Mia Redepenning

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Scandal and gossip on WIP Wednesday

 

I’ve made the final changes to Unkept Promises and am in the process of generating the files to upload to the retailers. So this is my last work-in-progress extract from the book, and this time, I’m thinking about that perennial driver of Regency and Victorian romance, gossip. In my excerpt from Chapter 2, we find that gossip was the force behind Mia’s and Jules’s marriage.

How about your stories? Has gossip been a motivating factor? Share an excerpt in the comments.

“Tell me about the rumours,” Jules commanded.

The three gathered around his bed. Susan fussed over helping him to sit then left the room so the men could see to his comfort. She returned to say she had sent for breakfast. “Just a coddled egg and some thinly cut slices of bread, Jules. Nothing to inflame your fever again.”

“Tell me,” Jules repeated.

“Eat first,” Father suggested, “and get a little of your strength back.”

From what he’d heard, Jules would need it.

The egg and bread came with a few mushrooms, some bacon, and a cup of warmed milk flavoured with honey and spices. Jules rejected the drink and demanded some of the coffee that had been fetched for the other three. “Now tell me what they are saying about Mia,” he demanded. “Surely people realise the circumstances? She was trapped with me, yes, but her father was there too, and she is, after all, just a girl.”

“Gossip,” Aldridge said. “Rumour paints her as your lover, of course, but worse is being said.” He held up a hand. “Not my servants. They know how to be discrete. It seems a mix of village small-mindedness and a couple of females who should never have been invited to one of my parties. I am sorry. They shall be, too, but not soon enough to undo the damage.”

Jules turned to Susan. “How bad is it? She hoped to be able to return to her home.”

“She insisted on going,” Susan said. “It was not a happy experience. Apparently, the rumours had arrived first. Thank goodness I persuaded her to allow me to go with her. Her landlord has evicted her, and even the woman who runs the local dame school…”

“She believed the gossip?” Mia had spoken so highly of the woman.

Susan shook her head. “Not at all. But she depends on the money she receives from the parish and the wealthier parents.” She shrugged.

“It is the other two roles ascribed to her that have done the damage,” Aldridge explained. “Mutually conflicting, but when was the mob ever rational?”

One story said she was a member of the smugglers’ gang (and whore to one or more of those ruffians). “She fell in love with your pretty blue eyes and killed several of the smugglers, including her lover, to free you,” Aldridge explained. “The number of people she killed in order to get you out of your cell grows with each repetition of the story. The latest round has her father cast as the smugglers’ secret leader, and accuses her of parricide.”

Jules and his sister snorted in disgust, and the marquis quirked one corner of his mouth in a twisted smile. “People are idiots,” he agreed.

“The other story has her providing entertainment at Aldridge’s party,” Susan added. “Some have to invent a whole new messenger to tell Aldridge about the smugglers, and some knit the two stories together to say she sold herself to Aldridge in return for help to rescue you. Either way, she purportedly accompanied the Marquis to the rescue, on his horse, semi-clad.”

“Partly true,” Aldridge conceded. “Not the semi-clad bit, obviously, but she did come on my horse.” At identical glares from Lord Henry and Jules, he held up defensive hands. “She would not take no for an answer, and I certainly couldn’t leave her at the castle until my guests had departed. Not those guests.”

“Jules,” Father said gravely, leaving the point, “her father appears to have been her only family. She has been left near destitute and with her reputation in ruins. But she refuses the remedy that would save her.”

“I heard,” Jules said. “Marriage to me. Because of Kirana.” He met his father’s gaze, his own solemn. “Kirana and I have two children, Father, if all went well with her lying in. I cannot desert them. My life is in Madras. I am posted to the Far East fleet, and should have been on my way back days ago. In addition, Mia is a child—just fourteen. Her peculiar upbringing has made her mature in many ways. Even so, she is not ready for marriage.”

“Mia is…” Susan began, but Father waved her to silence, leaving Jules to finish his own arguments for and against.

He was thinking about what his life might look like with Mia as his wife. He could think of worse fates. As Aldridge had implied, she would be a magnificent woman when she grew up. “Can I leave her with you? If I marry her… Would you take her in as a daughter and look after her until I come home?” Which could be years from now, and anything could happen. He was going back into the war. He might die. Any of them might.

Yes. He would marry Mia and let the future look after itself.

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Spotlight on Unkept Promises

It’s on preorder. My story of Mia Redepenning and her reunion with her absent husband, and what happened next, is finally with the proofreader, and I’m setting up a publication plan as we speak. Read on for an excerpt. See my book page for the previous three books, and The Golden Redepennings web page for more about the series. And all my novels are on 50% discount at Smashwords this month.

Unkept Promises

Book 4 in The Golden Redepennings series

She wants to negotiate a comfortable marriage; he wants her in his bed

“… oaths and anchors equally will drag: naught else abides on fickle earth but unkept promises of joy.” Herman Melville

Naval captain Jules Redepenning has spent his adult life away from England, and at war. He rarely thinks of the bride he married for her own protection, and if he does, he remembers the child he left after their wedding seven years ago. He doesn’t expect to find her in his Cape Town home, a woman grown and a lovely one, too.

Mia Redepenning sails to Cape Town to nurse her husband’s dying mistress and adopt his children. She hopes to negotiate a comfortable married life with the man while she’s there. Falling in love is not on her to-do list.

Before they can do more than glimpse a possible future together, their duties force them apart. At home in England, Mia must fight for the safety of Jules’s children. Imprisoned in France, Jules must battle for his self-respect and his life.

Only by vanquishing their foes can they start to make their dreams come true.

Buy links:
Smashwords: https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/947394
Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B07TXXK53N/

Excerpt

Jules had somehow found the time to organise for the military chaplain to visit Kirana, and he arrived later that afternoon when Mia was reading to her friend. The chaplain was a middle-aged man, balding and running slightly to fat, but with a kind eye.

Jules presented him to Mia. “Mrs Redepenning, may I make known to you Captain Albrooke, chaplain to the nth Regiment. He has been kind enough to come to see Kirana.”

What was the etiquette for introducing a man of the cloth to a mistress? Mia was certain the question had never been covered in any of her conversations with her mentors. She would have to behave according to her own best instincts, and hope she did not offend the man. “Captain Albrooke, thank you for coming. Please. Take my seat.” She rose, putting the book to one side “Kirana, my dear, Jules and I will be close by if you need us. Captain Albrooke, you may be wondering how to address my friend. Mrs Redepenning would be acceptable, or Mrs Kirana, if you prefer.”

Jules held the door for Mia, followed after her, and closed it not quite shut behind them. From inside the room they could hear the low hum of the chaplain’s voice, punctuated by Kirana’s cough.

“Albrooke was a bit non-plussed,” Jules told Mia. “More by your presence than by Kirana’s, I suspect. Not many wives would be as charitable, Mia.”

Mia shrugged, suppressing the movement part way through. Did Jules notice? Possibly not, but anyone raised as a lady would. Every day in a dozen ways she showed she had not absorbed the thousands of tiny rules of Society with her mother’s milk. Ladies did not shrug, or slouch, or skip, or shout, or saunter, or stride, or… she couldn’t think of another ‘s’ word, but she was sure she could create a list of ‘do not’s’ for every letter of the alphabet.

“Kirana had the prior claim, Jules.” Thinking about holding her body straight and still, she failed to guard her tongue. “I have never counted your relationship with her as a breach of your vows.” She would have caught back the last sentence, with its emphatic stress on the word ‘her’, but it was too late.

Jules was looking out of the window into the courtyard below, where Hannah was sitting with the two girls, reading them a book. But he heard the emphasis, for his head jerked around and she felt the burn of his blue gaze as he examined the flush that swept her face.

She bit her lip, but the words were said, and they were true.

“But you do count other relationships?” he asked. She was not deceived by the light conversational tone; not when the search beam of those eyes still stripped her soul bare.

“I daresay you think it presumptuous of me.” She could offer that much, though she herself did not think it presumptuous. He had acted in honour when he made sure she knew, before they married, that he intended to return to his mistress, and so she accepted that as a codicil to the vows they had exchanged in their hasty wedding. No exception for her, and only one for him.

“Not presumptuous at all.” Jules sounded tired all of a sudden, and her indignation evaporated. What a homecoming this had been for the poor man. “You are the one person on earth with the right to comment. And Kirana, perhaps, but she has never complained.”

Again, Mia spoke before her brain could censor her tongue. “You might be a better man if she had.”

He turned back to the window and his voice was dry as he replied, “You will undoubtedly amend her lapse. You’ve got yourself a poor bargain, Mia. I told you before I married you, I was not the Sir Galahad type. I’m no saint, either. Don’t expect me to be; I’ll only disappoint you.”

The door to the bedchamber opened. “Mrs Kirana Redepenning will sleep now,” Captain Albrooke said. “If I may, I will call again in a few days.”

“Of course,” Mia agreed. “Kirana will appreciate that.”

Jules carried the man off to his study for a drink and Mia set a maid to watching Kirana then went in search of a task, preferably one that involved punching things.

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Tea with Kitty and Mia

 

Eleanor was delighted to have Lady Catherine Stocke and Mrs Julius Redepenning to tea with her this afternoon. The two had been friends since they met at Haverford Castle half their lifetimes ago, when they were children. Lady Kitty was one of Eleanor’s many goddaughters, and Mia was the daughter of the man who had, in that long ago summer, been cataloguing the Castle’s library.

It was not many years later that Mia married in Haverford Castle — married Captain Julius Redepenning, who was a cousin of Eleanor’s nephew, the Earl of Chirbury.

Eleanor knew that Mia hadn’t seen her husband since the day of the wedding, since he immediately returned to his naval posting in the Far East — and the native mistress who had borne his children.

“What brings the pair of you to London?” she asked, as she handed them their tea and invited them to help themselves to the delicately iced cakes. She had heard, but gossip could distort, as none knew better.

“I am sailing to the Cape Colony where the Captain is currently posted,” Mia replied. “Kitty has come to see me off.”

“How lovely,” Eleanor said. “You and young Jules are to be reunited.”

The amusement in Mia’s eyes suggested she knew that Eleanor was fishing for confirmation of the rumours, and she kindly obliged. “He has been away at sea and might not be aware I am coming,” she explained. “But my friend Kirana is very ill — consumption, I believe. I am going to nurse her, and to bring Jules’s children home with me if the worst happens.”

Eleanor, who had rescued a number of orphaned Haverford by-blows and given them homes, educations, and futures, found nothing to object to in that objective. “So I understood,” she conceded. “I have been telling the harpies I totally approve, and you will apply to me, Mia dear, if you need any help.”

This happens just before Mia leaves for the Cape Colony, and the bulk of Unkept Promises begins.

 

 

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Arrivals on WIP Wednesday

This week, I’ve picked arrivals for my theme. Your choice. An arrival at a ball or dinner. The end of a long journey. Any kind of arrival, and from anyone’s point of view. Mine is Mia, the captain’s wife from Unkept Promises, meeting her husband again after seven years, when she comes to South Africa to look after his dying mistress. Ever since her own arrival, Mia has been expecting Jules back from his patrol in the seas off southern Africa.

Dear Heavens. The man was gorgeous. In the seven years since Mia had last seen him, she had managed to convince herself her memories had played her false. She had been alone and frightened, trapped by smugglers and locked up in a cave. And then a golden god had wriggled through from the cell next door. He had kept her company in the darkness, comforted her when her father died, fought the smugglers to win her safety, and then married her to save her reputation and give her a home.

Of course she adored him. She very likely would have developed a major crush even if she’d met him socially — she had been fourteen, had grown up largely isolated by her father’s social position as a poverty-stricken scholar of good family.  It was no surprise she fancied herself in love with the first young man she had ever properly talked to.

Handsome is as handsome does, she warned herself as she made her way down to the kitchen. But even in a taking about something, as he clearly was, he was unbelievably handsome. Mia thought she was immune to handsome men. Her brothers-in-law were all good-looking, and Mia had been propositioned at one time or another by most of London’s rakes, who clearly believed that a wife who hadn’t seen her husband in seven years must be in need of their attentions. None of them made her breath catch, her heart beat faster, and her insides melt.

Jules did, destroying all her preconceptions. Mia had assumed that, in the renegotiation of their marriage, she and Jules would be equally dispassionate. So much for that. Even grumpy; even with most of his attention on another woman, even with all that she’d heard about him to his discredit, she wanted him.

In the kitchen another handsome man, this one only twelve, took pride of place in Cook’s own seat, being waited on by his two adoring sisters. Marshanda was shuttling between the table and the chair, refilling the plate from which Adiratna was feeding her brother, who was sampling scones topped with different flavours of jam with the judicious air of a connossieur.

Marshanda saw her first. “Ibu Mia,” she announced, then ducked her head. She was not fond of being noticed, whereas her little sister wanted to be the star of every occasion.

Adiratna patted her brother on the cheek as a means to get his attention. “Ibu Mia is Mami’s sister, and our elder mother, Mami says.”

Perdana narrowed the beautiful eyes all three children had inherited from their mother, examining Mia thoughtfully.  Then he lifted Adiranta from his knee and stood to bow. “You are the Captain’s wife,” he announced. “Has the Captain arrived, Ibu Mia?”

Mia nodded. “He is with your mother, children,” she told them. “Give him a few minutes, my dears, and I am sure he will be down to find you.”

Adiratna was already on her way to the door, but she stopped obediently when Mia said her name. She turned and stamped her foot. “But I want my Papa now,” she whined. “He has been gone for ever so long. I want to show him the doll that you brought me from London, Ibu Mia.”

“And so you shall, darling,” Mia reassured her. “But we cannot properly greet Papa without just a little noise, can we? And noise makes Mami so tired.”

“Yes, Ada,” Marshanda said, her bossy streak overcoming her reticence. “You know you will squeal when Papa gives us presents. You always do.”

Adarinta’s eyes widened and sparkled. “Presents!” In moments, she was back across the room, tugging on Perdana’s hand. “What has Papa brought me, Dan. You know, I know you do.”

“Lumps of coal, like the Black Peter we saw on St Nicolas Day,” Perdana answered, promptly, “And a switch to beat you with, for you have undoubtedly been a great trouble for Mami and Ibu Mia.”

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Surprises on WIP Wednesday

Surprising my characters, and therefore my readers, is such fun. I’m working on three different projects at the moment — Unkept Promises, in which my heroine surprises her errant husband by turning up in the Cape Colony to look after his dying mistress and her children (my couple haven’t met in seven years); Never Kiss a Toad, the ongoing saga Mariana Gabrielle and I are publishing on Wattpad, in which the villain surprises the heroine in a dark alley and is surprised in his turn when she pulls a gun on him; and The Beast Next Door, in which my heroine flees her pushy family but finds her usual sanctuary has been invaded by a suspiciously well-cared-for dog.

Post an excerpt with one of your surprises in the comments. Meanwhile, here’s a surprise for Mia from Unkept Promises.

Mia turned left, but the servant darted in front of her, his arms wide. “Missus can’t go in there,” he said. “Missus go away. Come back another day. Captain wouldn’t like it.”

She raised her brows and glared. “The Captain is my husband, which makes this my house. Out of my way. Now.”

The glare, copied from her more formidable sisters-in-law, did the trick. He faded sideways.

“And you can make yerself useful,” Hannah said, “by bringing in Mrs Captain’s luggage before every street scamp in the town takes off with it.”

Mia had her hand on the door handle before the servant mustered another protest, and had turned it by the time he finished. “Miz Kirana, she not there.”

One glance in the room made that clear. A European girl lolled on the bed spooning fruit and cream into her mouth from a bowl — Scots or Irish by her pale skin and flaming red hair. Much of an age with Mia, at a guess, whereas Kirana was Eurasian, and in her early thirties, only a few years younger than Mia’s husband.

The girl confirmed her origins when she opened her mouth, her Irish accent plain. “Who’re ye, bustin’ into me bedchamber? Japheth, who is this gobermouch? And why did ye let ‘er in?”

“I am Mrs Julius Redepenning,” Mia said in her driest tones, “and you, I take it, are my husband’s most recent bed partner.” She ignored her sinking heart. It had been easy to overlook Jules’ attachment to Kirana, who had been his mistress for years before Mia met him. But were her hopes of making a real marriage to founder before she had a chance to even see him again?

A harrumph from Hannah. Her low opinion of men made her dubious about that part of Mia’s mission, but Mia would not give up. Not yet.

She looked around at the room, untidily strewn with clothing and jewellery. The woman had clearly been trying on garments in front of the large mirror before dropping onto the bed.

“Tidy up in here before you leave the room,” Mia instructed. “And do not think to take a thing that is not your own. My husband no longer requires your services.”

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Tea with Mia and Kitty

The two girls were discussing their suitors. Catherine Stocke had a sharp wit and a wicked gift for describing each man’s least charming characteristics. At least her suitors intended marriage. Euronyme Redepenning, as a married woman with a husband on the other side of the world, attracted less permanent offers, which she had no hesitation in refusing. Her stories of the rakes’ reactions had the girls in giggles.

The duchess should probably squash the conversation, which had become a rather racy for two maidens, for Mia was still untouched despite the wedding that took place in this very castle over two years ago. She would not, though. Both young ladies had experienced rather more of life than the sternest arbiters would consider desirable, and being able to laugh about the stupidities of men was a healthy reaction, Eleanor thought.

The mystery surrounding Kitty whereabouts these last seven years, and her sister’s recent marriage to Eleanor’s nephew the Earl of Chirbury, had made her a sensation since the day she walked into a London ballroom earlier in the year. Her own beauty and charm won her an immediate following. Her disinterest in any of her court had the paradoxical effect of increasing it event by event, despite her tactic of insisting that she would not dance more than once with anyone, and that the men surrounding her must take themselves off and dance with other ladies.

Mia’s tale was old news by this time. In the weeks surrounding her fifteenth birthday, she had been trapped by smugglers, forced to marry by the damage to her reputation, and abandoned by her husband on their wedding day (for his duty to the Far East fleet, said some; for his mistress in India, said others). Eleanor, who was rather fond of young Jules, thought the assessment harsh. Faced with conflicted duties, the boy had done his best. He had married an orphaned schoolgirl twelve years his junior in order to save her reputation and give her a home with his family. Then he’d returned to the east in obedience to his orders. Her in-laws had taken the bride into their hearts and been stalwart defenders these past two years.

Both girls had accepted her invitation to spend several weeks at Haverford Castle so they could spend more time together, away from the men who pestered them, and Eleanor was enjoying their company. No. She would not interrupt them. Let them have their fun. “More tea?” she asked.

Kitty and Mia are introduced in Farewell to Kindness the first book in The Golden Redepennings series.  In the Epilogue to that book, we are told that the two friends are staying with the Duchess of Haverford, so the scene above belongs to that visit.

My next newsletter subscriber story, going out this week, is of Mia’s encounter with the smugglers and her wedding. The novel I’m working on at the moment, Unkept Promises, tells what happens seven years later when she heads to the Cape Colony at the foot of Africa to retrieve her husband’s daughters by his mistress.

Kitty will have her own story told in the fifth book of the series.

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Out-takes on WIP Wednesday

I often cut scenes when I edit. Sometimes, I know even as I write them that they’re not going to be needed, but I still need to write them to get where I’m going. Sometimes, I love them dearly, but find out there’s a better way to achieve the same result. And sometimes I cut them reluctantly because I like them a lot, but they add nothing to plot or character.

This week, I’m busily writing a prequel to Unkept Promises that will never go in the book. It’s set seven years before the novel, and I posted the start of it a couple of weeks ago. Mia meets Jules when they are imprisoned together in a smugglers’ cave.

It is coming along, and I intend the whole sequence to be my next newsletter short story, from when Jules realises someone is in the next cell to where Jules kisses his new bride chastely on the forehead and rides off to Portsmouth and his ship.

Do you have a favourite deleted scene you’d like to share? Post it in the comments! Here’s the next bit of mine.

“Miss,” Jules hissed. The girl startled back from her father. Her face, already white, turned whiter as she faced the door, putting her body between herself and the unconscious man.

“I’m a prisoner,” Jules reassured her. “In the next cell.”

The girl held the candle high as she stood, peering towards the sound of his voice. He kept talking to guide her. “Lieutenant Julius Redepenning of His Majesty’s Royal Navy, at your service, Miss. I am going to get out of here, and I’m going to take you and your father with me.”

The face turned up to him was just leaving childhood behind, but the eyes shone with intelligence and her response indicated more maturity than he expected. “I hope you can, Lieutenant. But if your cell is as sturdy as mine, I beg leave to reserve judgement.” She sighed. “I am sorry for your predicament, but I will not deny I am glad to have company.”

“May I borrow the candle?” Jules asked. Her eyes widened in alarm and he rushed to add, “just for long enough to check my cell. They left me without light.” Without food or drink, either, but he would not tell her that. Perhaps the smugglers intended to supply him, and if they didn’t, he would not take the supply she needed for herself and her father.

She passed the candle up, her worry palpable, and he hoisted himself higher with one hand so that he could stretch the other through the bars. “I will be careful, Miss, I promise.”

“Mia,” she said. “Euronyme Stirling, but formality seems out of place, here.”

He returned her smile. She was a brave little girl; he had to find a way out for her. “Call me Jules,” he offered, “as my friends do.”

He rested the candle — a stubby bit of wax with a rope wick — on the sill between the bars and dropped, shaking the ache out of the shoulder that had taken most of his weight. When he reached the candle down, Mia let out an involuntary whimper at the loss of light.

“I have it safe,” he said. “You shall have it back in a minute.”

“I do without it most of the time,” she replied. “It’s just — I have always known I could light it again.”

Most of the time? “How long have you been here?” Jules asked, keeping his voice light and casual against the lump in his throat at her gallantry.

She answered a question with one of her own. “What is today? Tuesday? Or later.”

“Tuesday, probably. It was late Monday evening when I came across the smugglers. They knocked me out, but surely not for long.”

“The tenth of June? It was the fourth when Papa and I…” she trailed off, a small gulp the only sign of her distress.

Six days. Perhaps seven. “How long has your Papa…” Surely she had not been nursing a sick man all this time?

“They hit him when they attacked us, but I think — I wonder if he has had an apoplexy, Jules.” She took a deep shuddering breath and spoke again, her voice once more under her control. “He has not woken since that day. I have managed to get some water into him, but…”

“No food,” he guessed.

“They have given us nothing to eat.”

Bastards. They’d left her mostly in the dark, with no food, little water, and a dying father. He had been exploring his cell while they talked, and found no comfort in it. The door was firmly set, its hinges on the outside where he couldn’t reach them, though he ran his knife through the gap between the wood of the door and the stone of the walls, and guessed the hinges were iron by the sound they made. The door had a small hole, just big enough for someone outside to peer in, or for food or a small drug to be passed through. He pushed the shutter that blocked the hold from the other side, but it didn’t shift.

The only other gap in the stone was the high barred window between his cell and Mia’s. He put the candle up on the sill, and then added the bun, still wrapped in his handkerchief. That meant pulling himself up by the bars at the other end of the window, and the one closest to the edge shifted slightly as he put his weight on it.

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Tea with Kitty

The Duchess of Haverford sat straight in her chair and examined Lady Kitty over her tea cup. Long gone was the little girl who once visited Haverford Castle in Margate, trailing behind her eldest sister, and being solicitous of the next in age, dear little Meg, whose mind had stalled forever in childhood. Now in her twenties, Kitty had also left behind the debutante, thrilled with the gowns and glitter, loving the dancing, engaging with every sign of enthusiasm in the endless round of entertainments.

She had never shown much interest in the marriage-mart reasons behind the Season, and — for her — the gloss faded from the social whirl quite quickly. She’d had suitors aplenty. Her Grace had witnessed it for herself, and Kitty’s sister had confirmed that they’d received a number of formal offers. But Kitty refused them all. Was it because of the close friendship she’d formed with Euronyme Redepenning? Mia, as she was called? Kitty and the wife of Lord Henry Redepenning’s youngest son were the same age, had many of the same interests, and had been inseparable these past five years.

But Mia had left London this very week, sailing to South Africa to be with her husband. And with her husband’s mistress, which seemed very peculiar to the duchess.

How to begin? “Kitty, my dear, what are your thoughts on marriage?”

“It is a venerable institution with much to recommend it,” the younger woman replied, a smile dancing in her eyes.

The duchess tipped her head in acknowledgement of the quip, but raised one eyebrow.

Kitty seemed to come to some kind of a decision, for she gave one sharp nod. “Aunt Eleanor, I would like to marry, but I think it unlikely. I will not marry where I do not trust, and I trust few people, I regret to say. My family. My friends. How does one become friends with a man in our world, where every interaction is governed by rules and monitored by prying eyes?”

Unconventional, but perceptive. A man who could not be trusted was the source of much unhappiness, as the duchess knew all too well. “You are young to be so suspicious,” she commented.

Kitty put her cup down on the table beside her chair and leant forward. ” Has anyone ever told you about what happened between me and the Earl of Selby?”

The incident between Selby and Kitty happened in Farewell to Kindness, where the heroine is Kitty’s sister, Anne. Alex, who appears in the excerpt below, is the hero of A Raging Madness, next in the series. Both books are discounted for the rest of May, to celebrate the publication of the third novel in the series, The Realm of Silence, which is already available on my bookshop and comes out everywhere else tomorrow.

Clink on the links for blurbs and buy buttons.

Farewell to Kindness is currently discounted to 99c wherever it is sold as an ebook.

A Raging Madness is available with a discount of $2.75 off the list price of $3.99 on my bookshop only (the Buy from Jude Knight button). Use the discount code KWMS6GNW at checkout.

Excerpt from Farewell to Kindness

“And is Miss Kitty with Miss Meg?” John asked.

“No, indeed. She went off to bed a good ten minutes ago. You go too, Price.”

With a sense of alarm out of all proportion to the circumstances, John left. He had no reason, beyond Jonno’s concerns and a stirring uneasiness, to run down the eastern stairs instead of up the servant stairs to his own room in the attic. But run he did.

On the floor below, he stopped. The ladies’ bedchambers, including Miss Kitty’s, were mostly to the left. Acting on instinct, he turned right, to pass the room where Miss Ruth had slept.

He stopped as he came level with the closed door. Something moved inside. A struggle? Thumping and muffled cries. He tried the handle. Locked. Shouting himself in his alarm, he hurled himself against the door. Once, twice. The third time it burst open, and he fell through the doorway, catching himself with his hands before he crashed to the floor.

As he picked himself up, the Earl of Selby cast him a fierce look.

“Get out,” Selby ordered. The dirty swine held Miss Kitty pinned to the bed with his upper body, one hand muffling her cries while the other fumbled at the buttons of his breeches. “Get the hell out, man. This is none of your business.”

John grabbed the bastard by the shoulder, swung him around and planted a fist straight into his superior nose, sending him lurching backwards.

Miss Kitty slithered quickly off the bed, and ran to the door, where Miss Mia—who must have been woken by the shouting—wrapped an arm around her.

John put himself between Lord Selby and the doorway.

“You hit me!” Lord Selby said, incredulous. “You broke my nose!”

John figured he probably had. Certainly if the pain in his hand was anything to go by, he must have caused considerable damage to the bastard’s face.

“I’ll see you swing for this,” Selby hissed. “Striking a peer is a capital offence. You’ll swing for this.”

“Rubbish,” Miss Mia said, from the doorway. “You were drunk and you bumped into the bedpost. We all saw it.”

From below came a stentorian bellowing. “What’s going on up there? Jonno, get up those stairs and report, man.”

“Mrs Redepenning, this man attacked me.”

Miss Mia thrust out her chin. “Lord Selby, the Earl of Chirbury’s trusted friend protected a guest in his Lord’s house.”

Selby tried to dodge past John, who blocked him. Jonno came running along the hall and skidded to a stop behind Miss Kitty and Miss Mia. “Major wants to know what’s happening.”

“This man attacked me!” Selby roared. “I want him arrested!”

“This so-called gentleman attacked Miss Haverstock,” Miss Mia interrupted, “and Price came to her rescue.”

“Stop saying that,” Selby commanded. “I intend to marry the girl. There’s no need for all this fuss.”

The two women looked at him, shocked. “Marry?” Miss Kitty said.

Selby smiled, looking smug even with the blood dripping from his nose. “I’ll wager you didn’t think to catch a peer, did you?”

Her eyes flashing, Miss Kitty took a step away from Miss Mia’s protective arms. “Marry? Me? Marry you?”

Selby looked even more smug. “Of course you’re surprised, a village girl becoming a Countess, especially one with such a questionable past. But yes, I’ll marry you. What do you think of that? That changes things, doesn’t it?”

“I wouldn’t marry you if you were the last man in England,” Kitty hissed. “You slimy, disgusting slug, you.”

“Here now!” The smug look gone, Selby frowned. “You have to marry me. I’ve compromised you.”

“I don’t see any compromise,” Miss Mia argued. “Kitty has been with me the whole time.”

“But I have witnesses,” Selby looked at John, and at Jonno.

“I didn’t see nowt,” John said. “Did you Jonno?”

Jonno, a grin burgeoning, shook his head.

“Jonno, a hand here!” The peremptory command came from the stair landing. Jonno glanced in that direction, then ran toward it.

Miss Mia, looking after him, said, “Alex, how did you get up the stairs?”

“On my behind,” the Major replying, hobbling into view, leaning heavily on Jonno. “What’s all the noise?”

“Thank God you’re here,” Selby said, importantly. “You can sort this out.”

Major Alex let Jonno help him to a chair. Miss Mia led Miss Kitty into the room, her arm still protectively around her, keeping as far away from Selby as they could.

“All right,” Major Alex said, “what’s going on?”

Several voices started at once, and he roared, “Quiet! Selby. You first.”

“I want this man arrested. He hit me,” Selby commanded.

“A good one, too,” Major Alex observed. “I take it he deserved it, John?”

“He was trying to rape Miss Haverstock, sir,” John replied quietly.

“I’ve already said I’ll marry the girl,” Selby interrupted, impatiently. “He hit me, do you hear? He hit a peer. That’s a hanging offence.”

“Do you have witnesses to that, Selby?”

“Well, yes, Mrs Redepenning, and Miss Haverstock. They both saw him.”

The two ladies shook their heads. “I wasn’t even here,” Miss Kitty said, smiling at Miss Mia. “Mia and I were in her room, playing chess.” Miss Mia nodded. “Price wasn’t here, either, Alex. Lord Selby imagined the whole thing after he walked into the bedpost.”

Major Alex nodded. “Fair enough.”

Selby spluttered. “What do you mean, fair enough? It’s all lies. I’ve compromised the girl and I have to marry her! She has to marry me.”

“She doesn’t want to, Selby.”

“But… I’m an Earl. She would be a Countess.”

“You’re a slug,” Mia commented. “A slimy, disgusting slug, just as Kitty said.”

Major Alex’s eyes lit with appreciation. “That would seem to be a clear no, Selby,” he told the fuming Earl. “Jonno, John, the Earl appears to be shaky after his accident. Take him to his room and lock him in. Bexley’s valet has been doing for him, hasn’t he? Tell the man to pack the Earl’s effects. He will be leaving first thing in the morning.”