Hurrah! Chaos Come Again, the first novel in Lion’s Zoo, is out in the wild! Released 20 June.

Here’s an excerpt to whet your appetite.

Their lovemaking that night had an edge of feverish desperation, but by morning Lion had woken in a more philosophical frame of mind. “Perhaps the earl did me a favour,” he said, when she asked him how he was. She had woken in his arms, as she had every night since Gretna Green.

“How so?” she asked.

“He would never have let me go into the army had I been named his heir when I was a boy.” His smile was grim. “Or he would have asked for me to be given the most dangerous assignments so I was removed from the way of those with purer blood. Either way, the career I have had is my own.”

He rolled her, then, so she lay flat on the bed with him above her, his legs stretched between hers, his weight held on his elbows. “But I have cheated you, Dorothea. You thought yourself safe from marriage to a nobleman, and now look!”

“You are still my Lionel, and I am your Dorothea,” she reminded him. “For your sake, I will make the best of it.” She had puzzled it out for herself last night, while Lion was pacing the room, despairing over the loss of his military career. Indeed, he had lost more than her, since the earl’s heir she had inadvertently married was the man she wanted to be with for the rest of her life, whereas he would have to leave the army when his grandfather died.

Not before, he had insisted last night.

“But won’t the earl want us to stay now that he has named you his heir?” she had said.

The corners of his mouth had quirked in a wicked smile. “He has no say in where I go and what I do. I do not need his money, and nor does he have influence that will remove me from my post.”

So they were still bound for Portugal, and Dorothea was glad of it; glad of a year or two to become accustomed to marriage before they had to face the duties neither of them wanted.

Lion kissed her nose. “Are you tired of travelling? Would you like a few days rest before we leave for Portugal?”

“You are anxious to get back,” Dorothea said.

He kissed her again, a soft brush of his lips to the top of her head. “I am asking what you want,” he pointed out.

Whatever you want. But he would not accept that answer. “I would be delighted to leave Father behind, and to start our real life together.”

“Good,” said Lion. “Enough talking. All I want from you in the next half hour, wife of mine, are moans, the word more, and perhaps my name.”

And he made it so.