The Return of the Mountain King

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Relatives on WIP Wednesday

I am always tempted to commit family saga. I really have to rein myself in during short stories, but in the rest of my books, especially my regencies, I have plenty of room, since my characters wander back and forth between books and even series. I have relatives. Lots of relatives. And the number is growing now that quite a few of them are married.

I particularly like women relatives. Some of them are villains, some of them silly, but many of them are my heroine’s best friends and greatest supports. At the very least, they give her someone to talk to, someone to encourage her to follow her dreams, as the best female friends do. Give us an excerpt, if you’d like, with relatives of the hero or heroine in your work in progress. Mine is from To Claim the Long Lost Lover.

Within the hour, Sarah came looking for Nate. “My mother and my aunts wish to meet you, Nate.” He took her hand, feeling unaccountably nervous. Lady Sutton had every reason to despise the man who had run off with her daughter and then abandoned her, even if he had reasons, good reasons, for both actions.

He felt no better when he arrived in the drawing room, where three great ladies of Society sat side by side like justices in a courtroom, though they were seating on a long sofa behind a low table. Around them a number of other richly dressed ladies occupied chairs and coaches. In his fancy, they would be the jury in the coming trial.

Sarah bobbed a curtsy. “Aunt Eleanor? Mama? Aunt Georgie? May I make known to you my husband, Lord Bentham?”

Nate bowed to each of them. He had seen the duchess at various entertainments this season; Lady Sutton, he recognised from years ago, when she’d attended church from Applemorn, which made the third Lady Georgiana, the duke’s sister.

Sarah continued around the room. Charlotte, he knew, and Ruth. He also recognised the duchess’s ward, Miss Grenford, with whom he had danced on the night he first waltzed with Sarah, who sat side by side with her sister, Lady Hamner.

The lady with the infant on her knee was the younger Lady Sutton. She was married to the duke’s eldest son, who had arrived this afternoon with his wife and daughter, and immediately taken command of a large segment of the battle planning that continued in the study.

Nate was also presented to Lady Georgiana’s friend, Miss Chalmers, and Lady Rosemary, another daughter of the duke.

Once he had been conducted around the room, he was instructed to sit. “There, Lord Bentham, if you please,” said the dowager Lady Sutton. She pointed to a chair that had been placed a few feet away from and facing the long sofa. Again, he was uncomfortable reminded of a trial, an impression that was reinforced when Lady Sutton and Lady Georgiana nodded at the duchess, and she spoke.

“We are Sarah’s godmother, mother, and aunt, Lord Bentham. We have stood beside her and suffered with her since you persuaded her to cast propriety to the wind and abscond with you and then disappeared.”

She put up a hand when Nate opened his mouth, and he closed it again. She waited for a moment, as if to see whether he intended to continue his interruption, then nodded to Lady Sutton, who continued, “We understand that you were not responsible for your own abduction, but we wish to hear your explanation for the rest. Why did you elope with Sarah? Why did you not write to her? Why did you not return as soon as you were able?”

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Tea with Eleanor: Paradise Lost Episode 5

He straightened, and opened his mouth, but Eleanor spoke over the rebuke that was certain to come. “I have no objection, sir, but I assume you have not given her license to neglect your heir or to be impertinent to me.”

The duke frowned. “Certainly not. I shall have a word with the bitch.”

“Thank you, Your Grace. You have always required others to treat me with the respect due to your wife, and that is why I was certain I could depend on you for what I am about to ask.” Honey worked better than vinegar, one of the Haverford great aunts was fond of saying.

The duke smirked at the compliment and inclined his head, graciously indicating that she should continue.

Now for it. Best to say it straight out, as she had rehearsed a dozen times since she and Haverford’s base-born half-brother, who was also his steward, had concocted the strategy. “You may be aware, Your Grace, that I have been taking the mercury treatment for the pox. As I am a faithful wife, and have only ever had intimate knowledge of one man—yourself, Your Grace—I must assume it originated with you.”

As expected, Haverford erupted. “I will not—”

Eleanor held up a hand. “Your Grace has needs, and I would not normally comment on how you meet them, as long as any lovers you take within the household you have given me to manage are willing partners.”

She kept talking over his attempt to interrupt, hoping his temper would not override his manners. “I owe you a second son, Your Grace, and I fully intend to attempt to carry out that side of our bargain, but I have a request to make to keep me safe from falling ill again.”

He frowned, silenced for the moment. Eleanor thought it best to wait for him to speak. At least he was listening.

“Go on,” he said at last.

“My doctor has assured me that fewer than half of all people who contracted second stage syphilis moved into the deadlier third stage, and most of those have had the disease multiple times. Repeated infections may also kill or deform any further children we have. I would like to take steps to limit the risk, Your Grace.”

“What steps?”

In the end, Haverford lost his temper twice more before he signed the document she put before him. In it, he promised to not to require intimacy from Eleanor unless he had refrained from any potential source of the disease for six weeks, and had been inspected by a doctor.

She had delicately hinted at the retribution that would follow if he didn’t keep his word. A gentleman’s word was his bond, of course, but only when given to other gentlemen. Haverford would not hesitate to break an agreement with his wife, if it suited him.

Thanks to the duke’s training in politics, she knew all about the pressure to apply—in this case, the social contacts who would be informed of the whole disgusting situation if he broke his word. She had been a lady of the chamber to the Queen, was friends with several of the princesses, was sister to the current Earl of Farnmouth and sister-in-law to another earl and an earl’s second son.

Added to that there were all of her social contacts. Those she specifically mentioned to him were only the start. Being Haverford’s hostess had given her huge reach into the upper echelons of Society, especially those families headed by his political cronies and rivals. He was a consummate player of the game of Society. He knew all of that without her saying.

One son, she contracted for, and a maximum of two more pregnancies. Eleanor prayed she would conceive quickly, that she would suffer no more miscarriages, and that she would deliver a healthy son without any further ado.

***

Haverford House, London, April 1812

To give Haverford credit, Eleanor conceded, he had stuck to the agreement for several years. Her copy of the agreement was still in her secret compartment, somewhere. Her co-conspirator, Tolly Fitz-Grenford, had a second copy, and the third had been given to her brother in a sealed envelope, to be opened only if she died unexpectedly or sent a message asking him to read it.

Presumably, that copy was somewhere in the papers inherited by her nephew. Perhaps she should ask for it back, for Haverford had not approached her with marital duties in mind since she announced that she was enceinte with the child who proved to be the wanted spare son.

She very much doubted that he ever would. After all, his mistresses and lovers were all twenty or thirty years younger than Eleanor.

On the other hand, he was behaving like a bad-tempered guard dog over James Winderfield’s return, and she wouldn’t put it past him to—mark his territory, as it were. The copies of the agreement had better stay where they were.

In truth, as long as the disease never recurred, Haverford had done her a favour. Without the incentive, she might have taken much longer to grasp what freedom she could.

Eleanor felt dizzy again, just thinking about James as he appeared last night. Haverford’s command was not to be borne. Grace and Georgie were her dearest friends, and she was not going to be separated from them.

She would need to be careful, though. Perhaps one of her goddaughters could pass a note to one of Grace’s daughters. The Society for the Betterment of Indigent Mothers and Orphans was meeting tomorrow. That would do nicely.

She moved to her escritoire, took out a sheet of her monogramed paper, and sharpened a quill. Now. Where could they meet? Perhaps Grace or Georgie might have a notion.

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Caring on WIP Wednesday


I do love a strong masculine hero who shows his caring side. One of the scenes in Farewell to Kindness, where the hero tenderly washes his beloved’s wounds, is based on an experience in my own life. I’d been in a car accident, and had been through the windscreen. My betrothed came to me at my mother’s house, and gently washed all the blood and glass out of my hair.

Today’s theme is caring for one’s beloved, and I have a piece from To Claim the Long-Lost Lover. Please feel free to share an excerpt in the comments.

Nate fussed over the scrapes and cuts on Sarah’s wrists, the bruises she’d accumulated when she was being manhandled. Wilson had ordered up a hot bath, and he insisted on staying while she undressed so that he could inspect all of her wounds.

Since she was a small girl, Sarah had only ever been unclothed in front of two other people—and that rarely—her maid, when in her bath, and her husband, in the dark and under the sheets on the three nights—four now—she had spent in bed with him. Stripping in front of him in full daylight had her blushing like a young maiden, which she had not been for eight years.

He set her at ease with his manner: crisp and matter of fact, focused on checking that her injuries were no worse than she said. He finished by taking her gently in his arms and pressing a tender kiss to her forehead. “Now have a long soak, my love.” He stepped back and held out his hand to help her into the water. The scrapes stung as she lowered herself, but once she was immersed, the heat felt wonderful.

Nate knelt beside the tub, so his head was close to hers. “Wilson is bringing you a soothing herbal tea. If you will permit, dearest heart, I shall go up to see Elias. I daresay some of today’s doings might have reached the nursery, though I hope his nursemaid will have had enough sense to keep it from him. If not, I will be able to reassure him that you are home and well.”

A swift knock at the door was followed by Wilson’s entrance, with a tea tray. She could smell some of Cook’s delicious drop scones, and suddenly realised that she was hungry.

“Go, of course, she told him. “Tell him I shall be up to see him later.”

“After you have had a sleep,” Nate told her, firmly. “I shall be back by the time the water cools, and shall dress those cuts, then tuck you into bed. Wilson, stay with your mistress and make sure she doesn’t go to sleep in her bath.”

It had always annoyed Sarah when other people made decisions for her, but it was very nice, she decided, when the person doing the deciding loved her to distraction, had suffered when she was taken, and needed her to let him take care of her. Her hero.

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Action heroes on Work-in-Progress Wednesday

I do like a story with action–where something happens of more consequence that who asks whom to dance or what trim is purchased for a hat or gown. So my poor characters are kidnapped, chased, beaten, battled with, stolen from, abandoned, operated on, shipwrecked…

As always, I invite you to post an excerpt from your current work-in-progress; this week, an action scene.

Mine is from To Claim the Long-Lost Lover.

Nate held on as Aldridge raced his phaeton towards the address Lady Charlotte had given them, weaving close to buildings, feathering past carriages, missing pedestrians by inches, turning corners on a single wheel.

Nate, Drew, and the duke had been about to go upstairs to the nursery when Aldridge arrived, asking anxiously for Charlotte. He had word of a trap set in Clerkenwell; someone who planned to compromise and marry Sarah’s sister. What would the kidnappers do when they found out they had the wrong sister, and a married woman, at that?

If they arrived in time, it would be thanks to Aldridge’s driving skill. On any other day, Nate would be demanding that he slow down, take care. But with Sarah in trouble, he couldn’t go fast enough. He just gripped the side rail of the seat and gritted his teeth, and prayed as he had never prayed before.

How would he tell Elias if anything had happened to her? How would he survive losing her again?

Aldridge hauled the horses to a halt beside a carriage with the Winshire coat of arms. “You’re Lady Sarah’s driver?” he asked the man who sat nervously atop the carriage, a musket across his knees.

“Aye, sir.” The coachman looked towards a narrow gap between the buildings. “I’m waiting for Lady Bentham.”

Nate leapt to the ground, the pistol Uncle James had given him in one hand and his dagger in the other. “How long since my wife went in there, driver?”

“Perhaps fifteen minutes, sir?” the driver answered. “Is there something wrong?”

Aldridge shouted at a man who was lounging against a wall. “You there?!” The man spat a stream of yellow bile into the street and sneered. A coin appeared between Aldridge’s fingers and disappeared as quickly.

“I am the Marquis of Aldridge and I am giving you two options. You make sure no one touches my carriage or my horses or those of Lady Bentham, and you get a crown. Anything happens to either team or rig, and I find you and extract your brains through your nostrils, burn them, and sell them as pie filling. Your choice.” He held up the coin. “A shilling now, the rest when I come back.”

The man straightened. “Done.” He held out a hand and caught the coin that Aldridge tossed even as Nate ran past him into the alley.

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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?”

***

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.