Shout-outs
⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ Entirely engrossing story.lcdolphin
Ciaran and Lucy meet under peculiar circumstances and a deep friendship is forged. Lucy's Uncle has great plans for Lucy's life and her money, which she is determined to thwart, and Ciaran keeps trying to help. Really enjoyed the humour and the inventive way these two kept getting together. This book can be read as a standalone, despite being a part of a great series, as Ciaran's family only make a brief appearance. Highly recommend.
(Reviewed in Canada on February 18, 2020)
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Synopsis
After a sheltered upbringing, Lady Lucinda Sutcliffe is finally embarking on her first season, eager to experience everything she's missed. When Lucy realizes that her uncle plans to quickly marry her off in exchange for a slice of her fortune, she begs a favor of a new acquaintance, Ciaran Ramsey. If Lucy remains single until she turns twenty-one, she—and her money—will be out of her uncle's power. All the charming Scot needs to do is woo her for six weeks, and then jilt her . . .
The Ramseys don't need the scandal of a false engagement attached to their name. But Lucy's older suitor is both distasteful and dangerous, and Ciaran can't allow his lovely friend to be forced to marry such a man. And besides, the more time Ciaran spends with his new "betrothed," the more their ruse begins to feel very much like the real thing. Passion like this is impossible to feign, but how much is a rogue willing to risk for love?
Release date: February 18, 2020
Publisher: Lyrical Press
Print pages: 320
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For the Sake of a Scottish Rake
Anna Bradley
Chapter One
Brighton, England
May 1818
If a proper lady intended to engage in a shocking impropriety, a fashionable seaside resort wasn’t the place to do it. Lady Lucinda Sutcliffe had only arrived a few days ago, but she’d already discovered there were more gouty old men and phlegmatic old ladies in Brighton than there were grains of sand on the beach.
Dozens of aged invalids meant dozens of pairs of rheumy eyes, all in search of scandal.
Not in this part of town, though, and not at this time of day. It would be an hour or two before fashionable Brighton roused themselves from their beds, and when they did venture out, they wouldn’t come here. Lucy had been watching the tidy patch of sand behind their rented villa for days now. It was as close to a deserted beach as one could find in Brighton.
Location, timing, and privacy—these were the first three of the four necessary elements of any successful impropriety.
The final element? Don’t hesitate.
A lady had to seize her opportunities when she could. This might be Lucy’s first opportunity, her first adventure, and the first time she’d seized anything more exciting than an extra lump of sugar for her tea, but that didn’t make the rule any less sound.
She peered down the long stretch of beach to her right, then her left. She scanned the low outcropping of rocks to her east, but there wasn’t a soul to be seen. Ah, splendid! A smile spread across her face, and she rubbed her hands together in anticipation. This was the most brilliant idea she’d ever had—
“This is the most ridiculous idea I’ve ever heard of, Lucy.”
Lucy raised her gaze to the sky and prayed for patience before turning to face her accuser. She recognized the look on Eloisa’s face. It was a special look her cousin seemed to reserve for Lucy alone.
Two parts fascination, three parts horror. Even Eloisa’s eyebrows looked scandalized.
“You’ll get caught,” Eloisa fretted. “Then what do you suppose will happen? My father will keep us locked in our rooms for the rest of the month, and all our pleasure will be spoilt.”
Lucy didn’t bother to argue that point. Pleasure did seem to shrivel and die in her Uncle Jarvis’s presence. But surely that was reason enough to pursue it with single-minded determination behind his back?
Anyway, she wouldn’t get caught. “Who’s going to see?” Lucy waved a hand at the empty beach. “No one ever comes to this side of town.” If her uncle had understood just how unfashionable a neighborhood this was, he never would have taken the villa, but it was too late to change now.
Eloisa dropped the towels she’d been carrying onto a rock. “What if Father saw us leave the villa?”
“He didn’t. You said yourself he never rises before noon. You don’t suppose your mother saw us, do you?” Lucy’s aunt suffered from sleeplessness and was often awake at odd hours, but she usually kept to her room.
“No. She dosed herself with laudanum last night. She’ll sleep for hours yet.” Eloisa sighed. “Her nerves are overset.”
Yes, well, they would be, wouldn’t they? Lucy’s own nerves had been forged in fire, but after days of being trapped in a coach with her Uncle Jarvis, she felt as brittle as glass and as liable to shatter. Traveling with her uncle felt very like how Lucy imagined being buried in her grave would feel—that is, cramped and airless, with mounds of damp earth pressing in on every side.
Except instead of earth, Lucy was pressed on every side by mounds of damp flesh.
She’d spent the past five days flattened against the carriage door, but as much as she squeezed, she couldn’t escape Uncle Jarvis’s creeping girth. No sooner did she inch away from him than a pudgy knee or fleshy arm would fling itself into the sliver of open space. He’d been chasing her across the seat since they’d left Devon. By the time they’d reached Brighton, Lucy was ready to hang by her fingernails from the window to escape him.
But she didn’t want to think of her uncle right now. The beach stretched before them, the waves flirting with the sand at the water’s edge. “Come, Eloisa. We’re here now.” She gave her cousin a hopeful smile. “The water looks lovely. Don’t say you’re not tempted.”
Eloisa gazed at the water for a moment, her mouth turned down in a frown. “I don’t see why we can’t simply go out this afternoon in a bathing machine. That’s how it’s done, Lucy. Ladies don’t simply hurl themselves into the ocean.”
Well, for pity’s sake, why not? Growing up in Devon, Lucy had spent many happy hours of her childhood splashing about in the waves. Oh, it had been years since she’d been swimming, but she had vague memories of how glorious it felt to float along, her body cradled by the cool water around her.
She couldn’t experience that joyous freedom if she was tethered to a bathing machine. “There’s no pleasure in being dragged from a bathing machine by a large woman who plunges you into the water and knocks you about like a pile of soiled linens while your skirts billow like hot air balloons.”
Eloisa folded her arms over her chest. “Well, I don’t know how to swim, so I’d just as soon have a dipper, thank you.”
“We’ll go in the bathing machines later, with your mother.” For her aunt’s sake, Lucy had dutifully submitted to an hour’s tedious dipping every afternoon since they’d arrived. “But floating about like an overdressed corpse isn’t swimming, Eloisa.”
“Lucy! What a ghastly thing to say!”
“For now, I’ll be your dipper.” Lucy ignored Eloisa’s outrage, and gave her cousin a wheedling smile. Poor Eloisa. A lifetime spent pinned under her father’s thumb had bled her of every last drop of spirit. It wouldn’t do. One way or another, something would have to be done about Eloisa’s listlessness.
“Come, Eloisa. You don’t have to swim. You can paddle about in the shallow part. I won’t let you drift out to sea. I promise. Not that there’s much chance of that in this secluded little cove.”
The look that flashed across Eloisa’s face this time was three parts affection, and two parts exasperation. “You’re a regular hoyden, Lucy.”
Lucy shrugged. If a chance to swim unencumbered made her a hoyden, then so be it. “Please come in, Eloisa. It won’t be any fun without you.”
Eloisa’s face softened. “Your father did you a grave disservice, Lucy, letting you run wild as he did, but you’ve a good heart, for all that.”
Lucy choked back a laugh. Run wild? She couldn’t remember the last time her father had permitted her to run at all, wild or otherwise. By the end he’d hardly suffered her to stir out of doors at all, even for a stroll in the gardens.
“I’m not one to speak ill of the dead, and perhaps the less said about your father the better,” Eloisa went on, “But he wasn’t well.”
The laugh died in Lucy’s throat. No, he hadn’t been well, but he’d been a loving father for all his flaws and freakish whims, and that was how she chose to remember him. There didn’t seem to be much sense in arguing about it now, however. Eloisa had made her mind up about Lucy’s father years ago, along with the rest of England.
“If we continue to stand about like this, we’ll lose our chance.” Lucy loosened the tie at the neck of her cloak, tugged it off, and tossed it down on the rock next to the towels.
When Eloisa caught sight of the dark blue linen bathing costume Lucy wore under her cloak, her face paled. “Oh, Lucy! You can’t really mean to do this? Someone will see you, and it will cause a scandal!”
Lucy sighed. Everything caused a scandal, it seemed. “Why should it? I’m wearing a bathing costume, for heaven’s sake.” It was prickly as a hedgehog, too. “Though I don’t see why the ladies must be bundled up in scratchy linen when the gentlemen are permitted to swim about nak—”
“Lucy! I will not stand here and listen to you talk about gentlemen who are…gentlemen without their…unclothed gentlemen. It’s not proper.”
Lucy was tempted to laugh at Eloisa’s prudery, but then Eloisa would get into a snit, and Lucy would never be able to coax her into the water. “Then let’s not stand here at all. Are you coming in?”
Eloisa glanced at the water again, hesitating. Lucy waited, hope surging at her cousin’s longing look, but then Eloisa’s teeth sank into her lower lip and she shook her head. “No. I’ll go in later this afternoon, the proper way. I should never have let you lure me into this mad scheme in the first place.”
Lucy’s heart sank. Her childhood had been a lonely one, and she’d always longed for a sibling. When she found she had a cousin only a few years younger than she was, she’d dreamed they’d grow to love each other like sisters. But at eighteen years of age, Eloisa behaved as if she were already an old maid. She was prim and cautious, whereas Lucy was…
A hoyden? Perhaps, but there were worse things one could be.
A recluse, for instance.
She was twenty years old. Twenty years, and she’d hardly set foot beyond her father’s estate for the last four of them. So far, she’d seen little else since they left Devon aside from the inside of a cramped coach, and the row of graying teeth at the back of Uncle Jarvis’s gaping mouth each time he released a deafening snore.
Now, by some miracle she was here, mere steps away from the ocean.
After years spent wandering the halls of a dusty house with no one but her father and the servants to talk to, new adventures had at last presented themselves. Lucy intended to seize them with both hands.
But perhaps it was for the best if Eloisa didn’t join her. Despite all her planning, Lucy couldn’t be certain no one would see them. Risk couldn’t be entirely eliminated—that was what made this an adventure. If they did get caught, Eloisa would suffer for it far more than Lucy would.
After all, Uncle Jarvis wasn’t her father.
Lucy seated herself on the rock and kicked off her shoes. “Very well. You may as well go back then, before someone sees you. I’ll follow soon.”
Eloisa looked ready to scurry away that instant, but she hesitated. “Are you sure? If the water should become rough—”
Lucy waved a hand toward their villa. It was close enough to the slice of secluded beach Eloisa might be able to see her from their bedchamber window. “Watch me then, if you like, but it’s all right, Eloisa. I’ll be careful, and I won’t go far.”
“If anyone should ask for you, I’ll tell them you haven’t risen yet,” Eloisa said, anxious now to be helpful.
“Fine. I’ll return within the hour.” Lucy didn’t wait for Eloisa’s response, but picked her way over the sand in her bare feet, her bathing costume flapping around her shins. She closed her eyes and sucked in a quick breath when her toes touched the cold water. When she opened them again and turned around, Eloisa was gone.
Lucy moved forward until the gentle waves rose to her knees, then her waist, and then in one dive she went head first into the water. She kicked her legs until she was close enough to the bottom to grab a handful of sand in her fist. The water wasn’t deep, but deep enough when she was upright her feet dangled into a void. Water surrounded her on all sides, a flowing, surging cocoon. The cold waves caressed her skin, leaving a spray of sparkling wet goose bumps in their wake.
When she broke the surface the second time, a shout of sheer joy burst from her lips.
She’d been quiet all her life, it seemed, but now her cry echoed in the clear silence of the morning. Exhilaration shot down her spine and stole her breath for a moment, but in the next instant she filled her lungs and dove under again. She pushed against the gentle current, each strong stroke taking her farther away from the beach. Her limbs burned with restless energy, and she went under again and again, surfacing only to grab a few breaths before she plunged again, making a game out of diving deep enough to touch the sandy bottom with her fingertips.
When she surfaced at last, she swept the wet hair from her eyes and tipped over onto her back for a long, lazy float, her gaze fixed on the rosy sky above her. The sun had just crested the horizon. She’d have to go soon, but goodness, how delicious it felt to be in the outdoors, to spread her arms wide and feel the silky glide of the water against her back.
She’d come back tomorrow, and every day afterward for the month they were to remain in Brighton. How silly Eloisa was! Despite her cousin’s dire warnings, no harm had been done this morning. Now Lucy had had her swim without all of Brighton erupting in a scandal, perhaps she could coax Eloisa to—
“Oh!” A shocked cry tore from Lucy’s lips. God in heaven, what was that? Something had brushed against her leg. Seaweed? No, it felt like…it felt like…
A creature of some sort had taken hold of her foot! For one terrified moment visions of enormous octopi swam through Lucy’s head, but no, it wasn’t an octopus. That was impossible, because this creature had wrapped its fingers around her ankle. Octopi didn’t have fingers, only tentacles.
It wasn’t something that had grabbed her foot.
It was someone.
A man, judging by the size of the hand. A man, and perhaps a murderer, because whoever he was…
He was trying to pull her under.
“Let go!” Lucy kicked out and her foot connected with something hard and spongy at the same time.
“Oof!” There was a pained grunt. He dropped her ankle and Lucy tried to kick away from him, but the next thing she knew he’d grabbed a handful of the wet linen at the neck of her bathing costume and flipped her over onto her back. He wrapped an arm under her neck, dragged her body on top of his, and…
Dear God, he was enormous! His arm, corded with muscle, was like a vice against her windpipe, and his hard chest was at least the twice the width of her back. She kicked out wildly, but just when she’d managed to squirm free he hauled her back against him and wrapped one long leg around her thighs. “Stop squirming!”
Lucy’s mouth fell open in shock. An enormous man had just appeared from the depths of the ocean and wrapped his arm around her neck. This was not the time to stop squirming. “Let go! You’re choking me!”
The arm around her neck loosened at once, but instead of letting her go he anchored his palm under her chin and tilted it up, so her face was away from the water and her head tipped back against his shoulder. “You’re all right, lass.”
Lass? Was her murderer Scottish?
“Keep still, and we’ll be on the beach in no time.”
There was no mistaking that lilt—not when his deep, soothing voice was right next to her ear. That and the calm authority in his tone made Lucy pause just long enough for the worst of her panic to recede. She let her limbs go loose, and her body relax against his.
She felt more than heard an approving rumble come from his chest. “Aye, that’s better.” He unwrapped himself from her lower body and began to kick toward the shore, his long legs slicing through the water with ease. “You’ll drown us both if you thrash about.”
Drown? Oh, no. Surely, he didn’t think—
“There’s a good lass. I’ve got you.”
But of course, he did think it.
Dash it, why should he jump to such a conclusion? Just because a lady chose to have a swim…alone, that is, in the dark, before the sun had risen…
Very well, it was a trifle unusual, perhaps. There was some chance, just a tiny one, he’d mistaken her shout of joy as a cry for help. He must have seen her from the beach, or perhaps from the low rock wall. From there it might have looked as though the waves were dragging her down each time she dove under.
This poor gentleman had thought—not without reason, she had to admit—she was drowning, and he’d dived in to rescue her.
Lucy let out a low, despairing moan. Goodness, what a tangle.
“There, it’s all right now,” he murmured, clearly mistaking her moan of embarrassment for a terrified whimper. “We’ve made it to the beach.”
“Yes, yes, so we have. Oh, no! There’s no need to—”
He brushed her feeble protests aside and rose from the water with her in his arms. “Yes, there is. You’ve had a shock.”
She had, indeed, though not how he supposed. Still, there didn’t seem much point in objecting now. He’d already executed a daring ocean rescue. Was she really going to begrudge him another few moments of heroism?
Lucy surrendered, and he carried her onto the beach. He lay her down in the sand and knelt down next to her to catch his breath. “Are you all right?”
She lay on her back with her arm over her eyes for a moment, then turned to him with a sigh. “You’re very good, sir. I assure you, I’m—oh, my goodness! You’re bleeding!”
Watery red streaks stained the front of his white shirt, and a fresh stream of blood poured from his nose. He pressed a hand to his face, and his palm came away covered with it. “Aye, so I am.” He tried to staunch it with his sleeve, but it was positively spouting, and the wet linen was no match for it.
Lucy jumped to her feet to fetch one of the towels Eloisa had left on the rocks, then hurried back to him. “Here, take this. How did you…”
Oh, no. Lucy wished she could sink into the sand beneath her feet. In the water, when she’d been struggling to get away, her foot had connected with something hard.
She’d kicked him in the face. Hard. If the blood seeping through the towel was any indication…
“I’ve broken your nose, haven’t I?”
He shrugged. “It’s not broken. Just bent.”
She bit her lip. “But there’s so much blood.”
“Noses bleed.”
Lucy couldn’t see his face because it was hidden by the towel, but his big shoulders moved in another shrug. He didn’t sound angry. Despite her mortification, a grin tugged at the corner of Lucy’s mouth. “A dousing, a kick to the face and a broken nose? My, you’re taking all this quite well.”
A muffled laugh came from behind the towel. “Better a broken nose than a drowning.”
Lucy winced. “Um, yes. Well, about that. You see—”
“In any case, my nose isn’t broken.” He lowered the towel from his face, then rose to his feet until he was towering over her, his hands braced on his hips. “It’s hardly bleeding at all anymore.”
Lucy stared at him, eyes wide.
Goodness. He was quite…that is, he was rather…well, it wasn’t as if she could ignore it, since he was soaked to the skin, but even if he’d been dry, there could be no denying he was unusually…
Robust.
She was no expert on a gentleman’s anatomy, having scarcely set eyes on any gentleman but her father, but she doubted many of them could wear a wet shirt quite as well as this one did. His torso was…well, she’d never seen so many lovely angles and grooves in her life. The thin, transparent fabric of his shirt clung to his hard chest and taut belly as if it were proud to be there, and his dark blue breeches were plastered like a second skin to a pair of long, muscular thighs.
Thank goodness they weren’t transparent, or she might have fallen into a swoon.
Lucy’s face flamed with sudden heat as it dawned on her she was standing in front of him in nothing but her bathing costume. He seemed to notice it at the same time. His eyebrows rose as his gaze swept over her body. He had straight, dark eyebrows, and lovely eyes—a bright, ocean blue—but they narrowed as he stared at her, realization flickering in their depths.
“Tell me, lass. How did you end up in the ocean? Did you fall in?”
Lucy chewed on her lip as ten different responses flew through her head, each a more elaborate falsehood than the last. Really, what use was the truth in this instance? She couldn’t tell this poor gentleman he’d taken a blow to the nose and nearly drowned them both to save a lady who didn’t need saving.
It would be dreadfully rude.
Very well, then. A lie it was. “Yes, I’m afraid I’m quite clumsy. I fell in, and the next thing I knew I was fighting for my life in the pounding surf.”
A bit dramatic, but it would do.
“Were you, now? How terrifying. Did you fall from the wall?” He pointed to the ring of rocks lining the tiny cove.
The wall? Yes, that seemed plausible. “I did, indeed. Tumbled right over the edge of it.”
The blue eyes twinkled down at her. “Ah, I see. How did you happen to land in the water instead of in the sand?”
Blast it. “Well, you see, I didn’t so much fall as I…what I meant to say was I was walking on the wall, but then I came down to the beach and—it was foolish of me, I know—I thought I’d put just a toe into the water, but the current overcame me, and the next thing I knew, I was fighting for my life in the pounding surf.”
His lips twitched. “The pounding surf again? It must be powerful this morning to drag you out by a single toe. But there’s one thing I can’t quite make out about your story.”
“Is there, indeed?” Lucy widened her eyes and tried to look innocent, but she was as guilty as a thief with a pocketful of guineas, and she had the racing heart to prove it. “What’s that?”
“I just wonder how, between dipping your toe into the water and being swept out to sea by the pounding surf, you had time to change into a bathing costume?”
Lucy opened her mouth, then snapped it closed again without a word. Try as she might, there was simply no reasonable explanation for the bathing costume.
“That’s your cloak and your shoes on that rock over there, isn’t it?” He pointed over her shoulder, then held up the towel she’d handed him. “And another towel?”
Really, what could she say? That he’d been determined to save her, and since he was as big as a horse and twice as strong, there’d been little she could do to stop him? That his perfectly executed, daring rescue was entirely unnecessary? “Well yes, but—”
“Ah.” The blue eyes glinted with humor. “You came out for a swim, didn’t you?”
Lucy fidgeted with the skirt of her bathing costume. “Perhaps I did, but—”
“Tell me, lass. Are you a strong swimmer?”
She loosened her grip on her skirt and met his knowing blue eyes. “Yes, but even a strong swimmer—”
“Even a strong swimmer can drown in the pounding surf? Is that what you were going to say?”
“Well, yes.”
“Aye, that’s one explanation. The other is you weren’t drowning at all.” He toyed with the towel, running it through his fist. “So, which is it, lass? Were you one gasp away from sinking to a watery grave, or is there some other explanation for my broken nose?”
Chapter Two
“You just told me it isn’t broken.” Wide, dark brown eyes narrowed suspiciously on his face, drops of water still clinging to her eyelashes. “Is it, or isn’t it?”
Ciaran choked back a laugh. “Forgive me, ma’am. I should have asked if there’s some other explanation for my unbroken but severely injured nose.”
He crossed his arms over his chest and waited while she decided whether or not to continue with her lie. They both knew he’d caught her out, but he could see she was considering carrying on with it, just the same.
Dogged, daft little lass, wasn’t she?
He couldn’t decide if he was impressed by her persistence, or offended she thought his male ego was too fragile to bear the truth. He knew one thing, though. After that tale she’d just told about the pounding surf dragging her out to sea by a single toe, he was eager to hear what she’d say next.
The slight quiver of anticipation in his stomach felt odd. Damned if he could remember when he’d last looked forward to anything with even a flicker of interest. If he’d resisted this trip to Brighton with half as much enthusiasm, he wouldn’t be here now. “Well, lass? Which is it? A morning swim, or a near drowning?”
She bit her lip and cast him a measuring look from under her damp lashes. “It depends.”
Ciaran didn’t know whether it was the lady, the blood loss, or the shock of cold water so early in the morning, but a rusty laugh knocked loose from his chest. “On what?”
“On whether your nose is actually broken or not.”
Ciaran wriggled his nose a bit. It bloody well felt like it, but he hadn’t heard the telltale crack. No crack meant no break, but he wasn’t going to admit that to her. Not yet, anyway. “It’s difficult to say. Now I think on it, I may have heard a bone snap when you kicked me. It has taken a beating. It’s bruised, and likely to swell.”
“Swell?” Her brows drew together in a guilty frown. “Do you think so?”
Ciaran hastily stuffed the towel back into his face, and made a great show of holding it there and looking as pitiful as possible. “Yes. No doubt it will swell to three times its size and turn black and blue.”
“Oh, dear.” She winced. “Is it terribly painful?”
“Aye. The nose is a sensitive organ, lass, and that was a vicious blow you dealt me.” Ciaran hid his grin behind the towel. “The worst of it is I’ll certainly have to wear a plaster on it. The gentlemen will laugh at me, and the ladies will refuse to dance with me at the assemblies.”
“Surely people won’t be as cruel as that?” She wrung her hands. “Why, you saved a lady in distress. Your actions were heroic—”
“Were they?” He lowered the towel and took a step toward her. “Because I’ve an idea I saved you from nothing worse than your morning swim. Come now, lass. Tell the truth.”
She raised her chin. “You believed I was in distress and you risked your own safety to rescue me. The truth is, it doesn’t matter one whit whether or not I was frolicking in the waves or drowning. Either way, you behaved like a noble gentleman.”
Ciaran raised an eyebrow at this passionate speech. “I’ll have the truth between us just the same, if you don’t mind.”
She threw her hands into the air. “Oh, very well, if you must. I wasn’t one gasp away from succumbing to a watery grave, as you put it. But if anyone has the nerve to laugh at your plaster, I’ll tell them I was.”
This time Ciaran gave in to his amusement, throwing his head back with a hearty laugh. “That’s generous, but if I were you, I wouldn’t tell a soul about this.”
If anyone in Brighton found out she’d been out swimming alone in the early morning hours, she might as well pack her things and go home now. He didn’t used to give much of a damn about propriety, but that was before he’d come to England and seen with his own eyes how much damage even the smallest slip could make to a lady’s reputation.
And this wasn’t a small slip. It was a reckless dive straight into scandal.
She tapped a finger against her lips. “Yes, perhaps we’d better keep this morning’s adventure to ourselves.”
Ciaran might have let it go at that, but he felt obligated to give her a stern warning first. He wasn’t much of one for stern warnings—either delivering them, or heeding them—but it wasn’t just her reputation at risk. It was her safety. It was dangerous for even a strong swimmer to go out alone. If she’d been overcome by the current she might really have been swept out to sea by the pounding surf, and no one would ever have known what had happened to her.
His amusement faded at the thought. What was the chit doing out here alone? Who were her people, and why didn’t they keep a better eye on her? What the devil was she about, scampering about Brighton like a wild thing, risking everything for a bit of fun?
He eyed her, then asked in as firm a tone as he could manage, “If I happen to wander this same stretch of beach tomorrow morning, you won’t be here again, will you, lass?”
She didn’t reply, but Ciaran noticed the sudden, stubborn thrust of her chin, the tellt. . .
Brighton, England
May 1818
If a proper lady intended to engage in a shocking impropriety, a fashionable seaside resort wasn’t the place to do it. Lady Lucinda Sutcliffe had only arrived a few days ago, but she’d already discovered there were more gouty old men and phlegmatic old ladies in Brighton than there were grains of sand on the beach.
Dozens of aged invalids meant dozens of pairs of rheumy eyes, all in search of scandal.
Not in this part of town, though, and not at this time of day. It would be an hour or two before fashionable Brighton roused themselves from their beds, and when they did venture out, they wouldn’t come here. Lucy had been watching the tidy patch of sand behind their rented villa for days now. It was as close to a deserted beach as one could find in Brighton.
Location, timing, and privacy—these were the first three of the four necessary elements of any successful impropriety.
The final element? Don’t hesitate.
A lady had to seize her opportunities when she could. This might be Lucy’s first opportunity, her first adventure, and the first time she’d seized anything more exciting than an extra lump of sugar for her tea, but that didn’t make the rule any less sound.
She peered down the long stretch of beach to her right, then her left. She scanned the low outcropping of rocks to her east, but there wasn’t a soul to be seen. Ah, splendid! A smile spread across her face, and she rubbed her hands together in anticipation. This was the most brilliant idea she’d ever had—
“This is the most ridiculous idea I’ve ever heard of, Lucy.”
Lucy raised her gaze to the sky and prayed for patience before turning to face her accuser. She recognized the look on Eloisa’s face. It was a special look her cousin seemed to reserve for Lucy alone.
Two parts fascination, three parts horror. Even Eloisa’s eyebrows looked scandalized.
“You’ll get caught,” Eloisa fretted. “Then what do you suppose will happen? My father will keep us locked in our rooms for the rest of the month, and all our pleasure will be spoilt.”
Lucy didn’t bother to argue that point. Pleasure did seem to shrivel and die in her Uncle Jarvis’s presence. But surely that was reason enough to pursue it with single-minded determination behind his back?
Anyway, she wouldn’t get caught. “Who’s going to see?” Lucy waved a hand at the empty beach. “No one ever comes to this side of town.” If her uncle had understood just how unfashionable a neighborhood this was, he never would have taken the villa, but it was too late to change now.
Eloisa dropped the towels she’d been carrying onto a rock. “What if Father saw us leave the villa?”
“He didn’t. You said yourself he never rises before noon. You don’t suppose your mother saw us, do you?” Lucy’s aunt suffered from sleeplessness and was often awake at odd hours, but she usually kept to her room.
“No. She dosed herself with laudanum last night. She’ll sleep for hours yet.” Eloisa sighed. “Her nerves are overset.”
Yes, well, they would be, wouldn’t they? Lucy’s own nerves had been forged in fire, but after days of being trapped in a coach with her Uncle Jarvis, she felt as brittle as glass and as liable to shatter. Traveling with her uncle felt very like how Lucy imagined being buried in her grave would feel—that is, cramped and airless, with mounds of damp earth pressing in on every side.
Except instead of earth, Lucy was pressed on every side by mounds of damp flesh.
She’d spent the past five days flattened against the carriage door, but as much as she squeezed, she couldn’t escape Uncle Jarvis’s creeping girth. No sooner did she inch away from him than a pudgy knee or fleshy arm would fling itself into the sliver of open space. He’d been chasing her across the seat since they’d left Devon. By the time they’d reached Brighton, Lucy was ready to hang by her fingernails from the window to escape him.
But she didn’t want to think of her uncle right now. The beach stretched before them, the waves flirting with the sand at the water’s edge. “Come, Eloisa. We’re here now.” She gave her cousin a hopeful smile. “The water looks lovely. Don’t say you’re not tempted.”
Eloisa gazed at the water for a moment, her mouth turned down in a frown. “I don’t see why we can’t simply go out this afternoon in a bathing machine. That’s how it’s done, Lucy. Ladies don’t simply hurl themselves into the ocean.”
Well, for pity’s sake, why not? Growing up in Devon, Lucy had spent many happy hours of her childhood splashing about in the waves. Oh, it had been years since she’d been swimming, but she had vague memories of how glorious it felt to float along, her body cradled by the cool water around her.
She couldn’t experience that joyous freedom if she was tethered to a bathing machine. “There’s no pleasure in being dragged from a bathing machine by a large woman who plunges you into the water and knocks you about like a pile of soiled linens while your skirts billow like hot air balloons.”
Eloisa folded her arms over her chest. “Well, I don’t know how to swim, so I’d just as soon have a dipper, thank you.”
“We’ll go in the bathing machines later, with your mother.” For her aunt’s sake, Lucy had dutifully submitted to an hour’s tedious dipping every afternoon since they’d arrived. “But floating about like an overdressed corpse isn’t swimming, Eloisa.”
“Lucy! What a ghastly thing to say!”
“For now, I’ll be your dipper.” Lucy ignored Eloisa’s outrage, and gave her cousin a wheedling smile. Poor Eloisa. A lifetime spent pinned under her father’s thumb had bled her of every last drop of spirit. It wouldn’t do. One way or another, something would have to be done about Eloisa’s listlessness.
“Come, Eloisa. You don’t have to swim. You can paddle about in the shallow part. I won’t let you drift out to sea. I promise. Not that there’s much chance of that in this secluded little cove.”
The look that flashed across Eloisa’s face this time was three parts affection, and two parts exasperation. “You’re a regular hoyden, Lucy.”
Lucy shrugged. If a chance to swim unencumbered made her a hoyden, then so be it. “Please come in, Eloisa. It won’t be any fun without you.”
Eloisa’s face softened. “Your father did you a grave disservice, Lucy, letting you run wild as he did, but you’ve a good heart, for all that.”
Lucy choked back a laugh. Run wild? She couldn’t remember the last time her father had permitted her to run at all, wild or otherwise. By the end he’d hardly suffered her to stir out of doors at all, even for a stroll in the gardens.
“I’m not one to speak ill of the dead, and perhaps the less said about your father the better,” Eloisa went on, “But he wasn’t well.”
The laugh died in Lucy’s throat. No, he hadn’t been well, but he’d been a loving father for all his flaws and freakish whims, and that was how she chose to remember him. There didn’t seem to be much sense in arguing about it now, however. Eloisa had made her mind up about Lucy’s father years ago, along with the rest of England.
“If we continue to stand about like this, we’ll lose our chance.” Lucy loosened the tie at the neck of her cloak, tugged it off, and tossed it down on the rock next to the towels.
When Eloisa caught sight of the dark blue linen bathing costume Lucy wore under her cloak, her face paled. “Oh, Lucy! You can’t really mean to do this? Someone will see you, and it will cause a scandal!”
Lucy sighed. Everything caused a scandal, it seemed. “Why should it? I’m wearing a bathing costume, for heaven’s sake.” It was prickly as a hedgehog, too. “Though I don’t see why the ladies must be bundled up in scratchy linen when the gentlemen are permitted to swim about nak—”
“Lucy! I will not stand here and listen to you talk about gentlemen who are…gentlemen without their…unclothed gentlemen. It’s not proper.”
Lucy was tempted to laugh at Eloisa’s prudery, but then Eloisa would get into a snit, and Lucy would never be able to coax her into the water. “Then let’s not stand here at all. Are you coming in?”
Eloisa glanced at the water again, hesitating. Lucy waited, hope surging at her cousin’s longing look, but then Eloisa’s teeth sank into her lower lip and she shook her head. “No. I’ll go in later this afternoon, the proper way. I should never have let you lure me into this mad scheme in the first place.”
Lucy’s heart sank. Her childhood had been a lonely one, and she’d always longed for a sibling. When she found she had a cousin only a few years younger than she was, she’d dreamed they’d grow to love each other like sisters. But at eighteen years of age, Eloisa behaved as if she were already an old maid. She was prim and cautious, whereas Lucy was…
A hoyden? Perhaps, but there were worse things one could be.
A recluse, for instance.
She was twenty years old. Twenty years, and she’d hardly set foot beyond her father’s estate for the last four of them. So far, she’d seen little else since they left Devon aside from the inside of a cramped coach, and the row of graying teeth at the back of Uncle Jarvis’s gaping mouth each time he released a deafening snore.
Now, by some miracle she was here, mere steps away from the ocean.
After years spent wandering the halls of a dusty house with no one but her father and the servants to talk to, new adventures had at last presented themselves. Lucy intended to seize them with both hands.
But perhaps it was for the best if Eloisa didn’t join her. Despite all her planning, Lucy couldn’t be certain no one would see them. Risk couldn’t be entirely eliminated—that was what made this an adventure. If they did get caught, Eloisa would suffer for it far more than Lucy would.
After all, Uncle Jarvis wasn’t her father.
Lucy seated herself on the rock and kicked off her shoes. “Very well. You may as well go back then, before someone sees you. I’ll follow soon.”
Eloisa looked ready to scurry away that instant, but she hesitated. “Are you sure? If the water should become rough—”
Lucy waved a hand toward their villa. It was close enough to the slice of secluded beach Eloisa might be able to see her from their bedchamber window. “Watch me then, if you like, but it’s all right, Eloisa. I’ll be careful, and I won’t go far.”
“If anyone should ask for you, I’ll tell them you haven’t risen yet,” Eloisa said, anxious now to be helpful.
“Fine. I’ll return within the hour.” Lucy didn’t wait for Eloisa’s response, but picked her way over the sand in her bare feet, her bathing costume flapping around her shins. She closed her eyes and sucked in a quick breath when her toes touched the cold water. When she opened them again and turned around, Eloisa was gone.
Lucy moved forward until the gentle waves rose to her knees, then her waist, and then in one dive she went head first into the water. She kicked her legs until she was close enough to the bottom to grab a handful of sand in her fist. The water wasn’t deep, but deep enough when she was upright her feet dangled into a void. Water surrounded her on all sides, a flowing, surging cocoon. The cold waves caressed her skin, leaving a spray of sparkling wet goose bumps in their wake.
When she broke the surface the second time, a shout of sheer joy burst from her lips.
She’d been quiet all her life, it seemed, but now her cry echoed in the clear silence of the morning. Exhilaration shot down her spine and stole her breath for a moment, but in the next instant she filled her lungs and dove under again. She pushed against the gentle current, each strong stroke taking her farther away from the beach. Her limbs burned with restless energy, and she went under again and again, surfacing only to grab a few breaths before she plunged again, making a game out of diving deep enough to touch the sandy bottom with her fingertips.
When she surfaced at last, she swept the wet hair from her eyes and tipped over onto her back for a long, lazy float, her gaze fixed on the rosy sky above her. The sun had just crested the horizon. She’d have to go soon, but goodness, how delicious it felt to be in the outdoors, to spread her arms wide and feel the silky glide of the water against her back.
She’d come back tomorrow, and every day afterward for the month they were to remain in Brighton. How silly Eloisa was! Despite her cousin’s dire warnings, no harm had been done this morning. Now Lucy had had her swim without all of Brighton erupting in a scandal, perhaps she could coax Eloisa to—
“Oh!” A shocked cry tore from Lucy’s lips. God in heaven, what was that? Something had brushed against her leg. Seaweed? No, it felt like…it felt like…
A creature of some sort had taken hold of her foot! For one terrified moment visions of enormous octopi swam through Lucy’s head, but no, it wasn’t an octopus. That was impossible, because this creature had wrapped its fingers around her ankle. Octopi didn’t have fingers, only tentacles.
It wasn’t something that had grabbed her foot.
It was someone.
A man, judging by the size of the hand. A man, and perhaps a murderer, because whoever he was…
He was trying to pull her under.
“Let go!” Lucy kicked out and her foot connected with something hard and spongy at the same time.
“Oof!” There was a pained grunt. He dropped her ankle and Lucy tried to kick away from him, but the next thing she knew he’d grabbed a handful of the wet linen at the neck of her bathing costume and flipped her over onto her back. He wrapped an arm under her neck, dragged her body on top of his, and…
Dear God, he was enormous! His arm, corded with muscle, was like a vice against her windpipe, and his hard chest was at least the twice the width of her back. She kicked out wildly, but just when she’d managed to squirm free he hauled her back against him and wrapped one long leg around her thighs. “Stop squirming!”
Lucy’s mouth fell open in shock. An enormous man had just appeared from the depths of the ocean and wrapped his arm around her neck. This was not the time to stop squirming. “Let go! You’re choking me!”
The arm around her neck loosened at once, but instead of letting her go he anchored his palm under her chin and tilted it up, so her face was away from the water and her head tipped back against his shoulder. “You’re all right, lass.”
Lass? Was her murderer Scottish?
“Keep still, and we’ll be on the beach in no time.”
There was no mistaking that lilt—not when his deep, soothing voice was right next to her ear. That and the calm authority in his tone made Lucy pause just long enough for the worst of her panic to recede. She let her limbs go loose, and her body relax against his.
She felt more than heard an approving rumble come from his chest. “Aye, that’s better.” He unwrapped himself from her lower body and began to kick toward the shore, his long legs slicing through the water with ease. “You’ll drown us both if you thrash about.”
Drown? Oh, no. Surely, he didn’t think—
“There’s a good lass. I’ve got you.”
But of course, he did think it.
Dash it, why should he jump to such a conclusion? Just because a lady chose to have a swim…alone, that is, in the dark, before the sun had risen…
Very well, it was a trifle unusual, perhaps. There was some chance, just a tiny one, he’d mistaken her shout of joy as a cry for help. He must have seen her from the beach, or perhaps from the low rock wall. From there it might have looked as though the waves were dragging her down each time she dove under.
This poor gentleman had thought—not without reason, she had to admit—she was drowning, and he’d dived in to rescue her.
Lucy let out a low, despairing moan. Goodness, what a tangle.
“There, it’s all right now,” he murmured, clearly mistaking her moan of embarrassment for a terrified whimper. “We’ve made it to the beach.”
“Yes, yes, so we have. Oh, no! There’s no need to—”
He brushed her feeble protests aside and rose from the water with her in his arms. “Yes, there is. You’ve had a shock.”
She had, indeed, though not how he supposed. Still, there didn’t seem much point in objecting now. He’d already executed a daring ocean rescue. Was she really going to begrudge him another few moments of heroism?
Lucy surrendered, and he carried her onto the beach. He lay her down in the sand and knelt down next to her to catch his breath. “Are you all right?”
She lay on her back with her arm over her eyes for a moment, then turned to him with a sigh. “You’re very good, sir. I assure you, I’m—oh, my goodness! You’re bleeding!”
Watery red streaks stained the front of his white shirt, and a fresh stream of blood poured from his nose. He pressed a hand to his face, and his palm came away covered with it. “Aye, so I am.” He tried to staunch it with his sleeve, but it was positively spouting, and the wet linen was no match for it.
Lucy jumped to her feet to fetch one of the towels Eloisa had left on the rocks, then hurried back to him. “Here, take this. How did you…”
Oh, no. Lucy wished she could sink into the sand beneath her feet. In the water, when she’d been struggling to get away, her foot had connected with something hard.
She’d kicked him in the face. Hard. If the blood seeping through the towel was any indication…
“I’ve broken your nose, haven’t I?”
He shrugged. “It’s not broken. Just bent.”
She bit her lip. “But there’s so much blood.”
“Noses bleed.”
Lucy couldn’t see his face because it was hidden by the towel, but his big shoulders moved in another shrug. He didn’t sound angry. Despite her mortification, a grin tugged at the corner of Lucy’s mouth. “A dousing, a kick to the face and a broken nose? My, you’re taking all this quite well.”
A muffled laugh came from behind the towel. “Better a broken nose than a drowning.”
Lucy winced. “Um, yes. Well, about that. You see—”
“In any case, my nose isn’t broken.” He lowered the towel from his face, then rose to his feet until he was towering over her, his hands braced on his hips. “It’s hardly bleeding at all anymore.”
Lucy stared at him, eyes wide.
Goodness. He was quite…that is, he was rather…well, it wasn’t as if she could ignore it, since he was soaked to the skin, but even if he’d been dry, there could be no denying he was unusually…
Robust.
She was no expert on a gentleman’s anatomy, having scarcely set eyes on any gentleman but her father, but she doubted many of them could wear a wet shirt quite as well as this one did. His torso was…well, she’d never seen so many lovely angles and grooves in her life. The thin, transparent fabric of his shirt clung to his hard chest and taut belly as if it were proud to be there, and his dark blue breeches were plastered like a second skin to a pair of long, muscular thighs.
Thank goodness they weren’t transparent, or she might have fallen into a swoon.
Lucy’s face flamed with sudden heat as it dawned on her she was standing in front of him in nothing but her bathing costume. He seemed to notice it at the same time. His eyebrows rose as his gaze swept over her body. He had straight, dark eyebrows, and lovely eyes—a bright, ocean blue—but they narrowed as he stared at her, realization flickering in their depths.
“Tell me, lass. How did you end up in the ocean? Did you fall in?”
Lucy chewed on her lip as ten different responses flew through her head, each a more elaborate falsehood than the last. Really, what use was the truth in this instance? She couldn’t tell this poor gentleman he’d taken a blow to the nose and nearly drowned them both to save a lady who didn’t need saving.
It would be dreadfully rude.
Very well, then. A lie it was. “Yes, I’m afraid I’m quite clumsy. I fell in, and the next thing I knew I was fighting for my life in the pounding surf.”
A bit dramatic, but it would do.
“Were you, now? How terrifying. Did you fall from the wall?” He pointed to the ring of rocks lining the tiny cove.
The wall? Yes, that seemed plausible. “I did, indeed. Tumbled right over the edge of it.”
The blue eyes twinkled down at her. “Ah, I see. How did you happen to land in the water instead of in the sand?”
Blast it. “Well, you see, I didn’t so much fall as I…what I meant to say was I was walking on the wall, but then I came down to the beach and—it was foolish of me, I know—I thought I’d put just a toe into the water, but the current overcame me, and the next thing I knew, I was fighting for my life in the pounding surf.”
His lips twitched. “The pounding surf again? It must be powerful this morning to drag you out by a single toe. But there’s one thing I can’t quite make out about your story.”
“Is there, indeed?” Lucy widened her eyes and tried to look innocent, but she was as guilty as a thief with a pocketful of guineas, and she had the racing heart to prove it. “What’s that?”
“I just wonder how, between dipping your toe into the water and being swept out to sea by the pounding surf, you had time to change into a bathing costume?”
Lucy opened her mouth, then snapped it closed again without a word. Try as she might, there was simply no reasonable explanation for the bathing costume.
“That’s your cloak and your shoes on that rock over there, isn’t it?” He pointed over her shoulder, then held up the towel she’d handed him. “And another towel?”
Really, what could she say? That he’d been determined to save her, and since he was as big as a horse and twice as strong, there’d been little she could do to stop him? That his perfectly executed, daring rescue was entirely unnecessary? “Well yes, but—”
“Ah.” The blue eyes glinted with humor. “You came out for a swim, didn’t you?”
Lucy fidgeted with the skirt of her bathing costume. “Perhaps I did, but—”
“Tell me, lass. Are you a strong swimmer?”
She loosened her grip on her skirt and met his knowing blue eyes. “Yes, but even a strong swimmer—”
“Even a strong swimmer can drown in the pounding surf? Is that what you were going to say?”
“Well, yes.”
“Aye, that’s one explanation. The other is you weren’t drowning at all.” He toyed with the towel, running it through his fist. “So, which is it, lass? Were you one gasp away from sinking to a watery grave, or is there some other explanation for my broken nose?”
Chapter Two
“You just told me it isn’t broken.” Wide, dark brown eyes narrowed suspiciously on his face, drops of water still clinging to her eyelashes. “Is it, or isn’t it?”
Ciaran choked back a laugh. “Forgive me, ma’am. I should have asked if there’s some other explanation for my unbroken but severely injured nose.”
He crossed his arms over his chest and waited while she decided whether or not to continue with her lie. They both knew he’d caught her out, but he could see she was considering carrying on with it, just the same.
Dogged, daft little lass, wasn’t she?
He couldn’t decide if he was impressed by her persistence, or offended she thought his male ego was too fragile to bear the truth. He knew one thing, though. After that tale she’d just told about the pounding surf dragging her out to sea by a single toe, he was eager to hear what she’d say next.
The slight quiver of anticipation in his stomach felt odd. Damned if he could remember when he’d last looked forward to anything with even a flicker of interest. If he’d resisted this trip to Brighton with half as much enthusiasm, he wouldn’t be here now. “Well, lass? Which is it? A morning swim, or a near drowning?”
She bit her lip and cast him a measuring look from under her damp lashes. “It depends.”
Ciaran didn’t know whether it was the lady, the blood loss, or the shock of cold water so early in the morning, but a rusty laugh knocked loose from his chest. “On what?”
“On whether your nose is actually broken or not.”
Ciaran wriggled his nose a bit. It bloody well felt like it, but he hadn’t heard the telltale crack. No crack meant no break, but he wasn’t going to admit that to her. Not yet, anyway. “It’s difficult to say. Now I think on it, I may have heard a bone snap when you kicked me. It has taken a beating. It’s bruised, and likely to swell.”
“Swell?” Her brows drew together in a guilty frown. “Do you think so?”
Ciaran hastily stuffed the towel back into his face, and made a great show of holding it there and looking as pitiful as possible. “Yes. No doubt it will swell to three times its size and turn black and blue.”
“Oh, dear.” She winced. “Is it terribly painful?”
“Aye. The nose is a sensitive organ, lass, and that was a vicious blow you dealt me.” Ciaran hid his grin behind the towel. “The worst of it is I’ll certainly have to wear a plaster on it. The gentlemen will laugh at me, and the ladies will refuse to dance with me at the assemblies.”
“Surely people won’t be as cruel as that?” She wrung her hands. “Why, you saved a lady in distress. Your actions were heroic—”
“Were they?” He lowered the towel and took a step toward her. “Because I’ve an idea I saved you from nothing worse than your morning swim. Come now, lass. Tell the truth.”
She raised her chin. “You believed I was in distress and you risked your own safety to rescue me. The truth is, it doesn’t matter one whit whether or not I was frolicking in the waves or drowning. Either way, you behaved like a noble gentleman.”
Ciaran raised an eyebrow at this passionate speech. “I’ll have the truth between us just the same, if you don’t mind.”
She threw her hands into the air. “Oh, very well, if you must. I wasn’t one gasp away from succumbing to a watery grave, as you put it. But if anyone has the nerve to laugh at your plaster, I’ll tell them I was.”
This time Ciaran gave in to his amusement, throwing his head back with a hearty laugh. “That’s generous, but if I were you, I wouldn’t tell a soul about this.”
If anyone in Brighton found out she’d been out swimming alone in the early morning hours, she might as well pack her things and go home now. He didn’t used to give much of a damn about propriety, but that was before he’d come to England and seen with his own eyes how much damage even the smallest slip could make to a lady’s reputation.
And this wasn’t a small slip. It was a reckless dive straight into scandal.
She tapped a finger against her lips. “Yes, perhaps we’d better keep this morning’s adventure to ourselves.”
Ciaran might have let it go at that, but he felt obligated to give her a stern warning first. He wasn’t much of one for stern warnings—either delivering them, or heeding them—but it wasn’t just her reputation at risk. It was her safety. It was dangerous for even a strong swimmer to go out alone. If she’d been overcome by the current she might really have been swept out to sea by the pounding surf, and no one would ever have known what had happened to her.
His amusement faded at the thought. What was the chit doing out here alone? Who were her people, and why didn’t they keep a better eye on her? What the devil was she about, scampering about Brighton like a wild thing, risking everything for a bit of fun?
He eyed her, then asked in as firm a tone as he could manage, “If I happen to wander this same stretch of beach tomorrow morning, you won’t be here again, will you, lass?”
She didn’t reply, but Ciaran noticed the sudden, stubborn thrust of her chin, the tellt. . .
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For the Sake of a Scottish Rake
Anna Bradley
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