Hot Historicals Bundle with An Invitation to Sin, The Naked Baron, When His Kiss Is Wicked, & Mastering the Marquess

by Sally MacKenzie, Vanessa Kelly, Kaitlin O'Riley, Jo Beverley

Genres: Historical Fiction; Clean & Wholesome Romance; Historical Romance

Synopsis

An Invitation to Sin Forbidden Affections by Jo Beverley The doors to romance can be found in the most unexpected places, especially when the notorious Earl of Carne moves into the mansion neighboring Anna Featherstone's London townhouse. Who knocks first remains the only question. . . The Pleasure Of A Younger Lover by Vanessa Kelly Clarissa Middleton cannot resist the ardent kisses of Captain Christian Archer, though they must meet in secret or risk the censure of London society. In each other's arms, desire and love melt two hearts into one. . . The Naked Prince by Sally MacKenzie Josephine Atworthy is shocked by the goings-on at her rich neighbor's house party. Quite shocked. But her demure charm beguiles a mysterious nobleman, who begs a kiss--then another. And in a twinkling they fall head over heels in love. . . A Summer Love Affair by Kaitlin O'Riley Unmarried. Unconventional. Unchaperoned. Miss Charlotte Wilson is free to do as she pleases and Gavin Ellsworth is dashing. Summer in Spain at a secluded villa is about to get a whole lot hotter. . . The Naked Baron Tell Me What You Want New to London society and rather. . .awkward. . .Lady Grace Belmont would just as soon hide behind the palm trees as dance with a man she doesn't know. But Baron Dawson is on the hunt for a wife. Grace's generous curves and remarkable height do not intimidate him. In fact, it would be more accurate to describe his reaction to the charming newcomer as lust. Before Grace can so much as gather her thoughts, she finds herself in his arms, committing one shocking impropriety after another. The Baron's devilish attractiveness--to say nothing of his splendid muscles--is simply impossible to resist. Her beloved aunt and chaperone advises patience, but Grace is not about to listen. The handsome baron is whispering such delightful things in her ear. . . When His Kiss is Wicked After her father's death, Colette Hamilton is left with four sisters, an invalid mother and a failing bookshop. The only way she can save the family business is with her unconventional ideas. . .or let her uncle marry her off. As for the handsome stranger in her bookshop? He's Lucien Sinclair, son of an earl, and a known rogue uninterested in marriage. Unknown to Colette, Lucien has begun an urgent search for a bride, so that his ailing father might see him married before he dies. He knows what he wants--a plain, biddable woman without the curse of beauty to endanger his heart. Yet no matter how he tries, Lucien finds himself unable to stay away from Colette. And as sinful pleasure lures them ever closer to the edge of ruin, the only question that matters is whether they can survive the fall. . . Mastering the Marquess Since the loss of her parents, Meredith Burnley has contented herself with a solitary life looking after her half-sister, Annabel. But Meredith's peace is shattered when her uncle schemes to marry her off to his son in order to gain her inheritance. Desperate, Meredith has only one choice: to flee with Annabel to their estranged grandparents' home. But their arrival soon reignites a family scandal--and kindles unexpected romance. . . Happily reunited with the girls, Annabel's grandmother resolves to convince her nephew, Stephen Mallory, the Marquess of Silverton, to abandon his rakish lifestyle and wed Annabel. Stephen is clearly captivated--but with the wrong sister! Determined to make Meredith his own, Stephen embarks on a seduction that will leave her with no choice but to surrender to his touch. . .

Release date: February 1, 2011

Publisher: Zebra

Print pages: 1227

Sample

Anna Featherstone sat up in bed and fumbled urgently for her candlestick. Grasping it, she slipped out of bed to light it at the night lamp on the mantelpiece, then held it high and turned to study her peculiar new bedroom.

Her sleepy thoughts had been right. The Gothic monstrosity was exactly like Dulcinea’s prison in the novel,Forbidden Affections! When the notion had come to her at a point between sleep and waking she had been sure she must have been mistaken, but now she wandered the room, convinced she was correct.

It was a wonderful discovery, but also very puzzling.

Anna had spent her sixteen years in the Derbyshire countryside and knew she was not au fait with the latest fashions, but even if dark, heavily carved Gothic furniture was the rage in London, surely such morbid motifs as deadly nightshade and coffins were not. In the novel, Dulcinea’s cruel uncle had caused her room to be decorated with symbols of death to remind her of her probable fate if she did not surrender to his evil passions.

Anna was not the least alarmed by the grinning skeletons and contorted gargoyles in the carvings. She was sadly lacking in sensibility. When her sister Maria had once demanded to know what Anna would do if actually confronted by a skeleton in a monk’s robe, Anna had replied that she’d inspect it to find out how it held its bones together without ligaments or muscles.

Smiling at the memory of Maria’s shudders, Anna wandered the room, appreciating the fine attention to detail. The heavy armoire boasted ivory knobs carved as skulls, and the rather pretty design in the wallpaper turned out to be a coffin shape. As best she could remember, it was exactly as in Forbidden Affections.

She wished she had the novel with her so she could check each detail, but she had not been permitted to bring many books on this trip to London. Allowed only five, she would never choose Forbidden Affections over, for example, Cruel Matrimony, an earlier novel by Mrs. Jamison. Anna had always thought there was something unsatisfactory about Forbidden Affections, which had apparently been the lady’s last work. Perhaps she had been ill.

Anna longed to know the history of this room for it must have been created by a wealthy and devoted admirer of the novel, and not that long ago. Forbidden Affections had first been published less than ten years ago, though Anna had only read it last year. After all, at the time of publication she had scarce been out of the nursery.

Would the servants know the house’s history?

Number 9, Carne Terrace was just a house hired for the spring Season—part of a handsome row of houses in an excellent part of London. Her parents and sister had been delighted with it until this bedroom had been discovered. At that point, they had almost left to stay at an inn. The Gothic marvel was clearly the master bedroom, but Lady Feather-stone had declared most absolutely that nothing would persuade her to sleep beneath a canopy of gargoyles.

Maria, who always copied Mama, had declared the same, adding that she could never even open a drawer if it involved touching a skull. She had gone so far as to collapse into a convenient chair to make her point, and had required a sniff of laudanum to overcome the shock.

Since there were only three good bedrooms in the house, and Maria and Anna hated to share a bed, there was only one solution. Anna and her father had shared an ironic glance and Anna had made the noble sacrifice, secretly delighted to have such a room.

Now she was even more so. Imagine having Dulcinea’s chamber all to herself. Heavens, it might even turn her into a romantic heroine!

Anna caught sight of herself in a mirror surrounded by grotesque carved heads and laughed. Dulcinea she was not. Dulcinea—like all Mrs. Jamison’s heroines—was slender as a willow-wand, had a complexion of pearly hue, and silky golden tresses. Anna possessed thick, dark hair which always fought the constraint of her plait, full rosy cheeks, and a round body that was the despair of her fashionable mama.

She remembered then that when Dulcinea had first seen her reflection surrounded by gargoyles she had screamed and fainted. Dulcinea—again like all Mrs. Jamison’s heroines—tended to faint quite often. Anna had never fainted in her life.

She had always wanted to, and had tried various tricks to achieve it, including putting scraps of silk in her shoes, but she had never achieved so much as a slight sensation of dizziness.

With a grimace at her robust reflection, she hoped that sturdy nerves and common sense didn’t rule out all possibility of a handsome hero one day sweeping her off her feet.

Still delighted by the room, Anna began to return to bed, but then she turned back to contemplate the huge carved stone fireplace guarded by armored skeletons on either side.

Surely not!

In the book, evil Count Nacre had constructed a secret doorway in the fireplace so that he could sneak into Dulcinea’s room at night. One of the things about the book that irritated Anna was that Dulcinea’s escape from his wicked plans was not of her own doing. Anna could think of any number of ways the silly creature could have escaped, but of course Dulcinea had waited for handsome Roland to find the secret door and rescue her.

Just before ancient, rat-infested Castle Nacre crumbled to the ground during an earthquake.

Now Anna eyed the ridiculous fireplace, refusing to believe that anyone had actually gone so far as to construct a secret door in a modern London town house. Where could it go, after all? Number 9, Carne Terrace was solidly bounded by number 8 and number 10.

But she could not resist trying.

The lever, if it was there, would be the spear of the skeleton to the right of the grate. The spear was held across his body and extended into the chimney so that it wouldn’t be accidentally moved by a servant.

In the book.

This was real life. This wasn’t a book.

Anna seized the spear and pulled it toward her. At first—as she expected—nothing happened. Then it began to move.

Anna snatched her hands away and stared at the spear as if it had come to life. This was taking replication to extremes! After all, on the other side of this fireplace there assuredly was not an abandoned, rat-infested, ivy-covered tower.

Was there?

Her heart began to thump.

For the first time, Anna’s very practical mind was toying with the fantastic.

On the other side of this fireplace, she told herself firmly, was number 10, Carne Terrace, a respectable modern house.

Well, not precisely respectable.

That had been another shock for her parents—to realize that Carne Terrace was named after the Earl of Carne, who had built it, and that number 10, the large end house next door, belonged to the notorious fourth earl.

Their housekeeper had revealed that fact when asked who their neighbors were. Mrs. Postle had hastened to explain that the house stood empty and had done so for over eight years—ever since the incident.

Those two words had been said with the sort of meaningful glance that Anna knew all too well. It meant that young ladies were not to hear about it, and of course that had left Anna in a ferment of curiosity. What on earth had the earl done? It was probably to do with carnal relations. Incidents always were.

She’d followed the subsequent conversations very closely, but all she had learned was that after the incident the earl had left England and had not been seen since.

Anna was surprised. She’d heard of a number of young ladies who had traveled abroad as a result of incidents. Gentlemen, on the other hand, never seemed to suffer the full consequences of their follies.

She had been delighted by this hint of murky mystery, however. Though her parents had brought both their daughters to London, only Maria was to make her curtsy this year, and Anna had expected to be a little bored. Digging out the whole story of the incident would definitely enliven her stay.

Now it seemed she had other amusements—if she dared pull the lever fully.

Was it truly possible that it would open a door into the house of the wicked Earl of Carne?

Curiosity was Anna’s greatest weakness, and she knew it. She generally kept it under control, but she could never return to bed and sleep without finding out if the door was there or not. After all, if Count Nacre could creep into Dulcinea’s chamber, perhaps the wicked Earl of Carne could creep into hers!

She might be in danger …

But that was sophistry, and she knew it. She wanted to try the lever just because it was there.

She grasped it and pulled it all the way. It made only a slight grinding sound, but it clearly had done something. She took a deep breath, went to the right-hand part of the fireplace, and pushed.

Just as in the book, the panel swiveled slightly.

Anna stopped to consider. No, she was not dreaming. No, she had not been plunged into the pages of a novel. But there was, assuredly, a secret door.

Even Anna’s prosaic heart was beating high and fast as she pushed the panel fully open. She told herself it had to open the way into number 10 …

But a small, less rational part of her brain was prepared for it to open into a rat-infested, crumbling castle.

Anna, therefore, was prepared to scream.

Once the door was open she cautiously peeped through. She laughed shakily and her heart rate began to steady. The room beyond was a perfectly ordinary bedroom shrouded in Holland covers.

The secret door, as expected, simply led into number 10, Carne Terrace.

Of course, that meant that it led into the home of the wicked earl. A proper young lady, assuming that she hadn’t already fallen into the vapors, would at this point have run to Papa to have the door firmly nailed shut. Anna Featherstone, fairly bubbling with excitement, walked through to explore.

After all, the earl was not here, and had not been here for years. In confirmation, this room—which was probably the master bedroom—had the feel of a place long unused.

Anna turned to look at the fireplace and found it to be much more normal than the one on her side, though rather ornate for a bedchamber. It was of carved wood and had the heavy side panels necessary to disguise the moving parts.

Whatever the reason for this construction, there had obviously been a conspiracy by the residents of both houses, and she’d go odds it was all to do with the incident. Anna was not naive, and secretly connected bedchambers told their own story. Although she still wanted to know why the bedchamber in number 9 was so peculiar.

Being a careful person, Anna checked the mechanism before moving away from the door. Once she was sure she could return at will, she prepared to enjoy herself.

She was wickedly at large in someone else’s house, and it was an adventure impossible to resist, especially when the risk was so small. Since the house was unused it was unlikely that she would be found out. And if she did meet anyone, she would hardly be thrown into prison. A young lady of sixteen in her nightgown could not be mistaken for a housebreaker.

Anna crept barefooted across the carpet and gingerly turned the knob. It made no sound. She eased the door open and peeped out into a corridor rather wider than the one in number 9. This corner house, a nobleman’s residence, was at least twice the size of the other houses in the terrace.

She was struck by the silence.

It took Anna a moment to think why this was so strange, and then she realized that there was not even the ticking of a clock. She’d never before been in a house which did not have a clock ticking somewhere.

She detected no smell of decay or mold, though. The house might be unused but it was not neglected. In fact, now that she searched for it, there was the faint smell of polish in the air. This meant there had to be some servants and so she must be careful.

It did not mean she would give up her exploration, though. This was like having an enormous playhouse all to herself.

She walked the corridor, shielding her candle and glancing at the pictures on the walls. They were not particularly interesting—mostly rather nondescript landscapes with no indication of the places they represented.

She peeped into the various rooms along the hall, but they were not interesting, either—some bedchambers and dressing rooms and a moderately sized drawing room.

Then, in a large sitting room or boudoir, she caught sight of an intriguing painting. She wasn’t sure at first why it had caught her eye, as it was only half-lit by the flickering candle. When she went closer, she decided it was a simple matter of quality. She did not know a great deal about art but surely this portrait had been painted by a master.

Even in the candlelight the young man’s skin tones glowed with vitality and his dark curls sprang crisply from his brow. His expression was quite sober and yet she could feel that he desperately wanted to laugh. Perhaps it was the way his bright blue eyes were crinkled slightly with the humor he was trying to suppress. Was he trying to appear older than he was? She didn’t think he was a great deal older than her own sixteen years. He reminded her in many ways of her brother James and his friends, full of the joy of life and ready for mischief.

Of course, she reminded herself, by now this young man could be ancient.

She didn’t think so, though. The high collar and plain cravat fitted recent fashion.

Anna realized she had been staring at the portrait as if expecting him to move and speak, so skillfully had the fleeting expression been captured. With a smile of farewell, she made herself leave the room, feeling rather as if she abandoned someone to dark neglect.

When she had looked in every room on this floor, she came to her Rubicon, the stairs to the lower floor. A prudent miss would now return to her room and forget about this place. Anna had to admit as well that it was probably morally wrong to creep about someone’s house like this, peeping and prying. It was almost like reading a private journal.

On the other hand, there were no secrets here. It was just an empty house and she wanted to see all of it.

She went cautiously down the stairs to the main floor.

All the windows she had seen had been curtained, presumably to keep the sun off the unused rooms, but here a handsome fan light over the door spilled moonlight into the hall, making it seem more alive, more as if someone might suddenly appear.

She stood still, her feet chilling on the tiled floor, listening for any sound.

She heard only silence. Any servants were fast asleep.

All the same, Anna decided to hurry through the rest of her exploration and get back to her bed.

A breakfast room, shrouded. A reception room, the same. A dining room, a library …

Anna halted, faced temptation, and succumbed.

Anna loved books. She loved novels, but they were not her only reading. Her father said she would read anything, even a sporting journal if desperate, and he had always encouraged her. He had not, however, allowed her to bring more than a small box of books with her and to her dismay the library in number 9 was a skeleton of a room with empty shelves. She supposed no one would want to leave books for unpredictable tenants, but she had been disappointed. After all, her consumption of books was so large that trips to the lending libraries were going to take most of her days!

Here, however, was a supply, to hand and neglected. The books seemed to call to her, begging to be read.

No, no, her conscience argued. To borrow without permission would be like stealing.

Yet Anna was soon cruising the glass-fronted shelves almost without thought, drawn like iron to a magnet. Rows and rows of matched volumes—bound magazines, philosophical classics, eminent sermons. But also rows and rows of mismatched books likely to have been bought for love.

And organized. Here was travel. Here was science. And here were novels.

Just one row.

In fact, just the novels of Mrs. Jamison. That was intriguing, to be sure.

She opened the case and ran her fingers over the glossy leather covers, pausing at the three volumes that comprised Forbidden Affections. She wanted to read it again in Dul-cinea’s room to check the accuracy of the simulation. She wanted it so much it was agony to resist.

But Anna knew that if she took the books she would have gone beyond an intrusion of privacy to theft. She found the strength to close the bookcase doors and leave the chamber of temptation.

Frightened that she would weaken, Anna ran up the stairs and back to the secret door. Her candle blew out, but she knew the way. She groped toward the fireplace and squeezed through the door, easing it shut behind her. Then she was back in her own room again with that door firmly closed.

She jumped into bed and pulled up the covers, then lay there, wondering if what she had just done had been real. But she knew it had, and she knew she desperately wanted to explore again another day.

Anna awoke the next morning when Martha, middle-aged maid to the Featherstone daughters, drew back the curtains to let in sunlight. Anna’s first thought was that she had had the most interesting dream.

It took only seconds to realize that it had actually happened.

The room was still the same, and in daylight assuredly Dulcinea’s chamber.

“What a room this is!” declared Martha, setting the jug of hot water on the washstand. “You’re a braver lass than I am, Miss Anna, to sleep here so sound.”

Anna sat up to hug her knees. “I don’t mind. I like it.”

Martha just shook her head. “Up with you, miss. I’ll be back in a little while to button you up and fix your hair.”

Anna popped out of bed and washed, then put on her stockings and petticoat. She was just working into her light stays when Martha returned to help her.

“How do you like it here, Martha?” Anna asked, holding her long plait away from the buttons down her back.

“Seems a decent enough house, miss. Sit you down now. Breakfast’ll be ready in a moment.”

Anna sat in front of the gargoyle-guarded mirror. “Have you found out anything about this place?”

“About it?” Martha was quickly unraveling the plait and brushing it out. “What do you mean, miss?”

“Well, about this room. It is a little strange.”

“Who knows what they do in Lunnon, miss? The regular staff haven’t said anything, but then, by the time we were here and unpacked, it were pretty well time for bed.”

“I suppose so.”

The Featherstones had arrived at nearly eight in the evening and had only taken time for supper before retiring. They were here until June, however. Time enough for Anna to unravel the mystery this room presented, and to find out all about the wicked Earl of Carne’s incident.

As soon as Martha was finished, Anna ran down to the breakfast parlor and kissed her parents. Lady Featherstone, slender and blond, smiled in a slightly pained way at her younger daughter’s high spirits. Sir Jeffrey hugged her warmly.

“Sleep well, Pippin, in your Gothic chamber?”

Anna had to suppress a giggle. “Very well, Papa.”

Lady Featherstone shuddered. “Anna, you have no sensibility.”

“Which is as well, my dear,” said her husband, “or the girls would have had to sleep together, and you know they hate that.” Sir Jeffrey was ruddy-faced and robust. It was from him that Anna got her looks and temperament.

“Maria tosses and turns all night,” said Anna.

“Only in a strange bed,” said Maria, drifting in wanly. “I declare I have not had a moment’s rest! The mattress is decidedly hard.”

If Maria was poorly rested, it had not affected her looks. She, like Dulcinea, was a pale blond beauty with pearly skin and a slender, elegant figure. Lady Featherstone fussed over her, commiserating on her sensitive nature and plying her with tea.

Sir Jeffrey grinned at Anna. “Well, what plans for today, Pippin? Let me guess. An attack on the book emporiums of the Metropolis?”

Anna grinned back as she helped herself to eggs. “Most certainly. I am hoping you will direct me to the best lending libraries in town, Papa.”

Since Sir Jeffrey was a Member of Parliament, he knew London quite well and obligingly wrote out a list of the best book suppliers while his wife and older daughter planned their assault on modistes and haberdashers.

Folding the list, Anna asked casually, “What was Mrs. Postle referring to when she mentioned an incident concerning our neighbor, Papa?” She had reason to hope that her liberal-minded father would give her a straight answer.

However, his only response was, “Never you mind, Pippin. London isn’t like the country. It is quite possible to ignore neighbors.”

“But Papa, the doors are only feet apart. What if we encounter people coming and going?”

Her mother had picked up on the conversation and now a look flashed between her parents. Anna’s curiosity expanded to a bursting point. What had the earl done?

“Anna,” said her mother, “if you should happen to encounter any of our neighbors, a distant nod will suffice until you have been formally introduced. Which is unlikely since you are not here to be introduced.”

It was Maria who let the cat out of the bag. “Martha said that number 10 had a murder there some years back. Can you imagine? It makes me feel quite faint to think of it!”

Lady Featherstone began to say something sharp about the maid, but her husband overruled her. “It is perhaps as well, my dear, that the girls be prepared. Maria, Anna, it is true that an irregular death occurred at the Earl of Carne’s house some years ago, but it was suicide, not murder. It is an old matter and need not disturb you at all, but you should know that the earl, despite his rank, is not the sort of man who is introduced to young ladies. I am assured that he lives abroad, but if you should encounter him, you will ignore him entirely.”

Anna stared. “Cut an earl?”

“If the man has a scrap of decency that will not be necessary. But if he should turn up and approach you in any way, yes, you must refuse to acknowledge him.”

This was hardly the sort of talk to calm Anna’s bubbling curiosity, but she could see she would get nothing more out of her parents. She would have to hope the servants would be more forthcoming. It was typical, though, that Martha had told more to Maria than she had to Anna. It was so tedious being a schoolroom miss.

Immediately after breakfast Maria and Lady Feather-stone embarked on matters to do with Society. Sir Jeffrey warned Anna to go nowhere without both maid and footman, then went out to Parliament. Anna obediently summoned Martha and a footman and set out for the best lending library in London, her main intent being to bring home a copy of Forbidden Affections.

As they walked, Arthur, the footman, pointed out the sights, and the occasional famous person passing by.

Anna was interested in London, but she could not stop puzzling over the matter of number 10. “London seems so crowded,” she said at one point. “I’m surprised the house next door to us is allowed to stay empty.”

“Criminal waste of a house, I ’d say,” Martha remarked with a sniff.

Arthur shrugged. “It’s the earl’s to waste, Miss Anna, and he’s rich enough not to care.”

“But there must be servants,” Anna probed.

“Just a couple who keep the place up. The Murchisons have got it easy, and that’s the truth. The whole place is under covers, they say.”

Anna waited, hoping for more, but it became clear that if she wanted more information, she’d have to dig for it. “And no one has lived in it for years?”

“That’s right, miss. Ever since the earl’s ladybird was found dead there.”

“Arthur!” exclaimed Martha. “I’ll thank you to remember that Miss Anna is still a schoolroom miss!”

Anna could have strangled Martha. Just as the conversation was becoming interesting!

The earl’s ladybird? That meant lover. So the earl’s lover had committed suicide in number 10? Embarrassing, certainly, but enough to send a peer of the realm into exile?

Hardly.

And why had Maria reported it as murder?

These thoughts tumbled around in Anna’s head as she gathered an armful of books at Hatchards. She did not find a copy of Forbidden Affections so asked a clerk for assistance. He consulted the large book which served as their catalogue. “I’m afraid we no longer have a copy, miss.”

“What? Why on earth not?”

At her sharp tone he looked rather harried. “It is eight years old, miss. Possibly one of the volumes was lost or damaged … May I recommend this one?”

Anna listened politely as he recommended a number of the latest romantic novels, and even took one to allay suspicion. She knew it was irrational to think that Martha and Arthur, who were standing by chatting, would read anything into her desire for a copy of Forbidden Affections, but she felt compelled to disguise her feelings.

She wanted no one to discover her secret until she had solved the mysteries of Carne Terrace. And she wanted to solve them on her own.

She would have liked to go to another library to continue her search for the novel, but how could she with Arthur already burdened with at least two days’ reading? Seething at the stupidity of a library that didn’t have multiple copies of every one of Mrs. Jamison’s novels, Anna returned home.

Releasing Martha and Arthur to their other duties, she sat down to read. The books she had selected were interesting, but she could not concentrate on any of them. Her mind was full of Lord Carne, his dead lover, and the Gothic chamber of Dulcinea. In fact, Anna knew she was merely passing time until that night when she could explore again.

By mid-afternoon she could restrain her curiosity no longer and wandered into the kitchen where the cook, Mrs. Jones, and two maids were preparing dinner.

“Hungry, miss?” asked the wiry woman pleasantly enough. “There’s maids-of-honor there that could do with testing.”

Anna grinned at the cook and sat at the table to nibble an almond tart. “They’re delicious,” she said honestly. “Alas, I don’t think my stay here will increase my chances of becoming thin and interesting.”

“Let’s not have any of that nonsense, miss. Some healthy padding serves a woman well. And there’s many a gentleman likes an armful.” Mrs. Jones pushed another cake over to Anna.

Anna did not actually want another one, but she took it with a smile. “I certainly hope so, since I am to have your cooking. I’m sure they should charge extra for this house if you come with it.”

The cook preened. “Been here nigh on ten years, miss, and there’s been no complaints. Maggie, stop beating those eggs now and put the water on.”

A rather slack-faced maid put aside a big bowl of eggs and went to haul a copper pot onto the stove.

Anna decided on a direct approach to one part of the puzzle. “Were you here when my bedroom was made?”

The woman rolled her eyes. “That Chamber of Horrors? Aye. It was a fancy of the mistress of the time, Lady De-labury …” The woman broke off what she was about to say. “Maggie, the big pan!”

With a clatter, one pan was put down and another picked up.

“She must have been very fond of novels,” Anna prompted.

The cook looked at her in surprise and with a touch of suspicion. “How did you know that, miss?”

“Oh, there are rooms like that in many novels.” Anna dropped her voice and made it sound mysterious. “Usually in the less-frequented parts of moldering castles, hung with cobwebs and infested by rats …”

Both the cook and the two maids were staring at her.

“Well, there’s no rats in this house!” declared Mrs. Jones. “It makes a bit of sense, though,” she added more moderately, “since Lady Delabury wrote those sorts of books.”

“Wrote them?” Anna almost choked on a pastry crumb.

“Not under her own name, of course. Mrs. Jamison, that was the name she used, even when she were a single lady … All right, Maggie, stop gawking and add those bones … ! She was a lovely lady, miss, very like your sister. Lord Delabury would have done anything for her, so when she wanted that room he had it made. Dreadful upset, he was, about her death.”

A Dulcinea, in other words. No wonder Mrs. Jamison’s heroines were always of that type. But then why the doorway into the other house? Lady Delabury had her Roland.

Perhaps. Perhaps the poor lady had been married to Count Nacre and had dreamed of escape.

“What was Lord Delabury like?” Anna asked.

“Oh, a very handsome young man and a good employer. He gave up living here, though, after the death, and stays at his estate in the north nearly all the time. A sad tale … Maggie, come cut up these turnips … Look, miss, we’ve got to get on with dinner now.”

Anna took the hint, but instead of returning to the house, she chose to wander out into the garden, her mind churning with speculation. For Lady Delabury to have a room made in the image of a chamber in one of her books was eccentric but understandable. For her to incorporate a secret doorway into the house next door was another matter entirely. For one thing, it would surely require the consent of the owners of both properties.

And if the secret door was part of the incident, and Arthur had been right in what he said, then Lady Delabury had been the Earl of Carne’s ladybird even though she was quite recently married to a pleasant young man who adored her. And she had killed herself.

It was all deliciously intriguing.

Anna played with ideas as she wandered the uninspired garden, pulling up a weed here or there. At the limit of the garden she turned to look back at the row of houses. They told her nothing, however. Number 10, with its blinds drawn, was particularly uncommunicative.

There was a gate in the back of the garden and Anna saw that it opened onto the mews. There was a gate from the mews into the garden of number 10, too. She resisted the temptation to explore. The garden was unlikely to hold the key to the mystery.

She returned to the house and her unsatisfactory books, and waited for night.

To Anna’s frustration, her family was no longer tired from the journey, and they would never believe it if she claimed to be. If she tried to go to bed early, they’d send for the doctor.

It was very pleasant to play whist and read a little, but she was desperate to go adventuring.

The only progress she made with her mystery came from one comment by her father.

“I don’t think we need worry about the earl. The general opinion seems to be that he died on one of his wild adventures. In fact his heir, a cousin, has started a court case to have him declared dead.”

“I think that’s rather horrid,” Anna said, thinking of the young man in the portrait, for she suspected he might be the earl.

“It’s practical, Pippin. Servants are all very well, but a large estate should not be left unsupervised for so many years.”

Conversation turned then to another case of neglect and Anna learned nothing more.

At half-past ten, Lady Featherstone declared that it was time for her daughters to get their beauty sleep and they obligingly went to their bedrooms.

Martha came and went, Anna was officially in bed, and at last the adventure could begin. Even if the earl were dead, there was a mystery to be solved. She needed to do some research, and the library of number 10 was the place to do it. Anna had persuaded her conscience that if she didn’t take the books away it was not very naughty, and so she slipped through into the next house. Once there, she crept quickly, carefully, down the stairs to the library.

Safely behind the closed door, she placed her candle on the marquetry table and surveyed the bound copies of magazines and journals. Somewhere among them would be mention of the incident.

She looked first at the yearly report called The Annual Register. It did not take her long to find a reference, though it was frustratingly brief.

May 25, 1809. On this night a great uproar was heard in the handsome environs of Carne Terrace, when a lady of gentle birth and fine family was found to have done away with herself by means of laudanum. This tragic event was made bewildering because the lady, wife of Viscount D******y, died not in her own bed, but in the bed of her neighbor, the Earl of C****.

Heavens! That certainly would have set the cat among the pigeons.

The noble earl, however, was not in residence at the time, being at his estate in Norfolk.

And that must certainly have saddened the scandal mongers. Still, many had clearly deduced that the lady was his mistress.

Unless it had been well-known before.

The circumstances were made yet more mysterious by the fact that the earl’s heir, Lord M********le, was hosting a bachelor party on a lower floor. Neither he, his well-born guests, nor the servants saw the lady enter in her nightgown. A doctor was summoned, but life had long since departed.

Anna stopped to ponder that. Who was the present earl? The one whose bed the lady had chosen to die in, or the heir carousing downstairs? She suspected the latter, and a glance at Burke’s confirmed it. The current earl was now thirty years old and there was no Lord Manderville. What was more startling was that the earl had acceded to the title in May 1809, only days after Lady Delabury’s death.

Anna returned the Burke’s to the shelf and searched other publications for more details. She had almost given up when she found more in the London Report.

The account of the event was similar to that in The Annual Register, but this one continued to cover the inquest.

… a doctor brought in by the lady’s grieving husband stated that certain bruises on the arms suggested that the lady could have been compelled to consume the cause of her death, but since it was equally impossible that a murderer sneak into the house, and as Lord M********le and his friends all vouched for one another, that none had left the room during the evening, and in view of the fact that the lady was found clutching a farewell note to her poor bereaved husband, a judgment of suicide was made.

Anna closed the book. No wonder people thought the worst of the current earl, the then Lord Manderville. The death had been suspicious, and it was more than likely that he and his cronies would stick together.

What puzzled her was that no one seemed to know about the secret door or they would not wonder how Lady Delabury gained access to this house. It was particularly strange that Lord Delabury not know of it. Could he, in fact, have been the murderer?

She would dearly like to know what was in that note. What reason had the beautiful, talented young woman given for taking her life? Guilt because she was Lord Manderville’s mistress?

But why had a recently married woman sought a lover? Anna assumed Lord Manderville was the young man of the portrait, so she could see the appeal, but it did seem strange behavior, even for London. It suggested that her husband must have been a monster beneath his charming exterior.

But what of Lord Manderville, the prime suspect? Anna could believe that the young man of the portrait—a few years older—would have taken a neighbor’s wife as lover. She could believe he had spent an evening carousing with his friends. She could not believe that he would have callously forced his mistress to drink laudanum.

She sat at the table, chin on hands, to ponder it all. What else might have happened? If Lady Delabury had been Lord Manderville’s mistress, then she might have been at his party. Had it been some kind of orgy? Anna had read enough ancient history to know about orgies. She understood that quite sensible people could be carried into extremes of vice and passion.

Perhaps the young man had gone into exile out of grief and guilt because his wild party had turned into fatal disaster—especially if the events had led to the death of his father, perhaps from shame …

The candle was shrinking and it was time for Anna to return to her own room. She replaced the books thoughtfully, informed but dissatisfied. There was surely a great deal more to the incident but she was no longer sure what questions to ask.

Before leaving, she turned to the shelf of novels, wondering if there might be answers there. There clearly was some connection between Forbidden Affections and the unfortunate death, since the author had caused that room to be made.

Anna opened the glass door and hesitated. She would have to take the volumes back to her room to study them, and that was the line she had drawn for herself—she would not remove anything from the house.

But she needed to know the truth. She reached out for the first volume of Forbidden Affections—

With a click, the door behind her opened.

Anna froze, wondering in wild irrationality whether staying very still would make her invisible. But it wouldn’t, so she turned slowly to stare, appalled, at the man staring back at her.

She was caught.

And surely she was caught by the wicked earl himself. Tall, dark, and authoritative, it was the young man in the picture some ten or more years older.

The astonished silence stretched, and then the earl closed the door and approached. “I was not aware that the Murchi-sons had hired staff. You do know you are likely to be on the street in the morning, girl?”

He thought her a servant intruding where she had no business to be. “Beg pardon, sir,” Anna mumbled, thinking furiously. If she could just get out of this room without revealing her identity, he might never know who she was.

She was going to die of embarrassment if this got back to her parents!

He came closer, and her heart raced with even more immediate fears. Gracious, but he was tall and broad. Of course, that could be the effect of his heavily caped greatcoat. But then he shrugged it off and dropped it on a chair and was still tall and broad. His dark jacket and leather riding breeches did not soften him one bit.

She remembered the portrait wistfully. That young man had seemed a friend, but this person was entirely different. There was no laughter in those blue eyes now and the lines of his face spoke of experience and ruthless ways. He even bore a scar down one cheek. Wicked or not, Anna feared the earl was most certainly a dangerous man.

Was he a murderer, though?

If he discovered that she had been looking into the death of Lady Delabury, would he kill again?

Anna was not of a nervous temperament, but she liked to think she knew when it was reasonable to be afraid.

She was afraid now.

He sat in a winged chair, stretched his legs as if he owned the place, and eyed her thoughtfully.

He does own the place! Anna told her mind, which was turning giddy with fear. Think. Think. We have to get out of here!

She considered running for the door but had no doubt that he could stop her. If she was to conceal her identity, she had to persuade him to let her leave peaceably.

He slowly pulled off his black leather gloves, watching her every minute. “Since you’re here, girl, you can make yourself useful. Pour me some brandy.” When she did not move, he added, “I suppose it’s to your credit that you don’t know where it is. In that table there. Raise the lid and there should be glasses and a full decanter unless my orders have been ignored.”

Anna swallowed and went to the table to do as he said. Other reasons for fear were occurring to her. She was here alone with a gentleman—a wicked gentleman—in her nightgown. With not a stitch under it! Even though it was of thick cotton, high-necked and long-sleeved, she felt as if he must feel her nakedness as she did, open to the breeze of her movements across the room. He would know from her bare feet that she wore no stockings.

Just see what a bramble-patch your curiosity has led you to, Anna Featherstone! And you knew all along it was wrong and foolish.

Anna’s hands shook as she opened the table to lift the heavy-based tumbler and the cut-glass decanter. She managed to pour the brandy without spilling any, then put the decanter down and turned.

His brows were raised. “Do you think you’re serving a dowager? Fill it up, girl!”

Anna looked at the glass, at the modest amount she had poured, the amount her father would drink. A full glass would surely deprive a man of his wits. But that might be good. She filled it almost to the brim.

Then she had to take it to him. She wished her arms would suddenly become ten feet long, but they didn’t and so she had to walk over to stand by his chair.

She waited, but he made no attempt to reach for the glass, and so she had to press against his stretched legs to put it in his right hand. His boots rubbed against her calves through the cotton and something—almost an emanation—set her nerves jumping with panic. As soon as he took the glass she stepped back but his left hand shot out to seize the front of her nightdress.

“Oh, no, you don’t. What’s your name?”

Anna leaned back, desperate that his hand not brush her body. “Maggie!” she gasped, plucking the first name that came to mind.

He gathered in more of the cotton, pulling her closer, bringing her body close to his fist. “Well, Maggie, were you going to steal the books, or can you actually read?”

“I can read, sir!”

He drank from the glass in his right hand. “My lord,” he corrected. A glint in his eye told her he knew just how uncomfortable she was.

“Sorry, milord,” she muttered, though she wanted to do the wretch a very painful physical injury. What right had he to tease a poor maid this way, even if he had found her in his library? And more to the point, what were his true intentions? Anna knew how the wicked part of the world behaved.

“You’ll have to prove it,” he said.

Anna jumped. “Prove what, milord?”

He abruptly released her. “That you can read. Choose one of those revolting novels and read me a passage.”

Anna thought again of running, but knew it was pointless. Instead she accepted the test. Once he saw she was in here in search of reading material, perhaps he would let her go even if he did intend to dismiss her in the morning. Once she was out of this room unescorted, she could be back in her bed in moments.

She returned to the shelf. Avoiding Forbidden Affections, she chose Cruel Matrimony.

When she opened it, she realized with surprise that it had never been read. The pages weren’t even cut. She could read the first page, however.

“Was any woman so profoundly miserable as beautiful Melisande de La Fleur when the dreadful news descended upon her? She was to wed the dread lord of Breadalbane? Never!”

“Enough,” said the earl disdainfully, swallowing more brandy. “So you can read, and with an educated accent, too. Who the devil are you?”

Anna cursed her carelessness in letting her servant’s tones drop, and knew she was turning red with guilt. “I was raised gently, yes, my lord, but have no choice now but service.”

“Plunged into dire poverty, are you?” His voice gentled as he said, “Perhaps we can find you an alternative to base service, my dear. Loose your hair.”

It took a moment for Anna to guess his meaning, but then her breath caught. “No. Please, my lord—”

“Obey me.” It was said without great emphasis, yet it chilled her protests.

Anna heard a whimper, and knew it was her own. She should scream, but who would hear?

What would happen if she told him who she was? Would the wicked Earl of Carne continue his vile seduction when he knew she was the gently bred daughter of his neighbor?

If he did, said the logical part of her, then he’d care as much later as now. Perhaps he was just playing with her and would let her go in a little while. After all, she was hardly the sort of girl to drive men wild, especially a man like this.

So Anna took off her ribbon and fingered her dark hair loose, knowing her naturally rosy cheeks were apple red.

He eyed her over the rim of the glass, studying her dispassionately from tousled head to naked toes. “Very pretty. How old are you?”

“But sixteen, milord.”

“There’s no use putting on that servant’s burr again, sweetheart. Sixteen’s a good age.” He drained the glass and placed it on a table by his elbow. “Come here.”

The slight slur in his voice alarmed her. She suspected he’d not been entirely sober when he came in, and was now worse. Any belief that he would be rational was weakening and she glanced around in search of a weapon. There wasn’t so much as a penknife.

“Please, my lord, let me go. I’m sorry for having intruded—”

“But having done so, you must pay the toll.” His eyes were hooded. “A kiss,” he said with wicked softness. “No more, Maggie, or not yet. My word on it. Come here.”

Anna discovered that her feet simply wouldn’t carry her over to him. “I can’t …”

He raised his brows. “I could threaten to dismiss you tomorrow. Yet why do I feel that wouldn’t sway you? So, I’ll make another threat. If you don’t come here and be kissed, my sweet mysterious Maggie, I’ll come to you and do much worse. And you have my word on that, too.”

After a moment, he added, “That trembling innocence, the hands over the mouth, the eyes wide with panic, will not sway me. It’s actually quite arousing, you know. We men are such perverse creatures. You’d do better to appear bold and willing. I ’d probably dismiss you on the instant.”

Anna realized she was reacting exactly as he said, but she was a trembling innocent. “I wouldn’t kn … know how to act bold, m … my lord,” she stammered. “Have mercy.”

“Damnation, girl,” he said without heat, “it’s a kiss I’m demanding, not a life of sin. You’ll be the better for getting over these nervous tremors. Come here.”

The snapped authority in the last words had Anna walking toward him before she thought. He caught her nightgown before she could retreat and pulled her onto his lap. She did scream then, and struggled, but it did no good. He just laughed. “Squirm away, Maggie. It’s quite interesting, and in moments your legs will be naked as the day you were born.”

Anna went very, very still.

“Wise girl,” he said, and even smoothed her nightgown back around her legs—a touch that sent a jolt right through her.

He ignored it, and spoke soothingly. “There, see, the heavens haven’t fallen. Satan hasn’t appeared to drag you off to hell. Kissing is not a cardinal sin. You might even enjoy it. I suspect I will.” He caught her chin, smiling as a thumb rubbed along her jaw.

Anna twitched. “My lord!”

“Oh, do stop my lording me, girl! If we’re to share a kiss I’ll make you free of my name for a while. It’s Roland.”

“Roland?” Astonishment temporarily overwhelmed even fear.

He continued to rub along her jaw, gently, confusingly. “Why the amazement, sweetheart? Perhaps my parents had high hopes of me.”

“It … it’s an unusual name, my lord. You are called for Charlemagne’s hero?”

He grinned. “No. I’m called for a rich great-uncle who obligingly left me his all.” His finger was tracing the edge of her lips now, as if learning of them.

Or perhaps he knew the extraordinary effect it could have on a woman …

“Roland was a noble character, though, my lord,” Anna said desperately. In a moment she was going to have to tell him who she was. “Roland est preux …”

“She speaks French, too! Chérie, you are wasted in the kitchens. Let us proceed with your metamorphosis to a higher order.” He deftly moved her more intimately to his body and dropped a light kiss on her tingling lips. “You’re as tasty as a rosy apple, sweetheart. I think I’ll call you Pippin.”

At that use of her father’s pet name, it was as if he were here, witness to her shame.

Anna burst into tears.

The earl froze, but did not let her go. To her astonishment, after a moment he held her closer and even rocked her a little. “Hush, Pippin. What the devil’s the matter with you? We’re talking a kiss here. It’ll go no further today if you’re not of a mind to it. I’m no rapist and we’ve plenty of time …”

His very reasonable and rather bemused tone calmed Anna’s worst fears. She peeped up at him cautiously, sniffing.

But perhaps seducers always behaved like this …

“That’s better,” he said soothingly, thumbing tears from beneath her eyes and stroking strands of hair off her face. “Just a kiss, a taste, Pippin. And then I’ll let you leave. This time.”

Heart pounding, Anna held on to that. One kiss and she could go.

And she would never come back here again!

But when his lips brushed over hers—a gentle, brandy-flavored roughness—she flinched away instinctively. He was ready for it and trapped her head, preventing all effort to avoid the deepening of the kiss.

Anna tried to protest, but since her mouth was now covered by his, it came out as only a mewling sound. Her hands were trapped against his body and she truly feared that if she squirmed she would reveal all.

God help her, what would happen if her parents ever found out about this?

He ignored her struggles and protests, but released her mouth long enough to say, “You’ve the sweetest-tasting mouth I’ve known in a long time, Pippin.”

“My lord, please—”

But then he was kissing her again, pushing her mouth open, touching her tongue with his so she squeaked and struggled violently. But then, abruptly, like a wave crashing over her, Anna realized there was pleasure in it.

There couldn’t be.

But there was.

It was like the first time she had eaten oysters. She hadn’t liked the thought of it at all, and hadn’t liked the first attempt much. But then, somehow, she had overcome the thought that the shellfish were alive, and that they were a little slimy, and had discovered they were delicious.

She had never liked the idea of this kind of kissing, and hadn’t liked the first mingling of his mouth with hers, but now she found that he, too, was delicious—sweet and spicy beneath the tang of brandy.

In moments the moist heat of his tongue seemed as natural as her own, and that acceptance spread downward through her body, relaxing her …

He released her mouth with slow, parting kisses, smiling more warmly now, more like the youth in the portrait. “That’s it, Pippin, my rosy, juicy little apple. You see what’s in store? You needn’t fear I’ll mistreat you. I’ll take care of you …”

Anna suddenly realized that his hand was sliding under her nightdress and took in the meaning of his words.

She kicked against his touch. “No, my lord! Truly, I cannot be your mistress!”

Despite her squirming, his hand ventured slightly higher, up to her knee. “You didn’t think you’d like kissing, Maggie. Let’s see how you like this …”

“No … Help!” Anna tried to put the full force of her healthy lungs behind it but he clapped a hand over her mouth and laughed at her struggles.

So much for his promises!

As he looked down with interest at the leg her struggle was exposing, Anna saw the glint of the glass he had set down. She stretched out, seized it, and swung it with all her strength to crash against her ravisher’s head.

With a cry, he relaxed his hold.

Anna tore herself free.

He was cursing now and holding his head. Anna was dreadfully afraid that she’d done him some terrible injury, but that was even more reason to flee.

She raced into the hall and up the steps, her heart thundering, her breath mere gasps of panic. In moments she was through the door and back in her bedroom.

She slid to the floor in limp relief, offering earnest prayers of thanks to the deity who watched over foolish virgins.

Which made her think of lamps.

Which made her realize a terrible thing.

She’d left the candlestick!

At that moment, Anna Featherstone nearly fainted.

She wanted to huddle under her covers and pretend none of the recent events had happened but if she didn’t retrieve the candlestick, it would be obvious she’d been there. Quite apart from the fact that she would be short a candlestick, it was probably identifiable as from this house.

What on earth would happen to her? What if she’d done some terrible injury to the earl? What if he was lying on his library floor breathing his last?

Would they hang her?

At least, said a voice, if he’s dead he can’t identify his assailant.

But the candlestick could.

There was only one thing to do.

Anna’s legs felt weak as wet paper, but she forced herself to her feet. Still shaking and struggling not to sob, she opened the secret door again to re-enter the Earl of Carne’s cursed house.

She staggered out onto the landing, listening carefully for any hint of what was happening. She heard a voice. It was the earl, apparently calling for a servant.

Anna almost collapsed with relief again. He didn’t sound at all dead. But in that case, how was she to retrieve the evidence?

Then she realized that he was heading for the lower floor, shouting for his servants. She leaned over the stair rail and saw him, holding a white cloth to his head, disappear in that direction.

It almost demanded too much courage, but Anna forced herself. She ran down the stairs, tracking that distant voice all the time, dashed into the library, grabbed the candlestick, and raced back to her own room.

Once there, she flung herself into bed, pulled the covers over her head, and swore that she would never, ever, give in to curiosity again!

“Miss Anna! Miss Anna! Wake up.”

Anna stirred, resisting the call to wake. She’d been sleepless half the night worrying over the consequences of her actions.

“Miss Anna! Are you all right?”

Anna forced her eyes open. “Yes, Martha. Of course I’m all right.”

Martha frowned at her in grave concern. “I’ve never known you to be a slugabed. Are you sure you’re not sickening or something?

Anna struggled up, trying to appear her usual cheery self. “Of course I’m not! I must have just stayed up reading longer than I intended.”

“The state of the candle tells that story, miss,” said Martha with a glance at the candlestick.

Full memory rushed back and Anna winced at the thought of the story that candlestick could tell. Along with memory came anxiety. What would Lord Carne have done when he couldn’t find Maggie? Had he called in the Bow Street Runners?

One thing was certain, Anna must make sure the man never set eyes on her. She leaned back against her pillows. “Perhaps I might be catching a cold,” she said in a suffering tone. “My head aches a little …”

Martha came back to the bed and studied her. “You don’t look yourself, Miss Anna, and that’s the truth. Why, you’ve even taken off your ribbon and got your hair in a tangle. You must have been fevered in the night.” She shook her head. “You’d best stay in bed for now. I’ll bring you breakfast here and tell Lady Featherstone.”

Martha left and Anna groaned. Her hair ribbon. She’d left evidence after all!

It wasn’t a disaster, though. A candlestick was one thing, but a plain white hair ribbon could belong to anyone. It fretted her, though, so she was in danger of becoming truly ill through anxiety.

She took refuge in planning. The first thing was to stay out of sight for as long as possible, and being sick was an excellent excuse. It would be tedious, but far better than bumping into Lord Carne on the doorstep!

What was she going to do, though, if he intended more than a brief visit to his London house?

She rubbed her hands over her face. She should have known her mad behavior would lead to disaster. At the thought of what might have been, she shuddered. If that glass hadn’t been to hand, she might have been ruined beyond all repair!

To a young lady raised in the country, known by all and well-guarded, it scarce seemed credible that a chance encounter—no matter how peculiar—could have ruined her life, but it was so.

Lord Carne could have stolen her virtue by brute strength. Truth obliged her to admit that he might have managed to steal it by clever seductions.

Anna stared sightlessly at a grinning gargoyle and absorbed the fact that she had almost been seduced by a stranger.

Lady Featherstone was no believer in innocence as defense against ruin. She had informed her daughters about carnal matters, and warned them that the perils of the flesh sometimes included the temptations of pleasure. Her instruction was to avoid occasions of intimacy in case their consciences turned weak on them.

“And that frequently happens,” she had said. “Not many unfortunate girls intend their ruin. They are caught unawares and either forced, tricked, or seduced into depravity. And seduction means that they succumbed to pleasure. So be on your guard and avoid the very occasions of sin, girls. Prudent, well-behaved young ladies do not come to grief.”

Anna had never really believed that she could be forced, tricked, or seduced into ruin, but then she’d never anticipated anyone like the Earl of Carne. Cautiously, she allowed her memory to bring to mind the man she had met last night, trying to decide what made him so dangerous. Handsome, yes. But not in a smooth, gentle way. He was lean, hard, and had proved to be alarmingly strong.

Anna shuddered at the memory of being as helpless as a struggling toddler.

Perhaps, however, that very strength was part of the seductive appeal that lingered even now as a spicy sweetness beneath anxiety. Certainly something about him had speeded her pulse and weakened her knees in a way she had never experienced before, and it hadn’t entirely been fear.

Unless it was fear of the wantonness he had so easily summoned in her.

Yet another reason to avoid the earl. Anna was no fool.

Sometimes it was best not to put one’s willpower to the test.

She sat up straighter and turned her mind to assessing her situation and making plans.

With luck and caution, Anna decided, she might escape the consequences of her folly. She was not ruined, and it did not seem Lord Carne was seriously injured. He was doubtless puzzled as to the identity of Maggie, but if Anna stayed concealed for a day or two, all could be well. The earl would surely move on, either to travel again or to inspect his neglected estates.

Martha returned with a breakfast tray and Lady Feather-stone, who laid a cool hand on Anna’s brow. “You do not seem fevered, my dear. Are you in pain?”

“Just the headache, Mama.”

Anna’s mother studied her with intent concern and Anna felt sure she would read every secret. But eventually Lady Featherstone said, “I don’t think there is anything much amiss. Perhaps it is just the excitement of the city. Or this horrid room. Do you want to share Maria’s room?”

“No, Mama!”

With a shake of her head, Lady Featherstone dropped the subject. “Rest today, then, and I am sure you will soon be more the thing. But if you feel the need we will send for the doctor.”

When her mother had left, Anna settled to her breakfast, then asked Martha to help her dress, saying she would sit quietly on a chaise by the window. It was true that she had no desire to spend the day in bed, but she had other reasons. Her room looked out onto the street, and she wanted to be able to observe the comings and goings at number 10.

Preferably the goings.

What she hoped to see was the Earl of Carne entering a well-piled coach, clearly headed for foreign lands, or at least for the provinces. What she actually saw were two fashionable gentlemen stroll up and be admitted. Since they stayed about an hour, and neither looked like a doctor, Anna felt able to assume that the earl was not on his deathbed.

When two coaches arrived, Anna experienced a moment of hope, but then the chests and boxes were taken into the house. “Oh, no,” she muttered. “The wretch is taking up residence!”

Anna looked at the fireplace in alarm, then hurried over to push a solid bench in front of the secret door. It might not prevent a forcible entry, but it would prevent a silent one.

But how was she to avoid a meeting if the earl was to stay next door?

When Martha came to offer her lunch, Anna said, “There seems to be some activity at number 10. Has the earl leased the house after all?”

Martha put her tray on the table and started to lay out the meal. “Nay, miss. Believe it or not, his lordship’s come back. Arrived in the night without warning! And,” she added in a whisper, “it’s to be feared he’s mad.”

“Mad?” Dear heaven. Had her blow deprived him of his wits?

Martha looked around as if expecting an angel to come and silence her, then leaned closer. “He came knocking at the kitchen door this morning, miss.”

“The earl?” Anna’s heart started to flutter with panic. He knew! How did he know?

Martha leaned even closer. “The wicked earl himself! And the Lord knows what wickedness he’d been up to, Miss Anna, for he’d a mighty wound on his temple, all swollen and bruised-like. I tell you true, miss, none of us thought we were safe!”

“Whatever did he want?” Anna whispered back, wondering why the heavens had not already fallen on her.

“You’ll never believe it …”

“What?”

“He wanted Maggie! Poor little Maggie, who might be a bit slow, but hasn’t a scrap of bad in her!”

Anna didn’t know what to say.

“Mind you,” said Martha, straightening to rearrange a mustard pot on the small table, “the earl did come to his senses after a fashion. As soon as he clapped eyes on her he looked right bewildered. Apologized for disturbing us and took himself off.

“Sad, really,” she said with a shake of her head. “Mrs. Postle says he was a right promising young man once, before … well, before. Certain it is though, Miss Anna, that you must keep out of that man’s way. I’m sure your parents are going to be very concerned to know that he’s settling in next door.”

Lord and Lady Featherstone certainly were concerned, the lady rather more than the lord. Over dinner that evening she said, “You must be very careful, girls. Very careful. He has already shown his true flags.”

Lady Featherstone left it there, so Anna decided to stimulate discussion. “You mean him crashing into the kitchen covered with blood demanding Maggie?”

Unfortunately, Maria had not heard the story. She shrieked and assumed her ready-to-faint posture, hand to heart.

Anna’s father frowned. “Don’t exaggerate, Pippin. And Maria, don’t get into a taking. I am assured he knocked at the door and inquired after her in a fairly normal manner.”

“Normal?” demanded Maria. “Papa, how can it be normal for an earl to turn up at the kitchen door asking after the scullery maid? He must be mad. We’ll be murdered in our beds like that other woman!”

“Nonsense,” said Sir Jeffrey. “I will not have such exaggerations, girls. Lady Delabury took too much laudanum and it was years ago. As for Maggie, though I did not like to do it, I called on the earl and asked an explanation. It appears he surprised an intruder in his house last night, a young woman who called herself Maggie. When he attempted to apprehend her, she hit him on the head, which accounts for his wound. When his servants told him a maid called Maggie served next door, he naturally assumed she would be the same.”

“Then an honest man,” said Lady Featherstone, “would have sent for a Runner!”

“A charitable man might not, my dear. I did not expect it, but I gained the impression that the earl was motivated by compassion. He admitted that he had frightened the girl into attacking him, and he thought she might have been lacking her wits …”

Anna almost choked on a piece of chicken. The wretch!

“So he decided to discover her,” her father continued, “and speak to her superiors on the matter. Of course, since our scullery maid turned out not to be his quarry, he is no further forward in solving the mystery. And he did apologize for any upset he might have caused.”

“So I should think!” Lady Featherstone declared.

“I must confess, my dear, that I was pleasantly surprised by the earl. He seems a man of sense. We know he indulged in some youthful follies, but time can heal. I gather he has spent his recent years in the Eastern Mediterranean and he speaks intelligently of matters there. I suspect he may have been engaged on the King’s business.”

Her father might be quite in charity with their neighbor; Anna was not. She did not believe for one moment that Lord Carne had been moved by compassion. He either wanted revenge, or wished to continue his wicked plan to set “Maggie” up as his mistress.

Perhaps both.

Perhaps he had been intending to blackmail the poor, powerless maid into surrendering to his vile lust.

“Is the earl to stay in London, Papa?” she asked.

“It would appear so, my dear. His cousin’s efforts to have him declared dead have obliged him to return and prove his existence. It seems that he intends to stay for some time.”

“I cannot like it,” said Lady Featherstone. “It will stir all those old stories, and since there is a connection to this house, it will cause the kind of attention I cannot like.”

Anna was hard put not to roll her eyes at the word “connection.” If her mother only knew!

“Nonsense, my love,” said Sir Jeffrey with a twinkling grin. “The earl’s presence and those old stories will assure you an excellent attendance at any entertainments you care to give.”

And so it proved. When Lady Featherstone held a small, informal musical evening a few days later, her rooms were grat-ifyingly full, and it was astonishing how often conversation turned to neighbors, past and present.

As it was an informal affair, Anna had been allowed to attend in her one good silk gown to listen to the music. She knew she was not to put herself forward in any way, and was quite content to sit quietly, watching people and keeping her ears pricked for any snippets of information about the wicked Earl of Carne.

Unfortunately, no one seemed to know more than she. In fact she could, if she wished, give them a clearer story than they had.

She heard one person murmur that he was crippled by debauchery, and another report that she had been reliably informed that he was hideously scarred.

It was clear, however, that the ton was fascinated, and Anna suspected that the supposed wickedness of his past would easily be whitewashed by curiosity about his present. Add to that his status as a wealthy, unmarried peer of the realm and she had the sinking feeling that the dreaded earl would soon be accepted everywhere.

That was the last thing Anna wanted. Sitting in her corner listening to Mozart, she seriously considered taking up her investigations again in order to prove that Lord Carne really had murdered his inconvenient mistress. It would serve the wretch right …

“Miss Anna Featherstone, I believe?”

Anna looked up to see a young man bowing before her. She glanced at her mother, unsure how to handle this, but Lady Featherstone was deep in conversation with another guest.

Anna took refuge in good manners, smiled, and admitted her identity.

The pleasant-looking, brown-haired young gentleman took a seat beside her. “I know I am being a little bold, Miss Anna. My name is Liddell, by the way, David Liddell, and I am completely respectable.”

Anna met his eyes. “You would be bound to say so, though, wouldn’t you, Mr. Liddell? However, since I cannot imagine being the victim of seizure and rapine in my mother’s drawing room, I will not have the vapors just yet.”

After a startled moment, he laughed. “What a shame you are not making your curtsy, too, Miss Anna. You would set London by the ears.”

Anna twinkled at him. “I think that is what my mother fears.”

She held her smile even as her amusement faded. Her mother was clearly wise, for Anna had almost created disaster already. Perhaps bandying words with Mr. Liddell was a mistake, too.

He patted her hand. “Don’t grow nervous with me. Truth to tell, I wish to speak to you about your sister.”

“Ah,” said Anna, relaxing. This was familiar ground. “Have you fallen in love with her so quickly?”

He blushed. “Hardly that. We have only met a few times. But I would like to know her better.”

“Then I suggest you speak to her, not me, Mr. Liddell.”

“But I am being cunning, Miss Anna. If you will tell me the subjects that most interest Miss Featherstone, then I will be able to use my precious time with her to greatest effect.”

Anna considered him approvingly. “Initiative should certainly be rewarded, sir. Maria is interested in fashion, Keats’ poetry, and, on a more serious note, slavery. She is, of course, opposed to it. But I must warn you that we Featherstones are distressingly practical. Maria will not marry solely for money and title, but she is very unlikely to marry for love in a cottage. I do hope you have a comfortable situation.”

His face rippled under a revealing flash of pique before he controlled it. “I have expectations,” he said vaguely as he rose. “I must thank you, Miss Anna, and hope that perhaps one day we may be closer.”

Anna watched him cross to where Maria held court, feeling mildly sorry for him. He seemed pleasant and intelligent, but she feared his expectations were not equal to the occasion.

Then Lady Featherstone swished to Anna’s side. “And what, pray, were you doing conversing with a gentleman?”

“I could not avoid it, Mama. He introduced himself.”

“Gentlemen do not introduce themselves!”

Anna grinned. “They do when they want to know the way to Maria’s heart.”

“Ah.” Lady Featherstone frowned, but not at Anna. “It is unlikely to do, for all Maria seems to look kindly upon him.”

“Why? What is wrong with him?”

“He’s a Liddell. Which means he’s related to the Earl of Carne. That cannot be to his favor.”

Anna stared at Mr. Liddell with new interest. In her examination of Burke’s, she had scarcely noted the earl’s family name. “Is he the cousin, then?” she asked. “The heir?”

“Yes. Which now means he is a gentleman of limited means. ’Tis a shame, perhaps, that Lord Carne resurfaced, for as an earl Mr. Liddell would make an eligible parti. Without the title he is too small a fish.”

“But if Maria favors him, Mama?”

Lady Featherstone patted Anna’s head. “I will not force either of you to marry against your inclinations, dear, but nor will I permit you to follow some romantic fancy into hardship. It will be easy enough for a girl as pretty as Maria to find a husband who is both congenial and comfortable. Off to bed with you now, Anna. And tomorrow you are to cease this moping about the house or I will assuredly send for the doctor.”

Anna considered David Liddell before she left. Any resemblance between him and the earl was very slight, though he was handsome enough in his own way. She was surprised by the fact that she had not the slightest wish for the earl to die so Mr. Liddell could be earl in his place.

Not the slightest.

Not even if Maria did favor him.

Not even if the earl had committed murder.

Anna feared she was a sad case.

She was finding it impossible to forget her encounter with Lord Carne, who was not marked by debauchery, and whose scar enhanced rather than diminished his appeal. Nor could she forget the feel of being in his arms, of his thumbs gently wiping away her tears, of his mouth exploring hers.

These were not suitable thoughts for a sixteen-year-old schoolroom miss. Anna was painfully aware that her parents would be appalled if they could read her mind, and that saddened her for she loved them very much.

For she now knew she was wicked.

Every night when she went to her room she had to fight the temptation to open the secret door and venture once more into the territory of the wicked Earl of Carne.

The next day Anna did venture outdoors, for otherwise her mother would send for a doctor and it was Anna’s experience that doctors never admitted that a patient was healthy—there was no money in that. They always prescribed some medicine or treatment, invariably unpleasant. She had no mind to be dosed with tonic or worse, blistered, purged, or have blood let.

What Anna wanted to do was to attack the lending libraries again. She had long since finished the books from her last trip, and more than ever she wanted a copy of Forbidden Affections. She quailed, however, at the thought of walking down fashionable streets where she might come face-to-face with the Earl of Carne.

Instead, she gathered Martha and Arthur and announced a walk in the park. She was sure wicked noblemen did not walk in the park at this unfashionable hour. The dangerous moment would be leaving the house when there was the slight possibility that the earl might be doing the same thing. All Anna could do to lessen that hazard was to wear her deepest-brimmed bonnet.

As it happened, her precaution was unnecessary and she and her escort left the house with no incident at all.

Anna delighted in the brisk walk in the summer sun after so many days of idleness. It was almost like the country. Trees were in heavy leaf and bright splashes of blossom broke the smoothness of daisy-speckled grass. Ducks and swans cruised the small lake, while at the edges children pushed out toy boats. She also had Arthur’s gossip to enliven the day.

“Setting in for a regular stay,” Arthur said. “New staff and all. The Murchisons don’t much care for it if you ask me, Miss Anna. They’ve had an easy life all these years, living in comfort with no one breathing down their neck.

“Not but what they haven’t done a good job,” he added quickly. “And what a business about that young woman! Had a word with Jack Murchison myself, I did, and every word is true. They did think, as we did, that perhaps the earl had had a bit too much and imagined it, but Jack said he had clearly been hit a mighty blow on the head. And what’s more, there was a ribbon. A female’s hair ribbon!”

“Heavens!” gasped Anna, thinking such a response appropriate. In truth, she’d hoped that scrap of silk had been overlooked.

“No way to tell whose, of course. It’ll be a mystery till Domesday, if you ask me, for she was doubtless just a sneak thief, thinking the house was empty. For all we know, she’d been in the habit of prowling the house, snitching things, for years …”

Anna stopped listening at that point because she was pondering the fact that the earl did not appear to have told anyone that the intruder was in her nightgown. It was true the weather was warm, but it was hard to imagine any woman going thieving dressed like that.

She wondered uneasily what the earl was imagining.

Then, as if summoned by her thoughts, she saw Lord Carne, elegant in blue jacket, buff breeches, and tall beaver, strolling along the path toward them.

Chilled by panic, Anna swung away from the path to stare at some trees. “Look, a kingfisher. How peculiar to see one here in town!”

“A kingfisher, Miss Anna?” asked Martha, shielding her eyes. “You must be mistaken.”

“Oh, I could have sworn … Are there other birds of such bright color? It was a flash of the most remarkable blue! What other bright birds are there? Parakeets? Might one have escaped …?”

She maintained this ridiculous chatter as long as possible, but eventually was forced to turn back to the path. With a wash of relief, she saw that the earl had passed them and was well ahead on the path.

She wished the wretched man in Hades. What possible business had a gazetted rake to be in the park at this time of day when only doddering ancients and nursemaids with children were supposed to use it?

And why did he have to look so very elegant …

“Miss Anna! Are you all right?”

Anna snapped her wits together. “Yes, Martha. I just had a thought, that’s all. But it is doubtless time to return home.”

By the time they arrived at Carne Terrace, Anna was well into the blue devils. She could not go on like this, afraid to step outside the door, gabbling about kingfishers in Green Park! Perhaps it would be best to confess all to Papa and have done with it. She wouldn’t have to confess to that kiss, after all, for surely the earl must be as ashamed of it as anyone.

But her courage failed her.

Her parents would be so shocked by the fact that she had invaded someone’s home, never mind her brutal attack. And how was she to justify the attack without revealing the kiss?

No, she told herself, the chances of meeting the earl again were really quite slight since she didn’t move in fashionable circles. Her mother had assured her that now the Season was well underway, the hours kept by the ton would not be those of ordinary people. The fashionable throng rose at midday and returned to bed in the early hours of the morning.

If Anna kept her outings to the morning, she should be safe.

It was most irritating that the Earl of Carne did not keep fashionable hours.

At least, as far as Anna knew, he danced the night away with the rest of Society, but it seemed he often rose at an early hour as well. Her careful observation of the front door of number 10 showed him leaving to walk or ride at nine or ten of the morning.

She was beginning to wonder if her mind were disordered, for it did seem to her that no matter what time she chose to leave the house, the earl was likely to appear, forcing her to hurry in or out to avoid giving him a clear view of her face.

And she was extremely tired of wearing her coal-scuttle bonnet.

She was also concerned for her sanity because she had a disturbing tendency to study the man when she could do so secretly.

At first, she had tried to persuade herself that she was merely studying the enemy, but she was not in the habit of deceiving herself. The truth was, she liked to look at him.

There was a presence to Lord Carne, an unconscious authority in every movement. He moved with remarkable grace, and she had the impression that at any moment he could respond to danger if need be.

From behind her curtains, Anna studied his features and was forced to conclude that they were completely perfect. Not perhaps as smooth as some gentlemen’s, and there was that scar, but in her opinion they were everything a man’s features ought to be. His bones were excellent, his nose straight, his lips well-shaped and neither thin nor pouty …

She was inclined to linger on the thought of those lips and how they had felt against hers. She very much wanted that sensation again.

But not, she told herself firmly, at the danger of exposure or ruin!

Her obsession was not improved by the fact that she now had a copy of Forbidden Affections to study. There could be no doubt that Roland—Lady Delabury had even used his first name!—was the earl. Or Lord Manderville, as he had then been. If Anna took the youth in the picture and merged him with the man living next door, she had an exact representation of Roland of Toulaine, Dulcinea’s gallant lover.

That this merely confirmed the fact that Lady Delabury and Lord Manderville had been lovers was depressing indeed, especially when it suggested that the earl might have caused the lady’s death, even if only by driving her to suicide.

There was nothing in Forbidden Affections to cast light on Lady Delabury’s death, however, and Anna returned the book to the library and read Mrs. Jamison’s other five novels. The rereading confirmed that she enjoyed them more, and it puzzled her.

The heroine was always the same—a variety, Anna supposed, of Lady Delabury herself, or Miss Skelton as she had been before her marriage. The heroes, however, were varied. Anna thought them a rather unrealistic lot. She had never known men to be so inclined to protest their extreme unworthiness to even touch a lady’s hand, or to weep with grief at having dared to steal a kiss.

All this did rather incline Anna to remember a gentleman who would never weep over that stolen kiss, and would never for a moment imagine himself unworthy. She touched her own lips, remembering another touch, and was alarmingly aware that it would not take much for her to say to the Earl of Carne, “Kiss me again, please.”

Lady Featherstone was not always right. Sometimes young ladies did plot their own downfall.

Perhaps it was just that the constant avoidance of the earl was so wearing, or perhaps it was a secret wish for ruin. One day, when Anna returned home and encountered the earl leaving his house, as close to face-to-face as two people twelve feet away could be, she did not duck her head and scurry. Instead, she stared at him, chin up, daring him to summon the constables.

He was startled, then a slight smile moved his lips before, with the slightest nod of acknowledgment, he went on his way.

Anna went into the house in a daze of horror and relief.

He knew!

It was as if he’d spoken to her and told her that he knew, and had known all along.

She was horrified that anyone knew what Anna Feather-stone had done. At the same time there was tremendous relief. Clearly he was not going to call in the law, was not even going to inform her parents. And she didn’t think the composed gentleman she had encountered today was going to lie in wait to have his wicked way with her.

She was just the tiniest bit disappointed about that.

By the time Anna had her bonnet and spencer off, reaction had set in, threatening tears. The great drama of her life had proved to be as substantial as a … a soap bubble! Rather than spending the past weeks searching for a mysterious, dangerous intruder, the Earl of Carne had known all along that it had been a mere schoolgirl neighbor, and had been amused.

It was intensely mortifying.

Anna would have liked to flee to the country or fall into a convenient fatal decline, but this being reality rather than a novel, she had to go on with life and try to put the whole matter out of her mind.

When she began to pay attention to events around her, she found that the wicked earl was being received everywhere. No one seemed to care anymore about the incident, and Lady Delabury’s death was being politely ignored.

Maria was a great success, and though she had not made her choice, it was likely that she would accept an offer within weeks. Mr. Liddell was still a constant attendant, but his chances of success seemed slim. Now that Lord Carne was back, his heir had no prospects beyond a small estate and a government post.

Anna returned to spending her time as originally planned, visiting historic places and educational exhibitions. In fact, she should perhaps have acted this way all along, for she never encountered the earl in these activities.

Then he began to show a marked interest in Maria, causing a great fluttering in the Featherstone nest.

“I have grave reservations,” said Lady Featherstone at luncheon one day. “For all that the earl behaves quite properly, I cannot forget his past.”

“Time heals,” said Sir Jeffrey. “Morals as well as hearts. Since there is no evidence of anything but wildness in his past, I think Lord Carne should be judged on his present behavior. What do you feel, Maria?”

Maria raised a hand to her head as if dizzy. “I must be sensible of the honor, Papa. But I am not sure I can forget his past. Mr. Liddell has told me such things …”

“Mr. Liddell has his own ax to grind,” Anna pointed out.

“I know that,” said Maria, her expression a blend of irritation and complacency. She did enjoy being fought over. “But it is generally accepted that he … that the earl had an improper relationship with the woman who died. I cannot overlook that in a man.”

“Then you’d best get yourself to a nunnery,” Anna muttered.

Maria gasped, and even her father raised his brows in surprise.

“Anna!” exclaimed Lady Featherstone. “Go to your room at once, and study Bishop Stortford’s sermon on unclean thoughts.”

Anna flushed with mortification as she rose and curtsied. What had possessed her to say such a thing? “Yes, Mama. I beg pardon, Mama.”

In her room, however, Anna didn’t study the sermon—which she knew almost by heart—but contemplated the terrible reason for her outburst.

Jealousy.

She was jealous of Maria, and could not endure the thought of the Earl of Carne being her brother-in-law.

Which led to the next incredible step.

She wanted him for herself.

Anna laughed out loud. It was impossible, and exactly the sort of silly infatuation girls seemed prone to, but that did not make it any the less powerful at the moment. She ached with the loss of something she had never had, or had hope of.

She was honestly convinced, however, that Lord Carne and Maria would not suit. There was nothing wrong with Maria, but she needed a husband who appreciated sensibility and delicate feelings. The Wicked Earl would find Maria’s airs a dead bore inside a month.

There was nothing a schoolroom miss could do about this, however, except be miserable and intensify her efforts to avoid the man. It would be the last straw if she made a fool of herself by acting like a lovesick moonling over him.

Anna thought avoiding the earl would be easy, but she hadn’t considered the consequences of his interest in Maria. He now had the entrée to number 9.

In fact, he appeared at a small tea party Lady Feather-stone gave two days later. It appeared he had been invited, though no one had expected him to attend. After all, it was an informal affair, so much so that Anna was in attendance.

When Anna heard him announced her heart began to pound, blood rushed to her head, and though she focused all her attention on old Lord Threpton, who was droning on about his problems with poachers, she didn’t hear a word he was saying.

Once again she had this longing to become invisible, and that carried her thoughts straight back to a night in the Wicked Earl’s library, and the things he had done to her then.

She knew color was flooding her face.

She wanted to die.

The mere sound of Lord Carne’s voice—the first time she had heard it since that night—was interfering with her breathing, causing a perilous light-headedness.

Lord Threpton peered at her. “Hey, missie, I didn’t mean to upset you with these matters!” He patted her knee. “You’re a good girl to listen to an old man rambling on.”

Anna kept her eyes fixed on his rheumy ones. “I don’t mind, my lord. You are very interesting.”

He pinched her cheek. “Some man’s going to be very lucky in you, my dear. Now, why not go and find that plate of jam tarts and offer me another one. Very good, they are.”

Thus Anna was forced out of hiding and set to walk across the room on unsteady legs. Which meant that her mother had to introduce her to the earl. “My youngest daughter, Anna, my lord. She is not yet out.”

He bowed with his typical grace. “Miss Anna. Charmed to make your acquaintance.” He acted as if she was a total stranger, but Anna shivered as if he had stroked her back.

She wanted not to look to him, but couldn’t help herself. He was even more perfect up close than he was at a distance. And what an actor he was. There was no hint of anything untoward about him except perhaps for a hint of intimate humor in his blue eyes, humor fighting to escape, just as it had in the portrait.

Anna wished desperately that he wouldn’t look at her like that. It touched her heart and made her think of kisses.

Then she realized she was standing there red-faced and speechless, a picture of a schoolgirl gaucherie. She hastily dropped a curtsy and he moved on to be introduced elsewhere.

Maria came over to hiss, “For goodness sake, Anna, there’s no need for you to look at him as if you thought he’d eat you! You were the one defending him before!”

“I didn’t!”

“Yes, you did. Oh well,” she said with a superior smile. “I suppose you are unaccustomed to meeting earls. Don’t worry, dearest, he won’t expect much from a schoolroom miss.”

Maria switched on a warmer smile and went off to greet new guests. Anna marched on in search of jam tarts, wishing fiercely that she were at least out and able to compete on equal terms.

Compete? she thought, as she picked up the plate. It was hard not to laugh like the madwoman in Mrs. Jamison’s Lord of the Dark Tower.

Maria was a diamond of the first water, and Anna was a … mildly pretty pebble! Crossing the room with the plate, she flickered a glance at the earl. He caught her at it. Almost imperceptibly, he winked, and his mouth moved in a secret smile.

Anna jerked her gaze away, and hurried back to Lord Threpton. If she didn’t know better, she’d think the Earl of Carne was flirting with her!

Nonsense, she told herself firmly. What he was doing was playing a rather cruel teasing game just to make her uncomfortable. Perhaps it was his way to pay her back for her assault.

Anna found herself busy handing out tea and passing plates of cake, and was glad of it, but inevitably this led to her offering a plate to Lord Carne. She had to stand quite close and was sharply reminded of the time she had brought him that glass of brandy.

And of all that had followed.

She watched him warily and prayed her hand wouldn’t shake.

Again he met her eyes, but with no special expression. “Thank you, Miss Anna. I am spoiled for choice. Which cake would you recommend?”

Anna’s throat went dry as if he had asked something private and significant. She swallowed. “The lady-cakes are very good, my lord.”

He studied the plate, and Anna saw it start to tremble slightly with her nerves. “I wonder if a lady-cake would meet with me …” He appeared to trail off as if in thought.

Anna’s heart skipped a beat. Had he really said, “me” rather than “my”? And had he swallowed the word “cake” so that he seemed to say, “I wonder if a lady would meet with me?”

Surely not!

“I doubt it, my lord,” she mumbled. It had to be her imagination. Even the Earl of Carne could not be so bold. She remembered telling Mr. Liddell that she did not fear seizure and rapine in her mother’s drawing room. Now she was not so sure.

He looked up at her rather seriously. “What a shame there are no maids-of-honor here today.”

Anna flushed at the rebuke and the injustice of it. But inside here there was also a spark of delight at the sheer wit and effrontery of the man. He was using the name of the almond cakes and giving it another meaning.

“Perhaps there are maids-of-honor,” she retorted. “Gentlemen-of-honor might be a little harder to find.”

The lady sitting beside the earl tittered. “Miss Anna, you are too young to attempt barbed witticisms!”

Lady Featherstone came over quickly. “My lord, is there a problem?”

“Not at all, Lady Featherstone. I was merely inquiring as to maids-of-honor. I am particularly partial to them.”

“Oh. No, I’m afraid we do not have them today, my lord.”

“Alas. But as I like my maids-of-honor for a late supper, perhaps I can still order some for tonight. At about midnight, I think.” He took a jam tart. “And, Miss Anna, I think you are quite correct. If we have maids-of-honor, we should have gentlemen-of-honor as well. I wonder what sort of cake they would be?”

Taking up his meaning of “cake” as “fool,” Anna replied, “I don’t see how any gentleman of honor could be a cake, my lord.”

“Then it seems unfair that maids-of-honor be cakes, when it clearly is not so.”

“Unless it means that they take the cake, my lord,” said Anna, switching the meaning to that of victory. She was enjoying this clever wordplay immensely, but Lady Feather-stone interrupted.

“You must excuse Anna, my lord. She is bookish.”

As her mother steered her away, Anna heard him say, “I suspected it from the first.”

Anna hated letting him have the last word.

Lady Featherstone drew Anna to the far side of the room. “It is most inappropriate of you to be bandying words with the earl, Anna, and it is fatal for a girl to become known as clever. Moreover, I still fear there is something strange about that man. Going on about his supper, indeed. Keep away from him.”

“Yes, Mama.”

Anna dutifully passed the cakes around the other side of the room, but her mind was running back over that conversation. She had just been invited to a midnight tryst with the wicked earl, and promised that he would behave as a gentleman of honor, and that he held her in the highest regard.

And he’d done it in front of a room full of people!

She couldn’t help but admire a man like that.

She slid a glance over to him, and he smiled in a way that reminded her that she was a foolish, infatuated girl.

But how could a foolish, infatuated girl be expected to refuse such an invitation?

By the time she prepared for bed that night, Anna was still not sure what she would do, and she spent the next two hours pondering it.

Despite that talk of honor, logic said that it was more than likely that the earl was inviting her to a wicked encounter where he would kiss her again and try to do even more.

The alarming thing was that the idea was very attractive.

On the other hand, her instinct told her that the man she had met today had had no such intent, but some other reason for requesting a meeting. It was certainly true that there was little chance of them having a private tête-à-tête in a normal manner.

Of course, a silly little part of Anna’s mind was dreaming that he had fallen desperately in love with her during that one encounter. If that was true, then perhaps he would go on his knees and protest his undying love for her even as he declaimed his extreme unworthiness to so much as touch the hem of her gown, just like a hero in a novel by Mrs. Jamison.

“Fustian!” Anna said out loud as she struggled back into her gown, muttering about buttons that were never designed for a lady to do up by herself. In the end she put on a short spencer jacket to cover the undone buttons at the back.

The mirror assured her that she was covered neck to toe, and decidedly not the sort of apparition likely to drive a man mad with love or lust.

As the clocks in the house struck midnight, she told herself that was how she wanted it and, heart thudding, moved the bench so she could return to number 10.

The lever worked without a sound, and the door opened smoothly. She almost screamed, however, to find the earl awaiting her in the bedroom.

“Ah,” he said, investigating the doorway, “I thought it must be in here, but I couldn’t find the secret to it.”

Anna sidled away from him, shockingly aware of the intimacy of being alone with an unrelated man for only the second time in her life, and certainly for the first time in a bedroom! At least the place was still shrouded in Holland covers, which in some irrational way made it less dangerous.

“Does the room make you nervous?” he asked calmly. “Don’t be. I have no wicked intentions. But there are servants now, and to be wandering around the house would be very dangerous.”

Anna put down her unsteady candlestick, placing it beside his on a bureau. “What if the door had not been in here, my lord? Then I would have had to search the house for you.”

He smiled. “You are charmingly forthright. I gambled, but I also hedged my bets. There is a note in the library asking you to come here. Will you take a seat?” He indicated one of the two chairs bracketing the screened fireplace.

Both relieved and disappointed that there was no sofa, Anna perched on the chair. He relaxed into the other one and stretched his long legs so that his boots came perilously close to her skirts. “Damned uncomfortable, these chairs. I like ones with lots of padding. I see you feel the same.”

“Me?” It came out as a squeak. Anna tried to relax, but it was impossible when this man was sitting so close, making her feel rather breathless. “I am just somewhat apprehensive, my lord. Do you intend to tell my parents?”

His brows rose in surprise. “What! That you sneaked into my house, where I mistook you for a serving maid and did my best to have my wicked way with you? Hardly.”

“Oh. Then I don’t suppose you are going to try and blackmail me, either.”

“Is that what you thought? What was I going to blackmail you into doing? Oh, dear. Not into succumbing to my wicked way. You’ve been reading too much Mrs. Jamison, Pippin.”

Smarting from his tone, Anna snapped, “Don’t call me that! It’s my father’s pet name for me.”

“Ah. I’m sorry then. It does suit you, though. And I have the greatest appreciation for juicy apples.”

Anna could feel herself turning as hot as if there was a roaring fire in the grate. “Are you flirting with me, sir?”

His smile turned wry. “That would be most dishonorable, wouldn’t it, after I ’d given you my parole. Very well, to business. The reason I requested this meeting, Miss Featherstone, is because you clearly know things that I do not. Such as the location of that secret door. I’ve been trying to find a way to speak with you for weeks, and have had to resort to this. Would you explain it, please?”

Anna felt very loath to tell him, loath to share her secret with anyone, but made herself say, “It’s in one of the novels. Forbidden Affections.”

He sat up. “In a novel?” he said blankly. “Read by thousands?”

“Yes. You see, Dulcinea is kept in a room exactly like the one I have—it’s very horrid—and Roland …”

He winced as if in pain. “Did that dreadful woman actually name a hero after me?”

Anna tried to assimilate the word “dreadful.” It seemed to her that no one could refer to a lover as dreadful in quite that tone. “I’m afraid so. Roland of Toulaine.”

“No wonder you reacted to my name the last time we met. And what did the noble Roland look like? Or can I guess?”

She nodded. “Just like you, I’m afraid. Or rather, more like you in that portrait.”

His blue eyes opened wider. “You have been prying, haven’t you, my dishonorable maid.”

Anna was blushing again, this time with mortification. “I do beg your pardon. It was inexcusable.”

“Hardly,” he said, recovering his equanimity. “I doubt I could have resisted the temptation, especially at … How old are you?”

“Sixteen, as I said.”

“I was hoping you’d lied. Hélas. So, are there other aspects of this novel that relate to reality?”

“How should I know, my lord? You might read it for yourself. You do own a copy.”

“The woman gave copies of all her works to my mother, who was too polite to refuse them but has never read a novel in her life.”

“How sad for her,” said Anna militantly.

Humor flickered in his eyes. “She has often declared that they turn young ladies into weaklings, inclined to faint at the slightest thing. I will delight in telling her how wrong she is.”

“She’s still alive?” Anna immediately regretted the question, but she was startled to find that the earl was not alone in the world.

“Yes, though she has not been hearty for years. She resides in Bath. So, come, tell me more about this novel so that we can see what parallels there might be.”

“Why?”

“You are not a particularly biddable girl, are you? Because, Miss Featherstone, I am still suspected of having murdered Lady Delabury, largely because no one ever believed that she could have gained entry to this house in her very revealing nightgown—for, unlike you, she favored diaphanous silk—without me knowing. Since my friends vouched for me, this casts a shadow on their honor, too. I want the matter cleared up.”

“After all these years? And …”

“Yes?”

Anna looked down. “I feel horribly selfish, but how can you tell the world about the door without involving me?”

She looked up to see him smile quite gently. “I’ll find a way. You must trust me.”

And she did. Yet again, relief was tinged with a little disappointment. She trusted him with her reputation, but she feared she could also trust him with her virtue. He wasn’t going to seduce her, after all.

Oh, dear, she was a perilously wicked creature!

“Anna?”

She started at his use of her name.

“Anna, tell me about the book.”

And so she did, not making a great deal of it because it was quite a silly story. She told how Count Nacre had trapped poor Dulcinea on the very eve of her wedding to Roland, and hidden her in the deserted tower of his castle, where he intended to ruin her, thus forcing her to marry him instead.

“And each night he would come to her, intending”—she was blushing again—“intending the worst. But something would always happen to disturb them.” She found the courage to look at him. “It is a little like Scherazade, my lord, except that stupid Dulcinea does nothing to change her fate. She just faints and weeps.”

His lips twitched. “Unlike you.”

Anna’s face was heating again. “I did. Weep.”

“True, and most disconcerting it was, child. But you also smashed me on the head with a heavy glass. I’m sure Dul-cinea could have done the same.”

“Yes, she could. If I ’d been her I would have waited by the door and hit him with a poker as he came in. In fact, I saw nothing in the book to suggest that Dulcinea couldn’t have opened the door from her own side any time she wanted. But you see, she was afraid of the rats.”

He laughed out loud. “Oh, the scorn! Are you not afraid of rats, Anna?”

Something in his manner was causing a new kind of heat, a warmth that came from his relaxed manner and smiling eyes, from his admiration. “I don’t like them, my lord, but if it were rats or Count Nacre, I ’d chance the rats.”

“I’m sure you would. And so the fainting maiden waits patiently for Roland to arrive on his white charger and throw her over his saddlebow.”

“Hardly at the top of a tower, my lord.”

“True. So what did happen?”

Anna settled to telling the story. “Roland confronts Count Nacre in his hall, where they engage mightily with their swords. The contest is equal …”

“How old is Count Nacre?”

“Oh, quite old. At least forty.”

“Ancient,” he remarked dryly. “But then the contest is unlikely to be equal. He probably has the gout.”

“The count is a mighty warrior, my lord, champion of the king. May I continue?”

“I do beg your pardon,” he said unrepentantly. “So they engage mightily with their swords. Do they batter themselves to simultaneous exhaustion?”

“Of course not.”

“Why not? Ah, she frowns at me …”

Anna was indeed frowning, though she was hard-pressed not to giggle. “Because, my lord, the count suddenly comes to a realization of his own wickedness and throws himself upon Roland’s sword.”

He blinked. “How very disconcerting.”

“Hush, my lord!” She bit her lip and pushed gamely on. “Roland races up the tower to Dulcinea …”

“Despite his wounds?”

“Heroes are never wounded. Or not seriously.”

“Then they are hardly very heroic, are they?”

“Have you ever been wounded?” The words popped out before she could control them, fracturing the lighthearted atmosphere. Her eyes fixed on his scar.

“I’m no hero, Anna.”

“You didn’t answer my question.”

“Villains get wounded, too. Proceed with your story or I’ll show you my other wounds, which would move this meeting out of the field of honor, Miss Featherstone.”

Anna was crushingly aware of having been relegated to formality, and swallowed a hint of tears. “Where was I, my lord?”

“Your hero was racing up the tower steps despite his many wounds, and muscles that burned and ached from the mighty battle.”

“So he enters Dulcinea’s chamber, causing her to swoon.”

“Twit. You would have tended his wounds, wouldn’t you?”

“My lord, he wasn’t wounded!”

“How could she tell? He was doubtless covered by the evil count’s blood.”

Anna paused. “That’s true, isn’t it? I didn’t say it was a good story, my lord.”

“Just as well. So, what next? I suppose he has to carry her down the winding stairs. Tricky, that, I should think.”

“Doubtless, especially as an earthquake starts just then …”

“An earthquake? The very earth protesting at the count’s demise? Then he must be the hero, and Roland, vile Roland, a wastrel and a murderer.”

“Nonsense. Roland is the very epitome of a hero. But the stones do begin to tumble around them, and the steps crumble beneath their feet …”

“Whereupon, he slaps her awake and makes her use her feet as they race to safety?”

“Of course not! In fact, she does come out of her swoon …”

“Thank heavens …”

“… But by then they have rats swarming around them, which sends her off again. Please, my lord, don’t make me laugh or I will never finish!”

“There’s more?” he asked, straight-faced, but with eyes full of hilarity. He looked exactly like the portrait.

With difficulty, Anna gathered her wits. “It can hardly end then!”

“I don’t see why not. They can be entombed together as an eternal monument to folly.”

“They manage to survive. Just as they emerge, the tower crumbles, leaving only a heap of stones …”

“And a lot of homeless rats.”

“I don’t think that was mentioned,” she said severely. “The king then arrives …”

“George III?” he queried in astonishment.

“No! King Rudolph of … Oh, I’ve forgotten the country. It’s all made up.”

He raised one brow. “You astonish me, Miss Feather-stone.”

A giggle escaped, but Anna struggled on. “The king has found out that Count Nacre is plotting treason and has come to execute him …”

“How very unlawful. Due process, my dear.”

“… But now he makes Roland Count of Nacre …”

“Whereupon Dulcinea breaks off the match because she refuses to live in a rat-infested castle.”

“The castle wasn’t rat-infested, my lord!”

“It will be now the rats don’t have their cozy tower to live in. Where do you think all those rats went?”

Anna succumbed to laughter. “Oh dear! It is all … all so silly, isn’t it?”

He leaned over and passed her a handkerchief. “Very. Are you truly addicted to these novels, Anna?”

Anna controlled her laughter and wiped her eyes. “Most of them are not as bad as that. Even Mrs. Jamison’s earlier ones were much better, though her heroines did tend to swoon at the drop of a pin.”

“From the little I know of her, Lady Delabury was of much the same temperament.”

Anna made a business of drying her cheeks, considering yet another statement that indicated that the earl and Lady Delabury had not been intimate. Then why on earth had the woman committed suicide in this very room?

He leaned back, sober again and thoughtful, and echoed her thought. “I see nothing in that silly story to explain why the author decided to commit suicide, or why she chose to do so in this room.”

“Perhaps because she’d written such a terrible novel?” Anna clapped her hand over her mouth. “Oh, how uncharitable!”

He focused his serious features and amused eyes on her. “Quite. And Margaret Delabury thought every word she wrote absolutely perfect. She had just married Delabury, an excellent catch for her, and the poor man was besotted. She had everything.”

He lapsed into thought, and Anna chanced a question. “What was in the note she left, my lord?”

“Some stuff about despair because she could not hold her husband’s affection.”

“He was unfaithful?” Anna asked, knowing she was turning pink at discussing such matters with a gentleman.

“Most unlikely. As I said, he was besotted. One reason I left the country was because fool Delabury was convinced I was his wife’s lover and murderer. Having failed to get me sent to trial, he was intent on calling me out.”

“Oh, my.”

“I did hope that by now he’d found a new bride and no longer felt so keenly on the subject. I have just heard that he is on his way to town with dueling on his mind.”

“Oh, dear!”

“Quite. Which is why I want to solve this mystery.”

“I wish I could help. Truly. But I think I’ve told you all I know.”

He rose to his feet. “I think so, too.” He was suddenly standing quite close to her. “I have enjoyed this, though.”

She looked up at him, delight at their shared amusement still fizzing in her. She had never known an instant bond such as this. “So have I, my lord,” she admitted shyly.

For a moment she thought he had something important to say, but then he turned sharply away. “Would you permit me to glance into your room, Miss Featherstone?”

Anna swallowed her disappointment. “By all means, my lord. I’ve wandered all over your house, so it seems only fair that you should see a little of mine.”

As they went through the door, he said, “It is not at all the same. You should not invite men into your bedroom.”

She glanced back over her shoulder. “For fear that the very sight of my virginal couch will turn them into ravening beasts?”

“Something like that,” he said vaguely, but he was staring around the room. “Good God. The solution is obvious. The woman was mad.”

“A convenient assessment, my lord, but hard to prove.”

“This room is proof.” He poked a finger into the grinning mouth of a gargoyle. “I suppose one could keep small coins and buttons in places like that.”

Anna giggled, but placed her fingers over her lips. “Hush, my lord. I’m not at all sure your voice cannot be heard in other rooms!”

“And that would set the cat among the pigeons, wouldn’t it?” he said softly. He turned to look at her. “Farewell, Anna.”

Her heart skipped a beat. “No more secret meetings?”

“No more secret meetings. It would be very foolish.”

“No one need know …”

“Except us.”

Anna gripped her hands tight together. “I … I like you, my lord.”

There was the merest twitch of his lips, but his eyes looked rather sad. “I like you, too, Anna Featherstone.”

“Well,” said Anna, after swallowing a lump in her throat. “I suppose if you marry Maria, we will meet occasionally.”

“I have no intention of marrying your sister. I’ve only been paying court to her to get access to Maggie.”

“Oh. And that was just because you wanted to know about the secret door.”

“Exactly.”

It was all rather deflating, but that magical time of intimacy and laughter could not be entirely dispelled. Anna gathered her courage and looked up at him. “If you were feeling grateful for my help, you might perhaps … might kiss me once, my lord, with kindness, before you go.”

“Kindness? Was I not kind the other night?”

“It was hard for me to tell. I was very frightened.”

“It may be hard for you to tell now. Why aren’t you frightened?”

Anna considered it. “I trust you.”

“If I were truly kind and trustworthy, Anna, I would leave.” But he held out a hand.

Breath catching in her throat, Anna placed her hand in his, touching him for the first time in weeks. His hand was firm, warm, smooth … All in all, it would be extraordinary if it were anything else, and yet it seemed remarkable to her.

He drew her into his arms and inside she melted into a blend of sadness and wonder.

“It is so unfair,” she said.

He tilted her chin. “What is?”

“That this is wrong.”

She could not read his expression at all. “You do at least know that it is wrong?”

“To be kissing a man in my bedroom? And such a man? I ’d have to be perfectly fluff-witted not to.”

“And fluff-witted is the last description I would put to Anna Featherstone. Too clever by half …”

He kissed her simply on the lips. She was about to protest that the kiss was too brief when he returned to deepen it, teasing her mouth open and bringing the pleasure that had heated her dreams.

When he started to draw away from her, she tightened her arms around him. “Oysters,” she said.

“What?”

“Kissing is like oysters. A bit unpleasant at first, but quite delicious when one is accustomed.”

He laughed then, struggling to be quiet. He rested his head against hers, his shaking running through into her.

She moved her head so her lips found his and swallowed his laughter so that it changed into something else, something even better than before. Her body became involved in the kiss, moving against him as her hands explored—

He pulled away.

When she resisted, he used force.

Anna was abruptly mortified by her behavior, but at least he was none too calm either.

Then his expression became kind, and he brushed some hair from her face. “I do wish you weren’t sixteen, Anna Featherstone.” With that, he slipped back through the doors.

“I will get older,” she whispered, but it was to a closed panel.

Anna undressed, aching with needs she had never imagined but understood perfectly well. He was right, though. The world would be shocked by such a match, and an eligible earl couldn’t be expected to wait years until she was older, and “out.” He would marry someone else, and Anna’s heart would break. But at least it wouldn’t be Maria.

That was cold comfort. Anna sniffed a few tears as she changed into her nightgown and climbed into her chilly, virginal couch.

In the next days, Anna could only be glad that her parents and sister were busily engaged in the height of the Season, for it was beyond her to behave entirely in her normal, prosaic manner.

She was foolishly, idiotically in love. Daydreams filled her head, wild sensations flooded her body, and she could hardly think of anything but the Earl of Carne. She attempted drawings of him, and wrote his name endlessly on pieces of paper—which were hard to dispose of in warm weather when there were no fires except in the kitchen.

She spent entirely too much time sitting by windows hoping to catch a glimpse of him entering or leaving his house. Once or twice he looked thoughtfully at number 9, but she wasn’t sure she could read anything significant into that.

To try to bring some order to her mind, she began again to consider the mystery of Lady Delabury’s death. After all, if Carne was to be believed, the lady’s husband could already be in town looking for an excuse to call the earl out, or perhaps planning to kill him in cold blood!

She was sitting in the drawing room one day scribbling random thoughts on a piece of paper when Maria came in, untying the ribbons of a very fetching blue silk bonnet.

“I confess I am beginning to weary of this constant social round,” she said, with feeling. “We meet the same people everywhere, and everyone talks of the same things.”

“It must grow tiring,” Anna commiserated. “But it will be worth it if you find the ideal husband.”

Maria sighed. “What is an ideal husband? This one is handsome, that one is rich, another is clever, another has exquisite taste …”
. . .