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Tea with Eleanor: Paradise Lost Episode 3

Haverford House, London, March 1812

If she had said ‘yes’, what would have happened? He had a curricle in the mews. They could have left that night, straight from the garden where they’d slipped out for a private conversation. Haverford would not have assaulted her on her way back inside. James would not have challenged him to a duel, wounded him, and been exiled a step ahead of the constable.

Eleanor carefully replaced the rose and took out the letter her maid had brought her the afternoon after Haverford’s horrifying assault had been followed by the announcement of her betrothal. The maid had hidden it under the tray cloth when delivering her breakfast so that the footmen who guarded her bedroom door didn’t see it.

My dearest, dearest love

My father is in it, too. He says that Haverford is to have you, as soon as he has recovered from his wounds.

I wish I had never challenged the duke, or that I had shot to kill. I meant only to defend your honour; to show he could not speak of you as if you were his possession. Even a husband should hesitate to show such disrespect to the woman he has promised to cherish above all others, and so I told him. ‘You are not even her betrothed,’ I told him, ‘and the last man on earth to deserve her’. I am very sorry, Eleanor. I lost my temper, when I should have been thinking of the best way to press my case with your father.

Now, the devil is in it, my father insists that I must flee the country. He says Haverford will have me arrested for shooting him, and Father won’t lift a finger to stop him.

Come with me, Eleanor. The ship my father has organised leaves in two days, but I have a friend who can get me away tomorrow night. I promise I can look after you. I’ve sold the little estate my mother left me, so I have funds. We will go to the Continent. I can find work, I know I can, and we will be together. I know it won’t be what you are used to or what you deserve, but I love you, and you love me. Is that not worth fleeing for?

Meet me by the oak near the back gate of your garden as soon as the house is quiet tomorrow evening. I will be there. We have to be on the ship in time to sail with the dawn, and by the time your household wakes, we shall be gone down the river, and out to sea.

Come with me, my love.

Yours forever

James

Her father’s voice, in her memory. I’m not throwing you away on a third son, Eleanor Creydon. Winderfield is a fribble; a useless pup. Haverford wants you, and I’ve accepted him. Forget Winderfield.

The letter was yellowed with time, and Eleanor, too, had faded with age. But she had not forgotten. She would never forget.

Had she been brave enough or clever enough to break out of her room and evade the guards outside her door and patrolling the garden, Eleanor would not have been left with her reputation in tatters, refusing to marry Haverford and unable to marry James.

If she had continued to refuse, had stayed true to her memories of him, and had not finally given way to her sisters’ pleadings—for Lydia assured her that marriage would free her from the tyranny of her father and Helene had been set firmly on the shelf because of Eleanor’s scandal—she would not have spent thirty-four years married to a monster. But her father and the Duke of Winshire told her James was dead, and after that it didn’t matter what became of her?

They were mistaken, or they lied. Almost certainly, they lied. Now, James was back in England, and she would need to meet him and pretend that they hadn’t broken one another’s hearts so many years ago.

A few tears fell onto the letter, and then the Duchess of Haverford packed everything away, dried her eyes and returned the box to its place.

Weeping over the past and fretting over the future never helped. She had children who loved her, friends, important work in her charities, and a full and busy life.

She smiled at her reflection in the mirror. Her complexion had returned to normal, and her sense of herself, too. The girl who mourned James had become a woman she rather liked. How could she regret any part of the path that led here?

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The marriage business on WIP Wednesday

It is the nature of romance that a couple find love, within marriage or without, before the vows are exchanged or after. Of course, historical romance stretches the canvas. Throughout history, people have married for reasons other than love: security, family arrangements, the need for an heir, the desire for companionship and children. In my current work in progress, I have examples of several such approaches.

In my first excerpt, my sisters are discussing a marriage for companionship and children.

“It will have to be the right sort of person. And even if you find someone who will become father to your son and keep your secret, people will talk,” Charlotte warned.

Sarah shrugged. “As Uncle James says, people can talk all they like, but if they can’t prove anything, and if the leaders of Society accept him, the scandal will disappear.”

There would be difficulties. The chief among them, finding someone. The right person needed to be tolerant, supportive, respectful of women, understanding of a youthful mistake with consequences. She doubted she could find such a paragon in society, so she would have to look outside.

Even once she discovered suitable candidates, she would need to audition them very carefully. If they refused what she asked of them, she could not marry them. After that, their silence and their co-operation would be imperative.

“Darling, what of Nate?” Charlotte asked.

“I have to believe he is dead,” Sarah said. “He has been gone eight years, Charlotte. In all that time, he has never tried to contact me. If he is still alive, he doesn’t want me. Elfingham said he took money to leave me, and at first I thought he lied, but eight years, Charlotte!”

Charlotte nodded. She, more than anyone, knew that their brother had been unreliable. “Very well,” Charlotte said, settling herself back on her cushions and picking up her pen and the pad of paper on which she had been making notes. “Let us make a list.”

The father of the hero has made a marriage for an heir, and it hasn’t worked out for him.

“You need a wife, Bentham. Three sons, m’ brothers had between them and all of them single.” Nod. Nate could agree that his cousins had been single.

“You need to marry some well-behaved girl with wide hips,” Nate’s father insisted, “and bed her till you get a son on her.”

Nate’s father, Earl of Lechford thanks to the marital dereliction and deaths of his three nephews, was determined that the Lechford line would continue through what he insisted on calling ‘the fruit of my loins.’ He would have been happy to bypass his banished son, except the well-behaved girl he’d taken to wife once he inherited had produced three sickly daughters at twelve-month intervals, birthing the third with such difficulty she was unlikely to ever get with child again.

That left Nate, whom he reluctantly remembered and set about retrieving, setting the hospital where Nate worked into turmoil by searching for him under Nate’s honorary title as heir. To be fair, being called Bentham was better than ‘fruit of my loins’, as if Nate existed only by reference to his father. Mind you, that was certainly Lord Lechford’s view. His world had revolved around himself when he was merely the Reverend Miles Beauclair, third son of an earl and the vicar of three little villages on the ducal estate of one of the earl’s friends. His world view had not expanded when he came into his unexpected inheritance.

And in the third excerpt, we meet the sisters discussing their list, and why one man should not be on it.

“Aldridge probably is ready to set up his nursery,” Charlotte noted. The cross through Aldridge’s name had been the subject of some debate. The twins agreed that the duke’s terminal illness meant Aldridge must be in need of a bride, but otherwise disputed his suitability for Sarah.

Charlotte argued that Sarah was not seeking a love match, and that Aldridge met all her specifications for a husband.  “He would be a kind, courteous, and respectful husband, Sarah. He is not out for your money or your social position—he has more than enough of both. You get on well with his mother. And they have so much scandal of their own that they’re hardly likely to cavil at yours.”

Sarah countered with all of the marquis’s well-known character flaws, and then won the argument with a sneak attack. “Besides, while I do not want a husband who loves me, nor do I want one who has been dangling after my sister these past four years. He wants you, Charlotte, not me. Besides, even if I was prepared for the embarrassment of being married to a man who loves my sister, I doubt if Aldridge is going to accept such a substitution.”

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The war between thoughts and actions on WIP Wednesday

What we do and say isn’t necessarily a reflection of what we’re thinking, and part of the fun of writing is to let readers into the thoughts our characters are not willing to share with those around them. This week, I’d love to see any excerpt you care to share where a character’s actions are being driven by thoughts they’d rather keep to themselves. Mine is from To Tame a Rake. Charlotte has sought Aldridge’s help to rescue a boy who has been kidnapped. The boy has already escaped, but Aldridge rescues two prostitutes.

Aldridge sent his footmen home. “Get some food into you then sleep,” he told them. Tell Richards I’ve given you the rest of the day off.”

Lady Charlotte was glaring at him. “I will do myself the honour of escorting you to Winderfield House, my lady,” he told her.

She put her chin up, her nostrils flaring as she took in a deep breath to wither him.

“It is my duty, as I’m sure my mother would insist.”

“I need no other escort but Yahzak and his men,” Lady Charlotte said, looking to her fierce guard captain for his support. Yahzak backed his horse a step, his face impassive, saying nothing. Her statement was undoubtedly true from the point of view of her physical safety.

“Nonetheless…” Aldridge replied, not wanting explain—barely wanting to acknowledge to himself—his burning need see her safe inside her own home before he surrendered to the fatigue that was his reaction to the night they’d spent.

Especially that moment when he had stood by the mouth of that alley expecting Wharton’s hirelings, only to see Charlotte emerge, putting herself right in the path of danger when he had thought her safely out of the way observing from the rooftops.

That moment of heart-stopping fear had given way to anger when they’d ridden beyond the reach of the slum boss, and he’d been fighting ever since to contain his temper, to speak with her and the others with calm and civility.

Her obstinacy over the prostitutes had nearly defeated his control. Didn’t she understand how her own reputation could be tainted by association?

His civilised self knew that Saint Charlotte was nearly as well known for her virtue as for her works of charity, and that wouldn’t be changed by housing a pair of refugees from a brothel, especially two witnesses who could help bring down a dangerous criminal.

Actually, the value of the investigation was a good point to make if anyone dared criticise his ladyship in his hearing. Not that it soothed his irritation in the slightest. He was being irrational and he knew it. But he couldn’t seem to stop himself.

On the ride back through the steadily brightening streets, she ignored him, though he rode beside her. Probably as well. He didn’t trust himself to speak without disclosing more of his feelings than was consistent with dignity.

She had clearly been stewing, however. In the forecourt of the Winshire mansion, when he dismounted and reached her stirrup ahead of Yahzak, ready to help her down, she allowed the privilege, but stepped out of his reach while his body still hardened from her touch, turned both barrels of her ire on him and let fly.

“You take too much on yourself, Lord Aldridge. I am grateful for your help this past night,” (she didn’t sound grateful), “but that does not give you the right to dictate my behaviour or comment on my decisions.”

Aldridge managed to keep his reply courteous, even pleasant, despite his pathetic emotional state. “I want only to protect you, my lady.”

“Because I am not capable of protecting myself?” she demanded, with heavy irony. “Because I don’t have a family of my own to support me?”

“No!” He clamped his mouth shut on the next words on his tongue. Because you are mine. She would kill him. Or castrate him.

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Family in WIP Wednesday

Most of my characters live in the middle of family, some loving and close, others hateful or distant. We learn a lot about people by how they behave to their parents, siblings and children, and what makes them behave that way.

This week, I’d love you to share an excerpt that shows your main character or characters with family, either the one he or she was born into, of the one they have created through friendship.

Mine is from To Claim the Long-Lost Lover. Nate has escorted his half-sisters to The Regent’s Park, to meet the son he has only just found out about, and Sarah has told him that she wants to build a future with him and Elias.

Sarah smiled up at Nate, and he desperately wanted to lean under her very fetching hat and kiss her, but just then Norie screeched, “But I want to go on the bridge!”

The nurse, who was unfortunately as timid as Letty, was making ineffectual noises, but Elias said firmly, “You cannot, Norie. It is not safe. My Mama says it caught fire, and it might collapse if we go on it. Then the fishes will nibble your toes, and you would not like that.”

Norie narrowed her eyes.

“Go on bwidge,” Lavie demanded.

“Go to the tea shop for cake,” Nate suggested, swinging her back up into his arms, and the distraction worked magnificently. “Would you like to join us for cake, Master Elias? You and your family?”

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Elias opened his mouth to reply then shut it. Sarah was pleased to see him remember his manners. “May we, Mama?”

At Sarah’s nod, he managed a creditable bow. “Yes, please, Sir.”

“To Fourniers, then,” Nate said, and shared a smile with Sarah when the boy offered his arm to Norie in imitation of his elders. Charlotte grinned at Sarah and took Drew’s arm.

What a procession they made!

Drew and Charlotte led the way, with Elias and Norie, and then Nate and Sarah with Lavie still enthroned on Nate’s other arm.

The cluster of nursemaids followed with Phillida still in her baby carriage but now awake and chattering in baby gurgles at everything they passed.

The footmen brought up the rear and the guard spread out on both sides of the path.

Quite a sight, if somewhat wasted on the noon-time park crowd of children and their nursemaids, off-duty soldiers, and scurrying citizens using the park as a thoroughfare between Westminster and Mayfair.

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Tea without a scandalmonger

I have an excerpt post for you today–and no, I haven’t made a mistake in the title. In the new novel, To Mend the Broken Hearted, Eleanor Haverford does not have tea with Lady Ashbury, although she pours herself a cup after the widow leaves.

The widow was not one of Eleanor Haverford’s usual circle. She was too young to be one of the titled ladies with whom the duchess had ruled Society for more than thirty years, and too old to be one of their daughters.

That was not the real reason Eleanor barely knew her, of course, as Eleanor admitted to herself. The real reason was that Eleanor liked cats only when they had whiskers and four paws. Lady Ashbury was a cat of the human kind: one for whom the less influential members of Society were mice to hunt and torment.

If an innocent action could be given a vicious interpretation, Lady Ashbury would find it and the sycophants who clustered around her would spread it. And woe betide the person, lady or gentleman, who made a misstep in negotiating the silly rules that governed the lives of the ton. It would be magnified a thousandfold if Eleanor and her own allies were not in time to mitigate the damage.

Lady Ashbury sat in Eleanor’s formal drawing room, a striking beauty still, though she was in her late thirties. She should look colourless in her light blue walking dress and white spencer, with white-blonde hair drawn into fashionable ringlets that did not dare to do anything so indecorous as bounce, delicately darkened brows arching over ice-blue eyes. Instead, in the sumptuous splendour of the room, she drew the eye, like a diamond centrepiece that outshone the splendour of an ornate collar of gold and gems.

“How kind of you to invite me, Your Grace,” she purred. “I have long wished to be better acquainted. I admire you so much, and feel for you. I understand what it is like to be married to a man who is persistently unfaithful. My husband, too…” She trailed off.

Eleanor smiled, a baring of teeth containing little amusement. If this upstart thought the Duchess of Haverford was going to be manipulated to play her game of insinuation and scandal, she could think again.

“You were invited for one reason only, Lady Ashbury. I understand you are taking some notice of Lady Ruth Winderfield, the daughter of the Duke of Winshire.”

Lady Ashbury dropped her lashes to veil her eyes. “You have an interest in the matter, of course. The feud between Winshire and Haverford is well known to me, Your Grace.”

Eleanor allowed none of her disgust to show. “Your motivation, of course, is your brother-in-law, whose name you have chosen to couple with that of Lady Ruth.”

The woman looked up, a flash of spite in her eyes. “They connected their own names, Your Grace, when she stayed with him, unchaperoned.”

Eleanor could argue that Ruth had her companion with her, as well as a bevy of armed retainers, a maid, and six children; that she was taking refuge during a smallpox epidemic; that she was providing medical care for several people, including Lady Ashbury’s own daughter. But Lady Ashbury was not interested in facts, but in fixing her claws into the weak. This time, she had chosen the wrong targets.

Eleanor showed her own claws. “I would take it amiss, Lady Ashbury, if these rumours continue to circulate. Very amiss.”

An expression at last. Alarm, quickly concealed. Lady Ashbury’s tinkling laugh was unamused. “You jest, duchess. Haverford hates the chit’s father.”

Eleanor raised a brow. “I have not invited you to address me as an intimate, young woman. Nor will I.”

Colour flooded Lady Ashbury’s face. “Your Grace. My apologies, Your Grace.”

“You have miscalculated, Lady Ashbury. His Grace of Haverford cannot abide scandal-mongering women.” A slight exaggeration, but his pride, which would see an insult to his wife as an insult to him, would ensure that he supported Eleanor, at least in public, which was all that mattered.

“In addition, I am dearest friends with Lady Ruth’s aunt. I must thank you, however, for drawing my attention to the Earl of Ashbury. I had not noticed his absence from society since his brother’s death. I intend to amend that oversight. Your brother-in-law shall be presented to the Regent under my sponsorship and that of His Grace, the Duke of Haverford. I suggest you make yourself least in sight for the remainder of the little season. A sojourn in the country might be good for your health, Lady Ashbury.”

Lady Ashbury sat, as pale as her spencer, her mouth open.

Her Grace stood and pulled the bell chain. “My footman shall show you out,” she said.

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Deep-Dyed Villains on WIP Wednesday

An early reviewer sent me a private note about my latest villain, saying she had no redeeming qualities. I wrote back to agree. I really enjoy writing deep-dyed villains, people we can love to hate. Yes, I admire redeemable villains, too. I’ve read some wonderful stories where the villain in one book learns his or her lesson and is eventually given their own book. And somewhere between the two is a really nasty person who also visits his dear old granny on Sundays and is very fond of his cat, because human beings are complicated. So maybe my villains aren’t as bad as I paint them?

Perhaps I should give the villain in the following excerpt a cat? It’s from To Tame a Wild Rake, and should be self-explanatory. Oh, and, of course, if you have a villain you’d like to share, please add him or her in the comments.

The Beast was in a rage all the more potent for being suppressed as long as he had to be in front of customers. His men had searched all night, but the boy Tony was nowhere to be found, and no one admitted to seeing him.

The searchers brought back many reports about the intruders, and the two whores that had run off with them. They’d taken off on those odd shaped horses the Winshires bred. At first, the Beast had assumed Tony was in the carriage they had with them, but several reports insisted that the escaped females were the only occupants.

It couldn’t be doubted that the boy had gone out the window. The glass was broken and the door was still locked. But if the intruders helped him, why wasn’t he with them?

The guard said he’d not heard the breaking window. The guard was an idiot. He let himself be distracted and overwhelmed by Aldridge—a ton clothes horse, a pretty boy, an overbred mummy’s boy who had never done a lick of work in his life.

Aldridge. The Beast had hated him for two decades, ever since the youthful marquis had come between Wharton—as he was then—and Aldridge’s beautiful little brother. Lord Jonathan Grenford had been a new arrival at Eton, and Wharton’s fag. Wharton had so many plans. They would have been happy together, he just knew it. Gren—it had been Wharton that had given him that name—was a little jumpy, but Wharton was working on him, and he would have been happy in the end. Wharton would have taken care of him.

Then Aldridge had Gren assigned to another senior. Worse. He sent someone—a grown man—to growl threats in the dark, threats reinforced with a dagger to Wharton’s throat. Cowardly bastard.

He’d interfered, too, a decade later, sending his base-born brother to destroy Wharton’s fledging export business. And surely it was not coincidence that the man who cut off the supply of girls for that business was Aldridge’s cousin, another sodding peer.

Here he was again, sticking his nose in where it wasn’t wanted. Wharton had been looking for someone like Tony every since he lost the lovely Gren. The boy was a Grenford get, beyond a doubt, but all the Grenford males were so randy it could have been the father or either of the brothers. Or perhaps just a by-blow from an earlier generation.

Tony either didn’t know, or wasn’t saying.

No matter. He was unacknowledged, which meant the notoriously soft-hearted Aldridge didn’t know about him, which meant the Beast could have him without Aldridge’s interference. It was his reward for twenty years of suffering since Gren was taken from him.

Not the same thing, quite. Tony was a slum brat, not a refined lordling. But good food would put on some weight. Manners could be taught, and the bone structure, the colouring, even the voice, when he aped his betters… it was Gren come again.

The Beast sulked on his throne. He’d refrained from throwing things or screaming at people all night, lest he frighten those whose money was fast replenishing his coffers. Now the edge had gone off his temper, though he was likely to find it again if no one brought him news that allowed him to retrieve his property.

How did Aldridge come to find out about the boy? He came for Tony, the Beast was certain. He may have left with a couple of harlots, but light-heeled girls were ten a penny, and Aldridge was, in any case, too fastidious for brothels. He didn’t come for the girls.

The Winderfield chit, who was harbouring the boy, must have told him. The Beast glared at the stairs to the upper floor, where his sister reigned. This was her fault, too. She had assured him that Aldridge and the Winderfield female were at loggerheads.

He shouldn’t have trusted her, not after last year, when Aldridge’s mother put all her weight as a duchess behind another Winderfield female. Mind you, most of what followed was entirely the fault of the Winderfields, who dared to bring their foreign troops to attack him. And instead of objecting to such a clear breach of the law, that fat freak in Brighton deputed his own troops to support them!

That fiasco had ended with Wharton having to once agchange his name and start again, having lost several lieutenants and a reputation that had taken him years to build. For that, the Winderfields would pay.

Being no fool, the Beast had long ago realised the value of holding his assets and investments under another identity; one that had no connection with activities the law frowned on. Even so, building a new base had taken time, and he’d needed to shelve his plans for those who had opposed him.

No longer. The Winderfields had taken Tony out of the slums, away from the Beast, and then had come into his territory to steal the boyback. The Marquis of Aldridge had dared to invade his home, steal two of his harlots, and at least provide a distraction so Tony could escape. It was time for revenge.

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Tea with Lady Sutton

“Gracious me,” said Sophia, with an indignant glare at the letter in her lap. “How presumptuous. How impertinent!”

The Duchess of Haverford raised a questioning eyebrow, but her goddaughter was still scowling at the offensive missive and didn’t see.

Eleanor had enjoyed having Sophia and her little daughter to visit while Sophia’s husband, Lord Sutton, was off on some business for his father. Lady Mary Elizabeth was a darling delight; Eleanor would miss her when Sutton arrived to collect them in the morning.

Sophia had folded the letter in half and was tapping it against the arm of her chair, her brows knit in thought.

“Is it something you can tell me about, my dear?” the duchess asked.

Sophia looked up and smiled. “I beg your pardon, Aunt Eleanor. I was so annoyed by this piece of pernicious mischief that I quite forgot where I was. Yes, I would like to tell you about it, if I may.”

“Perhaps another cup of tea?” Eleanor suggested.

Sophia agreed with thanks, and scanned the letter again while Eleanor poured.

“It is from a woman in Fenwick on Sea in Suffolk,” she explained.

“The village where the ship your brother and sister were on took shelter from that dreadful storm,” Eleanor commented.

Sophia nodded, and gave the letter another thunderous frown.

“But Hythe and Felicity found another ship to take them to Belgium, you said,” Eleanor prompted. “What has this woman to say about them that has you so cross?”

“Not them. I mentioned, I think, that Felicity’s maid, Theo, remained in Fenwick. She had been terribly sea sick, and neither Hythe nor Felicity wished to risk her. I am to send a carriage for her as soon as we are back in Gloucestershire.” She smiled. “A slow one. Poor Theo has never travelled well.”

“I remember you left her behind at Hollystone Hall when you raced to London to marry Sutton before his grandfather died,” Eleanor noted.

Another quick smile as Sophia nodded, and then the frown returned. “This woman writes about Theo. Just listen!

‘The designing hussy made her move on the poor curate when the children he has taken in had a mild attack of the ague. Under the guise of nursing them, she took up residence in the village. They say that Mr Somerville also became ill, but since that female would not allow responsible members of the village to see him, we must decide whether this is true, or whether she had no desire for others to interfere in her nefarious attempt to force the man into a proposal by setting up housekeeping with him.’

I must post to Fenwick, and defend our poor dear Theo. James will simply have to take us to Gloucestershire by way of the coast of Suffolk! Rather the long way around, but darling Mary Elizabeth is a good traveller, thank goodness.”

“The curate, you say?” Eleanor asked. “Your sister Felicity mentioned she thought the pair were forming an attachment. Apparently she was right.”

“Yes,” Sophia replied. “And Felicity mentioned this…” she waved the letter… “Mrs Fullerton, too. Apparently the besom has been causing trouble in the parish. Felicity suggested Mr Somerville might be needing another position sooner, rather than later.”

Her smile broadened. “I am looking forward to meeting the man who has prompted my shy, perfectly-behaved maid to such scandal!”

A Dream Come True: By Jude Knight

The tempest that batters Barnaby Somerville’s village is the latest but not the least of his challenges.

Vicar to a remote parish, he stretches his tiny stipend to adopt his orphaned niece and nephew and his time to offer medical care as well as spiritual. A wife is a dream he cannot afford.

But the storm sweeps into his life a surprising temptation—a charming young woman who lavishes her gentle care upon his wards—and him.

God knows, he will forever be richer for having known her, even if he must let her go.

Storm & Shelter: A Bluestocking Belles Collection With Friends

When a storm blows off the North Sea and slams into the village of Fenwick on Sea, the villagers prepare for the inevitable: shipwreck, flood, land slips, and stranded travelers. The Queen’s Barque Inn quickly fills with the injured, the devious, and the lonely—lords, ladies, and simple folk; spies, pirates, and smugglers all trapped together. Intrigue crackles through the village, and passion lights up the hotel.

One storm, eight authors, eight heartwarming novellas.

Find out more on the Bluestocking Belles’ project page. 

Only 99c while on preorder. Published April 13th.

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Book blurbs in WIP Wednesday

My work in progress is making great progress! I’ve finished taking in the copy edits from the lovely Reina, given it a final proof, and made some changes to the cover. (It now says The Return of the Mountain King as the series title, for one thing.)

I’ve also rewritten the blurb, and that’s my excerpt for today. Next step, finalise the layout files and put them up in the retailers! Launch date is only a fortnight away.

Ruth Winderfield is miserable in London’s ballrooms, where her family’s wealth and questions over her birth make her a target for the unscrupulous and a pariah to the high-sticklers. Trained as a healer, she is happiest in a sickroom. When a smallpox epidemic traps her at the remote manor of a reclusive lord, the last thing she expects is to find her heart’s desire.

Valentine, Earl of Ashbury, was carried home from war three years ago, unconscious, a broken man. He woke to find his family in ruins, his faithless wife and treacherous brother dead, his family’s two girl children exiled to school. He becomes a near recluse while he spends his days trying to restore the estate, or at least prevent further crumbling.

When an impertinent, bossy female turns up with several sick children, including the two girls, he reluctantly gives them shelter. Unable to stand by and watch the suffering, he begins to help with the nursing, while he falls irrevocably for both girls and the lovely Ruth.

The epidemic over, Ruth and Val part ways, each reluctant to share how they feel without a sign from the other. Ruth returns to her family and the ton. Val begins to build a new life centred on his girls. But danger to Ruth is a clarion call Val cannot ignore. If they can stop the villains determined to destroy them, perhaps the hermit and the healer can mend one another’s hearts.

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Spotlight on To Mend the Broken-Hearted

Novel 2 in the Mountain King series is on preorder, and will be published on 23 March, in just 16 days. My copy editor calls it ‘a wonderful, emotional, engaging read’. Two of the beta readers said it is the best yet. I can’t wait to find out what you think! If you’re on my ARC team, expect an email in the next four days letting you know it’s ready. If you’re not, you can preorder To Mend the Broken Hearted here.

To Mend the Broken-Hearted

Ruth Winderfield is miserable in London’s ballrooms, where the wealth of her family and the question over her birth make her a target for the unscrupulous and a pariah to the high-sticklers. Trained as a healer, she is happiest in a sickroom. When she’s caught up in a smallpox epidemic and finds herself quarantined at the remote manor of a reclusive lord, the last thing she expects is to find her heart’s desire. A pity he does not feel the same.

Valentine, Earl of Ashbury, hasn’t seen his daughter—if she is his daughter—in three years. She and her cousin, his niece, remind him of his faithless wife and treacherous brother, whose deaths three years ago will never set him free. Val spends his days trying to restore the estate, or at least prevent further crumbling. When an impertinent bossy female turns up with several sick children, including the girls he is responsible for, he reluctantly gives them shelter. Even more reluctantly, he helps with the nursing. The sooner they leave again the better, even if Ruth has wormed her way into his heart. She is better off without him.

Danger to Ruth brings him out of seclusion, and into a future he had not been able to imagine.

And here is an early meeting between them

Something out of place alerted the sentinel in Ruth’s brain developed when she and Zyba had been in the guard squads assigned by her father to escort caravans through bandit country in the mountains and deserts of her homeland. Simpler days, those, with the enemies hidden behind rocks rather than smiles and lies.

There it was again. A metallic scrape. Silently, she uncurled from her chair, reaching through the slit in her skirt for the dagger in the sheath strapped to her thigh. Against the grey of the night, a blacker shape climbed onto the window sill, pausing there to whisper. “Lady Ruth?”

Assassins do not usually announce themselves. She could probably acquit the intruder of malicious intent, which meant he was more in danger from the illness than she and her charges where from him.

“Go away,” she told him. “This room is in quarantine. We have four cases of smallpox.”

The man moved, coming fully into the room so she could see hints of detail in the far reaches of the candle light. He was tall, with broad shoulders. A determined chin caught the light as he pulled something from his pocket and sat on a chair by the window. The light also glinted off a head of close-cut fair hair. Lord Ashbury.

“I am aware. Four patients, one of them my responsibility. One exhausted doctor. You need help.” As he spoke, he lifted one bare foot after the other, rolling a stocking on each and then tucking the long elegant foot into a soft indoor shoe taken from his pocket. He was deft with his single hand.

“I don’t need more patients,” Ruth objected, less forcefully than she might if he had not moved closer so that the light touched half of his face, making the rest seem darker by contrast. Dark eyes glinted in the shadows cast by firmly arched brows. His gaze was intent on hers.

“I have had the smallpox, my lady, and I am not leaving, so you might as well make use of me. I’m no doctor, but I can follow instructions. You need sleep if you’re to avoid illness yourself.”

Her tired brain caught up with the comment about his responsibility. “You cannot think to nurse the girls.”

“What prevents me?” Ashbury demanded. “My amputation? I have one more hand than you can muster on your own. Their modesty? You and the maids can manage their bathing and other personal matters. I can free you up to look after them in that way by lifting and carrying for you. My dignity? I work my own fields, my lady. I am not too exalted to fetch and carry for the woman who intends to save my niece’s life.”

Ruth turned, then, and looked straight at him, and he moved so the lamp shone directly on his face. “You are not qualified,” she told him.

Ashbury shrugged. “True. I daresay half the world is better qualified than I. But I have done some battlefield nursing and I am here.”

“You cannot stay. I am an unmarried woman. You are a man.” A ridiculous statement. Here, isolated from the foolish scandal-loving world of the ton, who was to know? Besides, she would never put something as ephemeral as ‘reputation’ ahead of the needs of her patients.

He took another meaning from her objection, spreading his remaining hand to show it empty, and saying gravely. “I will do you no harm. I give you my word.”

Of course, he wouldn’t. Even if he were so inclined, he would not get close enough to try. Something of her thought must have shown in her face, because one corner of his mouth kicked up.

“I suppose you are a warrior after the fashion of that fierce maiden you have guarding the quarantine. You are three-times safe then, my lady, with my honour backed by your prowess and reinforced by the knowledge that any missteps on my part will anger your champions.”

Her spurt of irritation was prompted by Lord Ashbury’s amusement, not by the unexpected physical effect of his desert anchorite’s face lightened by that flash of humour. “I was more concerned about the impact on our lives if it is known we’ve been effectively unchaperoned for perhaps several weeks.”

He raised his brows at that and the amusement disappeared. “My servants are discreet and yours would die for you. Besides, you have your maid with you at all times, do you not? And I have my—” he hesitated over a word; “my charges,” he finished.

His niece and his daughter, Ruth thought, wondering what story explained his reluctance to say the words. No matter. He was determined. He was also right; she needed someone else to share the nursing, and now she had a volunteer. Her attraction to him was undoubtedly amplified by her tiredness. She would ignore it, and it would go away.

At the realisation she could finally hand her watch over to someone else, her exhaustion crashed in on her, and it was all she could do to draw herself together and say, “Come. I will show you what you need to do, and explain what to watch for.”

 

 

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Internal dialogue on WIP Wednesday

It’s nice to give a character a friend to talk to, so readers can find out what they’re thinking. But now and again, we need to peek inside their heads. In today’s post, I’m including some thoughts that my character Aldridge would never share with anyone else. If you have an excerpt with internal dialogue that you’d like share, please feel free to add it to the comments.

Aldridge let himself into the Duke’s Study. The duke’s desk, a massive object of carved oak, stood in the bay window, its back to the view out over the pleasure gardens that descended from the house to the river. 

Aldridge had thought of taking it over; of moving it so it was at right angles to the windows so that he could enjoy the view while he was working.

He would certainly enjoy the extra space. His own cadet desk, tucked away in a corner near the door, was a quarter of the size. And, as each secretary in turn had pointed out, his father would never return to this room or even to London, and Aldridge was duke in all but name, rank, and title.

It was a final step he wasn’t willing to take until he had to. He would adopt his father’s desk when he took his father’s title. Refusing the first was, he knew, a symptom of his reluctance to assume the second. If the doctors were to be trusted, he’d be the Duke of Haverford within the next twelve months, and probably sooner rather than later. 

None of his secretaries or clerks understood. They thought he was lucky. But then, they and the rest of the population of England thought he was the Merry Marquis; envied him his wealth, his position, the hordes of women keen on an illicit relationship, even the maidens panting for a chance to be his duchess.

The reasons people wanted him had nothing to do with him. He could be a donkey on two legs, and they’d still praise him. The woman would still pant to bed him. The men would still court his favour. And if it was bad now, how much worse would it be when he was duke?

He was a title and a position, not a man. Even those who knew him best couldn’t see past the marquis, the heir. Just a clever automaton, smartly dressed, with a repertoire of motions and words to fool people into thinking he was a real person. On days like today, when he had given the one lady he wanted to attract yet another reason to despise him, when he’d been unable even to protect a boy who apparently bore his blood, he wondered if they were right.

He gave a short laugh. How the rest of the world would mock and marvel to know he was feeling sorry for himself.