The Little Mermaid

by

Meeting the Matchmaker on WIP Wednesday

Here’s a short excerpt from the book that’s out on 20th March, Hook, Lyon, and Sinker

Mrs. Dove Lyon was not as Laurel had imagined her. Laurel had expected someone garishly painted and indiscreetly clad in gaudy colors. After all, she ran a gambling establishment which also offered other entertainments of the most scandalous kind.

The person who joined Laurel was clothed all in black and veiled. Her garb would not have looked out of place on the most dignified of Society’s fashionable matrons, and was far less revealing than many gowns worn by such august ladies. Her language and carriage too, as she invited Laurel to sit and asked her preference for beverage, were those of a lady.

The knowledge comforted Laurel. Perhaps this desperate scheme might work after all.

Once Laurel had her tea, Mrs. Dove Lyon came directly to the point, without any polite evasions. “Why have you asked to see me, my lady? Do you wish for me to find you a husband?”

Blunt and to the point. Also surprising, for Laurel had agreed to Benjamin’s request that the broken betrothal should not be made public just yet. Laurel thought he wanted to give Tiber time to talk Laurel into reversing her decision, as she had last time, but she had agreed anyway. It suited her to keep the gossips at bay for a week or so.

Her hostess must have guessed at her thoughts, because she said, “Lord Tiberius Hastings was here last night, and he is indiscreet when in his cups. Most of the gentlemen present will now be spreading the news that you have jilted him. Mind you, his loose tongue will work to your advantage, for he was bemoaning his own stupidity in putting off the wedding once again. And, making it clear that his chief regret was losing your dowry.”

by

Tea with her husband and a problem

“Surely there is something we can do, James,” said Eleanor, the Duchess of Winshire to her husband. “It is outrageous that young Laurel must marry within a matter of weeks or lose her inheritance from her father.”

James shook his head. “Her father has been dead for years, Eleanor. If she was going to object, she should have done so before now. The fact that she has said nothing, and taken no action to challenge the will, means that the courts are unlikely to even listen to her at this late stage. And certainly not before the deadline of her twenty-fifth birthday.”

Eleanor sighed, impatiently. “She says she did not know about the provision, and indeed, how should she? Girls are not encouraged to attend the reading of a will, and apparently neither of her older brothers saw fit to enlighten her. Her youngest brother, who inherited when the older two died, was overseas with the army. He assumed that Laurel knew. Her fiance of the time should have known, but I gather he had not bothered to read the marriage settlements. Whether he really intended to marry her or not, I have no idea, but he has certainly lost his opportunity now.”

James frowned. “Is she certain, dearest? Would she not be better to marry the man she knows than to make herself and her dowry the subject of a contest in a gaming hall?”

Eleanor’s sigh was heartfelt. “So I suggested to her,” she said. “But Laurel says that she would rather be penniless and dependent on her brother for the rest of her life than to exchange another word with that snake, by which I take it she meant her former betrothed.”

“You might remember, Eleanor, that Mrs Dove Lyon’s has had great success as a matchmaker. Perhaps she will manage another of her love matches for your young friend Laurel.”

Eleanor managed a still deeper sigh. “If there is nothing we can do about the will, I suppose we must leave it to that woman. But James, if Laurel is not happy with the outcome of the contests, I am determined that we shall offer her a refuge.”

“Of course, dearest,” said her lovely husband.

***

Find out what happens to Laurel in, Hook, Lyon, and Sinker, currently available at the preorder price of 99c, and published on 20th March. It is part of the Lyon’s Den series, and also a reinterpretation of The Little Mermaid, in the spirit of my A Twist Upon a Regency Tale series.

by

Meet my “Little Mermaid with a Twist” in WIP Wednesday

Angelico Warrington made his painful way from the parlour of his employer down the stairs to the main hall of the Lyon’s Den, where he was nearly due to play another set with the other musicians. His progress was slow, but with a crutch on each side to take part of the weight off his damaged feet, Angel did make progress.

That was an improvement over those excruciating months after his friends rescued him from the French camp. They had insisted on sending him to London to see the best doctors, but he remembered little of the journey from Spain, and not a great deal of successive failed treatments. Except for the pain. He remembered the pain.

He had been working for Mrs Dove Lyons for a calendar month, completing the trial period she had offered him at the behest of her chief guard. Her wolves, she called them. Titan, their leader had served with some of same officers as Angel, but at different times. Still, at the request of one of his friends, he had put in a word with Mrs Dove Lyons, who had declared herself willing to employ Angel for a month. And after that, she said, they would see.

He had not doubted his ability to prove himself. Angel had always been a capable musician, though he had been a better singer. Once. Before he screamed his throat raw over and over during the month he had been in the hands of the French.

He had been a good dancer, too, once.

No point in repining. He could have been killed when the explosives he’d been setting under a bridge went off early and trapped his feet under piles of rock and his head under the water. He could have died at the hands of the French who rescued him, imprisoned him, and tortured him to find out what he knew about the movements and plans of the British army.

He could have passed away after his friends got him out, since by then the wounds in both feet were infected. Or he could have lost his feet altogether. The surgeons had been keen to cut off the poor mangled objects that remained after his captors had repeatedly rebroken the bones, over and over.

Instead, he was alive, free, and mostly recovered. He was even mobile, sort of. And he now had a permanent job. Mrs Dove Lyons had pronounced herself satisfied with his performances in the post month. She had offered him a contract and an increase in his wages. He could possibly move from the fourth floor room he shared with one of the other musicians, if he could find a cheap enough place on the ground floor somewhere.

He was smiling as he reached the intermediate landing and executed the manouver that allowed him to change directions, but one foot came down more heavily than he intended, and he shut his eyes against the pain that stabbed up from every poorly set bone in the dismal appendage.

As he did so, a warm fragrant body collided with him, and he lurched off balance into the wall, gritting his teeth against the agony, now from both feet as his crutches clattered to the floor.

“Oh, I am so sorry,” said a melodious voice even as a firm hand grasped his upper arm on one side to support him.

“Take a moment, Nereus. My lady, would you fetch my friend’s crutches?” It was Titan, the head wolf. Not that his true name was Titan, any more than Angel’s was Nereus. But Mrs Dove Lyon gave each of her workers a name—a stage name as it were. From Midsummer Dream, most of them, but not Angel. For him, their employer had strayed into Greek mythology. Nereus was the shape-changing god of the sea and particularly of its fish. Titan must have told the lady what Angel had done when he joined the Allied cause in Spain.

Titan’s was the firm hand, but not the melodious voice. Angel had to see who that was.

He managed to open his eyes, but the lady was wearing a bonnet with a thick veil. A pale blue rather than black, as was the fashionable gown that highlighted rather than disguising her figure. So not a widow. Wonderful. He had fallen in front of one of the customers.

“I truly do apologise Mr Nereus,” she insisted, as she handed Angel each crutch and he tucked them under his arms. “I was speaking to Mr Titan over my shoulder, and not looking where I was going. I do hope I have not hurt you. Well. I mean, I can see that I hurt you, but not worse, I mean.”

“Nothing that won’t pass, my lady,” Angel assured her. “As long as I keep my weight off my feet, they will be better soon.” Or as good as they ever were, which was the best that could be expected.

“Mrs Dove Lyons is expecting you, Lady Laureline,” Titan told the lady, and she smiled at Angel. “If you are sure you are unharmed, Mr Nereus,” she said, and continued on up the stairs.

Titan stopped to say “Stay there and I’ll help you down when I’ve seen the lady to Mrs Dove Lyons. He hurried after the lady.

Angel stayed leaning against the wall, it and his crutches doing most of the job of supporting him. He ignored the pain—it was a familiar companion. The thoughts that seethed in his mind took all of his attention. That was Lady Laurel.

Laurel Barclay. The girl he had once adored from afar. The girl he had saved from the sea when the ship they were on sank off the coast of Portugal. Eight years ago, that had been, in 1808. She had returned to her world and he had joined the British army.

Why on earth was Lady Laurel, virtuous sister of an earl, and flower of the English ballrooms, visiting the proprietor of a gambling den? Even such a gambling den as this, popular as it was with men and women alike, was not the place for an unmarried daughter of an aristocratic family.

A thought crossed his mind, but that couldn’t be her errand. Mrs Dove Lyon was a matchmaker for the misfits and the desperate. Laurel is betrothed. And if she does not like Lord Tiberius Seward9, and who could blame her, she can just choose another.

Titan caught him by surprise. “Nereus. You waited. Do we need to call a doctor?”

A fair comment. Usually, Angel refused help. “The lady,” Angel said. “I knew her once, a long time ago. I was curious about why she was here.”

Titan raised a brow. “Her business with Mrs Dove Lyon is her own. When did you have an opportunity to meet Lady Laureline? I thought you had only been in England for eighteen months.”

“It was long ago,” Angel said. “We were both on the same ship coming from Italy.” For part of the trip, anyway. Angel had been taken from his Sicilian home by pirates, and was on his way to the Tunisian slave blocks when the pirate vessel encountered a British naval patrol and came off the worst.

“The commodore was Lady Laureline’s uncle—Lord Somerford’s brother. I can’t say that we met, exactly. She was well chaperoned, and I was working with the crew. Then, off Portugal, a storm struck the fleet. It was scattered and our ship was blown onto rocks and foundered.” Angel shrugged. “Lady Laureline was the first person I rescued.”

“Which means,” Titan observed, “that you went back into the sea. More than once if I was to guess. How many people did you rescue, exactly?”

Angel shrugged again. He had no idea. Just the memory of aching heavy muscles as he forced himself through the waves again and again.