Mary had already loosened it; she needed only to push it over her petticoats before it slid to the floor in an ignominious heap. And what did it matter if the silk crumpled, stained as it was?

She attacked the more delicate matter of her corset, twisting so as to undo complicated laces in the dark. And then a figure near the window straightened.

“Elaine?”

“Mama.” Elaine paused, uncertain of her reception.

“Oh, Elaine.” Her mother moved closer, reaching out. Their fingertips met in the darkness, and then her mother pulled her close. She could feel her mother’s heartbeat, the desperate tide of her breathing.

Any other parent would have demanded to know where she had been. Her mother was just glad to have her back—with no uncomfortable questions about what she’d been doing in that state of dishabille.

And thank God that she didn’t have to answer queries as to her whereabouts. With her mother’s arms around her, she could remember what she’d let herself forget these last hours: that even though her mother would never comprehend the complexities of society, it brought her grief to know her daughter was unhappy. Her mother stroked her back, and in return, Elaine held her tightly. She wasn’t sure who was comforting whom. She didn’t know whose pain it was anymore.

“I never knew,” her mother murmured into her ear. “I’m sorry. I don’t understand when people laugh. I always thought they laughed because they were happy.” She spoke in rueful bafflement.

“There, there,” Elaine heard herself say.

“I know there are some things I don’t understand. Maybe, if it hadn’t been for me, you would have been the belle of the Season. Although—” Elaine could almost hear her frown “—I still do not understand why you are not. Are you sure you are not?”

“If it hadn’t been for you, I would have given up years ago.”

“I won’t give my lecture tomorrow.”

Elaine swallowed and thought of what might await her on the morning. Not so far away, Lord Westfeld was tied to his bed. She’d left him there. She still didn’t understand what had happened between them. She’d thought him so arrogant, so sure of himself and his own golden attraction. She had thought him so confident that he could despoil her, if only she gave him a little trust.

She had meant to teach him a little lesson.

But he’d made even her revenge feel flat. It wasn’t just that he was handsome. It wasn’t just that once he’d shed his jacket, the muscles of his arms were visible through his shirt. She could easily imagine him as a mountaineer, holding onto a bit of rock and pulling himself up with one hand. But as strong as he looked, when he had been tied up before her, she’d felt full-blown want. She could have touched him anywhere, done anything to him—and he couldn’t hurt her back. A dangerous thought.

An illusion, too. He’d never made her fear any physical danger—not even tonight. No, the danger in him was precisely the opposite: that he made her want to trust him, want to believe in him. But he was her enemy. And when tomorrow came, he would be angry and more implacable than ever.

On the morrow, her mother was supposed to deliver a lecture on comets. What would he do about that?

“We can leave,” her mother said. “It would just be a day early.”

She could flee.

But no. Elaine took a deep breath and set her hands on her mother’s shoulders. “We’ll stay. You will face them all, and you will tell them about your comet. I shall applaud you in all sincerity.” If nobody else clapped, she would cheer loud enough for everyone. What was the worst that could happen?

Westfeld could ruin her if he told anyone she’d been in his chambers alone. But at this moment, the thought of being cast out of polite society seemed more blessing than curse.

Her mother’s arm tightened about her. “If you want me to do it,” she said, “then I shan’t care about anything else.” And so for the second time that evening, Elaine was kissed—this time, just the dry touch of her mother’s lips against her forehead, sweet and without complication.

IT WAS AMAZING HOW DIFFERENT THE WORLD LOOKED to Elaine when she stopped dreading the future. She didn’t have to pretend to join the ladies at breakfast—although the conversation she overheard was sadly devoid of gossip about a certain earl being found tied to his bedposts. She went walking with her mother in the morning; in the afternoon she helped her prepare for her lecture. When evening came around, she sat in the front row.

The chairs had been set up in the ballroom, but tonight Elaine had no desire to contemplate the walls. Instead, she took pleasure in hearing the brilliant Lady Stockhurst speak. Everyone else might giggle at the light that came into her mother’s eyes, or the excited way she jumped from topic to topic. But Elaine drank in the sight.

Still, she was all too aware of Westfeld, sitting a few chairs behind her. He was close enough that she could imagine the heat wafting from his body, could almost feel the echo of his kiss on her mouth. She’d given herself leave not to care if he insulted her. But aside from sketching her a tiny bow from across the room, he’d not made the slightest attempt to seek his revenge. That seeming benevolence made her nervous. After last night, his vengeance would come. It had to.

And sure enough, when her mother had come to a breathless halt, and she asked if there were any questions, he was the one who stood.

He could not hurt Elaine. But if he hurt her mother, she would claw his eyes out in front of the entire crowd.

“Lady Stockhurst,” he said, and Elaine cringed—the respect in his voice must have been false. “In your calculations of the periodicity of the orbit, you assumed it was purely elliptical. What effect does the gravitational pull of the larger planets have on your calculation?”

Was that an insult? Did it hurt? Elaine held her breath and frowned.

But a sunny smile burst over her mother’s face. “What an excellent question! I have been calculating second-order perturbations since February, and…”

And she was off, bubbling over with excitement and mathematics that Elaine scarcely comprehended.

Westfeld simply watched. He was still standing; instead of exchanging looks with his cousin, he nodded as she spoke. His civility made Elaine feel uncomfortable. What was he planning?

Her mother’s explanation had devolved into one of those uncomfortable moments where she simply listed the formulae in her head—she could perform derivations aloud almost as easily as on paper. This was often the point when people started laughing into their hands. And when Lady Stockhurst started in on a string of x-noughts, Westfeld finally did look away: he glanced at Elaine. She saw no mischief brimming in his eyes.

The worst possibility of all occurred to her.

What if he wasn’t planning anything? What if he had meant it when he’d apologized to her? What if…what if he’d kissed her because he wanted to do so?

Those thoughts started a nervous flutter in her belly.

And then Lady Cosgrove yawned audibly and stretched. “Goodness,” she said, “How we do indulge our elders in their foibles.”

Lady Stockhurst stopped mid-phrase and glanced uncertainly at Elaine.

“Don’t be rude, Diana,” Westfeld said mildly. The expression on his face hadn’t changed, not one bit, but Elaine felt her stomach knot. “I was hoping that Lady Stockhurst would be so kind as to forward me a copy of her remarks. I have a friend who might have some interest.”

In response to this, her mother gave a gracious nod.

What if he didn’t hate her? If he didn’t, then last night…

But she was not the only one thinking along those lines. “Don’t tell me you’re interested,” Lady Cosgrove spat. “Everyone knows what you think of Lady Elaine and her mother. We’ve all heard it before.”

Westfeld’s eyes darkened. He turned to face his cousin. “No. Nobody knows. But as you’re bored with mathematics, perhaps I should tell you that story instead.”

The entire room went silent. Elaine didn’t dare breathe, for fear that her dress would shift and the sound would interrupt him. Her heart had seemed to stop in her chest.

“You see,” Westfeld said, “ten years ago, I met a lady. She was very pretty and quite fearless. She spoke her mind, and she laughed with abandon. I fell in love with her over the course of about an evening.”

It had to turn into a joke.

But he didn’t look like he was joking. “I was nineteen at the time, and therefore foolish. And so, to my mind, there were two important things I had to do. First, I had to make her notice me in the way I noticed her. I wanted her to look for me every time she walked into a room. I wanted her to miss me when I wasn’t there. I wanted her to be aware at every second of where I stood.” He paused. “Also,” he said, “being a young man, and thus having no thoughts to speak of, it seemed of utmost importance that nobody know I had fallen in love. If they knew, I would be embarrassed. And that would have heralded the end of the world.”

It wasn’t a joke. Elaine felt the palms of her hands grow cold.

“Somehow,” he continued, raising his head and looking directly into her eyes, “what started with those simple requirements—make her notice me, but guarantee that nobody understood how I felt—turned into the cruelest thing I have ever done to another human. I started to poke fun at her laugh. At first, it was one of those things I said to explain why I was staring at her—‘Good heavens, have you all noticed how Lady Elaine laughs?’ And then, as everyone eagerly took part, I found myself helpless to stop it.”

It wasn’t an excuse. It wasn’t an apology. It just was, and she didn’t know how to take this much truth.

He stopped and shook his head. His lips thinned. “No. I wasn’t helpless. I could have stopped at any time. I was merely too weak to do so. I wish I could say I just kept my mouth shut, but I didn’t. I was the worst of the lot. I made up half the cruel names. I would go up to her, speak to her face, just for the thrill of talking with her—and as soon as someone looked my way, I’d slip in an insult, so nobody would think I cared.”

Elaine’s entire world had been upended. Right had become wrong, and had turned back to right again.

“She never did look at me. But I could tell that she knew when I was present, because over the course of that year—over the course of that horrible year, when I hurt her time and time again, she gradually lost her fearlessness. It was near the end of the Season when I realized how completely I had succeeded in my aims. She came into a room. She looked around—just as I had wanted, when I’d first fallen in love with her. Her eyes passed over me. And yet she knew I was there because she turned and left. She was aware of me, every second of every day. I was the man who tormented her, and for her, knowing my whereabouts had become a matter of self-preservation.”

Did it make it better or worse that he’d understood what he had done to her? She couldn’t decide.

“So I did what any young, senseless idiot would do. I ran away. A retreat to the country wasn’t enough; I couldn’t bear to stay in England. I had to outrun the person you all believed me to be. I spent a summer in Greece, but every woman I saw brought me back to Lady Elaine. Finally, while passing through Switzerland, I talked to a man who had attempted the ascent on Mont Blanc. He told me that he’d nearly died in the process. To my mind, that seemed like the best thing I could do with myself.”

Westfeld gave the entire room a tight smile. “And so that was why I started mountaineering: because I was too cowardly to come home, apologize, and try to make things right.”

Right. She didn’t know where right lay any longer. But what he’d said was irrevocable. This gossip would race through polite society. She’d wanted him vulnerable, unable to hurt her…and here he was.

“And so here I am,” he echoed, as if he’d heard her thoughts. “Older, wiser, and I hope a good deal braver. Lady Elaine, you have my sincerest apologies for what I did to you. I don’t hope for your forgiveness, but I am in your debt. Deeply. Should you ever need anything—anything—you have only to ask, and it is yours.”

“You see,” her mother said into the resounding silence that followed. “I told you Westfeld was sweet on you. And I was right!”

Elaine could almost see the rising speculation in the eyes of those around her. After a declaration like that, she could guess what would come next. She could feel the future pressing against her, like a crushing weight of humid air overpowering her lungs.

He was looking at her. His eyes had always fascinated her, and this time she could see nothing of the snake in them. No lies. No jokes. Just a painful, awkward, humiliating truth. He was going to ask in front of all these people, and…and they would all expect her to say yes.

She stood so swiftly her chair was knocked over behind her. And without saying a word, she turned and left the room.

She knew even as she did so that he would follow.

Chapter Six

EVAN FOUND HER IN THE GARDEN, sitting on a bench amidst a quiet symphony of cricket calls. She looked at him as if she were holding court—regal and unattainable. There was almost no moon to speak of, but the stars were bright, and her eyes were, too.

Finally, she spoke. “How did you escape last night?”

He hoisted his sleeve and turned back his cuff. In the darkness, it was almost impossible to see where the rope had rubbed his skin into agitated redness. “A middleman’s noose can be converted into a slipknot. With a good bit of effort, it turns out. I’d never done it one-handed before.”

She looked at his wrist and then glanced away.

He sat next to her on the bench.

“I feel as if I should apologize for that,” she said, “but…but I can’t quite bring myself to do so. What was I supposed to think? You were talking about seducing me. That wasn’t a sign of respect.”

“I’ve wanted you for years.” He scrubbed his hand through his hair. “Respect doesn’t enter into it. Had anything happened, I surely would have married you.”

She hid her face. “Oh, Westfeld. Don’t.”

“But I must. Will you marry me?”

The silence stretched into awkwardness.

“I know you’ll have a hard time believing that I am serious. But please—I beg you to see that what happened all those years ago is in the past. I’m not the same man today.”

She raised her face to his. The starlight reflected in her eyes, gray and silver together.

“Do you really think I would want to marry you?”

No. Still, it was a blow to hear it out loud.

“I had hoped—I had so hoped I might convince you. Let me court you, then. You don’t know who I am now, and perhaps once you come to know me…”

He reached over to take her hand. The contact was inadequate—after last night’s intimacy, the mere feel of glove-on-glove seemed confining. She didn’t respond to his caress. But at least she didn’t push him away.

“I don’t think it matters what I know of you,” she said simply. “Do you know what you did to me?”

He could feel the tips of his ears flush. “I remember.”

“No.” She pulled her hand from his now. “You only saw the public moments. You cannot know.” Her voice dropped. “You are handsome and wealthy and titled. Perhaps I might someday believe that you are kind, too. But let me tell you what I feel when I look at you. In my first year out, two months into the Season, I tasked my maid to tell me a series of jokes. We filled a bath. And every time I laughed my laugh, I told her to duck my head under the water. I hoped I might cure myself.”

He didn’t know what to say to that.

“The first few times, it was just funny. And that made me laugh all the harder. So I asked her to hold my head under longer and longer.”

“No,” he breathed.

“Yes.” Her voice was sharp. “But it never worked. After the eighteenth time, I couldn’t stop laughing. Not for anything. I inhaled water into my lungs and was bedridden for days on end.”

“Oh. God.”

“What did you think you were doing to me when you called me those names? When you egged on your friends to poke fun at me?”

“But you were so serene. I wasn’t even sure you heard me half the time. You never—” He swallowed his protests. She shouldn’t have to break down in public for him to have a conscience.

“I’ll be the first to admit, Westfeld, that you’re an attractive man. When you’re not being cruel, you can be quite charming. You’re handsome.” Her voice dropped. “And I’m very curious about what we spoke of the other night.”

Such a bare recitation. Any other lady would have gladly accepted him for half as much reason, and he’d be kissing her already. Too bad he didn’t want any other lady. He wanted this one. He was only beginning to realize how much.

“But none of that matters. When I see you, I remember that you made me want to drown rather than be myself.”

He’d known he had been cruel. But this was the first time he’d really felt it, a deep ache that went straight to his bones. He didn’t want to believe that that could be chalked up to his account. How could he ever make up for that?

You can’t, you ass.

He’d never understood what regret meant until now. It wasn’t the pallid sort of wish he’d entertained before. He wished he could reach inside himself and take back what he had done. He didn’t want to be himself any longer.

No words could make it up to her. And perhaps that was precisely what struck him at that moment. He was always going to be the man who had done that to her. No matter how hard he wanted, his past followed him around as faithfully as his shadow. He would always cast darkness on her.

“Well,” he said eventually. “That’s it, then.”

She met his eyes. She didn’t pretend to misunderstand him. “That is it.”

When a man was nineteen, he felt invulnerable—as if nothing could touch him. That stupid belief had been the basis of a great many idiotic things that Evan had done in his life. But this notion that all the hurt he’d caused could simply disappear because he wanted it to—that had been the last childish dream he’d held on to. He let go of it now. What you did when you were young could kill you. It just might take years to do it.

“We can still be friends,” she was saying calmly. “Just…not anything else.”

“Friends.”

“Even…even back then, there were times I almost thought I could like you.”

“You are too generous.” The words came out sounding bitter, but he didn’t intend them that way. He wasn’t bitter. He wasn’t. Friendship and kindness from her—it was more than he deserved. Less than he wanted, true, but…

“I haven’t got it in me to give you any more trust than friendship. I’m still not sure I can trust you past three minutes.”

He swallowed. If he’d been his young self, he’d have stalked away in a fit of pique, furious that she’d thwarted him. He would have had his revenge upon her for rejecting him. But he was a great deal older now. And he’d cast enough shadows.

“Good.” He leaned closer to her. “Then in three minutes, we can be friends.”

“Three minutes? Why wait three—”

“Because friends don’t do this,” he replied, and leaned toward her. This time, he didn’t put his arm immediately about her. His lips touched hers. She was still—too still—and for a moment he thought he’d read her wrongly. But then she kissed him back.

She tasted like mint and wild honey. She was soft against him. And, oh, how easy it would be to let his control snap. To see precisely what he could do in the three minutes he’d given himself.

She liked kissing him. He could tell by the tenor of her breathing, by the sound she made in her throat as his tongue traced the seam of her lips.

He could tell because she hadn’t slapped him.

He set his arm around her and pulled her close. When she opened up to him, it felt even better than any of his fantasies. His mind could only envision one part of her body at a time—lips or breasts or buttocks, but never all three together. But here in the flesh she was a solid armful, an overload of good things. He could not break her down into constituent parts. It was just Elaine leaning against him, Elaine that made that sound in her throat, and then, by God, she moved closer, until her chest brushed his. He was on fire for her.

Still, in the back of his head, he could almost hear the inexorable tick of clockwork, as if this tryst were timed by the watch in this pocket. Three, and his other hand crept down her waist, cupping her close. Two, and his tongue sought hers out. One…

One kiss, and he’d come to the end of her trust.

He pulled back. Her fingers had slipped under his elbows, and they bit into his arms, ten little needle points of pressure. He wasn’t sure if she was holding him close or keeping him at arm’s length.

“Westfeld.” Her voice was just a little rough. “I…I…Please don’t do that again.”

He wanted to ask if she’d liked it. He already knew the answer. She’d liked it, but he’d reminded her, once again, of drowning. He wanted to curse.

“No,” he said softly. “We’re simply friends now, and friends don’t do that to each other. Not ever again.”

Chapter Seven

London, nine months later.

WHEN WESTFIELD HAD FIRST OFFERED HER FRIENDSHIP, Elaine hadn’t believed it. Friendship was a concept men bandied about to save face when they were rejected.

But he had nonetheless become her friend. He didn’t dance continual attendance on her, but he talked to her on regular occasion and he made her laugh. He introduced her to his friends—all his friends, that was, save Lady Cosgrove—and he talked with hers. As word spread of what he had said, she simply stopped being an object of fun. For the first time in a decade, she could go to a ball and breathe.

She couldn’t forgive him—how could she?—but was it so awful to enjoy his company?

“I think,” he said to her on this evening, his voice barely audible over the roar of the crowd at the soirée, “that your seamstress needs a new palette.”

A year ago she’d have bristled, hearing an implied insult. Today she smiled at him indulgently. “Why ever is that? Just because I happen to like pink doesn’t mean you must wear it.”

“That wasn’t why.” He grinned. “Although I’ll have you know that I turn out very nicely in pink. And purple. Any man can don white and black. It takes a truly masculine fellow to manage lavender.”

She laughed. And that was the best part of it: she could laugh without flinching. It was still too loud and still too long, but she no longer drew whispers from around the room.

“Then why?” she asked.

“Because one day, I want to see you walk into a room not in any of these watered-down colors.” He reached out and flicked the pale rose of her gown. “I want to see you in vibrant red or dark blue. I want to watch you walk into the middle of the room.” He dropped his voice. “And I want to see you take ownership of it.”

“I—oh—I couldn’t.” But what an enticing vision. Still, she would have to be as unaware as her mother to do that. Everyone would look at her. Everyone would talk, and laugh. “I’m not a middle-of-the-room sort of person,” she said apologetically.

“Yes, you are. You’ve hidden it deep inside you, but you are.” He was watching her, and she felt something all too familiar stir inside of her.

At times like this, she wished he had never kissed her. She could almost call to mind the feel of his lips against hers. It was a disconcerting thought to have about a friend, and he was a friend.

Just a friend, and friends didn’t think about kissing friends. He certainly had put all thoughts of kissing her out of his mind. He was affable. He was amusing. He was even reliable, something she never would have predicted. It was just that he wasn’t going to kiss her, and she wasn’t going to kiss him back.

“I prefer to enter the room like a mouse,” Elaine said, joking to dispel her uncertainty. “I creep very quietly along the wainscoting. Have you ever tried to creep wearing bright red? It can’t be done.” She glanced across the room and caught sight of her mother.

“If something is worth doing,” he said, “it’s worth doing bravely.”

“I’m brave,” she protested. “As brave as a mouse. It takes quite a bit of courage to enter a room populated by people a hundred times your size.”

He gave her a look. He didn’t quite roll his eyes, but he glanced heavenward, as if in silent supplication.

“Very well, then,” she said. “If that won’t wash, I’ll be brave as an ostrich. The instant I see something frightening, I’ll stick my head in the sand.”

This brought her only a sorry shake of his head. “My dear,” he said, “ostriches don’t put their heads in the sand. That’s a myth.”

“Oh?” On the other side of the room, her mother was talking to a group of ladies. Lady Stockhurst seemed to be quite excited, Elaine guessed by her exaggerated gesticulations.

Westfeld lectured on. “An ostrich weighs upward of fifteen stone. It can outrun a horse. What need has it for cowardice?”

The ladies who spoke with her mother waved fans. She could not make out their faces, but Elaine could imagine them biting back cruel smiles.

“Very well,” Elaine said. “I promise you, when I weigh fifteen stone I shall relinquish all fear.”

The crowd shifted, and in that moment Elaine saw that the woman standing closest to her mother was Lady Cosgrove. Over all these months, Elaine had begun to relax. But her mother was still her vulnerable heart. She had no protection of her own, and Westfeld couldn’t save her. Without waiting for another word, she started across the room.

“Elaine,” Westfeld hissed, following along beside her. But he’d seen it, too.

They’d talked of a great many things since they had become friends—Parliament and fashion, agriculture and the latest serial from Dickens.

They had not mentioned Westfeld’s friendship with Lady Cosgrove. The woman had kept her distance since the Season started, but Elaine had seen her all too often. It was impossible to escape her; she lived just across the street, after all. Elaine had often wished that it was Lady Cosgrove who was absent, instead of her never-seen husband.

“You know what she’ll do,” Elaine said.

“I know what I won’t let her do.” They were his last words before they joined the group.

“Why, Lady Elaine.” Lady Cosgrove smiled at Elaine while somehow avoiding her cousin’s gaze altogether. “Your mother has just agreed to speak for us a few weeks from now.”

“A lecture?” Elaine tapped her fingers against her skirts. A lecture wouldn’t be so awful. Not many would come, and her mother would enjoy it.

“Better!” her mother exclaimed. “In three weeks’ time, Lady Cosgrove is holding a gala at Hanover Square. There will be music, and hundreds of people, all interested in—”

“Mama,” Elaine interrupted blandly, “they’ve thrown tomatoes at some of the larger entertainments.” Remember. Remember. Lady Cosgrove doesn’t wish us well.

Behind Lady Stockhurst, Lady Cosgrove bit back a smile.

And, it seemed, this wouldn’t be one of the days when her mother recalled such things. “Why would they do that?” her mother mused. “I can’t account for it. Even the lower orders have better things to do with a perfectly good tomato. And genteel society…”

“They throw rotten vegetables to express displeasure.”

“Or boredom,” Lady Cosgrove put in. “But, then, Lady Elaine, you don’t believe your own mother is boring, do you?”

“This is all nonsense,” Lady Stockhurst proclaimed. “I don’t know what you’re speaking of, Elaine. The tomato is a fruit, not a vegetable.”

By Elaine’s side, Westfeld took her arm. “It will be well,” he said quietly. “It will be well.”

Lady Cosgrove’s lips pinched together.

“How can it be?” Elaine whispered. “I’ve seen how these things go. To expose her to more people, more indignity… How can it be well? I know you will be kind, but you cannot control how two dozen people will respond—and there could be as many as a thousand present.”

Westfeld simply shrugged. “What did Archimedes say? If you want to move the world, all you need is a long enough lever. It will be well.”

She huffed. “You also need a fulcrum on which to rest your lever, I believe.”

He smiled at that—an expression as arrogant and certain as any she could remember seeing on him.

“Well.” His deep drawl seemed to resonate with some deep part of her. “If ever you need to…rest your lever, here I am.”

She glanced up at him. He was watching her, and she felt as if she might burst into flame. She snatched her arm from his before he could notice. “Do be serious, Westfeld.”

He gave a resigned shake of his head. “And here I thought I was.”

OVER THE NEXT WEEKS, EVAN TRIED TO MAKE JOKES to lift Elaine’s distress. None of them worked, and finally he stopped jesting altogether. But despite every attempt he made to make her smile, he still held back the truth of what he was doing.

The truth was deadly earnest. By the time he’d found a seat in the hall at Hanover Square before Lady Stockhurst’s lecture, he was feeling the cost of the last two weeks of frantic work. He’d written letters, found couriers, and gone in person to speak to more than half a dozen men.

He’d had to. He understood too well how Diana operated. His cousin had planned for her evening of entertainment to be a stunning success. It started with a scene from the Pickwick Papers, performed by the Adelphi Theater. The acting was crisp and believable, the characters expertly portrayed. There followed a concerto by Mendelssohn for piano and violin, and a short intermission for light refreshment. It would end with a performance by the famed soprano, Giulia Grisi.

Lady Stockhurst, sandwiched between these shining lights, seemed to serve all too clear a purpose: she was to be the comic interlude. As she started, she did seem to fit that role. She’d had great star-charts made, showing the course of the planets and the placement of her comet in the night sky. She spoke with great animation; her exuberance overcame all ladylike boundaries. She ended her talk with an impassioned speech on the course of the stars, predicting a return of the heavenly visitation in twelve years’ time.

One either had to laugh or applaud…and when she finished, no applause was forthcoming. Instead, when she asked for questions, the audience sat in near-silence as if not sure how to react. The next few seconds would be crucial.

“Lady Stockhurst,” a woman said in the front. “I could not help but notice that your presentation included calculations that are traditionally left to gentlemen. As a lady, have you ever considered that perhaps you are unsuited to such work?”

It could have been worse. Still, across the hall from him, Evan could see Elaine tense. Her chin lifted, as if she were daring the world to speak ill of her mother. He felt his own heart contract, as if he were flinching from the pain she might receive.

Lady Stockhurst, however, simply frowned at the woman in confusion. “No,” she said tersely. “Next?”

A low titter swept the room. Evan had himself prepared a few queries. But he’d hoped that he wouldn’t have to intervene. After all, if the rest of his plans did not come to fruition, his solitary efforts could hardly sway a crowd this large.

He couldn’t pinpoint when he had started feeling this way, but now that it had been going on for these many months, he would personally take on every man and woman in the room just to win a smile from Elaine. It was stupid and pointless…and utterly inevitable. It had nothing to do with making amends any longer. He didn’t want her hurt; it was that simple. At his side, his hand curled into an involuntary fist.

“Lady Stockhurst?” A man stood in the back of the room. Evan had never seen him before—at least, not in person. But he’d seen a portrait of the fellow. Slowly, his hand unclenched.

The man was older, perhaps of an age with Lady Stockhurst herself. His face was thin and framed by short, unkempt hair that was beginning to go gray.

Lady Stockhurst beamed.

He fumbled with some papers in his hand, unfolding them, and then looked about the room. “I’ve not yet had the pleasure of reading your work myself, Lady Stockhurst, but my aunt saw an early copy of your monograph, and asked me to convey to you her appreciation for your meticulous work.”

“Oh.” Lady Stockhurst rubbed her nose in puzzlement. “But I’ve not given copies of my work to anyone, not except…” Her eyes darted to the left and fell on Evan. Evan tried not to smile.

He failed.

Two rows away, Diana stirred. Over the last months, they’d continued to talk—but their relationship had become strained. She wouldn’t talk with Lady Elaine, she wouldn’t apologize—and he half suspected that she’d designed Lady Stockhurst’s part in this evening’s entertainment as a way to prove to Evan that she wouldn’t change her mind.

“Nonetheless,” the older gentleman was saying. “I have some correspondence from her.”

Diana folded her arms in disapproval. “Well, there’s no need to listen to the old crones exchange their regards,” she said. Not too loud; but then, not too quietly either.

It was her typical style—a cutting insult delivered with a smooth smile. But it was not met with the usual response. A murmur swept through the room. Those nearest her repeated her words, until the hall practically rumbled with displeasure.

“Crones?” The gentleman turned to Diana, his expression perplexed. “Ma’am, my aunt’s recommendation brought fifteen members of the Royal Astronomical Society to this event. The instant Lord Westfeld sent word of Lady Stockhurst’s presentation, I knew I would have to attend.”

Across the room, Elaine shot Evan a glance. He smiled at her. There. I said it would all be well.

“The…the Astronomical Society?” Diana blinked at the fellow, no doubt trying to place him. “Who are you? Who is your aunt?”

“I am Sir John Herschel,” the man replied. “And my aunt is Caroline Herschel—the only woman to have been presented with the Gold Medal of the Royal Astronomical Society. She was unable to come from Hanover, where she currently resides, but she asked me to read a statement on her behalf.”

Across the room, Elaine was looking at him. Her eyes had gone wide and luminous. And in that instant, Evan knew precisely why he’d gone to so much trouble. Not only to make her smile. Not merely out of friendship. Not just because of his poorly-contained, ill-conceived lust. He’d done it because he was in love with her.

“When Lord Westfeld forwarded me Lady Stockhurst’s manuscript,” Sir John began, “I feared the worst. But it became clear to me after moments that I was reading the work of one of the finest minds in all of Europe.”

Elaine shook her head at him—not in reproof, but in uncontainable delight. The letter was half over Evan’s head—replete with mathematical references. In a way, it felt as if he’d come home—as if he’d righted a wrong that had long troubled him. It was worth all the trouble he’d endured to see Elaine smile without fear.

“I can safely say,” Sir John was concluding, “that Lady Stockhurst’s name should be linked with that of mine and Mrs. Mary Somerville for her keenness of understanding.”

Evan would have ridden through hell and back for the look on Elaine’s face—that brilliant, incandescent happiness, one that could not be smothered.

He felt the joy so keenly it almost hurt.

Chapter Eight

AFTER THE CROWD BEGAN TO DISPERSE, Elaine sought him out. How could she not? He was on the far side of the room, and yet as soon as her eyes landed on him, he turned to her. She could feel herself light up as their gazes met, like an oil lamp screwed to full brightness. So why, as she drifted across the room to meet him, did her innards seem to tangle in knots? What was this excitement that collected on her skin?

He was just a friend. Just a friend. A good friend, yes, and one who had done her an extraordinary favor. He stood on the edge of the hall as the crowd flowed past him, standing with a group of her friends. There were the Duke and Duchess of Parford, a smattering of ladies…and the duke’s younger brother, Sir Mark Turner, which rather explained the ladies.

“Duchess,” Elaine said, and her friend turned, smiling, and extended her hand. The Duchess of Parford was one of Elaine’s dearest friends. She had known of Elaine’s worry, and had come to lend her support. “Your Grace. Sir Mark.” Elaine nodded to the other members of the party, and then swallowed before addressing the last man. “Westfeld. How very, very good to see you all.”

Westfeld met her eyes. “We were speaking on the nature of friendship, Lady Elaine.”

“I was saying,” the duchess interjected, “that Westfeld has been a very good friend to you.”

“Yes.” Elaine found herself unable to break away from his gaze. “I’m very grateful to him.”

But grateful was altogether the wrong word. She knew it looking into the dark brown of his eyes. She might have looked into them all evening and not noticed the passing of time. No; it wasn’t gratitude she felt. It was something rather more electric.

“Grateful,” he said, the syllables of the word clipped. And then he shook his head and smiled ruefully. “Of course you are. But there’s no need to be.”

“There is. Every need.”

“That is what friendship means.” His voice dropped and so did her stomach.

She felt almost weightless, ready to blow away.

“In fact, tonight happened because of another one of my friends—Fritz Meissner, an old partner from Chamonix who hails from Hanover. I sent him a courier, and he badgered his uncle to show the work to Miss Herschel. From there, I had only to make certain that Miss Herschel’s response was widely known. It was nothing.”

“I assure you,” Sir Mark put in, “few friends would think the same.”

“Oh?”

“Most friendships,” Sir Mark continued, “are nothing more than a similarity of temperament, or a smattering of common interests. Friendship is about jokes told and laughter shared.”

While Sir Mark spoke, Westfeld shook his head. “I used to think the same—that so long as we were laughing together, it was enough. That was before I took an interest in mountaineering.” Westfeld was talking to the entire group, but his gaze kept returning to Elaine. “My entire notion of friendship altered when I depended on someone for more than just the pleasant passing of time. Once you’ve trusted a person with your life, it changes everything. It’s no longer enough to call someone ‘friend’ simply because you visit the same haberdashery. Once someone has risked his life for yours, and you’ve risked yours for his—once you’ve yoked yourselves together, knowing that one misstep could kill the both of you—well.” He shook his head. “Everything after that seems very pallid in comparison.”

“Ah.” Sir Mark smiled. “We’re boring.”

“Not at all. Maybe that’s what I have been looking for. When storms and rockslides threaten, I am looking for someone who will hold on to me and not let go.”

He was talking about friendship, but the way he looked at her… She would crackle like fire if he touched her.

“Is that what you were doing?” she asked softly. “Not letting go?”

“We’re friends.” His smile twisted ruefully. “And what that means is this: I won’t let anyone hurt you. Not if I can stop it.”

She couldn’t stop the stupid grin, too large and too painful, from creeping out on her face. She could feel herself lighting up under his perusal. And his smile—that awkward quirking smile, just a twitch too bitter. He had said they were friends. But…

She’d managed to put all thought of his long-ago proposal out of her mind. He joked with her so often that she’d assumed that it had been offered out of a sense of duty and obligation—and perhaps a hint of the desire he’d felt a decade before. He’d wanted to make up for past wrongs. And he knew—he knew she couldn’t marry him. She’d thought he had accepted it, because until this moment, until tonight, she’d believed he felt nothing for her but friendship.

But no. There was a savagery to his smile, and a darkness in his eyes when he watched her.

He was in love with her. And it hurt him.

EVAN HAD TO GET AWAY.

The air in the hall had become overheated. As he’d spoken, Elaine had begun to look at him with something like dawning horror. Her conversation had dried up. And once again, she’d wrapped her arms around her waist, drawing in on herself until she was as closed to him as a locked room.

So. She’d figured it out. He strode down the steps of the hall and signaled to his footman waiting in the drizzle. But there was no way to escape easily; the line of carriages stretched into the distance, and the waiting throng had begun to spill out onto the steps of the hall. He wouldn’t be rescued from that crush for at least half an hour.

Instead, he darted across the street to wait. The weather was more fog than rain, but the mist clung to his coat wetly. In the relative haven of the small square, he could pretend to be alone. The crowds across the way were blocked by dense shrubbery; the first tentative spring leaves on trees overhead dampened the carrying conversation. If he could stop up his ears and shut out the persistent clop of horses’ hooves, he might imagine himself very private indeed.

He’d made himself give up all hope of Elaine. Most people would have taken such a surrender as an admission of failure—capitulation, by definition, was the very opposite of success. Then again, most people imagined that the successful mountaineer climbed Mont Blanc by persisting in the face of unimaginable peril and privation.

Not so. A mountaineer who kept going when a snowstorm arose was not successful. He was dead. Only an idiot wagered his life against the flip of Mother Nature’s coin.

That was the first part of climbing a mountain: deciding not to die. He’d had to learn that one.

A formal walkway crossed the square; beyond it, a less formal path skirted the bushes. He walked alone in darkness, breathing in air that choked him, and trying to exhale every last frustration.

There was a second part to mountaineering: determining when to make another go at it. Sometimes, the best time to launch an assault was right after a storm, before the snow turned to ice. Sometimes you had to wait until all danger had passed. Evan had always sensed that if he pushed Elaine too hard—if he insisted that she rethink how she truly felt about him—he would lose her.

He stopped walking when the small crushed rocks of the path gave way to springy turf. A fountain, dry and empty of everything but the last remnants of moldering leaves, stood before him. To his right, a statue of William Pitt stood on a stone base. Pitt’s cast-metal head brushed the limbs of the trees that ringed the park.

Alone with a politician on such a night. Diana would laugh, if he told her.

And then a stick cracked behind him, and before he could turn to see who had invaded his privacy, he heard a voice. Her voice.

“Westfeld?”

He could see her only from the periphery of his vision, but still all his thoughts, so sound and rational, were swallowed up by her presence. He was nothing but a deep abyss of want, and only she could fill him.

He didn’t want to turn at the sound of her voice. If he simply stared into the hydrangea for long enough…then he would be a coward. He turned to face the woman who could bring him to his knees.

She approached until she was close enough that they could speak without shouting. Still, he couldn’t make out her expression. The new leaves of an ash tree blocked most of the moonlight, save for a few variegated patches that wandered across her cheek.

“Elaine.” His voice sounded too gruff, like a tiger’s rumble.

“Evan,” she whispered. It was the first time she’d used his Christian name, and he felt a little thrill run through him at the intimacy.

“What are you doing here?” He narrowed his eyes. “What are you doing here alone?”

“My parents are waiting for the coach. Papa is discussing politics with Lord Blakely, and Mama…” She shrugged. “In any event, I told them I wanted to speak with a friend.” She took a step closer. “And I do.”

She was within arm’s reach. He exhaled. “Do not trifle with me.”

“Is it trifling for me to say that I enjoy your company?”

“I’ll be your friend in daylight. I’ll treat you as a comrade in every gas-lit ballroom. But alone, under moonlight, I’ll not pretend that I want you for anything but mine.”

She didn’t say anything. She simply looked up into his eyes.

He reached out and laid one finger against her cloak in warning. “If you don’t want to be kissed, you’d better leave.”

She’d stolen all the oxygen from the air, and with it, every ounce of his rationality. She was going to run away.

But she didn’t. She stayed. He slid his finger up her arm to the crook of her elbow. With the moonlight dappling her face, painting her skin in cream and ivory, she looked like an illusion—a fairy-story princess conjured to life by the sheer strength of his want.

He pulled her to him. They were shielded by shrubbery and trees and the shadow of William Pitt, and even though he could still hear the clop of horse hooves, nobody could see them. There was only so much temptation a man could resist.

He lowered his mouth to hers.

She was most definitely real. She opened to him, warm and irrefutably solid. When he slid his tongue across her lips, she gave a small gasp of sincere pleasure. His arms went around her and he pulled her close. And then he was kissing her in truth, tasting her, unable to stop himself from plumbing her depths. He had the oddest sensation that if he let her go, she would float away. And yet she kissed him back. Her hands slid down his coat. Her tongue found his. Their lips met again and again, melding together until her breath was his, her kiss was his, her soul…

Even in the moonlight, even with her pressed against him, he knew better. Her soul was not his. Reality was the illusion. She’d been maddened by moonlight and taken by surprise. At any moment, she would come to her senses. But until then…

Until then, he was going to kiss her, for no reason except that he loved her and she would let him. He wouldn’t let any note of bitterness destroy the sweet taste of her.

He could sense when she began to withdraw. Her hands stopped clutching him closer. Her kiss grew less fevered. Finally, she pulled away from him. Only a few inches, but it was far enough that he could no longer smell her sweet scent. She wasn’t a part of him—not any longer.

“Westfeld,” she whispered, and with that word—his title, instead of his Christian name—the barriers between them returned in full force. “I—I don’t—I didn’t know what I was doing.”

He couldn’t help himself. He molded his hand to her face. “Elaine.”

She bowed her head and leaned against him, and he brushed his lips to her forehead.

“It happened,” he said. “I understand. I shouldn’t—” But he couldn’t bring himself to apologize for kissing her. He should have kissed her, damn it. He would hold that memory inside him forever—a moonlit kiss, half dream, half solid truth. And so he ran his gloved thumb along her lips, reluctant to relinquish his hold on her.

“Don’t speak,” he said. “Of all the things I wish for in this world, I want you to find happiness. I suspect you never will have that with me, and I’ve resigned myself to the matter.”

“Evan—”

“Don’t feel pity for me. Someday, I’ll find someone I can make happy—truly happy. I’m sure of it. But for now, I’m perfectly content to have had this one moment with you. I won’t ask for anything else.”

“Oh,” she said. “Evan.”

“Elaine,” he said softly, “can I make you happy?”

The breeze against his collar was light and insubstantial, close to nothing. He felt her cant away from him ever so slightly.

He’d had no hope of her. Still, her silence was a resounding refutation of his every dream.

“There we are,” he said, pulling away from her and offering her his arm, polite and gentlemanly once again. “Then I shall settle for making you happier.”

ELAINE WAS NEVER QUITE SURE how she made her way home. Her mother’s happiness burbled over in the carriage, but Elaine barely felt capable of containing the beat of her own heart.

She watched the Mayfair houses roll past, one dark shadow passing after another.

They went by Westfeld’s house along the way, a few short streets from her own home. The front windows were alight, and she could imagine him arriving home to his butler and his servants and…and was there anyone else? His mother stayed in the country; he had neither brothers nor sisters. And at this moment, with the memory of his lips still burning against hers, she was all too aware that he was not married. She could see the savage edge of his smile. I am not going to pretend that I want you for anything other than mine.

Her hand rose and curled at her throat.

Was that what she had made him do? Pretend?

The carriage jolted to a halt in front of her own home. Once she was safely ensconced in her room, the evening ritual required none of her attention. She was washed and undressed. Her hair was combed and then braided. But when she tried to sleep she felt his mouth on hers. The sheets against her skin brought to mind the strong band of his arms around her, the tightly-controlled tension of his muscles. And when she shut her eyes, she could see his eyes boring into hers.

He loved her. He loved her still.

Sleep eluding her, Elaine pushed out of her bed and threw her window open to the night air. The wind against her shoulders was as cruel as a cold exhalation.

She could look into his eyes forever. She tingled when he was near. She had stopped scoffing in disbelief at his pronouncements months before. Instead, when he’d told her all would be well, she had wanted to believe him.

His kiss had been as soft as breath itself, and nearly as vital. When had that happened? When had he begun to light a room by entering it? When had she begun to look for him when she first arrived at a party? When had she started to think of him first when she heard something amusing?

Over these last months, she’d altered, too. She no longer held back, hiding her head in the sand like some stupid creature. If she had hated him for what he’d made her into all those years before, she had come to love herself. Whatever resentment she’d harbored had blown away.

He loved her, and it hurt him.

He was close, so close. She could trace the route to his bed down streets lit by dim gas lamps. As she leaned out her window into the chill, the row of three-story houses vanished into the murky night before she could identify his. Ten years ago he’d hurt her. But today…

Elaine took a deep breath of cold air and held it in her lungs, held it until her chest stung.

He’d told her he could move the world, if only he had a lever long enough. Of course there was no need for him to identify a place on which to rest it. Over the last months, he had become her fulcrum: an immovable bulwark in which she could repose all her trust. He loved her.

She loved him back.

The realization folded over her, silent as the city street beneath her window. Two streets down. A mere handful of houses.

She could wait until she saw him next. She might signal her change of heart to him through any number of methods—fans, touches, even a whisper in his ear when next they were together. But no. All of that felt wrong.

She thought of him alone tonight with his bitter, savage smile. They had caused each other quite enough pain for a lifetime. If she was to make him happy, she wanted to start now.

Elaine took a deep breath, closed her window, and then rang the bell for her maid.

Chapter Nine

SLEEP ELUDED EVAN.

In point of fact, he hadn’t yet tried to succumb. After retiring for the evening and dismissing his yawning valet, his bed had seemed too empty and white to contain him. He’d retreated instead to the low fire of his library and poured himself a half tumbler of brandy.

Tomorrow, he’d berate himself for his idiocy. Tomorrow, he’d ascertain whether he’d completely ruined his chances. But for tonight—hell, tonight, he’d kissed her, and she’d kissed him back. Tonight was time for celebration. He raised his glass in the direction of her home and took a hefty swallow. The spirits burned his tongue, but slid down smoothly.

He set the glass on a table, and the hushed clunk it made seemed to echo in the night—as if that quiet tap had repeated itself behind him. He paused, cocking his head in confusion.

The sound came again—not the echo of glass hitting wood, but the low, firm sound of the knocker on the door being struck. He stood and hastened to the front before the noise woke one of his servants. Somehow, he knew what—whom—he would see awaiting him before he fumbled open the bolted locks.

Still, when he threw the door back, he felt as if he might have been dreaming. Elaine stood on his front stoop, a heavy white cloak wrapped about her. The moon, high overhead, illuminated her pale hair with an ethereal glow. She seemed so bright against the darkness of night that, for one moment, he thought himself snow-blind in a mountain pass, dazzling light reflecting off her.

But this was no dream. The cold air of the night was giving him gooseflesh. Besides, if he’d dreamt of Elaine on his doorstep, he’d have wanted her naked, and damn the remnants of winter. He also would have conjured her up by herself, and she’d brought an entourage with her. A maid and a footman stood behind her.

“I hope,” he said, nodding in their direction, “that their purpose is to ensure your safety, and not to serve as propriety.”

A small smile crept across her face, and she glanced down the empty street. “It’s past midnight. Propriety has long since gone to bed.”

He moved aside in a daze and she entered. Her skirts brushed against his legs as she did, and cold night air or no cold night air, he found himself coming to attention.

“Might I send them back to their beds?” she asked. “I have something to say to you, and—”

“Something that couldn’t wait until morning?” he asked hopefully.

She paused, turned to him. “No. It couldn’t wait another hour. Evan…”

“Yes?”

She took a deep breath. Even under that thick cloak, the movement of her bosom had him catching his breath.

She touched the hollow at the base of her neck, and he could help himself no longer. He reached out and took her hand, tangling his fingers with hers. A blue ribbon held her cloak in place. Gently, he pulled on the ends until the bow was undone. Her cloak slithered from her shoulders and fell to their feet in a puddle of warmth.

He’d only touched her hand at this point, but it took all his force of will to keep from sliding his hands down the vision she presented. She wore slippers and a gown so thick it might have offered some modesty, had it not clung so to her form. Her very lovely form.

“I have something very important to say.” Her eyes were wide and luminous.

He cupped her cheek in his hand. She was warm; as he touched her, she leaned her head to cradle against his palm.

He didn’t remember leaning down to her, but somehow, his forehead touched hers and their lips were almost level.

“What have you to say?”

“I…I…”

He didn’t know how it happened, whether it was she who tilted toward him or he who was drawn into the kiss by the feel of her warm breath. Still, his mouth met hers, and the only words her lips formed were kisses. Long kisses, languid kisses. He might have lost himself in kissing her.

“I had hoped you wanted to say that,” he whispered into her ear. “Now might I repeat it louder?”

He took her mouth again. She tasted of cinnamon. She yielded in his arms as he drew her closer. His hands crept up her side, and found nothing but soft fabric and softer flesh underneath.

No corset. She wasn’t wearing a corset. She let out a little sound as his hand rose to her breast, and lust surged through him. He could feel the point of her nipple rising against his palm. His hips pressed forward, seeking hers—

“Ahem.”

Evan froze, his hand on her breast.

The tone behind them was unmistakable. “That will be two weeks’ leave, then, my lady?”

Elaine burrowed her nose into his neck. “Three,” she said.

He would have felt mildly embarrassed, had it not been so marvelous to hold her. Still, he waited until the pair of servants had shut the door before he returned to the task of discovering her.

“Will they talk?”

“James and Mary have been slipping out together for years.” Her breath was ragged as he kissed her shoulder. “I’ve not informed the housekeeper, and so—ooh.”

He cupped his hand around the solid warmth of her breast, the weight heavy in his hand. “What was it you wanted to tell me? You never did say.”

She reached up and pulled a pin from her hair, and all that pale expanse fell past her shoulders. His mouth dried. He wanted her right now. Instantly. Sooner than instantly. But he hadn’t waited all these months for her acquiescence to rush the experience.

“I wanted to say—”

He leisurely rolled her nipple between his fingertips, and she let out a little gasp. “What was it you wanted to say?”

“I—oh, Evan.”

He kissed the side of her neck, and she arched against him.

“Evan, I can’t think when you—”

He slid his hand down her side, drinking in the feel of her curves. She felt so right against him, so perfect.

“I was going to say—”

She broke off yet again as he leaned down further and closed his mouth around her breast. Under his ministrations, the nub of her nipple hardened. He could almost feel her body coming to life, recognizing wants that she’d never quite understood before. He could sense her desire in the tension of her fingertips, biting into his shoulders; could discern it in the uneven rhythm of her breathing as he lashed his tongue along the hard tip. She flattened herself against him.

“Evan,” she said shakily, “are you doing this on purpose? I can’t think, much less speak. And I so wanted to say—”

He set his finger over her lips.

“No,” he told her. “Let me say it first. I love you, Elaine. I love your wit. I love your strength.” He frowned as he slid his hand around her neck. “I don’t love these buttons—ah, there we are.” He’d loosened her gown enough that he could slide it over her shoulder, until he could expose the naked curves of her bosom.

“I love your breasts,” he said honestly. “I really love your breasts. In fact, it’s hard to kiss your sense of humor, but these…” He leaned down to taste her again. As his tongue circled her nipple, she gave another little cry. And God, did he love her breasts—and her rounded hips—and her legs, long and delicious, against him.

He backed her against the wall of the entry. His hips pressed into hers and his erection was hard against her belly. By some instinct, she knew to push back. She nipped at his ear, and his own breath stuttered.

“I love you, darling,” he said. “But I’ve just realized that you mustn’t say anything back.”

He pulled her shift up, his hand seeking the warm haven between her legs.

Still she pressed closer. “But I want to. I lo—”

He cut off her words with another kiss.

God. And here he’d thought that the slick, warm feel of her was more than he could handle. But all his reason was melting into heated slag, like so much scrap metal in a blacksmith’s furnace. It was more than he deserved, more than he could possibly imagine. He had her here, body and soul, her skin against his.

“Don’t you dare say it,” he growled. “Somehow, I’m supposed to keep myself from bedding you before dawn.”

Her breathing hitched. And then her hands slid down his back to his elbows. She tilted her face to his. “And why are you supposed to do that?”

If he’d had any thoughts left anywhere, they scattered. He took her hand in his and led her upstairs, lifting her up the last few stairs in his haste. The hall had never seemed so endless; his door had never creaked so loudly. His room had gone completely cold, but he scarcely noticed because she was here.

She looked around her curiously. The dark wood paneling of his room seemed harsh and masculine in the night, but she tinged everything she looked at in an ethereal feminine light. Even the bed, with its straight posts and functional, square frame seemed to take on an elegant look when she ran her hand along the covers.

He shut the door behind them and then turned to her. “I shall need to find my snow spectacles.”

She shook her head in confusion. “Snow spectacles?”

“They’re of Esquimaux design. You don them when you must walk on the snow in sun. Otherwise, there’s simply too much light for your eyes. The world can be too bright.”

She must have taken his meaning, because she smiled at him. And then, as he was striding toward her, she gathered up her disheveled gown in her hands and pulled it over her head. Her hair, loose, spilled over her shoulders.

His mouth dried. Her hips were round and full. The hair that covered her mons was only a shade darker than the gold on her head. Her breasts were…oh, God. They were irresistible. Round and firm and even better than he’d ever imagined. Her hips were wide and curved, and her legs… He could imagine them wrapped around him, clutching him to her.

She sat on his bed, and as she did so, she let her limbs fall to either side of her. And if that were not invitation enough, she crooked one finger at him.

“You are the most damnable thing.” He managed only a croak. He took two faltering steps to her and then knelt at her feet. “The most damnable, adorable, scintillating thing,” he whispered again. He set his hands on her knees, and she grinned at him once more.

Confident. She was so confident. It was what he’d always hoped for from her—her trust, finally given over to him. It was the best thing he could have imagined.

Oh, very well. Second best. But his imagination was turning to reality now, and he could have the very best, too. He slid her knees apart. The rosy folds of her sex unfurled for him. It would have taken a trice to divest himself of his clothing and slide inside her warm depths. But she’d come here because she trusted him. And by God, he was going to prove her right.

So instead of slaking his lust as he desired, he leaned forward. His lips found her inner thigh. She let out a gasp, and her hand went to his shoulder, half in question.

“Trust me on this,” he said.

And she did.

He took her sex in his mouth. His tongue traced her folds, already slick with desire. He learned the contours of her, the grip of her fingers against his shoulder, the gasp of her breath as he found the nub of her pleasure. He tasted her want, her sweet feminine musk. And she opened for him, letting him take her, trusting him to bring her pleasure. He could feel when her thighs started to tremble, when her hips rose to meet him. By the time she was bucking beneath his ministrations he was hard and all too ready for her. But he brought her all the way, lashing his tongue against her until she let out a strangled cry. Her fingernails bit into his shoulders. And she came. And came. And came.

He waited until her shuddering subsided. She had fallen back on his bed, her breasts full and round above her. He knelt over her and nuzzled the side of her neck. Forced himself to take in the wild scent of her and not go mad with desire.

“Oh, God,” she said. “Evan. Lord above.”

“Was that…was that your first, or have you ever done that for yourself?”

She looked up at him, suddenly ducking her chin. “It wasn’t my first.” A slight blush touched her cheeks. “But you will be.”

“Yes.” The air was suddenly fire around him. “I will.”

He trailed his fingers down her neck, feeling almost singed with his own desire. He removed his shirt and waistcoat slowly as she watched. When he pushed down his trousers, her gaze followed. If he’d been hard before, he felt like stone when she looked at him. And when she reached out…

Even expecting her touch, the tips of her fingers against his cock sent a thrill through him. He gasped, and she looked up at him…and laughed. Oh, that laugh. As if she knew his secrets. As if she was lost to propriety. As if she held nothing back—and gave everything to him.

He pushed her onto her back. He wasn’t sure how he got on top of her, how his hands tangled with hers. But his mouth found her breasts. Her hips rose up to his. His shaft found her opening, warm and wet.

“Elaine.” It was not just her name, but a prayer.

“Evan.” Her hand trailed down his back.

She was inviting, spread before him, and he’d been waiting for this for far too long. With one thrust, he seated himself firmly inside her. And God, she felt wonderful around him—hot, tight, her passage clenching around him. It would have been perfect but for the noise she made in her throat—not quite a whimper, not quite a protest.

“Did it hurt?”

She shook her head bravely, but her fingertips bit into his arm. Yes, then, it had. But she wouldn’t admit it. He needed to relax, to give her a little time to adjust to the sensation of being filled in this way. He counted sheep in his mind—anything to distract him from the instinct that was overwhelming him.

But then she squeezed him, her muscles contracting about him. He gasped, gritted his teeth. Impossible, though, to set aside the sensation that roared through him.

She did it again. “Do you like that?”

“Yes.” He shut his eyes. “No. If you do that again, Elaine, I’m going to—”

“Do it.”

He couldn’t hold off any longer. He pulled back and then thrust inside her again. She was white-hot friction around him, clamping down on him so hard he could almost see stars. Her hips rose to his. With every thrust, he could feel her breasts—hot and large and lovely, and God, he dipped his head to taste them once more, and she pulsed around him, all heat and tenderness.

She was wet, so wet. He felt as if he were wooing her all over again, tempting her with every brush of his fingers. She was close, so close. He leaned down and pressed his lips to her nipple. It contracted under his kiss. And soon it wasn’t just her need that he courted so gently, but his own. Her hips rose to press hard against his thrusts.

He couldn’t think of anything but the slide of his body into hers, the pressure, the sensation—and then, deep in the distance, a faint roaring that filled his ears. It was bigger than just him. It was a wave that swept over him, engulfing everything as he pounded his want deep into her.

As he did, her body shuddered underneath his and she made a low, keening sound.

God, yes—she was perfect, totally perfect.

When it passed, he slumped on top of her. “God, Elaine.” He kissed her, more gently this time. She was still pulsing around him in little shocks.

It seemed impossible that he could be more aware of her, with the edge taken off his want. But when he relaxed on top of her, his hands tangling in her hair, his lips pressing breathlessly into hers once more, he felt as if he knew her as intimately as he’d ever known anyone.

And he never wanted to let go.

ELAINE SEEMED TO BE FLOATING ON A DREAM AFTERWARD, a dream where Evan ran his hand down the side of her face, his touch as light as gossamer. It was a beautiful dream. Her whole body seemed to melt away in utter relaxation. She felt as if she’d walked fifteen miles: her whole body throbbed with the ache of past exertion, but now she had nothing to do but slip into lassitude.

His lips brushed hers, touched her forehead. His hand slid down her ribcage and then his fingers entwined with hers.

Somehow, in the months of their friendship, he had become dearer to her than anything she could have imagined. She adored his wit. She was rather impressed by the muscles of his chest, covered with curly golden-brown hair.

But most of all, in the white-columned hall earlier that evening, he’d looked at her and told her what intimacy meant to him. She had wanted to be that person for him. She’d wanted to be the one he could trust.

She wasn’t sure how long they lay in the dark, their arms around each other. There was no reason for it, except that she wanted never to let go. Hours might have passed while their breath mingled. Moon-shadows tracked across his body, lengthening as the night drifted by, until in the dark hours of morning the light dwindled to faint starlight. Sleep came and went in fits and starts—warm, comfortable dreams interspersed with the most delicious wakings, to find him holding her, touching her. His fingers curled around her when she slept, and his arms enfolded her when she roused.

It might have been four in the morning before he finally spoke.

“Elaine.”

“Mm.”

He pressed his forehead against hers. “In an hour or so, the servants will stir, and I shouldn’t like you to become the object of gossip. We’d best get you back.”

Back. It was only two streets away. But her house seemed to belong to another lifetime.

For just one moment, she imagined herself staying there in his arms. The consequences seemed insubstantial. The gossip wouldn’t matter so much, would it? It was easy to avoid all thought of impending reality with his arms around her. She screwed her eyes shut and burrowed against him. “Don’t want to.”

She could almost feel him smile against her cheek. “I’ll seek out your father on the morrow.” Another smile. “I suppose I mean later today. We’ll have the rest of our lives to hold each other.”

She lifted her head slowly at that. It wasn’t morning that dawned; it was a lifetime of this—not just kisses and warmth and the feel of his arms around her, but of finally, finally feeling safe. She’d come home.

“Yes.” She wondered at the words. “We’ll have that.” Certainty felt new to her, so fragile that she feared it would steal away like fog if he so much as lit a candle.

But there was no need for illumination, not in the dark gray before dawn. He helped her dress, found her cloak, and then slipped into his own clothing. It wasn’t so far back—a ten-minute walk with his arm about her for warmth. He paused when they reached her doorstep.

“You’ve a way in, I presume?”

She nodded.

He reached out and tipped her chin up. Nobody was about. Still, when he kissed her in the open street, it felt like a proclamation shouted to the skies. Perhaps it was her imagination that the night lifted and the sky lightened. Perhaps it was him. He lifted his head from hers and drew a line down the side of her face.

“Elaine,” he said, “I—”

But his head shot up. A door had opened across the street. And then…

“Westfeld?”

Slowly, Elaine turned. She hadn’t needed to see the speaker to know who it was. Lady Cosgrove stood on her own doorstep, her eyes wide in disbelief.

“What is she doing here?” Elaine heard herself ask.

Lady Cosgrove’s eyes grew larger and more murderous. “I live here,” she hissed, starting across the street with long, swift strides. “Do you suppose I would be oblivious to a matter that concerned my own cousin’s welfare? Do you suppose me so stupid as to let you inveigle him into a match so far beneath him? Truly, Evan, it’s a good thing you consulted me, because—”

“You told her?” The words slipped out of Elaine’s mouth before she could think them through. “How could you?”

His hands bit into her shoulders. His face was gray, washed of all color. He took a step back as if she’d slapped him.

And…and she had. Just not with the palm of her hand. His lips pressed into a thin white line. He pulled away from her and turned to his cousin.

“Diana,” he said tightly, “have the goodness to talk directly to me, if you are going to discuss my welfare. And Elaine…” He paused, took a deep breath.

She winced, waiting for the words she knew she deserved. If you don’t trust me now, there’s no point in proceeding any further.

But he didn’t say anything about the hurt in his eyes, and somehow his silence cut all the deeper.

“We’ll talk later,” he said. “Now go, before the servants wake.”

Chapter Ten

“A NOTE FOR YOU, MY LADY.”

The folded paper that her maid slid into Elaine’s palm seemed as light and flimsy as her whisper.

Mary didn’t need to say that the missive had arrived via a clandestine route. Had it come by way of the front door, a footman would have brought it up. But then, had it come via the front door, news that Elaine was corresponding with a bachelor might have spread about town.

Hardly the worst gossip that could circulate, after last night.

She could be ruined. Oh, it wouldn’t herald a complete end to her good reputation. Evan wouldn’t let anything so dire happen. They would marry.

Still, when she shut her eyes, it was not her reputation that she thought of, but the expression on his face when she’d accused him of telling Lady Cosgrove. Never mind the impossibility of her accusation. It didn’t matter that she’d been tired and the woman had seemed to threaten her newfound happiness. With those thoughtless words, she’d banished the relaxed trust she’d seen earlier that night. His eyes had gone wide with hurt and the tips of his ears had turned white. She could hear the pained gasp he’d given. And the look on his face, when she’d assumed that he had spoken of her—it had skewered her through.

Of course he’d been hurt by her words. Her first panicking impulse had been to shy away from him. After everything he’d said and done, she still hadn’t trusted him.

She knew what Evan wanted from her. Not mere desire, not just friendship. He’d said it himself: he wanted someone who would hold onto him and never let go. But at the first sign of danger, she had shoved him away.

Her hand clenched around the note in her hand. The paper crackled. Elaine sighed and unfolded it.

Elaine, the note read. Don’t worry about Diana. I’ll manage her. It may take some time, though—I might not be over this afternoon to speak with your father, as we’d discussed. Perhaps we shall see one another at the ball this evening. Yours, W.

So formal. After last night, his note seemed stiff and impossible. And how was he to manage Lady Cosgrove? For God’s sake, the woman lived across the street. He would come and talk to her and not visit with Elaine? Not even stop by for fifteen minutes?

She bit her lip hard and thought of what she ought to say to him, how she should respond. She had a sudden vision of her turning pointedly away from him that evening. And wouldn’t that occasion talk, after their months of cozy friendship? The whole situation made her want to weep.

She was tired. She was overset. And she was imagining a life without him over a note that he’d dashed off in a hurry.

“It’s nothing,” she said to herself.

But it wasn’t nothing. After all these years, she was still waiting for him to hurt her. She’d not thought of it in months, but she’d been holding on to the pain of her past, always expecting the worst.

He’d hurt her. He’d made her feel awful.

But he hadn’t plunged her head underwater. She’d done that to herself.

And if she continued to flinch at every good thing that came her way, she would do it again and again and again, drowning everything she could have. He’d known it too. She didn’t need to forgive him. She needed…

“Enough of this.” She spoke the words aloud, slicing her hand through the air as she spoke.

“My lady?”

Elaine glanced behind her in surprise. Mary was still waiting behind her, stifling a yawn.

When Elaine had been hurt in the past, she had retreated inside herself. It was time to make a change.

“Mary,” Elaine said, clambering to her feet, “we have only a few hours, and I’m going to need a new gown.”

EVAN WAS TRAPPED BY PILLOWS. The afternoon sun filtered through his cousin’s sitting room. The room was papered in resplendent gold and green; Evan felt rather out of place in his sober brown. A profusion of tiny cushions, embroidered in cunning patterns, flocked about him. If he moved, he would knock them to the floor.

Diana sat opposite him. They’d exchanged only the most inconclusive of greetings. She’d ushered him into the room and had rung for tea, and they’d sat in awkward silence until the tray arrived. Only the faint lines gathered about her mouth suggested her distress.

She had scarcely spoken with him since that evening at the house party last summer. She had informed him at a family gathering in the autumn that he would soon come to his senses. Two weeks later, she’d asked him to drop his friendship with Elaine. He’d refused, and since then they had exchanged only stilted words when their paths crossed.

Now, even with the servants departed, they clinked their teacups at one another. Evan contemplated how to proceed.

But Diana set her saucer on the table next to her and turned to look out the window. “You know, Evan,” she said softly, “I would never say or do anything to hurt you.”

He leaned to place his cup on a nearby table. As he shifted, a forest-colored pillow tumbled to the floor. “I know. But—”

She waved her hand. “I know what you’re thinking. I would never spread rumors saying that I saw your precious Elaine in the morning with an unknown man, either. I wouldn’t think of it.”

He simply met her eyes levelly. She snorted.

“Very well. I considered it for a few moments, but no longer. If I did any such thing, you’d simply tell everyone it was you, and you would marry her instantly.”

“You know me too well.”

Her lips pressed together. “I do.” She reached over and took his empty cup. It was a familiar ritual to have her refill it and then add a half-spoonful of sugar. She handed it back, almost unaware of what she’d done. “But I hardly see how this matters. You’re going to marry her in any event.”

Yes. He was. But she’d not asked a question. She hadn’t needed to do so.

“Don’t.” She adjusted the teapot on the tray. “Please don’t.”

“If you tell me I can do better than her, this conversation is at an end. Besides, after last night, I haven’t any choice in the matter. Even if I’d wanted one.”

Diana lifted her head, but only to look out the window. “Don’t,” she repeated. “Please. You’re the brother I never had. I’ve missed you these last months. But how can we be friends with her around? She will never forgive me. If you marry her, I shall lose you forever.”

He swallowed.

“I knew you…you were interested in her. I guessed it quite some time ago. Do you remember that time, when you asked me if we mightn’t stop laughing at her?”

He nodded jerkily. It had been a few months into Elaine’s first Season. He’d broached the matter, speaking lightly, as if it were a joke. Diana had brushed him off, and he’d never said another word.

“That’s when I suspected. And I knew that if you stopped teasing her—if she came to know you—of course she would fall in love with you. How could she help herself? And when she did, your loyalties to her would soon outweigh your friendship with me. Evan, she hates me. How could she not?”

She forgave me. But he couldn’t grant Elaine’s forgiveness to Diana. And when Elaine had pulled from him this morning, he’d been left wondering whether he truly had received her trust.

“You could try being kind for a change,” he said mildly.

Diana gave him a sad smile. “After all that I’ve said? If I retract the claws, all of London society will devour me. It is either kill or be killed. If you’re not the wolf, you’re the rabbit.”

“There are no wolves. There are no rabbits. We’re all just human. I think you will find that if you treat people decently, they will respond.”

“If I were starting anew? Perhaps. But I can’t escape myself, Evan.”

He knew what that felt like. He could remember it all too well—the sick feeling in his stomach, the certainty that no matter what he wanted, he was forced to continue on. If he stopped being an ass, people would laugh at him. If he changed, they would turn on him. He’d run away, but she’d not had that option.

Diana’s eyes glistened. “I can’t stand myself,” she said, choking. “If people did not fear me so, how could anyone tolerate me?”

He knew that feeling, too. But that kind of regard was as false as a thin crust of snow, hiding a bottomless crevasse.

“It’s quite simple,” Evan said. “You’ll have to choose between accepting yourself and having others accept you.”

She wrapped her arms around herself. “Oh.”

Once, long ago, they’d vowed never to let each other be hurt. What they’d done with that pledge had been ugly. But the promise itself…

“There is one thing you should know.”

“No need to even speak it. If I hurt your Elaine, you’ll have nothing further to do with me.”

“That wasn’t what I was going to say.”

She raised her head, and for the first time, she met his eyes. She looked weary and ragged.

“You were my first true friend,” he said. “I have always known that you would never purposefully wish me harm. You’re the sister I never had, and if you think I will turn my back on you, you gravely mistake me. Friends do not let go of other friends. Even if matters become difficult. Even if the road becomes rocky. Even if it seems as if there is no other choice.”

She sniffled. “And what if you marry a woman who must certainly be my mortal enemy?”

“Even then.” He stood and pillows scattered about him. “But I think you’ll find that most people can be remarkably forgiving.”

She looked up at him, her eyes wide and sad. “Even you?”

He crossed to her and knelt beside her. “Especially me,” he said. And when she leaned against him, he hugged her, hard.

Chapter Eleven

UNTIL ELAINE WALKED INTO THE BALLROOM THAT NIGHT, she had not realized how much of herself she had locked away. She had always stood on the side of such rooms, dressed in colors that drew no attention.

Tonight, for the very first time, she wore a ball gown of red satin. It hugged her waist and then flared out over a multitude of petticoats. The neckline skimmed the top of her corset, flirtatious without quite crossing over into the realm of provocation. The cut was simple—so simple, it had been fitted together in a matter of hours. The hem was still pinned in place, rather than sewn.

It was simple, and yet when she’d looked at herself in the mirror beforehand, she’d been unable to look away. This was who she could be. For years, she’d had one purpose at gatherings like this: to make everyone look away from her.

Tonight she wanted them to look at her. She stood on the edge of the polished wood floor, feeling like a ship clinging to the shore. Out there, amongst the crowd, there were waves and storms and monsters. Here at the edges there was safety. Her first step toward the middle of the room was the hardest. The second came more easily. With the third, people had begun to look at her and whisper behind upraised fans.

Lady Elaine Warren didn’t wear red. She didn’t walk into the center of the room. She hid away everything about herself.

Not any longer. For once, those whispers did not make her falter. They made her lift her chin and take longer strides. The fourth step was the easiest yet, and on the fifth…

On the fifth, she saw Evan. He was standing against a wall, dressed in dark brown. His golden, curling hair was tamed, but when he turned toward her, something just a little wild entered his expression. His gaze dropped, and perhaps—she could not keep herself from grinning—so did his jaw. Just a little. By the time his eyes met hers, his smile matched hers, broad and unstoppable. He started toward her.

She could not run. Not with these slippers on her feet. If she ran, the flowers would fall from her hair, and the straight-pins holding her hem in place would come undone. But her steps grew faster. She made no effort to hide her destination. They met in the center of the crowd. He reached his hands out to her, and she took them. He pulled her close—and then, with everyone watching, he kissed her. Hard.

There might have been tongue involved. Eventually, he pulled away from her.

“Evan,” she said, “I’m so sorry—this morning, I—”

He set his fingers across her lips. “What did I tell you?”

“You said when danger threatened, you were looking for someone who would hold to you and not let go. And I—”

He glanced wryly down, where his hand still held hers. “You’re letting go, are you?”

“No, but this morning, I—”

“Elaine,” he repeated, “are you letting go?”

“No,” she whispered. “No. I love you.”

His smile broadened and he leaned down to her. “Over the years, everyone stumbles. That’s why I’ll be here for you—and you’ll be there for me. I don’t expect perfection. I want you, and you’re a thousand times better.”

Her heart was pounding. She was looking up into his eyes. The room was quiet with an expectant hush—

Wait, the room was quiet? For the first time since his hands had joined with hers, she glanced around her. The crowd around them had indeed gone silent—and had drawn in quite close. Everyone was looking at them. Everyone.

And why wouldn’t they?

Evan’s smile simply broadened. “I love you,” he said, just loud enough to send a murmur rippling through the awaiting crowd. And then he tucked her hand behind his elbow and gestured to the crowd. “Clear the way,” he said, his voice commanding. “If I don’t find Lord Stockhurst and ask for his daughter’s hand in marriage in the next five minutes, we’ll have a scandal on our hands. And none of you want that.”

Evan wasn’t the only one smiling, now. All around them, people were grinning. And then, one by one, the members of the crowd began to clap.

ACROSS THE BALLROOM, DIANA HELD HER HEAD HIGH, willing herself not to tear up.

No matter what Evan said, she didn’t believe that they could remain friends—not if she continued on as before. Strange; she’d never felt nervous before in a crowd. But right now, she could sense her own vulnerability. For the first time, she was the rabbit. And lo, here were these many wolves.

She caught sight of Miss Maria Wollton along the side of the room. Miss Wollton had pots of money, but it had all come from trade. When she spoke, she displayed a well-informed, intelligent mind. And so last month, Diana had called her a presumptuous little bluestocking. The appellation had stuck. It had been so easy to push the girl to a corner of the room.

Diana crossed the room to her and dipped a little curtsey. “Miss Wollton.”

“Lady Cosgrove,” the younger woman returned warily.

“That…” Why should this be so hard? “That shade of peach is quite lovely on you,” Diana said, all in a rush. “It truly brings out the blue in your eyes.”

Miss Wollton frowned in confusion. To her left, Diana could see the crowd gathering about Evan and Elaine, offering their congratulations. Soon, she would join in. She would have a great many things she would need to say to the two of them.

But for now… Diana drew a deep breath and did the hardest thing she had ever done in her life.

“Miss Wollton,” she said, “I owe you an apology.”

Epilogue

Two months later.

THE CHAMPAGNE HAD BEEN POURED in generous toasts. A dizzying multitude of friends and family had gathered around and offered the young couple congratulations. Elaine’s mother had scarcely been able to contain her happiness throughout the wedding breakfast, and so Elaine had barely managed to escape her parents’ home. A carriage decked with every spring flower had taken her away—all the way to Evan’s house, all of two streets’ distance.

Despite the beat of nervousness in her belly, she’d been introduced to his staff and he’d taken her on a leisurely tour of his home—their home now, to fill with an entire life together. He’d shown her to her chambers.

“The bed,” he said, quite seriously, “is the finest that money can buy. I had it made new for you, you know. I hope you…sleep comfortably.” A wicked smile danced on his face, and he glanced out the window at the afternoon sky.

Evening was still a depressing number of hours away.

Perhaps marriage did make you of one mind, because when she sighed, he winked at her.

“I was thinking that after our arduous day, we might consider retiring early.”

“What an excellent idea,” she returned, doing her best to keep her face straight and serious.

He stepped outside and gave the orders. The majority of the servants disappeared as silently as they’d come, heading to their own revels below.

Mary scarcely had time to divest Elaine of her formal white gown and replace it with an inappropriately virginal wrapper before a tap sounded at her door.

“His Lordship is eager,” Mary said.

“Mmm,” Elaine replied.

“And how could he be? After all, just last night, you were—”

“Mary, don’t you think you’ll need to pack? You have three weeks’ leave coming to you during our honeymoon. I should want to get started, were I you.”

Mary smiled and withdrew.

His Lordship wasn’t the only eager one.

But when he entered, he did not fall on her and ravish her immediately. Alas. He stood in the doorway, the light of afternoon painting his gold hair in hues of orange. He’d shed his formal coat and waistcoat; the tails of his shirt were untucked.

“Well, Lady Westfeld,” he said finally. “Are your accommodations to your liking?”

“Why so formal?”

He took a step toward her. “Formal? I’m just savoring the sound of your name.” Another step. “Lady Westfeld.” Another step, and he slid a finger under her chin. “Lady Westfeld of mine,” he whispered.

“You’ll just have to be my Evan,” she said in response.

“With pleasure.”

And then, step by step, he drew her into the center of the room for a kiss—and another one—and another one after that. She took hold of his arms, and she didn’t let go.

About Courtney

Unlocked is a companion novel in the Turner series. The other books in the series are Unveiled, Unclaimed, and Unraveled. You can also get the entire series as a box set.

Courtney’s latest series, The Brothers Sinister, includes The Governess Affair, a prequel novella, The Duchess War, The Heiress Effect, The Countess Conspiracy, The Suffragette Scandal, and Talk Sweetly to Me. I hope you enjoy them all!

If you’d like to find out when Courtney’s next book comes out, please sign up for her mailing list at www.courtneymilan.com.

Other Books by Courtney

The Worth Saga

Coming late 2014

click here to find out more

The Brothers Sinister Series

The Governess Affair

The Duchess War

A Kiss for Midwinter

The Heiress Effect

The Countess Conspiracy

The Suffragette Scandal

Talk Sweetly to Me

The Turner Series

Unveiled

Unlocked

Unclaimed

Unraveled

Not in any series

What Happened at Midnight

The Lady Always Wins

The Carhart Series

This Wicked Gift

Proof by Seduction

Trial by Desire

Chapter One

IT WAS GOING TO BE A TERRIFIC STORM.

Gareth Cavendish, Duke of Wessex, surveyed the rapidly darkening sky as he stood on the steps of his country estate. Gray-violet clouds boiled up in angry billows and every few seconds thunder rumbled, as if the storm were clearing its throat, preparing to roar. But so far not a drop had fallen.

“I do hope they’re near,” he murmured, scanning the pristine landscape of his property. “The clouds may burst at any moment.”

The man behind him shifted his weight. “Sir William is a very punctual man.”

“Yes.” Gareth narrowed his gaze upon a far-off puff of dust, just visible beyond the stately oaks that lined the road leading to Kingstag Castle. A servant had been sent out to watch for the visitors’ arrival, but it was still over a mile from the main gates to the house. A moment later, a traveling chaise-and-four emerged around the last turn. “There. Just as you said, Blair. Very punctual.”

His secretary murmured a vague reply.

The carriage bowled smartly down the drive, drawing nearer. He stood a little straighter. It wasn’t every day a man welcomed his bride-to-be to his home. Miss Helen Grey, younger daughter of Sir William Grey and the toast of the Season, would be the Duchess of Wessex by the end of the month. Gareth was very pleased with the match. Her father’s best property marched with one of his smaller estates, and according to the marriage settlements, that land would be his one day, as Grey had no sons. It was a good match as well, for the Greys were an old and respected family, even if they had fallen on rather hard times of late. And the young lady herself was ideal: a serene, gracious manner, a lovely face and form, and a beautiful voice. Helen Grey would make the perfect Duchess of Wessex.

Gareth glanced again at the sky. He hoped the storm broke soon and blew over quickly. Guests were to begin arriving the next day, and he shuddered to imagine the chaos if everyone was kept indoors for the next week.

“Let us hope there are no lightning strikes, hmm?” He half-turned to flash a faint smile at his secretary, who nodded, stony-faced. Gareth took another look at the man who was not merely his secretary. James Blair was his distant cousin from a poorer branch of the family and superbly competent. He relied on him like he relied on his right arm. Normally they worked together in perfect tandem, Blair anticipating his thoughts and Gareth relying on his cousin’s uncommonly good judgment in all matters. No one was more closely acquainted with his business concerns or personal matters, nor a better friend. He trusted the man completely.

But now his secretary looked as though a funeral train were approaching instead of a bridal party. “All right, Blair?” he asked curiously.

Blair stared straight ahead, his eyes flat. “Yes.”

He glanced toward the approaching chaise as an awful thought struck him. Good Lord. There couldn’t be something about this marriage giving him pause, could there? Blair had conducted the marriage settlement negotiations on his behalf while estate business had kept Gareth in the country. Naturally, he must have seen Miss Grey and her family a fair amount. Alarm stirred in his chest. Perhaps Blair has seen something troubling but hesitated to bring it up now that the documents had been signed and the engagement announced. Blair would notice. Blair also would not want to embarrass him.

He cleared his throat. “You seem quiet. No reservations about the bride, I hope?”

At last Blair looked at him, albeit reluctantly. “No. Miss Grey is a very suitable choice.”

That seemed an evasive answer. “Were there any problems with Sir William?” he asked, lowering his voice even further. Blair shook his head. “Come, man, what is it?” he prodded. “You look positively grim.”

Blair’s chest filled as if he would speak, and then he sighed. “My apologies, Wessex,” he muttered. “It must be the storm.”

Gareth closed his eyes and mentally smacked himself on the forehead; he’d completely forgotten Blair had been frightened of storms as a boy. Perhaps he still was, and now Gareth had just gone and forced him to admit it aloud. “Of course,” he murmured quickly.

“I wish you and Miss Grey every happiness,” added his secretary with a forced smile.

Gareth nodded, happy to let the conversation lapse. The carriage was almost to the steps, and for a second he wondered what he might have done if Blair had confessed some wariness about Miss Grey or the marriage in general. He couldn’t very well just send her home, but it would have been gravely alarming had James found her wanting.

There was a rustle of silk behind him. “I hope I’m not late,” said his mother as she stepped up beside him.

“Your timing is perfect,” he said. “I presume Bridget had something to do with it.”

“As ever,” she replied under her breath.

Gareth shot his mother a quick glance. All three of his sisters were beside themselves with excitement over the impending celebrations and desperately eager to meet Miss Grey, the reigning toast of London. But while Serena and Alexandra were capable of proper, dignified behavior, the youngest had a true genius for trouble. If anything were to break, go missing, or inexplicably wind up on the roof, Bridget was sure to be found nearby, protesting—with a perfectly straight face—that the most incredible circumstances had caused it. Normally he took Bridget’s mishaps in stride, but he would be eternally grateful if she managed to behave properly for the next fortnight. Perhaps he ought to tell Withers, the butler, to post footmen outside the guest rooms to make certain Bridget didn’t accidentally inflict a broken leg or a black eye on the bride.

“She’ll be on her best behavior, won’t she?” he asked, praying that would be good enough.

“Yes.” The duchess gave him a confident smile. “I’ve told her she will be excluded from all the wedding festivities if she is not. For now, I’ve sent her to help Henrietta entertain Sophronia.”

His shoulders eased. “A masterstroke.” The only person more capable than Bridget of causing trouble was Sophronia, his great-great-aunt. Or was she a great-great-great-aunt? He tended to think of her in the same vein as the statues in the garden: ancient, crumbling, and utterly impervious to anything. Normally Sophronia kept to her own apartments with her companion, Henrietta Black. But if she and Bridget could occupy each other tonight, so much the better for everyone.

“Never let it be said I don’t know my children.” His mother turned to face him and her gaze sharpened. “Do you love this girl, Gareth?”

She only called him Gareth when she wanted to get his attention. His eyes narrowed, but he spoke calmly. “What has love got to do with marriage?” He knew it existed and that it was pleasant to find it in marriage, but he’d never met a woman who stirred him, even slightly, the way poets and romantics sighed about: the world upended, walking on air, being struck by lightning from a clear blue sky. Rubbish. Whatever else Gareth might have been amenable to, he preferred to keep his feet on the ground, and he most certainly didn’t want to be hit by lightning. If such a force even existed, he was just as happy not to know about it. His marriage to Miss Grey would be elegant, refined, and sensible: in a word, perfect.

“Don’t scoff,” said his parent. “You know I only ask out of concern. You’ve persuaded me the match is advantageous for both parties, but you’ve hardly said one word about your feelings for the lady herself.”

“She’s lovely. She’ll make a very suitable duchess and mother. You’ll adore her.”

“I wasn’t worried about adoring her myself,” replied the duchess. “I worry about you adoring her.”

His jaw tightened. What a time to ask that question. “I have the utmost respect for her, and I trust we shall be very content with one another.”

His mother only sighed.

Irked at her and at Blair for ruffling what had promised to be a perfectly smooth welcoming, he descended the steps as the carriage reached the gravel and slowed to a more decorous speed. There was nothing to reproach in his actions. He was a sensible man who made logical decisions. He thought he’d chosen quite well, despite his mother’s sentimental disquiet and his secretary’s grim silence. If they had some objection to this marriage, he thought darkly, they had better speak soon or forever hold their peace.

But this was not the moment to brood about that. Straightening his shoulders, he prepared to welcome his future wife and her family. Miss Grey, her parents, and her elder sister would spend the next fortnight at Kingstag, preparing for the wedding at the end of that time. Behind him, the butler, housekeeper, and a few servants waited at the ready to greet their soon-to-be mistress. The house had been cleaned and polished to a bright shine over the last month to appear at its best for the wedding. He darted a quick glance at his mother, but she silently stepped up beside him, her serene smile back in place, and he breathed a sigh of relief.

The sky growled again as the coach pulled to a halt. A dust-covered servant jumped down to open the door, and Sir William alighted first. The baronet fairly radiated triumph. “A very great pleasure, Your Grace,” he boomed, sweeping a bow as the servant turned to help Lady Grey down.

“The pleasure is mine, sir. Welcome.” Gareth greeted the older gentleman. “May I present my mother, the Duchess of Wessex?” His mother stepped forward and graciously greeted the baronet.

Gareth turned his attention to Lady Grey. “Welcome to Kingstag Castle, madam.” He bowed over her hand.

Her pleased eyes climbed the façade of the house before she turned a beaming smile on him. “A pleasure it is to be here, sir. And for such a happy occasion!” She laughed, a little trill of delight. He smiled, then stepped forward to help his betrothed down from the carriage himself.

Helen Grey was lovely, he thought approvingly as she stepped down, her small hand nestled in his. He’d thought so from the moment he met her. Her dark hair was arranged in the latest style, her dress the picture of elegance. She looked as fresh and beautiful as the roses in his mother’s garden. The Greys must have stopped so she could change and refresh herself before arriving. “Welcome to my home, Miss Grey.” He raised her hand to his lips as he bowed.

She blushed, her cheeks a perfect soft pink. Her dark eyes glowed as she gave a little curtsey. “Thank you, Your Grace. I’m delighted to arrive at last.”

Gareth smiled in satisfaction. She truly was the perfect bride. Her voice was just as lovely as he remembered, and her person even lovelier. Her manner was gentle and sweet. What more could a man ask for in a wife? He presented her to the duchess, pleased to see his mother greet her as warmly and graciously as ever. He knew she would never be rude or crass, but he wouldn’t put it past her to probe—in that delicate, almost imperceptible way she had—into Miss Grey’s feelings as well.

“How fortunate you arrived before the storm broke,” he said to Sir William. “It’s been threatening all day.”

“Yes!” exclaimed Lady Grey, fanning herself. “We were quite worried we would be caught in a downpour.”

“It looks to be a bad one,” observed Sir William, squinting at the sky.

“Indeed. Shall we proceed inside?” Gareth paused, remembering something. “But did you not say your eldest daughter would also be accompanying you?”

A moment of silence passed over the group. Sir William and Lady Grey exchanged a glance. Miss Grey wet her lips. “Yes. My sister did come. She wanted a moment to repair her appearance, I believe.”

“Ah.” Gareth nodded, and turned toward the carriage again, wishing the sister would hurry up and get down so they could step inside before the rain came and soaked them all. How long did she need to repair herself, anyway? Miss Grey managed to look as neat and elegant as any lady in town.

“I’m coming,” said a voice from the carriage. “Just a moment!” She appeared in the door of the carriage, her face hidden by a dark red bonnet. She gathered up her vibrant yellow skirt in one hand and reached out to take the hand of the footman waiting to assist her. “So sorry to keep everyone waiting,” she said a bit breathlessly as she jumped down and faced them all.

She looked like her sister, but different. Where Helen Grey’s face was tranquil and composed, this woman’s face was lively and expressive. Her eyes sparkled and danced. Her features were sharper than Helen’s and her figure was fuller, almost lush. And as she tipped up her pointed chin and looked at Gareth with openly interested brown eyes, lightning struck.

Chapter Two

EVERYONE JUMPED AT THE THUNDEROUS CRASH and the burst of light that burned a streak across the sky. “Gracious!” cried Lady Grey, clapping a hand to her heart. “I thought it would strike us all dead on the spot!”

Helen’s sister turned her face to the sky as the first sharp drops of rain hit the ground. “It looks to be a good show,” she said mischievously.

“Indeed not, Cleo,” said her mother in an undertone. “Behave yourself!”

Gareth heard all this dimly, around the introduction. Mrs. Cleopatra Barrows, Sir William was saying, his eldest daughter. He thought he made the polite response but couldn’t be sure; once he took her gloved hand in his, he wasn’t quite sure what else went on in the world around him. It wouldn’t surprise him if his hair were standing on end, and he was most likely staring like an idiot. Mrs. Barrows put on a polite smile and curtseyed, but that excitement that sprang into her face at the crack of lightning stuck in his mind.

A soft noise behind him finally broke whatever spell he’d fallen under. He stepped back, remembering himself. “I’m delighted you’ve arrived at last. You remember Mr. Blair, of course?” Blair stepped forward and bowed.

“Capital to see you, sir,” said Sir William courteously, and Lady Grey gave him a benevolent smile.

“Mr. Blair,” murmured Miss Grey.

“Mrs. Barrows,” said the duchess, coming toward her. “What a delight to make your acquaintance. Welcome to Kingstag Castle.”

“Thank you, Your Grace.” She dropped a graceful curtsy.

“And you must meet Mr. Blair,” his mother continued, looking at Blair, who obediently stepped to her side. “He is Wessex’s secretary as well as our cousin.”

“How do you do, sir?” Mrs. Barrows gave Blair a sunny smile, and Gareth’s stomach clenched. He had to make himself turn away from her, unnerved by his reaction.

“Come, let us go inside,” he said, offering Lady Grey his arm. “The guests will begin arriving tomorrow. I thought you might like a day to explore the castle on your own before they lay siege to the place.”

Lady Grey gave her trilling little laugh again as she fell in step beside him. “How kind of you to arrange it so, sir! We are thoroughly delighted to be invited for such a stay, and to meet your mother and sisters! I vow, Kingstag Castle is every bit as lovely as I’d heard….”

She chattered on as they walked inside. Gareth was aware of Mrs. Barrows walking behind him with Blair. In the doorway he stole a glance back, catching sight of his cousin’s smile at something she said. Miss Grey followed, listening soberly to his mother, but her sister chatted quite amiably with Blair.

He felt a strange stab of discontent in his chest. Logically, he should hope Mrs. Barrows could revive Blair from whatever melancholy he’d sunk into lately. He should hope his cousin took a great enough liking to Mrs. Barrows to entertain her for the next fortnight, leaving Miss Grey to him.

Somehow, he didn’t.

The housekeeper stepped forward to show the guests to their rooms to refresh themselves and rest. Although, as Mrs. Barrows passed him with a swish of her brilliant skirt, he couldn’t help but think that the Greys didn’t look in great need of refreshing. Gareth watched as they climbed the stairs, Lady Grey in the lead with the housekeeper and his mother, followed by Miss Grey and Mrs. Barrows.

“Just as lovely as you remembered?” asked Blair quietly, coming up beside him.

Gareth tore his gaze off Mrs. Barrows’s figure, trying to shake off the unpleasant feeling of having been knocked sideways. “Yes.”

Blair exhaled. He still looked a little ill, his mouth tight and his eyes shadowed. “That is a great relief.”

Gareth breathed deeply. The ladies had reached the turn of the stairs, and he watched Mrs. Barrows trail one gloved hand along the banister appreciatively. “Yes. It is, isn’t it? I can hardly stop the marriage now.”

Blair shook his head slowly, still watching the women climb the stairs. “No. I don’t suppose you can.”

“GRACIOUS, HELEN, you never said he was so handsome!”

Cleo burst into her sister’s room, too full of energy to rest. Helen was lying obediently on the bed, but at Cleo’s entrance she sat up at once, just as she had since they were girls. Of course, this time their nurse wouldn’t come scold them for not resting like proper young ladies, thought Cleo with a grin, since she was a widowed lady and her sister was about to become a duchess.

“Do you really think so?” Helen’s face lit up with a luminous smile.

Cleo laughed. “Of course! Such broad shoulders! Such brooding eyes! Such a lovely home!” She laughed again. “Did Mama see Kingstag Castle before you accepted his offer, or after? I thought she would swoon with delight when the house came into view.”

Helen sighed, her glow fading. “After. You well know she would have liked him had the house been a fright. He’s a duke, Cleo, and very wealthy,” she said in perfect imitation of their mother’s voice. “What more does a girl want?”

“Mmm, and handsome, too,” Cleo added. “A mother might want a title and a fortune, but a girl wants a handsome face.”

Helen tried, and failed, to repress her grin. “Cleo, you’re wicked.”

“Of course I am,” she exclaimed. “That’s why you love to have me about. But hush—” She lowered her voice and glanced around. “I did promise to be on my best behavior this fortnight,” she whispered. “So you mustn’t let on when I’m my usual awful self, or Papa will send me packing.”

Helen’s smile disappeared. “It was dreadful that Papa said that to you,” she said in a low tone. “You are not awful.”

Cleo lifted one shoulder. “To them I am. The stench of trade, you know. I suppose someday I might give away all my money and take up embroidery or some other suitable pursuit and live out my days in respectable poverty.” She gave a theatrical sigh and collapsed backward on the chaise as if in a swoon, throwing up one arm over her head in a fit of drama. “Perhaps then I’ll be acceptable. Poor and dull, but acceptable.”

“You could never be dull,” said her sister. “I’m ever so glad you’ve come, because if you’re here, at least it won’t be dull.” She shuddered.

Cleo uncovered her face and looked at Helen curiously. “Do you think it will be? Why? You’re reunited at last with your betrothed husband, about to meet his family and become his wife.”

Helen rolled her lower lip between her teeth and plucked at the lace on her sleeve. “I don’t know him that well, Cleo,” she confessed. “I’ve only seen him a few times this year. And last year … well, he didn’t distinguish himself from my other suitors in any real way. It seems odd, doesn’t it, that I’m to marry him in two weeks’ time and I barely know his name.”

“Gareth Anthony Michael Cavendish,” said Cleo. “How could you not know his name, when Mama’s been practicing saying it every day? ‘Their Graces, the Duke and Duchess of Wessex,’” she mimicked her mother, just as well as Helen had done. “‘Wessex of Kingstag Castle.’ ‘My son-in-law, the duke.’ ‘My daughter, the Duchess of Wessex.’”

Helen laughed again. “Stop! Perhaps I do know his name, but otherwise….” She shook her head. “The wedding just seems so near, all of a sudden.”

This time Cleo looked more closely at her sister. It had been clear to her that Helen was nervous their entire journey, but she’d thought it was only bridal nerves. Helen wasn’t usually a nervous sort, though. “Don’t you want to marry him?”

Her sister’s face turned bright pink. “Of course. Who would not?”

Cleo couldn’t argue with that, and yet…. “Perhaps he invited us early to get to know you better,” she suggested. “To steal away into the garden with you and kiss you senseless.” Helen’s eyes went wide. Cleo grinned, trying to lighten the mood. “Oh, don’t be like that. It’s not at all a trial to be whisked into the shrubbery for a clandestine kiss from a handsome man.”

Helen’s smile was a trifle wistful. “Isn’t it?”

“No doubt you’ll soon find out.” Cleo leaned forward, unable to resist prying a little. She didn’t see her sister very much anymore, and she missed her. She and Helen had never had secrets from each other, once upon a time, before Cleo’s marriage and subsequent widowhood had horrified her parents and made visits to the family home uncomfortable. “Don’t you want him to?”

Before Helen could answer, there was a tap on the door, closely followed by the entrance of their mother. “Oh, girls,” she whispered in ecstasy. “Isn’t this the loveliest house? Isn’t His Grace the handsomest gentleman? Oh, Helen, my darling, you are a very, very lucky girl!” She bustled over to kiss Helen’s forehead. Watching her sister, Cleo thought there was a flicker of panic in Helen’s eyes before she smiled at their mother.

“Thank you, Mama. I thought you were resting.”

Millicent Grey waved a hand. “Pooh! As if I could sleep away my first hours at Kingstag Castle. It’s one of the most beautiful estates in all of England! And my daughter will be mistress of it in just a few days’ time!” She swept Helen into another embrace. Cleo draped her arms over the end of the chaise and rested her chin on her arms, watching. It had been a long time since she’d seen such an outpouring of maternal affection.

“Now, are you feeling well?” Millicent placed her hand on Helen’s forehead. “Shall I send for a tonic? Luckily we’ve brought our own Rivers, I can have her prepare my special tonic at once.”

Helen clasped her mother’s wrist and smiled. “I’m fine, Mama. I don’t need a tonic.”

“A bath?” pressed Millicent. “I wager the duke’s staff can have one ready in no time. I hear he even had pipes installed to bring in the water! Have you ever heard of such a thing? Let’s send for a bath and find out.”

Cleo couldn’t resist rolling her eyes. Hadn’t they just stopped at an inn barely three miles distant so Helen could wash and change her dress? Of course she must look lovely for her future husband—Cleo didn’t argue with that—but this was silly, pretending to rest when none of them could close their eyes and wanting a bath just to discover if there really were pipes for the water.

“I’m fine, Mama.” Helen pushed her mother’s hand away and dodged it when Millicent would have reached out to smooth her hair. “Really, I’m quite recovered from the trip. Cleo and I were just talking about the duke.”

Millicent paused, clearly caught between the excitement of gossiping about their host and wariness of whatever Cleo might have said. “Indeed?” she asked with a too-bright smile. “What did you decide?”

“That he’s a very handsome gentleman,” said Cleo dutifully.

“Of course he is!” Their mother beamed, relieved.

“But Helen doesn’t know him all that well, does she?” Cleo went on, unable to ignore the devil inside her. “How long was his courtship?”

Millicent glared daggers at her. “It was all very proper,” she said sternly. “He contacted your father, most properly, and made a very pretty proposal—”

“Before he’d spoken to Helen?” Cleo was genuinely shocked—she hadn’t known that—and looked to Helen for confirmation. Her sister frowned and looked down, picking at her sleeve again.

“And his secretary—no, his cousin, Mr. Blair, came every week to pay his respects and make the arrangements!” Millicent lifted her chin.

“Didn’t His Grace call on you, Helen?” Cleo asked, ignoring her mother.

Helen said nothing.

“Of course he did!” said Millicent indignantly. “Last Season! Several times! And twice this year!”

This was all news to Cleo. When Helen had said she didn’t know the Duke of Wessex well, Cleo had thought it was due to a short but typical courtship, not one conducted by proxy. “And he sent his cousin to propose?”

“He did—That is—Not everyone must run wild and elope like you did, miss!” Millicent’s temper got away from her, and Cleo could almost see smoke coming from her mother’s ears. Behind Millicent, her sister was ripping the lace from her sleeve, her head bent.

She relented. Helen had accepted Wessex’s marriage proposal, and it was her choice. She said she was happy to be marrying him. Cleo had no right to make her sister more nervous than she already was.

“No, Mama,” she said soothingly. “They mustn’t. And I am very happy for Helen.”

Millicent opened her mouth, then closed it, as if she’d been ready for more argument. “Of course you are,” she finally said, accepting the truce. “We all are. But Helen! You must rest!” Cleo watched her mother press Helen back down, fluttering around her like an excited bird. This must be a dream come to life for Millicent, marrying her most beautiful daughter to a duke, especially after the disappointment Cleo had been.

She wondered if her mother had ever had the same hopes for her, before she proved herself difficult and rebellious. She wasn’t completely unlike Helen. She was pretty enough, though not beautiful like her sister. She’d been told she was intelligent and clever, but with an appalling tendency to speak too strongly and be too opinionated. Her great failing, though, had been her willingness to marry a man in trade, thereby drawing shame and discredit upon all her family. Millicent, the daughter of a squire and wife of a baronet, had dreamt of having a titled son-in-law her whole life. For Cleo to saddle her with a merchant son-in-law was intolerable.

Of course, her mother’s reaction to her marriage had been kind and warm compared to her father’s response.

From across the room, Helen’s eyes met hers, reluctantly amused and resigned. She’d always been the obedient daughter, and today was no different. Cleo would have wagered a guinea Helen would end up taking both a nap and a bath to please their mother.

She jumped to her feet. “I’m going to take a walk in the garden.” It might not be the nicest thing to leave Helen at their mother’s mercy, but she didn’t think she could take all the smothering maternal affection. She whisked out the door and back to her own room for a shawl, then went in search of the outdoors.

Despite the lightning, the storm was mild. Only a light mist was falling when a servant directed her to the gardens behind the house. She let her skirt drag in the wet grass, lifting her face to the sky. It felt good to be outside after two entire days in the carriage with her parents. If she could have managed it, Cleo would have hired her own carriage just for herself and Helen, leaving the elder Greys to congratulate themselves on Helen’s triumph all the way to Dorset. Their mother, of course, had wanted Helen nearby in case a spasm of delight overcame her again and she needed to smother her daughter in an embrace. Their father hadn’t trusted Cleo not to put “radical and absurd” ideas into Helen’s head. He’d watched her warily the entire trip, and Cleo had nearly bitten her tongue off a dozen times keeping her silence. And his final warning, delivered even as they drove up the sweeping drive of Kingstag, had almost been too much. She’d had to sit in the carriage a minute and compose herself before getting out.

But she would keep her composure, come what may. It was only for a fortnight, and it was for Helen and her wedding. She was aware that her parents had invited her only because Helen wanted her to come. Her father might be ashamed of her and her mother might think her unnatural, but her sister still loved her, and she wouldn’t repay that by causing strife and discord.

She slowed down as she reached the gravel paths of the garden. The Duke of Wessex, no matter that he might be remote and cool when it came to courting a wife, had a lovely garden. She stopped to examine all the plants, marveling at the profusion of greenery and blooms. How on earth did they get them to grow so thickly? Her own house had only a small garden, and nothing seemed to thrive. But these roses! They were everywhere, lush globes of pink and yellow petals that smelled divine. Cleo stuck her face into the flowery bower and sniffed, in paradise. What she wouldn’t give for her garden to look like this….

And this would be her sister’s home. She touched another fragrant rose, spilling a cascade of raindrops onto her skirt. The Duke of Wessex wasn’t at all what she had expected. From Helen’s description of him, she’d imagined an older man, very elegant and urbane. The man she’d met today was far more masculine. Thick waves of dark hair threatened to tumble over his high forehead, which gave him a somewhat wild look that was at odds with his surprisingly sensual mouth. He was undeniably handsome, but there was an implacable strength in his face as well. Cleo fancied he was a man of strong passions and great control, the sort of man who wouldn’t be denied anything he set his heart on.

Then she shook her head at how ridiculous she was, imputing an entire personality to a man she’d only just met. No doubt he’d turn out to be much as Helen described him, once she got to know him a little better. Dukes were far out of her ordinary acquaintance.

She bent down to sniff a peony, trying to squash the seed of worry that had sprouted when Helen confessed to nerves. Her sister was gentle and kind-hearted, and Cleo wasn’t at all certain Helen would be able to stand up to a man as intimidating as the duke.

It worried her that Wessex had only called on Helen a few times. How could one marry on such short acquaintance? She could forgive her sister, who had, no doubt, been dazzled by his rank and broad shoulders and very handsome face, but she hoped the duke hadn’t chosen Helen because she was beautiful, demure, and dutiful. He must be a very busy man, and if he didn’t spend time with his bride, he would never know how wonderful Helen was. And if he made Helen miserable….

She sighed and walked on toward the irises. As strong as her instinct was to protect Helen, this was not her battle. Helen had chosen him, and she must have had her reasons. Again her father’s warning echoed in her mind: Hold your tongue or you will be dead to all of us.

The rain grew a little harder, and she shook out her shawl, intending to drape it over her head. She had two weeks to take the duke’s measure. The duke had two weeks to recognize what a jewel Helen was.

“Are you well?”

She jumped at the sound of the voice, dropping her shawl in the process. The man she had just been thinking of stood behind her. “No, no,” she said, flustered, then corrected herself. “That is, I’m quite well, thank you. I was just admiring the roses.”

The Duke of Wessex stooped to retrieve her shawl. “My mother is a passionate gardener. She’ll be pleased you admire her work.”

“Very much so,” she said with enthusiasm. “They’re superb!”

“She does dote upon them,” he agreed.

“Everything beautiful must be nurtured and loved.” Cleo reached toward a pink rose that climbed up a nearby wall. “Nothing could bloom this profusely without a great deal of care.”

He cleared his throat. “And a large contingent of gardeners.”

She laughed. “I am sure they help as well, but this is a garden of love. Don’t you agree?”

The duke didn’t move. “Love?”

Cleo vaguely knew she ought to mention her sister, but the intensity in his dark eyes jangled her thoughts. “Yes. Love for the plants … although also a place where one might be moved to steal a kiss in the shrubbery.”

She had shocked him. His eyes darkened, and he opened his mouth to speak only to close it again. Oh dear; she’d let her mouth run away from her already.

“Indeed. You may be correct,” said the duke before she could apologize. “Forgive me if I interrupted your study of the roses and the—er—shrubbery. I was on my way to see a tree.”

“A tree?” she echoed, grasping at a new topic gratefully.

“It was struck by lightning, or so I was told.”

Cleo remembered the tremendous crack of lightning when they first arrived. “Oh, yes! I almost fell off the carriage step, it startled me so. I hope the tree didn’t damage anything.”

His expression was as calm as ever, but his eyes were piercing as he looked at her. “Likely not. We are positively overrun with oaks at Kingstag. I expect we’ll all be glad of the lightning when the tree is fueling our fires.”

She grinned in surprise, not having expected a duke to pay attention to what went into his fireplaces. “How very practical.”

For a moment his gaze seemed to snag on her smile. Cleo wiped it away at once. Oh dear, had her impulsive nature already managed to offend? But all he said was, “Quite.”

She wet her lips. The rain was growing harder now, although the duke didn’t seem to mind. “I think I ought to go back to the house now. The rain….” She held up one hand as if to catch the drops falling around them.

He looked up as if just noticing the rain. “Of course. And here I am, holding your shawl.” He handed it back to her.

“Thank you, Your Grace. Until dinner?”

He thrust one hand through his hair, sweeping the wild locks back over his forehead. It exposed his sharp cheekbones and firm jaw more starkly. Cleo was impressed in spite of herself. Gracious, how could Helen not want him to whisk her into the shrubbery? “Until dinner, Mrs. Barrows.” He bowed and walked on, his boots crunching on the gravel.

Cleo flung the tail of her shawl over her head and hurried toward the house. Suddenly, two weeks didn’t seem so long after all.

Chapter Three

IT WAS AN ETERNITY before the dinner hour finally arrived.

Gareth delayed going to the drawing room. He smoothed his cravat and tugged at his jacket, trying not to notice how his heart seemed to be thudding very hard against his ribs. He hadn’t seen his bride since the Greys arrived. That was perfectly expected; no doubt she had wanted a chance to rest from the journey and refresh herself. The fact that he kept picturing Mrs. Barrows—instead of Miss Grey, his chosen bride—reclining against the pillows of her bed was surely just a result of the lightning strike. It must have been closer than he’d thought and disordered his brain. No doubt as soon as he saw her at dinner, he would realize how mistaken that first electrifying impression had been.

Of course, he’d met her for a moment in the garden and nothing had happened to change it. On the contrary; she’d called it a garden of love and mentioned kissing in the shrubbery, and his mind had almost ceased working.

But now it was time to see her, along with his bride and her parents and even—God help him—all his family. His sisters were wildly excited to meet Miss Grey, and his mother had deemed dinner the proper time. Perhaps some of his bride’s quiet self-possession would wear off on Bridget especially, he thought, trying not to think how Mrs. Barrows’s lively nature was far more like his siblings’.

He took a deep breath. What was the matter with him? It must have been the lightning. Once he met the lady in proper, dignified circumstances, he would revert to his usual sane, rational self. Surely a longer acquaintance would confirm what he truly believed, that Helen Grey was the best possible choice for his duchess. She would be an excellent hostess, a kind mother, and a good role model for his sisters. She would look beautiful on his arm. He would have her dowry property, which he had long coveted. Just thinking through the logical, sane reasons why he wanted this match had a calming effect. He had made the right choice, and his odd fascination with her sister was merely a passing flight of fancy.

The door opened behind him and James Blair came in. The storm had blown away, and Blair’s expression was once more calm and equable. He would be at dinner tonight as well, as he often was at family dinners or when there was an unescorted lady present. Gareth had even excused him from most of his duties for the next fortnight; Blair had spent a great deal of time around the Greys this spring, and he could help smooth any awkward moments that might arrive as the families mingled. “Ah, there you are. I was beginning to fear you’d left me to face the ladies all by myself.”

“Sir William would be there.”

“I had hoped for more,” said Gareth dryly.

“And here I am.” Blair made a grimace. “In desperate need of a drink, I’m afraid.”

“Yes.” Gareth seized on the word. Now that his cousin mentioned it, a drink sounded like just the thing. “A brilliant idea.” He went to the cabinet in the corner and poured two measures of brandy, glad of something to do.

“I’ve decided to grant your wish regarding Mrs. Barrows,” said Blair then, with no warning at all.

The brandy bottle seemed to lurch in his hand, spilling liquor on the silver tray beneath the glass. “What do you mean?” he asked, keeping his back to his cousin as he hastily mopped up the liquid.

“That I act as her escort this fortnight.”

“Ah yes.” Gareth had forgotten that request. It had seemed a natural one to make a week ago, when all he knew was that Helen Grey’s older widowed sister would be part of the party. Blair had already agreed to do that; why did he have to bring it up now? “I thought we’d settled that a week ago.”

“I was uncertain.” Blair accepted a glass of brandy. “But after meeting her today, I believe I may enjoy her company a great deal.”

Gareth was struck motionless. “Why?” was all he managed to ask. Had Blair also met her in the garden? Hadn’t he been cowed by the threat of lightning? For some reason, Gareth was wildly irked that his cousin might have seen her with raindrops glistening on her skin. Damn it, maybe they’d better go in to dinner at once, so he could take another long look at her and cure his irrational interest right away.

Blair seemed not to notice his tension. “I suspect she is the source of some tension in the family. There was something about the way she pressed her lips together when she stepped out of the carriage.”

He pictured her mouth and took a gulp of his drink. “She’s a widow with her own home. Perhaps there’s something in her own life, and not her family’s, that gave her pause.”

“No doubt. She married a shopkeeper when she was only seventeen, and she still owns and runs the shop.”

A shopkeeper’s wife. Gareth either hadn’t paid attention to that part of James’s report on the Grey family or hadn’t cared enough to remember. “Where is the shop?” he asked, instantly chagrined that he had done so. Why did that matter?

“In Melchester, near Grey’s property. A rather large draper’s shop.”

A draper’s shop. He pictured her running her fingers over bolts of brilliant silks, gauzy laces, satin ribbons. He tossed back the last of his brandy. Why did she run the shop? Ladies did no such thing; his mother would have fainted away at the thought of managing a shop. “How independent. What do you suspect, Blair?” He tried to get back to the main topic, which was … oh yes. Mrs. Barrows’s secrets. The way she pressed her lips together. “Is this shop a dark family secret?”

Blair shook his head. “No, although you won’t hear a word about it from Sir William. The man has a supremely inflated sense of himself, and I doubt he approves.”

“No, I expect not.” Gareth’s one overriding impression of his soon-to-be in-laws was pride. Sir William clung to it, and Lady Grey couldn’t hide her delight in having a connection to Wessex. He rather doubted a merchant in the family had been as agreeable to the Greys. “Why did she marry a shopkeeper?” he murmured, almost to himself.

“Apparently she loved him.” Blair’s faint grin returned. “I told you: impulsive, bold, and passionate. She’s a woman who isn’t afraid to pursue what she wants.”

Oh, Lord. He raised his glass and realized it was already empty. “Do you think that might be causing this tension you noticed?” he asked, grasping at Blair’s earlier comment.

“I’m not certain.” Blair spoke slowly. “Didn’t you remark it? I wasn’t aware of it earlier, in London, but it was almost palpable when they arrived.”

Gareth frowned. He hadn’t noticed anything amiss—well, he hadn’t noticed much of anything beyond Mrs. Barrows’s mouth and eyes and the way her skirt swayed as she climbed the stairs, none of which had struck him as remotely amiss. “I wonder why. Could it be the wedding?” He lowered his voice, watching his cousin closely. “Do you think Miss Grey or her parents want to break the engagement?”

Blair seemed startled. He turned to Gareth, a frown creasing his forehead. “I highly doubt it, Wessex. What made you say that?”

Yes, what had made him say that? He had no idea. This morning, he had been highly pleased with his impending marriage and his choice of bride. Not one wisp of hesitation had clouded his mind, not even his mother’s gentle chiding about love and affection. Then a woman—the wrong woman—looked up at him with sparkling brown eyes and it seemed as though all his logical decisions had been made hastily and foolishly, based on air. Now he had just asked, without any forethought at all, if his bride might be planning to jilt him. Even worse, there had been a thread of hope in his question.

What was wrong with him tonight? His mother had planned a wedding celebration that would be spoken of for years to come. Dozens of guests would be arriving in a matter of days. The marriage contract was signed. The bride was upstairs, probably already planning how she would redecorate when the duchess’s suite was hers. The marriage was going to happen. Gareth must have lost his mind to contemplate—let alone contemplate with equanimity—anything else.

“Nothing,” he said, telling himself it was true. “You made it sound very ominous, and that was the most alarming thing I could think of on the spot. The wedding is in a fortnight, after all.”

Blair’s shoulders eased. “Of course.”

He cleared his throat. “Yes. Right. Well, thank you for sharing your concern with me. If anything particular comes up, do let me know.”

“Of course I will. I shall do my best to learn Mrs. Barrows’s secrets.”

For some reason, that didn’t sit too well with Gareth. He cast a longing glance at the brandy decanter but resolutely set down his glass. “Shall we go to dinner?”

“Indeed,” murmured Blair. “Time to face the enemy.”

That fit a little too well with Gareth’s own feeling, so he said nothing. They went to the drawing room, where much of the family had already gathered. His sisters had clustered around Miss Grey, chattering with various degrees of animation. Serena and Alexandra, he was pleased to see, were achieving some level of decorum, but Bridget, as feared, was louder and more boisterous than ever. For her part, Miss Grey seemed a little cowed by them. Her smile was uncertain, and she wasn’t saying much, although in fairness, it must have been rather intimidating to have three girls discussing every detail of her dress and pelting her with queries about London.

His mother was conversing with Sir William and Lady Grey, who looked up with twin expressions of rapture at his entrance. Gareth joined them as Blair headed for the younger ladies. He had a way with Bridget, and Gareth hoped Blair could calm his sister down so she wouldn’t frighten poor Miss Grey to death.

“Good evening, Your Grace, good evening!” Sir William almost preened in his satisfaction. “Delightful house.”

“Oh yes,” gushed his wife. “I’ve never seen one finer!”

“How very good of you to say so.” He inclined his head, keeping one eye on the door. A quick survey of the room had revealed the absence of Mrs. Barrows.

“If you’ll pardon me, I shall have a word with the butler about dinner.” His mother lowered her voice as she passed him. “Sophronia has deigned to join us this evening.”

“Has she?” Gareth shot her a look. “How generous of her.”

“Don’t start,” she murmured, edging past him. “I tried to dissuade her.”

Everyone knew that was hopeless. Nothing dissuaded Sophronia once she set her mind on something. Still, it gave him something to think about as Lady Grey’s effusions of delight over Kingstag Castle continued. Everything was perfection, in her opinion, and she seemed determined to list each point. It grew to be a bit much, to tell the truth. Gareth appreciated his home and was pleased to hear it admired, but she went on and on as though praising a gift he had given her. As soon as he could, he excused himself and went to Miss Grey, who appeared more at ease now. Blair had channeled the discussion into the diversions planned for the next fortnight.

“Good evening, Miss Grey.” He bowed, and she curtseyed. Very proper. Very reserved. “How have you found Kingstag Castle thus far?”

She smiled. “It is lovely, sir. I look forward to seeing the grounds. Your sisters have described them so well.”

“We’re going to take her around to see everything!” put in Bridget, beaming. “The lake, the grotto, everything! Only, she doesn’t ride terribly well, so James will have to drive us in the barouche.”

“I never promised,” Blair said with a smile.

“But near enough! I shall be on my best behavior. Please?” she begged.

“Perhaps Wessex will want to show Miss Grey the grounds himself,” replied Blair with a glance at Gareth.

“If she wishes,” he said. “We shall ride out to see as much as you care to see, Miss Grey.”

She lowered her eyes and curtseyed again. “That is very kind of you, sir.”

Blair drew the younger girls aside, saying he had an idea for an entertainment later, and they retreated to a corner of the room, although the giggles and whispers were audible to all. Gareth looked at his bride-to-be, and she looked at him. He suddenly realized he had no idea what to say to her, and from the expression on her face, she probably felt the same.

“Your sisters are charming,” said Miss Grey.

“They are indeed—and they have been positively wild to make your acquaintance.” He watched Alexandra whisper something in Serena’s ear, and a slight smile curved his lips at the delight in Bridget’s face over whatever they were plotting. His sisters were exhausting, but he did love them. “I hope they haven’t been impertinent.”

“Not at all.” Miss Grey paused. “Sisters are important. I shall be glad to have some more.”

“I shall be glad to share them.” Gareth repressed the urge to glance at the door yet again at the mention of her sister. He must not allow himself to think what was teasing the edges of his mind. If their conversations were always rather dull, it must be his fault and not hers. When they were better acquainted, they would know what to talk about and not end up in these awkward silences.

“Good evening,” said a bright voice behind him. He turned, tamping down the quick spurt of anticipation. This time he was prepared. This time she wouldn’t catch him off guard, the earth would remain firmly and motionlessly lodged beneath his feet, and he wouldn’t feel as though he’d been hit over the head by a falling tree branch.

Instead he felt as though the breath had been sucked right out of his lungs. Mrs. Barrows wore a gauzy white dress that swirled and clung to her body with every step. A long, narrow shawl of vivid blue looped around her bare arms. Ropes of delicate gold chain looped around her bodice, jingling with little gold coins. Her sable hair was twisted up on her head, more gold chain running through it, and on her feet—her bare feet—were dainty leather sandals. She looked like a Roman goddess, he thought numbly: Venus, the goddess of desire.

“Oh, Cleo, how lovely you look,” said Miss Grey warmly.

“Thank you, Helen. The minute the chain came into the shop, I thought to wear it.” Mrs. Barrows beamed at her sister as she joined them. “Although I don’t think I can compare to you!”

Gareth turned his head to look at his fiancé. He hadn’t even noticed what she was wearing. A pale pink dress, very fashionable and very ordinary. His feet had never left the ground once while looking at her.

“Good evening, Your Grace.” Mrs. Barrows dipped a curtsey. The little coins tinkled softly as she moved.

“Good evening.” His tongue had trouble forming the words.

“Mrs. Barrows.” Blair appeared at her elbow with a pleased smile. “Good evening. What an original gown.”

She smiled. “Very unoriginal, you mean! I fell in love with an illustration in one of my father’s books and longed to recreate it for myself. This design must be two thousand years old.”

“But surely even better now,” he replied. Blair was looking at her with far too much appreciation, thought Gareth testily. “Don’t you agree, Wessex?”

“Er— Yes,” he said. At least the question gave him an excuse for staring at her.

She looked directly at him then, her dark eyes sparkling. A little smile curved her mouth into a perfectly kissable shape. Gareth felt a cold sweat break out on the back of his neck. He might need another brandy. “Thank you, Your Grace. You flatter me.”

The door opened, and Gareth’s mother returned, thank God—although with Sophronia and Henrietta Black in her wake. Sophronia looked as eccentric as ever tonight, in a gown thirty years out of date and her henna-colored hair tied up in a bewildering assortment of braids and knots, but her gaze was as keen and ruthless as ever. Unconsciously Gareth braced himself, sensing that she had decided to join them in order to stir up trouble in some way. “Isn’t it time to eat?” she asked loudly, confirming his suspicions. Her companion, Henrietta, tried to murmur something in her ear, but Sophronia waved her away. “I’m half-starved after the long walk down here.”

“Nearly,” said the duchess calmly, guiding her across the room. “Come meet our guests. Here are Sir William and Lady Grey. Wessex is to marry their daughter. Sir William, Lady Grey, may I present you to Lady Sophronia Cavendish?”

“A great honor, madam.” Sir William bowed.

“Oh yes, indeed!” trilled his wife, fluttering her hands as though she couldn’t contain herself. “A singular pleasure, my lady!”

Sophronia gave the woman a hard stare, then turned away. The duchess quickly intervened. “You must meet the bride!” She gave Gareth a look as Sophronia tottered toward him, and he made the introductions.

Sophronia baldly looked Miss Grey up and down, then did the same to Mrs. Barrows. “Are you the bride?”

Mrs. Barrows blinked. “No, my sister has that happy honor.”

The older woman grunted. “She doesn’t look honored.”

“Sophronia,” murmured the duchess in a warning way.

“Oh, but she is!” put in Lady Grey. “Who would not be honored to become the Duchess of Wessex, mistress of Kingstag Castle? I assure you, madam, my daughter feels her honor very, very well!”

“She doesn’t show it.” The elderly lady’s keen eye landed on Mrs. Barrows again. “Already married, are you?”

“No, my lady. I’m a widow.” Mrs. Barrows seemed amused by Sophronia. She shot her sister a glance full of impudent amusement. Her mouth twitched as if to keep from laughing. Gareth wondered what her laugh sounded like. What her lips felt like. What she wore underneath that slip of a gown.

God help him.

“You don’t dress like one,” remarked Sophronia. Once again she was coming perilously close to rudeness, and as usual, no one seemed to know quite how to deflect her. She peered closer at Mrs. Barrows’s gown. “Where did you get that chain? It’s quite unusual.”

“Oh my heavens!” burst out Lady Grey. Everyone looked at her and her face seemed to fill with panic for a moment. “I—I beg your pardon, Your Grace, I have just remembered something I must tell my daughter.”

“Yes, Mama,” murmured Miss Grey, stepping forward.

“No, Helen dear.” Her mother’s voice was high and strained. “Your sister.”

Miss Grey’s eyes flickered to Mrs. Barrows’s. Something passed between them, but Gareth wasn’t sure what. Suddenly he understood what Blair had meant about a tension in the Grey family. Even Mrs. Barrows’s supple mouth looked flat. “We’re about to go in to dinner, Mama,” she said, her voice quiet and reserved. There was none of the warmth and humor she had shown before.

Lady Grey’s face pinched. “It will only take a moment, Cleo. Come here.”

“Well, Alice, is it time to eat or isn’t it? I never had the patience to stand around waiting for my dinner.” Sophronia turned to the duchess, who began to look a little strained as well.

“Yes, dinner is ready.” The duchess nodded at one of the footmen, who swept open the doors.

“Thank goodness,” declared Bridget, bounding across the room. Alexandra and Serena followed more sedately. “I’m so hungry!”

“That’s my girl,” said Sophronia with approval as the duchess closed her eyes in despair. “Who’s going to escort me? I see you haven’t got nearly enough gentlemen tonight, Wessex.”

“The guests will begin arriving tomorrow,” he replied. “Blair will give you his arm tonight.” He nodded at his cousin.

Sophronia grunted. “I suppose he’ll do.” She put out her hand, and Blair obediently gave her his arm.

The duchess smiled at the rest of them. “Since we are just family tonight, I thought we could all go in together. I hope you will forgive the informality.”

There was a murmur of assent. Gareth turned to Lady Grey, still hovering behind him. What the devil had she wanted to tell Mrs. Barrows so urgently? And why had it banished the light from the lady’s eyes? Even now, she was staring fixedly at the carpet, her lower lip caught between her teeth. He felt again the oddest sensation of falling. He wanted to shake her mother—her own mother—for dampening her spirits. He must be going mad. “May I escort you, madam?”

Lady Grey hesitated, but after exchanging a glance with her husband, she took Gareth’s arm. “Why yes, how kind, Your Grace! I have heard such reports of your chef at Kingstag, I expect dinner shall be utterly incomparable….” She went on, but he barely heard her. His sisters fell in step with Miss Grey behind them, and they followed his mother into the dining room.

But when he reached the dining room and seated Lady Grey, he discovered that Mrs. Barrows and Sir William had not followed them.

Chapter Four

“STAY A MOMENT,” growled Sir William at his older daughter as the others left the room. Cleo waited, burning with humiliation. The momentary relief she’d felt when the Duke of Wessex intercepted her mother had quickly been replaced by dread when her father gave her a black look behind the duke’s back. For a moment there, she’d been blessing the duke with all her might but of course the coming confrontation couldn’t be avoided.

Her father waited until everyone else had left, then stared fiercely at the footman until the servant closed the door, leaving them in complete privacy. Even then, he spoke in a harsh whisper. “You think very highly of yourself, don’t you? When will you cease trying to humiliate us at every turn by bringing up your wretched little trade?”

“It is not wretched,” she said quietly.

He snorted. “It is indeed! My own daughter, laboring in a shop like some baseborn chit. It is intolerable, I tell you, intolerable. The very least you could do is remember your place here and kindly keep your idle thoughts and opinions to yourself.”

“What is my place?” she asked before she could stop herself. Perhaps he wouldn’t be able to tell her. Perhaps he had some trace of affection left for her.

“A tradesman’s widow,” he said with a snort. “Utterly beneath your ancestors! Your sister will be a duchess, and you stand in her drawing room and loudly proclaim yourself little better than a common servant!” Cleo’s mouth opened in shock, and he went on. “Sometimes I wonder precisely who you think you are, miss!”

“You named me for a queen,” she said. “Who do you think I am?”

He harrumphed. “What a laughable mistake. Cleopatra was born to royalty and she knew her place. Don’t think so highly of yourself, miss.”

“But she led her country,” Cleo reminded him. “I daresay someone thought that wasn’t her place.”

Her father glowered at her. “She did not go against her parents’ wishes and lower herself to go into trade.”

“She lowered herself to marrying her brother,” Cleo murmured. “Although I suppose that was at her parents’ wish.”

He closed his eyes and exhaled, then shot her another sharp glance. “You’ve done as you wished, and I have not disowned you. But don’t think I’m proud of your actions. You’re only welcome here because your sister wished it. It is her wedding—she, at least, will take her proper place in society, while you have done precious little for our family.”

Cleo shifted her weight back and forth, setting her skirt to swirling about her ankles. The tiny coins clinked softly. “I paid for Helen’s wardrobe.”

“Shh!” hissed her father, glancing around anxiously, as though the duke might hear her words all the way in the dining room. “Don’t tell everyone!” He gave a snort. “Bad enough that my daughter has to operate a shop like a common merchant. You’d tell the world I must accept your charity, too.”

“It’s not charity,” she protested. “I wanted to help! Helen is my sister.”

“Then mind your tongue,” he snapped. “Do you want to embarrass her in front of her future husband? Do you want him to think us a pack of penniless, hysterical fools?”

Cleo watched the coins settle into silence again. “No, Papa. I’m sorry.”

“You should be.” With that, he brushed past her, only waiting at the door to offer his arm. As angry as he was with everything she did, he would never break protocol and leave her to walk into the dining room alone. We must keep up appearances, after all, Cleo thought, pasting a wooden smile on her face, feeling oddly detached from her father even as her hand rested on his arm.

She knew her parents hadn’t understood when she and Matthew eloped; she hadn’t expected them to. The years of her marriage had been rather cool ones between her and her parents, but still civil. Cleo knew why; her mother had once outright admitted that if she had to be the wife of a shopkeeper, at least she was the wife of a very prosperous shopkeeper. At the time, she’d wondered who her parents thought she would marry. The Greys had had no money for as long as she could remember, and no connections of consequence. Suitors had been rare in their house.

But whatever their initial hopes for her, it was clear that all the burden of making a great match had descended upon Helen. Cleo felt sorry for that. She had been so happy with Matthew and wished the same for her sister, whether it was with a duke or a lowly tailor. She got some glimpse of what her sister must have endured after Matthew died. Her father had tried to insist that she sell her shop and return home. Unspoken was the presumption that she would make a better match the second time, now that she was a widow of some modest fortune. After that conversation, Cleo had made only the briefest visits home. She had no desire to settle into a ladylike uselessness in her widowhood. Working in the shop reminded her of Matthew, and Cleo liked being responsible for herself. She could support herself, it turned out, so why shouldn’t she? Without the shop, she would have precious little of her own: no children, no husband, no income … nothing to keep her mind occupied. What else was she to do with herself?

The unfairness of her father’s feelings made her want to scream. Never mind that her shop, which he hated, supplied her money, which he somehow managed to accept. At times she had been almost determined to stop offering it, since the source of the income was so hateful to both her parents. Perhaps they would be more appreciative if they felt the lack of her “common merchant” funds. But cutting them off would mean cutting off Helen as well. Helen was the dearest person in the world to her; Helen had wished her joy when she married Matthew. And now she had made a splendid match to the illustrious Duke of Wessex—even if he did seem awfully reticent and reserved—and Cleo would never regret helping her sister find happiness.

That was the thought she must keep in the forefront of her mind for the next few weeks. Stirring up an argument with either one of her parents would only cause Helen anxiety, and she had absolutely no wish to embarrass her sister in front of the Cavendish family.

Chapter Five

THE GUESTS BEGAN TO ARRIVE the next day. The house came alive with trills of female voices, and the jangle of harnesses was almost constant. Cleo had marveled at the size of the castle when they arrived, but after a while she began to wonder where all these guests would stay. Surely even Kingstag Castle couldn’t hold them all.

Helen, of course, had to greet everyone, welcoming them at the duchess’s side. Cleo joined her, losing herself in the excitement of meeting new people, none of whom seemed to recoil at the sight of her, common merchant though she was. Perhaps that was because she said nothing at all about herself, speaking only of her sister and the wedding and how lovely the castle was.

“I’m starting to sound like Mama,” she whispered to her sister after a while. “All I can speak of is Kingstag!”

Helen sighed. “There is a great deal to say about it.”

“Well, it truly is magnificent.” Cleo craned her neck to admire the vaulted ceiling of the hall, which put her in mind of a cathedral. The house was full of modern improvements—there was indeed piping for water inside the house—but it retained much of its ancient air as well. “To think, you’ll be mistress of this in a few days! Do you remember when we used to dream of living in a castle?”

Her sister smiled. “Yes. But even then I never dreamt of one this enormous.”

“All the more to explore!” Cleo grinned, but finally realized how pale her sister had become. “Helen, are you well?” she asked in concern. “You should sit down.”

There was a distant rattle of wheels on gravel. Helen turned toward the open door. “I can’t. Someone else is arriving.”

“Let Her Grace greet them. Come,” she urged. “I’m sure the duke wouldn’t want his guests to first see you passed out on the floor.”

“No, indeed,” said a male voice behind them.

Cleo jerked around. The Duke of Wessex stood there, watching in his intent way. His wasn’t a merry, fond countenance, but she had the feeling that he paid closer attention than most people. Even in this trifling circumstance, she felt the force of his regard in every fiber of her being. No wonder he was such a powerful man. She could barely drag her eyes away from his.

“Your Grace.” Helen dipped a graceful curtsey. “We did not expect you.”

“I had some pressing business to attend to this morning; my apologies.” He barely glanced at her. “What makes you think your sister is about to faint, Mrs. Barrows?”

Cleo wet her lips and darted a wary glance at her sister. Helen might have been a statue, from all the emotion or energy she conveyed. “She looks pale to me, Your Grace, but perhaps I’m imagining things.”

“I would never discount the keen eye of a loving sister.” He turned the blast of his regard upon Helen, who seemed to waver on her feet under it. “I agree with Mrs. Barrows, my dear. You must sit down.”

“As you wish, Your Grace.”

Cleo rolled her eyes. Now that the mighty Wessex had given his approval, Helen would sit. Still, she wasn’t one to cast aside help, so she merely took her sister’s arm and helped her into the nearby morning parlor, where a pair of elegant settees stood in front of the windows. Helen sank onto one, and Cleo perched on the edge of the facing settee. In the bright sunlight, her sister’s face looked drawn and lined, as if she had aged since they arrived. It was distinctly odd, and Cleo frowned in worry. Her sister should be glowing with happiness, or at least contentment. Instead she looked like she had come down with some wasting disease.

Wessex followed. He rang the servants’ bell, then closed the door. He came and seated himself next to Cleo, opposite his bride. “Why are you unwell, my dear?”

“I’m only a little tired, Your Grace,” said Helen. “A few moments’ rest, and I shall return to greeting guests with Her Grace, your mother.”

“Nonsense,” said Cleo. “You need to eat something; you hardly ate a bite of breakfast. There is no color in your cheeks at all.”

Wessex glanced at her. “Is this true, Miss Grey? Was breakfast not to your liking?”

Helen’s eyes widened in alarm. “Oh, it was delicious, Your Grace—I simply couldn’t choose….”

“Perhaps a tot of brandy will restore you,” he suggested.

Without thinking, Cleo snorted. “Don’t be ridiculous! She’s hardly eaten. Brandy will make her faint dead away.”

Slowly he turned to her. “What?”

“Tea would be better. Tea and some muffins. Ladies don’t normally drink brandy, sir.”

“I see,” he murmured, still watching her. “A pity, that.”

Yes, it was a pity, in Cleo’s opinion. She liked a little nip of brandy now and then—never enough to make her head spin, just a small amount after dinner in the winter or perhaps a drop in her tea on especially trying days. Still, her mother would have an apoplexy if she admitted that to the duke, so she merely smiled. “I think the muffins are particularly important. There were some delicious ones at breakfast this morning. May I send for some for my sister?”

“Of course.” As if on cue, a servant slipped into the room. Wessex arched one brow at Cleo. “What shall we send for?”

“Tea, please, with milk and muffins. And if there is any of that superb gooseberry jam, that would be lovely.” Cleo smiled at the servant, who bowed and hurried off. “Are the guests to arrive all day, Your Grace?”

“I’ve no idea,” he said without a trace of concern. “My mother will know, but she’s also quite capable of greeting them herself. I believe the first arrivals were to be family, in any event.”

She had to purse her lips to keep from grinning. “And you’ve no desire to see your family?”

“They will be here for a fortnight at the least.” He sounded resigned. “I will see them quite enough.”

“Perhaps some of the other guests will prove more diverting.” She couldn’t resist a naughty smile at his measuring look. “What are guests for, if not to provide entertainment?”

For the first time, his mouth curved. With his head tipped thoughtfully to one side, and that slow, slight grin, he looked sly and devastatingly attractive. “I devoutly hope you are correct.”

“I have great expectations,” she told him. “Your cousin in particular has promise.”

“Ah—you must mean Jack.” The duke’s grin grew wider. “I believe he inspired a formulation of smelling salts. I would suggest that you tease him about it, but he cannot be teased; on the contrary, he is quite proud of it.”

“Yes, very promising,” repeated Cleo with enthusiasm. “Dare I ask what he did to inspire smelling salts?”

“I don’t recall all the details.” The duke made a bored grimace even though his eyes shone with amusement. “It began with a wager, naturally, and took place during one of the most elegant balls of the season, but I never knew why there was a bow and arrow involved. And as for the monkey … well, the less said about the monkey, the better.”

“A real monkey?” she asked, trying not to laugh.

“Pungently real,” he confirmed. “Lady Hartington swore it took a month to get the smell out of her house.”

Cleo laughed. She had a strong feeling Wessex almost envied his cousin. Goodness, he was far from the stuffy duke she had thought him yesterday. He had a dry wit that charmed her, and he was devilishly appealing when he grinned. “No wonder he’s famous!”

“Infamous,” said the duke, though that slight grin still curved his mouth. “But even Lady Hartington forgave him. Apparently he has this way of smiling at ladies that makes them forgive and forget, even when he looses a monkey in their homes. It prompted some wit to declare that there ought to be a smelling salt to combat the effects of that smile, and thus a legend was born.”

Opposite her, Helen sighed, and she abruptly remembered herself. “Not that I think Lord Willoughby will upset the wedding! Indeed, he had better not, or I shall take measures—and I will neither forgive nor forget,” she added with a quick laugh. “Never fear, Helen, nothing shall mar your wedding day.”

Her sister smiled wanly, glancing at the duke. “I never thought it would.”

“Jack is a bit of a rogue, but he’s to stand up with me,” Wessex assured them. “I would never have asked him if I couldn’t rely on him.”

“I would never question your judgment, Your Grace,” Helen murmured. “See, Cleo, there is nothing to fear.”

The duke’s grin faded. “No. Nothing at all.”

An awkward silence fell over the room. Cleo looked down at her hands, shaken to realize she really liked Wessex’s smile. Not merely in the manner of a woman gratified to see some warmth and humor in her sister’s future husband. No, her thoughts had not touched on Helen at all. For a moment, she had quite forgotten why they were there, and her appreciation had been purely female. Which was wrong in so many ways.

It was a relief when the servant returned with a tray. Cleo busied herself with fixing a cup for Helen, keeping her attention firmly on the tea and her sister. Wessex said nothing, but she could feel him watching her. She steadfastly resisted the urge to watch him back. She had a terrible feeling it would be hard to look away again. After a few moments, the duke wished Helen well again and excused himself. When the door clicked closed behind him, she almost wilted.

“Thank you, Cleo,” said Helen before she could speak. “I don’t know what I would do without you here.”

She smiled uneasily. “Live in less anxiety that I’ll offend the duke?”

“He didn’t appear offended by anything you said.” Helen sipped the tea. Some color was already coming back into her cheeks. “He didn’t appear bored, either, as he always does when I speak to him.”

“Nonsense!”

“If not bored, then he looks as though his mind is elsewhere.”

“You mustn’t let him do that….”

“How can I stop him?” Helen sighed. “He finds me dull.”

Cleo sat in tense silence for a moment. She had a terrible feeling it was the truth. Wessex had barely looked at Helen while he sat with them; he had looked at her, and she had liked it. That must be corrected at once. “He had better begin to pay you more attention. Then he’ll see how sweet and charming and lovely you are.”

“Oh, Cleo.” Her sister smiled wistfully. “Not everyone sees me as you do. I’m not vivacious and capable of speaking to anyone, as you are.”

“Which makes you a far better companion, since you never say anything hurtful or rash, as I do.”

Helen stared into her tea. “I am sure, after a few years, the duke and I will have learnt how to get on with each other. I will learn what pleases him, and he has already been so solicitous of me. We will learn.”

“Er … yes.” She worked to keep the frown from her face. Every time she talked with her sister, it became less and less clear why Helen had accepted his proposal. Did her sister merely want to be a duchess? Was he simply too eligible, too handsome, too wealthy to refuse? Had Papa forced her to accept? Cleo wasn’t sure she even wanted to know if the last was true. Her father would never forgive her if she stirred up trouble, and yet…. “Are—are you pleased with this marriage, Helen?” Her sister looked up warily. Cleo wet her lips. “I presumed you were, when you accepted His Grace’s proposal, but…. I cannot help but notice how listless you are. It’s as if something you dread is approaching, rather than something joyful.”

For a long moment Helen said nothing. “My marriage won’t be like yours,” she finally whispered. “His Grace doesn’t love me as Matthew loved you. I don’t expect him to—I daresay most men of his rank don’t love their wives—and I knew that when I accepted his proposal. I suppose it’s just becoming real to me now, that he and I will be married in a few days.”

“You don’t have to marry him.” It popped out of her mouth before Cleo could stop it.

Helen’s dark eyes widened in alarm. “Don’t say such a thing! Of course I do. The guests are arriving! I couldn’t possibly jilt His Grace.”

You could if you really didn’t want to marry him, thought Cleo. She bit her lip, hard, to keep the thought unspoken.

“It’s just nerves,” went on Helen, a bit more firmly. She took a sip of tea. “Becoming mistress of this house, part of this family, a duchess…. It’s very overwhelming, but I shall do my best. Please don’t tell Papa anything.”

“No,” Cleo said after a pause. “I wouldn’t.” She hardly wanted to speak to her father at all, especially with this new suspicion in her mind that he had browbeaten Helen into accepting Wessex. She took a deep breath and shook off her worries. Perhaps it was just bridal nerves. Helen was reserved, but she was no shrinking violet. She would find her way; the Cavendish family was warm and welcoming, and he wasn’t unkind or cold at all. Cleo thought it would be very easy to fall in love with the duke. And surely once Wessex spent more time with Helen, he would see what a lovely person she was and fall deeply in love with her. It was impossible not to love Helen, once one knew her.

And if an opportunity presented itself to nudge His Grace a little closer to that happy state, Cleo would be prepared to take it.

GARETH LEFT THE HOUSE, avoiding the front of the castle where yet another carriage was arriving. His mother had planned the wedding and guest list, and as far as he was concerned, she could welcome every distant cousin and acquaintance who came. Normally he would be busy as usual, off in his study or out riding the estate. If he had any discipline, he’d return to his study now. Or more accurately, if he had any discipline, he never would have left it and gone down to the hall where he knew his bride and her sister were greeting guests. He knew because Blair had mentioned it as they sat down to work. And if his cousin had deliberately set out to destroy Gareth’s peace of mind, he couldn’t have done a better job. Within an hour Gareth had admitted defeat and gone to see for himself.

He didn’t want to think about why.

The contrast between the two sisters couldn’t have been sharper. Helen, his future wife, held herself with perfect poise, her hands clasped in front of her. Her smile was polite, her manner reserved. She was lovely, from the top of her glossy dark curls to the tips of her pink slippers peeking out from beneath her snow-white skirts. She was every inch the perfect duchess.

Mrs. Barrows, on the other hand, was like a bolt of light in the dark expanse of the hall. Her dress was blue, with bold embroidery on the skirt and—God help him for noticing—all over the bodice. Her smile was wide and warm. She greeted the arriving guests as though she were truly delighted to meet them, her hands as animated as her face. He lurked at the back of the hall and watched her laugh with his cousin Jack Willoughby, and a tendril of something like jealousy circled his gut.

Speaking to her, though, hadn’t helped at all. He’d been spurred forward by an apparent argument between the sisters, and he’d told himself he was being a solicitous fiancé, urging his bride to sit down and rest, as she did look rather pale. But then her sister spoke to him, and he’d almost forgotten his future wife was in the room.

Cleopatra. She was well named. Gareth could easily see men being willing to fight and die for her. How could two sisters be so unlike? And why, by all that was sane and reasonable, was he so mesmerized by the wrong one?

He had to stop this. He must think of Miss Grey—Helen. Perhaps if he called her by name, he would feel closer to her. Helen, Helen, Helen.

He walked down the gravel path that led to the stables. One of the ancient oaks that grew along the path had been felled, split right to the roots by lightning in the recent storm. It had fallen away from the carriage lane, but it would take weeks to clear the debris. There would be firewood for a year from that tree. Several men were working on it and doffed their caps as he walked by. Gareth nodded at them and walked on.

The Kingstag stables were spacious, laid out with a small courtyard in the center. The stalls could house almost eighty horses at a time, although in recent years they had rarely done so. Since Gareth’s father’s death, his mother had chosen to remain quietly in the country while raising her young daughters. Now he supposed there would be more entertaining at Kingstag; not only would he have a wife but his sisters would be making their debuts soon, which would necessitate balls and parties and all manner of visitors. He suspected his mother was looking forward to it, given her enthusiasm for the wedding plans. He remembered how much she had loved hosting parties and soirees when he was young. It was the only reason he had agreed to a large wedding celebration. Left to his own devices, he would have been happy to wed in the bishop’s private quarters.

He wondered what Helen wanted. He hoped his mother had consulted her.

A shiny black phaeton with startling yellow wheels currently stood in the stable courtyard. Grooms were unhitching a pair of large black stallions, although their actions were slowed by the awestruck glances they kept bestowing on the carriage. It must be Jack’s. If it wasn’t, Gareth would wager half his estate it would be Jack’s by the end of the week. His cousin was drawn to beauty like a bee to a flower, and this phaeton cast all others into the shade.

“Did you win it, steal it, or borrow it?” he asked loudly.

Jack Willoughby stepped out from behind his carriage. “I’m wounded. Naturally I bought her. Had to borrow a bit, but she’s mine.”

“She?”

“Hippolyta.” Jack whispered the name with the reverence of a lover. He reached out and rubbed a spot of dirt from the gleaming wheels. “Hippolyta, my beauty.”

“You named your phaeton.” Gareth shook his head. “Of course you did.”

“Just look at her, Wessex! Such curves, such elegance! Have you ever seen a female finer than this?”

Cleo Barrows’s laughing face flashed into his mind. Gareth exhaled. “As a matter of fact, yes.”

His cousin grimaced. “You always did do things the right way. Besotted with your bride already!”

He closed his eyes. God, he needed a drink—and it wasn’t even noon. “You brought the ring?”

“Of course.” Jack had gone back to gazing lovingly at Hippolyta. “Got it from the jeweler yesterday.”

For a moment there, he’d been almost hopeful Jack would have forgotten it. Lost it. Wagered it away in a card game. The ring was a family heirloom, sent off to a London jeweler to be sized and cleaned. If Jack had forgotten it…. But the ring was here, so the wedding wouldn’t be delayed by the need to procure another one.

“Excellent,” Gareth murmured. “Are you headed up to the house?”

“Not yet.” Jack took out his handkerchief and reached up to polish another spot on the carriage. “Too many girls in white dresses, giggling like mad. I may spend the next week here in your stables.”

“I’ll send Withers out with some port and a blanket.”

Jack grinned. “Very sporting of you, Wessex.”

Gareth nodded and left. He turned away from the house; if Jack wasn’t going back, neither was he. There was nothing at the house but trial and temptation right now, as long as Helen and Cleo would be standing in the hall, the contrast between them sharpened by their proximity. He had to cure himself of this unwanted fascination. He was the Duke of Wessex. He’d had his pick of women in England and he’d chosen Helen. He wished he could return to that certainty that she was the one. He wished he could feel any sort of contentment about his rapidly approaching marriage to her. He would even be glad just to be less attracted to Cleo; then he would be able to persuade himself that all would work out right in the end, that he would come to care for Helen, that they would all be happy eventually.

Instead … all he felt was dread, growing stronger by the hour.

Chapter Six

WHEN THEY HAD BEEN AT KINGSTAG SEVERAL DAYS, Cleo decided to catch up on her correspondence. She’d been away from her shop for several days now, and although she’d left Mr. Mabry, her most trusted clerk, in charge, there were decisions only she could make. A packet of reports and letters had arrived from Mabry the previous day, and she needed to read them.

Reading them would also, she hoped, restore her sense. A week at Kingstag had been both wonderful and a trial. Wonderful, because it truly was the loveliest estate she’d ever seen, from the sprawling splendor of the house to the grounds that seemed to encompass every beauty to be found in England. The food was superb, the servants were well trained, and even the guests were interesting and pleasant for the most part.

And yet it was a trial, because everywhere she saw the duke. Just a glimpse of him across the dining room was enough to make her heart skip a beat. She told herself it was just the awe of meeting a duke; she’d once been presented to a viscount, but nobility had been rare in her corner of the world before this week.

The correspondence, on the other hand, was her life—bills from the silk warehouses, requests from customers, and overdue accounts. A fortnight at Kingstag was an interlude, not a permanent change. She was very much out of place here and always would be.

She gathered her writing case and letters and set out in search of a quiet spot. It was too beautiful a day to remain indoors, bright and extremely warm. Thinking the lake might offer a secluded spot as well as some breeze, she headed down the shaded path along the side of the back lawn, pausing to marvel at the remains of the giant oak that lay beside the path. The trunk was charred black in places and looked as though it had been ripped from the ground. One of the men working to cut it up told her it had been hit by lightning a few days before. That must be the tree the duke had mentioned going to see when she met him in the garden. She was still shaking her head over it as she passed the path to the stables, when the one man she hoped to avoid stepped out in front of her.

“Good morning, Mrs. Barrows.”

Just the sound of his voice made her heart jump. “Good morning,” she replied. “I was setting out to explore your magnificent estate a little, if I may.”

“You must treat it as your own home.” His eye dropped to the writing case she carried. “May I carry that for you?”

Oh dear. Cleo tried to smother the little frisson of anticipation that shot through her veins. He had clearly just come back from riding and was even more appealingly masculine in riding clothes than in his evening wear. “You must have a dozen things to do….”

He glanced over his shoulder down the path to the stables, where male voices could dimly be heard shouting “Huzzah!” “On the contrary. I would like nothing better than a bit of a walk. Unless, of course, you preferred to walk alone.”

He was her host. It was only polite to accept, which must explain why she accepted at once. “Not at all! I would be honored.” She surrendered the writing case with a smile.

“How have you found Kingstag?” he asked as they strolled along the lane.

“It’s magnificent,” she said. “My mother hasn’t exaggerated in the slightest.”

“I’m not certain angels dwell in the attics,” he said dryly, “but I’m delighted you’ve found it comfortable and welcoming.”

“Did she really say angels in the attics?” Cleo tried and failed to bite back a laugh. “Well, she’s very pleased by it, and the excitement might have gone to her head a little.”

“I could seat her next to Sophronia, who would point out every draught and inconvenience of the house.”

Cleo shook her head. “It would make no difference. My mother is determined to see no fault, even if the ceiling should collapse before her eyes. She would only exclaim over how rustic it looked to have a pile of rubble in the dining room.”

He laughed. “That would be too rustic for me. I prefer solid walls and ceilings.”

“As do I. The grounds may actually be perfect, though,” she went on, shading her eyes with one hand to survey the lake, sparkling in the distance. Willow fronds waved above their heads, dappling the path with sunlight, and the scent of honeysuckle sweetened the air. “I don’t know how anyone even notices the house in these surroundings.”

“My mother deserves much of the credit. She created the landscape as much as the gardens.” He glanced at her, and Cleo felt her face warm. Not just a garden of love, but a whole landscape. “In fact, I seem to recall a nuncheon for the ladies in the garden today.”

She smiled uneasily at the veiled question. Nuncheon in the garden would include her mother. For the first few days, it had been enough for Millicent to bask in her role as mother of the bride, which was trying but not unexpected. Lately, though, Millicent had become almost unbearable in her delight, and when she wasn’t praising Kingstag in some way, she was fretting at Cleo about being proper and respectable. In the decade since she’d left home Cleo had got used to her freedom, and her patience for her mother’s anxious, inane chatter was wearing thin. And if her mother knew that the Duke of Wessex was carrying the drapery shop correspondence from Mr. Mabry at this moment, she’d probably faint dead away. “I have some letters to write and thought I might get a bit of exercise as well. I miss the outdoors.”

The duke nodded. “Your shop, I suppose, keeps you indoors a great deal.”

Cleo jerked, glancing at him in alarm. She wasn’t to talk about her shop at all, not to anyone, but especially not to him. But he was watching her with those dark, dark eyes, and she felt compelled to answer.

“Yes,” she murmured. “It does.”

“Mr. Blair tells me it’s quite a prosperous business,” he went on. Cleo couldn’t resist a quick glance over her shoulder, half expecting her mother to be lurking nearby, but they were quite alone. “Quite an achievement.”

“Yes, for a woman,” she said, too late hearing the edge in her voice. She forced a smile as he looked at her, his eyebrows raised. “My apologies,” she said hastily. “I shouldn’t have spoken so.”

“No,” he corrected her. “You should speak as you feel.”

Cleo fastened her eyes on the path in front of them and they walked in silence for a few minutes. “I was wrong,” she said when her voice was even and calm again. “I shouldn’t have spoiled our walk.”

“I don’t think it’s been spoiled at all.” He was remarkably unruffled. “It’s a draper’s shop, I believe?”

“Yes,” she said politely. There seemed no reason to lie about it.

“Is it a large one? I have little experience of draper’s shops.”

Cleo was torn. On one hand, he sounded genuinely interested, and she was proud enough of her business to want to talk about it. On the other hand, her parents would have an apoplexy if they discovered it. “Moderately,” she said, erring on the side of modesty.

“And yet you manage it on your own?”

“Does that surprise you?”

He tipped his head in contemplation. “I confess I have no idea what’s required to run a draper’s shop. I imagine it’s a great deal of effort, though. When my sisters descend upon the shop in Dorchester they are gone for hours, and one can only pity the poor proprietor, worn out from being sent back and forth for ribbons and lace and bolts of every sort of fabric sold in England.” He grimaced as Cleo almost choked on her laughter.

“It’s never that dreadful,” she protested. “Many aspects are quite enjoyable. Every year I travel to London to visit the warehouses and order the latest fabrics before anyone else has seen them. Nothing is more satisfying than spotting a beautiful piece of silk and knowing exactly which customer it will suit. My clerks do most of the fetching in the shop, but I quite like helping ladies choose the right colors and trimmings. A fine gown is a significant expense and ought to please the wearer for years to come. Most ladies are very grateful to have another woman’s approval before making the purchase. Men should understand; I know perfectly well most of the gentlemen here have spent a great deal of time in the stables admiring a carriage.” He gave her a sideways glance, and she grinned. “That, and drinking the many bottles of port I saw a footman carrying to the stables.”

Wessex coughed. “And a new gown is like a carriage?”

“To most ladies, a new gown is far, far more important than any carriage,” she confirmed.

The duke chuckled. “You have illuminated one of the great mysteries of life. I begin to see why Alexandra was reduced to tears when Bridget mocked her bonnet.”

“Well, mocking is never kind. She might have suggested a different ribbon, or less trimming.”

“Bridget’s way is rarely diplomatic,” he said in resignation.

Cleo, who rather liked the impetuous girl, waved one hand. “She has time to learn. I was very like her when I was younger, and we all endure difficult ages only to come out the better for them.”

“That is very encouraging,” he said. “Bridget is … a challenge.”

“Lady Alexandra and Lady Serena are very poised young ladies. I’m sure Lady Bridget will grow into it.” She paused, remembering the disputes and heartfelt conversations with her own sister when they were girls. Without Helen, she didn’t know what she would have done. “They are fortunate to have each other. They seem quite close, your sisters.”

“Devilishly.” He stopped and turned. “In fact … Serena?” he called.

First one girl, then another, and so on until no fewer than five young ladies emerged from behind a nearby hedge, looking guilty. “Yes, Wessex?” asked the eldest, a girl with auburn hair and the same intense dark eyes as the duke.

“You’re far from the house,” he remarked.

“We’re not doing anything wrong,” blurted out Bridget Cavendish. “It’s that horrid pest Henry—”

“Shh!” hissed Charlotte Ascot—sister to the horrid pest, if Cleo remembered correctly. “I swear he can hear his name from a mile away.”

“We’re just out for a walk,” said Serena with a bright smile. “As are you, I see.” She curtseyed to Cleo. “I hope you are enjoying your visit to Kingstag, Mrs. Barrows.”

“Very much so,” she replied warmly. “I simply had to see more of it and walked out in search of adventure.”

“Capital!” declared Bridget with a beaming smile. “Would you like to see the grotto? James was supposed to drive us on a tour but he’s disappeared.”

“All the gentlemen have disappeared,” muttered Kate Lacy with a very fetching pout. “They only turn up when there’s a cricket match.”

“Or a game of battledore,” put in Charlotte. “Which is even less entertaining to watch, even if that handsome Mr. Newnham is playing.”

“No, I much prefer to watch Lord Everett play cricket,” said Miss Lacy with a dreamy look on her face.

“They can’t have all disappeared into thin air!” burst out Bridget. “We just have to keep looking—” She froze, looking at her brother in alarm.

Wessex, though, merely grinned. “I can hardly turn traitor on my fellow man, can I?”

“And will you tell Mama?” asked Alexandra cautiously.

“We aren’t doing anything wrong!” cried Bridget again. “We’re just … just—” She glanced at her companions. “—just trying to be good hostesses. What if the gentlemen have disappeared because they’re bored to death of Kingstag and need reviving from their stupors?”

The duke glanced at Cleo, mirth glinting in his gaze. “No one accused you of doing wrong. But I doubt you’ll need to revive anyone from a stupor—not until the ball, that is.”

A chorus of protests went up. “No! The ball is the only worthy event!” “Who could fall into a stupor at a ball?” “The gentlemen wouldn’t dare try to miss the ball, would they, Wessex? Mama would be furious!”

The duke held up his hands. “I’m sure they’ll all be at the ball. Just as I’m sure you ought not to wander too far away. If Mama misses you, nothing I say will save you. It would be a terrible shame to miss the ball as punishment….”

He let his suggestion trail off as the girls stared at him in shocked horror. Without a word they turned toward the house, although as she passed Cleo, Bridget did whisper once more, “You really ought to see the grotto!”

Cleo laughed and waved farewell. For a moment she and the duke stood and watched them go, some with steps dragging and some putting their heads together to whisper.

“So that’s why the men have congregated in the stables,” she remarked. “Not merely the lure of a top-notch phaeton.”

He cleared his throat. “I don’t know anything about that.”

Cleo laughed again.

“Although—” Wessex glanced at his sisters’ retreating figures. “—one does sympathize.”

“Frightened by a group of girls?” she asked mischievously.

A faint smile crossed his face. “When Bridget is one of their number? Yes.”

On impulse, she added, “Where is the grotto?”

The duke looked at her, his eyebrows slightly raised. For a moment everything seemed to fade away but the two of them. Cleo felt again the mixture of attraction and alarm that had tugged at her in the parlor the other day. She wet her lips. “That’s twice now that Lady Bridget has mentioned it. I’ve never seen a grotto. Is it very dark and mysterious?”

His gaze dropped to her mouth. “Yes.”

Oh no. No, no, no. She held out her hand and forced a shaky smile to her lips. “Excellent! Perhaps I shall visit it some other day, after I’ve written my letters.”

He hesitated, then handed her the writing case. The weight of it seemed to help hold her feet to the ground; she was a lowly merchant, not someone a duke would find fascinating. She would take her bills and inventory reports, and he would go back to his castle. “You might find a quiet spot by the lake. There are blankets in the boathouse.”

She nodded. “Thank you.”

He looked as though he might say something else, but after a moment he merely bowed. “Good day, Mrs. Barrows.” He turned and walked back the way they had come, without looking back.

Cleo knew, because she watched him until he disappeared from sight.

Chapter Seven

GARETH JOINED BLAIR on the way to the bowling green a couple of days later. He hadn’t planned to go when his mother told him she had planned a day of bowls, but by now he conceded that he was unable to concentrate as usual. Besides, it is the proper thing for a host to join his guests, he told himself as he caught sight of the green, some distance from the house. The ladies reposed under the awnings, enjoying refreshments. A pair of young boys were on the green, arguing over something with fingers pointed and an occasional stamp of a foot. But otherwise there was something decidedly off about the scene.

“Where are the gentlemen?” he asked.

“In the stables.”

“All of them?” exclaimed Gareth.

Blair grinned. “Willoughby’s refuge has proven enormously popular.”

“That damned phaeton.” Gareth shook his head. He knew several men had joined Jack in the stables, but they had still come to his mother’s planned entertainments—until now.

“It really is the finest thing on four wheels I’ve ever seen,” agreed Blair warmly. “And as fast as the wind, he assured us all.”

He glanced sideways at his cousin. “So you’re a member of his band of refugees?”

“I was merely investigating where all the port seemed to have disappeared to,” replied Blair with a perfectly straight face.

“He took the best spirits, didn’t he?” That explained things a bit more.

Blair just grinned again.

Gareth shook his head. “God help the woman Jack marries. She had better be made of stern stuff.”

His cousin coughed. “We cannot all be as fortunate as you, Wessex, to marry a lady as agreeable as Miss Grey.”

Gareth had nothing to say to that. Helen Grey was agreeable—perfectly, completely, alarmingly agreeable. Whatever he said to her, she agreed with. Whatever he suggested, she did. He was developing the oddest feeling that she was afraid of him. Even Withers opposed him from time to time, and Withers was his employee. He reminded himself to pay attention to her today—and then felt guilty that he was in any danger of overlooking her.

Perhaps if he had no interest in any of the women, he wouldn’t feel that way. Unfortunately, Cleo Barrows had come to the wedding, and he was not only uninterested in his actual bride, he was fascinated by her sister. It was wrong. It was almost immoral. He wanted it to stop and yet felt helpless to do so when his eyes seemed to follow her of their own volition and his ears seemed more attuned to the sound of her voice than to any other’s.

They reached the largest of the awnings, set on a gentle rise overlooking the bowling green. His mother came to meet them. “What a lovely surprise!”

“Isn’t it my duty as a host?” Gareth kissed her cheek even as he covertly scanned the tent. He saw Cleo Barrows first, sending his heart leaping. She was speaking to another lady … whom he recognized a moment later as his betrothed bride. Not a promising beginning.

“I merely remembered that you told me you would be busy until the ball,” his mother murmured, linking her arm through his. “I’m very pleased to see you were drawn out earlier.” They strolled among the guests, pausing now and then to speak to someone. If Jack had assembled a gentlemen’s retreat in the stables, it seemed his mother had created one under the awnings for the ladies. Round tables held pitchers of lemonade, plates of cakes and biscuits, and pots of tea, constantly refreshed by servants. The seating included small settees and benches, although Sophronia was sitting in a large upholstered chair, like a monarch on a throne, slicing a cheese with her sharp little knife.

“Finally come to see the girl, Wessex?” The old lady fixed her gleaming gaze upon him. “You’ve hardly spoken to your bride.”

“Sophronia,” said the duchess. “Really!”

“I came to see you,” Gareth said before his mother could go on. He leaned down to kiss her cheek, which she presented with the regal detachment of a queen. “How are you, old dear?”

“Bored,” Sophronia replied. “Everyone here is too polite. There’s no trouble. No scandal.”

“Do we really want that?” he asked mildly. It only encouraged Sophronia when people gasped and swooned at her outbursts.

“It’s dull,” announced the old lady, pointing her dirk at him. “What good is a house party if everyone’s going to behave? I got my hopes raised when you invited that scamp, Jack Willoughby, but he’s barely shown his face around here! And even worse, he’s been a horrible distraction to Henrietta, and I have to let some parlor maid help me. I’m astonished to see her here today.” She glanced over at Henrietta, who was holding a plate of cakes and listening with obviously strained patience to a very earnest-looking young woman. “She still hasn’t brought my cake, though. I wager she’d bring it quickly enough if Willoughby wandered in.”

“I will speak to Henrietta,” began the duchess quickly, but Sophronia waved her off.

“Oh, let her have some fun. I’m sure they’re up to something scandalous. I’d pay a shilling to watch them torment each other, but they keep disappearing and Henrietta refuses to tell me what they get up to, the vexing creature,” she finished sourly, as if Jack and Henrietta had purposely schemed to deprive her of entertainment. “If she’s going to desert me, she might as well tell me how naughty he can be.”

“I’m not certain I can help,” Gareth said. He doubted Jack would be flushed out of the stables by anything less than a duel.

“I daresay you can’t,” she grumbled. “Too upstanding by half. And your bride—Miss Grey! I never met such a polite, proper girl in my life. At least the party includes a few interesting people. Have you met Angela?”

Gareth glanced at his mother, who looked nonplussed. “I don’t recall anyone by that name,” she murmured.

“Oh! I invited her. The daughter of a very distant relation—not your side of the family, Alice. Very intriguing girl. She must have slipped off somewhere, but you’ll meet her eventually.” There was a hint of relish in the old lady’s voice that made Gareth wonder what trouble this distant relation Angela might unleash.

“But Sophronia,” said the duchess delicately. “The house is very full. I’m afraid we haven’t any rooms to spare. If you had informed me earlier you wished to invite someone—”

“Don’t worry about that,” interrupted Sophronia. “Angela is staying with me. I need someone to talk to, now that Henrietta’s set her cap for Willoughby.” She scowled. “And if he doesn’t recognize her for the prize she is, I shall take my dirk to him. He won’t make a fool of my companion, no matter how charming his smile!” She stabbed her knife into the cheese for emphasis.

Gareth bit his cheek to keep from roaring with laughter at the image of Sophronia pursuing Jack with her dagger drawn. It was almost as entertaining as the thought of Jack falling for Henrietta, who was everything Jack was not: organized, responsible, and punctual.

He excused himself and made his way toward Helen, determinedly keeping his gaze fixed on her. She looked far livelier today, laughing and talking with obvious pleasure. She was truly lovely; her eyes glowed and there was a very handsome blush on her cheeks. She fluttered her hands about, as though portraying birds, and Gareth made the mistake of letting his eyes follow one graceful hand as she fluttered it over to rest on her sister’s arm. Her sister, sitting very close to James Blair on the bench.

He almost missed his footing at the expression on Cleo Barrows’s face. Her face was scrunched up with laughter—she had even wrinkled her nose—as she shook her head at whatever her sister said. Her curls bounced and threatened to topple down her back; one had already come loose and brushed the nape of her neck. Her sister was beautiful, but Cleo … she was captivating.

He had the growing feeling that he was doomed. The harder he tried to find a reason why she was undesirable in any way, the less success he had. He wanted to wind that loose curl around his fingers. He wanted to press his lips to the back of her neck, and the base of her throat. He wanted to talk to her, to have those sparkling brown eyes fixed on him, to see that impish grin directed his way. Instead he watched Blair receive all that and more when she turned to his cousin, put her hand on his arm, and leaned close to whisper something that made Blair throw back his head and shout with laughter.

“I’m delighted to see Miss Grey looking well again,” said his mother. “I do believe Mrs. Barrows could make anyone smile, though.”

He watched the way she tipped her head to one side, and for a single heartbeat their gazes met. “Indeed.”

“James seems quite taken with her,” she went on. “I understand she’s a widow with a pretty income. He could certainly do worse, if he’s thinking of marrying.”

This time there was no mistaking the feeling oozing through his veins. It was jealousy, raw and bitter. It was utterly irrational and yet undeniable. He forced it down. “I suppose,” he replied, in what he hoped was an offhand voice. “Has he said anything to you about her?”

“Of course not. Do you think I should encourage him?”

He gritted his teeth. “I think he’s a grown man capable of deciding such a thing himself.” Without waiting for her reply, he went down to join the boys still arguing over bowls. The only other male about seemed to be Blair, and Gareth found he had no patience to watch his cousin flirt with Cleo.

And he didn’t swerve from his course when he saw the lady in question stroll down to the green ahead of him.

TO CLEO’S IMMENSE RELIEF, Helen seemed like herself again when they walked down to the awnings the morning of the bowling party. Anyone’s nerves would have been strained by their mother’s incessant chattering about how grand and elegant everything—and everyone—was at the party. Cleo had long since grown content with what she could afford, but Helen had never been allowed to do the same. Sir William refused to acknowledge his straitened circumstances, and Millicent was incapable of economy; they had relied on Helen making a marvelous marriage to restore their fortunes. Cleo was fairly certain that burden had put the faint lines around her sister’s mouth and brought a shadow to her eyes.

But the bowling party had revived her. Perhaps it was the weather, which had been nothing short of perfect. A group of young ladies, including the duke’s sisters, had amused them for some time before Lady Sophronia came to grace them with her presence. Helen obviously found the old lady somewhat intimidating, but Cleo thought she was splendid. Sophronia spoke her mind and did as she pleased. When she’d had enough conversation, she simply announced that she was leaving.

“I see a fine cheese over there and want to secure it before someone else makes off with it,” she confided. “The guests at these parties are like wolves, eating up every crumb in sight.”

“Oh! May I fetch it for you?” Cleo offered, privately entertained by the description of the aristocratic guests as hungry scavengers.

“No, no. I can take care of myself.” Lady Sophronia drew—of all things—a small pointed dagger from her pocket. “A memento of my third fiancé, Malcolm MacBride,” she said fondly, showing them the knife. “I was very sad when the consumption took him. Still, it’s a very useful dirk—that’s what the Scots call it. I recommend you get one. No one interferes with a lady who is armed.”

“No, I imagine not.” Cleo’s voice shook as the old lady nodded to them and hobbled after her cheese. She glanced at her sister and saw Helen’s eyes tearing up. “Shall I give you a knife as a wedding gift, Helen?” she asked mischievously. “I don’t want you to lose out on any fine cheese….”

Helen covered her face. “Oh, my,” she gasped, fighting back giggles. “I can only imagine what Mama would say!” They were still shaking with suppressed laughter when Mr. Blair joined them. He immediately inquired what had made them laugh so hard, and Helen told him with animation and spirit, laughing anew at Sophronia’s concern for her cheese. It made Cleo’s heart lift to see her sister happy again. The only thing that might have pleased her more was if Wessex himself had joined them. He had arrived at the party with Mr. Blair, but was intercepted by the duchess. Cleo kept stealing glances at him, willing him to come over to them. He was looking fondly at Sophronia, and it was hard not to notice how attractive it made him. She wondered if he knew about Sophronia’s dirk.

Then, by chance, their eyes met. It was just a passing glance, no more than a moment, but it sent a little shock through her. He was smiling, his dark eyes bright with mirth, and it transformed his face from handsome to mesmerizing. Cleo turned instantly back to Mr. Blair, but she could feel the duke’s gaze upon her. It made her heart beat a little faster even as it reminded her of her vow to be quiet and discreet around His Grace. Helen had been right about one thing the other day: Cleo was more ebullient than her sister. She tended to attract people’s attention. Therefore, she must absent herself when the duke and Helen met, so there could be nothing to distract Wessex from falling in love with Helen.

If it also kept Cleo from becoming more attracted to him, she would be immensely relieved.

When she caught the duke and his mother watching their little group, she murmured an excuse and slipped away. Mr. Blair was charming and had already brought a wide smile to Helen’s face with an amusing story about Lady Sophronia; apparently, the dirk was not her only memento of a former suitor. Cleo knew her sister looked her best today, and if she left, the duke would be able to sit next to Helen and notice how enchanting she was.

Cleo walked down the gentle slope toward the bowling green, where two boys had been arguing for some time. “It seems you’re in need of an umpire,” she said as she reached them. “May I serve?”

“He put his foot in front of my bowl,” said the younger boy at once. He was sturdy and blond, with the look of a boy who spent hours outdoors. “His bowl is dead and I ought to be allowed to replay mine.”

“I did not!” Henry Ascot’s eyes glittered with tears. “I never touched your bowl! It stopped on its own!”

“You did,” accused the other. “And now you’re trying to cheat!”

“I am not a cheat.” His voice quivered, and Cleo could see how desperately he was trying to contain himself.

“‘Cheat’ is a dangerous word,” she admonished them both. “One should never cast it about without proof. Do you have proof that he impeded your bowl? I presume you’ve measured every cast so far.”

The first boy clamped his mouth shut and dropped the bowl in his hand. “Beg pardon, ma’am. I guess we ought not to play anymore.” He ducked his head and walked away.

Cleo stooped to pick up the discarded bowl, giving Henry a moment to collect himself. He was tall and a bit gangly, with an uncompromisingly square brow and dark hair. Lady Bridget had called him a horrid pest, but he didn’t look very dreadful now. “I hope there wasn’t a wager riding on the match,” she said.

He sniffed. “No. Not one I could win, at any rate.” She glanced at him through her eyelashes. The poor boy looked thoroughly dejected. “I never win at bowls,” he added softly.

“There’s more to life than bowls.”

“I know. There’s boxing and racing and quoits and all manner of sport where I can be a disappointment to my father.”

Cleo bit her lip. She knew more than a little about that herself. Before she could reply, though, someone else did.

“Every man has his talents, Henry. I daresay yours will turn out to be of far greater import than bowls.”

Henry looked warily at the Duke of Wessex, who had walked up behind Cleo. “Do you really think so, sir?”

“I wouldn’t say so otherwise.”

“Of course not.” The boy blushed. He shifted his weight, then awkwardly offered Cleo the bowl in his hand. “Thank you, ma’am, for settling things. I think I’d rather take a walk. Do—do you happen to know where my sister Charlotte’s gone?”

“I’m sorry, no,” said Cleo. Charlotte had disappeared with the rest of the young ladies some time ago, very soon after Henry and the other boy had reached the green.

“Toward the lake,” said the duke. “I believe she was with my sisters.”

Henry’s dark eyes lit up, and Cleo got the idea he’d be quite a handsome fellow in a few years. “Thank you, sir!” He hurried off with a spring in his step.

“What a devoted brother, wanting to see his sister,” she said lightly.

“Perhaps,” replied the duke with a wry look. “I suspect it’s more of an urge to torment. After I sent them back to the house the other day, Bridget came to me to lodge an indignant complaint that he had thrown mud on them.”

“The things a man will do for love.” Cleo heaved a dramatic sigh. “I’ll wager a shilling he has a bad case of calf love for one of them.”

“It had better not be Bridget.” Wessex shuddered. “I had to order her not to put treacle in his bed. She didn’t take it well when he ruined her favorite dress.”

Cleo laughed. She started down the green to collect the abandoned bowls. “Have they really gone toward the lake?”

“I did see a group of young ladies in the general vicinity of the lake today,” he confirmed, walking beside her. “It might have been some time ago….” Cleo laughed again. “But a long walk will do him good. He ought to clear his mind before he finds them. I’ve rarely seen one girl this week without three or four others nearby; the poor lad will be severely outnumbered.”

“It builds character,” she said.

“He’ll need it if he fancies Bridget. I daresay she’ll make Sophronia look demure and quiet.”

“Yes. Lady Sophronia showed me her dirk.” Cleo grinned at the way he cast his eyes upward and sighed. “A rather unusual remembrance of an old love.”

“There are many unusual things about Sophronia.”

“She is your great-aunt, I understand?”

The duke paused. “Great-great-aunt. Perhaps. I’m not entirely certain. I think I inherited her along with the house.”

Cleo snorted with laughter, and this time he laughed, too. Something seemed to melt inside her at the sound. His laugh was a rough rumble, as if he didn’t use it often. She stooped to retrieve a pair of bowls, holding them to her chest. When she rose, Wessex was holding the jack. He gave it a little toss, catching it easily in one hand. “Would you fancy a match, Mrs. Barrows?”

Cleo watched his fingers curve around the bowl. Good heavens, he had fine hands. “I haven’t played bowls in a very long time.”

“Neither have I,” he said. “But it’s a fine day out, and the greens are marked.”

She glanced at the awning on the hill above as they walked to the head of the green. Helen was still in conversation with Mr. Blair, but she raised her hand and gave a cheery wave. Cleo was torn. It was a fine day, and she wouldn’t mind a lighthearted game in the sun. Since the duke had invited her, surely not even her father would find it objectionable. She could suggest inviting Helen and Mr. Blair to join them, except that she knew her sister hated bowls. And perhaps this was her chance to determine the duke’s feelings for Helen.

“Very well. But we must have stakes.” She grinned at his raised brow. “Not money! After each cast, the winner must share something of himself or herself. After all, we shall be family within the week, and we ought to become acquainted, don’t you think?”

He looked at her for a long moment. In the sunlight, his hair seemed to have a hint of auburn; the breeze had ruffled it until he looked quite tousled. And his eyes were so dark, unfathomably deep as he regarded her. Cleo heard the echo of her own words—we shall be family—and felt her heart sink a little. Oh, why had he followed her, thwarting her intent to avoid him? He ought to be sitting beside Helen right now, gazing at Helen, making Helen yearn to smooth his wild mane and imagine his large hands on her skin.

“Of course.” Wessex bowed his head. “Will you set the jack?”

Unnerved, she turned toward the green and pitched the jack. It didn’t roll far enough, and she clenched her hands as he strode out to get it. She had to wrench her gaze away as he bent over to pick it up; good heavens, he was a finely made man, from all angles. And he would be her brother. Sisters did not look on their brothers so admiringly.

The second time she managed to set the mark appropriately, and the duke stepped to the footer to cast his first bowl. “Were you a good bowls player, when you last played?”

Cleo laughed. “Oh, my. I certainly thought so, but I was a girl then.” She delivered her first bowl, pleased to see it roll to within a respectable distance of the jack. Nearer than his, in fact. “I suppose you’re far more accomplished, given that you have a bowling green within sight of your house.”

He made his next shot. “Merely having a green doesn’t make one skilled.” His bowl wobbled off the green into the ditch.

“It takes a while to learn the bias of the bowls,” she said diplomatically, hefting her own. It was smooth and dark, shaped more like a fat egg than a round ball. This time she misjudged, and the bowl came to rest at the edge of the green.

They played the rest of the end and then walked down together to score it. “One point to you,” said Wessex, collecting the bowls. “What secret do you want to tell me?”

“Se-Secret?” she stammered, laughing nervously. “Oh, no, I didn’t mean a secret—”

“But we’ve only just met,” he said, watching her in that too-intent way he had. “Everything about you is a mystery.”

“Helen and I had a game, as children,” she said after a moment. “We would choose a play—one of the great works of antiquity, most often—and act out every part. It nearly killed my father when we performed Lysistrata, even though Helen and I had very little idea what it was about.”

“How old were you?” he asked, looking a little incredulous.

“About twelve,” she said airily. “And Helen only eight.”

Wessex coughed, then he laughed. “I would pay a fortune to have seen your father’s face. He doesn’t seem the type to take it well.”

Her father didn’t take most things she did well. Cleo’s smile faded. “I was a bad influence even then,” she murmured before she could stop herself. The duke gave her a keen glance but said nothing.

They bowled another end, and this time Wessex won a point. Cleo shook her head as she retrieved two of her bowls from the ditch but was glad that it was his turn to reveal something. “I inherited my title when I was sixteen,” he said. “Barely older than young Henry.” Her eyes rounded in shock. “My sisters were infants, my mother was heartbroken, and I was responsible for everything.” He turned to face the house, squinting against the sun. “I was deathly afraid of letting my father down by making a hash of it.”

“I’m sure he would be very proud!” Impulsively she laid her hand on his arm. “Kingstag is beautifully maintained. Your sisters are lovely young ladies, and it’s clear to all that they adore you. No man can be a failure if his family loves him.”

His arm flexed under her fingers. “Thank you,” he said quietly. “My sisters’ happiness is very important to me.” He paused. “As is, I think, your sister’s to you.”

Cleo snatched her hand away. “Yes, very important.” She went back to the mat, trying to ignore the faint question in his voice at the end. Helen’s happiness was very important to her, and yet here she was, almost flirting with her sister’s fiancé. She turned toward the awning again, both relieved and disconcerted to see Helen still absorbed in conversation with Mr. Blair. It should be Wessex sitting there with his head next to Helen’s, bringing that glowing smile to her face. He should want to be there, instead of here in the sun with Cleo. But when the duke joined her, bowls in hand, she didn’t say anything. She put her foot on the mat and bowled.

Wessex won another point. They walked to retrieve the bowls and she was glad again she didn’t have to say anything. “What can I tell you?” he murmured, facing her thoughtfully. “Hmm.”

“Something from when you were young,” she suggested, thinking it would be safer. “A fond memory.”

“Ah.” He grinned. The wind lifted his hair from his forehead, and he looked boyish for a moment. “Blair came to Kingstag when he was about ten. His family fell on hard times and my mother invited him; his mother is her cousin. As you might imagine, we had a grand time, two boys with all this to explore.” He swept one hand in a wide arc to encompass all of Kingstag. “One day I conceived a plan to go boating on the lake. Blair wasn’t as eager but he went along with it, and we soon were in the middle of the lake, two sporting gentlemen at leisure.” He shook his head. “Imagine my shock when I looked down to see an inch of water in the bottom of the boat. We neither of us wanted to swim—my mother would have punished us for spoiling our clothes and boots, to say nothing of taking out an old, leaky boat—so Blair bailed water with his hands while I rowed ferociously. We managed to come within a few feet of the shore before it sank entirely. Both of us had the most incredible blisters.”

“That’s your fond memory?” Cleo smiled. “Blisters!”

“No, it was the thrill of saving ourselves from disaster.”

“That I can understand, particularly if you didn’t get caught.”

“We didn’t,” he assured her, his eyes twinkling. “Blair and I have always backed each other up.”

She laughed. “All the sweeter!”

“Indeed. It was one of the few times I truly escaped responsibility.” He met her gaze. “Today seems like another. I can’t say when I’ve enjoyed myself so much.”

Cleo’s heart felt warm and light even as she tried to tell herself he was just being polite. “Nor I, Your Grace.”

“Wessex,” he said. “Please.”

Now her face felt warm. “Very well. But you must call me Cleo. After all, we shall be family.” Perhaps if she reminded herself of that, forcefully and frequently, it would blunt the attraction she felt.

The expression on his face certainly didn’t. If anything, it made things worse. Wessex had a way of looking at her that made the breath almost stop in her chest. “Very well, if you wish,” he said after a moment. “Cleo.”

She shouldn’t have. She’d made a mistake. It sounded too familiar, too tender when he said it. Cleo glanced back at her sister in despair. Helen hadn’t looked at Wessex any more than Wessex had looked at Helen. Not only had Cleo failed to discover the duke’s feelings for her sister, she had only succeeded in making her own feelings worse.

If she didn’t catch herself soon, she would find herself utterly in love with him.

AS SOON AS POSSIBLE, Gareth excused himself and went in search of oblivion. He found it in the stables. His cousin had the right idea, avoiding all the females. Some of the men looked a trifle guilty—Lord Warnford hastily hid a pair of dice behind his back—but Gareth just raised his hand in greeting and retired to a corner to contemplate the trouble he was in, a bottle in hand.

He brooded over his brandy while a tedious conversation about a horse race occupied the other men. The only person who appeared less interested in the race was the Earl of Bruton, who arrived shortly after he did and looked as grim as Gareth felt. He caught his old friend’s eye and invited him to have a drink, not surprised to see Bruton here. With that slashing scar down his face, the earl had long avoided the ladies.

“Thank God for Willoughby,” cried one decidedly drunk fellow all of a sudden. “He’s saved us all with this refuge from the ladies.”

“Hear, hear!” cheered the rest of the company.

“No offense intended, Wessex,” added the man, still swinging his tankard of ale in one hand. “Felicitations on your marriage.”

God help him; even drinking in the stables couldn’t save him from that topic. He nodded in acknowledgement and poured another gulp of brandy down his throat, wondering if he could drink enough to purge the sound of Cleopatra Barrows’s laughter from his mind. He could still feel the touch of her hand on his arm.

He left the stables, handing his bottle to Lord Everett as he went. If they raised a toast to his bride, he might be ill. There was one inescapable thought circling his brain, and he didn’t know how to address it.

He was marrying the wrong woman.

Chapter Eight

CLEO WENT DOWNSTAIRS EARLY two mornings before the wedding, which was finally almost at hand. After their match of bowls, she had taken care only to cross the Duke of Wessex’s path in company. Even at the ball last night, she had determinedly kept her distance. It hadn’t kept her from noticing how very attractive he was, or how kind and good-humored he was with his sisters, or even how gallant he was to Sophronia. How could one dislike a man who was so wonderful? Cleo had clung to her sister’s side and tried to interest herself in the wedding plans, but that had difficulties of its own. She thought she might scream if she didn’t escape her mother’s hawk-like watch for a few hours. As the wedding drew nearer, so apparently did her fear that Cleo would say or do something unacceptable.

Since Cleo knew very well that she was doing something unpardonable, it was hard to argue with her mother. She had diligently avoided talking about her shop except when directly asked, but her real sin was far worse, even though her mother could have no idea. She had tried everything to keep her wicked thoughts in check, to no avail, and now she had only one option left: avoidance. If she spent her time wandering alone over the estate and secluded herself in her room the rest of the time, she could endure until the wedding was over. Then it would be perfectly acceptable to make her excuses and return home to her little shop, where she couldn’t ruin anyone’s life but her own.

She paused before a mirror in the hall to tie her bonnet ribbons. The castle was still almost silent, populated only by the servants moving quietly about. Everyone would probably sleep late after the ball the previous night. In spite of everything, she would be sorry to leave Kingstag. It really was a wonderful place.

“Good morning,” said a voice behind her.

Cleo jumped. The one voice she’d been trying to avoid but somehow still longed to hear. “Good morning, Your Grace,” she managed to say, knotting her ribbons before facing him. “I was just setting out to indulge myself with a long walk.”

“As was I.” He wore a long coat and carried a rather battered hat. Cleo’s pulse leaped as he pushed one bare hand through his thick dark hair. “I rarely have the time to step out later in the day.”

“Oh! Please don’t let me disturb you,” she began, but he raised one hand.

“On the contrary. I didn’t expect to meet anyone this morning, but it would be a pleasure to have company.”

She should say no. She drew an unsteady breath. “I hate to oblige you….”

“Please,” he said, and Cleo closed her mouth. Without another word she put her hand on the arm he offered, and together they walked out the door.

A blanket of mist covered the ground, lending an unearthly air to the scene. Cleo drew in a delighted breath, loving the cool, earthy scent of the country. They strolled along the gravel, heading toward the lake, which lay still and quiet beyond the fog. “How beautiful,” she sighed. “I rarely see such a sight in town.”

“Are you always an early riser?”

She blushed. She had to be awake early to open the shop. “Yes. I love the morning light.”

“My sisters and mother prefer not to rise until the sun is high in the sky.”

“I’m sure they have good reason, particularly today,” she said lightly. “It would be very hard to rise early when there are guests and entertainments every evening.”

He smiled. “They are creatures of candlelight, even when there are no guests.”

“As long as they are all the same, I see no cause for worry. If Bridget were to favor the morning while the others did not….” She shook her head and sighed as the duke chuckled. “It’s lovely to see sisters so close.”

“Barely three years separate them. My father was away for much of my childhood as a diplomat.” Wessex slanted her a look. “My mother was quite joyous at his return.”

Cleo sighed, but with a smile. “How lovely to find a married couple in love.”

“And how sad when they are parted too soon,” he murmured.

She said nothing. It was true. The last time she had walked arm-in-arm with a man had been two years ago, before Matthew was cut down by an inflammation in his lungs. Not since then had she ever once felt the same easy companionship she seemed to have fallen into overnight with the Duke of Wessex. He was nothing like Matthew and yet … in some ways he reminded her of her husband. He had a wry way of putting things. He was even-tempered with everyone, from his ebullient sister Bridget to Cleo’s own flighty mother; even querulous Lady Sophronia never ruffled him. And he had a way of looking at her that made her feel every lonely minute of her widowhood.

“I understand you know too well how sad that is,” he said quietly. “Forgive me for mentioning—”

“No!” She squeezed his arm lightly. “I have nothing but happy memories of my husband.”

“Does that make it better or worse?” He cleared his throat. “To have loved and lost, I mean. My mother was destroyed when my father died. I was only a boy, but I became utterly convinced she would have been far happier if she hadn’t loved him.”

“I suspect she would disagree,” Cleo murmured. “Love is worth the risk.”

“Yes,” he said after a moment. “I am beginning to agree with that.”

“I am as sure of that as I am sure the sun will rise in the east. I took a great risk and suffered a great loss, but I would do it all again. Real love is very much worth it.”

“A great risk,” he echoed, sounding pensive. “What do you mean?”

“I suppose there’s no reason not to tell you,” she said, keeping her gaze fixed on something in the distance. She was under orders not to tell him and yet the words spilled out. “Helen knows, after all, so you would be sure to hear of it eventually. I eloped when I was seventeen. My parents have never forgiven me.”

He stopped, and she had to stop, too. Cleo realized how far she had to tilt her head back to meet his eyes. “As bad as that?”

The concern in his voice made her flush. He wasn’t haughty and arrogant, looking down on her for keeping a shop—unlike her parents. The temptation was too much. “Oh, yes,” she said with a rueful smile. “I’m only here on sufferance.”

“Oh?” His voice was soft and warm, comforting and seductive.

“Yes,” she barreled on. “He wasn’t enormously wealthy, titled, or extremely famous; he was a merchant. And my parents have never recovered from the shame.”

“I see.” He leaned forward a little. “Why did you do it, then?”

She smiled wistfully. “Because I loved him. He made me laugh.”

The duke seemed mesmerized for a moment. His face was so still and yet rapt.

Cleo supposed she had just displayed her common nature, impulsive and reckless, and gave a little shrug. “There is so much of life that must conform to duty or polite behavior, but I don’t know how people endure it all if they aren’t happy, or at least content. My parents were horrified that I would run off like a hoyden with no care for how it reflected on my family. I suppose they only wanted better for me, but I…. I was happy. For that, I could endure any discomforts life brought.”

“Yes,” he said, as though very struck by her words. “How very wise you are.”

“Oh! Not really.” She blushed at the look he gave her, direct and probing. “Headstrong. Willful.” Those had been two of the kinder words her father used.

“What is headstrong and willful in a woman is often called decisive and bold in a man.” He took a deep breath. “I wish we had had this conversation several months ago. You have shown me a multitude of errors on my part.”

They had passed the bowling green by now, the awnings still standing like lonely sentinels over the bare rinks. Cleo felt again the way her heart had turned over when Wessex grinned at her over the bowls, the breeze ruffling his hair. Why did it have to be her sister’s fiancé who made her heart leap? “I’m sorry,” she said softly. “That wasn’t my desire.”

“No!” He shook his head. “On the contrary. I’ve never shied away from my mistakes. I made a great many of them, inheriting a dukedom at so young an age. Humiliation is a powerful teacher. But I fear it also taught me some lessons too well, lessons I’ve only just realized were all wrong.”

She fixed her gaze upon the ground, afraid of what he would say next and yet desperate to know. “How so?”

“My parents were devoted to each other. My father’s death … it seemed to shatter my mother. To my horrified young eyes, all that love seemed to have turned into soul-rending anguish. I was sure I wanted no part of that in my own marriage, and I never met anyone who changed my mind—until you.”

“Love in marriage is vital,” she whispered. Her heart thudded dangerously.

“I am more and more persuaded of that.” He stopped walking. “You must understand…. I had the best of intentions when I courted your sister. I don’t love her, but I fully expected to be an honorable, faithful husband to her—”

“Stop.” Cleo put her hand over his mouth to stop him. Tears prickled in her eyes. “Don’t say anything else. You can love her—you will. Helen is the most wonderful girl, it’s impossible not to love her—”

Gently, tenderly, he covered her hand with his, moving her palm to his cheek. His eyes closed for a moment and he inhaled a long slow breath as he leaned into her touch. “But not in the right way.” He opened his eyes and looked at her, his face stark with yearning.

Cleo wavered on her feet at the longing that stabbed through her. If he had been anyone else in the world, she would be in his arms right now. God help her, she still wanted to be. But Helen—Helen, her beloved sister—even if Helen didn’t love him and he didn’t love her, Cleo couldn’t betray her sister that way.

“You have to try,” she said, her voice trembling.

“I have.” He sounded helpless.

She pulled away from him, recoiling a step even though he made no move to stop her. “Keep trying. You’ve not spent enough time with her—it’s just a bit of madness—we’ve only just met—”

“I don’t think a lifetime will be enough to change my feelings so dramatically.”

“Nor mine.” The words slipped out before she could stop them. She raised a trembling hand to her mouth as if to recall them, but it was too late; he had heard.

If Gareth hadn’t understood his own feelings before then, there was no doubting them now. He had thought—suspected—that Cleo was as attracted as he was, but he hadn’t known if she felt more. But as her words lingered in the air, confirming what he yearned for, it seemed as though the earth finally went still beneath his feet again. After days of being off balance, caught between disbelief and alarm that he was falling in love when it was almost too late, he found he finally knew what he wanted.

He had tried to love Helen, he really had. After the bowling match, he’d kept his distance from Cleo and paid more attention to his betrothed. It hadn’t helped—if anything, it had only convinced him he’d made a terrible error. Helen was as lovely and sweet-tempered as he had originally thought, but she was also far quieter. She was reserved and polite with the guests, and more than once he saw her glance longingly out the window, as if she couldn’t wait to escape the room. For the life of him he couldn’t remember why he’d thought she would make a good duchess; of course one could learn it and grow into it, and his mother was ready and able to teach her, but he suspected it would take years for Helen to feel at ease as the Duchess of Wessex and mistress of Kingstag Castle.

But when he looked at Cleo, more and more he saw someone who would be a splendid duchess from the beginning. She knew all the guests within days. His mother remarked on her effortless conversation. His sisters, who had been so eager to meet Helen, had quickly switched their adoration to Cleo, with her bold and unusual clothes and friendly manner. Even Sophronia liked her, and Sophronia was the harshest critic Gareth had ever met. What’s more, she was used to running a large business, overseeing more than a dozen men, and managing her own finances—much the same skills that would be required to run Kingstag. He doubted anything would daunt her, including him in his worst temper.

And then there was the way she made him feel. When she smiled at him, Gareth would swear he could still feel the electric tingle in the air, as if lightning had struck him anew. When she laughed, he wanted to kiss her. When she took his arm, he wanted to carry her off into the shrubbery. And when she put her fingers on his lips, he wanted to fall to his knees and make love to her on the spot.

But deciding what he wanted was only part of the difficulty. He knew what he would have to do, somehow. It would be unpleasant, no doubt, and he didn’t quite know how to go about it, but this was a risk that was definitely worth the reward.

“Cleo.” He took a step toward her. She turned her face away, biting her lip, but otherwise she didn’t move. He took another step and reached for her hand. “Tell me what you want,” he murmured.

“It doesn’t matter what I want.”

“It does to me.” He edged a step closer. She smelled of roses, soft and beautiful. “I didn’t believe in love, let alone love at first sight. I am torn in two, caught between what I want and what I’ve promised. Tell me what you want, darling, and I will move heaven and earth to do it.”

“I want my sister to be happy.”

“Only your sister?”

A shudder went through her. “No,” she whispered despondently. “But how can this end well for everyone?”

His fingers tightened on hers. “I promise it will.”

“How can you promise that?” She shook her head. She pulled her hand loose and finally turned to face him. There was no sparkle in her dark eyes now, no teasing curve to her lips. It was all he could do to keep from touching her. He wanted to hold her close and swear that everything would fall in place. Her unhappiness gutted him. “My parents—my sister—what will they think if you cry off? How could I cause such humiliation for my own wicked desires? Do you know what people will say about me, if you desert Helen for me? I can’t, Your Grace.”

“And what will your sister think of me if I marry her strictly out of duty?”

For a long moment she said nothing. “I hope you won’t—I hope you’ll be happy with her, and she with you. But I won’t interfere in my sister’s marriage.” She turned and hurried away, her footsteps muffled in the fog.

Gareth watched until she disappeared around the trees before cursing under his breath. He had to think; he had to find a solution to please everyone. He had learned to be a duke at age sixteen, responsible for solving his problems and everyone else’s. This was no different … merely his entire future happiness was at stake.

He was startled out of his thoughts by Blair, who came trudging across the lawn with a pistol case in hand. His cousin stopped short when he saw Gareth. “Wessex.”

“Blair.” Gareth stared at the case. “You look like a man on his way to a duel.”

“The duel was at dawn.” Blair looked troubled. “Bruton and Newnham.”

“They’re cousins,” said Gareth in shock. “And the best of friends—or so I thought. What did they duel over?”

“Rosanne Lacy. Newnham was courting her, but judging from what I just witnessed, Bruton will be marrying her.”

“What you just witnessed,” he repeated.

“Miss Lacy flying across the field, barely dressed and sobbing as if her heart would break.” Blair’s face twisted. “She flung herself into Bruton’s arms and I could see it in Newnham’s face. He loved her and yet knew he’d lost her. It takes a strong man to watch the woman you love marry another man.”

He heard again Cleo’s anguished voice, asking what her sister would think if he jilted Helen for her. Cleo loved him, but she couldn’t betray her sister.

On the other hand, the notoriously aloof Earl of Bruton had somehow fallen in love with the girl his cousin was courting, and he’d found a way to marry her. Gareth ignored the matter of the duel and focused on the result, which was that Bruton was marrying the right woman for him.

Somehow Gareth had to do the same.

“I trust no one was hurt,” he said. When Blair shook his head, Gareth added, “Excellent. Then it seems everything has worked out for the best.”

His cousin jerked up his head and gave him a strange look. “You really think so?”

He nodded. “Absolutely. I must remember to wish Bruton happy. He certainly deserves it.”

“I expect he and Miss Lacy will be very happy,” said Blair slowly.

“Yes.” Gareth grinned. “I expect so, too.”

Chapter Nine

CLEO TOOK THE LONG WAY back to the house before shutting herself in her room for the rest of the day. The conversation with Wessex whirled round and round her brain until her head ached. Every accusation her father had hurled at her seemed to be proven: she was wicked and reckless and dangerous to her family. Not only had she fallen in love with her sister’s fiancé, she had only by the very thinnest of threads held herself back from kissing him. She never should have walked out into the mist with him. She never should have bowled with him. She never should have come to Kingstag at all. She ate dinner in her room and sent for her trunk to begin packing, so she could leave as soon as the wedding was over.

She only ventured out of her room late at night, when the house was quiet at last. She couldn’t sleep and thought a turn in the garden might soothe her spirits. It must be beautiful in the moonlight. But a muffled sound caught her ear as she passed her sister’s room, and before she could reconsider, she tapped gently on the door. “Helen!” she whispered into the jamb. “Let me in!”

The door jerked open and Helen stared at her with wide, wet eyes. She turned her face away, swiping her handkerchief over her face. “Cleo. You’re still awake.”

She felt a chill of guilt. The duke had hinted that he didn’t want to go through with the wedding, and now Helen was crying. She stepped into the room and closed the door. “What’s wrong?”

“Nothing!” Her sister folded the handkerchief into her pocket and went to sit on the sofa. She looked up, a wobbly smile on her face. “Nothing at all.”

“I can see very well that something is wrong.” She sat next to her sister. “Why are you crying?” A sudden fear gripped her. “His Grace didn’t make you cry, did he?”

“I haven’t seen him all day,” said Helen, wringing her handkerchief and missing Cleo’s breath of relief. “How could I, when Mama kept me in this room all day with the dressmaker fussing over my gown, and had Rivers put up my hair three different ways to see which was most flattering, and wouldn’t even let me go down to dinner because she thought I looked pale? She told me I must keep up my strength because I’m to be mistress of a castle.” Her face began to crumple.

“Oh my dear.” Cleo bit her lip. “What brought all this on?”

Helen gripped her hands together in her lap. “The wedding, of course. She’s determined that everything must be perfect, because otherwise His Grace will be disappointed or ashamed of me. I don’t think I can be perfect anymore. I don’t know if I can do … this.” She waved one hand around the beautiful room, but obviously including everything about Kingstag.

In spite of herself, a poisonous weed of hope sprouted in Cleo’s heart. “What do you mean, you don’t know if you can do … this?” She waved one hand around as Helen had done.

Her sister sighed. “Being a duchess sounded so delightful: beautiful clothes and jewels, the highest society, never worrying about money or being received or given the cut direct. And it made Mama and Papa so happy—I cannot tell you how it eased their minds about everything when I accepted Wessex. I don’t think I’ve ever seen them happier.”

Cleo pressed her lips together. She was growing thoroughly tired of her parents’ feelings. What sort of people grew happier at the cost of their children’s joy? Because it was clear to see that Helen, whatever her original feelings about her marriage, was decidedly not happy now. And if Helen wasn’t happy, perhaps she oughtn’t to marry Wessex. She couldn’t bring herself to say such a thing, afraid of persuading her sister to do something she’d regret just because it suited Cleo’s own wishes. But neither could she advise her sister to forge ahead regardless of her feelings. “But you are not happy.”

Helen jumped up and paced away. “I know I should be. Most of the time, I’ve wanted to run into the woods and hide, even as everyone tells me how fortunate I am.”

“Many brides have nerves,” murmured Cleo.

Her sister nodded, nibbling her bottom lip. “Were you nervous, when you married? Are all brides?”

“All brides should be happy,” said Cleo diplomatically. She hadn’t been nervous, she’d been eager. Why, if she were in Helen’s shoes, about to marry Wessex….

But she wasn’t.

“Do you think I will be?”

She blinked at the question. “What?”

“Do you think I will be happy?” repeated her sister. “Married to the duke. Mama sees no other possibility—who could be unhappy, married to one of the richest dukes in England?—but you’ve always been honest with me. What do you think of him, Cleo?”

She sat like a woman turned to stone. How could she possibly answer that, after the traitorous longing that still stained her soul? Wessex was everything she thought a man ought to be, and more. He was the friend she longed for, the companion she had been without for so long, the lover she dreamt of at night. But he would never be hers. “He’s very kind,” she managed to say. “Handsome. Charming, in a wry sort of way. I think he’ll be a good husband.”

“But do you think I can be happy with him?” Helen seized her arm, her fingernails digging into Cleo’s flesh. “Do you?”

Her heart broke at her sister’s expression, anxious and yet hopeful. She swallowed hard. “It doesn’t matter what I think,” she said quietly. “Only you can know what your heart compels you to do. Your happiness is in your hands.”

Helen’s gaze bored into her. “Yes,” she murmured. Her grip loosened on Cleo’s arm as she turned away, her eyes growing distant. “Yes, it is. If I tell him—if I make him understand how I feel—he will have to listen. He did ask me to marry him, and a man doesn’t do that lightly, does he? If I persuade him that all this is too much. Yes, I think he will understand. It’s not too late, is it?”

“You mean … the wedding?” Cleo frowned a little. “Has it simply overwhelmed you?”

“Has it!” Helen gave a disbelieving laugh. “To no end! I have no idea who half these guests are, and if I have to listen much longer to Mama talk about how perfect Kingstag is and what an honor it is to be mistress of it, I may scream. You were so clever to elope, you know. You spared yourself immense aggravation.” She stopped, looking startled, then flashed a cautious grin. “I shouldn’t have said that, should I? Well, I think I’m done with doing what I ought to do.”

“Oh,” said Cleo, disconcerted. “Good.”

Her sister laughed again. “It is good—or rather, it will be, thanks to you.”

“I just want you to be happy,” Cleo repeated. And she would do whatever it took, including going away and never visiting her sister and her too-tempting husband again. Wessex was not hers to lose; he was Helen’s. And Helen certainly wouldn’t lose him to Cleo.

Helen smiled. Tears still glittered in the corners of her eyes, but they no longer ran down her cheeks. “You do, don’t you? Oh, Cleo, I think I would have gone mad without you. Sometimes I feel as if you are the only one who truly understands me.” She flung her arms around Cleo, and Cleo hugged her back, heartsick. If Helen really hadn’t wanted to marry Wessex, there might have been a chance … but it was foolish to have let the thought cross her mind. Firmly she smothered it, renewing her silent vow to leave as soon as the wedding took place.

“There,” she said, patting Helen’s back. “Dry your eyes. You only have one more day before your wedding.” The words were like a blow to her heart. “It’s finally upon us,” she said, her voice only breaking a little at the end.

Helen laughed, swiping at her eyes. “Yes. So it is—and I am ready for it at last,” she said. Her doubts seemed to have been allayed, which meant they couldn’t have been very serious doubts. Cleo told herself that was a good sign. “Thank you for coming. You’ve done me a world of good.”

Helen mustn’t know that her conscience was only just holding back the longing she felt. Helen didn’t know her sister was thinking impure thoughts about her future husband. Cleo gave a shaky smile. “I’m delighted to be of help, any help I can be.”

“Believe me,” said Helen earnestly, “you’ve been more help than you know.”

GARETH REALIZED TWO TRUTHS THAT DAY.

First, he couldn’t marry Helen Grey. Not only did he not love her—and suspect she did not love him—but the mere mention of Cleo made him forget the very existence of his betrothed bride. Just a glimpse of her snared his attention, and the very sound of her voice made him deaf to anything and anyone else around him. Everything she did persuaded him she would be perfect as his duchess—not a biddable ornament but a true partner. Gareth had little choice but to admit he was utterly lost.

But second, Cleo would never do anything to hurt her sister, even if she did want him as badly as he wanted her. What could he say to that? Gareth had sisters, too. He would never want to hurt them. Still, it would hurt Helen far worse to end up married to the wrong man, and he knew he must speak to her. Somehow—without mentioning Cleo—he would persuade her to break it off. It would be a great surprise to all the guests, but he was sure his family would support him, particularly when he revealed his true affection to them.

But there his plans were thwarted. For the rest of that day, Helen seemed to have gone into hiding. He finally located Sir William and inquired, only to be told Helen was busy with her mother, having her dress fitted. Mention of the wedding gown only made Gareth more anxious to see her, but she wasn’t at dinner. Neither was Cleo. He went to bed determined to see both of them the next day.

He hadn’t counted on his own mother and sisters, who surprised him with a private family breakfast the next morning in the duchess’s sitting room. “After today you will belong with your wife,” his mother told him with a smile as they lingered over coffee, “but we wanted you to ourselves one last time.”

“I refuse to give you all up,” he replied. “Surely you’re not planning to leave after tomorrow?”

Serena laughed. “Of course not! But you won’t want us about anymore, when you have Miss Grey.”

Gareth had to bite his tongue to keep from correcting her. “I shall always want you about. Who else will protect me from Sophronia? She was threatening Jack with her dirk the other day.”

Bridget hooted. “Perhaps Mrs. Barrows will! She’s not frightened of Sophronia.”

An excellent idea, thought Gareth, sipping his coffee to hide his reaction to her name. He quite liked the idea of Cleo defending him.

“Come, girls.” The duchess rose from her chair. “Your brother has a great deal to do before the wedding tomorrow. We must leave him in peace.” They protested a little, but bade him farewell with much laughing and teasing.

He turned to his mother as the girls trooped out. “May I ask a question, Mother?”

“Of course,” she said in surprise.

Gareth took a deep breath. “Would you have married Father if you had known how little time you would have together?”

Her lips parted. “Oh, my. Without a doubt. I loved him too much. A year with him made me happier than a lifetime with any other man could have done.”

He nodded. “For years I thought otherwise, you know; that the pain of losing him was so great, you must have wished you had never loved him at all.”

She put her hands on his arms and studied his face. “No. The love was greater than the pain.” She hesitated. “I wish you every bit as much happiness, Gareth, and for many more years than I had.”

“I thought you might say that.” He kissed her cheek. “Thank you, Mother.” He ought to have listened to her from the start, he realized, and set off to make her wish come true.

Unfortunately, his luck was no better this day than the last. By the time he found Helen and was able to manage a quiet word with her alone, everyone had gathered for dinner.

He drew her aside before they went into the dining room. “I must speak to you tonight.”

She ducked her head. “Is it about tomorrow?”

“Er—yes.”

Helen put her hand on his arm. Gareth remembered Cleo doing the same thing, although her touch had sent a shock of awareness through him, while Helen’s only made him tense. “Your Grace, I want to speak to you as well. I think tomorrow will be difficult for us both, but you must know that I’m confident it will be for the best. I’ve been worried about the wedding, you see, but my sister helped me understand that it will lead to great happiness.”

“Ah—yes. About that….”

“I want you to be happy,” she said wistfully. “As much as I want my own happiness.”

This was not going well. Gareth cleared his throat. “Will you meet me later tonight, then?”

She hesitated, and her mother swooped in. “Helen dearest! Oh, Your Grace!” She curtseyed, beaming from ear to ear. Gareth remembered the veiled hurt in Cleo’s voice when she spoke of her parents and could barely bring himself to nod at Lady Grey. “What a lovely couple,” she gushed. “I was just telling Lady Warnford how handsome you look together. I’m sure Sir William will hire a painter to capture your likenesses so we might always remember how perfect a pair you form!”

“There’s no need to rush to do so. Mama, His Grace has just invited me to walk out after dinner. May I?”

Lady Grey gasped. “Indeed not! It’s the night before the wedding! Not only is it bad luck, you need your rest, my dear! Please understand, Your Grace,” she hastened to add. “You will have her every night after tonight!”

Gareth clenched his jaw as Helen demurely bowed her head. “Yes, Mama. I am sorry, Your Grace.”

“Quite right,” he said bitterly. How the bloody hell was he supposed to talk to her? He was the Duke of Wessex, damn it, and if he wanted to see his bride … in order to persuade her to jilt him … he ought to have the right to do so.

He barely paid attention at dinner, working out in his mind how best to present the problem. Cleo wasn’t there again, for which he was grateful. There was still a stir over the engagement yesterday of Miss Rosanne Lacy to the Earl of Bruton, although no mention of the duel. Even Jack Willoughby’s shocking announcement that he and Henrietta Black had agreed to marry only diverted Gareth for a moment. There were several rounds of toasts, and Sophronia declared that she’d suspected that match all along, but Gareth only saw the ring. After making a blushing Henrietta stand up with him, Jack had presented Gareth with the Cavendish heirloom ring that had been sent to London for cleaning and sizing. He was supposed to put that ring on Helen Grey’s finger tomorrow morning. It sat on the table in front of him, taunting him through the port and the ribald conversation of the other gentlemen when the ladies had left. Every man here seemed pleased to be getting married except him.

By the time he extricated himself from the guests, Gareth was almost wild with impatience. He had to do this tonight. In the morning it would be too late; the bride would be dressing for a wedding he no longer wanted to happen. He finally decided to wait until the house was quiet and then go to her room. It was improper, but he didn’t see any other way. He couldn’t stand at the altar tomorrow beside Helen, all the while wishing it were Cleo standing beside him instead, Cleo with his ring on her finger, Cleo in his bed that night. Although if it were Cleo next to him, Gareth was quite certain she would be in his bed long before night. His mother could entertain the guests at the wedding breakfast, and he could entertain Cleo upstairs.

He retreated to his study and dropped into his chair with a sigh, letting his head fall back. He poured a generous glass of brandy and let his mind run wild with all sorts of schemes, in case he couldn’t persuade Helen. He could pay Sir William to break the betrothal. At this point, any amount of money would be a small price to pay. He could invent some crisis in London he must attend to at once and literally flee the scene. He could shoot himself in some harmless place to buy time; a man with a bullet in his leg could hardly stand up in church. Gareth set down his empty glass with a thunk when he realized he was willing to cripple himself to avoid a wedding he had once sought. He glanced at the clock and cursed; he should wait another hour at least before seeking out Helen. He’d have no choice but to marry her if people saw him going into her bedchamber.

He lifted the glass, intending at least one more drink, and a letter came with it, stuck to the bottom. He pulled it off and started to toss it back on the desk when the direction caught his eye. It was to him, in Blair’s hand. Gareth frowned. It hadn’t been here earlier in the day. Blair hadn’t said a word to him at dinner, or after. Gareth had bade him good-night barely an hour earlier. What would his cousin write that he couldn’t say aloud? He broke the seal and unfolded the letter.

He read it three times before the meaning sank in. And then he began to smile. He read the letter again, just to reassure himself he understood it, then laughed out loud. What a prize Blair was! And what an idiot he was; if he hadn’t been knocked senseless by Cleo’s sly little smile, he surely would have noticed something earlier and deduced what had made Blair so quiet and bitter lately.

But how to proceed now? Gareth thought carefully for a moment, absently rotating the empty glass under his fingers. This would solve all his troubles, if handled properly, and not merely his own troubles. At last he got to his feet, folded the letter carefully into his pocket, and poured another drink, smaller this time. He raised the glass to the portrait of his father above the mantel. “To Cleopatra, your future daughter-in-law,” he told the painting. “And to James Blair, the finest man I know.”

Chapter Ten

THE WEDDING DAY DAWNED cool and misty. Awake since before first light, Cleo lay staring at the ceiling until the maid brought warm water for her to wash. There would be dark circles under her eyes, but the last two days of solitary contemplation had been good for her, in a way. She had nothing to regret; she had lost nothing that had been hers. What she felt for Gareth … it was unnatural, besides being wrong. People couldn’t fall in love so quickly, she told herself. It was not love; it was merely desire, or perhaps a hidden longing to be married again emerging with all the fuss over Helen’s wedding. It would pass, she told herself, trying to believe it. Sooner or later. The important thing was that she hadn’t acted on any of those mad, wicked impulses and betrayed her beloved sister.

She dressed slowly, carefully. Her mother had dictated her gown for the day, and Cleo had rolled her eyes behind her mother’s back at the volume of lace and the bland shade of gray. It would have been entirely appropriate for elderly Lady Sophronia—or rather, for someone of Lady Sophronia’s age, for Sophronia would probably have sliced the gray dress into pieces with her little Scottish dirk. Normally Cleo would feel the same way; Matthew had even made her swear not to wear mourning for him. He didn’t want her to be old before her time, he had said. But this morning Cleo put on the gray dress without complaint. Today she felt old and mournful, and might as well look it.

She drank the tea the maid brought, then just sat by the window, staring blindly at the grounds. The carriages were to come at ten o’clock to carry them to the Kingstag chapel. It was only a little past eight, although if Cleo knew her mother, the carriages would be waiting at least half an hour. Millicent was incapable of being on time to anything.

A maid interrupted her morose thoughts. “Your pardon, ma’am, but your mother, Lady Grey, requests you come to her.”

Cleo’s eyebrows went up, but she went without question. No doubt she would provide an audience to her mother’s raptures over Helen’s gown and hair and shoes. With something as momentous as this, Millicent would need someone to boast to, and Cleo was the only person who would listen and not think her crass. She braced herself and tapped at Helen’s door.

It opened and her mother seized her arm, whisking her inside before closing the door behind her. Cleo rubbed her arm, startled. “Why must you do that, Mama?”

“Shh!” Millicent pressed a handkerchief to her lips before her face crumpled. “Something awful has happened.”

Her heart stopped. “What? Is Helen ill?”

“Helen,” said her mother in tragic tones, “is not here.”

“What do you mean? Of course she’s here, somewhere at Kingstag.” Cleo was astonished. “When did you discover she wasn’t in her room? We must look for her—”

Millicent waved her handkerchief as if to dispel the words. “Don’t say that! Would you have us run up and down the corridors calling her name? What would people think?”

“They’ll notice if she doesn’t come to her own wedding.” Cleo tried to tame her thoughts into order. “Chances are she woke early from nerves and went for a walk. Have you checked the garden?”

“Of course we did!” snapped her father, pacing in front of the fireplace. “What kind of fool do you think I am? I went there first thing.”

“But she’s not there—her bed hasn’t been slept in—she never rang for her maid—she’s gone and run off and we’ll all be humiliated when His Grace discovers it!” Millicent burst into loud weeping. Cleo patted her mother’s shoulder numbly, not knowing what to think. Where could Helen be? Had she truly run off?

Her heart took a mad leap at the thought; perhaps her sister didn’t wish to marry Wessex after all. Perhaps there was a chance for Cleo to have him without hurting her sister and causing a scandal. She was a wicked woman for thinking it, but she did think it.

“We must tell His Grace,” she began, only to be cut off by her father.

“We most certainly must not! What will he think?”

“He’ll think Helen’s not here,” said Cleo, “which is true. Mama, we must tell him,” she insisted as her mother shook her head and burst into tears again. “We cannot conceal her absence! He’ll notice his bride is missing.”

Millicent clutched at her arms. “You must find her,” she begged. “Please look—you and she were always thick as thieves. We’ll be a laughingstock if she jilts the Duke of Wessex at the altar!”

Cleo ignored that. She rather thought the duke wouldn’t mind being jilted, but there might be another reason Helen had gone missing. “I’ll go look for Helen, but I have to tell the duke. He has a right to know,” she said, raising her voice as her mother began to moan softly. “Let me change my shoes and get a pelisse.”

“Yes! Yes, you must go.” Her mother retreated to the sofa. “Oh, where are my Smythson’s Smelling Salts?”

Cleo went back to her own room and kicked off her gray satin slippers. Her sister might have gone for a walk and fallen; she could be lying hurt somewhere on the vast estate. Walking boots in hand, Cleo sat down at the dressing table, not bothering to ring for her maid to change her dress. Until she knew Helen was at least safe, there was no time to lose. She laced up one boot, combing her memory for any place Helen might have wandered. Where could she be?

The answer stared her in the face when she reached for the second boot.

Cleo seized the note tucked partly under a box of face powder. It was folded small and bore her initials in Helen’s delicate writing. Unfolding it with shaking fingers, she read. Then she read again. She laughed a little madly, then stopped at once, glancing around the room in guilt. People would think she was mad, and Helen, too.

Oh, God. What a twist.

On shaking legs she went back to her mother’s room. Her parents were where she had left them, alone, thank God. She closed the room door behind her, and cleared her throat.

“What is it?” barked her father.

“I’ve found a note,” she said, “from Helen.”

That roused even Millicent. “What does it say?” Sir William strode across the room to snatch the paper from Cleo’s hand before she could read it. His eyes skimmed it, then his face blanched, and he thrust it back at her as if it burned him. “You!” he croaked. “You did this!”

“No!” she gasped. “No! I did nothing!”

“What?” cried Millicent, struggling off the sofa. “What has happened to poor Helen?”

“Poor Helen,” spat Sir William, “has disgraced us all! Disgraced and ruined us! And you—” He shook his finger at Cleo. “—you are responsible!”

“I most certainly am not!” Cleo’s temper finally snapped at his unjust accusation. She had held her tongue about her shop and endured his suspicion without a word, but now she had had enough. “You are, Papa, if anyone is. You and Mama both.”

He reared back. “How dare you!”

“Helen has been unhappy and anxious since we arrived, and neither of you paid any attention because you were so pleased she was marrying a duke. I knew she was unhappy, but she insisted it was just nerves—which you, Mama, made worse with your incessant talk of how glorious Kingstag is and what an honor it will be to preside over it.”

“But it’s a castle,” protested her mother. “Helen needs to know—”

Cleo threw up one hand. “Helen needed to know her future husband cared for her. She needed to know she would be happy with him. It doesn’t matter what sort of house he has if she’s miserable!”

“This is the match of the season!” said her father furiously. “A brilliant marriage! You tempted your sister away from following her duty, prompting her into some hysterical fit. I knew it was a mistake to let you come.”

She shook her head. “Why is it Helen’s duty to replenish your fortune, Papa? Why wasn’t it your duty to make economies or learn investments or do anything at all to support your family? Instead you’ve been content to live off your daughters, taking the money I earned in my hateful little shop and now selling Helen in marriage, regardless of her feelings in the matter.”

Sir William’s face was purple. “You are dead to me now.”

Cleo just lifted one shoulder sadly. “I know. I’ve been dead to you for years. But now I think you shall be dead to me as well, if you cannot forgive Helen for what she’s done. Being happy is more important than being a duchess.” She turned to go.

“Cleo!” Her mother’s anxious voice stopped her. “You—you will still try to find her, won’t you? To make sure she’s not hurt, and—” Millicent cast an anxious glance at her husband. Cleo’s heart started to soften toward her mother. Perhaps one parent would be made to see reason; surely her mother still cared about more than Helen’s status. “—and perhaps,” Millicent went on hesitantly, “perhaps she might reconsider….”

“Yes, Mama,” she said, and left the room, closing the door on her parents. Her heart thudded, both with disbelief that she had finally been so blunt with them and with surprisingly little regret. She had borne it because she believed that, deep down, they loved her and Helen; she had told herself they were simply unable to conquer their disappointment in her marriage to Matthew. A shopkeeper was a distinct step down, and she had excused them that. But finally she accepted that it was excessive pride, indifferent affection, and arrogance. They wanted their daughters to marry well so they might live more comfortably and trade on their daughters’ connections. Her actions, like Helen’s today, mattered to them only as a reflection on their own state.

And if Helen had finally taken charge of her own life and happiness, there was nothing at all to stop Cleo from doing the same. She didn’t know where Wessex’s rooms were, but she found the butler and told him she must speak to the duke urgently. He directed her to the study at the back of the house, overlooking the gardens.

At the door she took a deep breath and knocked. Just the sound of his muffled voice made her pulse jump. She let herself in, glancing quickly around to be certain there was no one else in the room.

He was alone, standing in front of the window with his hands clasped behind his back. Just the sight of him made her dizzy with yearning and hope. She unfolded Helen’s note. “I have something to tell you, Your Grace. It is about my sister.”

His attention was fixed on her. “Oh?”

“Yes.” She checked that the door was securely closed. “My sister left me a note, which I only discovered a few minutes ago. May I share it with you?” He inclined his head, and she wet her lips, then read Helen’s note. “Dearest Cleo: By the time you read this, I shall be gone from Kingstag Castle. I am writing to you because you are the only one who will understand why: James and I are eloping. We hope to make Gretna Green by the end of the week.”

Her voice faltered. She swallowed, and read on. “I am very sorry to do such a thing to His Grace. He honored me greatly with his offer of marriage, and I did accept him honestly. But I feel it would be an even greater disservice to him if I were to go through with a marriage I no longer want, and could not be happy in, while I loved another man. Comfort him, Cleo, and tell him I am sorry. Your loving sister, Helen.”

For a long moment there was silence. Cleo folded the note, unsure what to do next.

He crossed the room to her. “May I see it?” She gave it to him, trembling a little as his fingers brushed hers. Wessex unfolded the note and read it before letting it fall to the ground. “So I’ve been jilted.”

“I believe you have been.” Her heart beat so hard it hurt. He wasn’t going to marry Helen, sang the wicked voice inside her head. Some remnant of duty obliged her to add, “My parents are distraught that Helen would do such a thing.”

“Yes, I imagine they are,” he murmured. “Are you?”

“Well—I wish my sister had confided in someone before disappearing in the night and giving us a great fright….”

“James Blair is the most capable man I know. If she’s with him, she is perfectly well.”

She just nodded, overwhelmed by the jumble of hope and uncertainty inside her. He was taking the news very calmly, but also without any show of the relief she felt that now he—like Cleo—was free to follow his heart. Perhaps his heart had reconsidered; perhaps he couldn’t stomach the thought of anything to do with her family after Helen’s action. She was a common merchant, after all, hardly a likely duchess. Perhaps she had been all wrong….

“And have you come to do as your sister asked?” He rested one hand against the door above her shoulder. “Have you come to console me, Cleo?”

The way he said her name was almost a caress. “If there is any way I can.”

A smile bent his mouth as his eyes darkened. “I think I may require excessive consolation after this most distressing fortnight.”

“And being jilted,” she whispered.

His smile grew darker, more intimate. “My darling,” he said, “being jilted has been the best part—thus far.”

Cleo’s knees went weak. She hadn’t been wrong at all. She laid her hand on his chest. He was wonderfully big and warm beneath her palm, his heartbeat steady and strong. “Your heart doesn’t seem broken.”

He laid his hand over hers, pressing it against his silk waistcoat. “On the contrary—I think it has only just begun to beat with purpose, now that you are here.”

She listed toward him. “Why is that?”

He smoothed a wisp of hair away from her temple, then curved his hand around her nape. “Because I can finally do this,” he said, and kissed her.

She melted against him, opening her mouth and meeting his tongue with her own. She gripped his jacket, holding him to her, and then she forced the lapels wide, trying to peel it off him. With a harsh exclamation, he pulled his arms free of the jacket and let it fall to the floor behind him before gathering her close. She pressed against him, her cheek on his chest, listening to the rapid thump of his heart. She could feel the warmth of his skin through his shirtsleeves.

“Cleo,” he murmured against her hair. “If there is any reason … any objection you have to me making love to you, tell me now.”

“No,” she gasped, catching his shoulders as his hands slid down around her bottom, lifting her up onto her toes, dragging her against his rigid arousal.

“No? I should stop?” He tugged her earlobe between his teeth.

Cleo whimpered. “Don’t stop,” she moaned. “Don’t ever stop.”

His hand slipped behind her back, pulling loose the tiny pearl buttons of her gown. The demure bodice slid down, and then he pulled it further down until her breasts were almost exposed. She shuddered at the cool air on her flesh, her head falling back against the door behind her. His hand cupped her breast, his mouth was hot on her neck. “Wessex,” she gasped, dimly thinking they ought to find a more comfortable location.

“Gareth.” He pulled at her bodice again, and there was a sound of cloth ripping. “My God, you’re beautiful in every way.” He lowered his head to her breast and Cleo abandoned all thought of moving. She plowed her fingers into his thick dark hair and gave herself up to the pleasure of his lips on her skin, his teeth scraping over her taut nipple, his tongue playing along the delicate flesh of her bosom.

He drew up the skirt of her gown, and she shifted her feet to allow him to press ever closer to her. He raised one eyebrow as his boot bumped against hers. Cleo blushed; in her hurry she’d run through the house wearing only one shoe. Gareth simply grinned as he fell to his knee, unlaced the boot, and tossed it aside, and then his hands were exploring the length of her legs. His fingers skimmed her silk stockings, plucked at her garters, and then roamed higher. She gasped aloud in pent-up desire when he finally touched the aching folds between her legs.

Even she, who had eloped at seventeen, had never been so careless of propriety and restraint. With inarticulate words and sighs she urged him on, clasping his head to her bosom as he stroked her and teased her. When her legs threatened to give out beneath her, she managed to tug at his hair. “Gareth,” she gasped, her heart thundering and her breath ragged. “Gareth, please….”

He shuddered. “When you say my name that way….” He lurched to his feet, tearing at his trousers. “Put your arms around my neck,” he commanded, his voice rough. Cleo obeyed, glad he put his own arm around her waist. She might have stumbled and fallen if he hadn’t. “Now tell me….” He caught her knee and pulled, hooking it around his hip to hold her skirt out of the way. “Say you want me, Cleo…. Please, darling….”

“I want you madly.” She strained against him. “I want you now.”

“Thank God.” He cupped his hand around her bottom and held her as he fitted himself against her and pushed home. Cleo made a faint gasp of delight and surprise. It felt so good, so right, to have him inside her. She tightened her grip on his neck and pressed her forehead against his shoulder. Every nerve felt alive as he held her so easily, so securely, so intimately. He seemed as moved as she was. His chest heaved and his arms trembled. “At last,” she thought he whispered, and then he began to move.

Whatever making love against a door might lack in finesse and comfort, Cleo thought she might prefer it to any other kind. She curled herself around Gareth, meeting each hard thrust with a little arch of her back. He held her easily, he knew right where to touch her, and when it all culminated in a fierce climax, she almost burst into tears. Gareth caught his breath and rested his forehead against hers as his hips jerked a few more times in his own release, and then he kissed her, leisurely and thoroughly.

And then there came a soft tap at the door. Cleo started in spite of the hazy contentment that enveloped her. She could feel the knock through the wood at her back, and the thought of what the person on the other side would think, if he knew what was just inches from him, made laughter bubble up in her throat. Lips pressed shut to hold it back, she looked up at Gareth, her eyes tearing.

He grinned lazily down at her. “Yes?” he called.

There was a pause, then the butler’s voice came through the door, low and rushed, as if he were whispering through the crack of the doorjamb. “Your Grace, Mr. Blair wishes to see you at once.”

The laughter stuck in her throat died. Cleo didn’t move, her fingers clenching in the folds of Gareth’s shirt. Mr. Blair had returned, which meant Helen must have as well.

Oh, Lord.

Gareth just kept smiling down at her. “Does he? Excellent. Where is he waiting?”

“In the stables, Your Grace. With Miss Grey.”

“Ah. Tell them I shall be with them directly.”

“Yes, sir.” Cleo could hear his footsteps faintly, going down the hall. Gareth still wore the slight grin of a cat who knew where the cream was hidden, and she didn’t know why. Part of her longed to run out to the stables and hug Helen close before shaking her and demanding an explanation, and part of her didn’t want to face her sister for years. She had just made love to her sister’s fiancé. Even though Helen hadn’t wanted to marry him, she might still be shocked and horrified to hear how quickly he had turned to Cleo.

And now there wasn’t much time for her to talk to Gareth before facing Helen. What did he want from her? Making love was one thing, but there were no promises between them. Cleo wanted more. She didn’t want to give him up to anyone, ever again.

She wet her lips. He was still inside her, his hand still curved around her hip. With a little wriggle, she unhooked her leg from around his, easing her weight back to the ground. With a soft sigh, he slid free of her, his hands steadying her waist as her knees wobbled. She smiled uneasily, smoothing down the skirts of her gown as Gareth repaired his own clothing. She wasn’t sure she could stand under her own power. Even now, aftershocks of pleasure left her muscles lax.

“Cleo.” His hand cupped her face, making her look at him. Gareth smiled. “You look so grim, darling. Was I that rough?”

Her mouth fell open. “No! You know you weren’t. It was wonderful. But Gareth—” He cut her off with a long kiss, and when he lifted his head Cleo had forgotten what she’d been saying.

“All will be well,” he said. “Trust me.” She gazed up at him, afraid to ask. “You look as though a great problem troubles you,” he added.

She was surprised into a weak laugh. “A great problem! This is a rather out-of-the-ordinary problem, I think….”

“Yes, I might have ruined this gown beyond repair.” He gave it a frown. “Although it’s not my favorite.”

She blushed. “My mother chose it.”

“No wonder,” he muttered. “I won’t apologize for ripping it, then.” Still, he turned her around and fastened what buttons remained. “Will you come with me? I expect your sister will want to see you.”

“What are you going to say to them?” she asked softly. His fingers moving so gently over her back had sapped her will to argue.

“I think your sister and my cousin explained themselves very well in the notes they left. I can’t think what they might have to add to that.”

Cleo blinked and whirled around. “Your cousin left you a note as well?”

“He did.”

“Then you knew before I told you that Helen had run off?”

“I did.”

“You might have told me,” she protested.

He grinned. “But I desperately wanted comforting, darling.” He kissed her. “Let’s go see what they have to tell us, shall we?”

Chapter Eleven

GARETH FELT AT GREAT CHARITY WITH THE WORLD as he and Cleo walked toward the stables. He held her hand in his; she had looked a bit self-conscious at first, but she made no effort to pull away. There was a beautiful flush on her cheeks, and her eyes sparkled as they had the morning she first arrived at Kingstag, when lightning had seemed to strike him in the head.

A servant lingering near the front gate ran forward to meet them and say that Mr. Blair was waiting in the rear tack room, where Jack Willoughby had established his gentlemen’s refuge earlier. As they headed there, they passed Jack’s shiny black phaeton, now covered with dust and being fussed over by a number of grooms. Cleo darted a curious look at him, but Gareth just shrugged. He had a feeling Hippolyta had helped the lovers in their escape and in their inexplicable return.

The instant they stepped through the door, Helen Grey jumped up from the bench. She was wearing traveling clothes, her hair swung in a braid down her back, and her eyes were haunted. On the bench behind her, James Blair sat with his hands on his knees, his head hanging as if exhausted. Helen took a hesitant step forward, eyeing them almost fearfully.

Without a word, Cleo opened her arms, and Helen fell into them, breaking into ragged weeping. The sisters held each other close. Blair’s expression twisted in anguish before he averted his face. Both were the picture of misery.

“I’m sorry,” Helen sobbed. “I’m so sorry, Cleo. I didn’t mean to cause trouble, but I was so unhappy and it seemed like the best idea….”

“Are you hurt?” Cleo pulled back to scrutinize her sister’s face, red and puffy and tear-stained. “Are you well?”

She nodded. “I’m fine. We—James and I—we’re both well. It’s just—it’s just—”

James Blair rose to his feet. “We both knew it to be wrong,” he said, his voice hoarse. “Wessex—Mrs. Barrows—I cannot apologize enough for what we’ve put you through. It was entirely my doing. I convinced Miss Grey—”

“No! I convinced him!” Helen grasped her sister’s hands. “It was my idea, all mine! I couldn’t go through with it. Cleo, you told me my happiness was in my hands and you were right, you truly were. I found James yesterday and forced him to take me away last night—”

“You did no such thing,” said Blair tenderly but wearily. “Helen….”

“It seems to me,” Gareth said mildly, interrupting them, “that the more important question is why one of you had this idea, and why the other consented.”

Helen raised her chin as she finally faced him, but he could see her hands shaking. “I am very sorry, Your Grace,” she said haltingly. “I … that is, I had a—a change of heart. I … fancied myself in love with Mr. Blair….”

“It was the duel,” Blair interrupted. “Bruton was willing to let his cousin shoot him rather than give up the girl he loved. I was his second, Wessex, and it went to my head—seeing his joy and relief when Miss Lacy threw herself into his arms…. And when you said you would wish Bruton well, I lost my grip on reason.” He gave Helen another hopeless look. “I’ve been in agony since the Greys arrived. I tried to forget my feelings, and I never wanted to betray you, but after the duel…. I didn’t know how I could bear to see you marry Helen.”

“And running off was much safer and preferable to a duel, don’t you see?” Helen pleaded. “I couldn’t let him risk being shot.”

“Indeed not. Blair is a capital fellow, and I would hate to see him wounded,” agreed Gareth. “He’s quite the most decent man I know. I congratulate you on your excellent taste.”

Helen glanced at Blair in bewilderment. He seemed equally dumbstruck. Gareth wanted to shout with laughter at the look on his cousin’s face.

Helen wet her lips. “But it was an abominable thing to do to you….”

“Not when weighed against the ills of marrying a man you could never love.” He paused. “You couldn’t, could you?” It was more a statement than a question, and Helen’s eyes welled up again as she slowly shook her head. “Then you’ve done us all a great favor,” he said gently. That had been his last trace of worry, that Helen might somehow have honestly regretted running off. If she had declared she was ready to carry on with the wedding, he would have had the very devil of a time.

“You’re not angry?” asked Blair in disbelief. “Wessex, I….” Words seemed to fail him; he shook his head in stunned silence.

Gareth smiled, darted a warm glance toward Cleo. “Angry? Not at all. In fact, I have rarely been happier. And it is all due to you, Miss Grey, for having the courage to defy propriety and follow your heart. And to you, James, for going with her. My only wonder is that you came back so soon. Are you married yet?”

“No,” said Blair in a dazed voice.

“Do you still wish to be?”

“Yes!” burst out Helen, which seemed to break her beloved’s trance.

“The marriage contract—”

He shrugged. “I don’t think we’ll have any difficulty about that. Sir William, I am sure, can be made to see reason.” Especially if Gareth gave him no choice.

“The guests,” said Helen hesitantly.

“Oh yes, I suppose we’ll have to tell them. I’ll send my mother to the church.” Everyone stared at him in disbelief. “If she won’t go, I’ll have Sophronia step in,” he added. “She’d delight in calling off a wedding.”

Cleo made a noise suspiciously like a smothered laugh. It made Gareth smile wider. He loved being able to make her laugh.

The runaway lovers exchanged a glance, then Blair stepped forward.

“Wessex,” he said humbly. “I must apologize. You would have been well within bounds to call me out over this.”

“What good would that do?” he asked, surprised. “You’re my right arm, James. You might have told me earlier you had feelings for Helen, but—” he shot Cleo another glance “—in the end your timing was nothing less than perfect. Allow me to wish you great joy.” He shook hands with his cousin. Helen hurried to his side, and he raised her hand to his lips. “And of course, since you’re to be married,” Gareth went on, “I must make you a wedding gift. A manor house, I think, somewhere nearby. You must be able to visit often.”

All three of them regarded him in shock. James just nodded, his jaw working as if he couldn’t speak. Helen covered her mouth with both hands, her eyes wide with hopeful joy. Gareth clapped James on the shoulder. “I don’t believe anyone else knows you’ve returned,” he said meaningfully, “but don’t take Jack’s carriage this time. There’s no reason to drive Hippolyta into the ground when the archbishop himself will be here. I suggest concluding your courtship in more … comfort.”

Blair blinked a few times, then began to grin. “Wessex, I shall be in your debt forever,” he said, before grasping Helen’s hand and pulling her out of the room. Gareth watched them go and even raised a hand in farewell.

“That was extremely generous,” said Cleo in the quiet that followed.

He nodded.

“You want them to be happy together,” she said, amazed.

He nodded again.

She bit her lip. “What will you tell the wedding guests?”

He lifted one shoulder. “That I won’t be marrying your sister. It’s fairly simple.”

She studied him. “What will your family say?”

He cocked his head to one side, a slight grin tugging at his mouth. “My mother, I expect, will be delighted. She wants me to be happy, and I would never have been happy married to your sister, as charming and lovely as she is.” He started pacing toward her deliberately. “My sisters will be thrilled at the excitement of it all, particularly as they will still have Helen as a cousin. Sophronia may be put out, I grant you, at the absence of scandal and uproar, but she knew the first night that Helen and I were never meant to be.”

“What did Mr. Blair’s note say?” she asked, even as a soft blush stained her cheeks. “Why didn’t you tell my parents when you found it?”

“Good Lord, why would I do that?” He grimaced. “Your father might have tried to do something foolish, like stop them.”

“Stop them! But they were already gone—” She stopped abruptly, her eyes widening. “When did you find it?”

“Last night,” he said. “About two hours after dinner. I couldn’t sleep and went to my study, where James had left it. I daresay they couldn’t have got much past Dorchester by then.”

“Last night!” she gasped.

Gareth nodded. “I knew they would need as much time as possible to get well away. I had gone to my study to plot how I could persuade your sister to jilt me. You might imagine my relief upon discovering that she had already worked out how to do it. All I needed to do was stay quietly in my study.”

She appeared unable to speak. Gently he pulled her into his arms and kissed her, loving the way her body softened against his until they fit together like two halves of a whole.

“If they hadn’t run off, I don’t know what I would have done,” he whispered. “Do you know, I saw my place in hell waiting for me as the wedding day approached. That’s what I would have earned, marrying your sister when all I could think of was you. Especially like this,” he added, casting a suggestive glance down at her ripped gown.

“When?” she asked softly. “When did you start thinking that?”

Gareth shook his head. “The moment you stepped out of the carriage a fortnight ago.” She looked at him suspiciously. He nodded. “Oh, yes, lightning struck as you stepped out of the carriage. Toppled one of my oldest oaks to the ground, don’t you remember? Split it right down the middle, and the whole thing fell. Much like my heart did when you looked at me.”

“You don’t believe in love at first sight!” she protested. “You said so the other day!”

“No, I don’t, which is why I looked again, and again, and again, until I was quite sure I would go mad from it. I just knew.” He nuzzled her neck, his mouth skimming over her collarbone and up the side of her neck. “When did you start?”

The blush that colored her face, all the way down to her neckline, was brilliant. “Almost as soon. But of course I knew it was wrong—you were betrothed to my sister….”

“But not any longer.” He paused. “Are you not pleased she’s marrying Blair?”

“Of course I am!”

“Why?”

“Why?” she exclaimed. “Why, because they’re in love!” He raised an eyebrow. “And,” she hesitated only a moment, “and because if you didn’t marry Helen….” She paused again. “Then you would be free.”

“Yes.”

“And—” She wet her lips. “—and then it wouldn’t be wrong of me to want you.”

“Oh, no,” he answered at once. “That would never be wrong of you. In fact, I was hoping you might keep on wanting me for the rest of your life.”

Later, Cleo told herself she would remember that moment for the rest of her life. The scent of oiled leather and horses, the faint buzz of bees in the shrubbery outside the window, the morning sun slanting across the dusty floor. And Gareth, looking at her as if he had never seen anyone half so wonderful. She couldn’t stop a small smile. “Is that a proposition?”

He laughed. “Proposition? My darling, I’m at an end to propositions. I made my last offer of marriage in a letter addressed to your father. May I make this one myself?” And he sank to one knee as he spoke. Cleo thought she must be goggling at him like a fool. “My darling Cleopatra,” he began, then paused. “Are you truly named for Cleopatra?”

“Yes,” she said dazedly. “And Helen for Helen of Troy. Father has classical fancies.”

“Ah.” He cocked his head to one side. “I wish I’d remembered that sooner.”

“Why?” Cleo still couldn’t quite take in that he was on his knees before her. Even Matthew hadn’t proposed on bended knee; he’d asked her over his shop counter, which had been romantic enough, but nothing like this.

“It would have made things clearer,” he said. “My parents named me Anthony, after all. Anthony never married Helen of Troy.”

She cleared her throat. “He never married Cleopatra, either.”

“This Anthony will,” Gareth declared. “If she’ll have him.”

Cleo gazed down at him, his brooding dark eyes fixed on her, his thick hair still ruffled from their activities in his study. “Shall I roll myself in a rug and have myself delivered to your rooms?”

“Make certain it’s a soft rug,” he retorted, “for I would unroll it before the fire and not let you off it for an hour.”

Cleo pretended to think. “I may have such a rug, in the shop….”

His eyes ignited. “That sounds like yes.”

This time her smile was wide and unrestrained. “Because it is. A hundred times yes.”

Epilogue

“ARE YOU CERTAIN?” Cleo took her sister’s hand.

Helen nodded. Her face was pale but determined. “I should have done it days—weeks—ago.”

“I doubt it would have upset them more.” Cleo shrugged philosophically, drawing a quickly repressed smile from her sister. Helen took a deep breath and opened the door in front of them.

There was a moment of stunned silence before their mother let out a piercing wail. “Helen! Oh, Helen, there you are! We were so worried—where did you go?” Her gaze flickered over Helen’s dark blue traveling dress, her dusty boots, her braided hair. “Never mind that,” she quickly added, as though deciding she didn’t actually want to know where Helen had been. “There’s still time—we must hurry!”

“Mama, there’s something I need to tell you and Papa.” Helen resisted her mother’s attempts to drag her toward the dressing table.

“Surely it can wait!” Millicent’s laughter trilled nervously. “We must get you ready for your wedding. Oh, we’ve barely half an hour—Rivers! Rivers, come at once!” she called for her maid.

“No, Mama.” Helen glanced at her. Cleo nodded in encouragement. Her heart was racing almost as much as her sister’s must be doing, but Helen had insisted that she would tell their parents. It was her wedding—at least, it was supposed to be her wedding—and she would be the one to call it off. Since Cleo had a feeling her parents wouldn’t listen to a word she said anyway, she hadn’t argued. “Mama, I won’t marry the duke,” said Helen in a clear, firm voice.

Millicent’s eyes darted warily to Cleo, then veered away. “Don’t be silly, dear. Your father signed the contract. You must marry the duke.”

“I’ve already told Wessex I’m breaking our engagement,” Helen went on, two bright spots of pink in her cheeks. “He took it very well.”

Her mother moaned, covering her face with both hands. “Don’t say that—oh, please don’t! What will your father say?”

“Helen!” On cue, Sir William appeared in the doorway. From the set of his features, he was still toweringly angry at both daughters. “Where the devil were you?”

This time when Helen pulled against her mother’s grip, Millicent let her go. “Sit down, Mama. And you, Papa.”

Their father scowled, but their mother, as if sensing she would be glad to be seated when she heard Helen’s news, went directly to the sofa. When Sir William didn’t move in the same direction, Helen just waited, her chin up and her expression composed. Cleo went to her side without a word. Neither parent looked at her, only at Helen.

Perhaps that was to be expected. They’d said she was dead to them now, and she’d replied in kind. Still, they were her parents; it hurt that they could shut her out so easily and swiftly. And because it bothered her, she was content to let Helen break her news in any way she liked.

“You’d better have a good explanation for causing such trouble,” growled Sir William, but he finally sat.

“There is something I should have told you weeks ago,” her sister began. “Perhaps even months ago. I don’t love His Grace.”

Millicent blinked. Sir George scowled again. “Love? Is that why you disappeared? Some female fit of hysterics about love when you’ve got a duke waiting for you in the church?”

“You’re being too hasty,” Millicent cried. “Helen, dearest, you must give yourself time to fall in love with him—I don’t see how you couldn’t! Why, just look around at this house, this park, the lovely family—”

“I never loved him and I never could,” said Helen, raising her voice slightly. “I am in love with someone else and I intend to marry him.”

For a moment the silence seemed deafening.

“You can’t,” said her father shortly. “I’ve signed a marriage contract with Wessex. You’re marrying him.”

She shook her head. “No, Papa, I won’t. He doesn’t want to marry me now, either.”

Her father’s face reddened. “Nevertheless, he also signed that contract. It’s binding!”

“Not if both of us refuse!”

Sir George made a visible effort to contain his anger. His tone softened, becoming almost wheedling. “Helen, see reason. Your marriage will be the making of us all. Wessex is a good man; your mother is right, you’ll come to care for him. And you’ll be a duchess. You’ll be mistress of this house, dressed as finely as any of the duke’s sisters, accepted in the finest circles in London. You’ll never have a shop door closed in your face; your every wish can be indulged.”

Helen shook her head. “It’s not worth it. I am in love with James Blair, and I’m going to marry him.”

Her father’s eyes bulged. “The secretary? Now see here, Helen—don’t be ridiculous! What sort of cork-brained idea—?” He broke off suddenly, and slowly turned toward Cleo. “This is yourdoing, putting foolish romantic rubbish into her head!”

She shook her head. “I had no idea until this morning.”

“She didn’t,” Helen agreed. “I told no one, Papa.”

A vein was pulsing in Sir George’s forehead. “Helen,” he said through his teeth, “I pledged my best bit of land in that marriage contract. It’s the only property I’ve got that isn’t mortgaged to the hilt. It was a stroke of luck His Grace wanted it, or else he might not have offered for you. If you jilt the duke, he could sue me for that land, ruining us all beyond redemption.”

“I don’t think he’ll do that,” Helen murmured, her lips beginning to twitch.

Cleo bowed her head to hide her expression. Gareth wouldn’t sue anyone—or so he’d said, provided her father didn’t make a fuss over breaking the betrothal.

“And you’d risk it, for a secretary, a man with few prospects? A man who may very well lose his position for making off with his employer’s bride?” Sir George lurched to his feet. “Helen, I am ordering you: you are going to marry the duke today!”

“How can you be so willful?” wept Millicent. “How can you disdain a duke? Oh, I’d so looked forward to visiting Kingstag often and now we shall never be able to show our faces in all of Dorset!”

“His Grace might have you to visit, but if I were you, I’d make up with Cleo before asking.” Helen winked at her. Now that she’d told her secret, she seemed uncaring of anything else. Cleo, who had carried a similar secret like an arrow in her chest, grinned back. Yes, it was very freeing to cut the lines behind her, to decide to face forward without thought for whatever dismay lay in her wake.

“Please, Helen,” their mother begged. “Please reconsider. There’s still time….”

“No, Mama, I don’t think there is.”

A knock sounded at the door. Cleo was already on her way to answer it. Gareth had said he’d give them a few minutes, no more. When she’d asked if he didn’t trust her and Helen, he merely raised his eyebrows in that way he had and said he didn’t intend to let the wrong engagement endure a moment longer than necessary. And now, as she let him into the room, part of her almost looked forward to hearing what he intended to say.

“Your Grace!” Sir George hauled his weeping wife to her feet and bowed, scarlet-faced. “You must pardon us—a family affair—”

“Indeed.” Gareth turned to Helen. “Have you told them?”

She beamed back. “Yes.”

“Excellent. You’ll find Blair in my mother’s suite, no doubt consuming a very large breakfast. Mother thought a spot of privacy would be best.”

Helen laughed. “How right she is! Thank you, Your Grace.” She bobbed a curtsey and hurried from the room, leaving her parents staring after her in open-mouthed astonishment.

Gareth faced them. “Sir George, we must discuss the marriage contract.”

“Er—yes. I suppose we must.” Sir George licked his lips. “My daughter tells me you no longer wish to marry her. That is breach, sir.”

Gareth arched one brow. “Do you intend to sue me?”

The baronet seemed to be scrambling for thoughts. “I must consider my options, sir. There was a very large settlement, you might recall—”

“Ah yes, the money that was to save you from penury, at least for a time. I have a strong suspicion it wouldn’t have lasted very long. You’re not a thrifty man, Sir George.”

To Cleo’s amazement her father turned pale. “A gentleman has expenses,” he protested. “But—but if you refuse to marry my daughter, I insist on satisfaction….”

“Oh, I intend to marry your daughter.” Gareth turned to look at Cleo, his dark eyes gleaming. “As soon as possible.”

For a moment her parents stared at him, uncomprehending. Then Millicent gasped and looked at Cleo. “You?” she whispered blankly. “Cleo, dearest—”

“You want Cleo?” Sir George seemed to realize how appalled he sounded, and rushed on. “That is—it’s such a shock, Your Grace. She’s nothing at all like Helen—”

“I know,” Gareth said, still watching Cleo with such heat in his gaze, she found herself blushing—and smiling so happily, her cheeks hurt. “And she suits me perfectly.”

“Oh.” The baronet seemed at a loss. “Well, then, I suppose I could give my consent….”

“Your consent?” Gareth turned back to him. “I haven’t come to ask for your consent. Cleo is an independent woman of legal age. Her consent is all I need.” He winked at her. “Will you still have me, darling?”

“You know I will,” she told him, her pulse speeding up as she remembered having him already, up against his study door.

There was another moment of shocked silence. “Cleo,” said Millicent, her voice trembling. “Cleo, darling, you’ll be a duchess.”

Cleo tore her eyes off Gareth and faced her mother. “I never asked for that, but since I love a duke, I suppose I shall have to endure it.”

Millicent blinked, then tittered nervously. “Don’t be silly, dear! You’re very fortunate….”

“I am,” she replied, giving up any pretense of not staring at Gareth with her heart in her eyes. “Even though he’s a duke.”

Her parents froze. Gareth laughed. “A duke in love.” He glanced at the older couple. “I do apologize for any fright you might have felt when Helen went missing. I believe she was worried that her choice wouldn’t be accepted calmly and reasonably, for some reason.” Sir George frowned, Gareth’s dry tone obviously striking home, but Millicent was too anxious to please.

“Helen’s always been such a good girl! I don’t know what got into her, Your Grace.”

“Blair is an excellent man, and he’s as deeply in love with her as she is with him,” Gareth went on. “I wish them every happiness.”

“And you…. And Cleo….” Millicent made a helpless motion, still looking dazed. “You really want to marry Cleo?”

“Desperately.” He put out his hand, and Cleo let him draw her into his arm. And to think, just a few hours ago she’d thought today would be the worst of her life….

Her father cleared his throat. “But the settlements….”

“You may have the money,” said Gareth, gazing down at Cleo with a smile. “You may even keep the land. She’s all I want.”

There was a long moment of silence. “My,” said Millicent blankly. “Oh my.” She mustered a smile for Cleo. “You’ll be mistress of Kingstag Castle, dear.”

Cleo closed her eyes. That was the last thing she wanted to hear about. Good Lord, could her mother think of anything else?

“Indeed she will be, but I think her shop will have prepared her quite well for it.” Gareth grinned. “Directing housemaids and gardeners can’t be much different from directing clerks, can it, darling?”

A thought struck her. “What shall I do with the shop?” she asked him. “I can’t very well run it from here.”

He shrugged. “Whatever you like. Sell it, or keep it and hire a manager. I do hope you’ll show it to me, though. My sisters will never let me hear the end of it if I don’t take them to visit the finest, largest draper’s shop in Melchester.” Ignoring the way her parents were now gaping at them both, he brushed a loose wisp of hair back from her face. “Now, change out of this ghastly dress.”

She struggled to keep back a laugh, wondering if her parents had noticed the damage Gareth had inflicted upon the garment.

“But Your Grace,” said Millicent hesitantly. She was wringing her handkerchief and looked quite dazed. Sir George, on the other hand, looked as though he’d be sick at any moment. “What about the wedding?”

Gareth shrugged. “My mother has already set out for the church. She’ll explain as much as necessary. I suggest you and Sir George compose yourself into gracious, even joyous, approval before she and the other guests return to the house.” He gave her a very ducal stare. “If there is any scandal attached to this morning’s events, I will hold you directly responsible. My mother couldn’t have been happier when I told her how much I love Cleo, and how dearly James loves Helen.”

“Oh,” said Millicent again, in a very small voice. “Yes—yes, of course, Your Grace.”

“Excellent.” Still holding Cleo’s hand, he turned and walked out of the room. In the corridor, the door barely closed behind them, he took her face in his hands and kissed her. “Thank God that’s over,” he murmured between kisses. “We can get on with more enjoyable things.”

She laughed, winding her arms around his neck even though they were in full view of anyone coming along the corridor. Although, now that she thought about it, most of the guests would be already at the church for a wedding that wouldn’t happen. They very nearly had Kingstag Castle to themselves. “Such as?”

His eyes gleamed. “This.” He kissed her again. “And escape. I’ve never been more desperate to get out of this house and spend a day at idle pleasure.”

Her breath caught. “Oh? Then perhaps … perhaps you might finally show me the grotto. I hear it’s not to be missed … and quite private.”

Gareth’s mouth crooked in his endearing half-smile. “Anything—and everything—you want, my darling. Today and forever after.”

About Caroline

Caroline Linden earned a math degree from Harvard University and wrote computer code before discovering that writing fiction was far more fun. Her books have won the NEC-RWA Reader’s Choice Beanpot Award, the Daphne du Maurier Award, and RWA’s RITA Award. If you’d like to be notified when her next book is available, visit her website to sign up for her newsletter. You can also follow her on twitter or like her on Facebook.

This novella was originally published in At the Duke’s Wedding, a collection of stories set at the Duke of Wessex’s wedding and starring Jack Willoughy, the Earl of Bruton, Lord Everett, and of course Sophronia and Hippolyta.

Other Books by Caroline

The Scandals Series

Love and Other Scandals

It Takes a Scandal

Love in the Time of Scandal — May 2015

The Truth About the Duke Series

I Love the Earl

One Night in London

Blame It on Bath

The Way to a Duke’s Heart

The anthology featuring When I Met my Duchess

At the Duke’s Wedding

The Bow St. Spies Series

A View to a Kiss

For Your Arms Only

You Only Love Once

The Reece Family Series

What a Gentleman Wants

What a Rogue Desires

A Rake’s Guide to Seduction

Other Novels

What a Woman Needs

Short Stories

Like None Other

Written in my Heart

A Note to Readers

This novella was my very first published work, and I’m delighted to make it available again for any readers who might have missed it.

The story was originally published in May 2009 under the title The Legend of the Werestag. I know, I know. It’s the weirdest title ever! At the time, I was a new author and hoped to catch attention through the sheer strangeness of it. But this is not, and never has been, a paranormal romance—just a light-hearted, sexy Regency romance with a few twists on gothic novels. The new title, How to Catch a Wild Viscount, better captures that spirit.

Even years and years after writing their story, I have such fondness in my heart for Luke and Cecily. I hope you enjoy their romance. As always, thanks for reading.

Tessa

Chapter One

Autumn, 1815

WHEN THEY’D ENTERED SWINFORD WOODS, laughing and making merry, passing around a flask of spirits “for warmth”, Denny had offered a forfeit to the first hunter to spot the beast. His last bottle of apple brandy from the pressing two years past.

Well, it would appear Cecily had won. It seemed doubtful, however, that she would survive to claim her prize.

Peering through the darkness, she studied her quarry. Dark, beady eyes regarded her around an elongated nose. The curved, lethal tip of a horn glittered in the moonlight. The creature’s rank, gamy odor assaulted her, even from several paces away.

The animal impatiently pawed the leaf-strewn forest floor, fixing her all the while with an offended glare. Good heavens, it was enormous. It must outweigh her by ten stone, at least.

She didn’t know what to do. Should she run? Climb a tree? Feign death and hope it lost interest and went away? She’d become separated from the others some ways back—stupid, stupid. Would they even hear her, if she called?

“Denny?” she ventured. The animal cocked its head, and Cecily cleared her throat to try again. “Portia? Mr. Brooke?”

The beast shuffled toward her, great slabs of muscle flexing beneath its hoary coat.

“Not you,” she told it, taking a quick step back. “Shoo. Go home.”

It bristled and snarled, revealing a narrow row of jagged teeth. Moonlight pooled like liquid around its massive jaw. Good Lord, the thing was drooling.

Truly panicked now, she drew a deep breath and called as loud as she could. “Denny! Help!”

No answer.

Oh, Lord. She was going to be slaughtered, right here in the forest. Miss Cecily Hale, a lady of perfectly good breeding and respectable fortune, not to mention oft-complimented eyes, would die unmarried and childless because she’d wasted her youth pining for a man who didn’t love her. She would perish here in Swinford Woods, alone and heartbroken, having received only two kisses in the entirety of her three-and-twenty years. The second of which she could still taste on her lips, if she pressed them together tightly enough.

It tasted bitter.

Luke, you unforgivable cad. This is all your fault. If only you hadn’t—

A savage grunt snapped her back into the present. Cecily looked on in horror as the vile creature lowered its head, stamped the ground—

And began to charge.

God, she truly was going to die. Whose brilliant idea had it been, to go hunting a legendary beast in a cursed forest, by the light of a few meager torches and a three-quarters moon?

Oh, yes. Hers.

Three hours earlier

“MENACING CLOUDS OBSCURED the moon’s silvered radiance.” Portia flattened one palm against a low-slung, imaginary sky. Her voice portentous, she continued to read from the notebook. “With a mighty crack of thunder, the heavens rent. Rain lashed the crumbling abbey in unremitting torrents, and a crystalline gale blasted like the very breath of Hell.”

From her chair near the hearth, Cecily checked a smile. This performance was pure Portia, right down to the dramatic toss of her unbound, jet-black mane.

“Rain filled the gargoyles’ straining mouths, sluicing down to their craven talons and pooling in the Byzantine crevasses, viscous and obsidian.” Portia dropped the notebook to her lap and closed her eyes, as though to savor the suspense. Then her eyes snapped open, and she tore the page from her notebook and crumpled it savagely before casting it into the fire. “Rubbish. Utter rubbish.”

“It isn’t rubbish,” Cecily protested dutifully. Friends, after all, were supposed to support one another, and if Portia wanted to write gothic novels, Cecily would encourage her. It was gratifying to see her friend excited about something—anything—now that she’d emerged from her year of mourning. “It’s a fine beginning,” she said. “Dramatic and chilling. Truly, it gave me a little shiver.”

“Perhaps there’s a draft,” Mr. Brooke remarked.

Portia ignored him. “Do you really think it will do?” She chewed her lip and fished a pencil from the folds of her skirt. “Maybe I should write it down again.”

“You should. You most certainly should. I don’t believe I’ve ever heard a group of sentences so…so very…”

“Wet?” The suggestion came from a shadowed corner of the drawing room.

Cecily recognized the deep, wry voice, but she refused to acknowledge the speaker. Why should she? Luke had spent the past week at Swinford ruthlessly ignoring her. Four years ago, during a ball at this very house, they’d been interrupted in the midst of a most intimate conversation. He’d left to join his regiment before dawn, and Cecily had spent four long years—the best years of her youth—waiting for him to return, praying God would one day give them a chance to resume that discussion.

Now he’d come back. They’d been in the same house for eight days. And he’d made it perfectly, painfully clear he had nothing whatever to say.

Well, she supposed she must be fair. He had spoken the word “wet” just now.

“Atmospheric,” she said evenly, forbidding any note of impatience or frustration or bitter heartbreak to tweak her voice. “I was going to say it’s very atmospheric.”

Portia looked to their host. “Denny, what did you think?”

Cecily shot him a pleading glance. She and Denny had practically grown up together, and she knew him well enough to recognize the peril in Portia’s question. He was a good-hearted, uncomplicated man, and he had a way of being too honest at times, without realizing it. Come on, Denny. Give her a kind word. A convincing one.

“Capital,” he exclaimed, rather too loudly to sound sincere. “First rate, I’m sure. At least, I know I could never write a thing to touch it, what with the torrents and the sluicing and those Byzantine crevasses.”

Portia pinched the bridge of her nose. “Lord. It is rubbish.”

“If you want my opinion…” Brooke said, lifting a decanter of whiskey.

“I don’t.”

Brooke, of course, was undeterred. To the contrary, a keen anticipation lit his eyes. The man possessed a cutting wit, and used it to draw blood. Some gentlemen angled trout while on holiday; others shot game. Arthur Brooke made it a sport to disenchant—as though it were his personal mission to drive fancy and naiveté to extinction.

He said smugly, “My dear Mrs. Yardley, you have assembled a lovely collection of words.”

Portia eyed him with skepticism. “I don’t suppose that’s a compliment.”

“No, it isn’t,” he answered. “Pretty words, all, but there are too many of them. With so many extravagant ornaments, one cannot make out the story beneath.”

“I can make out the story quite clearly,” Cecily protested. “It’s nighttime, and there is a terrific storm.”

“There you have it,” Denny said. “It was a dark and stormy night.” He made a generous motion toward Portia. “Feel free to use that. I won’t mind.”

With a groan, Portia rose from her chair and swept to the window. “The difficulty is, this is not a dark and stormy night. It is clear, and well-lit by the moon, and unseasonably warm for autumn. Terrible. I was promised a gothic holiday to inspire my literary imagination, and Swinford Manor is hopeless. Mr. Denton, your house is entirely too cheerful and maintained.”

“So sorry to disappoint,” Denny said. “Shall I instruct the housekeeper to neglect the cobwebs in your chambers?”

“That wouldn’t be nearly enough. There’s still that sprightly toile wallpaper to contend with—all those gamboling lambs and frolicking dairymaids. Can you imagine, this morning I found myself humming! I expected this house to be decrepit, lugubrious…”

“Lugubrious.” Brooke drawled the word into his whiskey. “Another pretty word, lugubrious. More than pretty. Positively voluptuous with vowels, lugubrious. And spoken with such…mellifluence.”

Portia flicked him a bemused glance.

He added, “One pretty word deserves another, don’t you think?”

“I don’t suppose that’s a compliment.”

“This time it is.” He raised his glass to her. “But if it’s gothic inspiration you seek, Mrs. Yardley, I suggest you look to our companion.” He swiveled to face Luke’s corner. “Lord Merritt, I must say you are the picture of decrepitude. Lugubrious, indeed.”

Luke said nothing.

Did they teach men that in the army? Cecily wondered. Drill them in the practice of cold, perfect silence? Years ago, he’d been so open and engaging. So easy to speak with. It was one of the things she’d most lov—

No. She must not use that word, not any longer.

“Actually,” said Portia, giving Luke an assaying look, “with that dark, ruffled hair; the possessive sprawl of his limbs… I would say he is the picture of gothic intrigue and raw animal magnetism.” With a dramatic sigh, she returned to her chair. “That’s it. I shall put aside my novel for the evening and work on my list instead.”

“Your list?” Denny asked. “What kind of list?”

“My list of potential lovers.”

Cecily coughed. “Portia, surely you don’t…”

“Oh, surely I do. I am no longer in mourning. I am a widow now, financially and otherwise independent, and I intend to make the most of it. I shall write scandalous novels and take a dozen lovers.”

“All at once?” Brooke quipped.

“Perhaps in pairs,” she retorted, without missing a beat.

The two locked gazes in challenge, and Cecily did not miss the current of attraction that passed between them. Portia, be careful. She knew her friend’s salacious plans to be nine-tenths brave talk. But Brooke could take that last tenth, her vulnerable, lonely heart, and slice it to ribbons.

“Luke Trenton, the Viscount Merritt,” Portia said, scribbling in her notebook. She gave Brooke a spiteful glare. “We widows do favor those dark, haunted types.”

No. She wouldn’t. She couldn’t possibly be so obtuse. During all the years Luke was at war, Cecily had never told Portia of her hopes—she’d scarcely dared admit them to herself—but surely her friend must know her well enough to understand, to intuit…

“I thank you for the compliment, Mrs. Yardley,” Luke said from the shadows.

No. He wouldn’t. He couldn’t possibly be so cruel.

“Actually, Portia,” Cecily said, determined to cauterize this vein of conversation, “you may find gothic inspiration in the neighborhood, if not within the house. Denny, tell her that story you used to tell me when we were children, summering here.”

His brow creased, and he ruffled his sandy hair. “The one about the vinegar bottle?”

“No, no. The one about the woods that border Corbinsdale.”

“Corbinsdale?” Brooke asked. “Isn’t that the Earl of Kendall’s estate?”

“The very one,” Denny said. “And well done, Cecily. Now that is a story for Portia’s gothic novel.”

“I don’t know about my novel,” Portia said, scribbling again, “but the Earl of Kendall definitely goes on the list.”

“Now wait,” Luke protested, “I cease to be complimented, if you’re lumping me in with that old devil.” He eased his chair into the firelight, and Cecily could not divert her gaze in time. Or perhaps she simply could not bring herself to look away. Portia was right; he did look haunted. Haunted, haggard, in perpetual need of a shave. The rough suggestion of a beard covered a sharply angled jaw and crept up gaunt, hollow cheeks. His face seemed more shadow than substance now. And his eyes… She could scarcely make out the green anymore, through that persistent glaze of liquor. When their gazes met, she saw only the pupils: two hard, black lodestones that trapped her gaze, pulled the air from her lungs, drew on her heart.

Oh, Luke. What has happened to you?

He turned away.

“The old devil you refer to died almost a year ago,” Denny informed him. “The son’s inherited now. A good enough fellow.”

“So the ladies report.” Portia flashed a wicked smile as she underscored Lord Kendall’s name in her book. “He’s quite a favorite with the widows, you know. Oh, Mr. Denton, do invite him for dinner!”

“Can’t. He’s not in residence at Corbinsdale. Never is, this time of year.”

“Pity,” said Brooke dryly.

“Indeed,” Portia sighed. “My list is back to one.”

“Leave him alone.” Cursing her unthinking response, Cecily added, “Lord Kendall, I mean. And do put away your list. Denny was about to tell his story.”

Luke moved to the edge of his armchair. Those cold, dark eyes held her captive as he posed a succinct, incisive question. “Jealous, Cecy?”

Cecy. No one had called her that in years. Not since that last night before he’d left, when he’d wound a strand of her hair about his finger and leaned in close, with that arrogant, devastating smile teasing one corner of his mouth. Won’t you miss me, Cecy?

Four years later, and her blood still responded just as fiercely as it had that night, pounding in her heart and pushing a hot blush to her throat.

She had missed him. She missed him still.

“Don’t be ridiculous,” she said, deliberately misunderstanding him. “Why should I be jealous of Lord Kendall?”

“Yes, how absurd.” Portia gave a throaty laugh. “Everyone knows Cecily’s going to marry Denny.”

Lifting his tumbler of whiskey, Luke retreated into the shadows. “Do they?”

Was it disappointment she detected in his voice? Or merely boredom? And for heaven’s sake, why couldn’t she simply forbid herself to care?

“Denny, won’t you tell Portia the story? Please. It’s so diverting.” She forced a bright tone, even as tears pricked her eyes.

“As you wish.” Denny went to the hearth and stirred the fire, sending up a plume of orange sparks. “The tale begins well before my time. It’s common knowledge, among the locals, that the woods stretching between Swinford and Corbinsdale are cursed.”

“Cursed,” Brooke scoffed. “Ignorance and superstition are the true curses. Their remedy is education. Don’t you sponsor a school on this estate, Denny?”

“It’s a story,” Portia said. “Even schoolchildren know the difference. And they could teach you something about imagination. Your cynicism is not only tiresome, but pitiable.”

“You pity me? How amusing.”

“Pity won’t get you on my list.”

“Really?” Brooke smirked. “It seems to have worked for Lord Merritt.”

Enough. Cecily leapt to her feet. “A man-beast!” she exclaimed, gesturing wildly toward the windows. “There’s a fiendish creature living in those woods, half man and half beast!”

There, now she had everyone’s attention. Even Luke’s, for the first time all week. He was regarding her as though she were a madwoman, but still.

Denny pouted. “Really, Cecily. I was getting to that.”

She gave him an apologetic shrug. She was sorry to ruin the end of his story, but it was what he deserved for dithering so.

“A man-beast?” Portia asked, her eyes widening. “Oh, I do like the sound of this.” She put pencil to paper again.

Brooke leaned over her shoulder. “Are you taking notes for your novel or adding to your list?”

“That depends,” she said coolly, “on what manner of beast we’re discussing.” She looked to Denny. “Some sort of large, ferocious cat, I hope? All fangs and claws and fur?”

“Once again I must disappoint you,” Denny replied. “No fangs, no claws. It’s a stag.”

“Oh, prongs! Even better.” More scribbling. “What do they call this…this man-beast? Does it have a name?”

“Actually,” said Denny, “most people in the region avoid speaking of the creature at all. It’s bad luck, they say, just to mention it. And a sighting of the beast…well, that’s an omen of death.”

“Excellent. This is all so inspiring.” Portia’s pencil was down to a nub. “So is this a creature like a centaur, divided at the waist? Four hooves and two hands?”

“No, no,” Cecily said. “He’s not half man, half beast in that way. He transforms, you see, at will. Sometimes he’s a man, and other times he’s an animal.”

“Ah. Like a werewolf,” Portia said.

Brooke laughed heartily. “For God’s sake, would you listen to yourselves? Curses. Omens. Prongs. You would honestly entertain this absurd notion? That Denny’s woods are overrun with a herd of vicious man-deer?”

“Not a herd,” Denny said. “I’ve never heard tell of more than one.”

“We don’t know that he’s vicious,” Cecily added. “He may be merely misunderstood.”

“And we certainly can’t call him a man-deer. That won’t do at all.” Portia chewed her pencil thoughtfully. “A werestag. Isn’t that a marvelous title? The Curse of the Werestag.”

Brooke turned to Luke. “Rescue me from this madness, Merritt. Tell me you retain some hold on your faculties of reason. What say you to the man-deer?”

“Werestag,” Portia corrected.

Luke circled the rim of his glass with one thumb. “A cursed, half-human creature, damned to an eternity of solitude in Denny’s back garden?” He shot Cecily a strange, fleeting glance. “I find the idea quite plausible.”

Brooke made an inarticulate sound of disgust.

“There’s a bright moon tonight. And fine weather.” Portia put aside her pencil and book, a merry twinkle shining in her eyes. Cecily recognized that twinkle. It spoke of daring, and imprudent adventure.

Which suited Cecily fine. If she had to endure this miserable tension much longer, she would grow fangs and claws herself. Imprudent adventure seemed a welcome alternative. With a brave smile, she rose to her feet. “What are we waiting for? Let’s go find him.”

Chapter Two

AT LAST, CECILY HAD HIM CORNERED.

The party had dispersed to prepare for their impromptu hunting excursion. Brooke and Denny had gone to see about footmen and torches. Cecily was supposed to be fetching a cloak and sturdier boots from her chambers, as Portia had done, but she’d tarried purposely until the three of them had left. Until she was alone with Luke. It was time to end this…this foolish dream she’d been living for years.

She cleared her throat. “Will you come with us, out to the woods?”

“Are you going to marry Denny?” He spoke in an easy, conversational tone. As though his answer depended on hers.

She briefly considered chastising his impudence, refusing to answer. But why not give an honest reply? He’d already made her humiliation complete, by virtue of his perfect indifference. She could sink no lower by revealing it. “There is no formal understanding between us. But everyone assumes I will marry him, yes.”

“Because you are so madly in love?”

Cecily gave a despairing sniff. “Please. Because we are cousins of some vague sort, and we can reunite the ancestral fortune.” She stared up at the gilt ceiling trim. “What else would people assume? For what other earthly reason would I have remained unmarried through four seasons? Certainly not because I’ve been clinging to a ridiculous infatuation all this time. Certainly not because I’ve wasted the best years of my youth and spurned innumerable suitors, pining after a man who had long forgotten me. No, no one would ever credit that reasoning. They could never think me such a ninny as that.”

That cold, empty silence again. A sob caught in her throat.

“Was there anything in it?” she asked, not bothering to wipe the tear tracing the rim of her nose. “Our summer here, all those long walks and even longer conversations? When you kissed me that night, did it mean anything to you?”

When he did not answer, she took three paces in his direction. “I know how proud you must be of those enigmatic silences, but I believe I deserve an answer.” She stood between his icy silence and the heated aura of the fire. Scorched on one side, bitterly cold on the other—like a slice of toast someone had forgotten to turn.

“What sort of answer would you like to hear?”

“An honest one.”

“Are you certain? It’s my experience that young ladies vastly prefer fictions. Little stories, like Portia’s gothic novel.”

“I am as fond of a good tale as anyone,” she replied, “but in this instance, I wish to know the truth.”

“So you say. Let us try an experiment, shall we?” He rose from his chair and sauntered toward her, his expression one of jaded languor. His every movement a negotiation between aristocratic grace and sheer brute strength.

Power. He radiated power in every form—physical, intellectual, sensual—and he knew it. He knew that she sensed it.

The fire was unbearably warm now. Blistering, really. Sweat beaded at her hairline, but Cecily would not retreat.

“I could tell you,” he said darkly, seductively, “that I kissed you that night because I was desperate with love for you, overcome with passion, and that the color of my ardor has only deepened with time and separation. And that when I lay on a battlefield bleeding my guts out, surrounded by meaningless death and destruction, I remembered that kiss and was able to believe that there was something of innocence and beauty in this world, and it was you.” He took her hand and brought it to his lips. Almost. Warm breath caressed her fingertips. “Do you like that answer?”

She gave a breathless nod. She was a fool; she couldn’t help it.

“You see?” He kissed her fingers. “Young ladies prefer fictions.”

“You are a cad.” Cecily wrenched her hand away and balled it into a fist. “An arrogant, insufferable cad.”

“Yes, yes. Now we come to the truth. Shall I give you an honest answer, then? That I kissed you that night for no other reason than that you looked uncommonly pretty and fresh, and though I doubted my ability to vanquish Napoleon, it was some balm to my pride to conquer you, to feel you tremble under my touch? And that now I return from war, to find everything changed, myself most of all. I scarcely recognize my surroundings, except…” He cupped her chin in his hand and lightly framed her jaw between his thumb and forefinger. “Except Cecily Hale still looks at me with stars in her eyes, the same as she ever did. And when I touch her, she still trembles.”

Oh. She was trembling. He swept his thumb across her cheek, and even her hair shivered.

“And suddenly…” His voice cracked. Some unrehearsed emotion pitched his dispassionate drawl into a warm, expressive whisper. “Suddenly, I find myself determined to keep this one thing constant in my universe. Forever.”

She swallowed hard. “Do you intend to propose to me?”

“I don’t think so, no.” He caressed her cheek again. “I’ve no reason to.”

“No reason?” Had she thought her humiliation complete? No, it seemed to be only beginning.

“I’ll get my wish, Cecy, whether I propose to you or not. You can marry Denny, and I’ll still catch you stealing those starry looks at me across drawing rooms, ten years from now. You can share a bed with him, but I’ll still haunt your dreams. Perhaps once a year on your birthday—or perhaps on mine—I’ll contrive to brush a single fingertip oh-so-lightly between your shoulder blades, just to savor that delicious tremor.” He demonstrated, and she hated her body for responding just as he’d predicted.

An ironic smile crooked his lips. “You see? You can marry anyone or no one. But you’ll always be mine.”

“I will not,” she choked out, pulling away. “I will put you out of my mind forever. You are not so very handsome, you know, for all that.”

“No, I’m not,” he said, chuckling. “And there’s the wonder of it. It’s nothing to do with me, and everything to do with you. I know you, Cecily. You may try to put me out of your mind. You may even succeed. But you’ve built a home for me in your heart, and you’re too generous a soul to cast me out now.”

She shook her head. “I—”

“Don’t.” With a sudden, powerful movement, he grasped her waist and brought her to him, holding her tight against his chest. “Don’t cast me out.”

His mouth fell on hers, hard and fast, and when her lips parted in surprise, he thrust his tongue deep into her mouth. He kissed her hungrily, thoroughly, without finesse or restraint, as though he hadn’t kissed a woman in years and might not survive to kiss another tomorrow. Raw, undisguised need shuddered through his frame as he took from her everything he could—her inhibitions, her anger, her very breath.

And still she yearned to give him more. Arching on tiptoe, she threaded her hands into his hair and boldly touched her tongue to his. She’d been afraid to, the last time. But she wasn’t afraid now, and she wasn’t satisfied with a timid, schoolgirl kiss. Her body bowed into his, and he moaned as he kissed her deeper still. This was what she’d been dreaming of, for so long. His taste, his warmth, his strength surrounding her. This was Luke.

This was Luke.

The man who’d years ago held her, kissed her, and left her in the morning without so much as an adieu. The man who saw no reason to marry her now. He was just going to do it all again. Hold her, kiss her…then leave her alone and yearning for him. Forever.

She pushed against his shoulders, breaking the kiss. “Luke—”

“Cecy,” he murmured, his mouth falling to the underside of her jaw. He burrowed into the curve of her neck, licking her pulse, catching her earlobe between his teeth…

“Luke, no.” Her voice was thick.

His hand slid up to roughly clutch her breast, and he nipped her ear, hard. Pain and pleasure shot through her, and she dug her fingernails into his neck. For a mad moment, she wanted to bite him too. To punish him, mark him…to taste him one more time.

“Stop.” She fisted her hands in his hair and tugged. “Stop.”

He froze, then slowly raised his head. His lips still held the shape of a kiss, and she slapped his cheek hard enough to make them go slack.

“Stop,” she repeated clearly. “I won’t let you do this to me again.”

He blinked, slowly relinquishing his grip on her breast. Then releasing her entirely.

Cecily knew better than to expect an apology. She smoothed the front of her gown. “I ought to have Denny cast you out of this house.”

“You should.” Luke stared at her, rubbing his jaw with one hand. “But you won’t.”

“You think you know me so well? It’s been four years. I’m not that naïve, infatuated girl any longer. People change.”

“Some people do. But not you.”

“Just watch me, Luke.” She backed out of the room. “Just watch me.”

LUKE WATCHED FROM HIS BEDCHAMBER WINDOW as the would-be-gothic, all-too-comic hunting party sallied forth. Footmen bearing torches flanked the four adventurers: Intrepid Denny in the lead; the dark-haired Portia and slender Brooke a few paces behind, squabbling as they went. Cecily, with her flaxen hair and dove-gray cloak, bringing up the rear—graceful, pensive, lovely. She’d always worn melancholy well. She was rather like the moon that way: a fixture of bright, alluring sadness that kept watch with him each night.

No, she had not changed. Not for him.

He watched as the “hunters” crested a small rise at the edge of the green. On the downslope, Cecily made a brisk surge forward and took Denny’s arm. Then together they disappeared, the green-black shadows of the forest swallowing them whole.

Luke felt no desire to chase after them. He’d had his fill of tramping through cold, moonlit forests—forests, and mountain ranges, and picked-clean orchards and endless fallow fields. He was weary of marching, and bone-tired of battle. Yet if he wanted Cecily, it seemed he must muster the strength to fight once more.

Did he truly want to win?

The answers were supposed to come to him here. Here at Swinford Manor, where they’d spent that idyllic summer, racing ponies and reading Tom Jones and rolling up the carpet to dance reels in the hall. When Denny had invited him back for this house party, Luke had eagerly accepted. He’d supposed he would greet Cecily, kiss her proffered hand and simply know what to do next. Things had always been easy between them, before. And the way he saw it, the pertinent questions were simple, and few:

Did she still care for him?

Did he still want her?

Yes, and yes. God, yes.

And yet nothing was easy between them, and Cecily had questions of her own.

When you kissed me that night, did it mean anything to you? How could he give her an honest answer? When he’d kissed her that night, it had meant little. But there’d been moments in the years since—dark, harrowing, nightmarish moments—when that kiss had come to mean everything. Hope. Salvation. A reason to drag one mud-caked boot in front of the other and press on, while men around him fell. He had remembered Cecily, in times and places he hadn’t expected to think of her at all. In places a delicate, well-bred lady had no business intruding. He’d dragged that memory—that fresh, pure kiss—through muck, sweat, blood. Surely he’d sullied it, tainted her innocent affection with violence and raw physical need. His behavior tonight had proved that beyond any doubt. He’d sniped at her and insulted her, provoked her to tears. Embraced her not to offer affection or comfort, but only because a twisted spear of aggression drove him to claim her body for his own.

He’d bitten her, for Christ’s sake.

People change, she’d said.

Yes, dear Cecily. They do, indeed. In more ways than you could dream.

A hollow laugh rattled in his chest. Portia had pulled them all out to the forest, to hunt for her fabled “werestag”? Little did she know, they’d left the true beast here at the house. He’d been prowling this bedchamber every night, driven wild by the knowledge only two oaken doors and some fifty paces of wainscoted corridor lay between him and the woman he’d crossed a continent to hold. By day, he’d been drinking himself into a stupor, positioning himself at the opposite end of every room, adopting a temporary vow of silence. Futile efforts, all. He’d known a scene like tonight’s was coming, and he’d known it would end with Cecily hurting and in tears. Charm, politesse, gentlemanly behavior—they’d long ago been stripped away. He was down to his basest form now, both hardened and desperate, and if she had not slapped him cold this evening, only the devil knew what he would have done to her. Cecily was far safer roaming a cursed forest with Denny.

She was safer with Denny, in general.

Sighing heavily, Luke closed the velvet drapes. He tugged his cravat loose, then rang for his valet and poured himself yet another tumbler of whiskey.

Time to be honest. He did know what to do about Cecily. The answer was easy, and there was just enough human decency left in him to divine it. He’d known it the moment he’d pressed his cracked, weathered lips to her pale, delicate fingers eight days past.

He had to let her go.

LUKE FOLLOWED HER INTO THE FOREST.

Cecily tried to leave him behind, but she couldn’t. The memories stalked her down the root-scored pathways; her thoughts cast long, flickering shadows. Two kisses they’d shared now: one innocent and fresh, one desperate and demanding. Both intoxicating. Stirring, in ways she scarcely had words to describe. She’d wanted him, even as a girl, though she’d hardly known what it meant. Now a woman, she understood longing and claimed more than a passing acquaintance with desire. And she burned for him, body and soul. She must find some way to extinguish that fire, before it consumed her completely.

“Tell us more about the werestag,” Portia called to Denny.

It took Cecily a moment to understand what her friend meant, and to recall that they were not hunting Luke in the undergrowth.

“Is the legend centuries old?” Portia asked, stepping over a fallen branch.

“Not at all,” Denny answered. “Mere decades. If you believe the locals, these woods have been cursed for generations, but the man-beast is only one of the more recent victims.”

“Oh, come now.” Brooke swatted an insect against his neck, then squinted at his hand before wiping it against his trousers. “What evidence is there for this supposed curse? Unless by ‘cursed’ you mean plagued by midges, in which case I readily capitulate.”

“People have died here,” Cecily said.

“People die everywhere.”

“Yes, but this forest claims more than its share,” Denny said, pausing and raising his torch high. “And it has a taste for the young and foolhardy.”

“Of course it does,” Brooke argued. “Most people who die of accidental causes are young and foolhardy.”

Denny shrugged. “Believe what you will. But there is no way to disclaim the fact that nearly every family in the area has been touched by some tragedy that occurred here. Even aristocracy cannot escape the curse. Why, the old Earl of Kendall’s—”

“This local history is all so very fascinating,” Portia interrupted, taking Denny’s other arm, “but could we return to the story of the werestag? If we’re going to find him, we ought to know what we’re about.”

“Yes, of course.”

Denny began to tell the story, and Cecily purposefully fell a few paces behind. She’d heard this tale before, many times. How an impoverished man, desperate to feed his ailing wife and children, had gone into the forest at night to trap game. Such poaching was illegal and incurred stiff penalties, but Denny’s grandfather had generally turned a blind eye to the practice. The man in the story, however, had made the grave mistake of wandering across the Corbinsdale border, and the old Earl of Kendall did not share Mr. Denton’s leniency. Men had been sentenced to hard labor, even transportation, for the offense of poaching on Kendall land.

“So there he was,” she heard Denny recounting in a dramatic tone, “crouched over his brace of pheasants, when he heard the hounds. The Corbinsdale gamekeeper had spotted him. The poor fellow ran, even dodged a bullet or two, weaving through the woods. But he couldn’t outrun the dogs forever. He tried throwing them the pheasants, but the hounds were well trained and barely stopped to sniff at the birds.”

Denny paused, drew up, considered. At length, he pointed right. “There’s a deer trail, just here. We’ll follow it.”

Although the winding ribbon of trail was only wide enough for one, Portia clung to Denny’s arm. “What did he do? The hunter, being chased by the dogs?”

“Ah, yes. Just as the dogs were about to reach him, the man fell to his knees and pleaded with the spirits of the forest to spare his life.”

“And…?”

“And a strange force struck him to the ground, and when his consciousness returned—he’d been transformed into a stag. A white one, so the story goes.”

“Absurd,” Brooke grumbled.

“After that, he easily outran the dogs—made it all the way back to Denton land. He was even able to change back into human form, once the danger had passed. But the spirits had played a cruel trick on him, you see—for he could never leave the woods again. Every time he tried to set a foot—or hoof—beyond the woodland border, some mystical force would throw him back. The forest spirits saved his life, but now they will not relinquish it.”

“What of his family?” Portia asked.

“His wife died,” Denny answered. “The orphaned children were sent to a workhouse. And the man-beast”—he cleared his throat—“beg pardon, werestag, has been doomed to roam the forest ever since.”

“Rubbish. Poppycock. Lies, all of it lies.” Brooke strode to the lead, then halted and turned to face the group. Everyone tripped to a standstill. “Legends,” he continued, “always have a logical explanation. This is clearly a cautionary tale, concocted by old, toothless grandmothers. Everyone knows the old earl was rabid about hunting, and he had these woods stocked with exotic game—peacock, boar, and yes, even stag. Everyone knows his lands were a magnet for poachers, and that he dealt with trespassers harshly. Of course the locals created this man-deer nonsense. They wanted to scare young people, discourage them from wandering off into the woods.”

“Well, if that was their intent”—Cecily looked around the group—“it doesn’t seem to have worked.”

“That’s right.” Portia released Denny’s arm and continued on the path. “Here we are, plunging ever deeper into these cursed woods, unarmed and intrigued. Fearless.”

Brooke grabbed her elbow. “A thin line separates boldness from stupidity.”

“Yes.” Smiling sweetly, Portia looked at his hand on her arm. “You’re treading it.”

His lips thinned as he released her.

With an affable grin, Denny pulled out his flask. “I don’t know about you all, but I’m having a capital time.”

The group forged ahead in silence. Once again, Cecily let herself fall behind, the better to indulge her maudlin humor. She trailed them by ten paces or so, lingering in that auditory border between her companions’ crunching footsteps and the forest’s profound hush. The sounds were smaller here. The chirp of insects. The subtle cracks as tree limbs splintered overhead. Little currents of rustling that betrayed nocturnal creatures burrowing in the undergrowth. Somewhere far in the distance a confused rooster crowed, a good five hours premature. That happened, sometimes, when the moon was nearly full and so bright.

Cecily strained her ears. Could one hear moonlight? She almost imagined she could—one clear, silvery note ringing through the woods, like the hum of a celestial tuning fork. The sort of sound one felt in her bones, rather than detected with her ears.

Beautiful.

A bright flash caught her eye, like a distant bolt of mercury. She swiveled, tracking it left. It disappeared, and she froze, peering hard into the woods in the direction she’d seen it last. To the left, then up a slight rise…

There. There it was again. An arrow of white bounding through the shadows. And…could that sharp glint be a prong?

She turned and stepped toward it instinctively, then looked down in surprise when her boot failed to create the expected crunch. She’d assumed, in stepping off the path, she’d crush a goodly number of leaves and twigs beneath her heel.

But she hadn’t, because the smooth-packed furrow of the trail split here, directly under her boots. The right fork led toward Denny and the rest, now several paces ahead. The left path shot off in the direction of the mysterious silver-white flash.

A thin line separates boldness from stupidity.

Yes, and she’d crossed it four years ago.

The little laugh she gave surprised her, as did the ease with which she made a choice. The decision smacked of petulance and self-destructive tendencies. Cecily knew it.

She turned left anyhow.

Chapter Three

HE WAITED FOR HER.

There was no other possible explanation. The stag must have waited for her, patiently gleaming in the moonlight, while she followed the serpentine path through the woods. For after following the trail for just a few minutes, Cecily rounded a tight thicket of brambles to nearly collide with the beast.

He did not bolt, but stood his ground. Awed, she did the same. She fought to keep her breathing steady, to make no sudden movements. How curious, that after all the cautionary tales of a cursed man-beast—“Werestag,” she heard Portia correcting in her mind—Cecily was concerned about frightening him.

With a soft snort, the animal gave her his handsome profile and regarded her with one large, dark, intelligent eye. His creamy hide bunched shaggy and soft on the underside of his throat, then stretched taut over his backbone and haunches. One of his rear hooves stamped the ground, as though the power coiled in those haunches wanted to spring free.

Feeling a little bit silly—and why should she, she talked to horses and dogs all the time—she addressed him. “Can you understand me? My speech, I mean?” When he gave no response, she added, “If you can understand me, nod your head twice. Or tap your hoof, perhaps.”

His neck lengthened a fraction, so that his regal crown of antlers struck an even more impressive silhouette. I am not one of your horses or dogs, his proud bearing told her. I do not nod or tap on command.

Oh, yes. He understood her. Or rather, they understood one another.

A sense of affinity passed between them, a moment of mutual admiration and respect. Cecily’s fingers itched to stroke the felty thatch beneath his ear, to judge if it was really as soft as it looked. But she sensed it would offend him, to be petted in such a manner.

Then off he darted again, and she stared after him, entranced by the power and grace in his easy, bounding gait. The creature halted on a distant rise, his sleek form just an iridescent glimmer in the distance.

Twice more they played this dash-and-follow game, until she was certain they must be well into Corbinsdale land. The distance didn’t concern Cecily. The path was always there, to lead her back.

But then the path grew fainter. Until she wasn’t even sure she was following a trail anymore, but perhaps only tracing a dried-up rill. She could hear the stream gurgling in the distance. That same stream emerged from the woods into Denny’s south meadows, where they sometimes picnicked on pleasant afternoons.

A rancid odor filled the small depression where she’d halted—as though something were rotting nearby. A little shiver of nerves swept her, but she bade herself to stay calm and survey her surroundings.

She pivoted slowly. A copse of alder crowded her view, and the stag’s shining form had disappeared. But she was not lost. If she had no other alternative, she could follow the stream to those familiar meadows, then return to Swinford Manor from there. It would make for a long walk home, and a muddy one, but she had several hours of good moonlight left, and a warm cloak. There was no cause for alarm. She was in no danger of wandering aimlessly in the woods until she died of thirst or starvation.

A harsh grunt made her jump.

No, she was in danger of perishing in this very spot.

Cecily turned toward the ominous snuffling noise. There, in the underbrush, lurked a boar. She’d never seen a boar, but she knew this must be one—else it was the largest, hairiest, most foul-smelling and predatory pig she’d ever encountered.

“Denny?” she called. Then, louder: “Portia? Mr. Brooke?”

The malodorous thing shuffled closer. It was drooling. Slobbering and snorting. The beast’s rubbery lips quivered and curled, revealing a pair of sharp, menacing tusks to complement the smaller, hooked set bracketing his snout.

“Go away,” she told it. “Shoo.”

No response.

A cloud moved across the moon, painting the forest a darker shade of greenish-gray.

“Denny! Help!”

As the beast lowered its head and began to charge, thoughts rioted in Cecily’s brain. Regrets, mostly. Of all the disgusting, miserable, lonely ways to die, she would end like this? And though she knew she had no one to blame but herself for this predicament, she felt an unreasoned surge of anger toward Luke. If he cared for her the slightest bit, she wouldn’t be here at all.

That irrational stab of fury broke her silence. She had already stood up to one brute this evening. She would not go quietly now.

“Arrogant, insufferable cad!” she screamed at the boar, grabbing up a fallen branch and raising it high above her head. Widening her stance, she braced for the impact, forcing herself to be patient…wait… She would only have one chance, one swing.

A benevolent gust of wind whipped the hair out of her face. She focused her gaze on one flattened, bristled ear and tightened her grip.

Almost…almost…

Now.

Just as she swung, some unseen force tackled Cecily from the side. She felt herself lifted effortlessly, then hurled to the ground. The stick clattered from her grasp. Loamy soil clotted against her cheek, and her fingernails scrabbled in moss and decaying leaves.

She struggled to rise, but a heavy weight held her pinned against the ground. Was it the boar? It couldn’t be. She felt no bristles against her flesh, and it didn’t smell nearly bad enough. She tried to scream, but a hand clamped over her mouth.

A hand. Yes. Fingers, palm, thumb. Human.

“Be still,” a deep voice growled.

And then the boar was upon them both.

Cecily’s face slammed against the turf again as the beast’s second charge hit home. Despite the jolt, she was aware of the stranger’s frame surrounding her body, absorbing the worst of the blow. When the boar eased off, presumably to charge again, the stranger released Cecily’s mouth, grabbed the tree branch she had dropped, and rolled over swinging. Even with her face still pressed into the dirt, she heard a dull crack and a porcine squeal of pain that told her the club had hit its mark.

The man’s weight was gone from her now, and she rolled onto her back, propping herself up on one elbow. A few paces away, the stranger—her protector—staggered to his feet and squared off against the angry boar. With the crosshatch of branches overhead and the clouds obscuring the moon, Cecily could barely make out the forms of man and beast as they circled one another, much less make out the stranger’s face.

“Denny?” she asked tentatively. His build appeared different from Denny’s, but then it was dark and difficult to see. “Denny, is that you?”

The man gave no response. Really, how could he, with the boar charging him again?

Survival first, she chided herself. Introductions later.

The stranger dodged right and swung, clouting the beast on the ear with his club. Amidst the boar’s angry squeals, Cecily registered the sound of ripping fabric and a masculine grunt of pain.

“Oh! Are you hurt?” She stepped forward, keeping her eyes focused on the writhing heap of hoary animal between them.

“Get back.” The command was delivered in a savage, almost inhuman voice.

The great boar struggled to regain its feet, and the man rushed forward to kick it in the head. The beast rooted and snapped with its snout and jaws, trying to bite the man’s foot. One tusk fishhooked on boot leather, pulling the man off balance and sending him crashing to the ground. The two were locked together now, boar’s jaw to man’s boot, and the stranger used the position to his advantage. Bracing himself on hands and elbows, he stomped and kicked with his free leg, landing vicious blows to the boar’s throat, crown, jaw. The boar backed away, dragging the man with him, but the animal couldn’t free its tusk. Again and again, the man kicked, until the boar’s squeals became choked gurgles. The scent of fresh blood, metallic and sharp, mingled with the beast’s own stench.

Cecily backed away, nauseated by the sounds and smells of violence. She tripped over a tree root and stumbled back, coming to rest on her elbows. She stayed like that, staring up at a slice of cloudy sky visible through the branches, until the pummeling blows stopped and the boar wheezed its last rattling breath. Then she slumped back further, laying supine in the leaves. Her heart throbbed against her breastbone.

“Thank you,” she whispered to her unknown rescuer. If he hadn’t intervened, she would have certainly perished. He must be one of Denny’s footmen, she reasoned. Or perhaps a gamekeeper from Swinford or Corbinsdale.

But then, he had no hounds, no gun. Strange.

Feeling sufficiently recovered to risk a look at him, she rolled onto her side.

She saw no one.

A hand clamped around her ankle, and Cecily shrieked. She attempted to rise, but could do no more than scrabble sideways with her leg pinned thus. Her rescuer, now turned attacker, crouched at her feet and began shoving her skirts to her waist. Horrified, she kicked at him the way he’d kicked at the boar, but before her boot could connect with his face, he’d captured it in his other hand. His head disappeared from view, and she felt him burrowing under her petticoats.

Oh, God. What cruel work of Fate was this? This man had preserved her life, only to ravage her body? Temporarily pinning her left leg with his knee, he unlaced and removed her boot. Vise-like fingers gripped the bared arch of her foot.

She shoved at his shoulders through the folds of her skirts, beat on his back with her fists. “No,” she sobbed. “No, please.”

“Shhh.” A rush of hot breath warmed her inner thigh. “Be still,” came the rough voice muffled by fabric. “I won’t hurt you.”

Cecily felt a swift tug at her ribbon garter—and since his hands were occupied restraining her ankles, she knew he had to be using his mouth. She shuddered as the ribbon fell slack and a neat row of teeth closed around the edge of her sensible woolen stocking. Slowly, tenderly, with a lover’s finesse, he drew the stocking down her leg. A desperate sensation built within her as the wool scraped over her thigh, her knee, the sensitive slope of her calf. Her senses buzzed with an exquisite blend of heightened awareness and fear. She trembled.

He slid the stocking over her foot, then released both her legs. “Forgive me,” he murmured.

Cecily heard him rise to his feet and stride away. She fought to sit up, batting away the folds of cloak and petticoat blocking her view. When she finally managed to get upright, she spied the man retreating into the shadows. His face was impossible to make out. What moonlight remained lit only the pale, tattered remnants of one shirtsleeve and the mud-streaked, sinewy arm beneath. Around his forearm, he had wound her stocking.

A bandage. He had taken her stocking to dress his wound. And it must have been a serious injury, for Cecily could already discern a dark stain of blood seeping through the ivory wool.

“You’re wounded.” She finally managed to get standing all of a piece, balancing her weight on her right leg as her bare left toes squished in mud. “You need help.”

He ignored her, striding away at a purposeful speed. There was no way she could keep pace with him, not missing one boot.

“Stop, please!” she called. “Come back. I know who you are.”

And then, the far-off call: “Cecily?”

It was Denny’s voice. She cast a quick glance over her shoulder and caught the bobbing glow of torches in the distance.

“Cecily?” he called again. “Is that you? Are you all right?”

She whipped her neck back around to look for the man, but he’d already disappeared. Squinting hard, she scanned the thick curtain of forest, flattening the brown and green shadows into one shapeless mass and hoping for just one stray flash of—

Of quicksilver. There it was. A bolt of mercury, bounding through the trees.

“Cecily!” Denny’s voice was now joined by Portia’s. “Cecily, where are you?”

“Here,” she called. “I’m over here.”

The torches moved toward her, and Cecily melted with relief. She’d had enough imprudent adventure for one evening, thank you.

“Cecily. Thank God.” Pushing his way into the stand of alder, Denny hurried to her side. He put an arm about her shoulders, and she gratefully leaned into his embrace.

“Where have you been?” Portia scolded. “Why on earth did you leave the group? We’ve been—”

When a piercing shriek ended her friend’s harangue, Cecily knew the torchlight must have illumined the bloody remains of the boar. Not wanting to look, she buried her face in Denny’s coat.

“Good Lord,” said Brooke. “What’s happened here?”

Cecily lifted her face and looked round at the group. Denny, Brooke, all four footmen. It couldn’t have been any of them. Her suspicions were confirmed. Dare she tell them the truth?

She swallowed hard. “I’ve just met the werestag.”

Chapter Four

“WELL, THEN.” Luke took his seat at the breakfast table. He was last to arrive, as was his habit, and he addressed his general greetings to the table. “How was your hunting excursion last night? Did you catch a glimpse of your man-beast, Mrs. Yardley?”

“No,” Portia replied with a coy smile. “But Cecily did.”

He swung his gaze to the other side of the table, where Cecily sat, calmly nipping sugar into her teacup. “Is that so?”

“Yes, it is,” she replied in a matter-of-fact tone, not looking up from her tea.

“She caught more than a glimpse of him,” Denny said. “And he took her boot.”

“He did not take my boot. I mean, he took off my boot, but he gave it back. It was my stocking he kept.”

“Oh, naturally,” Luke muttered.

Cecily gave him a sharp look, clearly annoyed with his flippant response. But really, how should he respond to the notion of Cecily disrobing in the woods and distributing items of personal attire to mythical beasts? A servant approached, offering him a plate heaped with eggs and kippers and a ridiculous number of buttered rolls. Rubbing his temples, he waved it away. “Just coffee.” Surely this would all make more sense after coffee. “Would someone care to begin this tale at the beginning?”

Cecily looked to Portia. “You’re the writer.”

Portia lifted her eyebrows. “It’s your story.”

“I spied a white stag in the forest,” Cecily began, carefully buttering a point of toast as she spoke. “I followed him, and became separated from the group. Deep in the woods, a wild boar attacked me. A man appeared from nowhere and killed it.”

“Butchered it, more like.” Portia shuddered. “What a gruesome scene.”

“He saved my life.” Cecily’s chin lifted. “At great risk to his own. Then he took my stocking to bind his wound and left. Just as I lost sight of the man retreating through the woods, I saw the stag again, bounding away.” Her clear blue eyes met Luke’s. “It must have been the werestag.”

“Absurd,” Brooke said. “You didn’t see a ‘werestag’, Miss Hale. You saw a stag, and you saw a man. It does not follow that they are one and the same. The man who came to your aid could have been anyone. A poacher, perhaps. Or a gamekeeper.”

“He was unarmed,” said Cecily. “He had no hounds.”

“Still. There must be some rational explanation. If he was a stag transformed into a man, where did he get clothes? Does he keep them stashed under a bush somewhere?”

Portia asked, “Are you calling Cecily a liar?”

“Not at all,” Brooke replied evenly. “But after a traumatic event like that, it would be perfectly understandable if she were confused, overwrought…”

“I am not mad,” Cecily insisted, letting her butter knife clatter to her plate. “I know what I saw. I am not the sort of hysterical female who imagines things.”

“Are you sure?” Luke sipped his coffee. “Are you certain you’re not exactly that sort of female? The type to harbor romantic illusions and cling to them for years, hoping they’ll one day become the truth?”

Ah, if looks could fillet a man, Luke would have been breakfast. But he would rather have Cecily’s anger than her indifference, and for the first time in nine days, that was what he was sensing from her. Whatever, or whoever, she had encountered in the forest—be it man, animal, or something in-between—it had captured her imagination, and her loyalty as well. Those treasures that had so recently, if undeservedly, belonged to him.

Not anymore. The way she defended her tale so stridently, the lively spark in her eyes, the fetching blush staining her throat… Luke felt these subtle signals like jabs to his gut.

She was falling out of love with him. And fast.

“I’ve known Cecily all my life,” Denny said from the head of the table. “She’s an intelligent woman, both sensible and resourceful. She’s also my guest, and I won’t have her truthfulness or sanity questioned over breakfast.” He propped one forearm on the table and leaned forward, fixing Luke with what was, for ever-affable Denny, a surprisingly stern glare.

Luke acknowledged it with a slight nod. If he must surrender her to this man, it was some solace to see Denny was capable of protecting her. In a breakfast room, at least, if not a cursed forest.

Denny turned to Cecily and laid a hand on her wrist. “If you say you encountered a werestag last night, I believe you. Implicitly.”

“Thank you, Denny.” She gave him a warm smile.

How sweet. Truly, it made Luke’s stomach churn.

Ignoring Brooke’s grumbling objection, Luke swiped a roll from his neighbor’s plate and chewed it moodily. He ought to be rejoicing, he supposed, or at least feeling relieved. She should forget him, she should marry Denny, the two of them should be disgustingly happy.

But Luke could not be so charitable. For four years, she’d held on to that memory of their first, innocent kiss—and he had too. And he liked believing that no matter what occurred in the future—even if she married Denny, even if an ocean divided them—his and Cecily’s thoughts would always wander back to the same place: that graying bench tucked beneath the arbor in Swinford Manor’s side garden. He didn’t want to believe that she could forget that night. But even now, as she buttered another point of toast, he could sense her mind straying…and she wasn’t kissing him on a garden bench. She was deep in the forest with a blasted white stag.

Damn it, it wasn’t right. When she lay abed at night, she shouldn’t see charging boars and violent tussles. She should dream of the scent of night-blooming jasmine and the texture of organdy and the distant strains of an orchestra playing a stately sarabande. As he had, all those freezing, damp nights. As he would, in all the bitter years to come.

What had she called him, last night? An insufferable, arrogant cad. Yes, he was. He wanted Cecily pining for him forever, dreaming she could tame him, yearning for the tender love he could never, ever give. He wanted her to remember the old Luke, not fantasize about some uncivilized beast. And if this “werestag” had eclipsed the memory of their kiss with his gory midnight rescue…

Luke just would have to do it one better, and give Cecily a new memory to occupy her thoughts. An experience she could never forget.

DENNY DID NOT PLAY THE PIANOFORTE. No one in his household did. Yet when Cecily sat down to the instrument that afternoon, she found it recently polished and tuned to a crisp perfection. He must have had that done for her, in anticipation of her visit. Always so thoughtful, Denny.

Her fingers lingered over the keys, coaxing a somber melody from the instrument.

“Is that my funeral march?” Luke’s deep drawl, from somewhere behind her.

She froze to her fingertips.

“Don’t stop on my account,” he said. “Melancholy does become you so.”

She closed her eyes and drew a deep, slow breath. If he wished to taunt her…two could play at that game. Her fingers launched into a jaunty folksong, one she knew he would recognize instantly. They’d sung it that summer, practiced it over and over in preparation for that farce of a musicale at Lady Westfall’s estate. She played the introduction effortlessly, from memory—not caring that she would betray the fact that she’d practiced it often over the years, out of sentimental folly. And here came the cue for his entrance, that gay little trill that ushered in his bass. She drew the notes out, extending him a musical dare. Would he sing his part? He’d always had the most beautiful voice, before.

“Enough,” he said. “I preferred the mournful dirge.”

Cecily dropped her hands to her lap. “So it would seem. You are as devoted to low spirits as bottled ones, these days.”

“Quite. I think I’ve developed an aversion to levity. When you marry Denny, together you will be so revoltingly happy, I shall have to remove myself to another county.” He came to stand at her shoulder. “Perhaps another continent.”

He would leave England again? The thought gutted her. She knew what it was, to fret endlessly about his whereabouts, not even knowing whether he still lived. It was a miserable way to spend one’s time.

“I’m not going to marry Denny.”

He paused. “You have told him this?”

“Not yet. I will tell him soon.”

“When did you decide?”

“Last night.” She lifted her face to his and read pure male arrogance in the set of his brow, the little quirk at the corner of his lips. How like him, to think that disastrous kiss had changed everything. “No, not in the drawing room. I knew it later, in the forest.”

He clucked his tongue. “Ah, Cecy. Don’t tell me you’ve fallen in love with the werestag? I fear he will make you a prickly husband.”

“Don’t be absurd. And stop deriding me for my honesty, while you hide behind that ironic smirk.”

His eyes hardened, and he set his jaw. Curse him, he still wouldn’t let her in.

Exasperated, she pushed back the piano bench and stood. “Of course I do not mean to wed a werestag,” she said, crossing to the window. “But that encounter showed me what I truly desire. I want the man who will be there when I need him. The man who will protect me, fight for me.”

“I have fought for you, Cecily.” His voice was low, and resonant with emotion. “I have fought for you, protected you. I have suffered and bled for you.” He approached her, covering the Aubusson carpet with a lithe grace that made her weak in the knees. For a moment, she was reminded of the majestic white stag: the innate pride that forbade him to heed her commands; the sheer, wild beauty of his form. They were so alike, he and Luke.

Cecily’s breath caught. What did he mean, he had fought for her, bled for her? Was he referring to last—

“I have fought for you,” he repeated, thumping a fist to his chest. “Risked my life on battlefields—for you, and for Denny, and for Brooke and Portia and every last soul who calls England home. Is that not enough?”

Mere inches separated them now. She swayed forward, carving the distance in half. Her heart drummed in her breast as she whispered, “No.”

His eyes flared. “Cecy…”

“It’s not enough.” She lifted one hand to his neck, curling her fingers into the velvety hair at his nape. Yes, every bit as soft as it looked. “I want more.”

If their game was taunting, victory was hers. Grasping her by the hips, he crushed her to the wall and kissed her with abandon. And unlike a typical kiss, which started with superficial contact and then deepened by degrees, this kiss began at the end. He devoured her in those first desperate seconds, prying her jaw wide, stroking deep with his tongue; but then he soon retreated to gently explore her mouth. And then he was worshipping just her lips—reverently tracing their shape with his tongue, blessing them with feather-soft kisses as she stroked his hair.

Oh. Oh, sweet heaven.

His hands slid up to cup her breasts. She arched against him, pressing her breasts into his palms, thrilling when he thumbed the hardened tips. He bent and kissed her throat, her collarbone, the tender border of her décolletage. His tongue dipped between her breasts, and she clutched him tight.

“Yes,” she said aloud, afraid he might stop. This was what she needed. Yes, yes.

This was paradise.

HE WOULD MOST CERTAINLY go to hell for this.

Luke knew it, and he didn’t bloody well care. It was all he could do not to drag her down to the carpet, toss her skirts up around her ears and claim her in the most primitive way possible—what remained of his soul be damned.

He wanted to possess her mouth, her body, her mind and heart. To touch every deep, soft and secret part of her: the tender arch of her palate, the vulnerable curve beneath each breast, the snug corner of her heart where his memory lived.

The mindless wanting surged in his blood, stiffened in his groin, twisted in his chest. It hurt. He ground his hips against hers to soothe the ache, and she shuddered, as though she could glimpse the lewd images cavorting in his mind.

He drew back immediately.

Rein it in.

This wasn’t about unleashing his base desires. This was about giving Cecily a new memory of him, to surpass all others. He’d been her first kiss, all those years ago. For the rest of her life, she would have compared every kiss from every man to that one perfect moment—until he lost control and mauled her last night, erasing that legacy completely.

But there were other firsts he could give her. Other experiences she would remember, measure every other man against. He had to restrain his animal urges, excavate whatever remnants of patience and tenderness still remained to him.

He had to make this very, very good.

She trembled as he eased her neckline downward, freeing the luscious swell of one breast.

“Don’t be afraid,” he whispered.

“I’m not,” she said. Then, pleading: “Just touch me.”

Now it was Luke’s knees that quivered as he stroked her breast, caressing her with the backs of his fingers before taking the plump weight into his palm. So pale and perfect. So smooth and cool against his tongue. He bent to draw her taut nipple into his mouth, suckling her until he pulled a deep moan from her throat.

With his other hand, he hitched up her skirts. A bit of impatient fumbling—he was out of practice, after all—and he found her sex, warm and dewy with excitement. It nearly undid him, to feel how much she wanted this. Wanted him.

Gently, tenderly, he caressed her most sensitive flesh. Learning the shape of her with his fingers, circling her swollen pearl with his thumb. Cecily’s breathing quickened, and her eyes fluttered shut.

“Open your eyes,” he said. “I want you to know it’s me.”

She obeyed, looking up at him. “As if it could be anyone else.”

God, the unabashed affection in her gaze… It punctured all the defenses he’d built around his heart. A flood of emotions swamped him: anger, confusion, fear. And beneath it all, a foolish, sentimental sort of yearning. He hadn’t known he still was capable of yearning, for anything.

She made him feel almost human again.

He sank to his knees, pressing his cheek to the cool silk of her inner thigh. “Cecy, my darling. I could kiss you for that.”

And he did.

Spreading his fingers to frame the slit of her drawers, he pressed his mouth to her core. She bucked against him, and he clutched her hips tight, pinning her to the wall as he teased and tasted her flesh. Her gasp of delight made his pulse stutter.

Slowly now. Don’t rush.

Yes, he meant to give Cecily an indelible memory, but he was also taking one for himself. He drank in her intoxicating perfume—the scents of clean linen and soap, mingling with the sweet musk of her arousal. He stroked her languidly with his tongue, wanting to memorize her shape, her texture, her taste. Most of all, he took his time learning her, delighting in the smallest discoveries: a caress just so made her moan; a kiss to this spot made her hips convulse.

Be it four years or forty—this would be a kiss to remember.

“Luke.”

Her peak came quickly. Too quickly. She gave a startled cry of pleasure and clutched his neck. Shamelessly, he slid a finger inside her, needing to feel that part of her grip him too.

Then it was over. All of it, over.

He caressed her until her breathing slowed. Then, with a light parting kiss to her thigh, he rearranged her drawers and petticoats before lifting his weight on shaky legs.

What to say, when she looked at him thus? Her heart shining in her eyes, her taste lingering on his tongue. After what they’d just shared, he couldn’t lie to her. He couldn’t tell her she meant nothing to him, then callously walk away. No, he had to find some way to make her understand she meant everything to him. And while he still must walk away, there would be nothing callous about it.

“Cecy.” He smoothed the hair from her face. And then, in a solemn tone of farewell, “You’re lovely.”

“No.” She grasped his lapel with one hand and reached for his trouser falls with the other. “No, don’t go.” Cupping the hard ridge of his erection, she kissed his neck and whispered fiercely, “I know you want me. You must know I want you too. Luke, I—”

“Don’t.” Summoning his last shred of restraint, he tugged her hand from the buttons and brought it to his lips. “You may think you want me, but it’s Denny you need. You deserve to be happy, Cecily. Adored, doted upon, surrounded by a half-dozen blue-eyed children. I want you to have that life.”

“Then give me that life.”

“I can’t. Don’t you see? Everything’s different now. I’m different now. I’m not that dashing, immortal youth who kissed you in the garden all those years ago.”

She stroked his cheek. “I’m not the giddy, moonstruck girl you kissed. I’m a woman now, with my own fears and desires. And a heart that’s grown stronger than you’d credit. Strong enough to contain four years’ worth of love.”

He cleared his throat and studied the wood paneling. The whorls of grain twisted and churned as he blinked. “You should have saved it for someone else.”

“I’ve never wanted anyone else.” She tugged on his chin until he met her gaze. “Luke. Fight for me.”

He shook his head. “I’m done with fighting.”

“And I’m done with waiting,” she said. “If you walk away from me again…”

“We’re finished. I know.” Tenderly, he hooked a wisp of her hair with his fingertip and slowly tucked it behind her ear. “Marry Denny.”

She stared at him, lips parted in disbelief. “What a liar you are. You keep insisting you’ve changed, but you haven’t changed one bit. Toying with my affections one moment, callously discarding them the next. I can’t decide whether you’re deceiving me or just lying to yourself.”

“Don’t overthink it, Cecy.” Turning aside, he tugged casually on each of his cuffs. “You said it best last night. I’m an arrogant, insufferable cad.”

He stepped away, stretching the taut thread of silence between them.

Long moments passed before she spoke. “Very well,” she said numbly. “I’ll speak with Denny today.”

“Cecily! Merritt! There you are.” Portia burst into the room, clearly too full of excitement to notice Cecily’s mussed hair or Luke’s skewed cravat, much less the tension hanging in the air. “I’ve been searching this whole blasted house for you.”

Thank God for rambling old estates. If Portia had found them a few minutes earlier…

“Come quickly, both of you. Denny’s gamekeeper found—” She made an impatient gesture and ran to Cecily’s side, taking her arm. “I’ll give you the details on the way. We’re off to the woods, all of us.”

Cecily shot Luke a strange glance before turning to her friend. “What is it, Portia?”

“Why, the werestag, of course.”

Chapter Five

“SO YOU’VE DECIDED TO JOIN US THIS TIME,” Denny said.

Luke shrugged. “Didn’t want to miss the entertainment.”

Together the men covered the sloping green in long, easy strides. Luke glanced over his shoulder at Cecily, who walked between Portia and Brooke. Her pale blue muslin gown caught the late-afternoon breeze, pulling against her soft, feminine curves, and he damn near sighed with longing. Things might be finished between them—they had to be—but he’d be damned if he’d let her wander loose in that forest a second time. The devil only knew what fearsome creature she might meet with, or shed her stocking for, next.

“We’re going another way this time,” Denny explained. “There’s a cottage tucked deep in the forest there.” Shading his eyes with one hand, he indicated the direction with the other. “My gamekeeper uses it from time to time, and he found something suspicious there this morning.”

“Not suspicious,” Portia objected, as the other group joined them at the trailhead. “Gothic and intriguing.”

“Please,” said Brooke. “A discarded stocking is neither gothic nor intriguing. It’s laundry.”

Luke’s eyes shot to Cecily. “He found the stocking?” He swallowed. “Your stocking?”

“So it would seem.” She clasped her hands together. “It was…soiled.”

“Crusted with blood, you mean.” Portia’s dark eyes widened as she touched Luke’s arm. “Werestag blood. It’s positively chilling. He truly must be the most fearsome, violent sort of creature. I tell you, Lord Merritt, if you could have seen the mincemeat he made of that boar…” She shuddered. “No one who witnessed that scene could doubt Cecily’s rescuer was half wild beast.”

All eyes turned to Cecily. Denny laid a hand on her pale blue sleeve, and Luke felt a possessive fury surge through his veins.

Let it go, he told himself. Let her go.

“Portia, he saved my life.” Cecily’s voice was indignant, and she shrugged off Denny’s touch. “Unarmed and unaided, he killed a ferocious boar that would have gored and devoured me. Yes, it was messy. Battles to the death often are. Stop speaking as though he took pleasure in it.”

“Your defense is most stirring, Miss Hale.” Luke deliberately adopted a formal, detached tone that he knew would only inflame her anger. “You seem to have developed a rather personal attachment to this man-beast.”

Tears glittered in her eyes as she glared at him. Tears, and accusations. “He fought for me.”

The group fell into an uncomfortable silence. She sniffed and dropped her eyes, and Luke took the opportunity to study her pale expression of distress.

Cecily, Cecily. Foolish girl, to think herself enamored with a beast. She could have no conception of Luke’s animal side. There were times during the war he’d been stripped down to it—become a base, feral creature that knew only hunger, sweat and the smells of blood and fear.

She was dreaming after a myth: a gentleman who dallied as a noble beast, rescuing damsels in some enchanted forest. With Luke, she would get a beast wearing the clothes of a man. An uncivilized creature who’d lost all enjoyment in balls and parlor games, who’d forgotten the words to all her trite little songs of green meadows and shepherds and love.

Enjoy your fantasy world, Cecily. Let me visit you there, from time to time.

“Now this is a thrilling development,” Portia sang. “I knew it. What an enchanting twist this will make for my novel. The heroine is in love with the werestag.”

“No, the heroine is not.” Fingers pressed to her temples and eyes squeezed shut, Cecily took a deep breath and began again. “Forgive me. But I tell you with perfect candor, I am not in love with a werestag. I’m just feeling…a bit out of sorts. Perhaps I’ve a headache coming on.” She extended a hand to Denny. “Will you walk with me? I feel better when you’re near.”

“But of course.” He tucked her hand into the crook of his elbow, and then addressed Luke. “Why don’t you lead the others on ahead? The path leads directly to the cottage. It’s not as though you could become lost. Cecily and I will catch up.”

Luke nodded. He turned and marched forward, a sense of hopelessness hollowing out his chest. He knew exactly what conversation would take place between Cecily and Denny on the way to the cottage. Well. That was that. When they returned to Swinford Manor this evening, he’d instruct his valet to pack up his things. Perhaps Luke would even ride out tonight. He could bring himself to let her go, but he’d be damned if he’d sit around and toast the happy couple’s betrothal.

To that, he would drink alone. In copious amounts.

“Very well,” said Portia thoughtfully. “Perhaps the heroine is not in love with the werestag. It makes a much better story if the beast is in love with her. So close, and yet so far from his beloved. Doomed to watch her from afar, never to hold her again. How tragically romantic.”

“How patently ridiculous,” Brooke replied.

Luke strode briskly ahead, leaving them to their quarrel. He would not have admitted it, but he rather agreed with them both.

SHE WOULD TELL HIM, Cecily bargained with herself, once they reached that small boulder. Or perhaps the little patch of ferns. Failing that, she would most certainly break the news before they passed that gnarled birch tree.

Denny kept pace with her easily, as he always did. Their silence was companionable, as it always was. All the while, Cecily kept up this internal bartering, staving off the inevitable just one more minute…and then again one minute more.

At last she halted at a rotted, mossy stump. “I cannot marry you,” she told the clump of toadstools flourishing at its base. “I’m so terribly sorry. I should have told you years ago, but—”

“For God’s sake, Cecily.” His soft laugh startled her, and she lifted her gaze. “You can’t do this, not yet. How can a lady refuse a man, when he hasn’t even proposed? I won’t stand for it.”

“It’s not right, Denny. I’ve known for some time now that we wouldn’t…that I couldn’t…”

He shushed her gently, placing his hands on her shoulders. “The truth is, we know nothing of what could be or would be. We’ve been delaying this conversation for years now, haven’t we? I’ve been waiting for… Well, I hardly know what I’ve been waiting for. Something indefinable, I suppose. And you’ve been waiting for Luke.”

Her breath caught. Denny knew? Oh, dear. Perhaps she shouldn’t be so surprised. They’d grown up together. He’d known her longer than anyone.

“Yes, of course I knew,” he said, as if reading her thoughts. “Why do you think I invited you both here, to my home? I wanted to know how matters stood between you.”

“And how do they stand?” she asked, hoping he would understand her better than she knew herself.

He sighed. “I know he has some strange hold on your heart. But I believe you’d be happier marrying me.”

Cecily shook her head in disbelief. If she didn’t know better, she would think him working in concert with Luke. Their arguments were one and the same.

“But, Denny…” She prayed these words would not hurt his pride overmuch. “But we don’t love one another, not in that way.”

“Perhaps not. But you’ve been in love with Luke for four years now. Has it made you happy?”

She had no answer to that.

“And I’ll admit, bachelorhood is losing its charms for me.” Gently, he folded her hands in his. “I know there is no grand passion between us, Cecily. But there is genuine caring. Honesty. Respect. Lasting unions have been built on foundations far weaker than these. And in time, perhaps some deeper attachment would grow. We don’t know what could happen, if only we gave it a chance.”

He brought her hands to his lips and kissed them warmly—first the knuckles, then each sensitive palm—before pressing them to either side of his face and holding them there. The sweetness in the gesture surprised her, as did the fond regard in his eyes.

This was Denny’s face she held in her hands. Dear, familiar, uncomplicated Denny, with the dimple on his right cheek and the tiny pockmark on the other. She’d known this face since her childhood. Could she learn to see to him in a new light, as a husband? She did want children and companionship and a happy home—all the things Luke refused to offer her.

She sighed. “I don’t know what to say.”

“That’s all right. I’m not asking you to say yes, not right now. Just…don’t say no quite yet?”

He smiled then, that crooked, endearing Denny smile. And he kissed her, still holding her hands pressed against his face.

It was sweet. He tasted of tea and peppermint, and his lips felt soft and warm. Denny’s kiss was mild, tender. Comforting and comfortable. And it was wretchedly unfair to him, that even as he claimed her lips, her heart remained divided. She couldn’t stop comparing this kiss to Luke’s.

It just wasn’t the same.

“DO YOU HEAR SOMETHING?” Portia asked, after they’d been walking some time.

“No,” said Brooke.

“Wait!” Portia signaled the men to halt, then put a finger to her lips for silence.

Luke shifted his feet impatiently, anxious to move on. If they stood here too long, Cecily and Denny might catch them.

“There,” Portia said, cupping one hand around her ear. “Do you hear it? That rustling sound, like dry leaves.”

“Dry leaves, in a forest,” Brooke replied. “Imagine.”

Luke forged ahead, and the pair followed, bickering in agitated whispers. The cottage couldn’t be much farther. Perhaps he could simply barricade the two of them in it and leave. The sooner these two shared a bed, the sooner everyone else could get some peace.

“Wait!” she called again.

Luke pivoted on his heel. “What now?”

“Look at these marks.” Portia pointed to a narrow stripe of depressions in the soil. “Why, they look like deer tracks.”

Brooke rubbed his eyes. “Deer tracks, in a forest. Imagine.”

“But we don’t know they belong to a deer! They could belong to him.” With a self-conscious hunch of her shoulders, she lowered her voice to a murmur. “You know, the werestag.”

“Why are you whispering? Afraid the man-deer might overhear you?” Brooke gave a caustic laugh. “My dear Mrs. Yardley, your fancies grow more amusing by the moment. What on earth would lead you to believe these simple deer tracks are the marks of a vicious werestag?”

“I am not your ‘dear Mrs. Yardley’. And how do you know these tracks do not belong to him?”

In a clear expression of annoyance, Brooke held up his hands. “Very well. I give up.”

“I don’t,” she replied, her eyes narrowing. “That is the difference between us.” Lifting her skirts, Portia made a quarter turn and stomped directly off into the woods.

“Just where do you think you’re going?”

“I’m following the tracks, of course. That’s the only way to learn the truth.”

As Portia’s dark cloak disappeared into the trees, Luke started after her. A wave of dread swamped his progress. “Mrs. Yardley, wait,” he called. “It’s unsafe to go walking off the path. At least let me—”

A metallic snap cut him off.

Followed by a piercing scream.

Luke and Brooke charged through the foliage. They found Portia lying sprawled in leaves and moss, her face gone utterly white.

“My…” She gulped for air. “Help me. I don’t know what’s happened to my foot.”

With shaking fingers, she drew her skirts up to the ankles. The steel jaws of a trap held her left boot clenched in their deadly bite.

“Bloody hell.” Brooke sank to his knees at her side. “Don’t worry, Portia. We’ll have it off straightaway.” He reached for the trap.

“Wait,” Luke said. “Don’t—”

Another tortured scream from Portia.

“Touch it,” he finished weakly.

“What’s happened?” Cecily and Denny joined them, linked arm in arm as they pushed through the brush.

“She’s stepped in a trap,” Luke replied, not risking a glance at Cecily’s face. “A small one, fortunately, but it has quite a grip on her foot. We’ll have to pry it off.” He scouted around him for a suitable branch, pausing only long enough to catch Denny’s eye. “Find me two sturdy poles, about six feet in length. I can release her from the trap, but we’ll need a pallet to carry her home.”

Denny nodded, and with a murmured word to Cecily, began searching the environs for saplings.

“It hurts,” Portia moaned. “It hurts so much. I must be dying.”

“Of course you aren’t.” Folding her skirts, Cecily settled at her friend’s side. Luke could feel her blue eyes on him as he selected a thick branch and stripped it of twigs.

Having removed his coat, Brooke folded it and propped it beneath Portia’s head, for a pillow. “You can’t die,” he told her, crouching at her other side. “Who would argue with me then?”

“Anyone with sense,” she said tartly. But when Brooke took her hand, Portia allowed him to keep it. “Don’t you aggravating know-all’s have some sort of debating society?”

“Yes, but none of the members have your amusing imagination. Nor such lovely hair.” He stroked an ebony lock from her pale, sweating brow.

Luke pushed her skirts to the knee and took a firm grip on his branch. “Mrs. Yardley, this is going to hurt.”

Portia whimpered.

Brooke kept stroking her hair, murmuring, “Be brave, darling. Scream all you like. Break every bone in my hand, if you must. I won’t leave your side.”

Cecily moved toward Luke. “How can I help?”

“You can’t.”

“I can,” she insisted. “Just tell me what to do. Shall I help you pry?”

“No,” he replied tersely. Damn it, he didn’t want to expose Cecily to this, but an extra pair of hands would be useful. “Just…hold her. Keep her ankle steady, even if she bucks.”

She nodded. “Portia, I’m going to hold your leg now.” Her delicate fingers closed around her friend’s ankle and calf, in grips so tight her knuckles blanched. “I’m ready.”

He bent his head and threaded the branch between the jaws of the trap. Despite his attempt not to jostle Portia’s leg, he could not help but brush it. Her low moan of pain was met with more murmured assurances from Brooke.

Luke looked to Cecily, anxious to gauge her reaction.

“Go ahead,” she said calmly, still gripping Portia’s leg. “Just do it.”

Luke braced his boot and levered the branch with all his strength. Pain ripped through his forearm, and Portia released a bloodcurdling scream that surely belonged in one of her gothic novels. But Cecily held her friend’s leg stoically, using all her weight to keep it still.

Within a few seconds, Luke had pried the jaws apart. “Now,” he commanded in a grunt, and Cecily understood him. She pulled her friend’s boot up and out of the trap, a half second before the branch splintered and the metal spikes snapped on air.

“We’ll need to assess her wound,” Cecily said, unlacing her friend’s boot while Luke stood panting for breath. She had Portia’s boot and shredded stocking removed within seconds.

Together they knelt over her wounded foot.

“These don’t look deep,” Luke said, observing the two puncture wounds on Portia’s pale foot. “And only a scratch below.”

“Thank heaven for sensible shoes.” Cecily flashed him a little smile.

A sweet pang of affection caught him in the chest. She was handling this so well, soothing everyone—Luke included—with her serene competence and dry humor. Where had she learned how to cope with scenes like this? Certainly not in finishing school.

Desperate to distract himself before he lost sight of any goal but kissing her, Luke returned his gaze to the wound. After studying it a few moments more, he said, “It’ll need to be cleansed thoroughly. But we’d best bind it for now, until we can get her back to the Manor. Cecy, give me your—”

“Stocking?” A wide ribbon of ivory flannel dangled before his eyes.

He looked up, startled. Her expression was all innocence.

“I was going to say handkerchief,” he lied, taking the garment from her. “But this will do.”

As Cecily jammed her bare foot back into her boot, Luke looped the stocking over Portia’s foot and ankle repeatedly, binding her wounds tight.

Denny returned, two serviceable poles in hand. Luke stripped off his own coat and threaded a pole through either sleeve before buttoning it down the middle. He did the same with Brooke’s coat, coming from the poles’ opposite end. The result was a makeshift conveyance that would bear Portia’s weight easily.

Brooke fussed over the wounded lady as they transferred her to the pallet, going so far as to plant a kiss on her brow to praise her bravery.

“What a kiss,” Portia complained. “As if I were a child.”

Brooke cupped her face in his hands and kissed her thoroughly. He released her only when Portia’s faint growl of protest melted to a pleased sigh. “There, was that better?”

“Quite.” Portia’s cheeks pinked.

“All right, then. Now be a good little girl, and lie still.”

She swatted at him feebly as he and Denny lifted the pallet—Brooke carrying the end at Portia’s head, and Denny lifting her feet.

Cecily went to Denny’s side. “I…I must rest a moment, but Portia needs a doctor’s attention. Please go ahead with her. Luke will see me home.” She popped up on her tiptoes to reward Denny’s nod of agreement with a light kiss to his cheek.

As if he were a child, Luke thought pettily.

And then somehow, they were alone.

“Will you walk with me?” she asked, suddenly standing at his elbow.

He silently offered his arm, but she shook her head, reaching for his hand instead.

Fingers laced in that intimate, innocent clasp favored by children and lovers alike, they covered the short distance back to the path.

“Not that way,” she said, when he turned to follow the others. “Let’s continue on to the cottage. We’ve come this far, and I may as well retrieve my stocking. I seem to find myself missing another.”

“As you wish.”

They walked on, their linked hands dangling and swinging between them. And it all felt so easy, so comfortable—as if they were on one of their leisurely strolls that summer four years past.

Of course, they had conversed during those walks. Talked of everything and nothing, in the way courting couples do. When had he lost his ability to make simple conversation? Surely Luke could find it within himself to say something.

“You are remarkable,” he blurted out, because it was the only thought in his head. “The way you responded to Portia’s injury, without fear or hesitation… I didn’t know you had it in you.”

“What, bravery? I didn’t always know I had it in me, either. But I do.” She gave him a pointed look. “I’d imagine we’ve each discovered new sides of ourselves in the past four years.”

All too true. But the discoveries Luke had made, he would never share with her. Shrugging defensively, he deflected her silent question. “You used to bolt at the sight of a spider.”

“Oh, I still hate spiders. But injuries do not frighten me. When a lady spends a year tending invalid soldiers, she sees sights far worse than Portia’s wound.”

Luke stopped in his tracks, pulling her to a halt as well. “You spent a year nursing invalid soldiers?”

She nodded. “At the Royal Hospital in Chelsea.”

“But…” He struggled to bend his mind around the idea. “But they don’t allow random gentlewomen to nurse invalid soldiers. Do they?”

“Well…” She shrugged and resumed walking. “I never precisely asked permission. You see, over a year ago there was a tragic case. A wounded soldier was found wandering near Ardennes. Evidently he was the sole survivor of his regiment. But he’d sustained a severe blow to the head, and he had no memory of who he was, or his home or family or anything before the battle. The papers printed articles about the ‘Lost Hero of Montmirail’. He was the talk of London, and Portia was desperate to go visit him. She had this vain hope that he might be Yardley—she’d just received notice of his death in France, you see, and wanted to believe there’d been some mistake. And I…” Slowing, she looked up at Luke. “I wanted to be sure he wasn’t you.”

A lump formed in his throat.

“But of course he wasn’t you,” she went on, “nor Yardley. While we were waiting to see him, I found myself talking with another man. A naval officer, wounded in a Danish gunboat attack. He called me in from the corridor, then apologized when he saw my face. He’d mistaken me for his sister.”

Cecily sniffed and continued, “Well, I felt terrible for disappointing him, so I stayed with him for an hour or so, just talking. Mostly listening. And then the next day, I came back, and sat with him again. He introduced me to a fellow patient, this one a lieutenant in the cavalry. I don’t recall deciding to make it a habit. Day after day, I just kept returning to the hospital. For the first month or so, I did no more than I had the first day—I would simply sit at a patient’s bedside and listen. Perhaps read aloud, if he liked. But then, sometimes it was impossible not to notice that their wounds needed tending, bandages needed replacing, and so forth. So I did those small things too.”

Luke could only stare at her. Yes, it was true. Cecily had changed. Her youthful sweetness and generosity had not disappeared, but added to them now were a woman’s serenity and confidence. One could see it in the tilt of her chin, the efficient grace of her movements. And the way the light glowed through the curling wisps of hair at her brow… She’d always been a pretty girl, but he’d never thought her so beautiful as he did this very moment.

“Remarkable,” he murmured. Clearing his throat, he added, “You didn’t find it tedious, listening to all those ragged soldiers rattle on? It didn’t repulse you, tending the wounds of complete strangers?”

“Not at all,” she answered lightly, squeezing his hand. “I just pretended they were you.”

God. She was killing him.

“Well then,” he said in a tone of false nonchalance, “I’m certain every last one of them fell hopelessly in love with you. How many proposals have you rejected in the past four years? A hundred or more, I’m sure.”

“Twenty-six.”

Luke slowed as the cottage came into view—a tidy, thatched-roof dwelling hunched between two tall pine trees.

“Twenty-six,” he repeated, coming to a stop.

She turned to him, clutching his hand tight. “Yes. Twenty-six. Not counting the invalid soldiers.” The color of her eyes deepened to an intense cobalt blue. “You cannot know how I have fought for you, Luke. Not in the same way you have suffered, to be sure. But I have waged my own small battles here. I have fought the pressure to marry, fought the envy for my friends who did. I have struggled against my own desire for companionship and affection.” Her voice broke. “I am not a woman formed for solitude.”

“I know it,” he whispered, raising his free hand to her cheek. “I know it. That’s why you need a husband who can—”

“I have fought despair,” she interrupted, “when months, years passed with no word of you.”

Guilt twisted in his gut. “I could not have written. We weren’t engaged.”

“Yes, but you might have written Denny. Or any one of our mutual friends. You might have casually asked for word of me.”

“I didn’t want word of you.”

She recoiled, and he whipped an arm around her waist, pulling her close.

“How can I explain? You know my parents died several years ago. I’ve no siblings, very few relations. And it didn’t take but one dusty skirmish in Portugal for me to realize—if I died on that battlefield, there would be no one to mourn me, but a handful of old school friends.” He touched her cheek. “No one but you. I did think of you. Constantly. I did remember that perfect, sweet kiss when I was bleeding and starving and pissing scared. It was the thought that kept me going: Cecily Hale cares whether I live or die. I couldn’t risk asking word of you, don’t you understand? I didn’t want to know. Surely I’d learn you’d married one of those twenty-six men queuing up for the pleasure of your hand, and I would have nothing left.”

“But I didn’t marry any of them. I waited for you.”

“Then you were a fool.” He gripped her chin. “Because that man you waited for…he isn’t coming back. I’ve changed, too much. Some men lose a leg in war; others, a few fingers. I surrendered part of my humanity. Just like the ridiculous werestag you’re out here chasing.”

“I’m out here chasing you, you idiot!” She buffeted his shoulder with her fist. “You’re the one I love.”

He kissed her, hard and fast. Just for a moment. Just until her mouth stopped forming dangerous words and melted to a soft, generous invitation, and her fisted hand uncurled against his chest.

Then he pulled away.

“Listen to me. I admire you. Adore you. Hell, I’ve spent four years constructing some twisted, blasphemous religion around you. And you must know how badly I want you.” He slid a hand to the small of her back and crushed her belly against his aching groin, then kissed her again, to stifle his unwilling groan. “But I can’t love you, Cecily, not the way you deserve.”

“Who are you, to judge what I deserve?” She wrestled away from him and stalked to the cottage door, taking hold of the door handle and giving it a full-force tug. “And what do you mean, you can’t love me? Love isn’t a matter of can or can’t.” She pulled again, but the door would not budge. “It’s a matter of do or don’t. Either you do love me, and damn the consequences”—she tugged again, to no avail—“or you don’t, and we go our separate ways.”

She let go the door handle and released an exasperated huff.

Slowly, he walked to her side. “There’s a little latch,” he said, pulling on the string above her head. “Just here.”

The door swung open with a rusty creak. Together they stood on the threshold, peering into the cottage’s dimly lit interior.

“After you,” Cecily said wryly. “By all means.”

“The light’s fading. We should return to the manor.”

“Not yet,” she said, pushing him forward into the dirt-floored gloom. “Strip off your shirt.”

Chapter Six

“WHAT?” Luke crossed his arms over his chest. His eyes darted from the cottage’s single window to the straw-tick bed huddled under the sloping corner of the roof. “You can’t be serious.”

Cecily found his panic vastly amusing. “Certainly I can.”

“Cecy, this is hardly the time and place for—”

“A tryst?” She laughed. “You think I mean to trap you in this secluded cottage and have my wicked way with you? You should be so lucky. No, remove your shirt. I want a look at your arm.”

“My arm?” His eyes narrowed. “Which one?”

“Which one do you think?” She crossed to him and began unknotting the cravat at his neck. “The one you injured while wrestling the boar last night.”

Oh, the look on his face…

Cecily wanted to kiss him. He was so adorably befuddled. At last, he’d let slip that hard mask of indifference he’d been wearing since his arrival at Swinford Manor. And in its place—there was Luke. Engaging green eyes, touchable dark brown hair, those lips so perfectly formed for roguish smiles and tender kisses alike.

This was the man she’d fallen in love with. The man she still loved now. Yes, he’d changed, but she had too. She was older, wiser, stronger than the girl she’d been. This time, she wouldn’t let him go.

“You knew?”

She smiled. “I knew.”

His breath hitched as she slipped the cravat from his neck. Attempting to ignore the wedge of bare chest it revealed, and the mad pounding of her blood that view inspired, Cecily set to work on his waistcoat buttons.

“How?” he asked, obeying her silent urgings to shed the garment. “How did you know?”

“It’s a fortunate thing you weren’t assigned to espionage. You’ve no talent for disguise whatsoever. If I hadn’t suspected already, I would have figured it out this afternoon. My stocking was found in this remote cottage, and you just happen to know the secrets of the door latch? Then there’s the fact that you’ve been favoring your arm since breakfast.” She undid the small closure of his shirtfront before turning her attention to his cuffs. “But I knew you last night. I’d know your voice anywhere, not to mention your touch.” She gave a shaky sigh, unable to meet his questioning gaze. “It’s like you said, Luke. You still make me tremble, even after all these years.”

His voice was soft. “I don’t even know why I followed you. The way we’d parted so angrily…I just couldn’t let you go, not like that.”

“And I’m glad of it. You saved my life.” With a brisk snap, she jerked the shirt’s hem from the waistband of his trousers, gathering the fine linen in both hands. “Arms up, head down.”

She made a move to lift the shirt over his head, but he stopped her.

“I caught a bayonet at Vitoria. I’ve scars. They’re not pretty.”

“I’ve been tending wounded soldiers for a year. I’m certain I’ve seen worse.”

And she had seen worse, Cecily reminded herself as she surveyed the pink, rippling scar slanting from his collarbone to his ribs. She had seen worse, but not on anyone she loved. It was so difficult to contain all the silly feminine impulses welling up inside her: the desire to weep, to hold and rock him, to trace his scar with her lips.

But he wouldn’t want that sort of fuss.

Clearing her throat, she turned her attention to his injured forearm. It was a clean wound, and not deep enough to be truly worrisome. But as she’d suspected, the binding had come loose—most likely when he’d sprung Portia’s trap.

“There’s water,” he said, nodding toward a covered basin on the table. “I filled it last night.”

Together they moved toward the table and settled on the two rough-hewn stools. Cecily dipped her handkerchief in the cool liquid, then dabbed his arm with it.

“If you knew last night,” he asked quietly, “why tell the others it was a werestag?”

“Because it was obvious you didn’t want the others to know.”

“Hang the others. I didn’t want you to know.” He swallowed hard, and stared into the corner. “I never wanted you to see me like that. When a man faces death, he meets the animal lurking inside him. When it’s hand to hand, blade to blade, kill or be killed…” Defiant green eyes met hers, and he slapped a hand to his scar. “The man who did this to me—I killed him. With his bayonet stuck in my flesh, I reached out and grabbed him by the throat and watched his eyes bulge from his skull as he suffocated at my hand.”

She would not react, Cecily told herself, calmly dabbing at his wound. That’s what he expected, what he feared—her reaction of revulsion or disgust.

“And he wasn’t the only one,” he continued. “To learn what violence you’re truly capable of, in those moments… It’s a burden I’d not wish on anyone.”

She risked a glance at him then. “Burdens are lighter when they’re shared.”

Luke swore. “I’ve shared too much of it with you already. I can’t believe I’m telling you this.”

“You can tell me anything. I’ll still love you. And I warn you, I’ve learned something of tenacity in the past four years. I’m not going to let you go.”

He shook his head. “You don’t understand. Sometimes, I scarcely feel human anymore. The brutal way I took down that boar, Cecily. That barbarism with the stocking…”

“Ah, yes.” She put aside her handkerchief and stood. “The stocking.”

She propped one boot on the stool and slowly rucked up her skirts to reveal her stocking-clad leg.

“Cecy…”

“Yes, Luke?” She leaned over to untie the laces of her boot, giving him an eyeful of her décolletage.

He groaned. “Cecy, what are you doing?”

“Tending to your wounds,” she said, slipping the boot from her foot. With sure fingers, she unknotted the ribbon garter at her thigh, then eased the stocking down her leg. “Making it better.” Skirts still hiked thigh-high, she straddled his legs and nestled on his lap.

“Shh.” She quieted his objection, then deftly wound the length of flannel around his injured arm, tucking in the end to secure it. “There,” she said in a husky voice, lowering her lips to the underside of his wrist. “All better.”

“I wasn’t after your damn stocking,” he blurted out. “When I took you to the ground last night and pushed up your skirts. By all that’s holy, I wanted—” With a muttered oath, he gripped her by the shoulders, hauling her further into his lap. Until she felt the hard ridge of his arousal, pressing insistently against her cleft. “Cecily, what I want from you is not tender. It’s not romantic in the least. It’s plunder. It’s possession. If you had the least bit of sense, you’d turn and run from—”

She kissed him hard, raking his back with her fingernails and clutching his thighs between hers like a vise. Boldly, she sucked his lower lip into her mouth and gave it a sharp nip, savoring his startled moan. Wriggling backward, she placed her hands over his, dragging them downward and molding his fingers around her breasts. “For God’s sake, Luke. You’re not the only one with animal urges.”

He took her mouth, growling against her lips as he did. Tongues tangled; teeth clashed. With a small rip of fabric, he liberated her breasts from her stays and bodice, fastening his lips over one pert, straining nipple. He licked roughly, even caught the tender nub in his teeth, and Cecily gasped with shock and delight.

Then his hand left her breast and strayed downward, tunneling through the layers of skirts and petticoats and drawers to find her most intimate flesh. He stroked her there, so tenderly. Too tenderly.

Impatient with desire, she grasped his shoulders and rocked against his hand. A thrill of exquisite anticipation coursed down to her toes. She licked his ear and heard his answering moan.

Yes. Yes. This was finally going to happen.

“God,” he choked out. “This can’t happen.”

“Oh, yes it can.” Breathless, she worked the buttons of his trouser falls. “It will. It must.” Having freed the closures of his trousers and smallclothes, she snaked her hand through the opening and brazenly took him in hand.

Of course, now that she had him in hand, she wasn’t quite sure what to do with him. She tentatively skimmed one fingertip over the smooth, rounded crown of his erection. In return, he pressed a single finger into her aching core.

“Cecily.” He shut his eyes and grit his teeth. “If I don’t stop this now…”

“You never will?” She pressed her lips to his earlobe. “That’s my fondest hope. You say you’re done with fighting, Luke? Then stop fighting this.”

He sighed deep in his chest, and she felt all the tension coiled in those powerful muscles release. “Very well,” he said quietly, resting his chin on her shoulder. “Very well. To you, I gratefully surrender.”

Clutching her bottom with both hands, he rose to his feet, startling a little shriek from her.

“Too late for protests,” he teased, carrying her toward the cottage’s narrow bed and tossing her onto it. With an impressive economy of movement, he stripped himself of his boots, trousers and smallclothes before settling his weight onto the bed. “Now you.”

All that remained of the daylight was a faint, dusky glow filtering through the small window and the chinks in the thatching overhead. He helped her out of her gown and petticoats, then loosened her stays and the ribbon tie of her drawers. When she was completely bared, he sat back on his haunches and regarded her with a quiet intensity. He sat that way for so long, she began to grow anxious.

“Luke? Is everything—”

“Promise me,” he said hoarsely, “that you will give me another opportunity to do this properly.” Shaky fingertips traced the pale curve of her hip. “You are so beautiful, Cecily. Yours is a body that deserves to be worshipped, adored. Promise me the chance to kiss every lovely, perfect inch of you—next time.”

How she loved those words, next time. She nodded as he prowled up her body. “Of course.”

“Good.” His voice was strained as he lowered his weight onto hers. “Because—forgive me, darling—this time will have to be quick.”

She gasped as he insinuated one hand between them, probing the slick folds of her sex and spreading her thighs apart. Then she felt the blunt head of him—there—pressing, pushing, stretching her to the point of pain. And beyond.

“Are you hurt?” He panted against her neck.

“A little.”

“Shall I stop?”

“No.” She clutched his back and hooked her legs over his. “Don’t you dare.” She had fought for him, fought to experience this pain, and she felt oddly possessive of the dull ache between her legs. She wouldn’t let him take it away. The pain was real, it was now—it meant he had truly come home at last. Home to her.

All too soon, the ache dissipated, lessening with each thrust, and a desperate yearning took its place. She rose up to meet each wild buck of his hips, her hands sliding over his back on a thin sheen of perspiration. His tempo increased, driving her closer and closer to that horizon of delicious pleasure he’d pushed her beyond that afternoon. But this time, it would be so much better. This time he would come too.

With a guttural moan, he froze deep inside her. His gaze caught hers, and Cecily instinctively understood the question in his eyes. They could create a child this way, if she allowed him to continue.

She swept a lock of hair from his brow and waited. He knew her feelings already. This decision should be his.

“I do,” he said roughly. “My God, Cecily. I do love you.”

Joy swelled inside her, until she trembled with the effort of containing it. Smiling up at him, she whispered, “Then damn the consequences.”

No more words after that. Only sighs and moans and wild, inarticulate urgings. Faster. More. There. Yes, there.

Now.

“CAN WE STAY HERE ALL NIGHT?” Cecily asked. She lay tangled with him on the narrow bed, struggling to catch her breath. Only now growing aware of the musty closeness in the cottage.

“We could,” he answered sleepily. “If we wish to be awoken by Denny’s footmen crashing down the door. He’ll have them all searching for us soon enough.”

“He knows I’m with you.” In more ways than one. She felt a pang of sympathy for her old friend. There’d been true disappointment in his expression, when she’d broken their kiss and refused him that afternoon. But Denny deserved to find love too, and she never could have made him truly happy. Not when her heart and soul belonged to Luke.

As if exerting his claim on her body as well, Luke tightened his arms around her. Kissing the hollow of her throat, he murmured, “Perhaps we can stay a half hour more.”

Afterward, they rose and dressed quietly, pausing to tidy the small dwelling before latching the door as they left. The night was cloudless, and the nearly full moon provided them sufficient light to follow the path. They walked hand in hand.

“Did you see it last night?” she asked quietly. “The stag?”

“Yes.”

“It was beautiful.” When he didn’t answer, she added, “Don’t you agree?” Perhaps men did not think animals “beautiful”, or did not admit to it if they did.

“Yes.” He gave her a rare, easy smile. “It reminded me of you. Beautiful, graceful, fearless.”

“And here I thought him so much like you. Proud, wild, strong.” She laughed softly. “Perhaps he didn’t exist at all, and we were just out here chasing each other.”

If the stag truly existed, they did not see it again before reaching the border of Swinford Woods and emerging onto the green. Then again, a whole herd of bloodthirsty man-deer could have been lurking in the thickets, and Cecily would have remained oblivious. She only had eyes for Luke.

And that fact must have been painfully obvious to Denny, when he nearly collided with them at the entrance to the drawing room.

“Cecily.” His gaze wandered from her unbound hair to her disheveled gown, to her fingers still laced with Luke’s. “I…I was just about to go searching for you.”

“There you are!” Portia called from behind him. “Come in, come in.” She lay swaddled in blankets on the divan, with her bandaged leg propped on a nearby ottoman. Brooke sat beside her, balancing a teacup in either hand.

Cecily turned to Denny. “I’m sorry to have worried you, but…” She squeezed Luke’s hand for courage. “You see, Luke and I—”

“I understand,” he replied. The serious expression on his face told her he did understand, completely. To his credit, he took it well. He turned to Luke. “When will you be married?”

“Married?” Portia exclaimed.

Cecily sighed. Just like Denny, to take his responsibilities as her third cousin twice removed—and only male relation in the vicinity—so seriously. But did he have to force the issue now? Certainly, she hoped that she and Luke might one day—

“As soon as possible.” Luke’s arm slid around her waist.

Cecily’s gaze snapped up to his. Are you certain? she asked him silently.

He answered her with a quick kiss.

“Well, then. When can we be married?” Brooke directed his question to Portia.

“Married!” Blushing furiously, Portia made a dismissive gesture with both hands. “Why, I’m only just learning to enjoy being a widow. I don’t want to be married. I want to write scandalous novels and take dozens of lovers.”

Brooke raised an eyebrow. “Can that be negotiated to lover, singular?”

“That,” she said, giving him a coy smile, “would depend on your skill at negotiation.”

“What an evening you’ve had, Portia,” Cecily said. “A brush with death, a proposal of marriage, an indecent proposition… Surely you have sufficient inspiration for your gothic novel?”

“Too much inspiration!” Portia wailed, gesturing toward her bandaged foot. “I am done with gothics completely. No, I shall take a cue from my insipid wallpaper and write a bawdy little tale about a wanton dairymaid and her many lovers.”

“Lover, singular.” Brooke flopped on the divan and settled her feet in his lap.

“Oh,” she sighed, as he massaged her uninjured foot. “Oh, very well.”

Luke tugged on Cecily’s hand, drawing her toward the doorway. “Let’s make our escape.”

As they left, she heard Denny say in his usual jocular tone, “Do me a favor, Portia? Model your hero after me. Just once, I should like to get the girl.”

Cecily and Luke tumbled into the corridor, hands still linked.

“I’m sorry,” he said, twirling her to a stop and backing her against the wall. “I didn’t have a chance to ask for your hand properly, but…you don’t have an objection, do you?”

She paused a moment to savor the endearing vulnerability in his expression. Then she kissed him soundly, threading her fingers into his hair and pressing her body to his. “There,” she said finally. “Does that feel like an objection?”

He smiled and planted a light kiss between her eyebrows before resting his forehead against hers. Between them, their hands made a tight knot of fingers and thumbs.

“I’ll leave within the hour,” he said, “to go speak with your father. I cannot expect even Denny to be so generous as to continue hosting his rival in this house. And I couldn’t spend another night here without having you in my bed.”

“As if I would find that objectionable.”

They kissed again, and he pressed her against the wall, his hips grinding deliciously against hers. “We must have”—kiss—“a very brief”—kiss—“engagement.”

“Can we not just elope? I could pack a valise in a trice.”

He laughed softly into her hair, and she thought it the most beautiful sound in the world.

“Cecy,” he whispered against her ear, “tell me this is not a dream. Are you truly mine at last?”

“Oh, Luke.” She slid her arms about his waist and gripped him tight. “I always have been.”

About Tessa

Thanks for reading!

I hope you enjoyed How to Catch a Wild Viscount!

If you’d like to learn more about me or my books, please visit www.TessaDare.com, or sign up for my e-mail newsletter to be notified whenever I have a new release. You can also follow me on Twitter at @tessadare, or like my Facebook page at http://facebook.com/tessadareauthor.

Tessa Dare is the New York Times and USA Today bestselling author of eleven historical romance novels and four novellas. Her books have won numerous accolades, including Romance Writers of America’s prestigious RITA® award and multiple RT Book Reviews Reviewer’s Choice Awards. Booklist magazine named her one of the “new stars of historical romance,” and her books have been contracted for translation in more than a dozen languages.

A librarian by training and a booklover at heart, Tessa makes her home in Southern California, where she lives with her husband, their two children and a big brown dog.

Other Books by Tessa

Castles Ever After series

Romancing the Duke

Say Yes to the Marquess — releases December 30, 2014

Spindle Cove series

A Night to Surrender

Once Upon a Winter’s Eve

A Week to be Wicked

A Lady by Midnight

Beauty and the Blacksmith

Any Duchess Will Do

Not part of a series

The Scandalous, Dissolute, No-Good Mr. Wright

Stud Club trilogy

One Dance with a Duke

Twice Tempted by a Rogue

Three Nights with a Scoundrel

Wanton Dairymaid trilogy

Goddess of the Hunt

Surrender of a Siren

A Lady of Persuasion

Chapter One

March 13, 1813, the rear lawn of Doyle’s Grange, Somerset, near the Exmoor hills, England

CRISPIN HOPE, FOURTH VISCOUNT NORTHWORD, stood to one side of the lawn and prayed for a miracle. None arrived. He remained unable to summon a blessed word. He twitched with the need to do something besides stand mute. Words, any words, would be better than his damnable silence. Action, any action, would be better than inaction. He managed to force a smile. A minor miracle, then. Hallelujah.

Naturally, a woman was involved in his present difficulties. A particular and specific woman. Was any man’s heart ever brought to its metaphorical knees except by a woman? Minor miracle or no, he needed to say or do something to convey how unmoved he was by her.

He tapped the side of his left leg with two fingers. Next, he cleared his throat. Portia sent a questioning look his way. Of course, words failed him. He affected what he hoped appeared to be mild interest in the proceedings; practically nonexistent. He coughed again and dug into his store of conversational inanities. “A fine day.”

“Mm.” She arched her eyebrows. “A touch cold for me.” Her attention returned to the sapling that was the reason he was standing out here in the first place.

He’d known Portia Temple since he was a boy of eight and she a girl of six. Twenty-one years. For the first ten years he’d never thought of her as anything but a friend and companion who by a quirk of fate happened to be female. Pity for her when boys were so superior, and how annoying that she’d disagreed.

For the second ten years he’d managed to set her neatly into a box in which she was devoid of femininity yet continued to exist as his best friend’s sister. A woman he avoided, but with whom he kept a friendly correspondence. Friendly. Nothing more.

He did his best not to think about the time between those bookends of decades. Silence reached out and set fire to his nerves. “It’s spring,” he said. Oh, Jesus. Had he really said that? “One ought not be cold in spring.”

That got him another careless glance, and he was convinced that she, unlike him, had found a way to forget. But then, in all their years of friendship, he’d always been the one who felt more deeply.

She stared at the sapling, head tilted. “You’ve been away too long. You’ve forgotten our weather.”

Resentment boiled in him, and he required a monumental amount of sang-froid to let that pass. Forgotten? He bit back a retort but could not quash the sentiment that came with the impulse. He’d not forgotten a damned thing. It was no accident that this was his first visit to Doyle’s Grange in ten years. Nor that this was his first time socializing since his wife’s passing nearly two years ago. Outside the circle of his most intimate friends and women of a certain reputation, that is. He straightened the lay of his coat and said with sharp intent, “I’ve not forgotten anything.”

“We’ll disagree on that.” If he’d not been watching her so closely, he might have missed the distress that briefly replaced her pleasant smile. But he had been watching, and he did, and it ripped him to shreds.

Jesus. They’d made their peace in letters and it was all a lie, all those words they’d written to each other were now stripped of that fantasy pax now that he was here. Instead of the two of them moving on in person as they had in letters, they were mired in the past.

She put a hand on one of the slender branches of the sapling. One would think that in ten years she’d have changed more than she had. He had. Her brother Magnus had. She was remarkably unaltered. Smiling, too-tall-for-a-woman, auburn-haired, full of life. It was—almost—as if those second ten years had never been.

While he watched her, she lifted the hem of her muslin skirt and tamped down the last shovelful of dirt around the tree she’d just planted. She was wholly unconscious of his stare. No. He’d not forgotten anything.

Mud coated the bottom and sides of her plain leather half-boots. Spatters of dirt clung to her hem. She’d not been careful when she pinned her hair this morning, for there were curls, and not the fashionable sort. Hers came loose every which way. In daylight, there was no disguising that her hair was more red than brown, and of all things, that was what doomed him. That dark red hair.

To no avail, he reminded himself she was Magnus’s younger sister. He had years of correspondence from her. He’d not realized how her spirit had stolen into the pages and words she’d written. Every time he’d read one of her letters, she’d filled a space in his heart he ought to have closed off. He’d not even known it was happening until now. Far too late.

“What do you think, Crispin?” She wore thick gloves of the sort ladies wore when they gardened, and when she swiped a wisp of hair out of her face the careless motion left dirt on her cheek. The breeze sent the curl free to dangle at the side of her face. An undeniably red wisp of hair. Most women with hair that color insisted it was brown. Hers was a deep, dark, secret red. Soft in a man’s hands, a river of curling, mysterious color that glinted with strands of gold.

He had been careful, over the last two years, never to make love to a woman with red hair.

“Well? What do you think?”

“About?” His query came late enough that she laughed at him.

“You didn’t have to come out here. I told you you’d be bored.” She put her hands on her hips. “What do you think about my tree?”

One afternoon, one unforgettable day—God, they’d been so heartbreakingly young—she’d changed him forever, while she went on being Portia. She knew him better than anyone. Still did. For God’s sake, she knew him better than the woman he’d married. She hadn’t blamed him for his choice. Never a reproach for his decisions, never a hint that she understood he had been avoiding her these last ten years. She knew, of course. She was too intelligent not to know. When it came right down to it, he wasn’t blameless either. Not entirely.

“Well.” He pretended to study the tree, but he was really looking at her. Her gown was a striped muslin with no bows, no lace, no fancy trim to direct a man’s attention to the curve of a breast or the column of a throat. Yet here he stood remembering his hand sliding down smooth skin, the bang of his heart against his ribs because he had never touched a naked woman before, and, Lord, how sinfully luscious she was. Had been. Still was.

He still wanted her. There was nothing so surprising about that. Men lusted after women all the time. But his lust and desire had got mixed up and confused with more powerful emotions.

“It’s a tree, not a Venus in marble.” She peeked at him, then returned to her study of the tree. “There is no meaning to divine other than God was right to make them like this.”

“I like oak trees. An oak is a proper English tree.” In London, her serviceable frock would have been thought plain two seasons ago. This season? The fact was, no woman of his set would be caught dead in such a gown. But Portia had never been farther from Doyle’s Grange than the village of Aubry Sock, some twenty miles distant. He was guiltily aware that he’d never invited Magnus and Portia to London before or after he was married. The reasons were legion, and not all them were to his credit. He’d wanted to think of her here at Doyle’s Grange. Safe. Unchanging. Here in sight of the Exmoor hills where she would always love him with a passion that moved better men to poetry.

“I’m glad you like oaks, but this isn’t an oak. It’s a rowan.”

“What?” He could not stop staring. Before long Portia was going to take offense.

She rubbed at her cheek, frowned and pulled off one of her gloves. “Have I got dirt on my face?”

“Yes.”

She handed her spade to Hob, the man who served as Doyle’s Grange’s general servant; footman, groundsman, groom, butler, and performer of any other work there might be. Hob stood several feet back, idly tapping the side of his boot against the bucket of water at his feet. The man had looked a weathered forty-five or a well-preserved sixty for as long as he could remember.

The servant came forward to take the spade from Portia. He retreated a respectful distance.

Portia made a few more swipes at her cheek and missed the dirt each time. So like her. Northword knew he ought not stand there like the sexually stunned lump that he was. She’d know something was wrong, and he didn’t see how he could possibly tell her that absolutely nothing, and everything, had changed. He wanted nothing more than to take her to bed again, and to do it as a man, not a green boy who didn’t know his way around a woman. He took a certain piquant satisfaction from imagining the results of his mastery of that.

Thank God Hob was here because the Lord only knew what he might say or do. He had made his peace with Portia in words, if not in his heart, and as he stood here, seeing her for the first time in ten years, his very soul resonated with all that had never been spoken or put to paper. Better, he thought, if they had done. They ought to have screamed and shouted and accused instead of burying everything beneath a veneer of pleasantness.

“Hold still.” He pulled out his spare handkerchief and walked to her. He could, and would, control his base urges. He put one hand underneath her chin, turned her face to the side, and wiped at the dirt. The smudge proved more stubborn than was safe for him. Her lips were full, that bottom lip so tender. Yet another delicate curve. Once, he would he have stolen a kiss. Taken it. Shared it.

“Hurry,” she said. “It’s cold.”

“It isn’t.”

“It is.” She blinked while he worked at the smudge. He remembered the way her eyes had fluttered closed when he had somehow managed to bring her pleasure during their mutual discovery and clumsiness. Too quick the first time. But slow and tender the next. Oh, the enthusiasm and quick recovery of youth during those weeks that he thought, stupidly, they would continue to escape consequences. All that against the deep, wide landscape of loving her.

“What do you think, Hob?” She seemed oblivious to Northword’s stare and his memories.

“Well and good, Miss Temple.” The man’s Exmoor accent was as thick as ever, but, as it happened, Northword had not unlearned how to listen to that accent and make sense of it. “Well and good.”

The smudge yielded to him. He held her chin a moment longer than he ought to have. He knew, now, how to conduct an affair—never outside his marriage, he’d kept those vows. “There. As tidy as I can make you.”

“Thank you.” She pulled off her other glove and shoved it in her pocket with the first one and made an even bigger lump to spoil the line of her gown. They did not have between them the safety imposed by the formality of titles. She’d always been Portia to him, never Miss Temple. He’d always been Crispin to her. It was only the direction of her letters that styled him according to his title.

Crispin. There were nights when he lay awake remembering the sound of his name on her lips as she came to pleasure. His body came alive at those moments.

“Will the lavender be all right there?” She pointed at the plants in question. Again, she was talking to Hob. “Or do you think it will be in too much shade? Too late now, of course.”

“It’ll be years before the tree’s big enough for that.” Of course he said avore not before. Remarkable, really, how easily one slid into understanding that accent. Hob leaned a forearm on the shovel. “Thee and me’ll be long gone by then.”

With the toe of her boot, she knocked away a clod of dirt. A smile flashed on her face, and Northword thought of the kind of sex that made lovers laugh. “Perhaps one day relations of mine will stand by this tree.” She used both arms to describe a tree of immense size.

While she did that, his eye was drawn, inexorably, to her bosom, and he felt an absolute dog for it. She remained lush in her curves, more than a good many women, less than others. They’d be as good together as ever. Better. He knew it down to his marrow, that thrill of animal attraction.

She lowered her arms. “They’ll curse whoever planted the tree so close to the lavender.”

“Surely,” he said from the safety of his London drawl, “they’ll wonder what bumblehead planted the lavender so close to the tree.”

Portia laughed, and his heart eased, to be followed immediately by guilt at his reaction. Just once, when he and his wife lay beside each other, her hand on his chest in a moment of perilous intimacy, she’d asked him whether he had ever loved someone else. His denial hadn’t come quickly enough. She never asked again.

“I hope you’re right.” She tapped the ground again with her boot. The view of her ankle damn near brought him low. Was he not a better man than this? Well. No. He wasn’t. She crossed her arms underneath her bosom, and the flesh above her neckline shifted in the most beguiling manner. “Done, then, Hob? Well planted?”

“Aye.” Hob came forward with his bucket and, after a glance at him—was that suspicion in the man’s eyes?—slowly poured the contents around the base of the rowan tree destined to be gigantic in a future that would not include him.

“I should like to know what this tree will look like in a hundred years.” She eyed the tree, but shot him a sideways look, a smile on her lips. “Don’t you?”

He shoved his hands in his pockets. “Strong and tall, I should think.”

“Yes. Yes, my rowan tree will be strong and tall.”

Quite deliberately, he closed his eyes and imagined a hundred-year-old tree, thick trunk, branches spreading over the house and shading this corner of the garden. In a hundred years, the world would be a vastly different place, and yet, there would be this tree, which Portia, the sublimely sexual creature inhabiting his senses, had planted with her own hands in honor of her upcoming marriage. She wanted, she’d told him, to know she’d left something of herself behind at Doyle’s Grange. As if she could help doing that.

When he opened his eyes, the first thing he saw was not Portia, but an auburn-haired woman with a delicious mouth and a ripe figure. He saw a woman with a lover’s mouth and hands. He blinked and forced himself to see her as Portia, his friend. Sister of his friend and a woman he’d allowed no claim to a difference in gender.

In the main, he failed.

Hob backed away from the rowan tree and sent a dark look in his direction. “Don’t worry, Miss, if the sapling looks ill for a bit. Root shock, you know.” He nodded sagely but, to Northword’s eye, his look was tainted with distrust. Hob knew men weren’t to be trusted. “Give her time. Don’t overwater.”

“I shan’t, then.”

“I’ll watch over the tree, Miss. Even after thee’s away.”

“I know you will.” She focused on Hob. He, Northword, might as well not be anywhere near. “Thank you. That would be a great comfort.”

“Ah,” said another woman. They all turned, him, Portia, and Hob. Mrs. Magnus Temple walked toward them.

Portia’s brother had married eight months ago. Magnus, it turned out, had met his wife during one of his visits to Northword’s London home and had been waiting ever since to have a Church living that would support a wife. As it happened, the living at West Aubry had always been Viscount Northword’s to give, which he had done as soon as practical after the previous possessor passed away. Within weeks, Magnus was married. Think of that. Waiting years to marry the woman you loved. Until the time was right and not a moment past then.

Northword had stood up for Magnus at the wedding, which took place by special license at Northword House in London. He’d offered them the chapel here, not even half a mile up the slope at Northword Hill and been refused. They would be married now, please, not in the time it would take to open up the house. And so it was done. Had been done, without Portia knowing about the marriage until Magnus had written to her. The couple had honeymooned in Bath, where Northword had a house he’d offered to them for a month.

“There you are, Portia.” Mrs. Temple arrived at the site of the tree planting and pursed her lips. She pointed at the undisturbed ground between the tree and the lavender. “What are those?”

“It’s spring,” Portia said. “Crocuses grow here every spring. You cannot hope to obliterate them all.”

“I can and I shall do so.” Mrs. Temple gestured at Hob and stepped around the patch of ground where the flowers were opening to the sun. “Dig them up, please.” She curtseyed to Northword and went so far as to bow her head. Her pretty blonde head. “Lord Northword.”

He bowed. “Mrs. Temple. Good morning to you.”

The woman had the most angelic smile he’d ever seen. “Portia, my dear. Might I have a word?”

Chapter Two

IN THE FRONT PARLOR, Portia stood with her back to the fireplace and smiled at her sister-in-law. Until recently, she’d not needed the ability to feign a smile or good cheer or any other mood. She was learning that most useful skill, though at times she feared the effort would turn her into a completely different person. Alone, she was Portia. Around Eleanor, she was another woman entirely. A false Portia. A Portia without truth.

Eleanor had stopped by the desk where Portia used to sit when she did the household accounts. The household accounts were now Eleanor’s domain. Her sister-in-law perched on the edge of the chair and, one hand on her lap, tapped a finger on the blotter. She gazed at Portia with an open, guileless concern that made her heart break.

“Yes?” Portia looked at the chair nearest the desk and decided she didn’t dare sit. She wasn’t good at interpreting Eleanor’s sighs and silences, though it was safe to assume Eleanor would be heartbreakingly disappointed when Portia failed to divine what was expected of her from all the things she did not say.

Her brother’s wife was generous and kind and assiduous in managing Magnus’s household, and she loved Magnus. She lived for Magnus, and Portia adored Eleanor for loving her brother with such honesty. And yet, other than Magnus, they had nothing in common. Their minds, their interests, did not intersect at any point, and she felt guilty for her failure to genuinely like Eleanor.

The finger tapping continued. “Dear, dear Portia.”

She smiled despite her dread of the conversation to come.

“What are we to do about you?”

“Nothing.” She managed, she hoped, to keep a pleasant expression. Her stomach contracted into a painful lump. “I am content as I am, you know.”

“But, Portia, my dear.” Eleanor tapped the lump that was Portia’s gardening gloves. “You might be brilliant, you know.”

She maintained her smile for, alas, Eleanor meant socially brilliant. Brilliant in fashion.

“You’ve led a sheltered life here at Doyle’s Grange. You do not see things as I do.” She cocked her head. “If only Magnus had brought you to London. In time, you would have sparkled. I am convinced you would have had a dozen beaus. Some gentlemen prefer a quiet woman such as you are, though I think if you had ever been to London, you would have come out of your shell. I’ve seen you smile, my dearest sister, and I cannot believe there is not a young gentleman of exemplary manners and family who would not see you smile and fall instantly in love.”

“I do not wish to have a dozen beaus or to dance away the night.”

“You are not too old to marry well. Imagine the good you would do your brother if you did.” She bent toward Portia, so earnest and mistaken. “Our connection to Lord Northword might be of great assistance in that.”

“Magnus cannot afford to send me to London so that I may dance with gentlemen who do not suit me. Particularly when I have already found a man who does.” She folded her hands together and struggled to match Eleanor’s cheerful concern. “I’m sure you did not bring me here to talk of this.” She smiled brightly. “Is there something I may assist you with? The household accounts, perhaps?”

Eleanor blinked rapidly and Portia felt horrible for her relief at diverting the conversation from the subject of suitable husbands. “What good fortune it is to have you for my sister. Without your kindness, I’d have a far more difficult time. Your brother, too, appreciates all that you do here.”

“How may I be of help?” She was not safely off the shoal yet. The most innocent remark or expression might send Eleanor’s mind reeling off toward ballrooms and dancing.

“If I may be honest—”

“Please.”

“It’s not so much what you may do, but what you ought not do and say. Especially if we are to engage Lord Northword’s assistance.”

“Oh?” This, too, was familiar territory.

Her sister-in-law’s lips set in a grim line. “I should hate for anyone to take offense when I know you do not mean to offend.”

“Indeed?”

“I know you will feel the same when I tell you this. I think that, living here as you have all your life, you are not aware of certain expectations.”

“Indeed, I hope not to offend anyone. Have I?” She did not hide her surprise, nor her concern, for if Eleanor, who was made of all that was light and sweet, thought she might have offended anyone, she may well have done so.

Eleanor intertwined her fingers. By now, Portia knew better than to think her distress would last beyond the next twenty minutes, but it was impossible not to feel the cruelty of allowing anything to beset her. Her sister-in-law lived so deeply in her emotions that it was probably for the best they never lasted for long. “You mustn’t be so familiar with Lord Northword.”

Portia clasped her hands behind her back. “You think I am?”

“You know I adore you and think the world of you.” Her puppy-eyes softened, and Portia’s heart fell at the possibility that Eleanor was about to lose track of their conversation again. “You did wonders before I came here. Looking after Magnus and the house.”

“Thank you.”

The corner of Eleanor’s mouth twitched down. “But, Portia, my dear, Lord Northword is a nobleman. A viscount.” She leaned forward. “The head of an illustrious and very old family.”

“I am aware.” As if she didn’t know.

“I thought my heart would stop when I overheard you call him by his Christian name.” She patted her chest as if she suffered still. “The proper style, the dignified style, is either my lord, or Lord Northword or, so as not to repeat oneself too often, sir. You would know this if you had ever been to London as I have. If your circle of acquaintance included men such as Lord Northword. Men who, I assure you, would not be as tolerant as he. Was there ever a man so forgiving? Besides Magnus.” Her mouth firmed. “I think not.”

She mentally counted to five. “The mistake is mine, of course. It’s just that I’ve always called him Crispin.”

Eleanor gave a frustrated sigh. “But, my dearest. Portia. How can I explain this? All our plans depend upon Lord Northword wishing to do you a service.”

“What plans do you mean?”

“He is your brother’s patron.” She wrung her hands, and even Portia, who wasn’t inclined to think much of helpless women, felt that familiar tug on her emotions that made her wonder if Eleanor hadn’t hit on precisely the behavior that ensured she would always come away with what she wanted. How could anyone bear to see Eleanor unhappy? “If we are to succeed, you must show him the respect due a man of his rank and influence.”

“You’re quite right.”

Eleanor straightened. “I am so glad you understand. He knows you do not intend to insult his dignity. He is a gentleman, after all. A nobleman. But I assure you, he feels it here.” She touched the middle of her chest again. “Naturally, he’s happy about your engagement, but he’s here in support of Magnus as he steps more fully into his position in West Aubry. He’ll want to see how the improvements at the church are progressing.”

“Yes, Eleanor.” It had been a shock when Crispin arrived at the Grange, despite her knowing he was to visit. No longer a married man. A widower. He’d walked in, and her heart had somersaulted in her chest with the same thrill as always. The years fell away to leave her with bare emotion despite knowing that aspect of their acquaintance was over. Over. Over and over. He was a man of the world now. He had been another woman’s husband.

“In London, among the Ton, others will misunderstand your familiarity and think you uncouth. Nothing could be further from the truth. For all that you have red hair and make no effort to improve yourself, we will make a success of you. I promise you. Honestly, my dear sister, if only your hair were walnut brown, I am convinced you would have a dozen more admirers.”

“I’m pleased with the one I have.”

“If you won’t do anything about your hair, you really ought to follow my advice as to your wardrobe. When I was in London, everyone wanted to know the name of my modiste. Everyone! Twice I had to intervene when other ladies tried to hire away Bridget.”

“Thank you, but I do not wish to go to London.” My God. They were back to London and the inadequacies of her dress, yet another familiar topic between them.

“Think what you may do there. My family, as you know, is easily as old as Lord Northword’s. Why, Ryans have been in Kent since the days of William the Conqueror.” Her smile made Portia wish she had the knack of looking so perfectly helpless. “While I love Magnus madly and think there can be no man finer, the fact is Temples are not so old a family as the Ryans.”

“We Temples are a youthful lot.” She nodded and nursed her faint hope that the conversation might be diverted again. “Not at all impetuous. Why, my grandfather took twenty years to decide whether he ought to move the hen house.”

Eleanor frowned and waved a hand. “I ought to have spoken to you before Lord Northword arrived.” She fluttered her eyes, and Portia suppressed the urge to comfort her. There, there, you poor dear thing. “I assure you, I did not anticipate your manner with him would be so familiar.” A cloud of discontent floated in her cerulean eyes. “If I’d known…

“I am Magnus’s wife and I should never call Lord Northword anything but that, unless it is my lord, or sir and therefore, you mayn’t either. You’ll surely meet other men of his rank, and higher, even, and with them you must be scrupulous.”

Portia nodded, and it was killing her, it really was, to speak of anything even tangentially to do with Crispin. “I do see. Thank you. You would have warned me. I understand. I’m sure you ought to have.”

Eleanor nodded as if Portia had given voice to the obvious. “Everything depends upon your appearance and your connections. Everything.” You’d think she was a surgeon discussing treatments for a dread disorder. “You have not my family’s standing, but I shall be there at your side to remind everyone. If we have Lord Northword’s support, why, you might marry very well indeed.”

“Yes, thank you. I believe I will, of course.” There were times she was convinced her sister-in-law was clever and possibly even diabolical. Such as now. “But I am not going to London.”

“Of course you are. I understand you have an arrangement with Mr. Stewart, but such arrangements come to naught all the time. No woman ought to marry until she has met at least eleven gentlemen who would be suitable husbands.”

“Eleven?” How odd. Her sister-in-law’s mind often confounded her this way. “Why not thirteen? Or a hundred?”

Her eyes went wide and, oh, Lord, they sparkled with joy. Too late Portia realized the error of expressing curiosity over the number of suitors one ought to have. Eleanor reached for Portia’s hand. “Thirteen would be unlucky, and a hundred is far too many. No, eleven is the perfect number. Never fear. I will guide and advise you.”

Portia summoned a weak smile. Eleanor’s fingers were soft and limp and milky white. Which fact brought home the shameful truth that, having removed her gardening gloves, she could see dirt under her fingernails. She drew away her hand and clasped them behind her back.

“I’m so glad we had this chat.” Eleanor rose and took a step toward her. “You understand now how vitally important it is for you to be circumspect in everything?”

“Yes, thank you.” Frustration threatened to burst from her in one long, terrible scream that dammed up in her throat. A vision of Eleanor in tears kept the impulse under control.

“I’ll apologize to Lord Northword for you.” The cloying scent of lilies floated between them when she stretched to press Portia’s upper arm. “Please, don’t feel you need say anything at all. I’ll put everything right with Lord Northword, rely on it. I am happy to help you through this difficulty.” She threw her arms around Portia and kissed her cheek. “You’ll adore London just as I did.”

When they parted, Eleanor checked the watch pinned to her bodice. “Goodness, we’ve hardly time to dress for luncheon. Do wear the pink frock we made for you. That’s your best gown. Together we shall dazzle Lord Northword with our beauty.”

“Yours perhaps.”

She giggled. Good heavens, Eleanor giggled. “Men like pink on a woman.”

Portia hated pink. She hated pink beyond anything. She especially hated that shade of pink in that thick satin. The gown was awful on her.

“I cannot wait for London!”

Chapter Three

AT A QUARTER TO TWELVE, Portia walked into the parlor a silent horror in a pink gown festooned with lace and bows. The very latest in London fashion, she had been assured. In order to accommodate her height, Eleanor had sewn frothy tulle over a five-inch layer of satin stitched to the bottom of the original hem. Though Portia did not entirely object to lace or bows, she objected to their combination almost as much as she objected to the unrelenting pink of…everything.

She was early to luncheon on purpose. God forbid she should make an entrance dressed like this. She sat and scooted her chair closer to the table while she exchanged a commiserating glance with Hob. One of Eleanor’s early changes at Doyle’s Grange was to put Hob into what amounted to livery when he served their meals. With Crispin here, the costume had been embellished beyond the bronze frock coat, breeches and heeled shoes with silver buckles. Now his costume included a powdered wig and a tricorn hat that refused to sit straight on his head. She found scant consolation in the knowledge that Hob looked as ridiculous as she did.

Two minutes before noon, Crispin strolled in with Eleanor on his arm and Magnus on his other side. “Portia.” He lifted his free hand in greeting, and his gaze swept her up and down. His eyebrows shot up. She wanted to shoot him dead for that taken aback look. “Heavens, don’t get up. Please.”

He was dressed for the country, but you’d never mistake him for anything but a man of fashion. A man who was not from Exmoor. His toffee-colored hair was too perfectly cut. A grown man now. Not the young man she’d so desperately loved. With all that had happened between them, the awful strain of those last days, he’d moved on in his life. It was she who had been unable to move forward.

Crispin led Eleanor to the table and touched his fingers to the top of her chair while she sat. Magnus brought a chair closer to Eleanor but before he took his seat, he waved his arms in the air as if he were summoning food and refreshments by magical means.

This brought Hob away from guarding the door. He pushed a wheeled cart to Eleanor and then brought over, one plate or dish at a time, a selection of meat, cheeses, cakes, biscuits and various other comestibles. There was even a pot of coffee. Without a moment’s hesitation, Crispin poured himself a cup, adding sugar and milk. So deftly done that one had to imagine he frequently sat down to coffee. It was a luxury here. And a rarity. This, too, was a habit of his of which she had no knowledge. She had herself never acquired a taste for coffee.

Conversation moved from politics to horses, to racing phaetons and the state of the poor who lived between Aubry Sock and West Aubry. Portia had little to contribute to the conversation. Every time she looked down or caught a glimpse of the frock Eleanor had so lovingly helped her make, she shuddered.

Hob brought over a plate of sliced duck and for a time there was no noise but that of silverware against the best china and teacups or coffee cups clicking against a porcelain saucer. She stared out the window. Clouds that promised rain all but blocked out the sky. She poked at her duck and set herself to mashing the remains of some cheddar. The thought of eating did not appeal. If this kept up, she’d waste away and become delicate through lack of appetite. She’d never look well in pink, though. Not with her hair. She didn’t even want to look at Crispin for fear she’d see in his eyes a reflection of how unsuited she was to gowns with lace and frills. He unnerved her, to be honest.

Magnus gave a great harumph and took a large helping of duck. “Are we ready, do you think, Eleanor, for our journey to the seashore?”

Weeks before Crispin’s arrival, Magnus and Eleanor had engaged to spend a fortnight in Brighton. They had rooms reserved at a favorite hotel, and Portia had been looking forward to several blessed days alone. She’d planned to stay up all hours, sleep away the mornings, and spend her afternoons transplanting crocuses to the rear lawns. That, alas, was not to be.

Once they had realized Crispin’s visit would overlap with the Brighton trip, Magnus had suggested Portia ask Mr. Stewart to bring his mother to the Grange for a visit so as to avoid any hint of impropriety. This was done and the invitation accepted. As it turned out, however, Crispin had an appointment in West Aubry during the days that Magnus and Eleanor were to be away, discovered too late to even think of putting off the Stewarts’ visit.

“Indeed we are.” Eleanor put her hand over Magnus’s and there was just no denying that when she looked at her husband, she glowed. “After Brighton, London. I hope, Lord Northword, that you will be in town then, for I know Portia is looking forward to seeing Northword House.”

His expression smoothed out. “I don’t know my schedule. I dare say it’s possible.” Crispin glanced at her, but Portia averted her eyes just in time. Having him here was much, much more difficult than she’d imagined. And that hint of distance in his voice? He did not want her in London any more than she wanted to go. The fact that Crispin and Jeremy must inevitably meet only deepened her tension and anxiety. “If I am not in town or at home, do please call. The housekeeper will give you a tour.”

“You’ll be in London for the sessions, I imagine,” Eleanor said. “I know Mr. Temple would like to attend them while I show Portia the delights of Bond Street and my favorite shops.”

Portia did her best imitation of one of Eleanor’s helpless smiles. She hated herself for it, but she did it. “I have been thinking,” she said for Eleanor’s benefit, “that if your London excursion comes off, I’m sure Mr. Stewart and his mother would love to accompany us. Would that not be agreeable?”

Crispin returned a shallow grin. “I should be delighted to show all of you Northword House.” He cut a slice of duck. “If I am in town.”

“Portia dearest, are you certain Mrs. Stewart can withstand such a journey? It’s such a long way for a frail woman.”

Oh, how neatly her trap was sprung. “What a disappointment if she cannot. But let’s not despair. I’ll settle everything when they are here and write to you at Brighton.”

“Have you been to Brighton, Portia?” Crispin pushed his cup forward so that Hob could refill it from the coffee pot. “Thank you.”

“No. I’ve not been.”

“You’d like it immensely. Seeing the ocean. Everyone ought to see the ocean at least once.” He moved her untouched teacup out of his line of sight. Candlelight reflected off his hair and turned the darker streaks in his hair to bronze. He was astonishingly confident of himself and at ease with the sort of conversation that took no toll on anyone. “Tell me, ladies, have you bathing costumes?”

Eleanor fluttered her lashes. “I have, my lord. It’s new, and I’ve been keeping it secret from Magnus.”

Portia wished she were married already. She wished she were nowhere near Crispin or Doyle’s Grange. The light in the room shifted with the gathering clouds and she seized on that as an excuse to stare out the window. She’d rather count cracks in the plaster than torture herself by watching Crispin bring Eleanor under his spell.

“And you, Portia? Have you a bathing costume?”

“I haven’t.” She looked away because she couldn’t bear that there was so little left of the woman Crispin had once loved. Eleanor made a face at her, and, perhaps a shade too late, Portia understood why. She coughed and patted her upper chest. “Forgive me. My lord. I have no bathing costume, secret or otherwise. But I cannot go to Brighton in any event, sir. And while I should like to see London, sir, I expect that won’t be possible. Not until after I am married.”

Crispin leaned sideways against his chair. He’d dressed elegantly this afternoon, hadn’t he? A far cry from the country clothes he’d worn when he’d lived at Wordless. His coat was the finest wool, his shirt a delicate lawn, and his waistcoat, well, that was heavy silk embroidered with tiny points of gold thread. “What’s got into you?”

“I don’t know what you mean.”

“Nonsense to be so formal, and you know it.” He rested his wrist on the edge of the table and his frown deepened. “I wish you would stop it.”

Eleanor gave a gentle sigh. “But, Lord Northword. Good manners are never nonsense. She ought to show you the respect due from a woman of her position. Indeed, to all men of your standing.” In tandem, Magnus and Crispin stared at Eleanor. She gazed back with that helpless gaze she’d so perfected. No one said anything for too long.

Crispin took a sip of his coffee. “Portia and I are old friends.”

“What will people say when we are in London and she speaks of you with so little respect?” Her mouth trembled. “She will make entirely the wrong impression.”

Crispin turned his head to her, and their eyes met. For a moment, it was as if they were lovers still, with none of their mistakes and missteps between them. Her heart stopped beating and did not start again until he looked away. Thank God. Thank God he had not acknowledged that moment.

“Eleanor,” she said out of pure desperation for a change in subject. “Were you not telling me you have a list of improvements you’d like to make to the Grange? Is there anything I may do to assist with that while you and Magnus are in Brighton?”

Crispin gave every appearance of being fascinated by Eleanor as he was not by her. Watching him, Portia wondered if his late wife had been anything like Eleanor. She’d never been able to pry much information from Magnus on the subject of Lady Northword, other than to have him say she was the daughter of a duke and quite beautiful. Once, after one of his visits to London, he’d let slip that her health was delicate. Portia had understood that to mean she was in a way of giving Crispin his heir. But there was never any announcement and never any letter of congratulation to write.

“The Grange is perfect just as it is.” Magnus helped himself to more cheddar.

“Darling man.” Eleanor patted his arm. “That’s because you have never known Doyle’s Grange to be other than what it is. Of course you love your home. It would be unnatural if you did not.”

“Quite right, my dear.”

“Change is upsetting, I will never deny that.” She smiled as she cut a slice of duck. From over Eleanor’s shoulder, Portia watched raindrops hit the windows, pinpricks of water on the glass. “There are improvements to be made here. Am I not fortunate to have Portia to assist me?” She swept a hand in an arc. “I have such plans for this room.”

Underneath the table, Crispin stuck out his leg and stepped on Portia’s toes. “What do you think?”

“About what?” That earned her another puppy-eyed gaze from Eleanor. She stabbed her duck with her fork and wished she’d thought to feign illness and stay upstairs in her room. “What do I think about what, my lord?”

“The plans for redecorating, of course.”

“Nothing.” He was only trying to make conversation, and here she was turning into the sort of dismal drear no one liked at all.

He looked around the table. A diamond winked amid the lace of his neckcloth. The young man she’d known would never have worn a diamond or the fobs hanging from his watch chain. Nor the signet ring gleaming from the index finger of his right hand. “All I know is I’ve no taste in such things.”

“I’m sure that’s not so, Lord Northword.” Eleanor returned him a brilliant smile. “Why, Northword House is all that is tasteful and elegant.”

“My wife managed all that. I was happy to have her do so.”

Magnus took Eleanor’s hand in his and kissed her knuckles. “Everything I have is yours, as you well know. Do what you will with the place, though I don’t see how it could be improved.”

“But Magnus!” She went wide-eyed again. “The room is green, and green, my dearest Mr. Temple, is not a color I appreciate.”

“No?” He kissed her knuckles again. “Away with it then.”

Crispin looked to Portia. His expression was bland, but she was convinced he was taunting her. “What color would you do the room in?”

“Green, I fear.” She had been a fortnight with the painters choosing that shade of green and another week before she was satisfied all the colors were exactly perfect for the room. It was six weeks before the room had been painted to her satisfaction. “If I had known Magnus was going to marry, I’d not have had the work done.”

Eleanor gave one of her delightful laughs. “One acquires a certain sensibility when one has lived in society. I have seen, as you have not, Portia darling, some of the great houses of London. Northword House, for example. So inspiring, my lord. I am most anxious to see it again, and I do hope one day that Portia, too, will see the house so that she will understand precisely what I mean to do here at the Grange. After all, Lady Northword was a woman of exceptional taste, and one will never go wrong studying what she wrought at Northword House.” She took a tiny bite of duck. “I will never forget how kind she was to give me a personal tour when I first called.”

This fascinated her. “You met Lady Northword?”

“I like to think we became friends.” Eleanor touched the strand of pearls around her throat. “I hope you don’t think me presumptuous, Lord Northword, to speak of your wife. I know you mourn her still.”

He nodded. “Not at all, Mrs. Temple.”

“Your wife and I had a great many interests in common.”

“Did you?”

Portia accepted the sting to her heart. She had nothing in common with Lady Northword. What had brought her and Crispin together was not what made a man settle on the woman he would marry. She shredded her duck until she had reduced it to a paste. Half an hour, she told herself. In half an hour, she could plead a headache and retire to her room. Which happened to be green.

“Oh, yes, my lord. We spoke at great length of how one ought to decorate and arrange one’s home. To be sure, Doyle’s Grange can never be on the scale of Northword House, or Northword Hill.” Eleanor surveyed the room, eyes moving over the architectural features and, no doubt, totting up all that must be removed, repainted or destroyed in order to make Doyle’s Grange over in the exquisite sensibilities of Lady Northword.

“The parlor, for example, might be made quite lovely. Lady Northword had the most exacting opinions about parlors. She had a particular horror of green, and ever since I have shared that opinion. Even so,” Eleanor went on, “there is a charm here that can be brought out. A few of Magnus’s best paintings might be hung on the walls, for example.” She gazed at Magnus. He gazed back, besotted and beguiled by his wife, and Portia could only feel the hollow certainty that she would never, not in a hundred thousand years, gaze at her husband that way.

Eleanor continued. “Several rooms are in need of the attentions of someone with refined tastes. So as to bring out charms that currently are hidden. Imagine how much more easily this can be accomplished if Portia could see the homes that inspired me. My dear Mr. Temple, we simply must bring her to London!”

Portia shot to her feet. Crispin stood, napkin in one hand. Magnus, too, after a moment. “Do sit down, you two.” She drew a breath and then found everyone staring at her as if she’d gone mad. Perhaps she had. The walls closed in on her, and she wanted nothing more than to be anywhere in the world but there. “Forgive me. I don’t feel well at all.”

“Of course, of course.” Eleanor stood and pressed the back of her hand to Portia’s cheek. “I’ll send a tisane to you. You must rest, please.”

“Thank you. You are too kind.”

She did not go to her room. God, she’d suffocate in there with all that green that was so offensive a color to Lady Northword. Instead, she went out the front.

The heavy door slammed behind her.

Chapter Four

AFTER PORTIA LEFT THE PARLOR, Magnus sat again, but Northword stayed on his feet, in the grip of an understanding that cut to his core. Portia’s life and his had diverged beyond hope of any reconciliation beyond the polite exchanges of their letters. It didn’t matter that he found her more attractive than ever. It didn’t matter that from time to time they fell into the old habits of their past intimacy. The woman he’d loved was gone.

“My lord?”

Mrs. Temple’s overly sweet voice grated on his nerves, and he gazed at her, still lost in his thoughts. There was no reason to be concerned for Portia, Northword told himself. She was well looked after here, and before long she would be married and in the care of her husband.

“Lord Northword?”

The so-feminine lilt to the woman’s voice snapped him back to the present. Could such naiveté be genuine? The moment the doubt entered his head, he felt guilty. She was a lovely, delicate woman who had never, at any time that he’d observed, said anything to deserve an unkindness from him. But good God, Portia must hate being spoken to as if she cared for nothing but the color of the damn walls.

“Hullo, there.” Magnus rapped on the table. “Word, you great lump.”

“I beg your pardon.” He threw his napkin on the table and was in the act of sitting when the front door opened and then closed with more force than necessary. Uneasiness lodged in his gut and expanded to take up the whole of his chest. He did not care for the feeling. Out of the window, from the corner of his eye, he saw a flash of pink and then the unmistakable deep red of Portia’s hair. What the devil was she doing outside when the skies looked ready to break open? She’d catch her death.

While he stared at that flash of receding pink, fat drops of rain hit the glass. She was out there, without a coat or cloak, and quite plainly, and to his mind, understandably upset. She had no one to talk to or rage at. He could not imagine her opening up to Mrs. Temple. Impossible, that.

“Excuse me, please.” He forced himself to smile at Mrs. Temple. “I have just recalled a letter I must write immediately. I can’t fathom how I could have forgotten to get it into the morning post.”

Magnus took a sip of his tea. “Give it to Hob when you’re done. He’ll get it to Up Aubry for you. There’s just time, I think, to make the afternoon post, if you’re quick about it.”

“Yes, thank you. I’ll do that.” He bowed and hurried out of the parlor. He hadn’t even known his wife disliked the color green. Why had he not known that? By the time he’d fetched his greatcoat and hat and was himself outside and heading toward the rear of the house, rain fell steadily. Portia was long past the back gate and moving away from the Grange, her gown a splash of pink against the green of the field.

He started after her. He’d made up perhaps a quarter of the distance between them when, at last, she slowed, though she maintained a brisk pace and kept her head down. When she disappeared over the other side of the slope, he walked faster. Rain came down hard enough to pound on his hat and turn the surface of the path to mud. He lengthened his stride.

At the top of the slope, he caught sight of her again, moving rapidly toward the top of the hill that lead—eventually—to Wordless. And wasn’t that a fine joke that he should call his own home by the name Portia had given it in her letters. Wordless, because he was familiarly called Word by certain intimate friends, and he was never at Northword Hill. He’d told Magnus about that, and they’d taken to calling all manner of things Wordless.

He cupped his hands to the sides of his mouth. “Portia!”

Wind whipped away the sound of her name, but she stopped. Then, without turning to look, she darted off, skirts in her hands. Wasn’t that just like her, to be contrary and headstrong? He plunged down the hill and slid in the mud, though he managed to keep his feet. Once, she slipped, too, but as he had, she caught herself and kept going.

Water dripped from the brim of his hat onto his face and wherever the drops hit his cheeks his skin burned with cold. She slowed, and God knows she would have needed inhuman endurance to maintain her pace in these conditions.

He caught up at the stone fence that marked the border between the Grange and his property. From here, the side of Northword Hill rose up, turned a darker gray by the rain.

This time, he did not need to shout. “Portia.”

She stopped walking but did not face him. Her hands hung at her sides. Water ran down the back of her neck, making rivers of the tendrils of hair that had escaped her hairpins.

Northword took a step closer. Even if he’d been close enough to touch her, he wasn’t sure he’d dare. Never mind their difficulties, never mind the years and the chasm between them, he did not want to see her in distress. Not like this. “Portia.”

She whirled on him, eyes ablaze. Rain dripped down her face, and she shivered once. Gooseflesh pimpled her exposed skin. “What could you possibly want from me? There’s no need to humiliate me like this. Haven’t I done enough to push you away?”

“I didn’t come after you to humiliate you.”

“Well, you have. Lord Northword.” She walked away, keeping to the line of the fence, away from the Grange. The hem of her skirt was muddy for several inches, and the fabric was soaked halfway to her knees.

He followed and raised his voice to be heard over the rain and the distance she was putting between them. “Since when does my chasing after you to make sure you don’t catch your death of sleet and rain count as humiliation, I’d like to know?”

The skies opened. Unbelievable as it seemed, it was actually raining harder, and cold enough now that there were tiny pellets of ice. He thought she meant to pretend she hadn’t heard him, but then she made a rude gesture. And kept walking. This was the Portia he remembered. Passionate. Always passionate.

“Stop.” He took three long steps and caught her arm, pulling her around to face him. Her mouth was rimmed with white but there was a telltale tremor around her jaws. “We can’t stay in this downpour.”

“I don’t care.” Rain plastered her awful pink gown to her body.

“I don’t care much if you think I’ve humiliated you when I haven’t.”

She stared him down. He did not know this woman. She was not a girl. She’d lived ten years without him, and in ten years, people changed. They left behind fancies of love and passion. They married and went on to live dutiful lives.

“Thank you for telling me how I feel. Now that you are Lord Northword, of course you know all.” She pulled away. He didn’t let go of her arm, and a good thing, too, because she slipped, and it was only because he steadied her that she didn’t fall.

He brought her close and raised his voice to be heard. “It’s bloody hailing. We’re going to freeze if we stay out here much longer.”

“You needn’t have come after me.” Her chin tipped up in an expression so familiar to him he lost sight of those ten years.

“Yes, I did need.”

“You didn’t.” She tugged on her arm. “Let go.”

“You know me better than that.”

“I don’t think I do.”

“You don’t at all if you think I’d leave any lady outside in this weather, not one dressed as you are, and not when I know she’s upset and unable to think as clearly as she ought.”

Her eyes widened, and not in recognition of his good sense. She was magnificently furious. “Let me alone, Crispin Hope, you booby-headed jackass.”

He kept his grip on her arm. “Use your intellect, if you haven’t let it be worn to a blunt by listening to your sister-in-law prattle on about gowns and London and the proper forms of address. You know as well as I that you’ll freeze out here.” He pointed toward the dark gray stones of his childhood home. “Wordless is nearer than the Grange. Let’s go there and wait out the rain.” He brought her closer to him, and he forgot everything that had gone wrong between them, the wrongs they’d done each other. Whatever else had happened, he could not bear to see her unhappy. “You can tell me everything that’s made you so miserable. Will you do that much? Please?”

Something of what he was feeling must have transferred to her, for she wiped water out of her face and nodded. “How long have you got?”

“As long as we need. You know that.” He ached to touch her, to console her, but didn’t dare. She was too angry. And he was too much on edge. “Out of the rain, if you please.”

She nodded again.

“Thank you.” He didn’t give her time to change her mind or form an objection. He swung her into his arms and bodily lifted her over the fence. From the awkward way she reacted, he knew she hadn’t expected to find herself in his arms. Nor had he anticipated doing so until it was done.

When she was safely down and steady on her feet, he stepped over the fence himself. He shrugged out of his greatcoat and put it around her shoulders. One did such things for ladies. As an afterthought, he clapped his hat on her head, too.

“Come along then.” He managed a smile that at long last did not feel false. “Before we drown or are killed by hail.”

He marched them toward the house and around to the front. He remembered the days when he had run up those twenty front stairs, often with Magnus and Portia in tow. He could see the house as it had been then—the servants, now long moved on to other positions, the interior of the house. How strange to think of those rooms as empty and dark. Rooms where his wife had never been and where she had left no mark.

No great surprise, the front door was locked. The groundskeeper lived in West Aubry and had no need for access to the house. His steward visited but twice a year to see to any interior maintenance that might be required.

Rain beat down while they tried every other entrance and found each door locked and barred, every shutter closed. Short of breaking a window or kicking in a door they weren’t getting inside. In the abstract, he was pleased that Wordless was so well protected, but at the moment, he was inconvenienced at being denied entry to his own damn house. Both of them were shivering now, with no sign of the rain letting up and the cold getting sharper.

“The stables?” Portia said.

He nodded and took her hand while they dashed along the gravel drive that led to the stable block only to find the grooms’ quarters locked up as tight as the house. They took refuge in the long stone archway of the stables, eight stalls on each side. The block emptied onto a courtyard with the carriage house at the far side. That was locked tight, too, he discovered.

Back in the archway between the two rows of stalls, they stood side-by-side, dripping water onto the paving stones. He stamped his feet and made a largely futile attempt to brush water off his coat and out of his hair. “At least we’re out of the wet.”

“Yes.” She stared at the rain beating down on the courtyard and cascading from the gutters.

“Tell me why you’re so unhappy?”

“I shan’t. Not more than you’ve guessed.” She shook her head. He’d give anything to have her look at him. “You’ll only think less of me than you do already.”

“She rubs my nerves raw, too, sometimes.”

“Oh,” she breathed. “Awful man.”

“True.” In the silence he stamped his feet some more and managed to dislodge some of the mud that clung to his boots. “It can’t come down like this for much longer.”

“Yes, it can.”

He’d lived here long enough to know it could rain like this until tomorrow. “Listen to us.” He rolled his eyes even though she wasn’t looking at him. “Talking about the weather like two old ladies.”

She shrugged, but halfway through the motion, she shivered. Without thinking, he put his arms around her. She didn’t come close.

“Take pity on me,” he said. “I’m cold.”

After a moment of resistance, she leaned toward him. He eased closer and tightened his arms around her. “Better. Much better.” He rubbed his hands up and down her back. She rested her head against his chest, and he slipped his hands underneath his greatcoat and rested them in the small of her back. He wanted to tell her he’d forgiven her, that he’d never forgotten a moment of their time as lovers, but that seemed…unwise.

After a moment or two of standing like this, she lifted her head and stared at the waterfall sluicing off the roof. The courtyard’s central gutters overflowed. The noise was near deafening. “I don’t think it’s going to stop.”

Like her, he stared at the water. “We can wait a while yet.”

“Hob will worry,” she said. “Magnus, too. They’ll wonder where we’ve got to.”

He continued to stroke her back. “Five minutes. Then we’ll go even if it’s no better.”

With a sigh, she settled against him, tucking her hands between them. Five minutes later, the rain hadn’t let up.

He forgot all about the cold and the damp as he brushed away a tendril of dark red hair that had stuck to her cheek. She pushed away, and he did the strangest, most contradictory, selfishly male thing imaginable. He brought her close instead of setting her back. She lifted her chin and gave him a quizzical look. The world dropped away. This was Portia. His Portia, and whatever had happened between them, no matter how they’d changed, nothing had changed at all.

He lowered his head to hers.

Chapter Five

FOR THE SPACE OF half a heartbeat, he told himself he wasn’t going kiss her. It would be stupid and wrong of him, and it would destroy the safety of the friendship they’d carved out for themselves during their years of letter writing.

His chest was so tight with tension, he could scarcely breathe. He was seventeen again, and his brain was overset with lust and desire and emotions too big to name. His cock was hard with the joy of holding this woman in his arms and at the prospect of being inside her. At long, long last.

Northword didn’t move. Didn’t breathe. Nor did she. In no way was that fact lost on him.

Her mouth brushed his. Barely there. For an instant, he didn’t react. He couldn’t. Surely, she had not meant that invitation. She was going to marry someone else, wasn’t she? Except she didn’t step away, and he didn’t want her to. She relaxed against him and she made a sound that was not quite a moan yet was soft and edged with need.

Almost no contact between them, yet his blood pounded in his ears. Their first time had been like this. Needful. Soul shattering. He burned in the moment, in her, in the heat of having his arms around her again. Familiar. Blazingly alive. She felt good in his embrace. Right. For the first time in years, he was whole.

She rested a hand on his upper arm, light at first, then fingers gripping. It was sweet, the way she leaned against him, sweet in his arms, and he wanted her so badly he hurt. Jesus, she felt good, and he’d been too long without sexual satisfaction because he was imagining doing a good deal more than her practically chaste kiss.

That condition could not and did not last, a kiss that did not reflect the tension zinging between them. In the initial days of their relations, they’d kissed for hours, what seemed like hours, before he’d brought himself to touch a hand to more than her cheek. It wouldn’t be the same now. Couldn’t be. The soul-stealing pleasure of his first time was just that. First. And therefore memorable. He knew about women, now, thank you very much.

Even during that year between, he’d known how the world worked. So had Portia. They knew what it meant for her to be Portia and him to be the future Northword. He’d been to bed with her, they’d been lovers, and in his thoughts, he was already imagining sexual relations with her.

There was nothing innocent about his desire. Nothing at all. There never had been, not since that long ago day he’d realized his feelings for Portia were more than friendship. Not since the day he realized she felt the same.

She kissed him again, her lips parted this time, and he took what she offered. Somewhere in the back of his head he had the thought that she hadn’t opened her mouth in order to invite more from him, but to draw breath. At the exact same time this was flitting through his thoughts, his mouth was open, too, and he was kissing her without restraint. Not in the least politely. Her mouth softened underneath his, matching, accepting him, answering him.

He knew a great deal more about kissing than he had ten years ago, but he was trembling just as he had then. They fit together, the two of them. He was taller since the last time she’d been in his arms, but she was still a good height for him, and she still made his heart too big for his chest.

The next thing he knew, the last of his restraint melted away, and he had her pressed against the stone wall of the archway, her head between his hands, his tongue in her mouth. Desperate for her. Desperately aroused. She kissed him back, her fingers gripping his upper arms in order to bring him closer. Familiar heat spiraled through him.

This.

He wanted this.

He rested his pelvis against her, and yes, he was hard and that seemed exactly how things ought to be. He filled his fingers with her wet hair and sent his hat tumbling to the flagstones. He pulled back so her head was at a better angle.

Lust rattled him, shook away everything but the two of them. All his adult life, he’d missed this immersion of his senses, and he was not, not going to let this pass without living every minute and second.

In the moment after their mouths separated, she gasped, a groan of desire that laid waste to his lingering reservations. The breath left his body. Whatever this said about his character, he wanted Portia to come undone. As a point of pride to prove to her she’d been wrong to let them end. He wanted her to fall under his spell, to believe in her soul that no other lover would do but him. He pulled back, just his upper body and not much of that. Enough to kiss the rain from her cheeks and watch her eyes open. Unfocused and half-drunk with the same passion that filled him.

She set her palms on either side of his face and said, so softly the tremor in her words barely registered, “How I’ve missed you.”

Yes. The word roared through him.

This.

He reached blindly past her and found the top of the nearest stable door. He fumbled it open and had just enough of his brain functioning that he thought to snatch a blanket hanging from a peg on the wall and spread it over the straw. Everything at Wordless was at the ready for the viscount to make use of his long neglected estate; clean blanket, clean straw. Thank God.

They dropped onto the blanket in a tangle of limbs and lips and, even, laughter. His lower back hit the blanket, and she was right here, kneeling between his upraised and spread apart knees. Her focus on him sent his heart pounding, and he propped one hand on the blanket and pushed up to loop an arm around the back of her neck and bring her in for another long, carnal kiss.

Outside, the rain beat down on the roof and cascaded onto the flagstones. All that faded away. There was no more cold. No rain. Nothing but the two of them. She offered her mouth. He accepted wholeheartedly.

With his free hand he adjusted their position so she straddled his hips. Kissing her still, he worked his hand underneath her skirts, pushing away damp-to-wet handfuls of that awful pink gown and her underskirts. She gave him the access he wanted.

His fingertips slid along her thighs, then up to cover her sex. Her pubic hair was as sparse as ever, almost nothing there. He pushed a finger between her legs. Slippery wet for him. Her gaze locked with his when his searching fingers slid along her. He knew how to touch her. He’d learned her. Memorized her. And he was better at this now. He was a much better lover than he had been. She set her hands on his shoulders and surrendered to her body.

“I missed you,” she said again. “I thought I would die from missing you.”

“Good.”

She swallowed hard just once, a reaction that echoed through her body as she opened to him. He dropped into a sensual haze. Everything aroused him, from the slide of his fingers on her, the sound of her sigh that turned to a moan, his anticipation of what would come.

While he kissed her, tongue in her mouth, tasting and taking, he found the core of her and that particular spot that would bring on a build to unbearable tension. She groaned when he backed off, and her eyes snapped with frustration. He gave her a smug grin because she knew what he was doing to her and why. He laughed before he licked a trail of raindrops from her cheek and moved his fingers in her. So tight. She tensed, and he waited for her to relax.

“Has there been no one since me?”

Her eyes slowly focused. “I wasn’t waiting for you, if that’s what you mean.”

He pushed his fingers further into her, into that soft, tight heat. “We can argue about that later. Right now—”

“God, Crispin.” The words came from her throat in a rush as she bowed toward him, hands pressed on the top of his shoulders, hips rocking into his palm cupping her sex. He watched her, felt her passage clench on his fingers.

There wasn’t a damn soul anywhere near so he had the rare, great pleasure of neither one of them having to be in the least discreet. He thought he might have one more chance to pull her from the brink before she came, but her fingers dug into his shoulders, and she left him to fall off the cliff he’d constructed with her, her breath shuddering. He stroked, pressed, and she threw her head back and completely, utterly, with heartrending passion, surrendered to pleasure.

She belonged to him. He felt her tighten around his fingers, and he damn near lost all restraint, he wanted inside with such ferocity. He sailed beyond lust, beyond arousal. Exactly as it had been with them every time before. Despite the words he’d never written to her, he’d bared his soul to her in his letters and kept her close in so doing. He had indulged in a fantastically ironic game of revenge. He’d wanted her to know exactly what she’d given up and to regret that for the rest of her life.

“This is what we’re like.” The words rasped from his throat while she was still coming down from her climax, her head bowed to his shoulder. “You and I. It’s not like this with anyone else. Just us.”

While she clung to him, and he stroked away the last spasms of her pleasure, he used his other hand to unfasten his coat and the fall of his breeches and free himself from his clothing. With one last stroke along the folds of her body, he slid his palm to the curve of her backside and brought her up and toward him, and when his cock was at her entrance, she lifted her head and caught her lower lip between her teeth as she answered his upward thrust with the lowering of her hips.

An inarticulate sound burst from him. Heat. Slick dampness. Tight, almost too tight. She didn’t relax around him because she’d not done this with anyone but him. He held back his urge to push hard. Slow at the start was good, too.

For a suspended moment, he was immersed in the simple pleasure of having his cock in a woman, but around the edges of that was this flicker of more. They weren’t too young this time. This time they were old enough to know there was nothing new in the world and that they did not invent passion, they created it between them, and it was that which was new and rare. He hissed as her body closed and softened around his cock. Nothing existed for him but her and his cock and the feral bliss of their connection.

“Crispin.” She grabbed his shoulders, and angled her hips. Her breath stuttered. “My God, Crispin.” Her head dropped back and, Lord, she softened around him just enough, and now he thrust the way he wanted, needed to. He leaned in to kiss her exposed throat. So tight around him, she gripped his cock, all of it, and with a shout that was part demand and part plea, he rolled her onto her back and let the imperative of sex take him.

She pushed her hips toward him and drew up her knees, and he shoved her skirts up higher, out of his way. That flicker of more stayed with him, and he closed his eyes to deny what that meant. Instead, he found the angles that made her groan with pleasure and the ones that sent him racing to orgasm.

Her body tensed, and he concentrated on bringing her again, the two of them partially on their sides, his hand between them, his mouth at the side of her throat, hard enough to leave a mark, kissing her until she cried out, and he felt the contractions of her passage around him. He remembered everything that had made her moan before, but he was caught up in their desperation, urged on by the sounds she was making, by the roll of her hips against his, the grip of her arms around him.

He planted his hands by her head and pushed up so he could watch her face and leverage the weight of his pelvis with his thrusts into her. More selfish this time, but then she wrapped her legs around his hips and rocked into him, and he didn’t feel selfish at all.

His balls tightened, and he thrust into her harder. Hard enough, hard enough. So close and then he was tumbling, soaring toward exquisite pleasure and then falling into it, and he had just enough presence of mind not to come inside her. Barely.

When he returned to his senses, he opened his eyes, but he was still in a sensual stupor and had few thoughts but those that centered around his physical repletion. He drank in her face and the warmth where their bodies still touched. Pelvis to pelvis, her thighs at his hips, his softening member between them.

The rain had stopped while they’d been lost in each other. She wound her arms around his shoulders, and then his head, and pulled him down for a searing kiss. Afterward, when he’d pushed up to get his weight off her, the fierce sadness in her eyes made his heart swell again.

Her fingers brushed his cheek, pushed away the damp. “We ought to go, my lord.”

He loved the sound of that honorific, the way the words left her lips soft and intimate and offered him her submission and her possession of him. He needed a few more breaths before he trusted himself to speak, and then she did first.

“Before you catch your death.” Her hand lingered at his cheek, and he turned his head to kiss her fingers. She snatched her hand away. “That tickles.”

“I don’t want to go.” He nestled against her. “I’m perfectly warm.” He drew her nearer and breathed in the scent of her body, of sex and the damp heat of them both. “I can think of ways for us to stay warm.”

“Oh, we’ll just live here, then. In the stable.”

“It’s my stable. We can do what we like here.” She didn’t know, he thought. She didn’t know what this meant to him, how shocking it was to feel he was home after ten years at sea with nights spent dreaming of stripping her naked and burying himself inside her.

She gave him a push, but she was already retreating from him, and he didn’t know how to bring her back. “Obstinate as ever, aren’t you?”

“I haven’t changed.”

She looked away. “That’s not so.”

He dipped his head to her ear, nipped her there and said, “Except, I think my prick is bigger, don’t you?”

That made her laugh, and then him, and that was just like them, to be bawdy and find it amusing, as if they were the only lovers ever to speak crudely to each other. She turned her head to his chest, shoulders still shaking. Well. It was a fine joke, wasn’t it? He kissed her again and realized it wouldn’t take much for him to be ready again.

She pushed at his shoulders. “We should go. It’s late.”

With a sigh, he pushed away and fumbled to get himself decently back into his breeches. When he’d done that, he helped her arrange her clothes, too, or would have except that she lay on the blanket with her hair beginning to dry and glint with indisputable red, and her pale legs exposed and her lower belly, too. He thought he’d never seen anything more beautiful than her sex. A bit of the old guilt nipped at him, and he embraced that, too. Fucking his friend’s sister was wrong, but he couldn’t bring himself to care at this moment. Not then and not now.

He set his palm on her thigh, and then on the inside of her thigh. He’d scraped her there during their frantic coupling. When he thought to look at her face, he found her watching him with eyes that killed him. He slid his fingers upward, covered her sex, and, still watching her face, slid a finger inside her, one then two. “I’m no green boy, now,” he said. She was getting slicker, and his two fingers moved in her easily. “If we didn’t need to get home, I’d prove that beyond your ability to speak.”

She pressed her head back because he’d pushed his thumb between her folds and along the flesh there. Her breath caught but she managed to say, “You could try.”

“Anything for you, my love. Anything.”

“What’s this?” She put a hand on his breeches. “Are you rising to the occasion, sir?”

“I think I am.”

And she gave him a wicked smile that melted him inside, and made him forget about Magnus and the fact that she was going to be married, and he didn’t stop her from unbuttoning the fall of his breeches nor say a word when she took him in hand and drew back his foreskin. “You once liked me very well on my knees.”

“Yes.” He sat up, then stood and stared into her eyes and understood that this was to be their very last time. “Please.”

He buried his fingers in her hair when she took him in her mouth, and he let her bring him that way and all the while he told himself that if she could walk away from this, then by God, so could he.

Afterward, they tidied up as best they could, at last feeling the cold and damp, and they headed for the Grange. The sky hadn’t cleared, though it wasn’t raining, and the ground was thoroughly soaked. Dozens of tiny puddles lurked in the thick grass and made the footing uncertain. At the stone fence, he lifted her over again and did not put her down as quickly as he should have. He leaned in and kissed her, hard and fast before he released her.

“Don’t,” she said. “Don’t do this.”

Since she knew the way, he followed her through the fields. The path was muddier than when he’d tromped through here heading the other way, and the clouds were getting that heavy look while the air turned colder and thicker. They gave up trying to keep themselves out of the muck and just trudged through the field.

He kept a hand around her waist because that was what a gentleman did when he was escorting a lady across treacherous terrain. Before he was quite prepared to return to reality, they were at the Grange. Fat drops of water hit them as they dashed for the front of the house, running now and laughing for no reason other than it seemed right. The very moment they reached the path to the door, the rain became another torrent.

At the door, Portia turned, face to the sky and thrust a fist into the air. “Curse you, god of rain, curse you!”

He fumbled with the door, and when he got the thing open he grabbed Portia’s other hand and pulled her inside, they were still laughing.

Until he turned around and saw Mrs. Temple standing in the foyer, a look of utter betrayal on her face.

Chapter Six

WITH FINGERS CLUMSY FROM the cold, Portia worked at the buttons of Crispin’s greatcoat, so heavy on her shoulders. She didn’t dare meet Eleanor’s eyes. She couldn’t bear to see that wide-eyed hurt again. She wasn’t Eleanor’s equal, not fit to be in the same room as her.

This time, she’d betrayed more than Crispin and her brother’s trust. She’d hurt Eleanor, who did not deserve that, and she’d betrayed Jeremy, the man she was supposed to marry. Again. She wanted to weep with the horror of how badly she’d failed.

Hob appeared at the top of the servant’s staircase. He came to a full stop, eyes wide when he saw the condition the two of them were in. Both of them soaked to the skin, her in Crispin’s hat and greatcoat, muddy shoes, and water dripping everywhere.

“Hob,” Eleanor said in a light voice. God, what a brilliant performance. You’d never guess now, that her sister-in-law thought there was anything the least untoward about this. “Do help Lord Northword with his wet coat.”

Hob bowed and said, as he went to Crispin, “I was about to walk out to find thee, Miss.”

“As well you didn’t. You’d have got drenched, too.” She meant to match Eleanor’s aplomb and failed miserably at that, too. A shiver cut short her attempt to wipe water out of her face. She’d hardly minded her wet clothes and hair before, but now she was miserable inside and out. She managed to get the greatcoat unbuttoned and off her shoulders. Hob took it from her without a word.

“What on earth possessed you to go outside in weather such as this?” Eleanor’s smile was sweet, so sweet.

It was on the tip of her tongue to confess everything. Every horrible impulse, every awful, unworthy thought, and beg for forgiveness. She ought to confess all the ways in which she’d traded a few moments of bliss for her very soul, but Crispin plucked his hat off her head and dropped it on the table by the door and her words went unspoken. “Before you take my coat, Hob, see to sending a maid to help Miss Temple out of her wet things, won’t you?”

“Yes, milord.”

“That won’t be necessary.” Eleanor gave a clear, silvery laugh, but Portia knew she’d forever tainted relations with her sister-in-law, and very likely Magnus, too. Eleanor smoothly transferred her attention from Hob to Crispin. “Do take his coat. Lord Northword will catch an ague if he leaves it on.”

Crispin lifted a hand. “Well, now, Hob, I can hardly remove my coat in front of ladies, can I? I’ll not be so indelicate.” On the table, a damp ring formed around the brim of the hat, slowly spreading outward. “I’ll need my valet directly, if you’ll see to that as well.”

“Aye, milord.”

Portia could not summon Crispin’s cheer nor Eleanor’s sweetness. Every glance, every word flayed her to the bone. Eleanor might as well have been there at the stable block, watching Portia fall into sin.

“You were gone so long Magnus was worried.” Eleanor picked up Crispin’s hat and handed it to Hob. He accepted it with a bow and headed for the stairs.

“We were caught in the rain,” Crispin said easily.

“Quite a downpour. We were worried.”

“Did you not hear or see how it came down, Mrs. Temple?” He turned part way to her so that half his back faced Portia. He spoke so gently. “Forgive me that, ma’am. I know how intensely you feel everything.”

She set her fingertips over her heart. “I do, my lord.”

“I know I would have worried had I been in your place and my sister-in-law had gone out in such weather.”

“Yes, my lord. Precisely.”

“There was nothing we could do but take refuge where we could.”

“Which was?”

He spread his hands. Water dripped from his sleeves onto the floor. “As you can well imagine, no place very dry. There was a tree. Not a very big one, I’m afraid. Not so far from the creek at the back of your property.”

“A tree.”

“Yes. A tree.”

It didn’t matter what Crispin said, or what excuses he made, or how convincing he was for any of it, Portia knew every word was a lie. Eleanor’s expression remained calm and pleasant, but dread curled in the pit of her stomach. That smile lay so heavy on them, around them, between them, that she could not react in any way.

“Thank you, Lord Northword, for going after her.”

“You’re quite welcome, Mrs. Temple.”

“My dear Lord Northword. You ought to change into some dry clothes.” Portia felt horrible. Eleanor was a woman incapable of malice and accustomed to thinking the best of everyone, and here they were, deceiving her. “You’ll take a chill if you don’t.”

Crispin set a hand on the back of Portia’s shoulder, no longer the man who’d kissed her senseless. Not the man who’d made love to her in a way that obliterated the life she’d built without him. He’d retreated behind a pleasant facade, and she was unbearably aroused by him. “You as well, Portia.”

She nodded, but Eleanor detained her with a hand to Portia’s arm. Crispin bowed to them and headed for the stairs.

“You’ve no idea how worried Magnus was for you,” Eleanor said.

“We were caught in the rain.”

“I do not understand why you would go outside at all when you did not feel well. And to make Lord Northword chase after you.” Eleanor’s smile faded. “I cannot imagine what people will say when they hear the tale. It’s bound to follow you, my dear.”

“I was foolish. I’m very sorry for the inconvenience and your worry.”

“I do hope you’ve learned your lesson about acting impetuously.”

“I have, thank you.”

Eleanor pushed her toward the stairs. “Go on, now. We can’t have you catching your death either.”

Bridget, the maid she shared with Eleanor, was waiting for her when she entered her bedroom. The young woman clucked at her bedraggled state.

Portia stood where she was, her thoughts no place in particular. She was glad to be ministered to with no need to do anything but move as required to get her wet clothes off. The cold penetrated to her bones. Had that second rain washed away the smell of sex? Lord, she didn’t even know if Crispin had come on her clothes or his.

The maid unhooked the last of the fastenings of Portia’s gown. “You poor thing. You’re soaked to the skin. What happened?”

“Lord Northword and I were caught in the rain.” She pulled her arms out of the sleeves of her gown and was immediately caught up in another shiver. “We took refuge under a tree.” She fixed an image of the stream in her head, as if doing so would make it true. “By the stream. Near where my brother likes to fish.”

“So far from the house, Miss?”

“It rained so hard we were drenched. There was sleet, too.” That was true. There would have been sleet by the stream as well.

“And here you went out without a cloak. Goodness, why? Come closer to the fire, Miss.”

“Thank you.” She shivered again when Bridget stripped her of her petticoats and undergarments. The places where Crispin’s early beard had rasped against her skin were livid against her bone-cold skin. The bruise his mouth had left on her throat, the scrape left by his clothes against the inside of her thigh. She’d not felt any of that at the time, but she did now. Her skin contained the residue of his mouth, his hands and his cock, the sigh of his breath. Bridget would surely put the evidence of her deception before Eleanor. Ten years since her fall from grace, and she’d given up body and soul without a thought. She’d tried to love elsewhere. She truly had.

Wiped down, dried off, hair combed out, and her in dry undergarments, she came out of her dumb state when Bridget picked up the pink gown. “I’ll be up half the night with this.”

“Don’t bother.” She sank onto an armchair. For the life of her she couldn’t think what Crispin had done when he came to passion, other than she was sure he’d not come inside her. “It can wait.”

“If I don’t launder this right away, it will be ruined for certain.”

“If it can’t be saved, burn it.”

“Oh, it’s too pretty for that.”

“Keep it, if you like. Whether it can be saved or not.” She met the maid’s astonished gaze head on and managed a smile. “The color suits you better than it does me.”

“That’s kind of you. Thank you, Miss.” She scooped up the rest of the wet clothes and undergarments then whisked away the gown before leaving Portia alone.

With no one to distract her, her heart crumbled. Part of her soul had vanished when she and Crispin proved unable to make a future together. Today, she’d had him in her arms again, and she wasn’t sorry for that. She wasn’t. But she’d been left with a newer and more painful reminder of exactly what she’d given up ten years ago.

Chapter Seven

THE BLOODY RAIN HAD STOPPED AGAIN. In Northword’s room, with its rear-facing windows, the light shifted with the constant change in the gaps of sky between the clouds. He held the note Hob had just delivered to him. He itched to toss it onto the fire. “No answer, Hob. Thank you.”

He left it to his valet to give Hob a coin, which was quickly and discreetly done. The moment the door closed, he crumpled the note—predictably, the sheet was scented—and threw it on the dressing table. It landed half on the portable secretary he’d brought with him and half on the abandoned leather strop. Meet at his earliest convenience. The devil he’d be summoned like he was a misbehaving son. Not again.

He yanked on his shirt sleeve. “Are we finished with this nonsense yet?”

“No, milord.” His valet was even tempered, thank goodness, since at the moment, Northword wore nothing but a shirt and clean breeches.

“Get on with it.”

After that display of impatience and having to endure the arrangement of the rest of his clothes, he fussed more than usual with his appearance. He wanted to strike just the right note of lordly perfection before he went downstairs to face the wife of his closest friend. He was prepared to answer any and all charges laid at his feet. He would not give honor short shrift. Not ten years ago, and not now. He studied his reflection and decided, just this once, that his resemblance to his father was acceptable. His father had been a ruthless, heartless specimen of manhood.

He went downstairs to the parlor, reminding himself that he could not blame the woman for being concerned about Portia. The truth was, he had done precisely what one imagined happened when a man ended up alone with a woman. He half expected Magnus to be there waiting to accuse him, too, but he wasn’t.

Mrs. Temple was just lifting a dish of tea to her lips when he walked in. She raised her eyes and smiled, and there was no anger in that smile, not the least sign of disapproval. He lifted a hand when she rose. He remembered the expression on his father’s face when he had been called to account. His father had not smiled. “Please, don’t stand on my account.”

“Lord Northword. Thank you for coming downstairs so quickly.” Mrs. Temple stood and curtseyed, unnecessarily deep if you asked him. He wasn’t the damned Prince Regent. “Tea?”

“Yes, thank you.” There was a tray of chevron-shaped shortbread on the table and two plates. The one before her had one of the familiar chevrons on it. The shortbread at Northword House had always been shaped thus.

She poured for him without asking his preference and moments later handed him a cup of tea adulterated with more milk than tea, for God’s sake. She gazed at him with that guileless, ravishing smile of hers, and it did absolutely nothing for him.

He took the cup and set it down. He did not care for milk in his tea. Sugar only for him. “Thank you.”

“Tea is so much more healthful when one drinks it with milk.”

He helped himself to the sugar only to have her tap the table by his tea cup. “My father’s physician instructed him to take a cup every morning, prepared just so. Without sugar.”

“Indeed?” She meant well. She did. A wisp of steam curled from the surface of his tea cup. He dropped in three lumps and then, in a moment of childish rebellion that was far too satisfying, added two more just to watch her horror. “It’s not my habit to take milk with my tea.”

She blinked several times, and his immediate instinct was to backtrack. She was not the sort of woman to see nuance in word or deed. “You ought to, my lord. After your adventures in our weather today, extra consideration for your health is in order, don’t you agree?”

“I enjoy excellent health.”

“Who’s to say it will stay that way?” Her hand fluttered around her upper chest. “Why, just today you were caught in a storm and soaked to the skin. I shouldn’t be astonished at all if you took ill as a result.”

He blinked, took stock of his state and decided he was mildly offended and feeling decidedly manipulated by that wide-eyed look of incipient distress. “Thank you for considering my longevity.”

“You’re welcome, my lord.” She beamed at him, and such was his irritation over tea with milk, he had almost no regret for his ironic tone. Besides, she gave no sign whatever that she’d heard the edge in his reply. “It was no trouble at all. I think you’ll find you’ll quickly acquire a taste for milk with your tea.”

“I dare say you mean I will learn to like a bit of tea with my milk.” He laughed and smoothed out the emotion that had sparked his pointed response. He failed, for the bite remained. Was he not better than this? This was not a woman of subtlety, and it was not kind of him to behave so with her.

Her eyebrows drew together and she tipped her head to one side. Portia, he thought, would have laughed out loud. But then again, Portia would have known better then to put milk in his tea. He sipped the concoction, and her smile turned incandescent. “Well?”

Undrinkable swill. He forced a smile, because, after all, he would not hurt her feelings for the world.

“I’m glad you like it.” She drank some of her tea. “I don’t know what to make of this weather,” she said. “It’s March, nearly April, yet, goodness. As cold and wet as December.”

“Is it?”

“What plans have you for the remainder of the day, my lord?”

He put off the necessity of speech by taking a bite of shortbread. “This and that.”

She tilted her head and smiled cheerfully. Beautiful woman, sublimely so. But she was married to Magnus Temple, and in so far as his physical tastes went, he’d never been partial to blonds. At the moment he couldn’t conceive of taking any woman besides Portia to bed. If he were to have that choice again. If there were any hope of repairing the break between them. Which there was not.

“I thought I’d walk out with Magnus later. To Up Aubry for a pint.” He glanced out the window where there was now not a sign of a rain cloud. “If the weather holds as it looks to be doing. Improves the health, a good brisk walk.”

“Oh, dear.” She folded her hands on the table. “I’m afraid Mr. Temple is not likely to be back from West Aubry in time for that.”

He selected a piece of shortbread before he responded. “I didn’t know he meant to go.”

“He had parish business to attend to.”

“Nevertheless, he should return in ample time.”

“It’s quite a long ride to West Aubry and back.”

“By the road, yes. But he’ll have walked. With the weather like this, he shan’t be delayed for anything but his business.”

“Oh but he did not walk. He rode.”

“Why would he ride?” By the road under these conditions, West Aubry was at least two hours distant.

“He would have had to walk through your private lands.”

“Yes. And?”

“Enclosed lands. I’ve told him not to presume upon your good graces when that walk takes him within sight of your house.”

He frowned. “He’s always done so. Walked past Wordless—”

“Oh, I cannot approve.”

“Of what? Magnus taking the shortest route to West Aubry?”

“There are a great many things of which one cannot approve.” Her tone of voice gave him an unpleasant shock, for he’d begun to believe he would escape an uncomfortable conversation about him and Portia.

She gave him another ravishing smile. “Forgive me, but your estate, my lord, is Northword Hill. Not Wordless. It’s not respectful of anyone to call it that. I’ve told Mr. Temple he mustn’t. Portia, too, though she hardly listens to a word I say.”

“Why, when I don’t mind?” He put down his half-eaten shortbread. “Call the place what you will, Northword Hill, Wordless, or that ‘moldering pile of stones,’ your husband has always had leave to walk through the property. Even when my father was alive.”

She smiled as if she knew a secret and did not intend to share.

“I’ve no issues with him or anyone from the Grange continuing to do so.”

“It’s a matter of what’s proper, my lord.” She got that lost look again, and it did tug at his heart. He resisted the urge to comfort her. “A man of Mr. Temple’s position and station in life, who has dedicated himself to the work of God, cannot be seen by his parishioners to act in any way that is improper.” She dabbed at her mouth. How did Portia endure this without going stark raving mad? “That holds true for all his family. All we Temples must be above reproach. His wife and his sister included.”

He ate his shortbread without tasting any of it while he marshaled his thoughts and temper. Surely, he thought, she did not mean to be so officiously and stupidly nice about Magnus doing what he had always done, and with his blessing. And surely it was only his guilty conscience that made him think she was working her way toward a condemnation of him being out in the rain with Portia. In the stable block with their clothes undone or tossed up, neither of which facts she could possibly know.

“I think, Mrs. Temple, that your distinction is too fine.”

She plucked another chevron of shortbread from the tray and ate it slowly. “When we fail to observe the niceties we court the danger of failing in our larger responsibilities. To God, to ourselves and to others.” He could practically hear Magnus speaking through her words. “Does not the Bible tell us to respect our elders and those who are in a position superior to us? As those who are our superiors must be mindful of what is best for those beneath them in rank and consequence.”

“I’ll grant the inhabitants of Doyle’s Grange an easement to cross the estate lands.” He shrugged. “I’ll write to my solicitor and have it done.”

“Until then…”

He was so desperate to put off the looming unpleasantness that he changed the subject with an utter lack of tact or finesse. “I’ve known Magnus and Portia since I was a boy. We have always been on the best of terms. I should hope you believe there’s little I would not do for either of them.”

She leaned forward. “Magnus and I are so very grateful for all that you have done for us. He would never ask you for anything on his own, you understand. He is too fine a man for that.”

He nodded.

To his astonishment, her eyes filled with tears. “He will not ask you, so I shall.”

“Please.” He could not help thinking that he’d been maneuvered to a point where he’d agree to almost anything to keep from seeing her dissolve into tears.

“He’s worked so long and hard, and for his own beloved sister to thwart him like this.” She picked up her napkin and dabbed at her eyes.

“I don’t understand.”

“This marriage of hers.”

“What of it?”

“Mr. Stewart is a fine man. We all adore him.” She fisted a hand on the table and looked so distressed he wasn’t certain if he should hand her his handkerchief or call for a servant to bring a vinaigrette. “Even if Portia were as madly in love with Mr. Stewart as I am with Mr. Temple, the fact is, her marriage does nothing to secure Magnus’s future.

A chill went down his spine, and his heart skipped a beat. “She’s not in love with him?”

“Oh, I’m quite sure she has tender feelings for him, my lord.” She smiled sadly. “Who would not? He is delightful. But she is not a woman of such pure emotion as I am. Surely, you have noticed this small defect in her.”

“I have not.”

“She does not feel as I do. Nor love so deeply. I have observed that few people do.” She waved a hand. “A marriage between her and Mr. Stewart is of no advantage to Magnus at all.”

He floundered, torn in too many directions to make sense of this. He’d come downstairs convinced he would be pressured to marry Portia, that it was only a matter of time before Magnus confronted him, and instead, unless he was badly mistaken, he was being asked to interfere in Portia’s engagement. “What is it you would have me do?”

No artist in the world could resist the temptation to paint her smile onto a Madonna. “Convince her to come to London before she ties herself irrevocably to a man who does not suit her. Put the full weight of your approval behind our appearance there with her. Any number of gentlemen of good family would be pleased to marry an attractive woman. You’ve not noticed that Portia is quite a lovely woman, but I assure you it’s so. With the proper gowns and only a little more attention to her appearance, why, she cannot help but make an impression.”

As it turned out, he did not need to concoct a reply to that, for she continued talking.

“A pretty woman whose family has the friendship of Lord Northword? Any of them would be men who could do Magnus more good, and suit her much better than Mr. Stewart.”

“Have you someone in mind?”

She brightened. “Several candidates, as a matter of fact.” She counted off on her fingers, but the names went by in a blur.

“So many?”

“Naturally, there are one or two at the top of my list, my lord. I understand it is a great favor to ask you to introduce suitable men to her, but consider that Magnus might one day be a bishop. Why, he might aspire to York or even to Canterbury. It’s not beyond his abilities.” She leaned in, intent. “If his sister makes a marriage of no advantage? All I ask is that you make known your approval of her when we are in London. What could be happier for us all?”

Chapter Eight

Ten past midnight

PORTIA DIDN’T MOVE FROM HER CHAIR when someone tapped on her door. With Crispin here, they were keeping later hours and, after all, she wasn’t in bed yet. She pulled her shawl tighter around her shoulders, but kept her legs drawn up on the chair. She wore only her chemise and the night wrapper she’d had since she was thirteen. Her hair was still loose even though by now it was dry. One had to expect that a woman who’d taken refuge in her room might not be dressed.

Whoever it was tapped again. In the best case, her visitor was Eleanor. In the worst case, Magnus himself had come to confront her. Either way, the visit could only be about her and Crispin. “Come in.”

The curtains weren’t drawn. Portia, seated in an armchair halfway between her dresser and the fireplace, continued to stare at the glass. On this clear, cold night with the stars shining bright in the sky, she could just see the moonlit branches of the rowan tree she’d planted. Already, the slender branches looked stronger. Decades from now, her tree would provide shade for whoever lived here. The door opened and cast a slice of light on the windows. Instead of the rowan tree or the stars, she saw a reflection of the door.

With a click, the door closed. She had no need to look, she knew who it was. A moment later, the key turned in the lock. Her skin rippled with awareness during the brief silence that followed that sound. He put his lantern on the table beside the door. “The walls aren’t blue any more.”

“I decided I liked this better.” She stood, but stayed beside her chair, her back to the window now, one hand resting along the top curve of the chair. Out of habit, she thought of all the times Crispin had been here. At night. When he ought not to have been and when the walls had been a pale blue. With them breathless and giddy. She gestured. “Moss. This green is called moss. Darker than the parlor, but green nevertheless and very much underappreciated, I do assure you. Except by me. It seems I overappreciate the color.”

He laughed and looked around the room, taking it in. “I like it.”

Her fingers dug into the chair. He took up all the space. All the air. “I was expecting Magnus or Eleanor.”

“To take you to task, I presume.”

She nodded.

“I am the hero of this tale, you know. The knight in shining armor facing down the dragon. Did you not hear your sister-in-law praise me for rescuing you from a storm you were obstinate enough to be out in?” He wandered into the middle of the room and took up even more space. She turned with his progress. “I’ve already been thanked, so you needn’t add yours.”

“I was not in need of rescue.”

“No?” He looked around again. “Other than the walls, everything’s the same.”

She made a fist of her hand. “What are you doing here?”

His smile vanished. “She wishes me to join in her efforts to get you to London before you are married.”

“Oh. Oh, dear. My apologies for that.”

“Shall I?”

She looked down and scratched an eyebrow. “It’s awful the way she gets what she wants, isn’t it?”

“Thoroughly unsettling.”

“Don’t abet her in this or any other scheme.”

He nodded once and into the growing tension he said, “We should talk. About what happened at Wordless.” His voice was so brisk he hardly sounded like the man she knew. His voice turned him into a stranger, into the Viscount Northword, not a man she’d known nearly her entire life. Not the man who’d been her first lover and her most recent one, but a stranger of terrible consequence.

She stared at her hand on the top of the chair and forced herself to uncurl her fingers. “I’m not sure there’s much to say.”

He walked to her dresser so that she had to turn around to face him. He’d stood exactly there dozens of times before. There was no mistaking him for the seventeen-year-old he’d been. He’d grown into all the promise of his maleness and gained an air of command. Both things suited him. “I think we ought to talk, don’t you? Clear the air.” He scratched his head. “Of all that.”

“Why? I don’t regret it.”

“Nor I.”

She couldn’t tell if Crispin was pleased or not and so said nothing.

He continued. “Please be perfectly clear on that point. I don’t regret what happened either. Even though it ought not to have happened.”

“I don’t think men regret such encounters.” Force of habit put a lilt in her voice. She wasn’t used to being on edge with Crispin, and here, in her room, their old familiarity seemed especially close.

“Is that all it was to you?” Of all the items on her dresser, he picked up one of the few new ones to be found. The porcelain pot no bigger than her fist contained as many crocuses as she could fit in it. A crease appeared between his eyebrows. “An encounter.”

“I’m sorry if that’s inaccurate.” Briefly, she closed her eyes. Her memories of him took on weight, the nights he’d walked here from Wordless under a starlit sky like tonight’s. “I don’t know what it was to you.”

“We’ll leave it at that, then.” He turned and tilted the pot, watching the play of light over it. He wore a thick gold ring on his first finger, and that, too, was something she did not recognize. In ten years, she’d acquired only two pieces of jewelry: a necklace and a pair of earrings, both a gift from Magnus when she turned twenty-one. Since she’d almost immediately lost one of the earrings, she almost never wore the necklace that matched. “You were not your usual self,” he said in his stranger’s voice. He looked up. “It would not be absurd to suggest I took advantage. I’ll apologize if you need that from me.”

“No.”

He leaned against the dresser, still holding the pot of crocuses. “Your favorite flower, are they?”

“They’ve always reminded me of you.” Too late, she realized how much that gave away. “They bloom every spring in the field between Northword Hill and the Grange. Every spring when Magnus and I were little, I tried to count them whenever we walked up the hill.”

He gave her a sideways look. “I remember.”

“There weren’t as many then as there are now. The first spring after you left, the hill was covered with crocuses as far as the eye could see.” She waved a hand. “Not just a few, but a carpet of them. People came all the way from Aubry Sock to see them. I told Magnus to paint it for you. Did he not send it on?”

“He did. My wife saw it and thought it lovely.” He let out a short breath. “I didn’t know it was from you. I had it framed and gave it to her as a gift.”

“Did you?”

“You know Magnus. He’s a gift for choosing an interesting perspective in whatever he paints or draws. She particularly liked that you could see a part of Wordless. I suppose it’s still hanging in her room.” Crispin, slouched against her dresser, set the pot back in its place. He watched her under half-lidded eyes. A lock of his hair, that lovely shade that was not quite blond yet not quite brown either, fell in a crescent slash across his forehead. “It’s a wonder you don’t curse them the way she does.”

He meant Eleanor. “Never.” She brought her shawl closer around her shoulders and caught the edge of his frown. “Why would I?”

“I don’t know.” He shrugged and avoided looking directly at her by focusing his gaze just past her ear. “Because I took your virginity on a night like this?”

“Turn about is fair play. After all, I took yours.”

That frown of his flashed again. He ought to have smiled at her joke, but he didn’t. And this time, he looked her full in the face. “For whatever offense I gave that made you leave me.”

She sat on the armchair, just on the edge of the seat, and clutched the padded arm. Her heart turned to ash in her chest while she searched for the words to explain what had happened. “I didn’t leave you.”

“You didn’t come with me.” He made a sharp, dismissive gesture. “It was ten years ago. We were practically children. Young and foolish, the both of us, but I have always, always, wanted to tell you that I never wavered.” He set his palm on his head and looked away in a gesture she’d seen a thousand times from him. When he did that, he was gathering his words, assembling thoughts, so that when he spoke he said precisely what he meant to say. “It’s done. You and I. Over.”

“I know.” She wanted to go to him, but that would be worse than presumptuous. She wanted so badly to touch him, to tell him she understood his anger and that he should let old hurts go.

“I ought not blame you for youth and inexperience of life, and yet I do.” He let out a frustrated breath. “It’s nonsense, my doing that. But seeing you again— Sometimes I think we were only yesterday and all my old habits with you come back.”

“It’s been difficult for me, too.”

He pushed away from the dresser and walked to the fireplace. For a while, he stood with his back to her, staring at the line of chimney ornaments on the mantle. He touched a bird’s nest he’d given to her when she was eleven. “You still have this.”

“I’m sentimental about such things. Magnus is always on about how I won’t discard anything. I’ve collected a box of buttons I’ll surely never use. Old grammars and the like. Sketches Magnus did when he was a boy. I kept them all, you know.”

He turned, and his eyes were hard as stone. “What happened today should not have. I’m sorry. I hope you’ll forgive me.”

“There’s nothing for me to forgive.”

He said, softly, after far too long, “I think about him all the time.”

She closed her eyes.

“He’d be nearly ten, if you’d had a boy. I imagine him with your beautiful eyes. My mouth.” His voice rasped over her, killing her. “Or a girl with your hair and my smile. She might have had your brother’s gifts.”

“Don’t.”

“I don’t think I ever told you how I felt, and I ought to have.”

She turned her head toward him. “It’s not the men who suffer. It’s the women who are turned out of the house. Women bear all that burden.”

“How could you not trust me? The day you told me you were with child, that night, I lay in my bed at Wordless, and I was glad and at the same time I was afraid of what my father would say when I told him. Afraid of Magnus and what he’d think of me for what I’d done to you. And afraid for you. Terrified for what might happen to you.”

She didn’t dare open her eyes. She couldn’t, didn’t, and still the tears came. In those days when she’d been trapped and desperate and unable to tell anyone for fear Magnus would find out, she’d felt as if the poison of Lord Northword’s hatred had given the man the power to twist the world into any shape he wished. Crispin’s father did not wish for a world where his son married a woman like her, and he had transformed the world until he had what he wanted.

“I knew you were afraid and distraught and that you blamed yourself, as if you’d gotten with child without any help from me. I knew you blamed yourself, but I never told you how much I wanted to marry you and hold our baby in my arms. I thought you understood that. I thought you knew I loved you too much to let that happen to you or our child.”

She rested her head on her arm, face down so that she could not see him. “Don’t do this to me.”

He moved closer. “What, Portia? Do what?” The ice was back in his voice. “You went to that woman without giving me a chance to convince you I would do anything you needed. Anything. My father could threaten me all he liked, and I would not have refused to marry you. You didn’t need to save yourself from that fate.”

The enormity of her loss hit her again. What might have been, the life they might have had. Words came on the heels of a short, low breath, fast and propelled by the force of all the years she’d kept those words back. She lifted her head and stared at him through a blur of tears.

“Your father told me if I married you, he’d have Magnus expelled from school. He said if you were still a minor he’d have the marriage annulled. He told me if I thought we could wait until Magnus was graduated, that if we did that, Magnus would never have a living anywhere, not for as long as he lived. He told me he’d already personally seen to it that the Royal Academy would never admit him, and he had. He did that to punish me, to make sure I knew he’d stop at nothing. That’s why Magnus was rejected. If it weren’t for me, he would have been admitted. He ought to have been.”

He set both hands to his head this time and stared past her.

“Your father was right about me. And so are you. I didn’t love you enough to bring more harm to my brother. I couldn’t do that to him when I’d already cost him his dream.”

Crispin dropped his hands to his side. She didn’t move. The silence ripened. At last, he said, “You ought to have told me.”

She leaned sideways against the chair and stared at the window frame past Crispin’s shoulders. She didn’t want to know if he was looking at her. It would kill her to know. “What difference does it make what I should have done or wish I had? There’s only the choice I made. And I am sorry. So sorry to have hurt you. I never wanted that.”

“I married someone else, and by the time I understood what an awful mistake I’d made marrying in anger and resentment, it was too late.” His voice was bleak, and if there had been a way to blot that out, she would have. “My wife deserved better. She was a good and decent woman, and she deserved more from her husband than the man she got.”

That took her aback enough to look at him. She had always imagined they were happy. Crispin would never have married a woman who wasn’t worthy of him. “I’m sorry.”

“Don’t be.”

He made a face when she reacted by reaching to him. Her hand fell back to her lap. “Don’t you be either, Crispin Hope. You never wrote of her except in the most tender and respectful ways. I always thought it was plain as anything that you loved her very much indeed.”

“Not the way I loved you.”

“Of course you didn’t.” She clenched her hand on her lap. “There isn’t only one way to love someone.”

He strode to her and did not stop moving until she was trapped between him and the chair. Her heart headed toward her toes. His every look recalled what they’d done today, and though she still felt the aches of their encounter, her body wanted him again. She wanted all the marks of their passion, the imprint of him on her soul rising up and taking shape once again. “Then why do I feel as if nothing’s changed with us?”

“The past hasn’t changed. It’s there in our memories. It won’t ever go away.”

The silence was uncomfortably long.

“I loved you.”

“We can’t go back.” She wiped at her tears. “My God, can you imagine if we tried? We aren’t that couple anymore. I don’t know you any more than you do me. Please, let’s be friends. Let’s keep that.”

He stepped back.

Her heart broke again.

Chapter Nine

Two days later

AFTER BREAKFAST THEY WERE ALL sitting in the parlor as near to the fire as they dared now that Hob had brought in the morning post. There were letters for everyone. Crispin had several, most of which he put in his pocket, but he read aloud from one in which a friend of his, a man whose name she recognized from reading the Times, described with lively detail his days spent hiking in Northumberland.

Magnus sat on a chair idly sketching while Eleanor knit. When Crispin had finished reading his letter and they had exchanged news or excerpts from the other correspondence, Portia cleared her throat and said, “I have happy news.”

Eleanor put down her knitting and beamed at her. “I adore happy news, and I should very much like to hear yours.”

“Jeremy and I have advanced the date of our wedding.”

In the silence that followed, Eleanor drew her eyebrows together. “But the day’s been set for weeks now.”

“We’ve decided to be married sooner. Not October, Eleanor, but May.”

“May? Next year, do you mean?”

“No. Next month. Nothing fancy. There’s no time for anything but the simplest of ceremonies, and we’ve decided we prefer it that way.”

Eleanor’s hands stilled. “But May is when we’ll be in London. For the end of the season.”

“You and Magnus may still go, of course.”

“When did you decide this?”

“I wrote to Mr. Stewart just a few days ago.” She was aware of Crispin’s silence, the way he watched her. “He agreed a May wedding was more convenient than October. I should like it very much, Magnus, if we could be married here at Doyle’s Grange on the last Sunday in May. As soon as the last of the banns are called.”

Eleanor’s hands fluttered. “I’ve told everyone you’re to be married in October. In West Aubry. ”

Her stomach folded in on itself. She glanced at her brother, hoping to see in his face confirmation that he supported her in this change. Magnus did not meet Portia’s eyes.

Eleanor smiled radiantly. “You see? It’s not convenient at all. I assure you, I am happy to be of assistance in bringing your wedding about in a suitable manner. At a suitable and convenient time.”

“Jeremy and I are settled on this.”

“I excel at managing such matters.”

“I’m sure you do.”

She leaned close and gave Portia’s arm a squeeze. “Your parents would have wanted you to have a lovely wedding, attended by the people you love. You’ve not had a mother’s firm guidance nor been able to see your father’s pleasure at seeing you properly married. The way I saw how happy mine were when Magnus and I were married.”

Resentment bubbled up even as she told herself that Eleanor only wished for her wedding to be perfect. But she wanted nothing more than to be gone from Doyle’s Grange. She did not want to continue an intruder on her brother’s new life. She wanted to be away from a world where the Viscount Northword could destroy her peace of mind. “I appreciate that. Truly, I do.” Lord, she could feel Crispin’s gaze. “But Jeremy and I are in accord that this change in date is for the best.”

“You have a sister now, my dear. Wiser and more experienced in such matters. I’ll take care of everything. You ought to be married in the church at West Aubry, with your brother presiding. You can’t have seen my guest list, the people I’ve invited for October. Or Mr. Stewart’s guests for that matter. I have the list from his mother, you know.”

“Have you?”

“With your brother so newly established in his living, you would be very selfish to insist on being married anywhere but in West Aubry. Will you deny his parishioners the sight of their spiritual leader living by example what he preaches to them every Sunday? No, my darling Portia, they deserve to see his sister married in their church, by the man who guides them spiritually.”

Magnus cleared his throat. “I think I can as well see my sister married here as at West Aubry.”

“But, my dear.” She blinked several times.

Portia cast about for anything to stop the tears that threatened. “Magnus is so new to his living, and you have so many expenses just now. The Grange, the work at the vicarage. I don’t wish for there to be any fuss. It’s not as if I’m a young bride. No, no, Eleanor, I must decline all that, despite your generous offer of assistance. We shall have a small ceremony attended by family only.”

Crispin leaned forward, and Portia’s stomach hollowed out. His hands had touched her, stroked her, and she wanted to hold the remembered sensations close. “The last Sunday in May, you say?”

“Yes, my lord.” Portia wanted to kick him for reminding Eleanor of that. “I know you’re to be back in London by then, but it’s all settled.” She held out a hand and smiled. “I will gladly accept your good wishes.”

He did not take her hand or return her smile. “You cannot think for a moment that I would miss your wedding.” Just now he reminded her so strongly of his father that she felt an echo of the dread she’d felt when in the presence of the late Lord Northword. “I wouldn’t. Not for the world.”

She allowed him to see her opinion of that. Magnus got up and put more coal on the fire, a welcome distraction, actually.

Crispin wasn’t having any of it. “If I must rearrange a meeting or two, then I shall, and there’s an end to it. I will be here. The last Sunday in May.”

This, then, was her way out. He’d given her the rope that would save her. “Thank you, my lord. How kind. It will mean a great deal to have you there.”

Eleanor gave her a panicked look. “But Portia, the house is so very small. If you’re to be married here, where will everyone stay? There’s no place suitable for Mr. Stewart and his family to stay in Up Aubry, and Aubry Sock is too far away. As is West Aubry from the Grange. No, the wedding must take place where we can accommodate the people who will insist on being here.” Her voice trembled. “Doyle’s Grange is lovely. I adore it, but there is so little room for guests—and when it is in this condition… In West Aubry, there’s the vicarage and several inns where guests might be made quite comfortable.”

Once again, Crispin settled everything. “Your guests are welcome to stay at Wordless. There’s plenty of time to open up the house, Mrs. Temple. I am happy to do so.”

“Brilliant, Word. And generous. You see?” Magnus said to Eleanor. “It’s settled as easily as that.”

“Northword Hill is at your complete disposal.” Crispin looked to Magnus. “You are not to be out of pocket for this, do I make myself clear? Whatever staff you hire will be employed by me. My valet will be more than happy to assist with the arrangements. I know Mrs. Temple will manage everything beautifully, and I shan’t have to worry about a thing. Nor will Portia.”

“Thank you, my lord,” Portia said. She smiled with pure relief. “That is very kind of you to offer your home.”

He waved a hand. “It’s the least I can do.” Then he gazed at Portia. “I look forward to meeting Mr. Stewart.”

Chapter Ten

Three days later

PORTIA STOOD IN FRONT of the lavender, scissors in hand. The rowan tree was to her right, leaves no longer drooping, just as Hob had foretold. She broke off one of the forming lavender blossom heads and rolled it between her fingers. Even this early in the season, the scent was lovely. Her heart pinched at the thought that she would not be here to see it in full bloom. Nor any of the rest of the garden.

Jeremy and his mother had arrived several hours ago and after much ado, Mrs. Stewart was resting upstairs. Jeremy, Magnus, and Crispin were ensconced in the back parlor while Eleanor was driving the servants to distraction overseeing preparations for her and Magnus’s departure for Brighton. Portia had escaped the chaos at the first opportunity.

Boot heels clicked on the stone steps. Not her sister-in-law, thank God. Too fast to be Magnus. Her brother never walked when he could stroll nor hurried when he could walk. Hob never moved that quickly either. Those footsteps came too quickly for anyone but Crispin.

She turned and saw him striding toward her in his tasseled Hessians and snug breeches. The lawn was muddy from the most recent rain, and he had to slow down, not much, but some, when he left the path to head her direction. When he reached her, she curtseyed and then, from deviltry, added, “Good afternoon, my lord.”

He stopped in front of her seconds before she would have been required to move, if only to avoid being run over. He ended up too close. He’d walked out without a hat, which she found absurdly thrilling despite it being obvious he’d come here with his annoyance in tow. She stood her ground. Besides, two steps back, and she’d be standing in the lavender.

“Is that woman somewhere near?” He lifted a warning hand. “You know who and what I mean. Can she see or hear us right now?”

“I don’t believe so.”

“Then don’t curtsey.” His mouth thinned. “It’s not necessary. Not when it’s just the two of us.”

“You think not?”

“That hasn’t changed.” He jammed his hands into his coat pockets. He was splendid in high passion, and it made her sorry for the anger that zinged between them. “She isn’t here to cry mock tears and convince us all she mustn’t be upset lest she melt away in a puddle of grand emotion.”

She crushed the bits of lavender in her free hand and let the bruised and torn pieces fall to the ground between them. “Why are you here?” She waved a hand. “Out here, I mean. Glaring at me as if I’ve gone into your room and mixed up all your papers. Or poured ink on your best shirts.”

His mouth twitched down. “As if you couldn’t guess.”

“I can’t.”

He worked his jaw, and she was tempted to take a step back. She didn’t though. “What the deuce, Portia?”

“Don’t scowl like that.” Never mind that he was glaring at her, he was all bluster. Eleanor was inside the house and could not see them. With the side of her thumb, she smoothed away the furrow in his forehead. She had the private pleasure of seeing him struggle to master himself, and it made her feel better, knowing that he might be feeling as to sea as she did. “Did no one tell you your face will freeze in that expression?”

He took her hand and held it. “You can’t be serious about this fellow.”

She pasted on a smile, but that did nothing for the lurch in her chest. “I like his mother.”

“A delightful woman, I grant you that.” He’d always been scrupulous in that way, honest even when it would have been easier not to be. “I can’t say I find her son equally delightful.”

“Stop.”

“Your face will freeze like that,” he said.

“If it does, at least I won’t spend the rest of my life with an ogre’s glower.”

He burst out in laughter, and she tried not to and failed. “Imp.”

“The largest imp there ever was.” She curtseyed to him, and she almost, almost, felt as if all was well between them. It wasn’t. It never could be, no matter how many times they fell into sin or avoided it.

“Portia.” Crispin threw an arm wide. “Fifty if he’s a day. I don’t care how much you like his mother. What do you mean by this?”

She freed her hand from his and clasped her hands behind her back. She never had liked dealing with what people meant rather than what they were saying and right now Crispin was not saying what he meant. “I don’t understand what you’re asking. What do I mean by this? What do you mean?”

“I’m not asking you anything.”

“My mistake.” She tapped her toe, and even though on the grass her boot made no noise, her irritation with him was plain enough.

“I’m demanding that you explain why you’re marrying a man old enough to be your father.”

“Sit, Fido,” she murmured. “Good dog.”

He took a step forward. “Don’t make light of this. You don’t love him. Don’t insult me by telling me you do. I know when a woman’s in love.”

“I’m sure you do.” And that came out too hard and too resentful.

“Mrs. Temple is right. You don’t love him.”

She set free her hands to break off another stalk of lavender and tap his chest with it. “You’re a worse bully than her.”

“I’ve not bullied you since you were ten. You wouldn’t stand for that from me.” He flexed his fingers then crossed his arms and glared at her. “Do you love him?”

So much was already broken with her life, she did not wish to have it fracture now by telling him things she did not care to admit to herself. Before Crispin arrived, she had been at peace with her decision to marry, indeed, she had been near to desperate to leave Doyle’s Grange, and the sooner the better. She reached behind her and broke off another stalk of lavender.

“The truth.”

“We’ve discussed this until it’s dead. Exploded.”

When she looked at him again, he frowned at her. “No, we haven’t. We haven’t discussed this at all.”

She stared at the crushed lavender on her palm. “Perhaps I don’t wish to discuss it. There’s nothing can be done.”

“Did what happened at Wordless mean nothing to you? Is that what you’ll have me believe?”

Guilt slid down her spine, but she ignored it. “Don’t tell me what I feel. Or what I ought to do. Or think or decide about anything.” She glared at him. “I am capable of making my own decisions, you know. I think I know what will make me happy.”

He snorted, and that earned him a glare. “I demand an answer.”

His curt words got her back up. “Do you, now?”

Being Crispin, he wasn’t concerned with the sort of manners he used with Eleanor. “I do.”

“What do you expect me to do about that?” In a fit of pique, she curtseyed. “My lord.”

“Stop that. I’ve told you it’s nonsense.”

“No, it isn’t. It isn’t at all. Stop telling me it is.”

“Portia.” His attention was too much for her just now. That sort of attention. His looking at her the way he had at Wordless. “Please. Do you love him even a little? How am I to bear the thought of you marrying a man you don’t love?”

She whirled away from him and the lavender, and walked away from the tree that was her permanent farewell to Doyle’s Grange. He followed. Of course he followed. He never knew when to let well enough alone. She let out a breath. “I am weary of all this interference in my life. Yours and Eleanor’s. If it continues any longer, I swear to you, I will marry Jeremy tomorrow and you and Eleanor can go to the devil.”

“I’m not going anywhere with that woman. Besides, you can’t. The banns haven’t been read.”

She snorted. “Scotland’s not far.”

His eyes pierced her, and she was sorry she looked because she couldn’t forget the feel of him, the rightness of having her arms around him and her heart beating in her chest. He said, “You’re too young to be marrying.”

She stopped walking and stared at him, incredulous. “What?”

“You heard me.”

Laughter bubbled up and for her very life she could not keep it back. He was so ridiculously earnest. She managed to draw in a breath and suppress her mirth long enough to speak. “You ought to be mocked for uttering such an absurdity. Too young? Good heavens, you can’t be serious. I’m twenty-seven. Better if you agree with Magnus and remind me at every turn that I am on the verge of too old to be marrying.”

“You’re not too old.” He yanked his hands free of his pockets and gesticulated.

“You shan’t find an answer in the air. Nor change my mind, either, not with all the bluster in the world.”

“Bluster. I’m not blustering at you. And that isn’t what I meant at all. You’re too young to be marrying that man.”

She folded her arms underneath her bosom and gazed at him, tapping one foot on the ground. He stared at her bosom. She looked too, brushing at her bodice. “Have I got something on me?”

He lowered his voice. “Come away with me again. To Wordless. Right now.”

“No.”

“Why not?”

She pointed at the house. “Because the man I mean to marry is inside.”

“It didn’t stop you before.”

“I was upset. Not in my right mind. That shouldn’t have happened. You said so yourself.” She closed her eyes a moment and tried to put the ring of truth and conviction into her words. “It was habit. That’s all. As you said, it’s how we are. That doesn’t make it right. It doesn’t change anything.”

“Meaning?”

“I can’t stay here. I won’t stay here with all”—she waved a hand—“that. Not even for you.”

“For yourself. For God’s sake, Portia.” He ran his hands over the top of his head, leaving his hair in disarray. “I’ll speak frankly, if you don’t mind.”

“Would you?” she said with full irony. “Just this once.”

He threw one arm wide. “I thought the man was going to pull down my britches and kiss my arse.”

She took a step away from him. “You don’t have to marry him.”

“Nor do you.”

“Yes, I do.”

Crispin opened his mouth to speak and then didn’t, then blurted out, “What?”

Chapter Eleven

SHE WATCHED CRISPIN’S EYES get big, and she wasn’t sure whether to laugh at him or be insulted when she realized what he was thinking. She put her hands on his chest and gave him a push. Anger was quite useful at times. It kept her from bursting into tears. “Is that what you think of me?”

“No.”

“That I’m marrying him because of that?”

He refused to be budged. “Why else would a woman feel she has to marry a man?”

“I am not with child, Crispin Hope.” She crossed her arms over her chest.

“I didn’t say you were.”

“You thought it.” Her breath caught at the insult. “Go to hell.”

“I’m convinced I shall. Why else would you marry that arse-kissing toady?”

“He’s not.” She made fists of her hands. “Because I want to.”

“He is. Believe me, I have met my share of men like him.” He crossed his arms, and he only did it to make himself seem bigger and more powerful. Well, she wasn’t about to be cowed by him. “I don’t believe you want to marry him. Not ten seconds after I met the man I knew you couldn’t possibly be in love with him. You’re marrying him because you don’t want to be here. There, I’ve said it.”

“You certainly have.” She bit off the words.

Crispin seemed to realize he’d spoken out of turn again, for he flushed. “I won’t apologize for telling you I don’t like him. Someone needs to tell you that you can do better.”

Anger boiled up. She was speechless with it. And thank God, for she’d have said words she would surely regret.

He reached for her, but she stepped to the side, and he missed his target. “Don’t marry him. You shan’t be happy.”

She tucked her hands behind her back and cocked her head. “Will you tell me who I ought to marry? Please. I should like to know. There aren’t many eligible men here. Men I’d want to marry, and it’s been years since any unattached gentleman came to the Grange to ask my brother if an offer would be kindly received.” She rocked on her heels. “The blacksmith is handsome enough, I suppose, but he’s already got a wife. If you tell me to go to London and find a husband there, I’ll never speak to you again. You and Eleanor can dry each others’ tears over that.”

He took her by the shoulders and stared at her. “I’m serious about this. He’s not anything like your equal.”

“You are not my father. Nor are you my brother. Nor anyone else with authority over me. How dare you tell me not to marry a decent man?” She twisted away from him. “Under the circumstances, he’s the best I can do.”

“No, he isn’t.” He grabbed her upper arm and turned her to face him. “Look at me.”

She thwarted him by staring at the sky. Amid the blue, the moon was a pale crescent, washed out by the late winter sun.

“You are a stubborn, stubborn woman. Look at me.”

She did and ought not to have because the moment she did all her resentment evaporated.

“I’ve no authority over you, God knows that’s so. But who else will you trust with the truth? Your sister-in-law? Or will you tell Magnus the reason you’re marrying a man you don’t love?”

“You know I can’t.” Tears burned in her eyes, and she had to look away to keep him from seeing how close she was to tears. She couldn’t. She could not complain to her brother about his wife nor breathe a word about her unhappiness.

“Come here.” Crispin tugged on her arm and spread his other arm wide and she walked into his arms where she had always been safe and where all was right with the world. “Tell me. You’ll feel better for it, you know you will.”

“I’ve tried to like her. I’ve tried. And I can’t.” She rested her forehead on his chest. He smelled good, and his body was warm. “She’s empty and shallow, and she loves Magnus, that’s obvious to anyone with eyes, but she doesn’t love Doyle’s Grange.” She lifted her head and Crispin used the side of his thumb to wipe away her tears. “I knew there was no hope when she didn’t laugh after Magnus told her his ridiculous joke about how it came to be called Doyle’s Grange.”

“She didn’t?”

“No. And that’s why I have to marry Jeremy.” She gripped the lapels of his coat. “I can’t stay here. I can’t. I’m not a good enough person for that. I’ll go mad if I stay, and if I don’t go mad, then one day I’ll say something to her I shouldn’t, and Magnus must take her side.”

Crispin stroked a hand over her head. “But him?” He spoke in a low voice. “The man’s not worthy of you.”

“You don’t know that.” She pushed away from him. “I shouldn’t have said anything.”

He followed her to the very rear of the lawn but needed another step to come even. They were off the path, both of them moving quickly.

She spoke before he’d caught up. “Magnus likes him.”

“Magnus tolerates him because he thinks you love the man.”

She put out a hand to slow him down. “Oh, do watch where you put your feet. You’ll step—”

“What?”

She stopped walking. But Crispin, being a tall man and in the middle of a step, moved those few inches more. She cried out. Too late. His foot came down on the grass. “Look what you’ve done.”

“What? What have I done?” He followed her downward glance with a puzzled expression.

“You’ve killed it.” Tears burned in her eyes and choked off her words until she managed to swallow. “There’s little enough beauty here anymore. Eleanor is determined to ruin it all, and now you’re destroying what’s left for me to enjoy. There’s nothing else here I love. Not any more.”

“I’m sorry.” It was plain he’d no idea what he’d done. None at all.

“You’re not.” She stared at the crocus that he’d smashed into the dirt, and all she could see was her future if she stayed. She knelt by the flattened plant. “You’re not sorry at all. Don’t pretend you are. This one’s managed to escape her and now you’ve crushed it, and it’s dead.”

Crispin crouched across from her and pushed away her hand. He built up a wall of mud and propped the flower on it. “There. Perhaps like the rowan it will recover with some benign neglect.”

“It won’t.” Those were tears thickening her voice, but she met his gaze head on. “If it survives the day, Eleanor will find it, and she’ll tell Hob to dig it up. If she doesn’t kill it with her own bare hands. That’s all she ever does, murder what I love and all the time she makes it impossible to be angry at her.”

He frowned at the mud on his gloves. With a hard sigh, he pulled them off and dropped them in his coat pocket. Then, both of them still bent over the plant, he tapped the underside of her chin. “I’m sorry I was clumsy and trod on your flower. I’m sorry Eleanor digs them up.” He took her hand and brought her to her feet. “I’m an oaf. I don’t watch where I put my feet. And now I’ve made you unhappy when that’s the last thing I meant to do. Listen to me.” He grabbed her by the shoulders again, and she looked at him through a blur of tears. “I’ll have the groundskeeper plant a hundred of them at Wordless. You can go there every day to see them. She won’t be able to ruin them for you there.”

Her chest was stuffed full of feelings, and she could not contain them all. “A hundred isn’t enough.”

“A thousand then.” With her hand still in his, he walked them toward the rear of the house.

“It’s too late for that, Crispin. I’ll soon be living too far away to walk to Wordless.”

His mouth thinned. “Then you can bloody well live at Wordless. I don’t mind if you do. I’m never there. Why oughtn’t you?”

“Because then everyone will think I’m your lover, that’s why.”

“It wouldn’t be true.”

Emptiness settled in her belly and made everything familiar and dear seem unfamiliar, from Doyle’s Grange to Crispin to her future life. “You’ve not changed a bit, have you? Still full of grand and impossible ideas. I might as well make my home in the clouds as live at Wordless.”

He cupped her face and brushed his thumbs across her cheeks and when he did that and looked at her the way he was now, the world with all its troubles dropped away. When he touched her like that, she believed she could live in a castle in the sky.

“Do you feel that?” he whispered. “Whenever I touch you there’s nothing but that heat.”

“I cannot live on that.”

“He’s not your equal.”

She blinked several times, but the heat coursing through her stayed. “Of course he is.”

“He’s not.” He dipped his head and for a breathless moment, she thought he meant to kiss her. She could no more deny the passion between them than she could deny herself air. He moved his finger again. “You’re cold.”

She drew her head back, and his finger slipped away. “Your hands are warm.”

“You’ve made up your mind, haven’t you?”

She nodded.

“Nothing will shake your conviction that he’s more than he is?”

“He’s what I need him to be.”

He shook his head. “Don’t. It’s a mistake. Don’t marry just to get away. I, of all people, know what a mistake that is.”

She swallowed hard. “I can’t stay here. I can’t.”

“Not even if it’s good sense? You’re running from a bad situation into a worse one, and it’s one you can’t take back when the hard light of reason proves your mistake.” He kept his voice low. “I promise you, there’s nothing worse than to marry where there is no love.”

“She’s ruined Doyle’s Grange for me. Ruined it.”

“He’s a belly on him and only half a head of hair. No doubt he’s losing his hearing.” He checked himself and after a glance at the house, lowered his voice. “Do you want to spend the best years of your life shouting at a fat old man who probably never read a novel in his life? And if he did, he’d not think it grand.”

While they stood here, the clouds had gotten thicker and darker and the air colder. She grasped his hand and pressed it. “He likes me, with my red hair and despite all my faults.”

“Is he marrying a wife or a nurse for his mother?”

“That’s uncalled for.”

“It’s entirely called for.”

She recognized that mulish look. “You’ve never had to do without something you want, let alone something you need.”

His eyes widened. “The hell I haven’t.”

“You? With ten thousand a month and houses all over England? He is a decent man. We understand one another.”

“Don’t attempt to tell me you love that man. I know what you look like when you’re in love.”

“It won’t be the way you and I were.” Her heart cracked open, irreparably broken, and there was just no way to repair the damage she’d done. “Not that kind of love, but then Jeremy and I are not young and foolish or in love for the first time. I dare say we’ll get on quite well. I know we shall.” She walked away from him. The chickens had been let out and a few of the hens scattered as she and Crispin approached the back gate. “Besides,” she said when he was next to her again. “He’s no objection to me, not even at my advanced age.”

His face emptied of emotion. “Marry me instead.”

“You don’t want that.”

She knew from experience that Crispin, when angry, turned quiet. His gaze was quite capable of freezing one to death with a glance. No doubt he’d learned that from his father. He went silent long enough to tie her stomach in knots. She waited him out and won that contest, for he spoke in a low, tight, voice. “Have you more to say about how I think or feel?”

“You’ll always resent me for what happened, for the choice I made. You were steadfast, and I was not.”

“I don’t blame you. Not for what my father did to you. To us.”

“You haven’t forgiven me.”

“You willfully misunderstand.” He touched her arm, and she flinched. “It’s not I who hasn’t forgiven. It’s you.”

Her mouth gaped. “I do not blame you. Not for your father, that’s hardly your fault, and not for anything else.”

“You can’t forgive yourself.”

She drew in a stuttering breath. “What sort of person would I be if I did?”

“The woman I used to love.”

“I’m not that woman. Don’t you see? There’s no repairing what happened. I’m broken. Nothing will ever fix that.”

Chapter Twelve

The following day

NORTHWORD LEANED FORWARD on the chair he’d brought next to Magnus’s and breathed in the scent of the beer that filled his mug. They were in Magnus’s office, sitting on chairs drawn up to the fireplace. It was just after one, and the remains of their luncheon were on the table by the door. That arse-kissing toady Jeremy Stewart had driven his mother, Eleanor, and Portia to Aubry Sock for tea. They weren’t expected back for another three hours at least. That left him and Magnus with the house to themselves. They were taking full advantage.

He reached behind him and flipped open the box of cigars on the table. He gave Magnus cigars whenever they saw each other. Northword fished out two and handed one over before he hefted his mug. “Good friends and happy marriages.” He did not intend for his toast to extend to Portia and that prick Jeremy Stewart, so when Magnus raised his glass he narrowed the scope of his words. “To you and Eleanor.”

While the April sky might be blue, it was bloody cold outside. The nearest window was open a crack to let out the smoke. The office where they sat was on the small side of cozy, with shelves jammed with books, a desk with stacks of pamphlets, papers, a two-day-old Times, and a Bible. A trunk with broken trim sat underneath the window. An oak highboy painted red took up half the wall across from the fireplace. The table behind them, close enough for them to use it, was covered with paper. Magnus’s doing, that riot of thick, odd-sized sheets of paper.

Charcoal and gum rubber littered the surface, and Crispin had flicked away a pencil that rolled underneath the cigar box. Several of the pages were sketches of the view from various windows of the house or of everyday items: a cup, an apple, a Bible seen from the page edges. Some were of furniture, a view of a window, and more recently, the church in Aubry Sock where Magnus, naturally, had spent a great deal of time before he had the living in West Aubry. There were a few sketches of him and several of the men and women who lived near Up Aubry. He had a knack for taking a likeness.

Magnus lifted his mug, recently filled from the contents of the earthenware jug he’d brought back from Up Aubry earlier in the day. The tavern there was half the size of this room and comfortably held the entire male population of the village, counting the proprietor and including Crispin. They served a dark and bitter beer that had to be the finest anywhere in England. “To good friends.” He winked. He took a long draw on his beer and when he was done, let out a sigh. “Light the bloody thing.”

“Impatient sod.” He leaned over with a candle for Magnus to use to light his cigar. He lit his when Magnus blew the first puff of smoke in the direction of the open window.

“If the subject should happen to come up, don’t mention the cigars to Eleanor.”

“Why not?”

Magnus contorted in order to tap the top of the cigar box. “She’ll have my head if she finds out about these. Thinks smoking is vile. Ungodly for a man of God.”

Crispin didn’t reply right away “Are you telling me you aren’t permitted to smoke a fine cigar in your own house?”

“Not just my house now.” He let out a stream of smoke. “There’s always the vicarage in West Aubry, but it’s smaller than here. Lovely, make no mistake, but she’s taken a fancy to the Grange, Eleanor has. It’s here she wants to live.”

“If she complains, tell her it was me, and that you tried to dissuade me.” He drew on his cigar. When he’d let out the smoke, he said, “Tell her I said I am the bloody Viscount Northword, and I can smoke a cigar anywhere I damned please.”

Magnus laughed. “Perhaps I’ll not say precisely that. But she’ll agree with the sentiment, I tell you that.”

“Tell her I refused to save my soul, but that yours remains unsullied.”

“That I will.” They sat for a bit, contemplating the fire and the warmth and the hint of chill at their backs. “Did Lady Northword mind you smoking?”

“Never. Though to be fair, I never did around her. The way you won’t around your wife.” He tried for a smoke ring and muffed it. “I don’t think less of you for that.”

“Your bloody house is big enough you could have a dozen men smoking and no one at the other end would know.” Magnus exhaled, then sank a little lower on his chair. “Put another bit of coal on the fire, won’t you?”

“Why should I when you’re nearer?”

“Because I’m more comfortable than you. Because I’m an old married man now. I need my strength.” He put his finger in the stream of smoke leaving his mouth and traced it upward as far as his arm could reach. When he’d settled again on his chair, he examined his cigar. “The last cigar to be smoked at the Grange. What would Doyle say if he were still alive?”

“Arf. Arf.”

Magnus’s belly shook. “The poor dog froze to death, I hear. For lack of coal on the fire.”

“God help us all if the Grange must be renamed ‘Doyle and Magnus’s Grange.’”

“I’ll carve it on my headstone. ‘Doyle was a fine dog but Magnus was the better man.’”

“Amen, my friend. Amen.” They laughed at that together, and when Crispin was back on his chair, having added half a scuttle of coal to the fire, they smoked in companionable silence. He stretched his legs as close to the grate as he dared. The wind rattled the shutters harder, then died away. “Will it rain soon, do you think?”

Magnus nodded. “They’ll be home early, I expect, Portia and Eleanor and the others. Oh, damn.” He shot to his feet, wiping at his waistcoat.

“Have you burnt it?” Crispin asked.

“Devil take me if I have. I think so.”

“It’s good you’re a married man.” He laughed. “You need looking after.”

“So do you.” Magnus stared at the spot where hot cigar ash had eaten a hole in the fabric. “Eleanor will have my head.” He brushed at his waistcoat before he sat again. “Portia will mend it for me, and not tell Eleanor, either. Solid as a rock, that girl. But then you know that.”

“I do.”

After several minutes more silence, Crispin put down his cigar and reached for a stack of the papers on the table. He went through them slowly, with the reverence due the pages. As always, he was in awe of Magnus’s talent. His art. Magnus Temple was a bloody genius, and here he was, the vicar of West Aubry when he ought to be in London painting for the Royal Academy. What a waste. What a bloody crime. Portia blamed herself for that, when really the blame belonged to his father. And to him. For not foreseeing that his father would threaten not Portia directly but the people she loved. “Why are all these out?”

“Organizing things.” Magnus shrugged. “Clearing out the old now that Eleanor’s here. I try to do some every few days.”

There were several drawings of Eleanor, including one in which she was clearly the inspiration for a Madonna. Crispin came to a portrait of Portia, done a few years ago. So young. His heart hurt to see her. She’d never been a conventional beauty, but he doubted any man would deny her appeal. Spend five minutes with her, and you’d soon be convinced you’d never met a finer woman. In the portrait, done in pen and ink, her head was bowed in concentration. Magnus had drawn just the tops of her hands, enough to show she held a needle. Behind her was the suggestion of the parlor fireplace. One expected she might at any moment lift her head and smile. A wave of lust hit him, pulling him under. He lay the stack of sketches on his lap, the portrait of Portia on top.

She still thought about the baby they’d made, when all these years he’d convinced himself she didn’t. How could he blame her for what she’d done as a sixteen year old girl in a desperate situation? His father had all but guaranteed she would carry that burden alone. There were women in her situation who died, and that knowledge chilled him to the marrow. She might have died, and a world without her would have been a barren place.

“My wife’s been gone more than a year, now. Nearly two.”

“We were sorry to hear that news, Portia and I.”

“I was a better man after I was married.” Marriage had agreed with him, that was true. Not a perfect union, but not a bad one either. He’d been happy in a calmer way. His wife had been a fine and admirable woman, and he had always hated himself for not loving her as she deserved.

“You’ll marry again.” Magnus nodded to himself. “You must. Unnatural if you don’t.”

“That’s so.” He did not have a son yet, and that must be remedied.

“Have you met anyone who will do?”

He shook his head, but Jesus, the lie of his denial spread ashes across his soul.

“Pity.”

“I don’t like Stewart.”

Magnus took another pull of his beer. “He writes verses. Did he tell you that? No? I expect that’s why Portia’s set herself on marrying him. The poetry did her in, that’s what I think. Lord knows she’s never paid any attention to other men, and they’ve come calling. I know you don’t see her like that, but there’s a good many men who’ve wanted to marry her.”

He did not move for fear of Magnus seeing more than he ought, but then he wondered if that wasn’t a worse way to lie to his best friend than if he plastered on a disbelieving grin. “Is that so?”

“He’s not bad, you know. Stewart.”

Crispin snorted.

“As a poet.” Magnus slunk lower on his chair. “Goes on about cliffs and bluebells flashing with dew. But there’s one about a stag I like. Noble antlers and beams of sunrise.”

“He’s an architect, I thought.”

Magnus reached over and tapped the underside of the sketches on Crispin’s lap hard enough to make the paper jump. “Only one of his occupations puts money in his pocket.”

He slumped on his chair. A poet? The man was a damned poet? “God save us from poets.”

“The Lord will strike you dead for that.” Magnus grinned and the lines of his face deepened, and it seemed to Crispin there were more now than there had been the last time he’d seen Magnus. “Might take fifty years, though.”

He picked up Magnus’s portrait of Portia, and something tugged at him as he studied the smiling woman on the page. She was unhappy now, and she did not deserve to be. Not then, and not now. He glanced at Magnus.

The words that came to his lips felt odd and foreign and right. They shook loose from wherever they’d been lodged and flew into the air. “I want to marry Portia.”

Magnus choked on his laughter.

He waited until there was silence again and then said, “I will marry Portia.”

A furrow appeared in Magnus’s forehead. “You mean that.”

“With your permission. Of course.” He wanted this. He did. No more deception.

Magnus looked at him with his artist’s eye, seeing what was there. And what was not. “What makes you say a thing like that?”

He worked through what Magnus had said and the careful way he’d said it and he felt as sick at heart and just as defiant as he had been when he’d said the words to his father. “You won’t agree to my marrying her?”

“You’re like a brother to me. You know that.”

He pushed out of his slouch. He was…affronted. Magnus owed him this. He bloody owed Portia the life she ought to have had. “I feel the same. But that doesn’t make Portia my sister.”

All trace of Magnus’s usual good humor vanished. He leaned forward and set his cigar against the ashtray. “No one could ask for a better friend than you.”

He sat up the rest of the way. Magnus was telling him no? The insult pricked him. Dented his pride. More, though, it scared the hell out of him. “Why not?”

“Is it wise?”

“Yes, damn it, it is. Why wouldn’t it be?”

Magnus shook his head.

The urge to spear him with a look of blue-blooded incredulity was impossible to resist. “I’d be a better husband to her than that doughty old poet she’s going to marry so you and Eleanor can make a life together.”

Magnus’s eyebrows shot up. “Is that what she told you?”

“Not in so many words, but it’s true. If she marries me, she’ll want for nothing, you know that. I should think you’d be pushing her my way. Most brothers with unmarried sisters do.”

It was Magnus’s turn to be insulted. “I’d never. You know that.”

“Yes. I do know that. Maybe you should have.”

“You and Portia?”

“Why not? Why the bloody hell not, I should like to know?”

“If she’ll have you.” He rested a hand on Crispin’s shoulder. “If she’ll have you, you’d have my blessing.”

“If she’ll have me?” The bottom dropped from his stomach. If Magnus didn’t think Portia would marry him, maybe she wouldn’t. Maybe he’d never change her mind. “Why do you think she wouldn’t if I asked her?”

“I shouldn’t say this, but I think she used to be in love with you. After you left, the joy went out of her.” He chewed on his lower lip. “I’ve watched her here, the two of you, and to be honest, whatever there was between you, one-sided as it was, it’s long dead. I don’t think you’re what she needs. Not any more.”

Chapter Thirteen

Four days later

HE DIDN’T LIKE THE SILENCE at all. In all the times he’d been at Doyle’s Grange, the house had never been this quiet, not when Portia was here. Jesus, what if he was too late? What if while he’d been giving her time, Portia had convinced that ridiculous poet to take her to Gretna Green?

Hob came into the entryway and bowed his head. He wasn’t wearing his livery. “Milord.” He straightened. “Didn’t expect to see thee here.”

Out of pure habit, he took off his hat, but rather than hand it over to Hob, he hung it from one of the pegs above the doorway that led to the servants’ quarters. “Where is everyone?”

“Gone. Or out.”

“I see. Who is out and who is gone?”

“Mr. Stewart. Mrs. Stewart. They’ve gone.”

“And Portia?”

“Out.”

“With the Stewarts?”

“With the tree.”

“Thank you. I’ll just go see her then. I’ll announce myself.”

“Milord.”

He left his hat on the peg and walked outside to the back of the house. She was sitting on the ground by the rowan tree, industriously doing something to the earth around the trunk. Her hands stilled when he had yet another five paces to cover.

“She’ll dig them up next spring, but I don’t care.” With both hands, she tamped down the dirt around the rowan sapling. “I’ve planted a hundred of them here, and next spring they’ll come up, and I’ll be the only one who knows it’s my name they’re saying.”

“The crocuses?”

She swiped a hand across her forehead and twisted a bit to look at him. There was a smear of dirt just at the part of her hair. “Yes. Why are you here?”

“Where is Mr. Stewart?”

Her hands fell to her lap. “I sent him away.”

“Did you?” He held out his hand, and she put her gloved hand in his and stood.

She glanced away, then back. “He’s a decent man, but you’re right. He doesn’t deserve a wife who will never love him.”

He pulled her close and brushed the backs of his fingers across her cheek. “Don’t be unhappy. You know I can’t bear it.”

His bare hand against her warm skin, a touch so light he hardly felt it, except he did. He remembered his mouth over hers and the dizzying wonder of finding her in his embrace again. This contact plunged through his body in the same way. He continued downward, caressing along her jaw, her throat. “I’ve done nothing but think about you since I left. Every second since I arrived. Before Wordless. After Wordless.”

“I as well.”

“Every bloody moment of the last ten years and, God willing, every moment of the rest of my life.” He brought out his handkerchief and cleaned away the dirt on her forehead.

“Thank you.”

“You’re welcome.” He removed her thick gardening gloves one at a time, and shoved them into his coat pocket. “Please. Hear me out. You’re right, too. All along you’ve been right. We can’t change the past, but we don’t need to. Everything we need to know about each other we discovered that day at Wordless. If you don’t believe me, I’ll prove it to you again.”

“Prove what?”

“That we are still in love. Despite what happened. Because of what happened. Will you let me show you?”

She tugged on her hand, and he tightened his fingers. “Here?”

“In private, if you don’t mind.” Her hand clasped in his, he dashed across the lawn to the back door. Inside, they caught their breath, and then headed upstairs, an urgent journey to his room.

Northword closed the door to his room as softly as he could. His fingers were tight around Portia’s hand, and he didn’t let go even after he turned the key in the lock. Arm straight down, he interlaced his fingers with hers. The palm of his other hand slapped on the wall above her shoulder, taking his weight while he leaned in and kissed her.

Eventually, they left off the frantic kissing and set themselves to an equally frantic removal of each other’s clothes. It took some time to remove the layers, to untie knots and unfasten buttons. But they were still young and healthy and far, far wiser about such things than they’d once been.

When she stood in just her shift, he touched her gently, from cheek, to throat, to her collar bone. Her breath hitched when his fingers reached the top swell of her breast. “You see?” he murmured. “That’s not changed. The way I react to you. Or you to me.”

His palm dropped down, too, touching her breast, curving over her, and with that, the world narrowed to him and Portia and that was precisely right. He allowed himself a smug smile. Again, he brushed just the tip of his finger over her. “Is that good?”

“Yes. Damn you, yes.”

“Think how it would feel if you were naked.” God, he loved to see her face when she was in passion.

“Beast.”

Her name was a sigh on his breath. He kissed her, one hand cupping the back of her neck, the other fully curved over her breast, molding her there so that he could push her breast higher. His tongue flicked out and followed the seam of her lips, and she opened her mouth and for him, it was like falling under her spell all over again.

He pulled away and cupped her face in his hands. She wrapped her fingers around his wrists, but that was all. They stayed like that, touching each other, settling into the familiarity of the contact and this time, there was a sense of the world coming right.

His torso pressed against her as he leaned in and kissed her ear. “I love you, Portia Temple.”

He wanted her now and afterward, and that was that. He wanted her in his life, this amazingly lovely creature who kissed with such delicate fever. Portia, who had inhabited his dreams for a decade. Portia, who had become a woman he admired and respected. He drew back before he completely lost control.

“How can you?”

“Because you are brave and strong and when I am with you, I want to see you laugh and smile. Because you would never, ever, ever put milk in my tea and tell me it’s good for my health.”

She gasped, and her fingers tightened around him. “She makes Magnus drink it that way, too.” They laughed together at that and then she draped an arm around the back of his neck, and set the other around his naked waist, fingers angled downward. “She did the same to me once, but I poured it all in the slop bowl. She nearly came to tears. Poor Magnus.”

“Poor me. You’re not naked yet.” He let go of her hand and fumbled at her shift while he kissed her, open mouthed, tongue involved. She kissed him back because Portia never did anything half way. Her shift dropped to the floor with the rest of their clothes.

If Satan himself demanded his soul for this, he’d gladly hand it over.

“I want you in my arms. I want us skin to skin. I want to make you spend and call on God and me. I want your mouth on me, your hands, your thighs around me. I want your eyes glazed with passion for me.” He took a step toward her. “I want to hear us both groan when I am inside you.”

Northword leaned against her, his cock hard and him halfway to coming because, God save him, Portia’s body was soft and curved, and he was going to make love to her until they were witless fools, and she had no choice but to agree they belonged together. She pushed up to kiss him again, and she was so very, very good at setting fire to his blood.

Lust, an unfathomable need, came from deep inside him, and it was everything he’d missed every damned time he’d had sexual relations. It wasn’t that he hadn’t loved his wife, he had. Or that he hadn’t enjoyed other lovers who came to his bed. He had. But not like this. Never. The missing part of his soul clicked into place with her, and he was whole as he had not been since the day his father had engineered their split.

Every shiver of Portia’s body, every soft sound to fall on his ears mattered to him because it was her in his arms. Failing to please her would rip him to pieces. He pushed away from her and grabbed her hand while he walked backward to the bed, bringing her along. No half measures. No caution.

Portia laughed and gave him a push. The backs of his legs hit the bed, and he sat on the mattress, splayed out to catch his balance. She stepped between his spread legs and he touched her naked backside or just stared at her breasts.

He drew her to him, hands sliding along her waist, up her back, fingers dancing down the dip of her spine. He took her mouth and she answered with a taking of her own. He cupped her bottom and brought her up until she had her knees on the mattress on either side of his hips. She gripped the top of his shoulders until she had her balance and when she did, he pulled the pins from her hair and kept going until her hair, dark, dark red, curled around his fingers.

“I adore your hair, every curl.”

“I’m glad you like brunettes.”

“My darling, you are deluded.” He took some of her hair in his hand. Light from the window nearest her reflected off her hair, turning even the shadows a rich, dark red. “Your hair is red, and I adore every lock on your head.” He slid his fingers beneath her chin and brought her face back to his. “I want you again. I want inside you now.” He leaned forward and nipped her lower lip. “Anything you want, if you’ll let me do that.”

Her smile was everything he loved about Portia. Her smile was bright and bold and for him, and her smile had been living inside him for years. A part of Crispin Hope and a part of the man who had become the Viscount Northword.

“Although, I feel I ought to tell you that I am inclined to be selfish just now.” For this slice of time, he was looking not at Portia, but solely at a naked woman whose proportions pleased him inordinately. Wickedly so. He brushed her hair behind her shoulders. In ten years, she’d become a woman. “You’re still beautiful, more beautiful and desirable than ever.” He put his palm over her mound, slid a finger between, and found slick heat. “That’s lovely.” He drew in a breath. “You’re wet for me.”

“Yes.”

“Good, because I’m hard for you.” Jesus, he wanted those legs around him. He wanted his hips tucked up tight against hers. He swept the back of his hand across her shoulder then down to her breast. “Lovely. That’s a fact.”

Her nipples peaked, and he swept his fingers across her again. His belly hollowed out. Somewhere in the house, timbers creaked. Outside, rain pattered against the windows. Then harder until it beat on the roof and windows. He held his breath until he was sure the noise was just settlement and the rain, and they weren’t about to be interrupted by a furious Hob.

He leaned close, his mouth by her ear. “What I’d like to do isn’t decent at all. It’s wicked and depraved.”

She angled her body against his. “You make it sound delicious. Is it?”

He fit both his hands over her breasts, and she leaned into his palms. He looked his fill of the sight, his hands over her, the flesh he couldn’t cover, the way her mouth parted. He pressed his lips to her shoulder; a light kiss while he swept his fingers along the underside of her breast, one, then the other, and the curve of her devastated him. He brushed a finger over her nipple and saw, felt, and reacted to the way she hardened at his touch. “I want my mouth here.” His fingertip came to rest at her mons then slid down until his hand cupped her. “And here.”

Her eyes opened wide, and she tipped her head to one side, curious. Intrigued. “There?”

“Yes. Precisely there.”

She arranged herself on his bed, her hair spread out, and her body open for him. He joined her and slid his hands underneath her bottom. One thing he’d learned was that he loved the taste of a woman. He’d had a mistress before he married, a courtesan who taught him things he hadn’t worked out on his own with Portia or some other woman who could never measure up.

Portia gave herself over to his mouth on her, and he made damned sure he didn’t bring her too fast. He adored her moans, the tension in her body when she came close, the way her hands touched his head, the tilt of her pelvis toward him. She made him feel like the best lover in the world, and the proof was in the way she came.

For a fraction of time, she went completely still, and in that space he spread her nether lips and licked along the center of her sex. She came apart, holding back none of her pleasure.

“More, Crispin.” Her voice shook. “More.”

He pulled himself over her, his mouth by her ear. “You have all of me. There’s nothing more for me to give.” He touched her once and she flinched with unsatisfied passion. “You have everything.”

He moved down her body and before long, she devolved into an incoherent cry. He spread his fingers over her belly while she came back to earth and then pulled himself up enough to dip his tongue into her navel. He lifted his head, and when she was looking at him, soft-eyed with pleasure, he thought his heart would burst as past and present emotions warred in him. As they did in her, too.

Northword spread his fingers over her stomach again. He had to work to keep his voice steady and then decided the battle wasn’t worth fighting. “Portia.” Her name came in a whisper. “I wanted you to have my child. I still do. I want it enough to beg you for another chance. We were young. You’re right about that. But I wanted us. And our child.”

“I know. I know. I know.”

“Say you’ll marry me, Portia. Promise it.” He stared at her stomach, fingers sliding, but tipped his head so he could see her face, too. Eyes closed, lips edged with white. “We can have the child we make tonight. Marry me. Please. I’m a better man, a wiser man. I’d be a proper husband to you and a loving father. Magnus knows I want to marry you. He doesn’t think you will, but I don’t give a damn for his opinion.”

“Crispin.”

He took her hand and moved over her, one leg across hers. The slide of his skin over hers heated his blood, the very marrow of him, and he pushed her shoulder until she was on her back. She opened herself to him. He pulled himself over her and thrust inside.

She was hot and slick, and he got harder being inside her, and inside, her soft body barely gave. He put his forearms above her shoulders and kept still, giving her time to adjust to him. “I couldn’t bear the thought of that man touching you.” He drew back his hips and pushed forward. “Nor the thought of you touching him. Nor that you might fall in love with him.”

She put her hands on either side of his face and arched her pelvis toward him. “Hush, my love.”

He drew back and pushed slowly in again, and it was heaven. Tension sang between them and, for him, it was the certainty that he could do exactly what he wanted, what would please them both, and the fact of her woman’s body that sent him into sensual paradise. He stroked in her steadily, and before long he knew he wouldn’t last much longer.

He stopped moving and that nearly killed him, holding back all the urges of his body. He took her head between his hands, weight on his forearms. “Marry me.” He drew back his hips and pushed forward enough to make his balls go tight. He stopped moving because otherwise he couldn’t think. He had to work to marshal his thoughts.

“Marry me because I love you. Marry me because you love me. We’ll have children. Us. God, Portia, please. I want what slipped away before. I don’t want to live without you. I love you. I’ve always loved you.”

With the last of his wits, the last bit of his coherence, he waited.

She put her hands on either side of his face. “I love you, too, Crispin Hope. I always have.”

“Marry me.”

She wrapped her legs around his hips and bit his ear lobe once. “Yes, you fool. Yes. Now do this properly. The way you promised me or I shall know you’ll never be a proper husband for me.”

And so he did.

About Carolyn

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Carolyn Jewel was born on a moonless night. That darkness was seared into her soul and she became an award winning author of historical and paranormal romance. She has a very dusty car and a Master’s degree in English that proves useful at the oddest times. An avid fan of fine chocolate, finer heroines, Bollywood films, and heroism in all forms, she has three cats and a dog. Also a son. One of the cats is his.

Visit her on the web at:

carolynjewel.com | twitter | facebook | Goodreads

Other Books by Carolyn

Historical Romance

The Sinclair Sisters Series

Lord Ruin, Book 1

A Notorious Ruin, Book 2

Reforming the Scoundrels Series

Not Wicked Enough

Not Proper Enough

Other Historical Romance

In The Duke’s Arms from Anthology Christmas In The Duke’s Arms (Carolyn Jewel, Grace Burrowes, Miranda Neville, Shana Galen)

One Starlit Night from the Midnight Scandals Anthology

Midnight Scandals (Carolyn Jewel, Courtney Milan & Sherry Thomas)

Scandal (RITA finalist, Best Regency)

Indiscreet (Winner, Booksellers Best, Best Short Historical)

Moonlight (Regency Historical Short Story)

The Spare

Stolen Love

Passion’s Song

Paranormal Romance

My Immortals Series

My Wicked Enemy, Book 1

My Forbidden Desire, Book 2 (RITA Finalist)

My Immortal Assassin, Book 3

My Dangerous Pleasure, Book 4

Free Fall Novella 1

My Darkest Passion, Book 5

Other Paranormal Romance

Alphas Unleashed, from Anthology Dead Drop

A Darker Crimson, Book 4 of Crimson City Series

DX, A Crimson City novella

Fantasy Romance

The King’s Dragon, a short story

Erotic Romance

Whispers, Collection No. 1

Chapter One

Algernon House

Derbyshire, England

April 1882

JUST BEFORE CLARISSA, DUCHESS OF LEXINGTON, met the man who would inspire four long years of unrequited love on her part, she was thinking about fossils.

She didn’t have any particular interest of her own in these mementos of prehistoric life, but her fifteen-year-old stepson, Christian, quite adored them—and his collection was growing at a problematic rate.

Christian’s father—and Clarissa’s husband—did not approve of his heir “mucking about in the dirt,” as he called it. Worse, he was always threatening to scrap all the specimens that Christian had painstakingly gathered.

Every night during the boy’s Easter holiday, he had lugged about trays of fossils, hiding them in various trunks and broom cupboards. The house was vast and some of the fossils were sure to remain undisturbed. But there was every chance of the rest meeting an ignominious end in the rubbish bin.

If only—

“There you are, Duchess.”

The voice belonged to Lord Hatchford, the duke’s good friend and fellow womanizer. And where Lord Hatchford was, the duke was never far away.

Clarissa no longer loved her husband, but sometimes, when she came upon him, she still experienced a pang in her chest: She missed her younger self—not the naive girl who had worshiped him, but the optimistic and confident young woman who had believed the world her oyster.

Or had that also been part of her naïveté? In either case, it had been a long, painful disillusionment to realize that the man she married was vain, arrogant, incapable of fidelity, and not even fun to have around.

She turned from the balustrade of the grand terrace where she had been standing. To her surprise, alongside the duke and Lord Hatchford there was a third man.

“Duchess,” said Lord Hatchford, “allow me to present my cousin, Mr. Kingston.”

Mr. Kingston bowed.

He was a young man—Clarissa was twenty-eight and he must be two or three years younger. He was also a handsome man, with an athletic build perfectly set off by his riding attire, a head of thick chestnut hair, and a chiseled face, the severity of which was softened just a little by the shapeliness of his lips—lips that were sharp and cleanly defined, like the rest of his features, yet fuller than one would have expected.

That subtle contrast caught Clarissa’s attention. But she had learned all too well that beauty was only skin-deep—it was certainly the case for her husband.

“Welcome to Algernon House, Mr. Kingston,” she said. “And please, gentlemen, don’t let me keep you from your ride. It’s a good day for a gallop in the country.”

Mr. Kingston bowed again. When he straightened, his gaze returned to her, level and unwavering.

“Did you invite that Miss Elphinstone again?” exclaimed the duke, who had sauntered to the edge of the terrace. “What use do I have for an old, ugly, and quarrelsome woman in my house?”

Clarissa could only hope the woman she respected for her learning hadn’t heard the duke. “I happen to think Miss Elphinstone is unconventionally handsome and highly original,” said Clarissa.

The duke rolled his eyes. “The duchess and her enlightened views.”

Lord Hatchford chortled on cue.

She waited for Mr. Kingston to do the same. Instead, he said, “I agree with the duchess. Miss Elphinstone possesses a leonine grace and a deep erudition. I hope to be fortunate enough to be seated next to her at dinner.”

The duke, to say the least, was taken aback. Clarissa twice as much: Other than Christian, she was not used to anyone coming to her defense.

Lord Hatchford chortled again, this time with more effort. “The day flees, gentlemen. We don’t want to ride in the dark, do we?”

The duke stalked off, Lord Hatchford in his wake. Mr. Kingston bowed once more in Clarissa’s direction before he too walked away.

At the door, however, he turned halfway around, as if he had something he wished to say to her. Her heart skipped a beat; her gaze fastened to his lips.

But after a moment of hesitation, he left without another word.

“Has he been an ass again?” asked Christian. “Should we throw darts at his portrait?”

He and Clarissa sat in the shade of a chestnut tree, which overlooked the old quarry on the property. The quarry, with its exposed strata of limestone liberally sprinkled with fossils, had long been Christian’s preferred playground.

“What?” asked Clarissa, her mind on Mr. Kingston, before she realized that her stepson was talking about his father. “Oh, no more than usual. Why do you ask?”

He poured more tea from his canteen into her empty cup. “You are quiet.”

“Well, sometimes when I’m quiet, I’m just scheming.” She smiled at the boy who was something of a cross between a son and a brother to her.

He smiled back. “Do tell.”

“Well, you know how your father is always going on and on about throwing away your fossils?”

“Oh, yes, I do,” he said dryly.

She admired the boy’s equanimity. When the duke had unkind words for her, Christian never failed to retaliate on her behalf, no matter how many times he had been sent to bed without his supper. But when he himself was the subject of the duke’s ire, by and large he brushed aside the duke’s tirades as if they were so many gnats on a hot summer day.

“It so happens that I have commissioned a number of armoires for the rooms of the east wing.”

“Nobody uses the east wing,” he reminded her.

“Precisely. I have been waiting for the armoires to arrive, and I am pleased to inform you that they are going to be delivered on the morrow. When you open them, you will find that they have been equipped with partitioned drawers of various depths, perfect for the storage of fossils.”

Christian sucked in a breath. “And they come equipped with locks, of course.”

“Of course. And no one will even be curious about them, since they will be permanently hidden under dust covers.”

He kissed her on the cheek, nearly upsetting her teacup. “You are a marvel, Stepmama.”

“Well, yes, I am,” she admitted modestly.

They both laughed and lifted their cups.

“To outfoxing your father,” she said.

“To you,” answered her stepson simply.

Her heart ached. Often she wished she’d had the good sense to not marry the duke, but never had she regretted becoming part of Christian’s life. She kissed him on his forehead and rose. “You go back to digging. I had better reorganize the seating chart for dinner.”

Mr. Kingston would be seated next to Miss Elphinstone even if Clarissa had to redo the entire arrangement from scratch.

For the next three days, whenever Clarissa wasn’t seeing to her guests or helping Christian smuggle his fossils into the new armoires in the east wing, she studied Mr. Kingston.

Very, very discreetly: a glance in passing, a question to someone in the next seat, a slightly more circuitous route that brought her near him as she wended among groups of guests.

She was…disappointed. The man who had been so assertive and resolute in praise of Miss Elphinstone’s virtues had all but disappeared; even Miss Elphinstone herself could barely get two words out of him. And the man who had almost turned around for a private moment with Clarissa did not approach her again during the remainder of the house party—did not even glance at her, as far as she could tell.

Except when he left. They happened to be alone in the entry hall of the house. As he said his good-byes—the first time she’d heard his voice since the day of their meeting—he gazed directly at her.

His eyes were hazel.

Her heart did something worrisome in her chest. A moment later she was looking at his retreating back, wanting something quite badly and yet not sure exactly what.

The other guests also departed; Christian left for a new term at Harrow; the duke and his latest mistress took off for London. All at once Clarissa found herself alone in a house of a hundred fifty rooms, with only her own thoughts and memories of Mr. Kingston’s seemingly contradictory actions for company.

Clarissa was taking her tea the next afternoon when a letter arrived from a woman named Julia Kirkland.

Your Grace,

I write in the hope of obtaining a cutting of lavender hydrangea from Algernon House. Please do not feel obliged to bestir yourself, for I am a terrible gardener and the cutting has a better chance of going around the world in eighty days than surviving my attempts at propagation.

All the same, I pray that you would part with a stem or two.

Some time ago, I had the opportunity of visiting Algernon House—and came upon a stranger standing by a large stone tub of the hydrangea. I fell in love at once. But, as is the way of such things, we parted with scarcely a word exchanged.

I would like to remember that day—and my unobtainable beloved—with a profusion of hydrangea blooms in my garden. I am more than a little ashamed at this maudlin urge—I had always believed myself made of sterner stuff. But then along comes love and makes fools of us all.

Yours sincerely,

J.M.K.

A portion of Algernon House, one of the greatest manors of the land, was open to the public, even when the family was in residence. From time to time, as Clarissa went about her duties, she would see clusters of tourists, necks craning, being guided by an under-housekeeper through suites of formal rooms or around the magnificent grounds.

But how strange to think of a visitor falling in love on those very grounds, to know that someone, at this very moment, was experiencing the same pangs of longing and futility that plagued Clarissa.

Dear Miss Kirkland,

I write to you seated on the grand terrace of Algernon House, a profusion of lavender hydrangeas all about me. It is quite a likely place for falling in love, especially in the afternoon of a spring day, when the light is golden and liquid, and the air warm upon the cheeks.

I wish I could send the affections of that perfect stranger via the Royal Mail. But alas, such gifts are not in my power. Please accept, in lieu of your heart’s desire, a sheaf of instruction from my head gardener, a lovely and well-spoken man, to help you in your effort at propagating the hydrangeas in your own garden.

Please also accept a tin of my housekeeper’s famous spiced apple cake as well as a bottle of the butler’s raspberry wine, of which he is justifiably proud.

Alas, would that it were as easy to appease the heart as it is to satisfy the stomach.

Do let me know if you should ever make headway with your beloved. If not, keep me informed at least about the hydrangeas. I hope they take root in your garden.

Yours truly,

Clarissa Lexington

She snipped the hydrangea stems before sunrise the next morning, wrapped the cut ends carefully in strips of moist toweling, and sent off the crate to the village post office.

It felt nice to do something for someone, now that she didn’t have Christian to pamper anymore.

To her surprise, a response came the very next day, accompanied by a large, beautiful conch shell.

Your Grace,

You cannot imagine my surprise and delight.

The hydrangea stems I shall pare and pot to the best of my meager abilities. The cake will serve as my treat at tea and the wine something to look forward to at supper.

At the moment, however, I have just finished a most unsatisfactory survey of my possessions and found nothing worthy of a thank-you present, except perhaps this conch shell, which I have had since I was a child, and which to me has always evoked the spirit of hope and adventure.

I enclose it with much gratitude.

Yours sincerely,

J.M.K.

P.S. I will endeavor to keep you abreast of any developments concerning the hydrangeas. As for my elusive beloved, only time will tell whether anything will come of it. But while I cannot recommend falling in love—the yearnings will prove my undoing—I have become most enthusiastic about falling in friendship.

Clarissa turned the conch shell around in her hands. It was surprisingly heavy. And when she put it to her ear, she heard a low hum, almost like the soughing of distant waves.

Falling into friendship, she liked that. She set the conch shell on the mantel, picked up her pen, and began her reply to Miss Kirkland.

Chapter Two

Algernon House

Four years later

CLARISSA ALMOST COULD NOT RECOGNIZE HERSELF in this dress.

There was nothing extraordinary about the fabric or the construction—it was a simple day dress of wool poplin—but oh, the color, like a glorious sunrise, set off by trimmings of cobalt blue.

The saturation of the hues was intense; her younger self would never have worn such eye-wateringly brilliant colors. Then again, her younger self hadn’t had to wear mourning for two entire years.

But as of today, her regulation mourning period had ended and she was once again free to dress as she wished, dance as she wished, and even marry as she wished—if she wished it.

A few days ago she had said as much to Miss Kirkland, confessing that the house party she was hosting at Algernon House was actually a secret plot to assess all the gentlemen of her acquaintance for matrimonial possibilities.

Clarissa had been joking, of course, but perhaps not entirely, for she had invited Mr. Kingston, and he had arrived at Algernon House an hour ago, according to her servants. She had seen little of him since their first meeting, but she had not been able to put him out of her mind—and there was no better time than now to find out whether there was anything to substantiate the spark that had ignited in her all those years ago.

She walked to the open window. The fruit trees in the kitchen garden had begun to bloom, the soft buzz of honeybees hard at work vibrated the air, and the breeze that fluttered the curtains, though still cool, carried the first shimmer of warmth.

Spring had returned.

A movement caught her eye. A rider charged across the expansive grounds, weaving amid copses of chestnut and hazel. He followed the bank of the stream that bisected the large meadow behind the house. And when he whipped off his hat, the wind rushing past him ruffling his thick, glossy hair, she bit her lower lip at the sharp dig in her chest, as if her heart had been dented.

Mr. Kingston, in the flesh.

Her logical mind knew that she was doomed to disappointment: She had not forgotten that even in the days immediately following their meeting, she had felt let down by his reticence and his seemingly resolute lack of interest in her. But whether one happened to be a wife deprived of a husband’s affection or a widow shut off from society, the nights were long. And in the dark, alone, her thoughts had all too often turned to Mr. Kingston.

This house party, for example, she had thought about for an entire year. The house was so big. Even with dozens and dozens of guests there would still be sections devoid of occupants, where her footsteps would echo as she walked down a long corridor.

What if she were to come upon Mr. Kingston in such an empty corridor? What if, as they passed each other, instead of nodding politely, he reached out and took her hand? And what if he then lifted her hand to his lips?

At least she was somewhat realistic in her fancies, not attributing to Mr. Kingston any kind of romantic verbiage that she had never heard from him. Only a silent, simmering passion.

It was possible, wasn’t it?

“I had no idea you could stare with that much intensity, Stepmama,” said a voice at her elbow.

She started. “Christian! When did you come back?”

“Just now.” The current Duke of Lexington was lanky, handsome, and all of two days past nineteen.

“What happened to Port Mulgrave?”

He was supposed to spend the last few days of his Easter holiday on the North Yorkshire coast—with his father’s passing, he was no longer restricted to the quarry or just the countryside surrounding Algernon House for his excavations.

“Terrible weather on the coast, and the locals don’t expect it to improve anytime soon. I will have to content myself with the quarry—there is an amphibian skeleton that might prove interesting.” He kissed her on the cheek. “I’ll be off, then. And don’t worry about rearranging the seating chart for dinner—I shall feast in the splendid solitude of my room.”

“You should be more sociable,” she admonished. The boy was perfectly amiable in private, but terribly aloof before company.

He grinned at her. “The Duke of Lexington will be as sociable as he chooses to be—and not a bit more. Especially not with the ancient crowd his stepmother prefers.”

She stuck her tongue out at him. He pecked her again on the cheek and sauntered out.

She had been a new bride of seventeen when she’d first met him, a sturdy, bright-eyed little boy of four. Now he was a man nearly full-grown and she a widow thirty-two years of age. Where had all the years gone? And when?

Her attention returned to Mr. Kingston, who had dismounted and was leading his horse along, his hat dangling from the fingers of his free hand. The gait of that man, unhurried and confident—and the way the fabric of his trousers moved with each fluid step…

She blew out a breath of air.

He crossed a stone bridge and turned onto the path that would take him to the stables. If he looked up, he would see her before the open window, lusting after such inconsequential qualities as the shape of his brows, the width of his shoulders, and the—

He looked up, as if he had known all along that she was there. Her hands gripped the windowsill, but she did not look away.

Their gazes held until he disappeared behind a bend in the path.

Clarissa remained at the window until a knock came at the door. It was a footman, delivering a letter from Miss Kirkland.

My dear Duchess,

I am more than a little surprised to see you thinking of marriage so soon—somehow I had received the impression that it might be years yet before you willingly walk down the aisle again.

Are you certain you are ready?

But I suppose you must be, if you have already invited all these gentlemen—and ladies, of course—to Algernon House. In light of that, I shall reverse my earlier decision: It seems I had better be there, since the occasion is turning out to be far more momentous than I had thought.

Yours devotedly,

J.M.K.

Clarissa exclaimed in both surprise and delight. Miss Kirkland, as it turned out, was something of a recluse who always found excuses to decline Clarissa’s invitations to meet. Had she known that a little misunderstanding concerning her matrimonial intentions would bring Miss Kirkland to Algernon House, Clarissa would have made such jokes much sooner.

P.S. I fear that in person I shall prove to be a sore disappointment. With pen and paper I am at ease; in the solitude of my own company my thoughts and ideas flow without obstruction. But before others it takes me the greatest effort to string two words together, and more often than not my words emerge awkward and off-putting.

P.P.S. By the time you read this, I should already be on my way.

P.P.P.S. And if I should say anything to upset you terribly, please do believe that I have never meant to hurt you—or to put our friendship in jeopardy.

The first postscript Clarissa had more or less expected—one did not become a recluse by being perfectly at ease in the company of others. The second postscript had her smiling. The third one, however, made her frown. They had written more than a thousand letters apiece to the other, exchanged countless ideas and gifts, and enjoyed years of closeness—intimacy even. And Miss Kirkland was afraid that Clarissa would take offense because she was less than accomplished at small talk?

Clarissa read the letter once more, then carefully slipped it into a thick portfolio dedicated to their correspondence—the third one, in fact, such had been the volume of their dispatches.

As she often did, after filing away Miss Kirkland’s latest, she extracted another letter at random, to see where they had happened to be in their years-long conversation on life, love, and everything else under the sun.

It was a letter dated shortly after the duke’s passing.

My dear Duchess,

I daresay I have no idea your state of mind just now, having such an enormous change thrust upon you all of a sudden. But if I may, I’d like to offer you a few words of counsel.

Do not be shocked if you are struck by a greater grief than you had anticipated, for no matter what, His Grace was and will always be the man you once loved.

Do not let futility seep into your heart that in the end there was no grand reconciliation to make up for years of neglect and casual cruelty.

And do not let guilt bother you, should relief—or even hope—wash over you. The duke breathed his last because of the will of God, not because his wife wished she could start her life anew.

While no one can predict what the future will bring, rest assured that I pray fervently for your happiness, and long to do what I can to help ease you into your new life and many new possibilities.

Yours devotedly,

J.M.K.

It never failed to move Clarissa, this particular letter—the fineness of Miss Kirkland’s understanding, the stalwartness of her support, and, between the lines, the unspoken but staunch optimism that things would turn out all right.

A knock came at the door.

“Yes?”

A footman bowed. “Mr. Kingston would like a moment of your time, Your Grace, if it is agreeable to you.”

Her chair scraped audibly as she rose.

In their entire acquaintance, Mr. Kingston had never sought her company. But a man acted very differently, did he not, when he perceived carnal curiosity on a woman’s part? Her long gaze upon him from the window—had he interpreted it as an invitation? Was this why he wanted to see her now, when he had been otherwise content to not approach her and not speak to her?

In her mind she experienced a silent, unsmiling Mr. Kingston pressing her against a wall, his body hard and muscular, his kiss ardent, almost bruising.

Her heart thumped. She took a deep breath. “You may show Mr. Kingston to the solarium. Tell him I will be there shortly.”

Chapter Three

IN THE SOLARIUM, Mr. Kingston stood near the fireplace, reading a horticultural guide Miss Kirkland had sent Clarissa. He looked up as he sensed her approach.

Clarissa nearly came to a dead stop. She had believed that in her mind she must have exaggerated the degree and intensity of his beauty. But the clarity of his eyes, the angularity of his brow, the carved precision of his high cheekbones—if anything her memories had been but a pale imitation of the reality of him. And the day coat of deep green he had changed into only served to emphasize a physique of spectacularly perfect proportions.

He bowed, still holding on to the book from Miss Kirkland.

She took a seat and spent a few seconds assiduously rearranging the folds of her skirt, to give herself time to recover from his effect on her. It would not do, would it, to speak to him all breathless and moon-eyed?

“Mr. Kingston, how do you do?” she said, perhaps a bit too severely.

He took a deep breath. “I am well, thank you. And you, Your Grace?”

Mesmerizing, the way his lips moved, beautifully sculpted, yet mobile and soft. And his voice, low and rich, was perfect for the whispering of sweet nothings.

She swallowed, her tone turning even cooler. “I understand you wished to see me, sir?”

His fingers tightened on the book. “I wanted…to thank you for your kind invitation.”

“When I invited Miss Elphinstone I thought of you, since you had enjoyed her company when you were last here at Algernon House four years ago.”

An outright lie, that; it had been quite the other way around.

He rubbed a thumb against the spine of the book. “I’m sure I will find her company equally gratifying this time.”

Neither of them said anything for some time, leading to an uneasy silence. Abruptly he set down the book and bowed again. “Thank you for seeing me, Your Grace. Please don’t let me take up any more of your time.”

When he was gone, Clarissa rubbed her temples. It had been a strange encounter, to say the least, at once nerve-racking and deeply unsatisfying. But really, what had she expected?

That he would come up to her, cup her face, and kiss her.

She sighed. And that was why she didn’t think such thoughts outside her bedroom or in the light of day. That was why it was the one secret she had kept even from Miss Kirkland.

It would be quite a hopeless business with Mr. Kingston. But at least soon Miss Kirkland would be here. Clarissa crossed the solarium and picked up the book she had sent. The horticultural guide had been a bit of a joke, as Miss Kirkland was self-acknowledged to be an execrable gardener, unable to keep anything alive except the lavender hydrangea she had obtained from Clarissa.

But it had been inscribed in all sincerity. On the first page, in Miss Kirkland’s familiar hand: Some turn the soil and plant seedlings. We garden with words and nurture affinity.

And how. From a dozen hydrangea cuttings, they had grown a beautiful friendship.

And it was this friendship from which Clarissa would derive solace and pleasure when all her hopes about Mr. Kingston had proven to be made of mirages.

After presiding over tea, Clarissa set out for the still little-used east wing, to check on the room she had asked to be made up for Miss Kirkland. She had decided to place her friend far from the rest of the guests so that the latter could enjoy a semblance of peace and quiet—seclusion, even—in the midst of a lively house party.

Preoccupied, she didn’t realize until she was about to turn into the main upstairs passage of the east wing that someone was behind her.

Mr. Kingston.

Really, if he was not going to kiss her, he should not waste her time.

And then, of course, she was ashamed of her uncharitable thought. He did not know of the countless hours she had spent turning him into a shorthand for all the excitement and passion missing in her life. Besides, he was a gentleman, and a gentleman did not simply grab a lady and kiss her.

“You wouldn’t happen to be lost, would you, Mr. Kingston?” she said over her shoulder. “Your room is on the other side of the house.”

“No, Your Grace,” he answered, drawing even with her. “I know where I am.”

“But there is nothing of interest here, other than some of my stepson’s fossils.”

“I beg to differ,” he said, his voice low but firm.

Flustered, she stopped before the room she had assigned to Miss Kirkland. “Do please excuse me, Mr. Kingston. I need to inspect this room.”

He opened the door for her. But when she had walked through, he followed her inside and closed the door. Her heart careened. Did this mean he wanted to be alone with her after all?

And was this not altogether wrong? Had they spoken five sentences to each other in their entire acquaintance? How very arrogant and brazen of him to presume that she would welcome such—

He settled a hand at her nape. She shivered with the sensation of his bare skin on hers, zigzags of electricity that shot deep into her spine. The searing heat spread. He was now touching the underside of her jaw, the tender skin just beneath her ear, and—

She gasped aloud as he pressed his lips into the shell of her ear.

“Clarissa,” he murmured.

Was she dreaming? Was it likely, or even possible, for mirages to suddenly prove themselves true oases after all? Her lips moved, but no response emerged. His hands were on her arms, their warmth seeping through the fabric of her sleeves. Slowly, he turned her around. Then he cupped her face and kissed her.

She couldn’t tell whether his lips were soft as rose petals or rough as sandpaper. She couldn’t seem to feel anything but this fire that scorched any and all nerve endings, as if she had grazed the corona of the sun.

She moaned. Her hands plunged into his hair. She returned the kiss roughly—if he was made of flames then let her be a fire-eater. Lips, teeth, tongue, she wanted everything.

Vaguely she felt herself lifted. She didn’t care. As long as she could continue to kiss him, nothing else mattered. Even when her back touched the softness of a mattress, it didn’t matter. Of course he must carry her to bed; she couldn’t be expected to remain on her feet forever while she kissed him.

Now there came the warmth of his fingers at her throat—he was unbuttoning her bodice. Yes, she wanted this, his weight pressed upon her, the feel of it as solid and sinewy as she’d always imagined. More, if anything. And he smelled wonderful, of cedar and cypress, and—

All of a sudden it dawned on her what she was doing: allowing a virtual stranger to make love to her. She might have fantasized about him for years, but she did not know him. Not at all.

“Mr. Kingston, please, please stop.”

He grunted and kissed her again. “Clarissa—”

“Mr. Kingston, no! Please listen to—”

The door burst open. Before she could quite comprehend what was going on, Christian, his face grim, wrenched Mr. Kingston off her and shoved him aside.

She struggled to her feet, stunned by this development. Christian yanked the counterpane from the bed and wrapped it around her, though she was hardly indecent—she had evening gowns that exposed more of her bosom and back.

Briefly her stepson embraced her. Then he punched Mr. Kingston in the face, as she cried out in alarm.

“How dare you?” Christian spat out. “How dare you come into this house and abuse Her Grace’s hospitality. Get out. Or next time I’ll use a pickax on you.”

She rushed to stand between the two men. “No, Christian, you are wrong! Mr. Kingston wasn’t doing anything that…that I didn’t gladly permit him to do.”

“Then why were you beseeching him to stop?”

“Because…” She groped for an answer. “Because I remembered that we are in Miss Kirkland’s room and she might arrive any minute. If we were to…proceed any further, obviously we must stop and engage in a change of location.”

Christian looked from her to Mr. Kingston and back again, blushing visibly. “So…my intrusion was unwelcome.”

“Hardly,” said Mr. Kingston with great dignity—cheer, even, considering that he had just been interrupted in his lovemaking and given a cut on the cheek. “I’m quite delighted that Her Grace has such a fierce champion.”

Christian inclined his head. “If I do not hear from you twenty minutes before dinner, Stepmama, I will take your place as host. And I’m sure I can come up with an acceptable reason for Mr. Kingston’s absence.”

As soon as he had left, Clarissa rushed to Mr. Kingston and peered at him. “Are you all right?”

He looked at her the way she had always wanted him to look at her—and even smiled a little. “Yes, I’m fine.”

She flushed, remembering what they had been doing. She walked to the pitcher by the washstand, dipped her handkerchief in the cool water, and wrung it out. But it was a few seconds before she could turn around and go back to him.

He hissed slightly as she dabbed the handkerchief on his cheek. “This is probably as good a time as any to tell you that Miss Kirkland won’t be arriving to interrupt anything.”

She stilled. “What do you mean?”

He exhaled slowly. “You were married, you were lonely, and you were proud. I thought…I thought perhaps I could be a friend to you, even if I could be nothing else. So I invented Miss Kirkland.”

She stumbled back a step. She had never noticed it before, but that first letter from Miss Kirkland had arrived the day after his departure from Algernon House. And Miss Kirkland’s initials, J.M.K., could just as easily stand for James Maitland Kingston.

All these years, all those letters…it had been his words—and warmth and camaraderie—that she had cherished. Her head spun a little, unable to take it all in. “You never said anything.”

She could understand why he had chosen not to reveal himself while her husband yet lived, but the latter had been dead for two years.

He looked down briefly. “I was afraid to lose your friendship. It is difficult, as such, for me to speak to others. When it’s you, it becomes…almost insurmountable. I thought you would find me a terrible substitute for Miss Kirkland.”

“Then why now?” But even as she asked the question, the answer came to her: He believed her blithe declaration that she was going to make one of the gentlemen in attendance her next husband. “Ah, I see.”

“I wanted to tell you the truth when I asked to see you, but I turned into a coward. So I decided that this time I must not fail.”

She remembered how coolly she had conducted herself during their meeting. He must have thought that she did not care for him—when that couldn’t be further from the truth.

Her hand raised of its own accord. Her thumb grazed along his bottom lip—yes, it was wonderfully soft. “The path to success, of course, was via kisses.”

He took her hand and kissed her on the center of her palm, sending a jolt of heat into her arm. “Easier to kiss than to speak.”

She had stopped his kisses because she had believed there to be something missing in their interactions: that lovely approach of two souls toward a point of communion. But it wasn’t lacking at all. He was already her stalwart companion and trusted confidant; he had already known her in every season and every mood.

She was, all at once, very close to tears.

He held both of her hands in his. “Please believe me when I say there was never any malice or mischief on my part. I only wished to do something for you—and be closer to you. Because…because I love you. I have loved you from the moment I first saw you.”

Of course she believed him. Of course she believed her best friend in the entire world. She kissed him, her heart full of wonder and gratitude.

“You are sure you are not angry with me?” he said between kisses.

“Angry? You were my lifeline.” She ran her fingers through his hair, loving that he was no mirage, but a true oasis. “I only wish you had told me sooner, so I didn’t have to spend so many nights, long after I became a widow, wondering what your lips felt like.”

His gaze dipped to her mouth. “Now you know.”

She traced his lips again. They were delectable to the touch—everything she had ever dreamed of and more. “Not well enough—never well enough.”

Chapter Four

CLARISSA DANCED. It was three o’clock in the morning, but she was still bursting with energy and euphoria. Thanks to Christian’s promise to look after her guests in her stead, she and her wonderful James had been able to spend eight solid hours together, making love, talking, making love some more, and talking some more. And once her lover stopped thinking of her as the Duchess of Lexington, but only as his dearest friend and correspondent, he didn’t even have that much trouble speaking.

Now she had to wait until morning to see him again—morning could not come soon enough.

She was twirling past the fireplace for the third time when a light knock came, followed by an envelope from under the door.

When she opened the unsealed envelope, she was greeted by a most familiar and beloved hand.

My dear Duchess,

I know I have said it in your presence, but permit me to also set it down in writing: This has been the most marvelous day of my life. I am filled with such a sense of well-being and invincibility that I just might attempt giving a speech in public. Perhaps I’d even commandeer the nearest piano, pound its keys, and sing at the top of my lungs.

I am drunk without having touched a drop of spirits.

Will you make me permanently intoxicated with life and all its beauty by consenting to become my wife? I am already the happiest man alive. But as your husband, I would also be the proudest.

Yours devotedly,

J.M.K.

She pressed the note against her heart, but only for a moment, as she rushed to open the door and pull him inside. Before he could speak, she placed a finger over his lips and led him to her sitting room, and with him leaning over her shoulder, penned her reply.

My dear Mr. Kingston,

Why, yes, of course I will marry you. I did say that I would choose a gentleman from among those at my house party for my future spouse, did I not? I am a woman of my word.

If it is agreeable to you, let us marry as soon as we can obtain a special license. Where should we go for our honeymoon? We need not return until the Eton and Harrow game in July.

Yours impatiently,

Clarissa

Her dear James solemnly read the note after she handed it to him, even though he already knew exactly what it said. He then kissed it, folded it carefully, and put it into the inside pocket of his jacket.

“When your party disperses, will you come with me to my house and see my hydrangea garden?” he asked.

In other words, would she like to come and see his heart held out before him and the hope that had sustained him all these years?

She rose and wrapped her arms around him. “Yes, I will, darling. There is nothing I’d like to see more—except you, every day of my life.”

About Sherry

Thank you for reading Claiming the Duchess. Claiming the Duchess is followed by Beguiling the Beauty, which tells Christian’s story. For your copy of Beguiling the Beauty, click here.

Want to know when the next Sherry Thomas novel will be released? Sign up for her newsletter at www.sherrythomas.com. You can also follow her on twitter at @sherrythomas and like her Facebook page at http://facebook.com/authorsherrythomas.

Other Books by Sherry

The Heart of Blade Series

The Hidden Blade

My Beautiful Enemy

The London Trilogy

The Luckiest Lady in London

Private Arrangements

His at Night

The Fitzhugh Series

Claiming the Duchess

Beguiling the Beauty

Ravishing the Heiress

A Dance in Moonlight

Tempting the Bride

The Bride of Larkspear

The Marsden Brothers Series

Delicious

Not Quite a Husband

The Elemental Trilogy (Young Adult Fantasy)

The Burning Sky

The Perilous Sea

The Immortal Heights — 2015

Not in any series

The One in My Heart — spring 2015 (Contemporary Romance)

Chapter One

Nottinghamshire, 1821

HE WAS SIMPLY a boot at first. A scuffed boot propped on her newly upholstered ottoman. Catherine Meredith Carthwick Raybourne, the Marchioness of Forster, paused on her way down the hall. Quiet settled as quiet does on a tame Wednesday afternoon. The butler had not announced any guests, and her brother was not to return to Nottinghamshire for five days yet. The boot gave way to a long leg. Cat leaned forward and peered around the corner of the library door.

And nearly fell over.

She’d never expected to find her missing husband in the library.

Forster sat in a puddle of sunlight beneath the near windows, all dark hair and tanned skin. He’d removed his jacket, rolled up his shirtsleeves, and propped his dusty boot on her Chinese silk.

Her husband was home.

Cat had awaited his return for five years. Five long years of moldering in the country with nary a letter from him. Nary an inquiry or a simple message directed through an impartial third party.

Only once, in all that time, had she queried her errant spouse’s whereabouts. The family solicitor was “not at liberty to share such information.” But he did confirm, “The marquess is of sound health and mind.”

Catherine had received the news with a proud spine and undiminished composure. Inside, she’d been gravely disappointed.

Forster, it seemed, was not stranded on an exotic island with a strange disease. Or trapped by the ice in the cold north. Or eaten by a bear in the Americas. More’s the pity.

Beneath her disappointment, where dark emotions lurked like wriggly things in a deep well, she’d seethed with fury.

He could very well be cohabitating with another woman, starting another family while she awaited him till death did they part.

Now, she did not know what to think. She shook her head, but the apparition did not disappear.

Her husband was in the library.

Time, which was supposed to have stood still, or slowed, or demonstrated any other gentle kindness to make the moment easier to bear, instead raced forward and backward like a dog searching out a scent and not knowing where to begin. Her turbulent heartbeat scrambled along, a pulse behind, unable to catch up.

She took a deep breath. Then another. “So, you are home.”

Sunlight glinted off Forster’s dark hair as he lifted his head from the book in his hands.

He glanced across the room and met her eyes. His face was thinner than she recalled, sculpted into sharp lines and hollows. But his eyes were the same sky blue. Set against his tanned skin, they appeared only more brilliant.

Uncoiling his long limbs, he pressed to standing. He seemed taller, or perhaps that was the thickness of his shoulders. “Lady Forster.”

His voice was deep velvet. Somehow, her husband had become a man. The boy she’d known since childhood had lived an entire chapter of his life without her.

Sorrow, or something like it, knocked at the heavy door of her heart. Cat refused to let it in. She straightened her spine and closed half the space between them.

Faint lines fanned out from his blue eyes. A tiny scar, one she had never seen before, marked his right cheekbone. Another scar, the shape of a small star, sat high on his forehead. She knew that one. She’d put it there herself.

“Good afternoon, Jamie.” His name slipped from her lips. He’d once traced his name on her mouth, claiming when she said “Jamie” it appeared she said, “Kiss me.” Where was that boy who had brought her wildflowers and embraced her in the thick woods?

The man standing before her tilted his head to the side. “Good afternoon, Cat.”

It poured through her, the sound of her name. His deep voice. Poured through her like church bells ringing into the hills, awakening those who would forget their longing, their anger, their terrible regret.

She fingered the riding crop in her hand. “Whatever are you doing in the library?”

He arched a dark brow at her tone. “You sound surprised to see me. One might have expected my return after Sutton’s passing.”

“I wasn’t aware you knew of Sutton’s illness.” One does not expect things of a husband after five years’ absence. “My condolences on the death of your cousin.”

“Thank you.” Still, he did not approach but remained before the rosewood armchair he’d always favored. In a fit of pique, she’d had it reupholstered in pink and green damask with matching tasseled pillows.

The pillows were now on the floor.

Cat noticed it then, the tea tray waiting beside his chair. A plate of crumbs and jam.

He’d called for tea without even informing her he was home.

How dare he. The current of her blood burned beneath her skin, left her nearly breathless. She wished she could recall any of the set-downs she had practiced over the years. Any of the gracious welcomes that were to show her equanimity in the face of his absence. Instead, she blurted the only thing that came to mind. “I was in my dressing room.”

He dropped his gaze, slid it over her in a quick lick of heat that ended with her toes curling in her riding boots. When he met her eyes again, the left side of his mouth quirked in the half smile she remembered so well.

She ignored the quick flip of her heart. “What I mean to say is I have been home all day, should someone have thought to inform me of your return.”

Forster didn’t apologize for his lapse. He didn’t shrug his shoulders or shift his feet. He didn’t do anything.

Infernal man. “Did you not even inquire if I were home?”

“It is not so big an estate. I assumed our paths would cross.” He swept his hand toward her. And here you are.

Her husband was either a hopeless idiot, a selfish arse, or still punishing her. Most likely all three.

“That is it, then? Five years and I get a”—she waved her hand in a motion that mimicked his—“crossing of our paths?”

He had the intelligence to look wary. “What would you like me to say?”

“Oh, I don’t know. How about ‘How are you, Catherine?’ or ‘I’ve been in India and the goats ate all my correspondence.’”

His blue gaze was intent upon her. Once, this expression had made her feel like the center of his world. “It is good to see you, Cat.”

“Good to see me?” Her throat burned with the urge to yell at him. She tried to take a calming breath. Composure. Graciousness. Indifference. Those were the qualities she needed to strive for.

“Perhaps we should continue this conversation later,” he said.

“Later?”

Jamie scrubbed a hand through his hair. “Though this homecoming is truly heartwarming, I am exhausted from my journey.”

“You’ve had five years to avoid arguing with me, Forster.”

“Then what’s an afternoon more?”

“What’s an afternoon more?” she repeated. Loudly.

“I do not mean to interrupt your day.” He crossed his arms over his chest. Yes, he was definitely thicker there, in his shoulders.

“What do you know of my day? You’ve not even inquired into my affairs.”

“Yes, a husband should know all about his wife’s affairs, should he not?” Ice cold. The man still wanted his revenge, then.

“You know very well I did not have an affair.”

“Funny, then, how I was deemed a cuckold only a fortnight after my wedding.”

“I…you…” Cat snapped her mouth shut. Finally, the argument she’d been waiting years to have, and she could think of no sharp retort.

JAMIE STARED AT HIS WIFE. Anger glinted off her like sparks beneath a hammer.

She was glorious.

It took everything he had within him not to breach the space between them. He wanted her in his arms. He wanted to touch her, taste her. Goddamn smell her. She, the woman who had betrayed him worse than any other.

He was a bloody fool.

A fool who was in no mood for an argument. The last he had seen Cat, they’d had a row to end all rows. Between them, they had smashed two matching Rouen vases, torn down a curtain from the window, and disemboweled a throw pillow.

His pride had fared no better.

“It is lovely to have you home, my lord.” Cat crossed her arms, mimicking his posture. The tasseled riding crop in her hand stuck out at a funny angle. Only Cat would have a silk crop specially designed to match her riding habit. “The villagers will be delighted that the lord of the manor has finally returned to Forster Abbey.”

She sounded anything but delighted.

“I am happy to be home.” Dread heavy in his belly, he widened his stance. His favorite chair waited behind him, now covered in some appalling fabric. But it didn’t seem he’d be sitting down any time soon. He’d been at sea often enough to recognize the signs. This storm was gathering strength, not abating.

Foolishly, he’d thought a surprise reunion might work in his favor. A warning of his return would afford his wife time to amass her anger against him. Apparently she didn’t require time or warning to gather her fury. Her blond curls trembled with emotion beneath her riding hat.

She smiled at him. Or, more correctly, bared her teeth. “I trust you will discover we bore your absence well. Splendidly, in fact.”

“I see.”

“I do hope you found what you were looking for during your travels. But perhaps I shall decline to recognize you? Perhaps I shall call for a contest. Whoever shall string the king’s bow and shoot an arrow through twelve axe-handles may win me.”

“If it pleases you, Penelope.” He smiled back. Always quick with the retort, his Cat. “But might I remind you I was gone five years, not the twenty Odysseus was away.”

She dropped her arms to her sides. Her blue riding habit matched her eyes. The jacket was tight with double buttons beneath her breasts. He knew those breasts. Knew the weight and shape of them in his palms. Knew how she most liked to be—

She smacked her crop against her boot. Jamie looked up.

“I am your wife, Forster, whether you wish it or not. I have maintained your household, brought kindness to your tenants, and otherwise been faithful to my vows. All the while I’ve had no notion where you were.”

“You act as if I owe you an explanation.”

“I made a mistake. I apologized for it. Five years ago.” She ground out the last.

“Perhaps I was five years wounded.”

“Perhaps you were five years stubborn.”

“Perhaps my pride needed time.”

“Perhaps you are a hardheaded man.” Her cheeks were flushed, her eyes bright. She was awake in this world and alive within it. He had always liked that about her.

Right now, he was half tempted to carry her upstairs and show her how hardheaded he was. Perhaps they could wrestle this quarrel to its natural conclusion.

He forced himself to take a step back. “Is there anything else I can do for you, Lady Forster?” Better she not know the inescapable effect she had on him. The control she had always held over him.

She smashed her lips into a hard line, obviously holding back whatever retort she wanted to make. Her whip whack-whack-whacked against her boot. Then, with a toss of her head, she looked out the window.

But he’d seen it, in the quiver of her chin and the slant of her eye. Seen what he’d not wanted to see.

Her vulnerability.

“Cat, I…” He what? He had no notion what to say. Certainly he did not owe her an explanation. She was the one who had been found in a compromising position with a known libertine only two weeks after their wedding. He was the one made to look a fool.

“Why are you returned, Forster?” She directed her query to the afternoon sunlight slanting through the window.

How to answer her question? On every piece of land he’d visited, no matter how breathtakingly beautiful, he’d missed the rolling hills and familiar hearths of his childhood home. But the truth, the more immediate cause, pressed at his tongue.

It was difficult, the real cause for his return, and Cat might not like it, but he would honor her with it. There would be no more games between his wife and him, no more half-truths or misunderstandings. “Sutton passed.”

“Yes.” She swung her cautious gaze back to him.

“I no longer have an heir.”

“I am sure there is someone.”

“Not in direct line.” Only some fourth or fifth cousin he’d never heard of. It had been a damnable curse, the lack of males in his family.

“I see.” She held herself very, very still. Perhaps she did see. Perhaps he should simply leave well enough alone.

But he wanted to be crystal clear. “I need an heir, Catherine.”

Chapter Two

I NEED AN HEIR, CATHERINE.

Thirty minutes later, Cat still could not catch her breath. Jamie had made the preposterous statement with utmost calm, his face quiet, his gaze steady on hers. As if he’d said “I need a new pair of boots.”

An heir.

Her skin burned with the very word.

It was not the thought of children that unsettled her. Not even the knowledge of how children were created.

It was the memories. Vivid flashes of heat that thrummed under her skin. Jamie in her bed. The shock of his mouth everywhere. His skin impossibly smooth against hers. The places she craved him. Jamie filling her, again and again, the madness between them. Her unimaginable pleasure.

Five years of a cold bed and she had not forgotten a thing.

Her hands were unsteady on the reins as she rode the six miles to her brother’s estate. She could not go into the village as planned.

No. A friend, that’s what she needed. Someone who would not be easily shocked. Someone like her sister-in-law.

Cat urged her mount on faster. What would it be like, to bed the man Jamie had become? All thick shoulders and cool composure?

She drew in a deep breath, only then noticing she was close to the main gates of Giltbrook Hall. It was good her horse knew the way, for she’d not paid a single thought to the passing scenery.

Moments later, she tossed the reins to a stableboy and entered the back of her childhood home. Really, she’d rather not see any of the staff in her present state. She slipped silently through the hall, but the butler still found her. She waved him off with a request for a pot of chocolate—yes, in the middle of the afternoon—then found Mazie outside on the sunlit terrace. Her sister-in-law, normally spry and ever on the move, was lying on the divan, a wet cloth across her forehead.

“Please, don’t sit up.” Cat approached with soft feet. “The nausea is not improved?”

“It is torture, Cat. I am never having another child.” Mazie’s day gown was hopelessly wrinkled, her chignon askew. “Did something happen to the village project? Are the workers behind schedule?”

Cat felt a twinge of guilt for neglecting her duties in the village today. “Everything is still on schedule. The families visit in a few days’ time.”

“Good, I’ve gathered some more furniture.”

“Send it when you are ready.” Cat couldn’t sit down, not when she was so full of ache and fire. She twitched her skirts out of the way and paced the length of the terrace. Taking a deep breath, she plunged into the heart of the matter. “He’s returned.”

“Who has returned? Trent is not to be back for a few days.” Mazie peeled the cloth from her forehead and scanned the terrace. With a groan, she covered her eyes again. “Is someone pretending to be the Midnight Rider?”

“No, no.” Cat whipped around. “Forster.”

“What?” This did prompt Mazie to sit up. She put the cloth aside and studied Cat. “Forster is here? In Nottinghamshire?”

“Yes.”

“My goodness. No wonder you are so upset.” Mazie made a halfhearted attempt to corral her chignon, which threatened to fall off one side of her head.

“Oh, Mazie, what am I to do?” Cat needed someone to give her answers, for she certainly had none.

“To begin, you must stop pacing.” Mazie pressed her hand over her eyes. “I cannot watch you.”

Cat stifled a sigh and sank into a chair. She had finally made a life for herself that did not include her husband, or her lack thereof. What was she to do now?

A footman arrived with a pot of warm chocolate and two slices of lemon cake. He placed the tray on the small table between them.

Mazie leaned back onto her divan. “How can you drink that vile stuff?”

“Chocolate? You love it.”

“The smell.” She waved her hand and mumbled something about locks on her bedroom door.

Cat took pity on her sister-in-law and moved the tray to the far side of the terrace. She filled her cup nearly to the brim before returning to her seat. Chocolate could fix anything.

“Forgive me for being such a terrible malcontent today, Cat. I am glad you stopped by. Forster understands you did not truly have an affair, doesn’t he?”

“I have told him the truth. Beyond that, I do not know what he thinks.” Cat took a healthy sip of chocolate. “The annulment papers are in my desk.”

Mazie lifted the cloth from her eyes and looked over at her. “Will you file them?”

“It has been my plan for some time.” Jamie certainly had not displayed any joy at their reunion. She had no cause to change her plans.

“You will claim breach of contract?”

“Yes, I will try.” Cat studied the floral pattern on her cup. “I don’t think he missed me at all.”

“You cannot know that—”

“What if he fell in love with someone else?”

“That would certainly be unfortu—”

“What if he plans to leave again and not return for another five years?”

“Did you ask him?”

“No. I argued with him.” Cat laughed at herself but felt no humor. “He wants an heir.”

“My goodness, that was some argument you had.”

It would have been a much better argument, had she remembered half the things she wanted to say to her errant spouse.

A breeze blew across the lawn, bringing the scent of ripening apples. Somewhere, a warbler trilled. The little bird would be leaving soon, making the long flight to warmer climes.

“You would make a wonderful mother,” Mazie murmured.

“So you think I should stay with him?” Cat turned to her sister-in-law. If only there were an answer to the riddle in her heart.

“Oh, my dear, I cannot tell you what to do.”

Cat sighed and drained her cup of chocolate. She could stay with Jamie, be a mother, and learn to live with the ache in her heart. Or she could strike out on her own and start anew, as had been her plan this last year.

“Are you in fear of him, Catherine?” Mazie asked quietly.

“No, of course not.” It was herself she feared. That she would let her husband break her heart again.

CAT WAS AVOIDING HIM.

Jamie had not seen his wife in two days. Not in the hallway, not in the breakfast room, and certainly not in the dining room.

He did hear her at night, though. The wall connecting their bedchambers was not thick enough to drown the sound of her voice as she chatted with her maid. Alas, he could not make out her words no matter how he strained to hear. She sounded happy enough, if one went by tone alone. Other than taking pains not to see him, she seemed unaffected by his presence in the house. He, on the other hand, could not stop thinking of her.

It seemed to always be this way.

He padded around his bedroom and sitting room. He would focus on his delight to be home, and not his frustration over his wife. Some of his luggage had arrived and he unpacked the souvenirs from his trip. A ceremonial mask from Senegal sat beside a Ming vase atop his bookshelf. A statue of the Hindu god Ganesh acted as a bookend on the middle shelf, holding his travelogues upright.

But it was not his journeys that interested him. It was his home. He had spent the last two days visiting his estate and reacquainting himself with the land and people he had left behind.

Except for his wife, that is. She was nowhere to be found.

Jamie knew she had retired for the night. He had listened to the muted lilt and fall of her voice as she spoke with her maid. Silence had settled a bit ago. What would she do if he poked his head into her room and wished her a good night?

Toss him out, most likely. She had not liked his pronouncement that he needed an heir.

But perhaps she would welcome him. Perhaps they could talk. He would like that, to talk to her.

Before he could reconsider, Jamie walked to the door adjoining the two rooms and knocked. She did not answer.

He pushed the door open and peeked inside.

Cat was asleep on her bed, a book still in hand. A fire blazed in the hearth and a copper tub, full of water, sat in the middle of her chamber. She had been naked. Or perhaps not naked but wrapped in a wet, translucent shift.

He nudged the door open a few inches more.

Her blond hair was unbound and spread out in waves across her pillow. It would most likely be damp from her bath and smell of roses. She’d pulled on a green silk robe but her lower arms and legs were exposed to the heat of the room. He’d forgotten how elegant she was. The shape of her face, the curve of her ankle, the milky-whiteness of her skin.

He had missed her.

The realization hit him like a fist to the gut. Like he could no longer make sense of his breath. He leaned a shoulder against the doorframe and took his time looking at her.

His wife.

The word still felt awkward. She was Cat, the girl he’d known forever. The girl he’d wanted as long as he could remember. And when he finally got her, he’d left.

He could just make out the shape of her slim calf in the shadows. He knew her body. Knew it with a thousand caresses. Knew it as well as his own.

No matter how he’d tried to push her from his thoughts in their years apart, she always came back in his dreams. Long limbs. Full breasts. Hair spilling as it was now.

He dragged his gaze up her legs to the mound of her sex. She would be soft from her bath. Warm. He could be hard for her in a moment. Was already hard.

She was naked beneath her robe.

His cock throbbed, and he forced his gaze away. She’d redecorated the room. The purple and silver suited her in its refinement with a hint of passion beneath. Vases full of roses sat atop her bedside table and her dressing table.

The second bloom of late summer roses always was her favorite. “It’s as if they know winter is coming and are eager to give away all of their beauty,” she once said.

His gaze found its way back to her. The fucking would be the easy part. It was the forgiveness that would be a challenge. He’d not forgotten how she’d hurt him. The weight of his anger had been a chain around his neck for all these years.

He did not wish to carry it anymore. What is it they said? Forgiveness frees the one who had been wronged.

Could he possibly forgive his wife?

Would she welcome him into her bed if he did not?

Jamie took a deep breath. It was odd, this ache in his chest. He could not account for it. One felt such things upon leaving a beloved land or watching a particularly inspired sunset. Not spying on one’s estranged spouse as she slept.

Cat’s lady’s maid slipped in from another door. Jamie recognized the woman, but could not recall her name. Beneath her white cap, her eyes narrowed and her lips pressed into a hard scowl. She appeared ready to stomp across the room and slam the door in his face.

Once, he might have reprimanded the audacity of her disrespect. Now, irritation burned across his chest, but he did not react.

He knew the servant was no fool. She saw written on his face what he could not hide from his heart.

Ancient anger. The fire of ache. And the signs of an internal war.

Casting one last glance at his sleeping wife, he stepped back into his room and pulled the door closed.

Chapter Three

THE SEPTEMBER DAY WAS LOVELY, as was often the case in Nottinghamshire. Cat tried to focus on the sunshine and the work ahead of her rather than thoughts of her husband.

Three days and he had yet to seek her out. She did not know whether to be disappointed or relieved. She should be thinking of her future, of the plans she had created for herself. Plans that did not include the presence of the marquess. Despite the suddenness of Jamie’s return, and the boldness of his demand, nothing had changed.

Jamie’s lack of attention did not influence her toward wanting to start a family with him. She desired a child, but that child needed a father.

A large patch of Michaelmas daisies bloomed in the open plot between the Wentons’ and Rogers’s cottages. Bees hummed in the purple flowers, content to be busy on this fine day. Cat crossed the street to walk in the shade. Honey and sunshine and soft sounds invited a languidness she could ill afford. Already her blood moved in a slow rhythm, exhausted from the previous evening. She’d lain awake in the dark. Wondering if Jamie would visit. Telling herself she would not welcome him into her bed and imagining it all the same.

She was imagining it now. Silly girl. Cat took her pencil from her pocket and scribbled some rather useless ideas in her notebook. Really, she ought to pay better attention to the work around her. She wanted this cluster of cottages to be perfect for the families who would soon inhabit them. She wanted the children, a few of whom had spent years in the workhouses, to know sunlight and fresh air. The gardens would help their bodies to be healthful, while the open fields and trees to climb would repair their spirits.

These were not families who knew comfort, as she did. They knew work, and sickness, and hunger. And some of them, gaol.

In three years’ time, this end of the village would be full of life. The families would be healed and the flower boxes would be overflowing.

And Jamie, would he still be home?

Pushing the thought from her mind, she entered what would be the Warners’ cottage. The north-facing windows were particularly large and exposed to the street. Redford’s Mercantile had some new fabrics in stock that would make lovely drapes.

The deep blue velvet she had seen last week would be too formal for the cottage, but perfect for Jamie’s bedroom. The cool color suited him well. Especially his eyes, and the way they were set off by his darkened skin…

Work. Work was a good distraction.

Cat crossed to the windows and considered the spindly ladder lying against the bare wall. She’d never actually measured for drapes herself, but she’d watched the footmen do it. Surely it couldn’t be too hard. The laborers were busy repairing the chimney across the street, and she hated to bother them.

She dragged the tall ladder toward the windows and climbed the first rung. Nothing hard to it. Any independent-minded woman could do this work. She climbed near to the top and removed her measuring tape from her pocket. She held the end of the tape above the window and let the rest of it drop to the ground.

Dash it. This wouldn’t work, she could not read the numbers at the bottom of the window. Perhaps she should stand in the middle of the ladder.

She took a step down and froze as her dress pulled sharply against her throat and shoulders. Her skirts were caught beneath her boots. Just wonderful. She stepped up the ladder and freed the fabric. This time, as she descended, she kicked her skirts out wide. Still, her left foot managed to catch the hem of her riding habit.

This was silly.

She threw the measuring tape to the ground and grabbed as much fabric into her right hand as possible. Cool air rushed against her calves as she hoisted her skirts.

She took a precarious step down, but could go no further. Alas, it was not possible to descend a ladder without the use of two hands.

Footsteps sounded on the front porch.

“Oh good,” Cat called to the workman. “Can you please help…?”

Her voice trailed off as she felt a familiar shiver run up her spine. That was no workman watching her. It was her husband.

“My, my,” he drawled from the doorway.

Oh, buzzing and warmth and languid sunshine. It caught up to her regardless. Cat closed her eyes and felt the heat of his gaze on her back.

She could only imagine what he saw. Her lower legs were bare above her riding boots. And her drawers, should they be exposed, were frilled with lace at the bottom. Jamie had enjoyed extravagances like that, had bought her the most glorious undergarments the week after their wedding.

The sound of his footsteps drew nearer at a leisurely pace. She did not drop her skirts. She could not help it, she enjoyed his looking.

“I don’t know if I should admire you or call you to task.” His rough voice rubbed against her, sent gooseflesh skittering across her skin.

Strong hands wrapped around her waist and she opened her eyes. He was touching her. Framing her body with his long fingers. She was honey, shaped by a vessel. Fire, blazing within a ring of rocks. She was safe. Pouring out. Held together.

Jamie. Her Jamie.

“You can release the ladder now, Cat.”

But she didn’t let go. It was too long since she’d last been touched. Not the purposeful touch of her lady’s maid, or the quick buss on the cheek from a friend. But touched by a man. Touched so that the hairs on the back of her neck stood on end as they were now.

He shifted his hands and spread his fingers wide, almost brushed the underside of her breasts. Her sharp inhale was loud in the silent room.

She opened her hand and let go, let herself fall back into him. Jamie slowly lowered her to the floor.

When he did not immediately release her, she stepped to the side. She did not want to give him this power over her. Not again. She dropped her skirts and squared her shoulders before she turned.

Attraction hummed between them, infinitely louder and hungrier than the honeybees. Jamie made no attempt to hide his arousal. His blue eyes were molten, his lids heavy. She struggled to hold his gaze before he let it slip down to her lips.

He was going to kiss her.

Cat stepped back and banged into the ladder. “Whatever are you doing in the village?”

His lips lifted into that dratted half smile. “Whatever are you doing, climbing a ladder?”

She slid to the side, needing more space from him. “Measuring for drapes. You?”

“Come to find you.” His eyes followed her escape. “You seem intent on avoiding me.”

Avoiding him? Cat opened her mouth to deny his accusation, but, in truth, she had been doing exactly that. Taking meals in her chamber, detouring around the rooms he seemed to frequent, and spending more and more time in the village.

It pleased her that he noticed this. She looked down and shook out her skirts so he would not see the flush heating her face.

“Why are you measuring for drapes?” Jamie collected her tape from the floor and handed it to her, then looked out onto the street. “And why is Abbey Lane overrun with workmen?”

His back was to her, so she allowed herself time to reply. She didn’t know how much she could trust Jamie with her plans for the village. Not that she thought he would object. Just…she didn’t want to be vulnerable to him. Not in the least.

“You have decided to renovate the village?” Shadows played beneath the hard angles of his face as he turned toward her.

“Yes.”

“Because it was…looking shabby?”

She drew back. “Do you think that would be my only concern?”

He glanced down at her legs. “You have always had an eye for pretty things.”

So he had seen the lace on her drawers.

Still, she was no longer the girl he knew her to be. It was true, in the past she might have worried about the cottages simply because they appeared disheveled. She would have renovated them to impress visitors approaching Forster Abbey. But that girl was gone. “You have been away a long time, Forster.”

His eyes searched her face. “It seems I have.”

Neither spoke for a wide stretch of time. At least not with words. Cat felt the subtle shift as her body reacquainted itself with his presence. As the skin knows the touch of sunshine, or the nose a familiar smell, so her form knew his. Blood, bones, muscle, even her heartbeat attuned to him. He was everywhere, within every part of her.

She did not like it.

“Where are the tenants?” His face was half light and half shadow as he stood before the window. “I thought the Thompsons inhabited this cottage.”

“They’ve moved to Nottingham.” How flattering that he could remember his tenants’ names, but not his simplest duty to his wife, such as a note to let her know he was still alive. “His sons needed employment.”

Jamie glanced at her from the corner of his eyes. Her skin prickled and her heart thumped. So dramatic, this reaction of her body to his body.

“I’d like to keep these cottages full with estate workers, as is tradition.”

Was he saying the families she had chosen were not welcome? For they did not include husbands and fathers. And she had a plan to employ the women and children outside of farming. “There simply isn’t enough work in the fields, not with the threshing machines.”

He tapped his fingers idly on the windowsill. “I am increasing the farming capacity of the estate and will soon be in a position to employ more men.”

Irritation pressed into her with insistent fists. If he had need for more homes, there were other empty cottages on the estate.

Indeed, Jamie acted as if he could come back after a five years’ absence and reclaim control of her world—her plans, her womb, her future. “How ambitious you are in your return, Lord Forster. So much plowing of new fields and increasing of crop yields.”

He slanted her a sharp look, his blue eyes intent on her.

I need an heir, Catherine.

Turning to face her, he leaned a shoulder against the window and took his time considering her. Considering the shape of her face, which she kept achingly impassive, then curve of her breast and waist where he had held her. He dragged his gaze back up to hers. “I’m a very ambitious man, Lady Forster.”

The sun beat through the window, but it did not rival the heat in her blood.

Desire. Its soft fingers threaded down her spine and ripened the flesh that would welcome his.

He shifted his weight onto one foot. They stood before the large window, visible to any villager or laborer who should look their way. She could not concern herself with their impression. Certainly it was well and clear what would be seen. There were bulls and mares in the field that considered each other thus.

It was not so rare a thing.

But neither was it without a subtle persuasion.

Jamie was already her husband. She knew the feel of him within her flesh, the pleasure he could give her. She knew what it was to gasp and tremble and ache and tumble over the precipice of desire together.

Lust was not an emotion that required forgiveness.

And lust did not keep a husband. Did not bind a father to his home.

She uprooted her feet and crossed the cottage, stopping only when she reached the door and the fresh air outside. She cast her husband as impartial a look as she could manage even as her limbs trembled and her blood screamed NOW.

“Do have a care, Forster. Untended fields have a predilection for thwarting a man’s designs.”

Chapter Four

THAT NIGHT, CAT EYED HER BED distastefully. It was a lovely contraption, covered in lavender silk shot through with silver. But it seemed torturous to consider another night spent tossing and turning within its confines.

She glared at the door connecting her room with Jamie’s. Twice now, she’d thought she heard his footsteps crossing toward the door. Twice now, she’d waited in trembling anticipation for…nothing.

A big, bewildering, disappointing nothing.

She would never be able to sleep.

Not after she had felt his hands on her earlier that day. Not after he’d almost kissed her. And certainly not after the naughty thoughts that had punctuated her evening.

Cat tightened her dressing robe. Really, she ought to just knock on the door herself. She and Jamie had much they needed to discuss. This business of him requiring an heir did not supersede the reason he had abandoned her in the first place.

They must settle this thing between them once and for all.

Cat marched across her room and rapped her knuckles on the door.

“Enter.” She couldn’t tell if Jamie sounded surprised. Could wood absorb such a thing?

She opened the door and stepped into her husband’s bedchamber.

Jamie was relaxed back on his bed dressed in nothing but loose trousers. Her gaze immediately landed on the tanned skin of his chest. Elegant, thick muscles rounded and corded across his shoulders and abdomen.

My goodness.

She couldn’t recall for a startling moment why she’d entered his room. Her eyes trailed downward, over his sculpted abdomen to the top of his trousers.

Jamie cleared his throat. “Good evening, Cat.”

She blinked, trying to clear the hard, lean sight of him from her mind. But she tumbled through memories. The hot silk of his skin. The tang of salt as she pressed her tongue to his muscle. The way he filled her, rode her, pleasured her.

Jamie’s chest expanded on a long inhalation. Cat’s body followed.

She dragged her gaze up all that hard beauty into his eyes. “What are you planning to do, Jamie?”

He lifted his brows. “Planning to do?”

“Are you going to visit my rooms?”

His mouth curved up at the edges. “I’d thought to give you some time. If you are ready now—”

She stepped back. “And what then? Will you stay here at Forster Abbey, or will you leave again?” She did not like the nervousness in her voice.

The bed creaked as he pushed himself up and onto to his feet. His trousers fell low across his abdomen, revealing curious dips and hollows. “This could not wait for morning?”

“No.” No, this could not wait for morning. She could not wait.

Jamie scrubbed his hand through his dark hair, leaving it standing on end. “The answer is yes, I plan to stay at Forster Abbey.”

Cat dipped her chin in a sharp nod. The creation of a child did not require love. It did not even require forgiveness. But a marriage did. And she did not want to bring an innocent baby into an unhappy family.

The ultimate question remained. Would he ever forgive her?

She looked up and met his eyes. Her palms began to sweat. “We need to talk about what happened.”

He scrubbed his hand through his hair again. “To what do you refer, exactly?”

“The affair. Or the non-affair, as it were. You do believe me, don’t you?”

“Yes, I believe you. I always did.”

Cat felt her shoulders drop. Thank God he understood. As well he should have. He had known for weeks that Simpson was trying to seduce Lady Allysandra, not her. Indeed, Simpson was a notorious rake known for his conquests of tall brunettes. Cat was neither tall nor a brunette. She took a few tentative steps toward Jamie. “It was terrible luck that I was discovered with Sim—”

“It was not an act of luck, Cat.” Jamie leaned one shoulder against his bedpost and crossed his arms.

She stopped her approach, rooted by his frustrated tone and the hard expression on his face. He was still angry, even these five years later.

Tight lines bracketed his mouth. “You went out onto the balcony willingly and on purpose.”

Yes, to warn her friend, stubborn man. “She was engaged to a duke.”

“She was a bloody fool.” And so were you. He did not say the words, but they hung in the air regardless.

“Everything happened so quickly.” What a nightmare that evening had been. Cat had never intended for people to believe she was the one having the affair. “I was just trying to protect Ally. She would have been absolutely ruined.”

“And what about me, dear wife?” Jamie’s voice was quiet and barely stirred the air in the room. “Were you so worried what others would think of me?”

Truthfully, she hadn’t been thinking of him. She’d been thinking of her exciting friendship with a soon-to-be-duchess. She’d been thinking of flirtations and intrigues and the entertainment of her first London Season. Not her new husband. She looked down at the floor.

He sighed. “Are we really going to argue about this now? I am ready for bed.”

“I hadn’t thought to argue.” Tightness banded her chest. “I thought perhaps if we talked about it…”

She had hoped that he might come to forgive her. That they might press on into the future together.

It was a silly hope, she knew this. She had known this for years. She straightened her shoulders against the sadness that wanted to curl inward. She would move on without him. She already had.

“You must understand that your actions had simple consequences.” His blue eyes were fierce on her, unrelenting. “I could not stay in London and be thought a cuckold.”

“Could not or would not?”

“I was angry with you. I’d warned you against your friendship with Lady Allysandra. You would not listen to me.”

“You lectured me. As you always did.” The old impatience colored her voice. Even as Jamie had courted her those many years ago, even as they had flirted and played and fallen in love, he had treated her like a younger neighbor. She’d been the innocent girl in need of guidance, and he the worldly man who would provide it.

His shook his head, as if denying her memories. “I allowed you to be free with your actions, Cat. You wanted a Season and I humored you. I watched you dance and flirt with other men, even after we were wed.”

Her breath caught in her throat. Shame, anger, embarrassment, she could not tell what she felt. Did not care to examine it. She inhaled sharply. “You talk as if I was loose—”

“I just wanted you for myself! Good Lord, Cat, I waited for two years to marry you. I know it was not your doing, with your father putting off your first Season, then your aunt falling ill. But I waited, and—” He looked down at his hand, flexed and unflexed his fingers in a tight fist. When he looked up again, his eyes were sad. “Honestly, Cat, I gave you everything. I don’t know what more you could want from me.”

“I am sorry, Jamie. I am a thousand times sorry for my actions that night. But I cannot undo the past.” She could not look at him, her handsome, half-dressed husband. The man she had won and lost. She scanned the room and her gaze landed upon the new objects on his bookshelf. Some kind of mask and an odd statue. “You have been all over the world while I’ve been here, atoning for my mistake. Still, it is not enough.”

He said nothing.

“I cannot continue like this, Jamie.” Her words sounded hollow, empty. Fitting, for that was how she felt.

“What are you saying?”

Cat adjusted the sash on her dressing robe. Pulled herself together. She would once and for all close the door on this man who had broken her heart. “I’m saying I cannot give you an heir, not with such animosity between us. In fact, I think we should apply for an annulment.”

“WHAT?” JAMIE STIFFENED. Certainly he’d misheard.

“I think we should apply for an annulment,” his wife repeated. “You would be free to marry and beget your heir with someone else.”

She was mad. Madness dressed in provocative green silk.

“We cannot get an annulment, Cat. I am not impotent. You are not a virgin.” The words tasted like ash in his mouth.

“I might as well be.” She had fire to her now. She dropped her arms and lifted her chin. “I’ve hardly experienced the marital bed. And that was years ago.”

“They would have to examine me.” Jamie tried to loosen his jaw. “I would have to prove that I cannot raise my victory flag.”

She arched an impertinent brow. “That shouldn’t be hard.”

“Oh, it gets hard, all right. You, of all people, should know.”

“Should I?”

“You talk as if you’ve forgotten.”

“What was there to forget? A few nights, that was all.”

He launched two steps toward her. “I don’t believe you.”

She straightened at his approach, all haughty pride. “Don’t believe what? That you could be so easy to forget?”

He closed the rest of the distance between them, his blood a fire of anger and desire. And possession. He would never give her up. “You are my wife.”

“Barely. I am not the same woman you once knew. And you are not the same man.”

“I am not so different, Cat.” He was shockingly the same, in fact. His travels had changed him around the edges, but the core of him had solidified. Like he had stepped completely into his own skin.

“I do not know, Forster. I find I do not know you at all.” Her eyes trailed over his chest, then flicked away. There was desire in her gaze. She could not hide it.

“You’ve known me practically my entire life.”

She wouldn’t look at him. He took her shoulders and turned her around so she faced the large mirror on his bedroom wall. He swept her hair to the side and stood close behind her. She was lightness to his darkness. Delicacy to his heft and bone. She was perfect.

“See there? That is us. You and me. Cat and Jamie.”

She shook her head and tried to struggle out of his arms. “You do not even know me—”

He held onto her. “I have not forgotten anything about you.”

Her gaze snapped to his in the mirror. The wildness in her blue eyes slammed into him. His Cat. His wife. His lover.

Everything pulsed through him, hard. The ache and the fire and the madness he had carried for years. It pulsed through his blood and became a buzzing in his ears.

He dipped his head and nuzzled the sensitive skin at the back of her neck. Her spine arched helplessly against his mouth as he knew it would.

She smelled of roses, and warm skin, and woman. And she felt so damn good in his arms.

“You have not forgotten me, either.” Her skin was hot beneath his mouth. She shivered as he trailed kisses beneath her ear, then caught the sensitive lobe between his teeth.

God, he had missed her. He was a fool to have stayed away so long.

He lowered both his hands to cup her breasts and brushed his thumbs across her nipples. She dropped her head back against his shoulder, the sound of her breath heavy in the room.

She wanted him. He would not let her pretend that she didn’t.

He molded and shaped the heavy weight of her breasts until he felt her legs threaten to give way beneath her.

He caught her nipples and gently squeezed as he kissed the soft skin of her throat.

“Jamie,” she cried out, pressing back against him, seeking more contact.

Blood roared in his ears. He had loved this woman, had given her everything—his heart, his name, his future—and she’d made him look a fool.

Not just look a fool, but also feel a fool.

Yet he did not want to let her go.

“You’ll not get me to sign an annulment.” He turned her in his arms and claimed her mouth. Their first kiss in five years. She was soft and open and tasted of home. Of the very texture of his soul.

She was everywhere. In his breath. In his blood. She always had been and always would be.

Cat pressed her belly against the hard length of his cock. His hands found the hem of her robe and night rail, then the moist, wanting place between her legs. She shuddered in his arms, ready for him. Ready for more.

He backed her toward the bed. He would take her once, fierce. It could not be helped. Then he would pleasure her. He would remember every inch of her skin.

She froze in his arms. “No.”

A growl rose in his throat.

“I do not want this.” She panted for breath.

He clenched his jaw before speaking again. “You have about three seconds to get back into your room and lock the door before I’m coming after you.”

Her eyes widened as if she recognized the truth in his words. Her robe billowed out behind her as she fled.

Chapter Five

JAMIE DUG HIS SHOVEL deep in the earth and heaved a heavy clump of mud to the side. The strain on his muscles felt wonderful after the frustration of the night before.

Pent up as a rutting bull in a pen, that was he.

With a great shove, he buried the blade again. The mud made a sucking sound as he hauled out another load. The earth didn’t want to give up. Jamie knew how that felt, the stubbornness of clinging to muck and mire. He had let himself remain angry at Cat for five years now.

Holding a grudge was exhausting work. Maybe Cat was right, maybe it was past time he let it go.

With a sigh, he dredged out another clump of muck and threw it onto the growing pile.

He’d spent so many years reviewing the reasons he had to be angry with his wife—and they were good reasons—that he’d not even considered the possibility of forgiveness. He was like a ship sailing on one course for so long, he’d forgotten how to tack. An entire world waited on the other side of the horizon if he just dared to move the rudder.

Certainly, he’d wanted to set his course in Cat’s direction last night. Good Lord, but she was all temptation wrapped in soft silk, her hair down and golden in the firelight.

Annulment, his arse. He wasn’t letting Cat go.

“It will take a right mount o’tile to drain the field, milord.”

Dragging his thoughts back to the damp morning, Jamie glanced over at his land steward, Mr. Bourne. The man was short, with a brimmed cap and boots that went over his knees. He was half covered in mud.

Jamie leaned against the handle of his shovel. “Then we will fire more tile.” It seemed so simple, his plan to turn this swampland into arable fields. Change felt not only possible, but nearly guaranteed of success. What if his marriage could follow the same path? “Let’s lay the first tile, shall we? I’d like to test our theory.”

“Robert and I can do it, sir.” Mr. Bourne looked over his shoulder to where his boy waited with the horse and wagon. Three tiles were stacked within. “It’s a tricky thing.”

Jamie didn’t argue. The land steward had struggled enough that morning, watching the Marquess of Forster dig in the mud. He stepped back from the hole he’d dug and let the man and his boy take over.

Next harvest, this field could be waist high with wheat.

And what of him? Could he leave behind his muddy past and turn to the future? He certainly wanted to. Needed to, if he wanted to be fair to Cat. She was right; he should set her free if he couldn’t learn to forgive her. Lingering resentment was no life for her, for him, for their family.

He sighed and looked over the fields. Late morning mist rose above the muddy acres and tangled in the trees. Birds chattered and argued and sang for the pure joy of singing. It was an undeniably British scene.

Like a breath of wind that blows over the meadow and finds the exposed places on one’s skin, it caught up to him, all in a rush.

He loved this land. He loved the roll of the hills to the west. The meadowlarks in the fields. Even the fish in the pond. These were his creatures. Not by some sense of entitlement or ownership, but by history. By the love engendered by a youth spent out of doors exploring these green miles.

He had watched the sun rise over the snow of the Alps, blaze across the shining expanse of the desert, and set through the thick canopy of the jungle. But the beauty had not stirred his heart, not like this.

This was his home. His soil. He was born of this earth and would be buried within it.

A rider at the far edge of the field caught his attention. Cat, riding alone, regal as a queen. He was ridiculously glad to see her. Lifting a muddy hand, he waved. A wide arc of his arm that she couldn’t fail to see.

She was part of his home, too.

But she did not stop. Just rode on ahead in the direction of the village. Still avoiding him, then.

All at once, he wanted to see her. To try to change. To try to forgive her and move toward their future together.

“Can you finish up here?” he called to Mr. Bourne. He’d need to hurry to the house to dress in clean clothes first.

“Of course, sir.”

Jamie smiled into the morning, and went after his wife.

CAT KEPT HER GAZE AHEAD and pretended not to see her husband. It was a bit ridiculous, considering how he waved and waved as if calling in a ship from sea. But she hardly wished to speak with him this morning. She felt entirely too…unsettled by his return. Vulnerable.

Last night had been a wild challenge. Her desire for him was a force she could not control. Did not wish to control, truth be told.

But she needed to keep her distance from him until she felt more certain of her future. She was not surprised he had declined an annulment—that had been a rather far-fetched idea. But neither did she wish to be the womb he required.

In truth, the idea terrified her.

For now, she would focus on what was hers to control. She would put her attention on her village project.

She turned her mount onto the wagon path, and from there entered Abbey Lane.

Mayhem awaited her.

Or, more correctly, a number of the families awaited her by the cottages. Mrs. Harthorn was trying to keep her young boys out of the flower gardens while another gaggle of children played tag in the street. The women clustered around each other chatting.

They all stopped and waved as she approached.

“It looks wonderful, Lady Forster.”

“I cannot believe me eyes.”

“Are you sure you want to let us live here?”

Cat halted her horse and slid onto the mounting block, then stepped down to the earth. She smiled at the small crowd. Truly, she was as grateful to them as they were to her. They had saved her from a life of uselessness. A future of idle nothingness.

Looking around at their hopeful faces, her joy was a tangible thing, taking wing in her heart. “I cannot wait to show you everything. What an adventure we shall have together.”

She tethered her horse in the shade, then peeked into the empty carts on the side of the road. The vehicles had collected the families at their temporary lodgings in Nottingham that morning and would return them later that afternoon. Finally, Cat found what she wanted—the bushel of apples she had requested.

“But first, come here, children,” she called. “Who is my apple monster today?”

The brood of straggly, patchwork children surrounded her. They looked hardly better than street urchins. They were clean, however. And smiling.

Cat handed the basket to an older girl, who dispersed the apples to anxious fingers. “Let’s start in the gardens while you eat, shall we?”

She led the noisy group around back of the cottages to a series of gardens. “We have vegetable gardens and herb gardens already planted. I am told the carrots, cabbage, onions and—” she waved her hand at the other mysterious green plants “—a variety of vegetables will be ready for harvest this fall.”

The women ooh-ed and aah-ed. Cat felt wonderful, knowing these families would no longer be hungry. They would be independent, in control of their future happiness beyond the whims of men. They would not be thrown off course by—

A tall figure rounded the side of the Warners’ cottage.

Jamie.

Her belly flipped with nerves as he approached. She could not anticipate how he would react to her project. She’d purposefully kept the details from his estate manager. This was her domain, funded by her pin money. Yet, the cottages were Jamie’s, or at least belonged to the estate.

His easy smile did little to soothe her agitation. If anything, it kicked up her heartbeat. She tried not to notice how his riding breeches hugged his long legs, or how his jacket molded to his wide shoulders. She’d always known he was handsome; it was silly that the fact should steal her breath now.

The women noticed her distraction and turned toward the marquess. They greeted him with curtseys and murmured words to their children to bow.

Jamie smiled his lopsided smile into the crowd.

“My husband, the Marquess of Forster.” Did she sound breathless? She felt rather breathless.

“Please, don’t let me interrupt.” He waved a hand.

Taking him at his word, Cat straightened her shoulders and plowed on ahead. “We’ve also a barn for milking cows and goats, and pens for chickens. If you would please follow me.”

The women twittered behind her as they filed down the path.

“So handsome,”someone whispered.

“Dashing,”said another.

Cat could feel Jamie’s eyes on her as she led the way toward a newly built barn. He was not going to like the surprises on the tour. She turned to face the crowd, her chin lifted to hide her nervousness. “The animals will be delivered once you are all in residence and can see to their care. To our right”—she pointed in that direction—“is the new lace factory.”

This was it, the moment Jamie would interrupt. She steeled herself and met his gaze.

But he said nothing, simply raised a brow. Lace factory? He did not need words to convey his surprise.

Marquesses did not have factories on their estates. And, if they must, they would support an iron furnace for a local mine or some other such industry. Not a lace factory.

Jamie strolled forward, his hands clasped behind his back, and poked his head into the small building.

Cat felt a tug on her skirts and looked downward. One of the young children, he couldn’t have been more than seven, stood at her side. “Ma tells me I don’t ever have to go back to the workhouse.”

“That’s right.” Cat smiled at the boy and put her hand on his head.

He beamed up at her.

“You will help your mother here, at the factory, but you will also go to school.”

“School.” He screwed up his face. “Aww.”

Again, Cat looked up at Jamie to gauge his reaction. He had disappeared within the factory. She could see the outline of his form through the windows. Ah, well, she couldn’t worry about him now. “Are you ready to see your cottages?” she called to the crowd.

“Yes!” the children cried.

“Follow me. Warner family.” Cat looked over her shoulder. “You are first here in the yellow cottage.”

JAMIE ENTERED THE COTTAGE at the back of the crowd and found his wife standing in the kitchen. She flicked her gaze to him, then over his shoulder. She was dressed right out of a fashion plate, as always. Soft wool fell in perfect lines, while lace framed her collar and cuffs. She was more of a delectable than a sturdy country miss. Jamie liked this about her. He liked it very much.

But he didn’t like the surprises that had awaited him. He supposed he could grow accustomed to the idea of a lace factory on his estate, but he should have been apprised of Cat’s plans earlier. He’d been home nearly a week, had visited the village more than once. His wife had possessed plenty of opportunities to make him aware of the extent of her project. Again she was taking matters into her own hands, making decisions without considering the effect they would have on his life and reputation.

The old irritation itched across his skin. Having a wife was harder than he’d ever anticipated. Especially a wife who did things her own way.

He relaxed a shoulder against the wall and took a deep breath. He was here to make amends with Cat, not begin a new quarrel.

The crowd was noisy and filled the cottage. A gaggle of women and children with a distinct lack of men. In fact, there wasn’t a single male over the age of twelve or so.

What else was Cat not telling him about her project? And why didn’t his estate manager know what was going on? The man had simply said that her ladyship was renovating the cottages.

Over an hour passed before Jamie could talk to his cunning wife. He spent the time inspecting the renovations. Cat had seen to everything, including refurbishing the chimneys for safety and repairing the roofs. The cottages were in near perfect condition. He had to admit, he was impressed. And he could not blame the families for their excitement. These inviting homes would be theirs in just a week’s time.

Finally, the crowd departed in a parade of carts and he cornered Cat by the fireplace. “Where are the men?”

She threw him a look. “There are none.”

“None?”

“I’ve offered the cottages to widows and their children.”

“I see.” He kept his tone neutral. Truly, he did not particularly care if there were men living in these homes. There was another group of cottages, farther from the village but closer to the fields, which were also empty should he employ more laborers. He simply wished Cat had explained this to him privately. “Why did you not tell me of your plans?”

“When would I have done that?” Irritation flashed in her blue eyes. “I didn’t know where to find you.”

“I don’t wish—”

“I’ll not let you stand in my way, Jamie.”

He held up his hands. “I didn’t say—”

“These families have nowhere else to go. Take this cottage, for example. Mrs. Warner was reduced to stealing silk handkerchiefs to feed her children and landed in gaol. They are free now and need a new chance.”

“But—”

“You cannot come home after five years’ absence and think to take back control of everything.”

Jamie raised a brow. It was not like Cat to interrupt. Why was she so upset? He’d hardly threatened to end her project. In fact, now that he’d reflected on it, he thought her rather clever. She was wise to offer these families a means of work. And she’d inspired him with her improvements. He would see all the estate cottages refurbished for safety, especially the chimneys. It didn’t take much to start a fire raging through the village.

A part of him felt proud of her. And a tad guilty. The Cat he had known was more interested in the latest fashions than charity work. He could only assume it was loneliness that had prompted her to do so much for others.

He simply wished she had told him first.

“I’ve not come to argue, Cat. I have no quarrel with your project. I think allowing these families a new start is a wonderful idea.”

Relief crossed her face.

“In fact, I finally conjured an apology for you.” He smiled, hoping to set her at ease.

She held his gaze, taking time to consider her reply. “I suppose I could hear you out.”

Jamie cleared his throat. Much depended on this conversation, and he found himself oddly anxious. “Let’s ride first.”

Chapter Six

CAT FOLLOWED HER HUSBAND out of the village and onto the small lane. Regardless of the gray clouds overhead and mist clinging to the trees, the day felt warm and bright. She had worked hard, had made something beautiful in the village. She had brought a future to those who would not otherwise have one.

To top it off, her husband was going to apologize. Finally.

Her contentment abated step by step as she realized where Jamie was taking her. She knew this path through the flooded western field. It led to the hidden glen where they once used to meet. Flushed with excitement, giddy with first love, they had sneaked away to the glen to touch, to gossip, to dream. Those days seemed so long ago, the idyll of youth, the glory of ignorance.

How innocent they had been. How foolishly hopeful.

Jamie led the way onto the narrow path through the trees, then pulled his mount to a stop in the small meadow. Memories whipped at her like the gusts of wind trapped in the narrow valley. Cat briefly glanced around before studying her hands. She did not want to be here. She looked up to tell Jamie she wanted to talk somewhere else. Anywhere else. But he was there at her side, and his hands were on her waist, lifting her down.

She was suspended in the air for a breathless moment. His blue gaze caught hers. Something took flight in her chest, beating its impossible wings. Something that held the soaring, reaching quality of hope.

Disoriented, she placed her hands on Jamie’s shoulders. He lowered her slowly, a kind of embrace. Her feet touched the earth, but he did not remove his hands from her waist.

She did not step away, as she had that startling moment at the ladder. Was that only yesterday? Time bounced in dizzying circles. Age seventeen felt closer than the week prior.

She should maintain distance from the man who had dashed her soul against the rocks of heartbreak. She knew she should. Her heart thumped with insistence about this.

But she didn’t want to. Hope was a ridiculous thing.

“Do you remember our spot?” Light shone in Jamie’s blue eyes.

Cat bit back a smile and shook her head at him. “Of course I do. I am surprised you remember.”

“I am not so forgetful as that.” He did not take his gaze from hers as he trailed his hands up her sides. He explored the shape of her waist, her ribs, nearly touched the sides of her breasts.

She shivered everywhere, a leaf on a tree trembling in the wind.

No. She stepped back. No, she was not some small thing to be blown this way or that by the whims of her husband. She was solid. She was the tree itself. She was not dangling in the air, ready to fall with the change of the weather. She had sent her roots deep into the earth.

“You said something about an apology?” she asked.

He did not react to the harshness in her tone. His lips spread into a smile. “Patience, dear Catherine.”

A twig snapped beneath his boot as he closed the space she had taken. She could feel the heat of him. Five years was an ache to a body that knew what it was missing.

He leaned forward, but paused, his lips inches from hers. “Might I kiss you?”

He was going to make her answer.

She opened her mouth to say no, but he placed one finger over her lips.

“I want to kiss you, Cat.” His voice rumbled from deep in his chest, unguarded and unhurried. “More than anything. Please.”

She would make her own fate. She lifted her heels, arched onto her toes. The edge of his mouth was soft and warm beneath her lips. He smelled of earth, and spice, and the musk of man. Desire burned through her, left her raw and full of want.

With a smooth glide, she slid her lips across his, a tease of a kiss. She was tempted to part her lips, to take more, to finish what they had started last night.

Before she could act on that impulse, she dropped back to the earth and stepped away.

His eyes were hot on her, his cheeks hollow with hunger. He looked like he would protest, as would any starving man. But he took a large breath instead. Fed his hunger with the sighs of the green plants around them, or the whisper of memory, or some other thing she could not fathom.

He took her hand and twined his fingers around hers, as he used to do. Then he pulled her deeper into the glen, to the large oak tree at the far side. Some years earlier, he’d carved both their initials—JM + CC—in the rough bark of the trunk.

They stood together, hand in hand, solemnly facing the old tree as if the oak were the vicar reading their wedding vows. The leaves shook and rustled overhead.

“What a mess we made of things,” he murmured.

“Yes.” Jamie’s hand had shaken that morning at the altar. Now, it was steady in hers.

“We lost something we didn’t even know how to value.” He slanted her a glance from the corner of his eyes, slung his next words straight at her heart. “I truly did love you.”

Her chin jerked down in a nod and sorrow grabbed hold of her, twisted her features into the useless, ugly face of regret. Letting go of his hand, she bent and tugged at a stem of purple mallow.

The flower stalk left a trail of green on her riding gloves. She pulled off her gloves and dug her bare hands into the yellow hawkbit hiding in the thick autumn grass. A few leaves, tinged with brown, had already fallen. “I loved you too, Jamie.” She spoke the words to the earth, to the leaves.

“We talk about the past.” His voice was solid and without embarrassment. It drew her eyes up to where he leaned against the oak tree.

“Five years is in the past.”

“Do you think it is lost?” He did not ask if she still loved him. She was glad for that, for she feared the answer, and the vulnerability it would bring to her heart.

“Some part of it is lost, yes. We can never go back to being the same people.”

“But we are the same people.” The edges of his lips tilted up. “I thought we established that last night.”

Cat didn’t reply. She sat on the grass and gathered more flowers, then braided the yellow hawkbit and purple mallow together. One bit twisted around the other until they were solidly bound. Together, the flowers made an entirely new creation. She ought to make a wreath for her hair, something pretty and cheerful. “After you left, I would come here to cry.”

Jamie’s boots appeared by the hem of her skirts. When he dropped to her side, she let him haul her into his arms. “I feel terrible that I ever hurt you like that, Cat.”

Cat closed her eyes and felt the warmth of his body, the living energy thrumming beneath his skin. She had missed this man. Had mourned his absence. “I know I hurt you as well. I have regretted my actions terribly. But I did apologize at once.” His hand lay on her leg, by her knee. He had removed his gloves and his fingers looked long and tan, colored by a foreign sun. “I feel like you chose every day to be away from me, Jamie. Every day you woke up and decided not to come home.”

“It wasn’t like that.” His sigh came from deep in his chest.

“What was it like, then?”

“Traveling wasn’t so much a choice as it was a habit. It just became what I did. I was always on the move to the next port, the next adventure. Once I was gone, it was simply easier to stay away. I didn’t know how to come back and face everything.”

A puny excuse if she’d ever heard one. As if drawn by a magnet, her anger centered on his hand, there by her knee. She leaned forward, ostensibly to reach a patch of mallow, but truly to remove his offensive, tanned appendage from her person. “Did you even think of me? Of what my life must be like?”

His hand slipped from her leg. “All the time.”

“Why did you never write?”

She could feel the shift of his body as he subtly drew away from her as well. “I did get reports on you.”

Reports? “So you sent your spies to watch me? What did they tell you?”

“That you seldom returned to London. That you were quiet.”

“Lonely.” She hadn’t had the heart to go back to London. Not after the scandal she’d caused.

“I never wanted you to be lonely.” Sadness marked his voice. He pulled her back against his chest. “I thought about you all the time.”

Cat started to push away from him again, but he stilled her motions with the band of his arm. “Please, let me hold you.”

With a sigh, she leaned back against him. He pulled off her riding hat and she rested her head on his chest. Still, she did not understand. “How could you have thought about me and yet not thought to return?”

“I don’t know how to explain. It’s not a this or that kind of thing.” Jamie leaned to the side. He took her chin in his hand and tilted her face up. “I apologize for being gone so long, Cat. I am full of shame that I did not write. From the depths of my being, I apologize.”

“Thank you.” Her voice was a bare whisper. She’d been waiting for this moment for years. Why, then, did it feel so empty? No, not empty. Aching. Raw.

“I want us to be married.” His eyes searched hers. Emotion bracketed the firm line of his mouth. “I would like the future we once dreamed of together. With children, and travel, and a long life together.”

“It’s not so simple.” She turned in his arms so she faced him.

“Why not?”

“I don’t know. It’s just…too much has happened between us. You hurt me terribly. We hurt each other terribly.”

“I’d like to put the past behind us. To perhaps start over.”

She looked at him a long time. “Start over?”

“Yes, like your families.” With a wide sweep of his arm he indicated the path back to the cottage. “I think we should both vow to forgive each other.”

“How?” She recognized the coldness around her heart. She did not know if she could ever forgive him.

“What’s done is done. In many ways, it is dead.”

“It is hardly dead,” she scoffed. “It is braided into our past. We don’t get to pick and choose which memories shape us more than others.”

“But neither should we dwell on the worst of them. There were plenty of happy moments as well, both before our wedding and after.”

He made it sound impossibly simple. “How am I to trust you not to hurt me again?”

His shoulders dropped with a heavy sigh. “I am not going to spend five years traveling the world again, Cat. I can promise you that.”

“But you could still leave me. You could go to London, or take a mistress, or retreat into the far corners of your mind.”

“I don’t want any of those things.”

“But what if you simply want to feel this way because it is more convenient? After all, you do require an heir.”

He tucked a strand of hair behind her ear and bent to whisper against her cheek. “I have wanted you since you were sixteen and came to my mother’s picnic, twirling your new parasol. You must believe that.”

He wanted her, but did he still love her?

She pushed the thought aside and considered the shaded notch in the forest. Green, green, everything inconceivably green. Living things bustled with the business of living, no matter that winter lay around the corner.

What was their secret? How did the earth sleep so soundly through the cold of winter and never fail to arrive fresh and hopeful the next spring?

Cat leaned forward and placed the flowered, braided wreath atop her head. She had to tell Jamie the entire truth, to make him understand.

She glanced at him from the corner of her eye. He watched her, waited. She cleared her throat, found only the simplest words. “I was with child.”

He froze. He was stone. He was ice. He was solid oak.

“A few weeks after you left, I discovered I was increasing.”

“My God, Cat.” The words were as much sigh as sound. “What… Why…?”

“It was not meant to be.” Her throat hurt. She could say no more, so she shrugged.

The green glen held its breath. Everything hushed around them. Pressure built in her chest. Cat undid the top button of her riding jacket. She took a deep breath.

This memory was not one that would just disappear. A baby had grown within her womb. A life had flourished. Had been lost.

“A child.” Jamie brushed his hand over his face. He appeared pale, stricken. “How did I not know this?”

How did he not know this? She wanted to laugh. He’d been gone.

“Why did no one inform me?” he pressed again. Something wild lit his eyes. She knew that feeling. The tangle of beauty and loss and confusion.

“It was early, and I did not make the news known.” She had feared word of the babe would bring Jamie home, when his wife could not. And in the next breath, she had feared even a child would not make him return.

He reached out to touch her. His hand hovered over her knee, then pulled back. “Was there pain?”

“Some.” The heartbreak had been worse. The feeling of being emptied out, the unnameable grief. Even now, tears prickled her eyes with their sharp thorns. She blinked them away.

“Do you think…? Could my absence have caused…” He cleared his throat.

“I was never ill. The doctor said I should have been ill, had the babe been healthy.”

She could only glance at him beneath her lashes. “I’ve never told anyone, Jamie. Not even my brother.”

There was so much shame wrapped up in that time. So much failure. Still, she could not understand why this had happened to her. What had she done to deserve such a sad fate? She told herself it was natural. She told herself many women experienced the same thing. But it only helped a bit. She had cherished that baby.

She had failed as a mother. Failed as a wife. Failed as everything she had been raised to be. Lost everything she had most hoped for.

THE TALL OAK SIGHED with the wind. Jamie stared at the play of shadows across the glen.

Cat had been with child. He’d almost been a father.

Joy and pain and disbelief knotted within him. So many years ago…the babe was long from this world, a distant memory to the ancient oak. But it was new to him.

He’d almost been a father and not even known it.

With a hard motion, he scrubbed a hand through his hair, felt the pull of his roots against his scalp. He did not know how he should feel. How did one manage such news? A baby. His child.

He dropped his hand, hammered a hard fist against the earth. Dammit, he should have been there. He never should have stayed away so long.

“I wish I had been there with you.” His voice was quiet. The same quiet one uses in a house of God. The hot knife of loss made his chest ache. Made his breath tight.

“Yes.” Cat said the word on a swallow, as if she could not hold it back.

She’d always wanted children. Had often talked of the large family they would have together. And she’d gone through the loss of the baby alone. “I am so sorry.”

She did not look at him. Simply removed the braided wreath from her hair and turned it in her hands.

He wanted to scoop her up. To carve out her sorrow and bear it himself. She had carried this burden alone for too long.

“Thank you for telling me.” He contented himself with pulling her back against his chest. He buried his face in her hair, smelled the hope of late-summer roses. “One thing I know to be certain, you deserve to be happy.”

He hoped he could be the man to make her happy. He’d done so once. Certainly he could do so again.

He would do his damndest to try.

Chapter Seven

LATER THAT AFTERNOON, Cat received a note from Jamie requesting the honor of her presence at dinner that evening. She took her time with bathing and dressing. Discarding gown after gown, she chose a dress she knew would delight her husband. Cut low off the shoulder, the elegant peacock blue silk shone against her pale skin while a satin sash emphasized her waist. Long earbobs of sparkling sapphires were her only adornment.

Something had changed between Jamie and her that afternoon. Something she did not expect. It was as if she had removed a corset and breathed deep, full breaths. She had not recognized the burden her secret pregnancy had been.

Turning this way and that, she checked her appearance in the long mirror. Excitement curled low in her belly, tingled up her spine. When was the last time she had dressed for a man? She had forgotten the naughty thrill of it.

Jamie waited for her. Jamie, who desired to have a future with her again.

Jamie, who wanted her in his bed.

Her hands shook as she pulled on her long white gloves. She was a fool to do this, to allow him back into her heart.

So true a fool is love.

She took a deep breath and went to meet her future.

He was standing in the drawing room, as handsome as ever. His dark hair was swept back from his forehead, his tanned face clean-shaven and relaxed as he considered a portrait of his mother. Soft shadows settled beneath the hard edges of his cheekbone and jaw, under the curl of his lower lip. A tumbler of amber liquid, brandy most likely, dangled from his fingers.

Turning at her footsteps, Jamie swept his gaze over her. His impossibly blue eyes met hers. He smiled and something hot pulsed through her blood. It felt true and easy, the smile she gave him in return.

Her husband put down his drink and crossed the room to bow over her hand, as courtly as any suitor. “I am humbled before your beauty, Lady Forster. You steal my thoughts like fine wine.”

“You flatter me, Lord Forster.”

He straightened, but did not let go of her hand. “No, I would like to flatter you, but I cannot recall the simplest bit of poetry.”

She warmed under his praise. “You just saw me this afternoon.”

“Not all of you.” His gaze landed on the full tops of her breasts where they pressed up against the tight bodice of her gown.

Men were too easy. But oh so enjoyable.

“Cat.” The sound of her name rumbled out from deep in his chest.

“Jamie.”

“I am going to take you to my bed tonight.”

A jolt of pleasure shot down to her feet and made her toes curl. “So certain of yourself, are you?”

He flicked his gaze up to hers and stepped forward. Touched her with the heat of his body, with the spicy scent of his shaving powder. “I will make you mine again, Cat. And I won’t let you go.”

Her breath caught in her throat, trapped by the heated look in his eyes. She did not doubt his intentions. But what did she want?

She wanted to be taken, to be ravished, to be made his.

She wanted sovereignty, independence, unequivocal control.

Cat tossed her head, placed her hand on the sharp angle of his jaw. “I am hungry, Jamie.”

His eyes flared at her words, then dropped into a sleepy, sultry look.

Yes. She would not forget her power over him. “Take me to dinner.”

He cleared his throat. Arched a dark brow. “Is that all you are hungry for?”

With a coy lift of her bare shoulder, she dropped her hand and turned away from him. “We shall see.”

Jamie caught her arm in his and led her into the dining room. Everything was aglow with candles, though the sun had not yet completely set. Her husband seated her by his side at the head of the table. This would be an intimate meal, then, without the length of the table between them as was customary.

She did not mind.

As he sat, Jamie’s coat strained across the shoulders. She did not mind this either. It gave him a rather virile air, as if he could not be contained by civility. She recalled the sight of his chest, unclothed and golden, the curve and heft of his muscle.

He must have noticed her looking, for he chuckled. “I suppose my attire is hopelessly out-of-date.”

She glanced up at him, into his smiling eyes.

“Might you consult with me if I send for a new wardrobe?” he asked.

“Of course.” She took a sip of wine and felt warm everywhere. “What of your valet? Surely he would have an opinion.”

“I haven’t had a valet for years. Frank, the head footman, has been dressing me since my return. I thought I might hire him on.”

No valet? Cat studied him more closely this time.

Jamie laughed again. “You appear shocked, dear wife.”

“Who dressed you if you had no valet?”

“I dressed myself.”

“And there were no mishaps?” Quietly, the footmen served the first course of white soup.

Jamie tilted his head playfully. “I would not say that, exactly. Though the worst of it was no fault of any valet. It was simply a great misunderstanding.”

Cat smiled. It was so easy between them tonight, as it used to be. “Do tell.”

“I was in the French West Indies, on an island called Martinique. It had been a long, windless sail from Morocco and I was impatient to stretch my sea legs. I went for a walk into the hills and stumbled upon a waterfall for bathing.”

“Bathing out of doors?”

He nodded. “Fresh water was a boon I never passed by. And this waterfall was beautiful, higher than the mast on our ship. The water fell into a pool rimmed with rocks and ferns. As I was completely alone, I quickly divested myself of my clothing and jumped into the pool.” He shook his head as he remembered. “It was heaven.”

Cat could picture Jamie, naked and tan and wet, surrounded by a tropical lagoon. Goodness, she would like to have seen that.

“I wish you had been there.” He winked. “I thought of you. What I would like to do to you.”

“Strangle me, you mean?”

He reached across the table and touched her cheek. “I never stopped desiring you, Cat.”

Her pulse leapt and tumbled. “Alas, I was here in Nottinghamshire.” Where you left me.

“I would take you anywhere you wished to go. If you want to see the world, I am your escort.”

“I like my comforts too much for exotic travel.”

“Then I will take you somewhere you will be treated like a queen.”

Two footmen entered and served their pheasant. Cat assumed Jamie had requested this dish, it being her favorite. The sauce had an unusual color to it. Jamie watched her taste it.

Her brows lifted with the spice on her tongue.

“I supplied Cook with a special curry powder.” He watched her take another bite. “Is it to your liking?”

“I have never tasted a flavor like it.” She swallowed another bite. “I find it quite invigorating.”

“Yes, it is that.” Jamie smiled at her.

Whether it was the spices, the wine, or the effect of his smile, she felt most languid and awake at once. An unusual combination. “You were in the lagoon…” she prompted.

“Yes. I swam around a bit, sunned myself on the rocks, and otherwise forgot about the world. Then I decided it was time to return to town and discovered I had a great problem. My clothes were nowhere to be found.”

“No.” Cat put her fork down.

“I am very serious. My boots were where I had left them, but my trousers and tunic were gone.”

She laughed at the image.

Jamie laughed too. “I did not know what to do. I could only assume someone had sneaked by while I was swimming and stolen my things. But I could not understand why they would leave my boots, which were worth far more than my linens.”

“What did you do?”

“What could I do? I pulled on my boots and went in search of my clothing.”

“Unclothed.”

“As the day I was born.”

More laughter bubbled through her and she covered her mouth with her hand.

Jamie shook his head. “Oh, it only gets worse. Here I am, sneaking about the foliage looking for whichever miscreant had stolen my clothes.” He chuckled. “I must, you can imagine, contain my modesty.”

He held up his palm and cupped his hand, demonstrating.

“It is a good thing you are not overlarge,” she teased.

He playfully narrowed his eyes at her. “I look forward to reminding you of the truth, dear wife.”

Cat smiled around a bite of pheasant, enjoying the unusual curry spice and savoring her husband’s warm regard.

“I could not return to the village,” he continued. “Not as I was. But with luck and perseverance I did find the pair of thieves. They lolled about in the shade and enjoyed their bounty.”

She lifted her brows. “Village children?”

He shook his head. “Goats.”

“Goats?”

“Yes, a pair of goats sat across a meadow, happily munching on my trousers and tunic.”

“But you got them back?”

“It was not so simple as that. I approached the guilty pair very stealthily, of course.”

“In all your naked glory.”

“Yes, well, my glory must have been enough to frighten them, for they quickly scampered away, my clothing locked in their mouths. I chased them and was led right into the center of their flock. The tricky pair hid within their own brothers and I could not tell them apart.”

“Sneaky goats.”

“I chased them all, determined to ferret out the two.” He stopped to eat his pheasant. “Not only did I scare the entire herd but the shepherdess as well.”

“Oh no.”

“Oh yes. The poor girl. I did not see her until the herd separated.” He made a parting motion with his hands, as if scattering the herd. “There she was, all youth and innocence.”

“And you unclothed.”

“Not just unclothed, but flailing about with my hands in the air and my, well, jewels exposed to all.” Jamie waved his hands about, mimicking the motion.

Cat pressed her linen napkin to her lips, trying to swallow her bite of pheasant. This was too funny.

“The shepherdess ran away, of course, and I almost had those tricky goats in my grasp when a gunshot exploded. Bam!”

She jumped.

“I covered myself with one hand and put the other in the air.” Again, he demonstrated with his hands, dropping one into his lap and lifting the other in a gesture of surrender. “Her father had come down, angry and armed.”

“What did you do?”

“He spoke only the thickest dialect. I could not make sense of him, and he certainly could not make sense of me. I was forced to use my hands to try to communicate and, well, you can picture that.” Jamie lifted his hand from his lap and held it in the air. “There wasn’t even a rock to stand behind. I tried to point to the guilty goats, but they had hidden themselves, clever pair that they were. I tried to explain to him about the goats taking my clothes.”

Jamie made the oddest motions with his hands, a kind of charade that was the most ridiculous thing she had ever seen. Her laughter was not to be stopped.

“That looks nothing like a goat taking clothing.”

“The father did not think so either. By this time his daughter and half the village had arrived to watch the scene. The farmer pointed toward his daughter and I shook my head and made clear ‘no’ signals with my hands.” Jamie crossed his hands like a sharp X. “I pointed to the goats instead.”

“Oh, Jamie.” Her smile ached now.

“Yes, not the best choice. The villagers collapsed into an uproar of hilarity, thinking I wanted to abuse the goats and not the shepherdess. The father only grew angrier. I thought for certain I would be shot.”

“How did you finally explain?”

“Finally a villager arrived who understood Parisian French and was able to translate to the farmer.” Jamie dropped his head into his hands. “The guilty goats were caught, but my clothes were completely ruined.”

“I hope they gave you something to wear.”

“Yes, I was the guest of honor after that. It was quite dark by the time I was returned to my lodging, dressed in clothing that was made for someone of a much smaller stature.”

She shook her head at him. “I do not know if I can believe such a ridiculous tale.”

“I wish it weren’t true.” Jamie shrugged, his blue eyes twinkling. “If only to save my pride.”

Taking a sip of wine, Cat considered her husband. Dark, handsome and smiling, he reminded her of the boy she had fallen in love with. But there was an edge to him now, a maturity that was thrilling and startling at once.

I need an heir, Catherine.

The question remained. Was she ready to welcome him to her bed?

Chapter Eight

HIS WIFE WENT BACK to her room. Alone.

Jamie stared at the connecting door between their chambers, wondering where he’d gone wrong. His embarrassing story had appeared to entertain her. He’d even savored an after-dinner glass of port as Cat played Mozart—his favorite—on the piano. Lacy underthings and soft skin happily danced through his imagination with each small smile she gave him.

Then he had simply stood there, a hopeful fool, as she bid him good night and went upstairs. That was not how he had planned for the evening to end.

Was he to follow? Leave her be? Beg? Insist?

He was flummoxed.

Randy and flummoxed.

He rubbed the back of his neck. A part of him wanted to go after Cat simply because he’d been thinking of touching her all day. Touching her legs, her full breasts, the soft, wet place between her thighs. He would take her on her back, on her knees, every way he could imagine.

But it was more than that. More than lust.

He wanted her back. All of her. Her smile, her excitement, her challenging pride. He wanted the past they had shared, and the years they had spent apart. He wanted to soothe her heart over the loss of their child.

If only he could make her love him again.

Bloody hell, but he was a fool to have stayed away so long. She had every right to slam the door in his face.

Gifts. He would bring her gifts.

He certainly had a lot of treasures to give her. Damn his awkward pride that had hidden the bounty beneath his bed.

He dragged his gaze from the connecting door and pulled the small trunk from beneath his bed frame.

Please, let this work.

His offering in his hands, Jamie knocked on Cat’s bedroom door.

And waited.

“Cat,” he murmured when she did not reply. “Let me in.”

Finally she opened the door a hand’s width and peered around the edge. She wore her green silk dressing robe, her hair brushed loose around her shoulders.

“I brought you something.” The rough tumble of his voice sounded nervous, unsure. He did not care.

“Oh.” She opened the door as wide as her shoulders and peered down at the wooden box in his hands.

He cleared his throat. He did not know what he would do if she refused him. Try again tomorrow. And the day after that. “Might I come in?”

Cat stepped aside and he entered her room, then put the trunk down on her bed. She stood next to him and stared at the box as if snakes might leap out.

He rubbed his sweaty palms together. “Open it.”

“What will I find inside?”

She was so adorable. “Open it.”

It took forever, but finally she released the clasp and lifted the lid. The smallest boxes lined the top.

Cat flicked her gaze up to him and opened the first box. It contained a pair of hair combs. Carved from mother-of-pearl, they were shaped like small butterflies.

“I bought those in Persia.” When he had seen them in the market, his only thought was of how they would look in her hair. Not of how angry he was with her. Not of gossip and shame. He should have known then to come home. “Remember the day we rode by Shepton’s maize fields? Butterflies flew across the crops like living flowers. We stopped for a while to watch. Later, you let me take the pins out of your hair. I think I said your hair was more beautiful than maize silk, or some other such horrid poetry. You laughed at me.”

“Yes, I remember.” Shadows played across Cat’s face as she dipped her chin and studied the combs. “They are beautiful, thank you.”

“There is more.”

Slowly, almost as if she was reluctant, she opened the next box.

“That is from India. She is Saraswati, the goddess of knowledge, art and song.” Cat glanced up at him and searched his face. He smiled, wanting to put her at ease. “She reminded me of you.”

“Are these all for me, Jamie?”

“Yes. Every one.” Her hand felt cool when he wrapped it within his. “I never forgot you, Cat. Not once.”

She obviously didn’t know what to say. She withdrew her hand from his and unwrapped the miniature music box. She wound it up and it played a tinkling tune.

“Switzerland,” he said. “We danced to this waltz together at our engagement ball.”

She pulled her lower lip into her mouth and bit it between her teeth. Was she upset? God, he hoped these gifts worked. Not to bribe her, just to make her understand. “Do you like them?”

“I don’t know how to feel.” She touched the small figurine of an archer, still wrapped in gauze. “I suppose a part of me is jealous that you had all these experiences alone.”

He ran his hand down her arm, stopping when the calluses on his palm snagged at the soft silk of her robe.

“Why did you buy these things?”

“Because I missed you. And I saw you everywhere. And I suppose I wanted to share a piece of my experience with you.” There were still several gifts in the trunk. “They are a poor substitute, I know. But I did not want you to think I forgot about you.”

She seemed to be listening. Hope spread through his chest.

“Like an imbecile, I thought if I just got enough distance, if I just found the perfect distraction, my anger would go away. I realize now that I was a fool. A self-centered, righteous fool. I wasn’t even really angry anymore. I should never have let it go on so long.”

Cat’s lips spread into a smile. A glorious smile. For him. “You said the words, not me.”

“We are in agreement.” He dared to reach for her. “I was a fool.”

He wrapped his arms around her and she turned her face up, welcoming him. “Kiss me, Jamie.”

CAT DIDN’T NEED to ask twice. Her husband lowered his lips to hers and she opened her mouth, tangled her tongue with his. He tasted of wine and desire and man.

She’d been a nervous mess when she left the drawing room earlier that evening. Wanting him. Not trusting herself for wanting him. Confused by all that had transpired over the last week. She’d fled to her room hoping he would follow and fearing it all the same.

Thank God he’d followed.

She lifted up onto her toes and pressed tighter against his chest. His skin held the same smell of spice and shaving powder. She drank it in. Her Jamie.

He’d thought of her. All those years, he’d never forgotten her. The trunk was still packed with gifts she had yet to open. Gifts from all over the world. Personal gifts that could only be for her.

She shifted until she felt his hardness against her belly and rubbed against him. He was thick and ready.

Immediately he pulled away and held her at arm’s length.

“Are you sure?” His eyes were smoky, heavy-lidded. “Tell me now if you want to stop.”

“I don’t want to stop.” Passion made her voice husky.

“Good.” He yanked the tie to her wrap and let it fall open, revealing the yellow night rail beneath. Made of nearly translucent cotton, it hid very little.

Truly, she had hoped he would knock on her door.

Now that he was here, she stood tall and let him drink her in with his eyes.

“You always did have exquisite taste in bedclothes.” It thrilled her, his growl.

Laughter bubbled through her as picked her up and half-fell, half-lowered her onto her bed.

“My wife.” Her skin quivered with his words and the hot brushes of his breath against her neck.

More. She needed more. Arching against him, she pressed her breasts into his chest. He lowered his mouth and captured the hard peaks of her nipples through the fabric of her gown.

Finally. Finally.

She dug her fingers into his hair. The pleasure he gave her, it raked across her skin, left her shaking.

Soft cotton slid across her legs. Jamie was pushing her gown up. She did not stop him, but pulled his mouth back to hers.

When his hands fumbled with the fall of his breeches, Cat caught her breath.

“Jamie,” she panted. “Wait.”

“I apologize.” He dropped his hand and laughed against her skin. “Thoughts of you have been making me crazy all day.”

“It’s all right.” Her voice quivered. Did he notice?

She would give him everything. But first, she was going to make him pay. Cat rolled her husband onto his back and kneeled at his side.

“Take your shirt off.”

“Your wish is my command.” He’d already removed his waistcoat and cravat before he came into her room. He quickly divested himself of his shirt and threw it to the floor.

She leaned down and licked the hard muscle of his chest. He tasted of salt, just like she remembered. She sat back on her heels. “Now your breeches.”

Her heart beating wildly in her chest, she held his hot gaze as he pulled off the last of his clothing. His member lay long and thick across his belly.

No doubt about it, she would taste him everywhere. “Lie down and cross your hands behind your head.”

He didn’t listen at all. His hand was back in her hair. “But I want to touch you.”

She pulled back from his touch and shook her head. “Up. Cross them. Behind your head.”

Her breath faltered as he did as commanded. He looked so delicious like this, the muscles of his chest and shoulders highly defined. Feeling saucy, she straddled his hips and pulled her night rail over her head. Her hair brushed down over her naked back.

His ragged groan filled her room. Cat pulsed low and hot between her legs. Her husband’s erection was hard against her buttocks. She could easily lift herself onto him.

But she would make him wait.

Feeling naughty and delicious and not the least bit protective of her heart, she ran her hands over her belly. “I touched myself after you disappeared.”

His smoky eyes widened, then dropped down to her hands. She slid her palms up to her breasts, drawing the heavy mounds together. “I liked this.” She brushed her nipples with her thumbs.

Jamie’s chest rose and fell with his rapid breath. “What else?”

Aching now, ready for touch, she lowered her hand between her legs to the secret place she sought at night.

“Yes.” A sheen of sweat glistened on his skin and, beneath her, his muscles tightened.

Cat tilted her hips forward so she could slide into her own hot depths.

“How does it feel?” He watched her hand.

“Wet. Soft.” Excitement sizzled through her. She dipped her finger inside, then worked the slick fluid around her tight bud.

The touch of her fingers sparked a thousand sensations. There was no loneliness tonight. Just shuddering breath. Fluid pleasure. And the erotic heat of Jamie’s eyes on her.

“Touch your breasts again,” he demanded.

Cat complied, drawing the fingernails of her free hand across her nipples. Her thighs clenched and her shoulders tensed. She was close to crisis already.

“I would think of you,” she panted. “I would remember what you did to me.”

“Tell me.”

“When you would kiss me here.” She rubbed her damp core in tight circles.

“Come here. Let me kiss you now.”

“Not yet.” She dropped her head back, enjoying the fierce heat of his gaze on her skin. She felt everywhere naughty, desired, voluptuous.

He had not forgotten her.

It was a quick tumble, her fall from the ledge of pleasure. Throbbing, undulating waves of euphoria washed up her spine, burst from her lips in a hot cry.

But she was hardly satisfied. She wanted him inside her.

She pressed up on her knees and at once Jamie’s hands were on her. “No,” she shook her head and her hair brushed across her bare shoulders. “Not yet. Hands behind your head.”

He groaned again, but complied.

Cat inched her way down the bed, keeping his legs between hers, until his erection stood before her. It was proud and hard and ready for her. She grasped it in her hand and he froze.

“Have mercy.”

Oh, she would. Just not yet. Cat moved her fist up and down as Jamie had instructed before they were married.

Tonight, she wanted more. She’d only used her mouth on him twice. He’d all but flown apart in her hands.

Leaning over, she took him, hot and smooth, between her lips and gave a gentle suck.

“Ungh.” He lifted his hips, trying to press deeper into her mouth. Cat smiled and took him as deep as she could, then drew back. She did it again and again, enjoying the heavy sounds of his pleasure filling her room. This room that had once felt so lonely.

When she felt his belly tensing beneath her, she pulled away. Sat back and looked at him.

“Is this punishment?” he panted. “Because if it is, I think I like it.”

Her smile was unbounded. “I want you to know exactly what you were giving up those five years.” Oddly, the words didn’t hurt as she said them. She was too full of want and power.

She crawled back up him so her knees were above his shoulders. “Make me feel good. Really good, Jamie. Then I just might let you have me.”

He grabbed her buttocks in his hands and pressed his mouth to her mound. Pleasure spiked through her, overwhelming and raw. She gritted her teeth and grasped the top of the headboard as he laved and licked with his lips and tongue, driving her past the point of passion to someplace bordering on madness. His fingers wandered and pressed. She had no name for what he was making her feel.

She was arching, shattering over the cliff when he grabbed her hips, moved her down so that he could thrust his cock into the quaking core of her.

He filled her everywhere. He fit her perfectly.

She sought the softness of his lips, the tang of his skin as he lifted and lowered her hips, meeting her in hot, thick thrusts that were still somehow not enough. He tasted of desire. Smelled of man. She couldn’t get enough.

“More,” she cried.

“More.”

Still thick inside her, he rolled her onto her back and pressed her legs against her chest. Again and again, he drove into her, filling her and filling her more than she thought possible.

The slap of flesh and the smell of passion overwhelmed her senses, drove her mindless. Jamie leaned down and captured her lips with his. With a long, deep thrust, he sent them both tumbling, together, into a wordless void where self and other no longer existed. Where there was only one.

Chapter Nine

CAT STIRRED AWAKE with the birds. The room was still dark, the thick curtains blocking out the morning sun, and she rolled over to find her husband.

But he was gone.

Her bed was empty.

She sat up and searched the darkened room.

He couldn’t have been gone long. She could still taste him, smell him. He must have gone downstairs to enjoy a plateful of breakfast. The man would certainly be ravenous after the previous night. He’d awoken her twice in the darkness, their bodies slick and panting for more.

Come to think of it, she was rather hungry herself.

Cat slipped from bed and opened the window sashes. The sky was dark and roiling. Rain was imminent.

After calling her maid, she quickly dressed and went downstairs to find her husband. She did not mind the threatening clouds, the morning was still full of hope and possibility. She and Jamie would start a new life together, build a future out of the ashes of their past.

Jamie was not in the morning room either.

The butler found her as she stared confusedly at the coddled eggs.

“His Lordship asked me to inform you that he will be gone for the day, but shall return by dinner tonight.”

“Of course.” She said the words as if she had known he would leave. As if she could push away her disappointment. He’d left no note—again. But at least he had left a message. And he would return that evening. She needn’t be a ninny about it.

It was silly to feel lonely, even as the hours ticked by and darkness fell. She ought to just put her husband from her mind and tend to the final preparations for the cottages.

But dinner came and passed and he still had not returned. Not for bedtime either. Not even when the clock struck midnight.

She simply needed to ignore the doubt niggling at her thoughts.

Naked and alone, Cat awaited Jamie in his bed. Somewhere around three in the morning, she stopped listening to the chime of the case clock in the hallway and fell into a restless sleep.

He did not return the next morning.

Where the hell was he?

Anger sizzling beneath her skin, she called for a quiet breakfast in her own rooms. So much for their hopeful future. She was a fool to think Jamie would put his pride aside and forgive her. He had told her all along what mattered to him—an heir. Not her.

He’d never said he loved her.

Outside her window, the wind chased the clouds across the sky. She had no idea where Jamie was, when he would return. Again.

She hated being this wife.

She hated being left behind. Ignorant. Powerless. Rambling alone about an empty estate with the thrilling, frightening possibility of being pregnant.

With each chime of the clock, her body closed inward. Closed like the petals of a flower curling at the unbearable touch of dark and cold.

BY THE AFTERNOON, Cat was done waiting. She’d taken herself to the library, hoping to distract herself with a book.

The unending quiet of the day was broken by the pattern of footsteps hurrying down the hallway. Cat looked up, her silly heart in her throat. Was Jamie so eager to see her he rushed down the corridor?

The butler scrambled into the room with uncharacteristic haste. Her heart plummeted to her toes. Something was terribly wrong. Something had happened to Jamie.

“My lady.” The butler was flushed and out of breath. “It’s the village”—again he wheezed—“the village is on fire.”

AFTER A FRANTIC FIFTEEN MINUTES of calling for her cloak, her carriage—never mind what gloves—Cat finally arrived in the village. Already, the fire blazed higher than the cottages.

Men crowded around the hose carts, working at a desperate pace. The thin streams of water seemed a paltry defense against the hungry beast eating through the village. Cat pressed a hand to her mouth.

Most of her cottages were ruined. Fire shot out of the windows, blackened the walls, tore through the new roofs they had painstakingly rebuilt.

Only the Warners’ home remained untouched by the blaze. All her other work. Gone.

Anger burned her from the inside. Where the hell was Jamie? Of all times, she needed him now.

She could not worry about it. She elbowed her way into the throng of men, stopping only when a wall of heat blasted her skin. What should she do? What could she do?

Villagers scurried by carrying buckets and axes and lengths of chain. It was chaos. She whirled around, not knowing where to start.

And then he was there. Appearing out of the smoke. Her husband. Her Jamie.

She shook everywhere. Relief and anger and concern poured through her at once.

He frowned when her saw her and immediately came her way. “Darling, you have to stay back.” A dark smear of soot slashed one cheek. Ash colored his hair and ruined his clothes.

“How much has been lost?” Fear sharpened her voice.

“I do not know, exactly. The blaze started in the baker’s chimney and is moving fast. I’ve not been here long.”

“You look a mess.” Her fingers trembled as they brushed the soot from his face. “What have you been doing, fighting the fire with your bare hands?”

He searched her eyes. “Your cottages…” He did not continue. There was nothing more to say.

Her heart squeezed in her chest. Jamie had been trying to save her cottages. He’d been fighting for her. And still, the homes were lost.

Cat waved her hand. A gesture that said nothing. Nothing about her heartbreak. Her gladness at seeing him. Her fear for the future. “At least the Warners’ home still stands.”

The wind shifted, smoke and ash choked the breath from her lungs. She raised a handkerchief before her nose and tried to breathe.

Men shouted and Jamie looked over his shoulder, then back at her. “The Warners’ cottage is all that remains between the fire and the rest of the village.”

Pricks of pain stung her eyes. “What are you saying?”

“We have two options. We can fight the fire as is, and hope for the best.” His face looked grim. The best was not going well so far. “Or we can pull down the Warners’ cottage. Create a firebreak.”

Pull it down?

What of the family, gaunt and haunted and desperate for a new future? Of the tidy home with lovely curtains and warm beds? “They have nothing else, Jamie. Can we not save the cottage?”

His eyes were serious beneath lowered brows. “I do not know. Perhaps. Fire is not predictable.”

Again, a gust of wind blew a thick cloud of smoke across the crowd. Cat mopped at the tears coursing down her cheeks.

“The decision is yours, darling. I will honor whatever you choose.”

Shouts lifted up, and men ran down the street.

It was a terrible scene.

A living nightmare.

And she had to choose. Ruin or ruin. There was no good option. “Do you think it will work?” she asked. “The firebreak?”

“We have no other ideas.”

Ideas were often in short supply during times of crisis. Cat knew this. Had lived it before. “Then do it. Pull down the Warners’ cottage.”

Jamie brushed the tears from her cheek. “I’m sorry, Cat.”

She straightened her spine. Now was not the time to mourn. “What can I do?”

“Stay back. For God’s sake, don’t go near the blaze.”

“But—”

“You must listen to me on this. I am not lecturing you. Your skirts could catch a spark and easily set to flame.” He grabbed her upper arms. “I’m sorry I was gone last night. The bridge was washed out and I couldn’t get back before today. Please, stay safe. For me.” He pulled her to him for a quick, hard kiss, then turned toward the angry blaze.

Cat couldn’t watch him go. She whirled away from him and the danger he faced. On the far side of the street, women and children huddled together and observed the men. She couldn’t help fight the fire, but she could help the villagers.

She grabbed a footman whose livery was ruined by soot. “Run up to the Abbey and tell them to fetch the doctor in Giltbrook, then to send any food and drink they can find to the village. I will be waiting for it.”

“Yes, my lady.” The boy hurried off.

“And salve and bandages,” she called after him. “For burns.”

It seemed a paltry thing, to worry about food and comfort now. But the men were exhausted and the children scared. And the women, the women silently endured it all, as they always had. The least she could do was offer the villagers strength for their bodies. And perhaps their spirits as well.

It seemed forever before the wagon arrived from the Abbey with refreshment. A farmer’s wife passed food to the women and children while Cat brought ale and bread to the men fighting the fire. They came to her blackened and sweating and exhausted, with minor burns on their hands and arms.

She watched the crowd for Jamie, listened for the sound of his voice. There was no sign of him. With each breath, she fought down her panic. Inhaled through the lump of fear that wanted to close her throat.

“The marquess?” she asked the men who stopped for a drink.

They shrugged, or pointed vaguely, or told her what she did not want to hear. “In the back. Where the flames are worse.”

Cat would not think on it. He had to be safe.

She loved him. With every part of her being, she loved him.

She could not lose him again.

Still the men came to her. They needed water. Bread. Bandages. She held herself together by sheer will and helped them.

By now, the fire had caught up to the Warners’ cottage, which lay in shambles on the ground. Flames licked across the ruins. Men scurried by with hoses and shovels, trying to protect the firebreak.

Somewhere, her husband was in the midst of it all.

A rumbling rolled through the crowd toward her, then an actual cheer. Cat stopped on shaky legs and peered down the street. At the far end of Abbey Lane, where her cottages lay in smoke and ash, appeared a horse and carriage. No, not a carriage, another hose cart. Jamie must have sent word to the baronet, their closest neighbor. The horses protested at being led toward the fire. Their harnesses jangled as they threw their heads and drew back from the smoke.

Five men rushed forward and freed the hose cart from the horses, then ran the cart down the street to the smoldering ruins of the Warners’ cottage.

Water. Glorious water poured over the flames, sputtering them out.

The village was saved. But everything Cat had worked for—the cottages, the lace factory, the barns—it was all destroyed. Burnt to a pile of ash and charred ground.

Chapter Ten

FIRE IS AN EQUITABLE FORCE. It clears away everything in its path, regardless of use or beauty.

Jamie’s shoulders sank with relief when the blaze was contained at last. God’s teeth, he’d seen the plumes of smoke from miles away. He thanked the men who had fought the fire, grateful there were no serious injuries, and went to find his wife.

By now, the unburnt half of the village was swarming with dazed, sooty faces. Everyone wanted to talk to him. He shook hands, murmured assurances, and answered what questions he could. Finally he spotted Cat by the village square. She stood beside a wagon, a line of villagers spread before her. Two men wandered away with slices of cheese and apples in hand.

She was feeding them.

She was safe.

Breath he did not know he was holding whooshed out of him. Her face was pale beneath the smudges of soot and ash. At some point, she’d removed her bonnet and her hair fell in tangles around her shoulders. The sleeve of her gown was ripped, her skirts in ruins. She looked exhausted. She looked beautiful.

She looked sad.

He headed straight for her, not stopping until his arms were around her. He did not care who witnessed their embrace. God, what if something had happened to her? He loved this woman. Was fair to bursting with it. “I am so damn proud of you, Cat. And so sorry about your cottages.” His voice was raw from emotion as much as smoke.

“Jamie.” She wrapped her arms around his shoulders and clung to him tightly. “Don’t you ever disappear again.”

“I won’t, love.” He buried his face in her hair. She smelled like smoke.

“You’re squeezing me,” she coughed.

“I want you close.”

“I waited all night for you.”

He might have thought she was angry, were she not pressing her face into his neck. “I apologize, darling. I had to go around the bridge in Polesworth and lost nearly twenty miles. It was an incredibly difficult journey.”

“Polesworth? Where did you go?” His shoulder muffled her voice.

“To get you a gift.”

At this, she pulled back and looked up at him. Her eyes were soft, surprised, but the corners of her lips dipped down.

He ran a finger down her cheek. “Why are you angry with me?”

“I don’t know,” she huffed.

Jamie didn’t want to stop touching her. “I’m sorry I was detained, Cat. I meant what I said.”

“You said you needed an heir.”

“No.” He pulled her back into his arms so she wouldn’t see his smile. “I mean, I said a lot more than that.”

“You said you liked my taste in bedclothes.”

He let out an exasperated laugh. What a saucy wife he had. He loved that about her.

He dropped his chin and glanced down at her. She kept her face buried in his neck.

“Look at me.” She must have heard the tenderness in his voice, for when she glanced up, no lines of anger marked her features. “Let me be clear. I love you, Cat. I always have. I want you as my wife. And I never want to be away from you again.”

CAT STARED UP INTO her husband’s blue eyes.

He’d said he loved her.

Or maybe the fire and smoke and shouting had damaged her ears. “Say it again.”

“I love you, Cat.”

Her heart leapt, and she began to tremble everywhere.

“I—” She stopped to catch her breath. Why was she so nervous? She placed her hand on his heart. Willed herself to be brave. She wanted to say this, needed to. “I never stopped loving you, Jamie.”

She did not know he could look like this, so soft and tender. She kissed him on his chest, where his shirt was open. “I suppose if something is worth doing once, husband, it is worth doing twice.”

“Yes.” He stroked her hair.

Cat looked up at him, this man she had loved for as long as she could remember. “We can rebuild.”

He tilted his head to the side. “The cottages?”

“Yes, the cottages.” Down the lane, smoke rose from the ruins of her homes. She’d put so much time and work and hope into those cottages. A part of her felt very nearly burnt to the ground with them. But another part of her, a stronger part, refused to give up. She would rebuild. The families could stay in the empty cabins on the western edge of the estate, closer to the fields. Jamie wouldn’t hire more laborers until spring, and by then her families would be settled in the village. In fact, the women and children could help with the restoration.

One setback, even a large one, was not cause for defeat.

When she glanced back at her husband, he was still watching, waiting. She took a deep breath. “And our marriage. We can rebuild our marriage.”

Relief softened his eyes. He lowered his head to kiss her, and she pressed up on her toes to meet him halfway. It was not an elegant embrace. Neither was it polite. But it was real. And raw. And full of love.

“I would like that,” he murmured against her lips.

“I am not saying it will be easy. And I am still frightened that you could hurt me again. But you are worth it.”

Jamie pressed his forehead to hers. “I regret my actions, Cat. I cannot change them. I cannot undo the hurt I caused you. But I promise I will learn from them. I want to be a better man, a better husband.”

“And I a better wife. We were both at fault. I should have put you first, that horrible night in London. I should have thought of you before my friend.”

“And I should have stayed and made amends.” This time, when he hugged her, he lifted her off her feet. “I never want to leave you again.”

“Especially not in a cold bed,” she grumbled.

He put her down and stepped away. “Wait here.”

Playfully, she planted her hands on her hips. “You just said you were never going to leave me.”

He threw her a smile over his shoulder. “I promise you will like it.”

Jamie disappeared into the crowd and returned wearing his riding coat. It was ridiculously clean where everything else about him was blackened and dusty.

He stopped before her and, to her surprise, dropped onto one knee.

“This is what my important business was.” He opened a small box and held it up. The most beautiful sapphire ring she’d ever seen lay nestled inside.

“Marry me again, Catherine Meredith Carthwick Raybourne. I want to renew my vows to you. I made promises to you that I broke. I promised to love and cherish you, and I fear I did not do very well.”

Cat blinked through the tears in her eyes. She hugged her arms around her chest as if she could contain the joy bursting through her. Everything within was singing, soaring, spinning with hope. “Well, I promised to obey you. And I admit I didn’t really mean it.”

He laughed, his teeth a flash of white against his soot-covered skin. “So you will marry me, again? You will be the wife of my heart?”

“Yes, Jamie.” Yes, yes. Of course yes! “Always.”

She twisted her hands together as he came to standing, resisting the urge to throw her arms around him. He had more to say and she wanted to hear what it was.

“I found the sapphire in Kashmir. Let me see how I did.” He took the ring from the box and held it next to her eyes. “Yes. I remembered your eyes exactly.”

Cat held out her hand, and he slid the ring onto her finger. The band was designed with elaborate scrolls and perfectly matched her previous engagement ring. “Where did you have it made?”

“The Jewelry Quarter in Birmingham.”

“It’s perfect, Jamie.”

“No, it’s not.” He brushed her hair back from her face. “But it doesn’t need to be perfect. It just needs to be true.”

Epilogue

LEAVES RUSTLED OVERHEAD as Jamie took her hand beneath the old oak tree. They stood before the heart he had carved into its trunk nine years prior.

“I promise to love you, Catherine, for all my days. To write you notes whenever I must leave, to tell you about my worries as much as my celebrations.” No humor showed on his face, no amusement. Only deep intention. Integrity. And love. “And to trust you, even if I do not understand or agree with your actions. I pledge my heart to you until death shall us part.”

Cat squeezed his hands. They were shaking in hers. “I pledge to love and honor you, Jamie, as my husband, my lover, and my friend. I promise to hold you foremost in my heart, even when we do not agree. I will share my life with you, my laughter and my tears, and cherish you always. I pledge my heart to you until death shall us part.”

He lifted her hand and slid the sapphire ring onto her finger. “With this ring, I thee wed. Again.”

Cat looked up and smiled into his eyes. Her husband tilted his lips into that lopsided half smile that never failed to melt her heart.

“Now kiss your bride,” she teased.

Never did he have to be asked twice. He leaned down and claimed her mouth in a searing kiss.

Wind sang through the trees. The crisp scent of autumn lingered in the sunlight. Winter was coming and the world was alive with joy.

Cat slipped her hands down around Jamie’s hips.

“Hmm,” he murmured against her mouth. “I like this.”

“We’ve work to do, husband.”

“Work?” He pulled back and studied her face.

“Yes,” she tilted her head to the side. “Didn’t you say something about needing an heir?”

“So I did.” She laughed as he picked her up and laid her down in the grass.

The future looked very bright indeed.

About Leigh

Leigh LaValle, a RWA Golden Heart® finalist and Amazon Bestselling author, pilfered her first Historical Romance novel off her mother’s bookshelf and quickly developed a lifelong love affair of rogues, rakes and rascals. When she is not writing, mommying, or reading, she is rarely seen cleaning, and more often found hiking or, when she is really lucky, in the white powder of the ski slopes. Leigh is also a devoted yoga practitioner and instructor. She currently lives in the Pacific Northwest with her family, and is hard at work on her next novel.

Follow Leigh LaValle on twitter at @Leigh_LaValle, friend her on Facebook at http://www.facebook.com/leigh.lavalle, or visit her website at http://www.LeighLaValle.com.

Other Books by Leigh

The Nottinghamshire Series

The Runaway Countess

The Misbehaving Marquess

The Rogue Returns

The Runaway Countess

During a hot and thunderous Nottingham summer, a lady thief steals from the rich to give to the poor. Captured by a handsome lord, she resists his interrogations but not his tempestuous kisses. Right and wrong turn inside out as she finds herself falling in love with her mortal enemy.

The Rogue Returns

With siblings to protect and creditors at her door, an intrepid lady has no recourse but to seek a fabled fortune buried years ago. Forming an uneasy alliance with a silver-tongued rogue, she adventures through the high peaks of England, battling treasure hunters, violent storms, and dangerous terrain. But can she escape the growing passion that threatens to steal her heart?

To Catherine Gayle, for putting up with me and my endless questions.

And for Kirk, even though you’re entirely too nice to ever be a decent rake.

Prologue

“NICOLAS, SAY HELLO to your new cousin.”

Eleanor Abbington glanced up sharply at her new aunt’s statement. How had she been singled out? With the entire family gathered in the courtyard of Malcolm Manor to meet Uncle Robert’s new wife and her son, it didn’t seem fair that Eleanor should find herself the center of attention.

Aunt Lavinia smiled as she glanced back and forth between them, her golden eyebrows raised in two perfect arches of expectation. “Eleanor is closest to you in age, only two years your senior.”

Only two years? That was more than a quarter of the boy’s lifetime. For some reason it annoyed her that a seven-year-old was nearly as tall as she. He looked rather like a giraffe, actually, with his long and spindly limbs. Sighing, Eleanor waited for him to say something, to get these forced niceties out of the way. But he didn’t. Instead, he just stood there, staring down at his shiny brown shoes and letting the silence stretch.

Tittering like a squeaky field mouse, Aunt Lavinia turned to Eleanor. “I think he’s shy with all these new people. Be a good girl and give your new cousin a kiss.”

A kiss? Eleanor tried not to make a face, but it wasn’t easy. She couldn’t possibly expect her to kiss this strange boy. Just because Aunt Lavinia had called him her cousin, didn’t make it so. She had overheard Mama talking to Aunt Margaret; she knew that Aunt Lavinia was just a silver-tongue widow—though her tongue looked quite pink to Eleanor—who had somehow managed to fool Uncle Robert, the revered Earl of Malcolm, into marrying her.

Eleanor sent a pleading look to her mother. Mama cut a glance to her new sister-in-law, her mouth pinched and her brow lowered in the same sort of disapproving expression she gave the dog when it slipped inside with muddy paws, but she didn’t intervene on Eleanor’s behalf.

At her side, Libby watched with rounded eyes, leaning into their mother’s skirts. For once, Eleanor was envious of her little sister. No one expected a toddler to have to do such a thing. Or even a five-year-old, for that matter, though William, her real cousin, didn’t seem as though he’d mind such a fate, peering up in adoration at his new stepbrother as he was.

“Eleanor,” her mother said in warning.

Fine.

Sighing hugely, Eleanor stepped forward, reluctance weighing her feet like stones. Still Nicolas didn’t look up. He simply stood there, letting his shaggy hair hang down across his forehead. Great—not only did she get a cousin she didn’t want, but he was rude to boot. Didn’t he know you should face someone when being forced to meet?

Pursing her mouth into a kiss that put her lips as far from her body as she could manage, she leaned forward, aiming for his freckled cheek. He smelled like wind and sunshine, which was better than the dirt and sweat smell she expected of a boy. Just when she was about to graze his cheek, he turned, quick as a whip, and smacked his lips to hers.

She sputtered and jumped back, wiping her whole arm across her violated lips. “Ew! Mama, he kissed me!”

For the first time since he arrived, Nicolas looked her right in the eye. He was grinning like the fool he was, his pale green gaze dancing with smug merriment. “I was just standing here. You were the one who kissed me.”

“Not on the lips,” Eleanor said, spitting the words out along with the taste of him. “That’s disgusting.”

“Eleanor!” Mama barked, grabbing her by the arm and tugging her back sharply. “Mind your manners, young lady.”

Mind her manners? She was the one who had been accosted by the little ruffian! But with Mama’s fingers already digging into her upper arm, Eleanor knew better than to say what she was thinking. “Yes, ma’am,” she mumbled, all the while leveling furious, narrowed eyes on Nicolas.

Did he appear even the tiniest bit contrite? Not even a little. As the adults went on with their greetings, she wrinkled her nose, telling him as clearly as she could manage that she did not like him, cousin or not.

His grin only widened, and then he winked at her. Winked!

Eleanor’s mouth dropped open, which only made him look that much more pleased with himself. Of all the… she snapped her head to the side, refusing to give him the attention he so clearly craved. Even with her gaze averted, she just knew he was still watching her, his infuriatingly smug grin still in place. So he thought he had bested her, did he?

Well, they’d see about that.

Chapter One

Fifteen years later

OH LORD, SHE WAS TRAPPED.

Standing in the center of the sun-dappled folly overlooking the rolling hills of her uncle’s estate, Eleanor suddenly realized exactly what was about to happen. Don’t say it. Please don’t say it.

“Miss Abbington, will you consent to be my wife?” Across from her, Lord Kensington stood perfectly erect, his thick eyebrows raised in polite query.

Drat, drat, drat. Eleanor bit her lip, dismay settling like a brick in her stomach. Or was it dread? Why hadn’t the man listened to her when she had told him in every way possible that she was happy in her situation, and had no plans to change it?

Better yet, why had she been so utterly oblivious to his intentions when she agreed to the walk in the first place? Now she was stuck, with no other choice than to be blunt. “Oh, my. I am sorry, my lord, but I am afraid I must decline your kind offer.”

Silence reigned for the space of ten seconds, broken only by the nearby oak leaves rattling in the light wind as Lord Kensington absorbed her response. In those moments, the spacious, open-air folly seemed to shrink to the size of a cupboard, making it difficult for Eleanor to put enough space between her and her completely unwanted suitor.

“I beg your pardon?”

She tilted her head the slightest bit and tried to infuse compassion into her posture and expression. “My apologies, Lord Kensington, but my answer is no. I will not marry you.”

What a fool she’d been to let it come to this. Yes, she’d known her uncle strongly favored a match between them, but this was only the second day Kensington had been at Malcolm Manor, for heaven’s sake. The rest of the guests would arrive tomorrow, at which time the house party would officially begin. Did he feel that he had to rush things in order to get a leg up on the competition?

Ugh, as if a houseful of boring members of Parliament would tempt her.

“But…” He trailed off, his dark eyes troubled. Confused more than troubled, actually. There was no telling what Uncle Robert had led him to believe.

She set her jaw. Why her uncle was so keen to have her marry all of a sudden was beyond her. Clearly he had not believed her earlier in the summer when she had told him she was content to serve as her Aunt Margaret’s companion and remain a spinster, no matter how society viewed her choice. Old and dried up at that age of four-and-twenty, according to the ton. Which was ridiculous. She was perfectly moisturized and plenty young, thank you very much.

And she had been happy, all the way up until about three minutes ago. Now she had an affronted, would-be suitor gaping at her as if she’d, well, rejected his offer of marriage. Sighing, she offered an apologetic smile. “Please know how flattered I am by your proposal. I wish you nothing but the very best in the future, my lord.”

The situation could not have been any more awkward. Spending the rest of the week with him was going to be excruciating. Spending the rest of the week with Uncle Robert would be even worse.

She swallowed; she couldn’t even think about that now.

As his face grew increasingly mottled, Kensington tugged on the hem of his mustard-colored jacket. “If you’ll excuse me, Miss Abbington.” The words were stilted and brusque, understandably.

As far as she was concerned, the sooner this interview was over, the better. “Yes, of course,” she murmured, dipping into a shallow curtsey. He turned and stalked away, cutting a straight line through the grass toward the house. Expelling a lungful of air, Eleanor sagged against one of the folly’s rounded stone columns.

That was an experience she hoped never to repeat.

If he’d only listened to her in the first place. Must people look upon her unmarried status as something to be pitied or remedied? Before her father had died, she had seen all too well the life of a married woman. That was something to be pitied—not her perfectly lovely life. Besides attending to Aunt Margaret’s comforts, no one ever told Eleanor what to do, how to act, or what to say. No one ever humiliated her, laid a hand on her, or made her cry.

She was free, and she intended to stay that way.

A quarter of an hour later, Eleanor let herself into the empty library, carefully pulling the glass door closed behind her. The cool interior felt good against her flushed cheeks, and she went straight to the nearest chair and collapsed in it. If she were very, very lucky, perhaps no one noticed her coming back to the house. She wasn’t ready to face her uncle just yet. She wanted a chance to think of what to say—

Bam!

The door banged open, startling her into sitting up straight. Uncle Robert stalked into the room, his heavy grey brows lowered over narrowed eyes. With his full grey beard and patrician nose, he was only a toga away from looking like a vengeful Zeus.

So much for having time to gather her thoughts.

“For God’s sake, Eleanor, have you lost your mind? What would possess you to turn down the suit of such an advantageous match?”

Advantageous? For whom, exactly? Indignation flared to life, trumping her apprehension. Her own brows pinched as she lifted her chin. “I am sorry, Uncle, but I did make it quite clear I had no intentions of marrying Lord Kensington.”

“And I made it abundantly clear that Kensington is a valuable political ally with whom I wish to align myself.”

“I’m certain he is a fine politician. I am less certain, however, as to his suitability as a husband.” The very thought made her stomach ache.

“He’s a suitable husband because of his politics,” he snapped, coming to stand directly in front of her. “This isn’t some fairytale, Eleanor. Marriage is a vehicle for strengthening bonds between allies, as you well know.”

How could she forget? In the three months since she had come out of half-mourning, he had spoken of little else. Eleanor drew a calming breath, trying to sound rational. “I can appreciate that. However, I am not prepared to sacrifice my entire life so that Lord Kensington feels obligated to vote more favorably. The politics should stand on their own merits, should they not?”

His nostrils flared, though the rest of him remained unnervingly still. “You have no idea of what you speak, and quite frankly, you are far too old for this sort of selfish childishness. Thank God my sister is not around to see the sort of ungrateful person you have become.”

His words pierced her armor like a well-placed blade. He knew exactly how to flay her, leaving her breathless. “I will not believe Mama would have wanted me to suffer the same fate as she.” Her words were raspy, filled with barely leashed emotion.

The muscles of his jaw hardened, same as his eyes. “And what fate was that? To become a respected member of society? To have children and be the mistress of a great house? To attend the most exclusive balls and dine at the Prince Regent’s own table? You should be so lucky to ‘suffer’ a fate such as hers.”

She swallowed hard against the need to lash out. To baldly state the truth they all knew but no one ever said. Antagonizing her uncle at this point would only make things worse. Straightening her spine, she nodded. “I am sorry I have failed your expectations, Uncle. It was never my intention to disappoint you or this family.”

He shook his head, regarding her as one might a convicted horse thief. “You’ve gone too far this time, Eleanor. Your streak of independence must be nipped in the bud. You have a duty to this family, as do I.”

She bit her tongue, literally, and nodded. When he set his teeth like that, she knew from past experience it was best simply to agree—no matter how idiotic the statement. So long as she didn’t anger him before she left, she could stay out of sight until he cooled down, and he’d likely forget it.

Maybe.

He did look particularly agitated this time.

Linking his hands behind his back he circled her, his pace slow and deliberate. “As the head of this family, I am responsible for the wellbeing and future of each and every one of us. And it’s a good thing, since you have so clearly demonstrated you haven’t the sense God gave you.”

Her head stilled, unable to bob in agreement to this particular statement. How dare he say such a thing to her? A dozen arguments sprang to mind, but she steadfastly clamped her mouth shut. She mustn’t fight with him. He was puffing up like a riled cat, and she didn’t want to feel the sting of drawn claws.

“Whether you like it or not, Eleanor, it is past time for you to apply yourself to finding a husband. We should have done so the moment you were out of half-mourning. We are fast approaching the time you will be viewed as unsuitable for marriage, rendering yourself useless to this family.

“You’ve ruined our chances with Kensington. He has already announced his intention to leave.” He made no effort to hide his resentment, pinning her with his furious gaze. “Fortunately, there are three other suitable candidates for marriage who shall be attending the party. Therefore, I have a proposal for you.”

He turned to her, waiting for her to acknowledge the statement. He loved to do this—forcing her to bow to his will. Lifting her chin, she said, “Oh?”

“I had thought to announce your betrothal at the welcome dinner tomorrow night, but obviously that won’t be the case. However, a betrothal announcement will be made by the end of the party. The choice is yours: Lord Henry, Lord Netherby, or Lord Shevington.”

Anger coursed through her, turning her blood cold. He couldn’t demand such a thing—it was absurd! “Surely you can’t be serious. Please, be reasonable, Uncle.” Her tone was remarkably composed, thank goodness, despite the fury that had her digging her fingernails into her palms.

“You dare speak of being reasonable to me? After denying Kensington’s suit?” Indignation stiffened his shoulders. “I’ll have no more of your stubbornness. You will choose a husband who will strengthen this family’s future, or I will do it for you.”

Her lungs couldn’t seem to remember how to function. Her breath came in short, inadequate bursts, starving her of the air she so desperately needed to clear her mind. “And if I refuse?”

He smiled for the first time since entering the room. “Then I suppose I’ll have to summon your sister home from Hollingsworth. She’s always been so delightfully biddable.”

Eleanor’s breath left her body in a whoosh. He wouldn’t. Libby was barely seventeen—months still from her first Season! Surely he wouldn’t force her into marriage with some dry, aged member of parliament who was two or even three times her age merely to secure a favorable vote for his proposed bill.

Surely nothing. The icy blue steel of his gaze plainly told her the truth of his warning. He was dead serious.

Her first instinct was to lash out, to tell him exactly what he could do with his threats. But she couldn’t. To do so would only make things worse. She needed time to think, and that meant she had to have him think she would bow to him and his dreadful demand. “I see.” Her throat was tight, her words strained. She swallowed and tried again. “If you’ll excuse me, it would seem I have much to prepare for in the coming days.”

Smug satisfaction lifted the corners of Uncle Robert’s full lips. “Excellent.”

She couldn’t escape the room fast enough. Holding her expression neutral until she made it out of his sight, she dashed down the corridor, heading for the massive staircase that led to her bedchamber. Tears of frustration burned at the back of her eyes, but she refused to let them spill over. She would not fall to pieces at another of Uncle Robert’s demands.

She finally made it to the entrance hall and was only steps away from escape when the front door opened. Please, please don’t let it be Kensington! She was not in the state of mind to greet anyone, but most especially not him.

Tolbert, uncle’s butler, stepped inside, and her shoulders wilted with relief. But of course she couldn’t be that lucky. As the servant stepped aside, the silhouette of a tall, broad-shouldered man came into view.

She blinked. Definitely not Lord Kensington. The bright sunshine behind the man hid his face, but she could make out close-cropped hair and an exceedingly fine figure. His upper body, encased in a tightly fitting jacket, narrowed from those wide shoulders down to a lean waist.

For half a second, her distress eased as curiosity flared. Who was this ma—

Oh Lord. It couldn’t be.

“Well, well, look who’s come to greet this weary soldier. Your dedication truly warms the heart, coz.”

“Nicolas?” She gasped. He looked so different—if it weren’t for the insolence of his tone, she wouldn’t have recognized him at all.

He had always been such a scrawny boy, and had never really changed much as an adolescent, save for his growing taller. He’d only been gone two years. Was it possible to double one’s weight in that amount of time? His arms, once thin and lanky, were now padded with muscle, visible even through the fabric of his crimson coat, while his ivory breeches did little to hide his long and powerful legs.

She gave her head a little shake. None of that mattered, for heaven’s sake. This was Nick, and as was his talent, he had shown up at the worst possible time. “What are you doing here?”

He set his satchel on the tiled floor and handed over his gloves and hat before offering a careless little grin. “I knew how much you must miss me, so when I had the opportunity to come home three weeks early, I jumped at the chance. Oh, I know Mama will be thrilled, but I’m sure that’s nothing compared to the delight wending its way through your pitter-pattering little heart at the very sight of me.”

“That’s dread, Nick. I know they start with the same letter, but I’m certain you can tell the difference if you apply yourself.”

“No, no—your face says it all. You’re beside yourself with joy.” He stepped toward her, spreading his arms wide. “Come now, give us a kiss.” He puckered his lips like a particularly surprised fish and leaned toward her. It was the same annoying greeting he always gave her, loving as he did to remind her of their first meeting. Having this small bit of normalcy after such a terrible day was oddly comforting.

Rolling her eyes, she put a hand against his chest, blocking his advance. Good heavens, was he hiding a metal breastplate beneath his shirt? She gritted her teeth and blew out a breath. Surely she only noticed these things about him because she was so frazzled from her encounter with her uncle. “I am not in the mood, Nicolas.”

He angled his head, his gaze far too observant for her peace of mind. “Shall we proceed directly to the joyful weeping, then? I do believe your eyes are dewy already. Yes, I know, two years is simply too long to do without my company.”

Eleanor stiffened under his scrutiny. Yes, her eyes were a little teary, but it had absolutely nothing to do with him. She yanked her hand away and backed up a few steps. “I’m very happy you are alive, intact, and returned to the bosom of your family. Now, if you’ll excuse me.”

Before she could flee up the stairs, he reached out and snagged her arm. “Elle, is everything…all right?” His ever-present grin slipped and for the first time, she could see him for the officer he was.

Blast it, now the tears were threatening all over again. This was Nick; he hadn’t a compassionate bone in his body. They teased, mocked, and riled each other, but they didn’t do…this, whatever this was. She swallowed past the lump in her throat and nodded briskly. “Yes, of course. I’ll see you at supper, I’m sure.”

He didn’t try to stop her when she pulled away, and she dashed up the stairs, not daring to look back. With the mess Uncle Robert had just dumped in her lap, dealing with her annoying cousin was the last thing she needed to worry about.

No matter what strange feelings the sight of him had roused.

Chapter Two

FISTING HIS HAND AT HIS SIDE, Nick watched as Eleanor fled up the stairs, clutching handfuls of her skirts as she rushed to escape him. His heart pounded like a battle drum despite the brevity of the encounter.

He’d waited so long to see her, and even in her plain white gown and simple coiled braid holding her straight dark hair in check, she still looked better than he remembered.

And he remembered her looking pretty damn good.

He took a long, deep breath. Not exactly the best homecoming in the world. He had always been a burr beneath her saddle, but she’d been particularly agitated, especially considering how long he’d been gone. Something was definitely bothering her, and for once, it wasn’t him.

Yes, they rarely shared a civil word, but it was never with any real heat. It was a challenge of sorts to see who could trump the other’s barbs most effectively. He learned early on it was the most effective way to engage her, and over the years it had become the norm.

Her scent still lingered in the air, a delicate mix of lavender and honey, the same blend that haunted his dreams. He certainly couldn’t do anything now, but perhaps he could wheedle the problem out of her at dinner. Besides, it was a long ride here, and he very much needed a change of clothes and a hearty drink.

He had made the trip from London in record time, pushing Caesar, and later a rented mount, much harder than he should have, but unable to force himself to pull back on the reins. It had been too long, and he had seen too much, to want to delay his homecoming even another minute.

Footsteps in the corridor leading to the west wing jarred him from his woolgathering, and he unfurled his hand and straightened his spine. His stepfather emerged, his gaze already assessing as he approached.

Exactly the person Nick didn’t wish to see.

“Malcolm,” he said in neutral greeting, offering a slight nod. “I hope you are well.” Or not. Either would be fine with him.

“More or less. You’re early.” It was more accusation than observation.

“Indeed. My plans changed, so I thought I would surprise my mother with my illustrious presence.” He heartily wished she was here now, but Tolbert had informed him Mother was visiting the village for the rest of the afternoon.

“Yes, well, try to make yourself presentable before she returns. You could pass for a highwayman in those filthy clothes.”

Because no one else on earth would possibly gather a speck of dust on them after a pounding eight-hour journey. “Didn’t you know? That’s the fashion these days.” He grinned simply because he knew it would irk his stepfather.

And it did.

The earl set his jaw, narrowing his eyes for a brief moment. “And here I thought the military would be able to make a man of you.”

He always had gone straight for the throat. Good thing Nick had a lifetime of acclimation to such comments. “Well, if you couldn’t, what hope did the army have?”

Malcolm’s gaze would have frozen lava. “Clearly none. Some people are beyond hope.” Without another word, he strode from the room and out the front door.

Evidently nothing had changed.

Relaxing the tense muscles of his shoulders, Nick shook his head. It was ironic, really. During the past few years, Nick had had the meaning of respect drilled into him. As a commissioned officer, he’d been taught to earn the respect of his men, as well as possess a healthy dose of it for his own superiors. But apparently, he still had a blind spot when it came to his stepfather, who incidentally had paid for Nick’s commission. Not that he felt bad about it, since clearly the feeling was mutual.

The lofty Earl of Malcolm had never quite forgiven Nick for being part of the package that was his mother. Raising—no matter how loosely such a word could be applied to their situation—another man’s orphan wasn’t quite what he had in mind when Nick’s mother had ensnared the earl all those years ago.

The purposeful clearing of a throat had him looking over to Tolbert. He’d completely forgotten the man was even there. “Yes?”

“Shall I have your room readied, sir?”

There was no missing the censure in old Tolbert’s tone. Fantastic—Nick’s arrival had upset yet another member of the household. The butler hated surprises just about as much as he hated laughter, gossip, and puppies. All of which led to the disruption of his schedule, which was worse than any cardinal sin.

Nick nodded, infusing a healthy dose of humility into his expression. “Please, though if it is too much to ask, I am quite adept at making do. I’ve even slept on God’s own dirt a time or two in the not so distant past.”

Such a thing would seem the worst possible fate to Tolbert, but in truth, those nights hadn’t bothered Nick. When surrounded by people who respected him, even the worst conditions were preferable to this house and its self-important master…except for when Eleanor was in residence, of course.

The butler’s stiff brow relaxed slightly. “I’m certain we can find something more comfortable than that, sir.”

Well, well—was that a bit of dry humor he heard? “So glad to hear it.”

“And may I be so bold as to say, welcome home, sir.”

His first genuine greeting. Nick smiled and nodded his acceptance. After a distressed cousin and a contentious stepfather, he’d happily take a kind butler right about then. With a sigh, he retrieved his satchel and trudged up the stairs to the rooms he’d so infrequently used these past five or so years.

So far his homecoming was going bloody brilliantly.

STEP ONE: DISCOVER A LARGE CACHE OF MONEY.

Step two: Purchase a cottage beside the sea.

Step three: Tell uncle to go to the devil.

A perfectly reasonable plan, as far as Eleanor was concerned. There was only one problem: she was fairly certain no undiscovered treasure troves languished on the estate’s grounds.

It just seemed so hopeless. She had been unable to come up with any real plan in the two hours since her uncle laid down his ultimatum. It was incredibly frustrating to know he held all the cards. As he well knew, Eleanor would do anything to protect her sweet sister.

Libby had an innocence about her that Eleanor was determined to preserve. Papa had died before she was old enough to recognize the tension in their home, or at the very least to place its origin. She had a rosy view of love and life that would be crushed by some overbearing aristocrat. It was a fate she did not deserve.

Of course, it was a fate Eleanor didn’t deserve, either. The whole situation was just so blasted unfair. Blowing out a breath, she paced the length of the room. Aunt Margaret’s snores filtered past the ebony door that separated their suites, and Eleanor immediately quieted her footsteps. Her aunt’s noise may not wake her, but the woman heard just about everything else in a half-mile radius.

Eleanor would love nothing more than to pour out her frustrations to her aunt, but she had just been so delicate since Mama’s death. Gone was the fiery woman who had once been a tour de force among the ton. Growing up, Eleanor had wanted to be just like her. Widowed young and without children of her own, she had always been so strong and independent—a striking foil to Eleanor’s mother while Papa was still alive.

Now, however, she was simply the aging, older sister to one sibling who was dead, and another who was a boorish nobleman who liked to manipulate them about like chess pieces.

And on top of everything, Aunt Margaret had been under the weather this week, and Eleanor didn’t want to cause her undue stress. Sighing, she rubbed a hand over her eyes. She wasn’t getting anywhere.

A light tap on the door to the corridor interrupted her thoughts. She padded over and pulled it open, only to find Nick on the other side. What on earth was he doing here? His short, brown hair was damp and in need of a comb, standing up in all different directions. He’d taken the time to shave as well, and the late afternoon light illuminated one perfectly smooth, chiseled cheek while the other was cast in shadow.

For one fleeting moment, she had the oddest desire to run a fingertip down the side of his face, to see if the skin was as soft as it looked. And then her sanity returned with a biting snap.

Was he mad? One couldn’t go knocking on a woman’s bedchamber on a whim. She pulled the door mostly closed, leaving only enough room for him to have a clear view of her censure. “Nicolas,” she hissed, annoyance making the single word into a curse, “what are you doing here?”

He lifted one corner of his mouth is a rakish grin, knowing full well that she hated when he acted as though he was some sort of Corinthian. “You ran away without a proper greeting, young lady. I thought I might give you the chance to grovel for my forgiveness before dinner.”

“Oh please, I am not a young anything to you. Now go away, I’ll see you downstairs soon enough.” She started to shut the door, but he put his hand out, stopping her forward motion with a jolt.

“Not until you tell me what is bothering you,” he said, an underlying hint of concern coloring the otherwise belligerent words. Then, just when she was about to think he might actually care, he added, “You are not nearly waspish enough for all to be well.”

She rolled her eyes, her gaze landing on the bulge of his arm muscles as he held the door in place, resisting her attempts to shut it. It was so jarring for him to look so different. And distracting. Her heart gave a little flip as her gaze slipped over his broadened shoulders and the exceptionally sharp line of his jaw. Truly, they must have worked him like a mule in the army.

Good.

Having regained her wits, she glared at him. “Would you please leave me be?”

“Of course.”

“Thank you,” she said, exasperation clear in her whispered words.

“Right after you tell me what has your face drawn tight as a miser’s purse strings.” He gave another infuriating little grin. “Careful, such a thing will give you wrinkles. Especially at your advanced age.”

“Oh, do be quiet,” she said, shaking her head. “Honestly, Aunt Margaret will hear you, and if you wake her, I will make you regret it.”

He leaned in toward her until his face was only inches from hers, the clean scent of his shaving soap teasing her nose. His light green eyes held the same challenge they always did when he’d set his mind to having his way. “Then I suggest,” he murmured, his voice low and deep, “that you let me in and tell me what is troubling you.”

“You are troubling me,” she insisted, keeping her own voice down. “Now leave. I’ll see you at dinner.”

Nick sighed, shaking his head as though profoundly disappointed. “Only two years away, and they’ve turned you into such an old maid.”

An old maid? For heaven’s sake, was everyone intent on labeling her the doddering old woman today? It didn’t help that he looked as vibrant and virile as a prize stallion. And to think she had been inadvertently admiring him. The men in her family could go to the devil, as far as she was concerned. Fresh anger welled up from the conversation with Uncle Robert, from the helplessness and impotence of being played like some puppet.

Eleanor jerked the door open so suddenly that Nick stumbled forward, very nearly falling flat on his face. She waited until he recovered to pin him with a frosty glare. “I am not an old maid, Nicolas Norton, and you are not some sort of confidant. Why would I tell you anything? You’ve been back all of two hours, and already you have reverted to the wayward young boy who always tagged behind me like a puppy, making trouble for me at every turn.”

She would never in a thousand years say such harsh things to any other person on earth, but Nick had always thrived on annoying her. This was what they did. She doubted she would know what to do if he ever offered her a genuine kind word. To do so would mean that he actually took something seriously.

“What is life without a little trouble?” he asked, brushing off her insults. “You know what I think? I think you’ve missed me.”

“Yes, about as much as one misses a hangnail.”

He chuckled, his green eyes sparkling despite the waning evening light. “You do say the sweetest things, Ellie. Lucky for you, I know exactly what you need.”

She crossed her arms, looking at him with patent disbelief. He knew nothing about what she needed, nothing at all. She needed freedom, respect, the ability to not be married off to the man of Uncle Robert’s choosing. “Oh? And what is that, exactly?”

“To meet me at the ruins. Tomorrow at dawn.” He gave her a quick wink, made a military turn, and marched from the room.

She blinked, caught off guard. Then a slow, reluctant smile softened the corners of her mouth. For once, he was absolutely right. Devil take the man for knowing her so well.

“MY, BUT YOU ARE LOOKING SO WELL, DARLING.” Nick’s mother stretched her lips in a lazy smile from across the dinner table. She was the only person he knew that could manage such an expression without betraying a single wrinkle. Perhaps the vast quantities of drink she had consumed all these years—including tonight—were successfully preserving her after all. “Eleanor, isn’t he looking well?”

Ignoring his mother’s slightly slurred words, Nick raised an eyebrow at Eleanor, challenging her to disagree with the assessment. He could practically hear her grit her teeth.

“Indeed,” she murmured, clearly pained to admit it. An actual compliment would probably kill her.

Although, to be fair, he never complimented her, either. She was slender and beautiful, with full lips that begged to be kissed and gorgeous dark hair that looked so silky, he’d spent the last decade fighting the desire to run his hands through it. All of this, however, would never leave his lips.

Lifting his glass in a mock salute, he said, “Please, cousin, you’ll give me a big head with such eager praise.”

“You don’t need me for that.”

“Now, now, the both of you. Do behave at the dinner table.” Mother paused to take another drink of her wine before turning her less than focused gaze on Nick. “It’s been so long, my son. Please, tell us all about your life in the militia.”

Malcolm’s knife screeched against porcelain as he cut his roast lamb with much more force than necessary. “I don’t think we need to hear about his battlefield experiences, Lavinia.”

Nick ran his tongue along his teeth in an attempt to hold back his retort, but it was no use. “Are you certain? I was under the impression gory battlefield details were appropriate conversation for the dinner table, and was about to proceed accordingly.”

His stepfather glared daggers above the floral centerpiece as the candlelight flickered menacingly in his eyes.

“Oh, Nicolas, how you tease,” Mother trilled. “It’s a shame Margaret couldn’t join us. She does so enjoy your cheek.”

Malcolm’s gaze flickered to his wife before returning to his meal. “You remember to keep your cheek in hand, Nicolas, while you are in my home.”

My home. It was a theme that never quite went away. When he first came to live here fifteen years ago, the man went out of his way to put Nick in his place. As soon as he found a school that would take him, Malcolm packed him off with ill-concealed pleasure and washed his hands of him. If it weren’t for school breaks, Nick might have never seen his family.

“That goes for you as well, Eleanor,” Malcolm added, residual sharpness hardening his words.

Eleanor’s head jerked up at the mention of her name, her forkful of potatoes halted halfway to her mouth. She looked as though she wanted to argue with the unfair admonishment, but instead merely pressed her lips together and nodded.

Damn it—Nick hated to see her like this. Where was her spunk? Her fire? It was as if all the fight in her fizzled whenever the earl so much as glanced at her. Hopefully tomorrow Nick could shake loose the bee in her bonnet.

Mother took a hardy sip from her wine, seeming oblivious to Eleanor’s distress. Setting down the goblet, she turned to Malcolm. “How wonderful that Nicolas should be here for the house party, don’t you think? I imagine he shall catch quite a few ladies’ attention.”

Nick could tell exactly how excited his stepfather was with his presence. A firing squad might have been more welcome. “I’d rather he’d have come when he said he would. This party is hardly the place for him.”

She pursed her lips, looking as though she were thinking very hard. “Actually, he’s come at just the right time. Lord Kensington’s absence would have had us in quite the pickle. Now there’s no need to fret over our numbers.”

Mother’s statement had exactly the opposite effect on the mood than Nick would have expected. Malcolm slammed his silverware to the table and snatched up his wine glass. Eleanor jumped at the noise, nearly dropping her fork.

What the hell was going on here? And why had Kensington left before the party had even started? Nick wanted answers, but he’d be damned if he’d ask them with his stepfather around.

Mother, as was usual, was completely unperturbed. “Nicky, darling, I have just the girl for you to entertain. Mr. Landon’s oldest daughter turned eighteen this month, and this is to be her first foray into society. She’ll officially debut with Libby next Season.”

“Just what we need,” Malcolm muttered as he set down his drink. “A fresh-faced young debutant providing unfavorable comparison to Eleanor.”

Nick very nearly choked on his peas. Of all the… he may often tease Eleanor, but Malcolm’s comment was designed to draw blood. With outrage burning in his gut, Nick jerked his gaze to her, not even giving a damn if she could sense his fury. Her face was pale, her jaw tight, but she gave her head a quick, nearly imperceptible shake when their eyes met. Her meaning was clear: stay out of it.

Ah hah—he was beginning to realize what might be the cause of her odd behavior since his return. Knowing Malcolm, that was surely not the first comment he had doled out to her as the party approached. Despite her wishes, his fists clenched under the table, a retort poised precariously on his lips.

“Don’t worry,” Mother said breezily, heedless of the tension at the table. “I’m sure Nicky will have no problem keeping the girl occupied.” She smiled broadly, her eyes half closed before lifting her wineglass again and downing the contents.

Glancing once more to Ellie’s wan face, Nick finally managed to swallow the words he wanted to say. “Well then,” he said, working to keep his tone light, “sounds as though Miss Landon and I should suit perfectly. I’ll leave the serious entertaining to Eleanor.”

The rigid line of her shoulders relaxed even as her gaze remained fixed on her plate. Malcolm cut his eyes toward her, his gaze hard and steady. “For once, Norton, you may actually be of some use.”

Agreement from Malcolm? Something was definitely wrong here. Refusing to break from character, he lifted his glass and tipped his head to his stepfather in a classic arrogant move before taking a long drink.

Whether she wanted to or not, Eleanor would tell him what the devil was going on. After all, what good was being trained in the art of war if one couldn’t shamelessly exploit it on one’s family?

Chapter Three

THE SWISHING OF RAZOR THIN METAL through cool air soothed Eleanor in much the way harp music calmed the music lover, or fine wine pleased the connoisseur. In the early morning gloom, damp fog was her cover, the dim promise of sunrise her only light. She moved forward swiftly, danced backwards, and thrust again. Nothing but mist met her blade, though she couldn’t help but imagine her uncle’s chest at the end of her buttoned tip.

“Your form is terrible, cousin.”

Eleanor gasped at the sudden pronouncement, and swung around, her rapier extended. Nicolas’s smiling face was inches from her blade. He didn’t even have the decency to flinch, drat the man. “Even my worst form would be miles better than yours.”

Leaning back against the crumbing ruins of the old abbey wall, he nodded solemnly. “I agree wholeheartedly. Unless, of course, we are speaking of fencing. If that is the case, allow me to clear up your misconceptions.”

She didn’t relax. The way she was feeling this morning, she could happily take her meddling step-cousin’s head right off. “Sounds like a challenge to me. Have you come prepared?”

Though they used to meet frequently for these clandestine matches, it had been over two years since their last one. As much as he was a thorn in her side, she would be forever grateful to him for teaching her the sport. It had started as a lark, but had quickly evolved to their favorite form of communication, taking their verbal sparring and converting it into proper duels.

Stepping back, he whipped his own sword up to clang against hers, making an X of the two weapons. “But of course. I wouldn’t dare meet anyone at dawn unarmed, least of all you, dear Ellie.”

She rolled her eyes, sending a brief glance heavenward before meeting his gaze. His amused gaze. Of course. Everything was a game to him.

“En guard,” she commanded, planting her feet more firmly and extending her left hand behind her for balance. “And don’t call me Ellie.”

“As you wish, my sweet.” He paused for a moment, pursing his lips, then backed up a step. “By the way, I’m very sorry about your mother. I know I said as much in my letter, but it was a damn shame.”

She blinked, taken aback by his quiet words. Sincere words. Leave it to Nick to throw her off kilter. She swallowed against the sadness that rose from deep within her, letting her gaze fall to the rocky ground. “Thank you,” she said, nodding twice before looking back up. “I’m very glad to have Aunt Margaret, at least.”

She smiled tightly, willing him to move on from the topic. This gentle side of him she kept catching glimpses of unnerved her. She didn’t quite know what to make of the changes she saw in him.

As if sensing her desire, he repositioned his blade, tapping it lightly against hers. “Shall we?”

“Do you think you can keep up?” she asked, lifting a brow in challenge.

Below his morning scruff, his lips curled in his signature grin. She let out a relieved breath—they were back on familiar ground. He knew it drove her mad when he gave her that self-satisfied smile, which meant he was rarely without it. “Now, do try to be nice. It’s been weeks since I’ve had a proper match.”

Before the last word had even left his mouth, she lunged forward, going straight for his gut. He flitted backwards, parrying her move and striking forward with one of his own. His foil slapped against her right shoulder.

She gritted her teeth, not so much against the sting of the hit as the sting to her pride. He was toying with her, damn him. “Two years in the militia and that’s all you’ve got?” She tsked as they both got back into position. After the awfulness that was last night’s dinner, this was exactly what she needed.

“Taking it easy on an old gal like you.”

“Old gal? I’m all of two years older than you, thank you very much.” She engaged him once more, darting forth with lightning speed and poking his ribs with a sound thump.

“Ow,” he laughed, slapping her foil away with his own. “Careful, that’s tender young flesh. You’ve likely forgotten how delicate youthful skin can be.”

She bit her bottom lip to keep from grinning. He was always such a pest. For that little quip, he earned himself a slap across his gloved hand. “Sorry, did that hurt? You’re right; I can hardly remember what such a hit feels like. Though it’s less from my advanced age and more from the lack of a proper opponent.”

“Ah, you’ve missed me. Should I come home more often then? Clearly you are in want of my company if it is a proper opponent you seek.”

He whipped his foil up again and charged her, a move that she easily deflected. They carried on for a few more swings, the clashing of their blades ringing out in the pre-dawn hush. She was starting to enjoy herself, to push aside the fury of her recent arguments with Uncle Robert, and give herself over to the mind game that was fencing.

When she finally had the upper hand, she tagged Nick once more on the shoulder. “Ha! What were you saying about a proper opponent? Unless your valet cares to extend his services, I know not why your visiting home more often should make a difference in my ability to find a worthy adversary.”

He shook his arm out, but still smiled that maddening grin of his. “It’s a pity you’ve had to make do without an opponent in my absence. I’m sure Aunt Margaret and Malcolm would be happy to help you find one, should they learn of your early morning exercise.”

She knew very well he was teasing, but still she lifted her tip toward his neck. “You wouldn’t dare say a word, since you are the sole reason I have taken to fencing. Feeble-minded female that I am, I was easily led astray by my dear, trusted cousin.”

He snorted, stepping back at the same moment to deflect her foil. “If you’re feeble-minded, then I’m a weakling. And we both know that’s not true,” he said, purposely bullying his way toward her with hard, fast slashes of his blade.

Not true, indeed. Even as she concentrated on defending herself, her gaze darted toward him of its own volition, catching glimpses of his hardened chest through his loose, open-necked shirt. His sleeves covered muscled forearms that she knew would be flexing this way and that, and his biceps strained against the fabric despite its generous cut. Awareness washed over her, peppering her skin with goose bumps. Good heavens, he must be as strong as an ox now.

She bit her lip, forcing her mind back to their volleys, both verbal and physical. “You know Uncle Robert would never believe otherwise.” Her words came out in staccato puffs as she struggled to hold her ground.

“Because the man’s an idiot.”

The comment caught her off guard, making her grin. He immediately took advantage, surging forward with a volley that forced her backwards, pinning her against one of the tumbledown half-walls that once delineated the abbey’s courtyard. Drat it all—how had he gotten the upper hand so quickly? Her breath came out in a rush as he leaned against her; the X of their crossed foils the only thing preventing his chest from pressing against hers. She went a little lightheaded at the thought.

The crisp scent of sweat and soap surrounded her as his lips lifted in a slow, smug smile. “You’ve gone soft,” he murmured, shaking his head. “That was entirely too easy.”

Oh, no—there was no way on earth she would allow him to win this, their first battle in so long. Especially when her whole body seemed to be betraying her. Her nerves tingled at his closeness, her lungs willfully drawing in the scent of him. Forcing herself to relax, she offered a contrite smile. “I suppose I’m out of practice. Take your pound of flesh and be done with it.”

She turned her cheek, waiting for him to lean forward for the kiss he had long claimed as his prize of choice. Just another way to remind her of how he had bested her in their first meeting.

He bent forward, his green eyes alight with mischief. She held her breath, working to maintain the focus that wavered at his nearness. Just when she was about to spring, at the very moment her muscles tensed to counter attack, he stopped, tsking. “If you think,” he said quietly, his lips only inches from her flushed cheek, “that I would believe for a second you would just roll over and let me win, you have underestimated me, cousin.”

Smarter than she had hoped. Fighting to regain her flagging resolve in the face of his overwhelming closeness, she shrugged. “Then prepare yourself.”

With every ounce of her strength, she launched herself on the offensive, forcing him away and whipping her foil up between them.

He mirrored her position, his hand held out behind him with his legs evenly planted on the rocky ground. “See? Not feeble-minded in the least. Stubborn, willful, and scandalous, but never feeble-minded.”

They engaged once more, the clanging of their swords carrying across the dew-laden field. “I am not scandalous, thank you very much.”

He blocked her jab and countered with one of his own, but she saw it coming and danced back just in time.

“But stubborn and willful?”

She smiled. “A woman never argues with a compliment.”

Chuckling, he dodged her strike and repositioned himself. “That explains so very much.”

“Good. And a woman unwed is not scandalous. She is independent.” The fierceness with which she said the words felt good. The match was helping to give her back a bit of her confidence. Being with him somehow made her feel stronger.

He widened his eyes dramatically, gasping in mock disbelief. “Independence is so much worse than scandal. Malcolm would be in vapors to hear you speak thusly.”

Standing in the middle of the ruins, dressed in wholly improper clothes and clutching a sword of all things, she couldn’t help but laugh. Lowering her foil, she put her free hand to her waist. “Look at me, Nick. I do believe independence would be the least of his objections were he to see me right now.”

She hadn’t meant it literally, but still his gaze swept over her, taking in her flowing, wide-legged trousers and sturdy, well-fitting long-sleeve blouse made of padded linen. It was impossible to miss the flash of appreciation in his celadon eyes. The oddest tug answered low in her belly, as though gravity had released her for a moment. Or perhaps it was reason leaving her body.

He tipped his head to the side. “Point conceded.”

Purposely looking away, she tucked her foil beneath her arm and tugged off her thick gloves. “Speaking of which, it’s getting late. I’d best get back before I’m missed.”

“Too late.”

She frowned, glancing to the first pink fingers of dawn stretching into the sky, heralding the start of the day. “Not at all. I have a good quarter hour before sunrise.”

Leaning his sword against the abbey wall, he stepped toward her, shaking his head. “No, I don’t mean you will be missed. I mean you have been missed.”

Her heart skittered as he extended his hand to her. Why was she acting such the fool around him? He was treating her exactly as he always had—since they were children, in fact—yet everything seemed to hold a different meaning. She was reacting to him as though he hadn’t spent the first decade of their acquaintance driving her mad.

When she didn’t move, he gave a one-shouldered shrug. “You’d be amazed what you’ll miss when your only companions are a few hundred under-washed, stir crazy soldiers.”

Resolutely, she shoved aside the strange feelings, and accepted his proffered hand. “Yes, well, I suppose I may have missed you as well. You do serve as quite the magnet for Uncle Robert’s temper, which I inadvertently benefit from. At the very least, I’m glad you didn’t get yourself killed on some Godforsaken battlefield.”

“Careful cousin—a man can begin to think you actually care for him, with such gushing concern.” He winked before tugging her into an easy, one-armed embrace. The hard wall of muscled side was a far, far cry from the slim, lanky build she always associated with him. With his free hand, he gripped her chin in a firm hold and planted a loud, smacking kiss on her cheek.

To her shock, heat seared her skin, and she had to force herself to breathe normally. Still, she did exactly what she always had, making a show of scrubbing at her cheek with her sleeve, wrinkling her nose in disgust. “Ugh—must you insist on accosting me?”

Her tone was as light as always, his expression every bit as teasing. It was a scene they had engaged in for years. So why, oh why did she feel as though she was meeting him for the first time?

“Off you go, Ellie. No sense risking trouble merely to bask in the glory of my company a few moments longer.”

She’d do very well to remember that.

Chapter Four

WHEN NICK HAD PUSHED HIMSELF in his bid to make it home as soon as possible, it most certainly was not so he could find himself stuck in the midst of a house party. Yet, as he scanned the twenty or so guests mingling beneath the glittering chandeliers of the Manor’s impressive drawing room, he resigned himself to exactly that fate.

He cut his gaze to where Eleanor stood beside Malcolm, a smile fixed on her full lips as she greeted Lord Netherby. The man had gained at least two stone since the last time Nick had seen him, though apparently he was still attempting to fit into the same clothes. His expression was that of one inspecting a horse at Tattersall’s as his eyes freely roamed Eleanor’s figure.

Lecherous old codger. Would it be bad form to grab the man by his too-small jacket and toss him out on his ear? It didn’t help that Eleanor had changed into a perfectly fitted white and turquoise gown that suited her coloring just so. Never mind the other young women peppering the room—she stood out as the Incomparable she was.

She could have easily taken the ton by storm, had she decided to do so. Though he hated how she had come about her feelings on matrimony, he was glad for them nonetheless. It was the only thing that kept the jealousy at bay as she turned to greet yet another male guest.

In contrast to her polite but distant facade, Malcolm was thoroughly enjoying himself. Every time he moved on to another guest, he guided Eleanor around like a dog on a lead, his hand firmly grasping her upper arm.

Nick took a sip of wine, continuing his surveillance over the rim of the glass. His stepfather’s domineering ways didn’t surprise him, but Eleanor’s continued passivity did. She hardly looked like the same person he had met at the ruins earlier. In the morning gloom, she had stood straight, tall, and proud. He hated seeing her inner light squelched by Malcolm now. For a moment he considered intervening, but it would probably only serve to annoy her.

“Nicky, darling,” his mother said from behind him, “I must introduce you to Miss Landon.”

Suppressing a sigh, he turned and nodded to his mother. She was arm in arm with a pretty young blonde girl who smiled up at him with a shy smile.

“Miss Landon, allow me to introduce to you my son, Mr. Nicolas Norton. He is an officer in the militia, and he has only just returned yesterday after an extended absence. We are so thrilled to have him home safe.”

Nick bowed as the girl curtsied. “A pleasure to meet you, Miss Landon.”

A delicate pink blush touched the apples of her cheeks. “We’ve met before, Mr. Norton, though I doubt you would remember it. I was but a girl, and you were home from Cambridge for a few weeks.”

She looked to be ‘but a girl’ still, with rounded freckled cheeks and wide blue eyes. Though he would have sworn he didn’t know her from Eve, he smiled politely and said, “Well, it is good to see you all grown up.”

Mother patted her arm. “I had forgotten all about that. You’ve some catching up to do, then. Why don’t the two of you talk—I see Lord Henry is in want of conversation.” With a none-too-subtle wink at Nick, she floated away, waving her fingers at the widowed earl.

“Is this your first house party, then?” Nick asked, struggling to keep his attention on the girl when Eleanor was visible just over her shoulder.

“Indeed, sir.” She glanced around the room, surreptitiously taking in the other guests. “I must say, I’m feeling a bit out of place.”

“What, you don’t normally fraternize with old, yet politically important, men?”

Her cheeks turned scarlet, and she ducked her head. “I can scarce believe you said that,” she said, biting her lip against laughter. “I was referring to how very sophisticated everyone is—men and women.”

He waved his hand dismissively. “Sophisticated is just another word for old and boring. Though I will grant there are a few exceptions here tonight. Not many, but some.”

She giggled, covering her mouth with her hand. “Oh, do stop, Mr. Norton. My mother would have my head if she overheard this conversation.”

“Ah, but that is the beauty of a house party, Miss Landon. With my mother agreeing to be your chaperone, you are as good as free to do whatever you like.”

They both glanced at his mother, who was lifting a wine glass from a passing tray as she stood entirely too close to Henry.

“Regardless, I’m much too terrified of incurring my mother’s wrath to make even the smallest faux pas. It’s a long time until the Season—I’d rather not spend it listening to her lectures on propriety.”

“I’d be more worried about impropriety when you are with Nicolas, Miss Landon.” Eleanor, apparently having broken free of her jailor, grinned at the girl. “He can be quite the trouble-maker.”

“Noted, Miss Abbington,” she answered, returning the smile. “Mr. Norton, you must be on your best behavior around me.”

Nick offered the pair of them his most rakish look, making Miss Landon giggle and Eleanor roll her eyes.

“It shan’t work, Nick. Miss Landon is a friend, and I will not allow her to be fooled into believing you are the consummate gentlemen.”

It was a relief to see a spark of mischief glinting in her eyes. He affected his most solemn expression, shaking his head. “Have no fear, Miss Landon. I am a reformed man, courtesy of the army. If Eleanor wasn’t so busy playing the part of the social butterfly, she might have noticed what an utterly charming and devoted companion I am tonight. Isn’t that so?”

The girl went along with his teasing, nodding. “Yes, utterly.

Eleanor arched a dark eyebrow, “Somehow I’m not convinced. I suppose I shall have to take your very dubious word for it, since I’m much too busy to keep an eye on you this evening.”

Spreading his arms, he let a wicked grin turn up the corners of his mouth. “And yet, here you are.”

She opened her mouth to respond, but Malcolm interrupted, sidling between Nick and Eleanor. “Pardon me, but I’m afraid I must steal Eleanor away. There are many who wish to speak with you, my dear.”

The mere sound of his stepfather’s voice put Nick’s teeth on edge. Why was he acting as though Eleanor was his to command tonight?

Returning his stepfather’s false smile in spades, Nick said, “Yes, including Miss Landon and myself. I’m certain the others will expect her to mingle with everyone present, and we wouldn’t want Miss Landon to be neglected.”

It was only because he was watching that he caught the flash of surprise in Eleanor’s eyes. Before he could interpret whether she was pleased or not by his interference, Eleanor pasted the artificial smile back in place and raised her gaze to meet his. “Uncle Robert’s right, I should return to my duties. But it is so lovely to have you with us, Miss Landon. I do hope Nicolas will find it within him to be good company for you.”

Nick had to work to keep his expression neutral. What the devil had gotten into her lately? Why was she being so damned biddable? She may look perfectly content to others, but he knew her too well. He could see her strain in the way she held her mouth, and the dullness of her normally luminous brown eyes.

It made him want to shake her, to make her confide in him. Had her mother’s death changed her so much, or was it something else?

Pulling Eleanor away from them, Malcolm said, “I’m quite certain Norton can provide all the entertainment Miss Landon could hope for.” With a slight bow, he headed for Lord Shevington, pulling Eleanor along with him. Nick couldn’t help but be put in mind of a sacrificial lamb.

“Well, that was a bit awkward,” Miss Landon said, biting her lip as she looked after Eleanor.

“Indeed,” he murmured, narrowing his eyes in thought. Did Malcolm think he could use Ellie as some sort of pawn? He took a good hard look around the room. There were an inordinate number of members of the House of Lords present—several of whom were unmarried. There was no disguising the fact that this house party was meant to strengthen political bonds.

A thought occurred to him, one so distasteful he nearly crushed the stemware in his hand before he realized what he was doing. Did Malcolm have visions of marrying her off to one of these overly dry, mostly older men? Nick had no doubt that if his stepfather couldn’t get by on his politics, he’d use whatever weapon he had in his arsenal to get what he wanted.

And Nick would be damned if he’d let Eleanor be the man’s ammunition.

WITH A BLAND SMILE FIRMLY IN PLACE, Eleanor pretended to listen as Lord Shevington droned on about his hunting trip to Scotland last month. She couldn’t have cared less about the details of the hunt, but she was determined to appear to Uncle Robert that she was abiding by his ultimatum.

The very thought of his words poisoned her mood, and she swallowed against the lump that lodged in her throat. It had been over a day since Uncle Robert had thrown down the gauntlet, and absolutely no alternative had presented itself, no matter how much she tried to think of one.

She could refuse, make a fuss, cause a scandal—but all of them seemed to come back to her sister paying the price. Libby deserved a Season, blast it. More than that, she deserved the chance to decide her own future.

By God, Eleanor wouldn’t let her uncle steal that from her.

Laughter from across the room caught her attention, and she glanced to where Nick stood with Miss Landon and Lady Blackwell. Her brittle smile softened just a bit. It had been the highlight of her night when he had attempted to free her from her uncle’s control.

Or was it just that he enjoyed being contrary to his stepfather? That was more likely the case, but still, she appreciated the effort.

“Don’t you agree Miss Abbington?” Shevington blinked at her expectantly, his old-fashioned whiskers making him look like a squirrel begging for a nut.

“Of course,” she said with conviction, having no idea to what she was agreeing. Whatever it was, it made the man smile and carry on.

Sneaking a glance in Nicolas’s direction again, she was struck with an unexpected pang in the vicinity of her ribs as Miss Landon giggled at something he said. It was the oddest sensation—she’d never once felt jealously where Nick was concerned. He was a pest; surely she was just envious of their freedom. It had nothing to do with the brief touch of Miss Landon’s fingers to his sleeve, or the way he tilted his head toward her when he spoke.

Ugh—she had to get a hold of herself. This was Nick! The bane of her existence, her competitor, her own personal tag-along tormentor. Clearly Uncle Robert’s demands had addled her brain.

Speaking of which, she should be paying more attention to Shevington. A low burn deep in her chest nagged at her, threatening to turn to full-blown panic. The men she had met so far tonight either were old enough be her father, or worse—reminded her of him. Polished manners, polite smiles, but with a certain arrogant authority about them that could easily translate to overt possessiveness or unreasonable rage.

She shuddered, pushing back against the memories that threatened to surface at the thought of her father.

“Are you chilled, Miss Abbington? Shall I have a footman fetch you a wrap?”

Caught in her woolgathering, though thankfully he didn’t seem to recognize it as such. She purposefully relaxed her tense shoulders and smiled. “No thank you, my lord. I think perhaps I could use some refreshment.”

“Allow me to fetch you something to drink,” he replied, bowing his head before lumbering off in search of a servant.

Eleanor breathed a sigh of relief. Finally—a moment of peace. Of their own volition, her eyes strayed once more toward Nicolas. Miss Whittingham had joined them and was fluttering her eyelashes as though caught in a windstorm. Not that Eleanor blamed the girl for trying to flirt with him—he was the youngest man present. And his regimentals did rather stand out among the sea of somber jackets the other men wore.

“Eleanor,” Uncle Robert murmured from directly behind her, his hot breath uncomfortably damp against her ear, “I suggest you ignore your little friends and set your focus on the task at hand. Not that I mind choosing a husband for you.”

She turned, as much to escape his invasion of her space as anything. “I’m aware of what I should be doing,” she said through clenched teeth. At that moment, Shevington returned with a glass in each hand, and she gratefully accepted the one he held out to her.

She was beginning to understand why Aunt Lavinia liked spirits so well.

“DID YOU HAVE A GOOD EVENING, my dear?” Aunt Margaret, looking better than she had in days, smiled up at Eleanor from the chaise lounge nearest the windows. The drapes had been pulled wide to allow the morning sun to infuse the small, private sitting room they shared.

Eleanor mustered a tired smile as she tucked a blanket more securely around her aunt’s legs. “I certainly met a lot of people,” she hedged, settling into the chair closest the chaise. It didn’t seem particularly good form to respond, “I spoke with none but boring, self-important old men most of the evening, all the while chained to Uncle Robert’s side.”

The one and only highlight of the night had been just before she’d gone to bed. Nick had caught her on the stairs and murmured, “I do so love a good sunrise, don’t you, cousin? I shall enjoy it tomorrow at the start of the hunt, and perhaps the day after that in a more… private locale.”

Of course he could only mean the ruins. After the evening she had endured last night, the idea of pouring out her frustrations through her foil had tremendous appeal. She only wished they could have met this morning. But, with the hunt planned, such a thing would be impossible. At least the men would be gone for most of the morning and she could escape the need to endure the forced match making.

“Interesting, but not an answer to my question,” her aunt said, bringing Eleanor back to the conversation at hand. “I have met many people in my day, and not all of them served to enrich an evening.”

Eleanor’s smile was genuine. “You know me too well. All right, it was a passable evening. I spent most of the time speaking with Uncle Robert’s acquaintances.”

Her aunt’s thin white eyebrows rose, wrinkling her normally smooth forehead. “Heavens, whatever for? A drier group of men I cannot imagine. Were not Miss Landon and Miss Hollister present? Or even Lady Blackwell?”

“Oh, they were. And I was fortunate to have a few moments with each of them. But it was my mission to get to know Lords Henry, Netherby, and Shevington better.” A mission enforced relentlessly by Uncle Robert.

Aunt Margaret pursed her lips. “Lords… oh, I see. They are all bachelors, are they not?”

Good, she was catching on. “Indeed,” Eleanor responded with an ironic grin. She knew her aunt would understand exactly how distasteful such a proposition would have been for her.

Unaccountably, a soft smile brightened her aunt’s face. “I’m so very glad to hear it, my dear. Perhaps there is hope for you yet.”

Stunned, Eleanor blinked, trying not to show her dismay. Perhaps there was hope for me yet? Clearly Aunt Margaret mistook her conspiratorial grin for one of earnestness.

So the truth comes out.

Her heart sank low in her chest, weighed with disappointment and betrayal. Could not one of her relatives see that marriage wasn’t something Eleanor wanted? She had thought Aunt Margaret understood that, and that she liked having Eleanor around for her companion. In the back of her mind, she had hoped her aunt would raise an eyebrow and say, “How dreadful!” She had imagined confiding in the older woman and having the satisfaction of her gasping in outrage when she heard of her brother’s manipulation.

But no—apparently even she wished for Eleanor to drop her objections and marry. Her very soul ached with the knowledge. There truly was no one to champion her.

Oblivious to Eleanor’s distress, Aunt Margaret pushed aside the blanket and came to her feet. “I must say, I am feeling much improved this morning. I do believe I shall be fit to join you downstairs today.”

Eleanor nodded dully. “I shall inform the countess at once.”

It occurred to her as she stood and padded woodenly for the door that only one person had shown her any amount of support in the last few days.

The very last person she would have thought: Nicolas.

IF EVER THERE WAS A WORTHLESS WASTE OF TIME and perfectly good lead, it was surely grouse hunting. Nicolas stifled a yawn as he tramped through the underbrush a few yards back from the others. It was all so damned civilized and organized. Everyone walked forward, waited for the flock to be set to air, then shot at the lot of them as if there was any real sport in it. Already the day’s take numbered in the hundreds, and beaters were doing their damnedest to flush out stragglers.

Finally, a cluster of birds rose toward the low clouds, and gun after gun discharged. Sighing, he raised his weapon to his shoulder, aimed for a perfectly innocent looking cloud to the left of the flock, and fired.

There. Duty fulfilled. Three hundred birds bagged, twelve gentlemen entertained, and one tedious morning at an end.

“If that’s the best the army has to offer, old boy, it’s a wonder old Boney ever tasted defeat.” Handing over his gun to the servant beside him, Lord Henry laughed and walked over to where Nick stood.

Offering a good natured grin, Nick nodded. “Too right. I suppose it’s fortunate that humans are a much larger, less flighty target.” He wasn’t about to inform the man that he was as good a shot as any man present.

From half the field away, Malcolm’s head turned in their direction, his interest in their conversation clear. He quickly shoved his gun to his attendant and scurried over to join them. Scared Nick would say something politically ruinous, was he?

“What an excellent bag, Henry. You must have singlehandedly brought down four dozen birds today.”

The man’s chest puffed up as though such praise was the highest of possible compliments. “Well, your lands offered quite the bounty. I hope I’ll have the opportunity to join you again in the future.” He paused and gestured toward Nick. “Perhaps you can give your boy Norton here a lesson or two by then so he can keep up with us.”

The two older men shared a laugh, though Malcolm’s was harsh and devoid of humor. He was surely stewing at Nick being referred to as his boy. “Sadly, some simply aren’t born with a talent for sports—and they’re called women. What, exactly, is your excuse, Norton?” This brought on fresh laughter, setting Nick’s teeth on edge.

Forcing a pleasant smile, he said, “Must have been my pauper father. He spent his days toiling in the courts and had little time for the finer gentlemanly pursuits. By the time Malcolm took me in, I fear it was too late.”

It wasn’t quite true—his father was a respected barrister who enjoyed the occasional hunting trip. That, however, wouldn’t have needled Malcolm nearly as much. In his eyes, Nick’s father might as well have been a clerk. Reminding his guests of his stepson’s humble origins meant bringing attention to a black smudge on his noble family lineage. Already Nick was reaping the rewards of the comment as his stepfather’s eyes narrowed in ill-concealed fury.

Nick grinned. Malcolm could consider it repayment for the way he’d treated Eleanor last night. It little mattered that the man wouldn’t realize it. Nick had scored a point against him, and that was good enough for now.

“Damned pity,” Henry said, shaking his head as they started back toward the house. “I wonder, is your son a good shot?”

“The best. The boy’s a natural.”

Lord Henry chuckled, clasping his hands behind his back. “Just like his father. Speaking of your excellent family relations, I do hope I’ll have the opportunity to enjoy more time with Miss Abbington. She is quite a lovely young woman.”

Nick stiffened, his jaw clenching at the mention of Eleanor. Already she had spent too much of her time with the man. She hadn’t looked particularly pleased by it, but she had made no efforts to disengage. He couldn’t help the grimace that idea wrought—the man was old enough to be her father!

But as vehemently opposed to the idea as Nick was, Malcolm appeared absolutely delighted. Clasping the earl on the back, he nodded. “Nothing would please me—or her—more.”

Chapter Five

“WHAT IF I WERE TO SEEK EMPLOYMENT?”

Metal pinged against metal as Eleanor parried Nick’s rather sneaky advance-lunge. He was quite nimble for the early hour. Perhaps he too had woken with the burn of anticipation for their match.

He lifted an eyebrow as he retreated, raising his foil once more. “Are there very many opportunities for mediocre female fencers?”

Invigorated by their play, she grinned for the first time that morning, shaking her head. “My, don’t we think we’re clever. All that overt female attention these past two days must have fooled you into believing you were actually witty, and not just the only man present under the age of thirty.”

“And here I thought you liked all those old codgers. You’re certainly spending enough time with them.” The grin was in place, but his tone was more biting than usual.

“Yes, because I have so much choice in the matter.” She saw an opening and took it, executing a perfect raddoppio before thrusting her point into his ribs. It went a long way toward venting her frustration.

Nick grimaced and fell back, rubbing a hand over the wound. “Good hit,” he conceded, offering a quick salute of his blade.

“Thank you. And I was thinking of becoming a companion,” she said, returning to the point of the conversation. It was wishful thinking; it wasn’t as though she could simply leave and take her sister with her.

“Do you think someone would actually pay you to keep them company? I should think they would pay for the opposite.” The last word came out on a whoosh of air as he attacked. Their blades carried on the conversation for the moment until he slipped past her defenses and tagged her hip.

Falling back to catch her breath, she finally answered him. “If that worked, you’d be a wealthy man by now.”

“Touche,” he said, chuckling lightly. “I suppose Aunt Margaret might be inclined to pay you, if you should insist.”

Fresh disappointment settled on her shoulders and she lowered her foil. “I don’t think so. At the moment, she’s just as enamored as Uncle Robert at the prospect of marrying me off.”

“Don’t be silly,” he scoffed, his words clipped. “They know as well as I do that you’ll not be falling into the parson’s trap. Plus there’s the issue of finding a man to put up with you,” he added, giving her a light, teasing tap beneath her chin with the blunted tip of his blade.

She tensed, hating even speaking of the hopelessness of the situation. “You’re wrong. They can’t wait to foist me off on the highest bidder.”

The teasing light faded from his eyes. “Is that what this tension in the house has been all about? They want for you to marry, despite your wishes?”

She gave a curt nod.

Giving an exaggerated roll of his eyes, he said, “Then tell them to go to the devil and move on. Stop acting like a docile pony and stand up for yourself.”

She stiffened. Just who did he think he was? “It’s not that easy. And I don’t appreciate the analogy.”

“Then stop being so damned analogous. Find that elusive thing called a backbone and fight them on this. I know Malcolm. He’ll be angry, but it’s not as though he’ll toss you out on the street, for God’s sake. This family doesn’t work that way.”

She should be so lucky. She’d take that any day over her uncle’s true threats. For a moment she considered telling him everything, pouring out the full extent of the turmoil brewing within, but what good would that do? He’d only dismiss her worries, just as he was dismissing them now. “You don’t know anything about what he’d do.”

“Don’t I?” he said, quirking a brow in challenge. “If anyone would be tossed out on the street, don’t you think it would be me?”

Where had that come from? “What are you talking about?”

He jabbed his blade’s point into the earth, resting his hand loosely on the hilt. “A mongrel like me? With no lineage or noble blood to speak of? He’d sooner be cleaved to the plague.”

He actually seemed to mean it. Cocky, arrogant, self-satisfied Nick, speaking of himself as though he were a blight on his family? This was uncharted territory for them, this gravity. She honestly didn’t know whether to take him seriously or not. “Come now,” she said, falling back on their usual banter. “A Frenchman, perhaps, but certainly not the plague.”

“Do you have any idea how much money that man has spent in the sole pursuit of keeping me as far from his home as he can manage?” He snorted, shaking his head. “Harrow, Cambridge, even the bloody army. It’s a wonder he didn’t try to bribe an infantryman to ‘accidentally’ discharge his weapon in my direction.”

Eleanor shifted, unsure of what to say. He seemed genuinely distressed, but knowing him, he was probably just setting her up for some scathingly witty rejoinder. “My, my—who knew you were fit for Drury Lane?”

Extracting his blade, he pointed the buttoned tip of his foil toward her chest. “Right. You’re waxing on about being tossed out the window like the contents of a chamber pot, and I’m the one being dramatic?”

Her brows came together defensively. Of the two of them, she was by far the most sensible. “I’m not being dramatic. And I’m not talking about being tossed out. I’m facing facts.”

Letting the weapon fall to his side, he gave her a patently disbelieving look. “And what convoluted ‘fact’ is that? That Malcolm will actually march you down to the church alter, forcing you to marry or else?”

The very thought made her stomach churn. It was exactly the scenario she feared would happen. “Yes,” she ground out.

“Eleanor, this is ridiculous. You don’t have to marry.” He spoke with such conviction, she almost believed him.

Sometimes, very rarely, a side of him came out that almost made her feel as though he was on her side. Protective of her, even.

“I don’t have a choice, Nicolas. Either I choose a husband, or Uncle Robert will do it for me.”

NICK SAW RED—AND IT WASN’T JUST THE BREAKING DAWN, which turned the sky a violent crimson. Gripping his foil so tightly his hand ached, he stepped toward her. “He said that?”

She pressed her lips together and nodded. “Right after I turned down Lord Kensington’s offer of marriage only days ago.”

Bloody hell—Malcolm had gone too far this time. He’d be damned if he let his stepfather get away with this. There was a certain amount of selfishness in his reasons, but more than anything, Nick didn’t want Eleanor to be forced into the one thing she feared most. Anger burned in his gut, heating his blood.

“The man’s a damn fool.”

“That may be the case, but he also is the head of this family.” She lifted those big brown eyes up to him, the effect of which was amazingly similar to a kick in the gut. “At least with you he was content to throw money at the problem. His only solution with me is to guarantee ruining my life, no matter which way I choose.”

A light breeze tugged at the loosened hair around her face, pulling the raven strands across her too-pale skin. He had the maddest desire to comb the silky strands back with his fingers and kiss her for real. Not the playful kisses he always demanded from her as payment, but a true kiss that would steal her breath and completely override the worry that turned down the edges of her cupid-bow lips.

And he knew exactly how worried she must be. After the way her bastard father had treated her mother, marriage was about as attractive to her as running naked through Mayfair.

“I would never let him ruin your life, Ellie.” The words were too charged, too honest. She glanced up sharply and he forced a smile. “Where else could I find another dreadful fencing partner to make me look so good?”

She rolled her eyes. “Very funny. You could hardly influence his choice of tea, let alone what he wants to do with me.”

Damn it all—he wished she would have a little faith in him. Yes, he was younger than her, and yes, theirs had been an unconventional relationship, but didn’t she realize he would walk through fire for her?

No, of course she didn’t, because he would never let her know such a thing. To her, he would always be the inferior, annoying little boy his mother had foisted on the family. A sparing partner, both verbally and otherwise, who provided small entertainment and great annoyance, by her own description.

No, she would see no rescue from him. So he had to do the next best thing: show her that she could save herself. Which from the look of it would be quite the undertaking. She stood there, already defeated, her brow wrinkled with worry as if she had no hope left in her life. That made him even angrier than Malcolm’s asinine pronouncement.

Where was his little fighter? Where was the girl who had taken to combat like a bird to the sky, for no other reason than to have it out with him? Dropping back into fighting position, he whipped up his blade. “En garde,” he demanded.

She stared at him in confusion, her foil still idle at her side. “Nick—”

“En garde,” he barked again, swishing his weapon through the air in warning.

Warily, she raised her foil and planted her feet. He sprang into action, lunging at full force. She yelped and stumbled backward, glaring at him.

“What was that for?”

He didn’t answer. Instead he engaged, forcing her to defend herself or be struck. She didn’t disappoint. After a few hits, she started to get angry, her cheeks gaining color and her eyes narrowing in fierce concentration. That’s when she really began to fight. The clash of metal against metal rang through the morning air, punctuated by harsh breathing and grunts of exertion. Around them, the red light of dawn grew brighter and brighter, but he had no intention of relenting, not yet.

“What… has … gotten … into you!” She ground out through clenched teeth as her foil whipped left and right, parrying his attacks.

“Shut up and fight,” he growled, punctuating the words with powerful hits. They danced back and forth, their feet moving over the rocky ground almost in unison. Sweat poured down his face and dampened his shirt, but still he didn’t let up. He wasn’t going to coddle her, damn it. He wanted her to work, to be forced to battle as if their lives depended on it.

As she retreated from his lunge, she stumbled over a rock, falling hard on her backside. “Ow! Nick, wait—!”

But he didn’t wait. Dirt flew as she scrambled away from him, abandoning her weapon. Oh no, he wasn’t about to let her give up. He kicked the foil back at her, waiting for her to pick it up. Frustration came off her in waves as she reclaimed it and struggled to her feet, sucking in gusts of air. She jerked a hand through her hair, scraping the fallen strands back from her sweaty face.

With a warrior yell, she came at him, her swings even stronger, her precision more deadly. Again and again she jabbed and slapped her blade against him, even tearing his shirt at the shoulder. This was more like it. This was a woman on fire, damn it. He met her swing for swing, making her work for every small point.

“Getting a little angry, are we?” he said, forcing the arrogant smile he knew she hated.

“Yes,” she fairly growled, advancing again and again. Finally, she was giving it all she had. She was focused, and driven—furious as a caged lioness—and every bit as glorious as a Greek goddess of war. Her cheeks were red, her eyes flashing. Her body was all that was powerful yet graceful. He’d never seen her so passionate, and he loved it.

Again and again she forced him backward, forced him to yield to her onslaught. As his back smacked against the ruins of the old abbey wall, he jarred to a stop, losing his grip on his weapon. His foil clattered to the ground between them.

For a moment they just stared at each other, their shoulders heaving as they panted for air. And then her eyes grew wide with shock as she realized what this meant. She’d beat him. For the first time ever, she had won. Eleanor pointed her blade directly at his heart, as the certainty of victory visibly engulfed her.

He’d never been so proud of anyone in his entire life; he was nearly bursting with the force of it. “That’s the girl I wanted to see. You’re a fighter, Elle; never forget it. Malcolm can’t take from you what you refuse to let him have.”

She stood stock still, her gaze assessing as she worked to calm her breathing. At that moment, the sun crested over the horizon, illuminating the pride in her eyes. God, but she was gorgeous. Had anyone ever looked more beautiful with messy hair and a dirt-streaked face?

“If you tell me,” she said sternly, “that this was all meant to teach me some sort of lesson, I may very well plunge this foil into your heart, Nicolas Norton.”

He chuckled before dragging his sleeve over his sweaty forehead. “Bloodthirsty wench.” Grabbing her foible, he pulled the weapon from her grasp. She didn’t fight him, easily surrendering her hold. He dropped it to the ground beside his own, and held out his hand to her. “Come here.”

“I will not,” she said, straightening her shoulders imperiously. “In case you didn’t notice, I won.”

It was all he could do not to tug her into his arms right then. “Yes, and as such, you may collect your spoils, same as I always have.” He turned his cheek, screwing up his face just as she invariably did whenever he claimed his prize, pretending he didn’t want her to kiss him.

Hoping like hell she would.

Her laughter was full of delight, heady in its sweetness. “Do you know, Mr. Norton, for the first time in your life, I think you may have earned a kiss.”

ELEANOR STEPPED TOWARD HIM, feeling strong and in control in a way she hadn’t in days. Years perhaps. Nothing was solved, but hope had been renewed. Faith in herself had been restored. She could at least try for another solution. Nick had given her that much, and for that she adored him.

For the next few moments, at least—then they could return to being adversaries.

With his damp shirt plastered to his body, he looked every bit the gladiator, standing tall and proud on the heels of victory. Ironic, considering he had lost, but still somehow fitting. She hadn’t been exaggerating—he had truly earned a reward.

As she leaned forward, his chest rose with a sharp intake of air. She flicked her gaze from his cheek to his expression, and froze, only inches away. His green eyes were burning, his lips slightly parted. Awareness washed over her, cascading through her veins and landing deep in her belly. All at once the moment took on a whole new meaning.

She wasn’t just sharing an innocent moment with her step-cousin. She was standing almost chest-to-chest with a tall, powerful, handsome-as-sin man.

Alone.

Her heart slammed against her ribs, pounding harder than it had during their entire match. His smell was familiar, his eyes exactly as they had always been, but somehow everything seemed different.

Slowly, deliberately he turned his head until they faced each other directly, the very air they breathed mingling in the narrow space between them. The morning light caressed them as they stood completely still, unable to look away. She knew it should feel wrong—this was Nicolas!—but nothing had ever felt more natural.

Her eyes dropped to his lips. For once they were without any hint of that rakish smile with which he so loved to torture her. He’d always seemed so young, but all she could see right then was the man he had become.

A man her very heart seemed to be beating for.

And yet, still neither of them moved. A sixth sense told her that as soon as they did, nothing would ever be the same. He would never again be little Nick, thorn in her side. Uncertainty warred with unfamiliar passion, and she dragged her gaze up to meet his, helpless as to what to do.

For a moment, she thought he would act, pressing his lips to hers and releasing the desire that both tantalized and terrified her. She held her breath, afraid to so much as blink. How was it possible she could want something so badly, and at the same time want to escape, to run from the emotions she wasn’t prepared for?

Finally, he closed his eyes and exhaled, surely every drop of air from his lungs. When he opened them again, it was as if a curtain had been drawn shut. “Fine, fine—I’ll give you a reprieve. I know deep down you’re just afraid you’ll never measure up to my outstanding kisses.” His voice was hoarse, but the smile was firmly in place. “Now off with you, before someone discovers us and ruins all our fun.”

He was right. Already, the sun was well above the horizon, the sky transitioning from reds to pinks. Nodding, she bent to retrieve her foil, trying to convince herself that it was relief, not regret, that wilted her shoulders. Whatever madness had seized her, it was gone now.

Or so she told herself.

Turning on her heel, she hurried toward the dirt path that led to the house, wanting to put distance between them, to cut the odd connection that even now tempted her to turn back.

With her future at stake, she simply couldn’t afford to be diverted by the man who had long been her opponent, but who now seemed like so much more.

Chapter Six

GOD IN HEAVEN, what had just happened?

Nick slumped down the wall, dropping to his backside and letting his head fall back against the cool stones of the old tumbledown wall. His blood still roared in his ears—as well as in other places—and he raked his hands through his hair, digging his fingers into his scalp.

What the hell was wrong with him? If she had any clue how he truly felt about her, she’d never allow them to be alone together again. Perhaps not even in the same bloody room. He gave a humorless laugh. How could he have let his control slip so thoroughly?

Because of her.

For the first time in fifteen years, she had been about to kiss him. Of her own prerogative. When she’d declared her intention, he’d been so surprised, he couldn’t stop his reaction. How could he? It was something he’d dreamed about for so long, he couldn’t bloody well remember a time he hadn’t wanted it.

But this wasn’t about him. It wasn’t about the desire coursing through his body, or the secret longing he had hid so effectively for years. This was about Eleanor having what she wanted in life; or more to the point, what she didn’t want: a husband.

He closed his eyes, shaking his head back and forth. He’d do whatever it took to protect her from getting hurt. Yes, he wanted to instill self-confidence in her once more, but after that near kiss, he wasn’t leaving anything to chance. He’d be damned if he’d let another man claim her against her will.

If Malcolm thought he could strong arm her into doing his bidding, he had another thing coming. The trick was Nick had to come up with a way to keep her from being married off, without giving Malcolm the chance to blame her.

Drawing in a deep breath, he came to his feet and straightened his shoulders. It was time to go to battle.

IF UNCLE ROBERT SENT ONE MORE SELF-SATISFIED LOOK in her and Lord Henry’s direction, Eleanor was going to scream, right there in the middle of Miss Landon’s song. And wouldn’t that put a damper on his plans. She allowed a small smile at the thought.

The earl leaned closer from his seat to the right of her and murmured uncomfortably close to her ear, “I’m so pleased to see you enjoying yourself, Miss Abbington. My late wife, bless her, never was one for these sorts of amusements.” He fluttered a hand in the vicinity of his forehead. “Megrims.”

Possibly. Eleanor was more inclined to believe the dearly departed countess was simply more skilled at escaping his company than she. She nodded politely and leaned away as inconspicuously as she could manage.

It wasn’t that he was unkind, but he possessed the conversation skills of a parrot. Not to mention he seemed to think her eyes were located somewhere in the region of her breasts, or the fact that he was exceptionally fond of onions, the evidence of which emanated from him like a fog.

She really didn’t dislike him, but the idea of marriage to him made her physically ill. And blast it all, Nicolas was right. She didn’t have to bow to Uncle Robert’s demands, nor did her sister have to suffer the consequences. There had to be a way to get around them, and she wouldn’t rest until she figured out what that was. Perhaps she should have shared with Nick exactly what she was dealing with. He’d surprised her a lot since returning home; maybe he’d be able to surprise her again by coming up with a solution.

For perhaps the tenth time since the recital began, Eleanor cut her gaze toward the side wall, where he stood alone, watching the performance. She still had no idea what to make of what had happened between them this morning. Or more accurately, what hadn’t happened. All she knew for certain was that every time she thought of him, her cheeks heated and a shower of sparks seemed to cascade through her middle.

As if he sensed her thoughts, Nick shifted his gaze, catching her with God knew what expression on her face. She jerked her attention back to the front of the room, her heart beating like mad. Good heavens, she had to get hold of herself. She was acting like a proper fool there in the drawing room for anyone to see.

And truly, there were much more important things to think about.

Beside her, Aunt Margaret hummed along with the music, her head bobbing in time with the pianoforte tune. Eleanor still didn’t know what to do about her aunt. It was a sort of betrayal, knowing that her own mother’s sister had thought her hopeless these past few years. They were supposed to be each other’s support.

The song came to an end, and Miss Landon curtseyed prettily as the guests clapped. Eleanor stood, hoping to steal a few moments for herself, but Lord Henry blocked her way. “Miss Abbington,” he said, his cheeks oddly ruddy, “Would you care to step out onto the terrace with me? The night air shall do us both good after an evening indoors.”

Drat it all—why couldn’t he see she wasn’t interested in spending time with him? Not that she could overtly offend him, but still, one would think her disinterest would speak for itself. “Oh, how kind. But my aunt and I were just about to take a turn about the room.” She widened her eyes at her aunt, willing her to go along. It had just come out—a holdover from when she could rely on Aunt Margaret’s support.

Blinking in surprise, the older woman hesitated for an instant before turning a bright smile to Lord Henry. “Yes, yes, I thought a bit of exercise would be just the thing after sitting for so long.”

Eleanor sighed. Thank goodness.

“There you are, dear sister,” Uncle Robert cut in, sidling up behind them. “I wonder if I might steal you away for a moment. I have… something that I wish to discuss.” Though he smiled cordially, his eyes were sharp enough to cut glass. “Lord Henry, you wouldn’t mind keeping my niece company, would you?”

“Delighted, old man. I was just saying a bit of air on the terrace sounded like just the thing.” He lifted a brow at Eleanor. “Shall we?”

Blast, blast, blast. To refuse would be the height of rudeness. Now was not the time to make a scene. Dipping her head in reluctant agreement, she said, “Indeed.”

As she and Lord Henry started for the doors, her eyes met with Nick’s. He stood beside Miss Landon as she chattered away, her cheeks rosy and her face alight with delight. Eleanor felt the heat of his gaze all the way to her toes, but then he abruptly turned away, severing the connection as he gave his whole attention to his companion.

Hurt flooded her heart even as she smiled her thanks to Lord Henry for opening the door for her. Despite herself, she’d been begging Nick to help, to somehow intervene. She had no right to be upset, but it still stung that he had turned his back on her—literally.

Warm, sweetly fragranced air greeted her as she stepped outside. She allowed Lord Henry to guide her to the ornamental balustrade overlooking the rose garden, which, thanks to a series of torches along the outer wall, was well enough lit so as to not seem overly intimate.

“Miss Abbington,” he said, surprising her by boldly taking her gloved hand in his. “It’s no secret I came to this party with an eye toward beginning the search for my next wife. With only my three daughters, I am still very much in need of an heir. At my age, the thought of marrying a young debutant seems a somewhat distasteful. You, on the other hand, have the maturity and lineage to be quite an appropriate match.”

Even through her growing alarm, Eleanor still managed to be insulted. Yes, at four-and-twenty she was the perfect match for a man with four and a half decades under his belt. Gently but firmly she tried to extract her hand from his grasp, to no avail.

Chuckling indulgently, he said, “No need to worry, my dear. I have already spoken with your uncle, and obtained his permission to ask you to be my wife. Such an intimacy is to be expected.” He lowered his head slightly, and she exhaled in an effort to ward off the smell of his breath. “Besides, Malcolm told me how favorably inclined you were to accept my suit. I’m honored that you think well enough of me to approach your uncle about such a thing.”

Alarm catapulted into panic as her blood turned to ice. She was supposed to have more time—she wasn’t properly prepared yet.

“Lord Henry, I…” Her mind went blank as she desperately cast about for a proper response—one that would not result in a betrothal announcement.

He squeezed her hand and grinned. “I can see you are quite beside yourself. To be expected, I think. Perhaps we shall bypass words for a moment.”

Bypass words? What did— Oh heaven help her, he was leaning in for a kiss. Eleanor tensed, her mind flailing about for a way to escape.

“There you are.”

The sharp, jovial words made them startle apart, and Eleanor stumbled backward a few steps, desperate for space. Nick stood at the door, outlined by the blazing candles of the drawing room behind him. He stepped toward them, his muscled shoulders ramrod straight and his hands clasped behind his back. His features were arranged in polite greeting, but his eyes blazed in the torchlight. “Lord Henry, my stepfather asked that I retrieve you. He had a most pressing matter which he feels must be discussed at once.”

Eleanor sucked in great gusts of air, trying to regain her composure. Nick had never looked more handsome, more like a savior than he did in that moment, especially with his smart crimson army dress jacket.

“Now? Can you tell him I’ll be in momentarily?” Henry sounded as befuddled as she felt.

Nick lifted his chin in a gesture designed to showcase his authority. “I’m afraid he was most insistent, my lord. I’ll wait here with my cousin while you see to him. She’ll be here when you return.”

For the first time, Eleanor could imagine him dressing down one of his men. He emanated power and superiority with little more than a stern expression and commanding voice. Henry glanced back at Eleanor for a moment, clearly unsure of what to do. She found a smile, heaven knew where from, and nodded encouragingly. “Do hurry back.”

She held her breath as he hesitated, willing him to leave. A moment later he relented. “Very well. I’ll be only a moment.” He offered a dip of his head before hurrying inside.

Oh thank God. She released her breath, sagging against the balustrade. That had been a very near thing. She turned her attention to her unlikely hero and offered him a wan smile. “I shall never be able to repay you for your timing. Or Uncle Robert’s timing, I suppose.”

He stepped closer to her, tilting his head but never taking his eyes from her. “Oh? And why is that?”

“Because he just asked me to marry him,” she exclaimed, putting a hand to her heart. “I, I didn’t know what to say, and then he was leaning toward me and I was so flustered that I didn’t know what to do and then…” She trailed off, shaking her head.

He took another step. “And then …?”

She sucked in a cleansing breath and peered up at him. “You were there.”

His eyes were piercing in the near darkness. “Because you needed me.”

“Yes. But I thought …” She pictured him, turning away from her pleas as she’d silently begged for his help.

“What did you think?”

Her heart pounded and she couldn’t even say why. “That you turned your back on me. That you put me from your mind.” But she’d been wrong. He was here now, there when she needed him most.

“Never,” he said, the single word rife with conviction. “But I did have to make my excuses.” He stepped nearer still, bringing them at once entirely too close together and not nearly close enough. He lifted her hand from the stone railing and guided her around so she stood between him and the house.

The torchlight danced in his eyes and bathed his skin in a warm, golden glow. He looked…determined. Decided. But not altogether sure of himself. Instead of releasing her hand, he raised it to his lips and placed a soft, gentle kiss to her knuckles. Awareness raced down her back in a flurry of gooseflesh—he had never done such a thing before. His kisses were to mock, not to soothe. To tease and provoke, never to show care or affection.

The old Nick, the one who had left two years ago and gone to the army, was fading fast from her memory. In his place was this man. Capable of tenderness and seriousness. Of being her champion.

When he lifted his head, his gaze flicked to just over her shoulder before meeting hers. “Do you trust me?”

There was an edge to his voice that wasn’t there moments earlier. “Should I?” She didn’t know what he was asking, but she knew instinctually that it was important.

“Probably not.”

A ghost of a smile slipped over her lips. “Then you should not ask it of me.”

“Then can you at least forgive me?” he asked, lacing his fingers with hers with an urgency that made her pulse quicken.

Forgive him? Confusion at his words warred with an unexpected rush of desire at his touch, robbing her of her wits. “What—”

But he didn’t give her a chance to complete her sentence. With a sharp tug, he pulled her flat against his chest and before she could do little more than gasp, his lips crashed down upon hers. A thousand butterflies set flight in her stomach—her first kiss! She moaned with the pure pleasure of it. His lips were deliciously warm, and fit against hers as if they’d been molded for each other. The smell of his skin was like a drug, sending ribbons of pleasure through her whole body.

It was perfection. Even better, if that was possible.

Her Nicolas, her opponent for so many years had somehow turned into the man who made her heart sing and her toes curl with one utterly searing kiss.

He guided her hands to the hard plane of his upper chest, pressing them in place before dropping his own hold to her waist. He pulled back slightly and whispered against her lips, “I’m sorry.”

Sorry? Bewilderment stilled her body, and a heartbeat later he launched himself backwards, as if pushed by an unseen force. She blinked, her eyes wide as she struggled to make sense out of what was happening.

“Good God,” a male voice roared from behind her, “What is the meaning of this?”

Chapter Seven

IF LOOKS COULD KILL, Nick would have been a smoldering pile of ashes on the flagstone. Malcolm nearly glowed with red hot anger, his face contorted with the force of his fury. Beside him Lord Henry stood frozen, his shock congealing into horror. Already faces were appearing in the window as people rushed to see what the disturbance was about.

Nick picked himself up off the ground and brushed off his soiled clothes. “Malcolm, Henry.”

“Explain yourself,” his stepfather demanded, stalking over to where Eleanor leaned against the railing, both hands covering her mouth.

Nick couldn’t meet her eyes. Not yet. Shrugging, he said, “I thought to steal a kiss. The lady thought otherwise.” His tone was lazy, insolent even, despite the emotion burning in his veins.

The kiss was meant to be a means to an end: ruin Eleanor’s marriage prospect, without her taking any blame. To let Malcolm’s wrath fall on his head, not hers. But that was before their lips touched. Before the whole world had so completely ceased to exist, and the woman he had loved for years had actually leaned into the kiss. Before he’d tasted her, or felt her thundering heartbeat.

“I ought to—”

“Lord Malcolm,” Aunt Margaret interrupted, pushing through the crowd to where they stood. “Perhaps this is a discussion to be held in private.”

She put her arm around Eleanor and tried to guide her away, but Ellie resisted. “No, I should go with them. This isn’t what it looks like.”

Nick started to speak, to say something that would keep her from ruining his efforts, but Aunt Margaret beat him to it. “Not now, dear,” the older woman said through gritted teeth. “You’ll have time for that later.” She forcefully pushed Eleanor to the house, glancing back only once before disappearing inside. He’d never seen Eleanor’s skin so pale, and for a moment guilt assailed him.

No, he refused to feel guilty. He knew when he came out here that he would be hurting the rest of his family, as well as Eleanor. But he could think of no other plan to free her from Malcolm’s dictates. There would be hell to pay—his stepfather would make sure of it—but Nick would not regret this night.

“In my study,” Malcolm ground out, then turned on his heel and marched inside.

Obedient as a lapdog, Nick followed behind him, allowing a small self-satisfied grin to curl his lips as he walked through the gathered guests. He had a part to play: ruinous rake, not to be trusted with delicate English maidens.

They passed his mother as they strode through the drawing room. Her eyes were red, her gaze unfocused as she smiled in confusion at the pair of them. She raised her glass, saying after them, “My two favorite men, together at last,” before draining the contents in one drink.

Drunk again—what a bloody surprise. She never had been there to stand up for him when he was growing up, when the disdain for her own husband had nearly crushed him. Why should anything change now?

Once in the study, the door hadn’t even clicked closed before Malcolm turned on him, eyes burning with fiery resentment. “You filthy bastard—you did this on purpose.”

“Purposely kissed her? Yes, no denying that.”

Malcolm slammed a palm against the surface of his desk. “Ruined her chances with Henry! You could have kissed her a thousand times in a thousand different places—you purposely set out to destroy what I worked so hard to bring together.”

“’What God hath brought together, let no man set asunder?’ Sorry, but your plans had little consequence on my actions, old man.”

“This is all some sort of bloody game to you, isn’t it? See what you can do to drag the Earl of Malcolm down to your level?”

Of course he would think that. As if Nick had ever wanted anything for or from the man, other than a little respect. Perhaps a kind word or two. Instead, all he’d had was ill-concealed disgust. “Oh, looks like you caught me.”

“You pathetic excuse for a man. Congratulations, you’ve made me a laughingstock. Any hope of Eleanor making a good match has been destroyed.”

Good. “Come now—I wouldn’t say that. Now that I have claimed the fair maiden’s kiss, I suppose I could marry her.” His chest tightened as if wrapped with steel bands. He’d love nothing more than to do exactly that, just as he knew Eleanor would like nothing less. By making such a statement, there was no better way to insure that Malcolm would never let it happen.

Nostrils flaring like a taunted bull, Malcolm shook his head in disgust. “Over my dead body. You’ve always been jealous of the natural children of this family. You never could handle the fact they are superior to you in every way possible.”

Nick bit down on his tongue, hard. William, Libby, and Eleanor were the best things that had ever happened to him. Despite the fact William was years younger and given all the privilege his status as heir required, he had never been anything but a brother to Nick. As for Eleanor… This was all for her. He had to hold his tongue, no matter how much he ached to fight back.

Nick tilted his head as if considering the charge, then shrugged. “Perhaps.”

Malcolm stilled. “I should call you out. If it wasn’t political suicide, I would do just that.”

Doubtful; Malcolm knew he could never win in a duel with Nick.

The earl walked behind his desk and sat, inspecting Nick as if he were the foulest of creatures. “As of this moment, you are expelled from this family. I hereby banish you from this house and from any other property I own. If you try to step foot on even a square inch of my land, I will have you thrown in gaol. Furthermore, I forbid you to see your mother, or any other member of this family.”

A boulder settled deep in Nick’s gut, making it hard to breath. He gritted his teeth, struggling to maintain a neutral expression. If this was the price of restoring Eleanor’s choices for her own life, than so be it.

Malcolm leaned forward over his desk, resting his elbows on the polished wood and lacing his fingers in front of him. “And lastly,” he said, a hint of malevolent pleasure lifting one side of his lip in a sneer, “a letter will go out in tomorrow’s post addressed to my solicitor. By this time next week, your commission will have been sold.

“Welcome to the life you should have had, Norton. I hope you choke on it.”

AUNT MARGARET PACED from one side of the room to the other, her face drawn with worry as her fingers mangled a lace handkerchief. “I don’t understand, Eleanor. Why on earth would he have done such a thing? Ruining your chances like that,” she said, shaking her head. “He has always been a bit of a scoundrel, but I always felt he was a gentleman at heart.”

Heedless of her fine silk gown, Eleanor sat in a heap on the settee, pressing a pillow to her middle. The myriad of emotions rushing through her all at once made it hard to think, let alone make sense of what had just happened. What should she do? What did this mean for her sister and her?

Her heart ached bitterly. What on earth had Nicholas been thinking? She wouldn’t be surprised if Malcolm met him at dawn over this. Peering up to her aunt, she shook her head. “He was trying to save me.”

If only she had told Nicolas the whole truth of the situation. Eleanor squeezed her eyes shut. He may have had some ridiculous notion of helping her, but what if Libby was the one forced to pay the price?

Aunt Margaret stopped dead in her tracks. “Save you? From what?”

“From having to marry Lord Henry.”

She blinked, dumbfounded. “But you wanted to marry. You told me yourself you were finally interested.”

It was Eleanor’s turn to be at a loss. “What? No, I didn’t want to marry. Uncle Robert was forcing me to. You know how I feel about marriage after Mama and Papa.”

Aunt Margaret put a hand to her mouth. She looked beyond appalled. “Oh my dear! I had no idea. I thought at long last you had changed your mind. I thought you had finally seen the goodness marriage can hold.”

She’d been on Eleanor’s side after all? Something inside of her eased, making things just a little less awful. “No—I mean, I’m sure that it can be, but I never wanted to risk it.”

“Then why—?”

“Because Uncle threatened that if I didn’t, he would summon Libby from school, forcing her to marry instead.” The words burned her throat like whisky.

The fury in her aunt’s eyes was a balm to her soul. “Over my dead body.”

Eleanor gasped—it was the most passion she’d seen in her aunt since Mama died. She seemed fully alive again, like the formidable woman she had once been.

“He ruined your mother’s life by forcing her to marry your father. She was determined that you and your sister would not suffer the same fate. Before your debut, she made Robert swear that you and Libby would be free to choose your own husbands—if you even wanted one at all.”

Eleanor swallowed against the emotion that clogged her throat. Mama had done that for her?

A small, unexpected smile deepened the lines bracketing her aunt’s thin lips. “She threatened if he didn’t, she would marry a Whig and take up the plight of the working class, handing out pamphlets on the street if need be. She would have done it too, I swear to it. Robert realized it as well; I was right there when he finally gave his word.”

He had agreed? He had given Eleanor’s mother his word, only to break it the moment it suited him? Anger flared to life deep within her, heating her blood and searing her resolve. She thought of Nick, standing up for her in his own convoluted way, now being subjected to her uncle’s fury.

This wasn’t his fight—it was hers. It was past time Uncle Robert was subjected to her wrath, not the other way around. Hadn’t Nick just shown her how strong she could be? “I have to go,” she said suddenly, unable to sit idle for even one more moment.

“Wait.”

She stopped at the authoritative tone in the older woman’s voice. “Yes?”

Tilting her head, Aunt Margaret leveled a thoughtful gaze on Eleanor. “I understand now why rescue was necessary in the case of Lord Henry. But I still don’t know why Nick decided he was the one to do it. Are not the two of you adversaries?”

And there was the crux of the matter.

An unfamiliar longing wrapped around her heart as she thought of him and what exactly he was to her. What they were to each other. “Oh Aunt, I’ve been so stupid. All this time we bickered and argued, but yet all along…” she shook her head helplessly. “It’s been him. It’s always been him. The one who drives me mad, who makes me want to throttle him, but who always challenged me. Always looked to me as an equal.” She swallowed as a new truth assailed her with the force of an exploding firework. “I can’t bear the thought of being without him.”

“So you didn’t mind his kiss?”

Heat scorched her cheeks, but she looked her aunt straight in the eye. “I loved it. And I love him.”

Aunt Margaret’s mouth dropped open in surprise, even as her eyes misted over. Nodding crisply, she rose to her feet. “I’m coming with you. And next time,” she said, tossing a shawl about her shoulders before linking arms with Eleanor, “do feel free to come to me when my brother makes an arse of himself.”

NICK STOOD RIGIDLY STILL, absorbing the ramifications of his own stepfather’s words. His commission. His livelihood—his very identity. These were to be the price for Eleanor’s freedom.

So be it.

Though dread filled him like rising flood waters, there was no regret. No remorse at all. She was worth any price, as far as he was concerned. He forced his lips into a grin as he addressed his hateful step-father. “Ah, the relief you must feel to finally wash your hands of me. See now? I did you a favor after all.”

“Too bad such a thing didn’t happen a decade ago,” the earl retorted. “You have ten minutes to be gone from this house before I have you thrown out.”

Nick nodded once in acknowledgement, then turned and strode for the door. As he reached for the knob, the door swung open, and Eleanor nearly bowled him over. He jumped back, regaining his balance even as he lost his breath. His heart soared at the sight of her. Her face was a mask of determination, her head held high and her eyes flashing like fire-lit bronze.

His beautiful, glorious warrior—God how he loved her.

Malcolm started to protest, but she sliced a hand through the air, silencing him. She marched straight past Nick to the desk, Aunt Margaret following behind her. “How dare you, sir. You made a promise to my mother, and she’s not even gone a year before you break it? What kind of man are you?”

Malcolm’s face contorted, going as red as the scarlet curtains behind him. “How dare I? How dare you, bursting in here like some sort of lowborn, mannerless chit. Margaret, escort our niece to her room. I will deal with you both later.”

Instead of jumping to his bidding, Aunt Margaret crossed her arms in a show of protest. “I do believe I’d like to hear what the girl has to say, dear brother. Eleanor?”

Well done, Aunt Margaret! Nick stared in shock at his normally impeccably-mannered aunt. And he wasn’t the only one. From behind his desk, Malcolm sputtered in outrage, unable to even come up with a proper response.

“Thank you, Aunt,” Eleanor said primly before returning her full attention to her uncle. Her spine was ramrod straight, her chin lifted and her shoulders back. “Listen to me, and listen well. If you think today’s scene reflected badly upon you, you can’t even imagine what I will do if you so much as harm one hair on Nicolas’s head, or seek to injure his prospects.”

She took a step closer to the desk, forcing Malcolm to look up to her. “I will happily bring shame to this entire family if it means making you pay for what you did to my mother, and what you tried to do to me and my sister.”

Her gaze jerked to Nick. “What has he promised as punishment? Are you to duel?”

“Er, no,” he replied, momentarily caught off guard. Absurdly, he had to bite back the grin that threatened to emerge. She was just so damn magnificent. Straightening his face, he said, “Merely permanent alienation from this family, and the revocation of the funds for my commission. Nothing I can’t handle,” he added, not wanting her to think it was too great a penalty for him to bear.

“No, nothing you will handle,” she said, her eyes fairly glowing with passion. She’d never been so self-assured; it was all he could not to applaud her. Her hands to her hips, she turned back to Malcolm. “Nick attempted to rescue me from the fate you tried to manufacture, but this is my fight, not his.

“So here are your choices, dear uncle. Either I go back to the party and make a scene you will not soon forget, or you go in there and announce that, much to your surprise, your niece and step-son have made a love match, and will be married in one month’s time. Oh, and my entire dowry will be transferred upon our marriage.”

It took a moment for Nick to realize that the echoing gasp was his. “No, Eleanor, I won’t allow you to be trapped—”

She whirled to face him, her eyes flashing and her color high. “You mean married to you?”

Married to Eleanor. He clenched his teeth together, ruthlessly squelching the surge of hope her words evoked. Everything he had done tonight was to protect her from exactly that fate. “Yes,” he answered, unable to keep the desperation from his voice.

She shook her head, looking up to him with soulful brown eyes. “What choice do I have? You have ruined me.”

Chapter Eight

ELEANOR WAITED FOR THE SHOCK of the statement to sink in before stepping forward and taking Nick’s hands in her own. “Yes, you ruined me in the eyes of the ton, but that’s not what I mean. Nick, you have ruined me for any other man. You’ve ruined me for living the life I once enjoyed.”

She met his gaze directly, wanting him to see the truth in her eyes, to know that she meant what she said. “You have shown true valor, you have treated me with respect, and you’ve shown that my wishes are as close to your heart as your own.

“I never thought I could bear to be married, but now I know that I can’t bear not to be. I can’t fathom being without you. And I must know,” she said, her voice raw with the emotion that consumed her, “after that kiss, have I ruined you as well?”

He looked down at her, his green eyes giving away nothing. “No,” he said, shaking his head decisively.

“No?” Her heart squeezed painfully in her chest, taking the breath from her lungs. Had she lost her gamble? Had she been wrong about the kiss, and the connection she felt between them?

“You ruined me with the first kiss,” he said, squeezing her fingers tightly in his. “Eleanor Josephine Abbington, I have loved you since the day we met. One look at those huge brown eyes and the challenge you presented, and I was lost.”

He couldn’t be serious! He’d loved her all these years? She shook her head, unable to believe what he was saying. “But all the teasing, and insults, and pestering…”

For the first time that evening, a smile came to his lips. “When a fatherless, friendless boy is set before the gorgeous older granddaughter of an earl, what hope does he have? None – other than to keep the girl well enough engaged that she can’t possibly ignore him, even if she wanted to.”

She simply stared at him, unable to process the emotions welling up inside her like a cyclone. Happiness, incredulousness, joy, love, disbelief—it was impossible to untangle one from the other.

The moment was broken when Uncle Robert came suddenly to his feet, knocking his chair back with a clatter. “Enough! If you think I am going to bow to your whims like some sort of coward—”

“Not a coward,” Aunt Margaret broke in. “A wise man. One who knows when he’s been beat. One who will salvage the evening exactly as presented, so that his precious bill, and the support of those influential men out there, will not be compromised.”

“I will no—”

“You will.” The steel in her voice was unmistakable. “I may not have been here to help my sister, but by God I will help her daughters. And let me just say, the scene Eleanor promises will be nothing compared to the scandal you would see from me if you ever threaten any of my nieces or nephews again.”

Eleanor’s heart nearly burst for the woman beside her. She slipped her hand into her aunt’s and squeezed.

The fury on her uncle’s face would have scared her before, but not anymore. He had no sway over her, and he never again would. And, judging by the way his jaw worked as he ground his teeth, he knew it, too. Finally, he said, “I will make the announcement. I will sign over the dowry. But I will never, ever have the two of you step foot on my property again. In fact, I wish never to see your faces again.”

Victory! Squeezing both her aunt’s and her betrothed’s hands hard, Eleanor nodded. “Agreed.”

Marching straight past them, Malcolm stormed from the room without another word.

Releasing her death grip on the others’ hands, the three of them joined in a spontaneous hug.

“Have no fear,” Aunt Margaret said. “I hereby exempt my home from his restrictions. Now, I believe I’ll go find your mother, Nicolas.”

Alone at last.

Suddenly shy, Eleanor bit her lip and pivoted to face the man who had turned her whole life upside down in a matter of days.

Smiling, he slipped his hands to her waist. “Now, my prickly sweet Ellie, I have a question for you. Will,” he kissed her forehead, “you,” then her nose, “marry,” he lingered over her lips, “me?”

Laughter bubbled up within her, completely eradicating all the negative emotions that had brewed inside her for days. “I thought we already agreed.”

His brows snapped together in mock affront. “I will not accept a proposal issued from you through my stepfather. Now, answer the question.”

Her joy was so complete as to be all consuming. “If you are mad enough to marry me, my love, then I am likewise inclined.”

He flashed a huge, genuine grin, all arrogance and mocking forever gone. He wrapped his arms fully around her waist and lifted her from her feet, spinning them both in a quick, dizzying circle before pressing his lips firmly upon hers, despite their laughter.

She encircled his neck with her arms, holding him as closely to her as she possibly could. Her sweet, infuriating, irresistible Nicolas. When the kiss ended, she pulled back slightly and smiled down into his eyes. “You do realize that Uncle Robert is serious about disowning us.”

“Thank God,” he replied, his green eyes sparkling. “My plan may have taken a decade or two, but it finally paid off.”

“Oh, so I’m a means to an end, am I?” she teased.

“Indeed…the means to a happy ending.”

Epilogue

JUST WHAT DO YOU THINK YOU ARE DOING?”

Eleanor froze mid-lunge, her foil extended straight out in front of her. Blast, she was caught. The babbling brook that had so enchanted her when they purchased their small estate had apparently masked the sounds of her husband’s approach. Biting her lip, she straightened and turned to face the music. Nick stood behind her, partially shrouded in the heavy sheet of early morning fog, his arms crossed and his brow raised expectantly.

She offered a bright smile, all innocence. “Morning constitutional?”

He let his hands fall to his hips, giving her a very nice view of his chest through the partially-buttoned, generously-cut white shirt. “Uh huh.” He started forward, closing the distance between them with four easy strides. “You, madam, know full well you are not to be out here like this.”

Even as he pinned her with his sternest expression, his lips still curled with a hint of that delicious smile of his. Her heart gave a little flip. Almost a year of marriage, and he still could take her breath away.

He stopped an arm’s length away and held out his hand. “Your weapon?”

Scrunching her nose, she tucked the foil into the crook of her elbow. “Don’t be silly, Nicolas. There’s nothing wrong with a little exercise. In fact, I think it’s good.”

He flapped his hand open and closed in the universal sign for hand it over. “The doctor said no strenuous activities.”

“Oh really,” she said, lifting an imperious brow. “If I recall correctly, you were quite enthusiastic about our strenuous activities last night.”

Nick gave a bark of laughter and shook his head. “Oh, sure—use that against me.” Chuckling, he slipped a hand over her shoulder and tugged her in for a kiss, foil and all. She sighed happily, readily leaning into his embrace.

When he pulled back, he placed a tender hand to her middle. The warmth of his bare fingers seeping through the fabric of her fencing shirt was nothing compared to the warmth of his gaze. “I know it’s very early yet, but put a poor soldier’s mind at ease, and do please stick to walking for your constitutionals.”

She loved when he looked at her like that, as though she were the most precious treasure in the world. Because of that look, she had taken the biggest risk of her life—throwing years of caution to the wind in order to be with him—and it had paid off beyond her wildest dreams. A husband who loved, respected, and cherished her, a much longed for baby on the way, and all the family members who really mattered—Aunt Margaret, Libby, and William—by their sides, refusing to be intimidated by Uncle Robert’s wrath.

She was happier than she’d ever been in her life, and she had one person to thank for it.

Covering his hand with her own, she sighed and nodded. “Fine, fine. Have it your way. But I warn you—I shall hold you accountable for keeping me entertained for the next seven or so months.”

His smile was slow and devilish and full of promise. “Deal.”

In one smooth move, he divested her of the foil and lifted her into his arms, making her laugh out loud. “Nicholas!” she gasped, clinging to his neck as he started back for the house.

“What?” he said mildly, not the least bit winded as he navigated the rocky uphill path. “I take my promises very seriously. If it is entertainment you want, it is entertainment you shall have.”

Grinning, Eleanor settled into his arms, relishing the familiar smell of his skin and the feel of his muscled arms around her. There was no other place on earth she’d rather be. “Thank you,” she whispered, the simple words filled with a wealth of emotion.

He slowed and tilted his head so he could meet her gaze. “Whatever for?”

“For making me the happiest person in all of England.”

His arms tightened around her as he brushed a soft kiss against her lips. “My dear Ellie,” he said, his voice slightly gruff. “I’m merely returning the favor.”

About Erin

Despite being an avid reader and closet writer her whole life, Erin Knightley decided to pursue a sensible career in science. It was only after earning her BS and working in the field for years that she realized doing the sensible thing wasn’t any fun at all. Following her dreams, Erin left her practical side behind and hasn’t looked back. Now a multi-published award-winning and best-selling author, she is living her own Happily Ever After in North Carolina with her tall, dark, and handsome husband and their three spoiled mutts.

As a full-time writer, Erin always has something in the works! To keep up with news and the latest releases, sign up for her newsletter at www.ErinKnightley.com. Her website also includes videos, free music downloads to accompany her books, and her infamous bucket list that proves she can cross ‘Meet and hug Colin Firth’ off the list! Erin is active on both Facebook.com/ErinKnightley and Twitter.com/ErinKnightley, and hopes you’ll drop by and say hi.

Other Books by Erin

The Sealed with a Kiss Series

More Than a Stranger

A Taste for Scandal

Flirting with Fortune

Miss Mistletoe, a Penguin eSpecial

The Prelude to a Kiss Series

The Baron Next Door

The Earl I Adore – Jan 2015

The Duke Can Go to the Devil – July 2015

The All’s Fair in Love Novella Series

Ruined by a Rake

Scandalized by a Scoundrel

Deceived by a Duke

Copyright

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.

Unlocked: © 2011 by Courtney Milan.

When I Met my Duchess: © 2013 by Caroline Linden.

How to Catch a Wild Viscount: © 2014 by Eve Ortega.

One Starlit Night: © 2012 by Carolyn Jewel.

Claiming the Duchess: © 2014 by Sherry Thomas.

The Misbehaving Marquess: © 2012 by Leigh LaValle.

Ruined by a Rake: © 2013 by Erin Knightley.

Cover design © Courtney Milan.

Cover photographs © Novel Expression LLC.

Digital Edition 1.0

ISBN: 978-1-937248-43-7

All rights reserved. Where such permission is sufficient, the authors grant the right to strip any DRM which may be applied to this work.

Thank You!

Thank you for reading Seven Wicked Nights. We hope you liked the stories. We appreciate any review you'd be willing to leave for this boxed set.

Table of Contents

Table of Contents

Title Page

“Unlocked,” by Courtney Milan

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Epilogue

About Courtney

Other Books by Courtney

“When I Met My Duchess,” by Caroline Linden

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Epilogue

About Caroline

Other Books by Caroline

“How to Catch a Wild Viscount,” by Tessa Dare

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

About Tessa

Other Books by Tessa

“One Starlit Night,” by Carolyn Jewel

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Chapter Thirteen

About Carolyn

Other Books by Carolyn

“Claiming the Duchess,” by Sherry Thomas

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

About Sherry

Other Books by Sherry

“The Misbehaving Marquess,” by Leigh LaValle

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Epilogue

About Leigh

Other Books by Leigh

“Ruined by a Rake,” by Erin Knightley

Prologue

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Epilogue

About Erin

Other Books by Erin

Thank You

Copyright

Table of Contents

Title Page

Unlocked, by Courtney Milan

Dedication

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Epilogue

About Courtney

Other Books by Courtney

When I Met My Duchess, by Caroline Linden

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Epilogue

About Caroline

Other Books by Caroline

How to Catch a Wild Viscount, by Tessa Dare

A Note to Readers

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

About Tessa

Other Books by Tessa

One Starlit Night, by Carolyn Jewel

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Chapter Thirteen

About Carolyn

Other Books by Carolyn

Claiming the Duchess, by Sherry Thomas

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

About Sherry

Other Books by Sherry

The Misbehaving Marquess, by Leigh LaValle

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Epilogue

About Leigh

Other Books by Leigh

Ruined by a Rake, by Erin Knightley

Dedication

Prologue

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Epilogue

About Erin

Other Books by Erin

Copyright

Thank You!