Table of Contents

Cover Page

Excerpt

Dear Reader

Title Page

About the Author

Dedication

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Chapter Thirteen

Chapter Fourteen

Chapter Fifteen

Chapter Sixteen

Chapter Seventeen

Chapter Eighteen

Chapter Nineteen

Chapter Twenty

Epilogue

Copyright

“Stop looking as though you expect me to drag you off and ravish you,”

the earl said softly.

The words were spoken in an amused tone, and yet his gray gaze had not softened, and the way he said “ravish” made Prudence blink behind her spectacles.

“Oh, my!” she whispered, half to herself, as she snapped open her fan. “I beg your pardon if I have been gaping at you oddly, my lord.” She fanned herself rapidly. “I am not sure what has come over me lately. It is rather warm in here, is it not?”

“Undoubtedly,” Ravenscar agreed, his appealing mouth curving sensuously. “Uncomfortably warm, I would say.”

There was a wry note in his voice that made Prudence glance up at his eyes again. It was a mistake, for they swept over her anew like storm clouds racing and churning with the heady promise of lightning.

“Oh, my,” Prudence muttered again as a moment of silence as charged as his look stretched between them…

Dear Reader,

The Devil Earl from Deborah Simmons is a delightful new Regency with a calm, sensible heroine who is determined to heal the wounded soul of the dark and brooding Earl of Ravenscar, the inspiration for the heroes in her popular Gothic novels. And be sure to keep an eye out for Deborah’s new medieval novel, Maiden Bride, coming in September.

Also out this month, the third book in award-winning author Theresa Michaels’s Kincaid Trilogy, Once a Lawman, features the oldest Kincaid brother, a small-town sheriff who must choose between family and duty as he works to finally bring to justice the criminals who’ve been plaguing his family’s ranch.

Miranda Jarrett’s hero, Captain Nick Sparhawk, is tormented by a meddlesome angel bent on matchmaking in Sparhawk’s Angel, which Romantic Times calls “delightful, unforgettably funny and supremely touching.” And an indentured servant is torn between her affection for her good-hearted master and her growing love for the rugged frontiersman who is guiding them to a new life in the territories in Ana Seymour’s new Western, Frontier Bride.

We hope you will enjoy all four titles, and come back for more. Please keep a lookout for Hartequin Historicals, available wherever books are sold.

Sincerely,

Tracy Farrell

Senior Editor

Please address questions and book requests to:

Hartequin Reader Service

U.S.: 3010 Walden Ave., P.O. Box 1325, Buffalo, NY 14269

Canadian: P.O. Box 609, Fort Erie, Ont. L2A 5X3

The Devil Earl
Deborah Simmons

www.millsandboon.co.uk

DEBORAH SIMMONS

began her writing career as a newspaper reporter. She turned to fiction after the birth of her first child when a long-time love of historical romance prompted her to pen her own work, published in 1989. She lives with her husband, two children and two cats in rural Ohio, where she divides her time between her family, reading and writing. She enjoys hearing from readers at the address below. For a reply, an SASE is appreciated.

Deborah Simmons

P.O. Box 274

Ontario, OH 44862-0274

This book is dedicated to Lynn Dominick,

Deb Jeffers, Marie Mattingly and all the staff of the

Galion Public Library for their continual assistance,

support and encouragement.

Chapter One

Autumn—1818

Cornwall, England

The wind howled. The shutters rattled.

Millicent swooned.

The specter rose up, a chilling vision, to loom over her

prostrate form…

“Drat!” Prudence muttered. Pushing her slipping spectacles back into place, she frowned at the sheet of foolscap before her. Her heroine was swooning far too frequently, and the specter very much resembled the apparition in her last book, The Mysterious Alphorise. Her second effort was simply not going well at all.

What she needed was…inspiration. With a sigh of frustration, Prudence gazed out the window at what had always provided her with the necessary stimulus: Wolfinger Abbey.

Of course, Mrs. Radcliffe’s novels were what had given her the courage to take up writing herself, but it was the abbey that stirred her creative spirit. It stood high up on the edge of the sea cliff, enshrouded in mist, its dark gray stone stark against the bleak sky, its towers home to the earls of Ravenscar for hundreds of years.

What secrets did it hold? Prudence had always pondered them, and even as a child she had woven tales of death and destruction, passion and murder, for the area’s most famous structure. Rumors spoke of a vast network of tunnels that lay beneath it, used by wreckers and smugglers not so long ago, but, to her great disappointment, Prudence had never found a single shaft.

When she was a young girl, she and the village children had dared each other to pass the gloomy gates or creep into the cemetery where the monks who had once walked its halls were buried. But the others had always fled, shrieking in terror, when they got close, leaving Prudence to be turned away by the aged caretaker.

Ever since, Prudence had been frustrated in her efforts to gain entry, because the abbey stood empty, for the most part, the earldom having passed to a distant relation who was more interested in the dissipations of London than in a lonely seaside residence. Life went on, bypassing Wolfinger, but it remained, a Gothic sentinel, ancient and aweinspiring. Like a standing stone, it kept its barrow of mysteries closely guarded—and waited for new blood.

A few locals claimed it was haunted by the ghosts of the sailors who had died on the rocks below, by fair means or foul; others said it was cursed by the bad blood of the Ravenscars who had dwelt there. To the fainthearted, it was macabre; to the more prosaic, an eyesore.

To Prudence, it was perfect.

She loved Wolfinger Abbey with a fierce devotion that no one else, certainly none whom she knew, could possibly comprehend. To her, the eerie edifice was the epitome of romance, adventure, excitement—all the things that were lacking in her own placid existence.

“Pru!” The shout startled her out of her contemplation, and, realizing she was nibbling on the end of her pen, Prudence promptly spit it out and turned to greet her sister.

Phoebe rushed into the morning room, pink-cheeked and charmingly breathless. Putting a dainty hand to her bosom, she stopped and stared at Prudence, her bright blue eyes wide and slightly glazed. Well accustomed to Phoebe’s theatrical tendencies, Prudence saw no cause for alarm, but simply waited for her sister to explain this sudden excitement. The answer was not long in coming.

“Oh, Pru! Pru! I have seen him, at last! Oh, be still my heart!” she whispered so dramatically that Prudence spared a moment’s concern that her sister might actually swoon.

“Him, who?” Prudence asked calmly.

The question sent Phoebe into new transports. Giving her sister an airy smile, she sank into one of the worn chairs near the hearth and sighed. “Oh, Pru! Simply the most wonderful being in the world…”

Smiling herself, Prudence knew it would be pointless to seek pertinent details at this juncture, so she simply waited and listened while Phoebe extolled the virtues of some unknown gentleman.

“He is handsome, so very handsome,” Phoebe said, dreamily lost in reflection. “And so elegant, and such fine manners! Of course, I knew him to be of noble birth at once! His education is obviously well beyond anyone’s in the confines of our small surroundings, and he must be very comfortable in his income.” She shot a guilty look at Prudence. “Not that such a consideration would weigh heavily with me, if it were not for all his other splendid qualities!”

“Of course,” Prudence agreed, her lips twitching with restrained laughter. “And who exactly is this paragon, or did you not gain his name?”

“Penhurst. The Honorable James Penhurst, but recently come from London.” She sighed again.

“Penhurst,” Prudence muttered. “Penhurst?” She looked over at her sister with a start of surprise. “Do not tell me that he is one of the Penhursts, heirs to Wolfinger Abbey?” she asked, her own excitement rising to match her sister’s.

Phoebe frowned prettily. “Yes,” she admitted reluctantly. “He is staying there, but I will not have that signify, as he is not at all fond of the place and is more at home in London.”

“Phoebe! He is at the abbey? You do not mean it!” Prudence leaned forward in her seat, her spectacles slipping down her small nose with the force of her enthusiasm. “This is wonderful. Why, only just now I was thinking again of how I might someday see inside it. If your gentleman is staying there, then surely we can, at last, view the interior!”

Phoebe shuddered. “Ugh! I have no interest in that monstrosity,” she said. “A nice town house in London—not too big, mind you, but well situated—now that would be the thing! Oh, how I wish I could see the city, just once…”

Her fancies were lost upon Prudence, who was intent upon her own objective. “James Penhurst,” she muttered. “An honorable, did you say? Then he must be a younger son.” She paused, half-afraid to voice her hopes aloud, then plunged on. “Phoebe, is he…Ravenscar’s brother?”

“Yes, though I cannot believe it myself. He is nothing at all like the earl, I am certain of it!”

Prudence could hardly contain the unusual agitation that gripped her. If the brother was here, perhaps…Pushing her glasses back into place, Prudence sought her sister’s attention once more.

“Phoebe! Phoebe, is Ravenscar with him, at Wolfinger?” Positively tumultuous, Prudence tried to restrain herself, but she had wondered about the earl for years, making the mysterious nobleman the subject of her particular interest. To meet him after all this time would surely be the height of her existence!

Phoebe shook her head, shattering Prudence’s hopes in a careless instant. “No, and I am sure I am quite glad of it, for Mr. Penhurst did not seem at all fond of him.”

The unfamiliar thrill that had seized Prudence began to ebb away, and the wild pounding of her heart eased, returning her to her usual sensible self. With a briskness that belied her overset emotions, she sat up straighter and buried her disappointment.

“Well, then, we must gain an invitation from the Penhurst who is there. Where did you see him?”

“In the village, of all places! I had just been to the market to pick up a bit of mutton for supper, and there he was!” Phoebe’s eyes drifted shut, and Prudence hurried to finish her questions before her sister threatened to swoon again.

“How long is he staying? Dare we invite him to call?”

“Oh, Prudence, but that is what is most delightful of all!” Phoebe said. Rousing herself from her dreamy state, she leaned forward to take her sister’s hands. “He said… He said he would like to call upon me here at his earliest opportunity!”

“Well!” Prudence answered, squeezing gently in return. “That will surely do.” She listened absently while Phoebe went on and on about young Penhurst, and she made the appropriate noises when expected, but already her mind was racing ahead to the practical details of her sister’s news. The cottage needed a thorough cleaning, Cook must make up something special, and—Oh, dear! She must put by some good wine, or whatever it was that gentlemen drank.

Dropping her hands back into her lap, Prudence calculated just what was needed to receive their new visitor, and then…Then, she let herself think of how she was going to finagle an invitation from him to see Wolfinger and explore all its mysteries at last.

Although Prudence and Phoebe waited eagerly, the Honorable James Penhurst did not arrive the next day, or the next, and the sisters were both becoming much discouraged. They had helped their servant girl, Mary, with the cleaning until their small home fairly sparkled, and Mrs. Collins, the cook, had made up special biscuits, but apparently their distinguished neighbor was unaware of the delights awaiting him at the cottage, for he did not come.

By the third day, Phoebe was in a pique, and Prudence had gone back to her writing. Try as she might to concentrate on her characters, however, the living, breathing owners of Wolfinger came too often to mind, interrupting her work.

This was not the first time Prudence had thought of Ravenscar, of course. The earl had long occupied her imaginings. In her heart, she wished him to be as darkly handsome, mysterious and compelling as his home. In her head, she knew that he was probably short and fat and red-faced, or so old and doddering as to be utterly lacking in interesting qualities altogether.

However, having heard his brother described in such glowing terms by Phoebe, she had reshaped her opinion. Perhaps, just perhaps, the earl was not so aged or ugly…

“He is here!” Phoebe’s strained whisper of excitement broke through her concentration, and Prudence lifted her head instantly. So intent was she upon Ravenscar that for a moment she thought it might be he, but, no, it was his brother who came today. Well, here was her chance, Prudence thought, with grim determination. No matter what the Penhursts looked like, she wanted to see their home, and she was resolved to gain an invitation.

Sending Phoebe on to receive their guest in the parlor, Prudence hurried to the kitchen and asked Cook to prepare a nice tray. Then she stepped into the parlor for her first look at a Penhurst and stopped stock-still, staring helplessly.

Of course, Phoebe had said he was handsome, and Prudence knew Phoebe’s tastes well enough, and yet she was still a little stunned by the Honorable James Penhurst’s appearance. He and Phoebe were seated close together, their young faces bright with animation, their bent heads nearly indistinguishable, for they were much alike. Although Phoebe’s curls were lighter, Penhurst sported blond hair, too, glowing golden around his face in the latest of hairstyles.

His clean, smooth features were comparable to Phoebe’s, too, in their beauty and balance. Dusty brows rose over sparkling blue eyes, paler, perhaps, than Phoebe’s, but no less enchanting. His nose was straight, his lips were even, his jaw was well-defined. In short, he was quite an attractive young man.

Prudence tried to swallow her disappointment.

The Honorable James Penhurst did not look the slightest bit as if he would be at home at Wolfinger, Prudence decided, her opinion more firmly set when her gaze flitted to his clothing. He wore a puce coat over a garish yellow-and-red-striped waistcoat, complete with watch fob, and his starched collar rose so high, she was certain he would have difficulty turning his head.

He was, Prudence realized with a shudder, a veritable tulip of fashion. Briefly, her more imaginative side wondered if the wicked Ravenscars of the past, including the Devil Earl, a fiendish character who had locked his wife in the tower room until she murdered him, were rolling over in their graves to know that the abbey was housing a…dandy.

Realizing that she was gaping rudely, Prudence finally managed to speak, and the two young people raised their blue eyes to her, their voices intermingling sweetly in greeting. Young Penhurst’s manners were very nice, and Prudence could find no fault with the way he behaved. Still, she could not help but be dismayed to discover, once again, that the world was a far cry from her own surreptitious imaginings.

Luckily, Mary soon entered with the tray, and Prudence occupied herself pouring tea for them all. Once that task was completed, she was left to her own brooding thoughts, as it soon became apparent that the Honorable James Penhurst was interested solely in Phoebe.

Prudence did not feel slighted by this display of partiality, for she was well used to Phoebe drawing attention. Phoebe was, after all, the beauty of the family, and a dear pet, and Prudence took pride in her. Too, she could not help being pleased that her sister was gaining the admiration of someone more illustrious, if less tastefully dressed, than the local fellows.

However, it was not long before the pleasure of watching an attractive couple chat about nothing more interesting than the weather began to pale and Prudence’s original resolve returned in full force. Perhaps Mr. Penhurst was a sad disappointment to her, but surely the abbey itself could not be less than she hoped. And since young Penhurst seemed amiable, she suspected it would be quite easy to gain an invitation to see for herself.

“Mr. Penhurst,” Prudence said, cutting short a particularly long discussion of the local landscape. “How long will you be staying at the abbey?”

Penhurst’s angelic face lost some of its luster. “I…I really cannot say, Miss Lancaster.”

“Oh, but you must stay for the rest of the summer, at least,” Phoebe said in her prettiest tone.

“I shall certainly think about it, Miss Lancaster,” he said, flashing Phoebe a white smile. “To be honest, I had not thought to stay this long, but neither did I expect to find such lovely companionship here in Cornwall, of all places!”

Ignoring his casual slight of her beloved home, Prudence pressed on toward her goal. “We have some wonderful sites to recommend us here along the coast, the abbey for one. Living in its shadow for so many years, we have grown quite curious about it. You must tell us all about it.”

Mr. Penhurst looked decidedly uncomfortable.

“Oh, Prudence!” Phoebe scolded. “Why you are so interested in that horrid place, I will never know. I do not see how you can bear to stay there, Mr. Penhurst. Why, it must be ghastly!”

Mr. Penhurst smiled thinly while Prudence sent Phoebe a speaking look of reproach. Not only was Phoebe undermining her hopes, her sister was being rude, as well.

“Nonsense, Phoebe, the place is positively fascinating,” Prudence argued. “Why, the history of your own ancestors, the Ravenscars, is full of intriguing stories,” she began, turning toward Penhurst.

At the mention of the family title, their guest paled visibly. “I am afraid I don’t know much about the old place. I am quite in agreement with your sister—a rather odious building, actually. Cold and damp, and not at all up to the state I am accustomed to. The rooms I had in London were much more comfortable.”

“Oh, London!” Phoebe said, clapping her hands with delight. “Do tell us of town doings.”

Regaining some of his composure, Penhurst smiled and began a discourse that was, for the most part, amusing, and he slipped only once in a while into unseemly cant. If he were any other gentleman, Prudence would have been quite content to watch him entertain Phoebe, but he was a Penhurst, and she was intent upon garnering an invitation to the abbey.

“More tea?” she asked, interrupting, and, having done so, steered once more toward her goal. “How are you situated for servants at Wolfinger? I would imagine it difficult to get good help there. There are so many silly rumors about it, and the locals are nothing if not superstitious.”

Penhurst looked as if he might choke, then managed a healthy swallow. “Actually, I believe both the housekeeper and butler have been kept on retainer.”

“Oh?” Prudence asked, with interest. “The servants are kept at the ready, then? Does your brother plan to visit sometime, too? I would dearly love to meet him.”

Penhurst dropped his spoon. “I am sure I am not aware of…the earl’s plans. Now, if you will excuse me, ladies, I really must go. It has been delightful, to be sure.” He stood, and Prudence saw Phoebe shoot her an accusing look.

“Oh, surely, you do not have to leave so soon, Mr. Penhurst?” Prudence asked. She tried her best to salvage the situation, but to no avail. Despite both her and Phoebe’s efforts, young Penhurst could not be moved, and they were forced to submit graciously to his wishes.

While Phoebe saw their guest to the door, Prudence removed her spectacles and rubbed the bridge of her nose. “Drat!” she whispered to herself as she put the glasses back on. “And double drat!” Leaning back in her chair, she glanced toward the window, where one of Wolfinger’s towers could be seen rising in the distance. Young Penhurst’s visit had been an unqualified disappointment, for she was no closer to viewing his residence now than she had ever been.

Why, he would not even talk about the place! Crossing her arms, Prudence chewed absently on a finger while she contemplated young Penhurst’s extraordinary behavior. Whenever she had mentioned Ravenscar or the family’s ancestral home, the boy had been most uncomfortable, most uncomfortable indeed.

It was very peculiar, Prudence decided, growing heartened once more. Perhaps the afternoon had not been a total loss, after all, for if she was not mistaken, whatever mysteries Wolfinger harbored still had the power to discompose a rich young dandy like the Honorable James Penhurst.

Why did her questions so upset him? Was there something that the Penhursts did not wish outsiders to see at the abbey? Already, her writer’s mind was leaping ahead to its own conclusions, and Prudence felt eager anticipation replace the abject disappointment within her breast.

Oh, my, she thought giddily. This was turning out even better than she had hoped!

Chapter Two

Prudence became more determined than ever to seek out the abbey’s secrets. Penhurst’s sudden visit was odd, very odd indeed, for he seemed to despise Wolfinger. He was a dandy who described London with enthusiasm, and yet he was staying in an isolated part of Cornwall with little entertainment other than that offered by a small fishing village and some local gentry, whom, by all accounts, he had made little attempt to contact. What, then, had brought him to the family seat? It was a puzzle worthy of Prudence’s investigative skills, and she latched on to it eagerly.

Between unsuccessful bouts at her writing desk, Prudence pondered the mystery and how to delve further into it. She was deep in contemplation two days later when Mrs. Bates arrived suddenly. Since Phoebe was out walking, Prudence was left to deal with the unexpected and not very welcome guest.

Her annoyance at the interruption was soon compounded, for it became apparent that Mrs. Bates, who considered herself one of the area’s leading social arbiters, had not received a visit from Penhurst. Nor was she pleased that the Lancaster sisters had been so favored, when she had not.

“My dear Prudence,” Mrs. Bates began, once they had settled themselves down with some tea and Cook’s seed biscuits. “I am afraid that I am here today not simply for a pleasant visit.”

“Oh?” Prudence was not surprised, for she would not describe any of Mrs. Bates’s visits as pleasant.

“Yes. I have heard some distressing news—so distressing that I can hardly countenance it.”

“Oh?” Prudence said again. Since Mrs. Bates seemed to be distressed quite often, Prudence could not summon up any concern for the matron. She listened with all appearance of attention, while her mind wandered back to her work.

“Yes,” Mrs. Bates replied with a frown. She settled her rather large bulk back in her chair, her voluminous hat nodding in time with her double chins. “It has come to my ears that you have entertained a single gentleman here at the cottage, unchaperoned!”

Prudence thought back over the past few days. She remembered that Clarence Fitzwater had been to the house, mending the fence for them, but good old Clarence, of plain farmer’s stock, would surely bristle at being labeled a gentleman. The vicar had been by earlier in the week, just at suppertime, forcing them to feed him, but the vicar was well-known for his habit of inviting himself for meals everywhere in the parish.

The only other visitor had been Phoebe’s young man. “Do you mean Penhurst?” Prudence asked, nonplussed.

“Of course I mean the Honorable James Penhurst, younger brother to the earl of Ravenscar!” Mrs. Bates said with a huff. “Surely you have not entertained any other single gentlemen of late?”

“Well—” Prudence began, but she was cut off by a noise of disapproval from the matron.

“Really, Prudence, I am quite shocked to hear you admit to it so readily!”

“Well, I—” Prudence tried again, but her next words were quickly trampled by the formidable Mrs. Bates.

“It is time someone took you two girls in hand, I must say. Living here all alone, with no supervision whatsoever, you are leaving yourselves open to scandal.”

Prudence listened with some small measure of surprise to this rebuke, since she and Phoebe had shared the cottage with their cook—Mary coming in for days only—since the death of their grandmother four years ago. But Mrs. Bates was obviously in a taking about something, and nothing would do but that she continue.

Prudence let the woman drone on while her mind drifted to a particularly difficult point in her book, where her heroine confronted the villain. It was the villain, Prudence decided, who was causing most of her problems. He was simply not distinctive enough…

“And, so, I have been moved finally to protest, my dear. You are not old enough to set up housekeeping without a chaperone!”

Prudence blinked behind her spectacles, drawn out of her reverie by Mrs. Bates’s forceful comment. Surely, the woman could not be serious! Prudence had long ago given up any dreams of marriage. If, indeed, she had ever entertained any, they would have been difficult to fulfill in such an isolated part of Cornwall, where eligible gentlemen were few.

Oh, had she been determined, she could surely have made a match with some shopkeeper or farmer or even one of the more successful fishermen, but since her earliest years she had borne responsibilities that claimed her attention above all else. Caring for her elderly grandmother and her younger sister and balancing their small budget had kept her too busy for frivolous pursuits. Then, burying grandmama and officially taking the reins of the household had occupied her, and by the time Phoebe was old enough to do for herself, Prudence had found herself a spinster.

“I am twenty-four years old, and firmly on the shelf,” she protested wryly.

Mrs. Bates answered with one of her frequent sounds of indignation. “Humph! You are still young enough to catch a man’s eye, and although you are a sensible girl, you are hardly of an age to chaperone a taking thing like Phoebe, or keep her within bounds.”

“Nonsense,” Prudence said. “Phoebe is of a vivacious nature, that is all. There is no harm in her.”

“The gel’s flighty, Prudence, and you know it. We all love her, but I have seen her kind before. She needs a husband, and quickly, before she gets herself into any mischief. She will not be satisfied to shut herself up here with her books and her scribblings, like you, Prudence, nor should she. The gel is a rare beauty, and could make a fine catch, if she were able. If only she could have a London season…”

Mrs. Bates sighed heavily, her chins jiggling in succession. “Have you no relatives in town who might be willing to sponsor her?”

“No,” Prudence answered simply. “We have only a male cousin in London. Nor are we situated comfortably enough to afford an extended visit.”

Some sort of sound, half groan and half snort of disgust, came rumbling out of Mrs. Bates’s throat. “Well, you must get the gel out more, perhaps to the dances over in Mullion, and you simply must get a chaperone! Have you no relations but a…male cousin?” Mrs. Bates uttered the words as if they were positively distasteful.

“No,” Prudence said, more forcefully.

“Well! Perhaps someone of my acquaintance could be induced to stay with you. Goodness, but there are always impoverished females who need a place to live. I shall ask the vicar.”

Prudence, who had listened but absently to most of the matron’s speech, drew the line at this alarming turn. “Oh, no, Mrs. Bates, I am afraid that you must not.”

The matron fixed her formidable dark gaze on Prudence and shook her pudgy finger in warning. “I tell you, you simply cannot go on here, with no one but two young girls and two female servants in the household. Such an arrangement might have been viewed with indulgence by the villagers, but society at large would look askance. What kind of impression do you think it gave your gentleman caller?”

Prudence considered young Penhurst’s behavior and could see nothing odd or untoward in it, with the exception of his intriguing uneasiness about the abbey. “I hardly think Mr. Penhurst even marked our situation, Mrs. Bates,” she answered bluntly. “He was the soul of propriety. He did not attack either one of us, nor did he treat us as if we were two lightskirts setting up shop along the cliffs.”

While Prudence watched calmly, Mrs. Bates turned red in the face and sought to catch her breath. When she finally did, she released it in various loud noises, indicating her affront. “Prudence Lancaster! I cannot like your plain speaking, nor have I ever. You may think it amusing, but I do not. There! I will leave you to your own devices, but mark my words, you had better keep an eye on your sister. The gel needs a firm hand. And you are most certainly not the one to guide her!”

With several outraged harrumphs, Mrs. Bates took her leave, but Prudence did not spare a thought to the woman’s displeasure. Only one part of Mrs. Bates’s speech had bothered her, and that was the stricture against so-called gentlemen visitors.

“Drat!” she muttered aloud. If she was not free to invite young Penhurst back to the cottage, how was she ever going to secure an invitation to Wolfinger?

When two more days passed without any sign of the abbey’s current resident, Prudence reached the end of her patience. Without renewed inspiration to guide her, it seemed that she did little but stare at a blank piece of paper. Finally, she glanced up at the fog-enshrouded abbey, threw down her pen and called for her sister.

She had already donned her cloak when Phoebe reached her. “What is it?”

“I am afraid I can no longer wait for Mr. Penhurst to call upon us,” Prudence replied. “Who knows bow long he will remain in Cornwall? He said he did not plan upon a lengthy stay, and I cannot let him go without seeing Wolfinger, a goal which I have held dear most of my life. No, I simply cannot trust to fate to bring us together again,” she added with grim determination, missing the look of alarm on her sister’s normally serene features.

“But, Prudence!” Phoebe protested. “Surely you cannot intend to march right up to his door! Mrs. Bates would have an apoplexy should she hear of it! And Mr. Penhurst… Why, I am sure that he would not like it above half. He hates that gloomy old place, and does not want people traipsing through it. Why, he himself is only staying there because he is forced to by…by…”

“By what?” Prudence halted suddenly, her fingers resting on the latch, and eyed her sister with curiosity.

“By…circumstances,” Phoebe said, before she turned and groped for her own wrap.

“What circumstances?”

“I am sure I do not know the whole, Mr. Penhurst having not taken me into his confidence,” Phoebe replied. She seemed inordinately interested in the way her garment was situated upon the sturdy peg by the rear entrance.

Watching her, Prudence felt a strange uneasiness. “And when did he tell you all of this?”

“When…we were visiting together, of course. Silly!” Phoebe whirled around, with a too-bright smile upon her face. “I cannot approve of your scheme, Prudence, but if you wish to go for a walk, I shall join you,” she added, putting on her cloak. “It looks like the weather might turn, and I would not have you caught out in it alone.”

Prudence felt a strange niggling, as if a thought were tapping at the corner of her mind, trying to gain her attention, but Phoebe was already leaving the cottage, and she had to hurry to catch up with her sister.

The air was damp and cool and the sky gray—not the best day for a climb along the cliffs, but the Lancasters were hardy girls and they followed the well-worn paths with ease. Phoebe chatted in her usual companionable way, but Prudence was intent upon one thing—reaching the abbey.

She had never put much stock in convention, so it mattered little to her if she strained the bounds of propriety a bit by showing up uninvited at a bachelor’s establishment. It was not as if young Penhurst were a desperate character intent upon ravishing them. He was an aristocrat, a neighbor, a well-mannered gentleman, and she did not plan on a lengthy stay. A peek—just a look at the famed building’s interior—was all she wanted.

If Phoebe noticed that they were gradually working their way toward the abbey, she did not mention it. However, it was not long before she tried to coax Prudence to return home. “Perhaps we had better go back, Prudence,” she said, frowning thoughtfully. “The weather has turned, as I knew it would, and I have no wish to be caught by a storm!”

Prudence looked up, rather surprised to see how the sky had darkened. When she was lost in thought, she often became oblivious of all else, and this was not the first time she had been startled by a sudden change in her circumstances.

The wind had picked up alarmingly, too, flapping their cloaks and whipping their hair about their faces. Although Prudence was well aware of the dangers of such sudden storms, they were already on the grounds of Wolfinger. She could see the rear of the tall structure towering above them, like a beacon calling to her, and she was loath to surrender her scheme after coming so far.

“Nonsense!” she answered. “Look, Phoebe, we are nearly to Mr. Penhurst’s. Perhaps he will be about. It would be a shame to leave without passing by.” With brisk motions, Prudence urged her sister on, determined to take the quickest route to her goal.

Without a thought to her grim surroundings, she opened the wrought-iron entrance to the ancient graveyard that lay in the shadow of the abbey and picked her way through the overgrown stones. She heard Phoebe following, murmuring a protest, and then the gate slammed shut with a loud clang that made her sister jump and squeak.

“Prudence—” she began in a high, anxious voice. “Mr. Penhurst will not be about. No one is out in this weather! I want to go home!”

“Nonsense,” Prudence repeated.

“Prudence! Oh, I don’t know why I let you drag me here,” Phoebe wailed. “I despise this horrid, ghastly place!”

Ignoring her sister’s words, most of which were lost upon the wildly gusting breeze anyway, Prudence climbed over the crumbling stone wall that marked the edge of the cemetery and stepped toward the long, curving drive that led to the imposing abbey. The wind was positively howling now, rattling shutters and setting the graveyard gate to banging like a clock striking the hour.

A breathless Phoebe reached Prudence’s side and pulled rather frantically on her arm. “Come, Prudence, let us go home before we are drowned or washed into the sea.” Following her sister’s gaze, Prudence found it was not the slippery cliffs that drew Phoebe’s look of horror, but Wolfinger itself, tall and black and menacing in the dim light. As she viewed the formidable edifice with admiration, Prudence noticed a figure hurrying toward the great stone steps that marched toward the arched entrance.

“Hello!” Prudence called, moving forward. “Hello, there!” The man halted and gazed in her direction, and to Prudence’s delight, she realized it was young Penhurst himself. With high hopes, she strode toward him eagerly, ignoring the dismay that was quite apparent on the boy’s face.

“Mr. Penhurst! How nice that we should run into you!” Prudence said, speaking louder than usual, so that she might be heard over the roaring of the wind. “We were just out for our walk, and I said to Phoebe, we simply must look in on Mr. Penhurst.”

If Mr. Penhurst saw anything unusual in the two girls’ strolling about on such a ferocious day, he was too well-bred to say so, but he did not appear pleased to see them. He looked anxiously over his shoulder, as if torn between inviting them in, which, apparently, he did not want to do, and leaving them to the mercy of the elements, which would hardly mark him as a gentleman.

Although his face brightened at the arrival of Phoebe, who had hurried to join them, he nonetheless appeared troubled as he glanced around. Seen against the backdrop of his ancestral home, and stricken by some sort of nervous energy, he seemed more of a Penhurst, but Prudence still found him sadly lacking. The gathering clouds muted the brilliance of his blond hair, yet he could hardly be called mysterious, and he was obviously uncomfortable in his surroundings.

While she listened absently to the young people’s chatter, Prudence brooded. When it became clear, from his peculiar manner, that young Penhurst was not going to invite them inside, she suspected that she would have to think of some way to politely force him to do so. She was just on the point of manufacturing a swollen ankle when the decision was taken away from them all.

Thunder had been growing in the distance, so at first no one took note of a low rumbling, and the sky had become so dark as to make seeing any great distance an impossibility. But suddenly a great flash of lightning lit the area as bright as day, illuminating a coach and four that appeared over the rise in the drive.

Prudence was immediately struck by the funereal aspect of the scene. It seemed apocalyptic: the black horses, their hooves pounding in their headlong race toward the abbey, and the shiny, midnight-colored carriage, with its driver wrapped so well against the weather as to be completely unrecognizable.

She sucked in a breath, trying to absorb the majesty of the vision as the animals rushed forward against a bleak, stormtossed sky, the wind whipping and howling around them like a banshee.

This was the stuff of her dreams, and Prudence was suddenly filled with a sort of wild exhilaration that she had never known before, her blood pumping fresh and fast within her veins. Never in her quiet, sensible existence, or even in the silent splendor of her own imagination, had Prudence known such a moment, and she felt giddy with the force of it.

She was aware of Mr. Penhurst pulling Phoebe back, closer to the steps, but she remained where she was, thrilled by the thunder and clatter of the magnificent vehicle’s approach. It rolled to a halt but a few feet from where the three of them stood watching, and with breathless excitement, Prudence recognized the Ravenscar coat of arms, gleaming in the shadowy light.

Then the door was thrown open, and a man stepped out. Tall and lean and swathed in a dark cloak, he looked like some phantom from hell, and Prudence saw Phoebe inch closer to her neighbor. The Honorable James Penhurst had paled considerably himself, and his interesting reaction made Prudence eye the new arrival more closely.

The wind whipped hair as black as night away from his rather gaunt face, and his mouth curled in a sardonic smile as he spoke in a deep—and oddly disturbing—voice. “Well, James, have you no welcome for your brother?”

Young Penhurst’s soft reply barely reached her ears above the roar of the oncoming storm, but she caught one word, a bitterly whispered “Ravenscar.”

With a start of surprise, Prudence stared openly at the mysterious earl she had so often conjured in her imaginings. He was tall, far taller than she had first thought, and dark. His raven hair was a little longer than fashion dictated, and if it had ever been combed into a dandy’s perfect coiffure, the effect was lost to the gusting air.

He had a high forehead, a hawklike nose, and strangely slanted brows that gave him a devilish look, heightened by the inch-long scar under one of his steel gray eyes. His very masculine mouth curled contemptuously as he eyed his brother, and Prudence heard Phoebe draw a sharp breath of dismay. In all fairness, Prudence acknowledged that to some, Ravenscar’s face might appear too harsh; to others, he might even look menacing.

To Prudence, he was the handsomest man she had ever seen.

The earl of Ravenscar not only was a fitting custodian for the abbey, he surpassed even her wildest dreams. He appeared to be the embodiment of the elemental forces around them, his features as mysterious and stony as Wolfinger itself.

The exhilaration that had been gripping Prudence since she had first noted the coach’s approach soared now to a new level. For the first time in her life, she felt as if her legs might fail her. Words did. Instead of seeking an invitation into the abbey, she simply stared, along with her sister and young Penhurst, at the man before them, while the coach rattled away.

“Have you nothing to say for yourself, James?” Ravenscar asked, in a chilling tone that sent a shiver up Prudence’s spine. When Penhurst did not answer, the earl laughed coldly. “Well, you will, I expect. I wish to speak to you inside. Now. Alone,” he added, his gaze flitting to the girls and dismissing them with obvious uninterest.

Instead of bristling at the rude slight, Prudence felt her awe of the man redouble. Oh, my! He was a worthy heir to the title, as arrogant and wicked as the cursed line’s reputation. She gazed at him in open admiration, while Phoebe shrunk back against his brother, just as if the earl might suddenly swoop down and swallow her whole.

Young Penhurst, finally moved to action, cleared his throat. “Ravenscar,” he said haltingly. “I would like you to meet two of our neighbors, the sisters Lancaster. Their cottage—”

“Good afternoon, ladies,” Ravenscar said, without even looking at them. “Now, if you will excuse us, I have business that I must attend to with my brother—in private.”

Whatever protests young Penhurst might have made at this peremptory order were drowned out by a huge clap of thunder that shook the air with deafening intensity. With a soft shriek, Phoebe abandoned Penhurst for her sister, grabbing at Prudence’s cloak and pulling her toward home.

“But could we not—” Prudence began, finally jolted from her dazed admiration of the earl.

“Sebastian, I hardly think—” Penhurst started to argue at the same moment.

Ignoring their feeble entreaties, Ravenscar strode up the stone stairs that fronted the abbey and called for his brother. With one last look of apology, mixed in with a healthy dose of anxiety, young Penhurst turned to follow his brother, leaving the two sisters to stand in the driveway, their wraps whipping frantically about them while the first heavy drops of rain finally appeared.

Knowing when to quit the game, Prudence did not linger, but glanced up at the opening skies and shouted to her sister. “Run!” she yelled and, grasping hands, they rushed for the path in a headlong race against the oncoming deluge.

Unfortunately, they did not win, and by the time they reached the cottage, they were soaked to the skin and shivering, their clothes spattered with mud and their spirits dampened.

“What a horrid man!” Phoebe moaned for the millionth time as she wrung out her stockings and hung them up to dry in front of the fire. “Rude, ghastly creature! I can well understand why Mr. Penhurst does not wish to see him. Why, he looked as evil as…” Obviously, having seen nothing as scary as Ravenscar in all her sheltered sixteen years, Phoebe was at a loss for words. Finally, she gave up and conceded that even the abbey itself was not half so frightful as its owner.

Prudence listened absently to Phoebe’s complaints as she finished with her own toilet. She had hung out her wet clothes and changed into a warm gown, but she refused the hot soup that Cook was pushing upon them. She was too eager to get back to her desk and begin writing.

For, despite the failure of her scheme to enter Wolfinger, Prudence had been rewarded with new inspiration—Ravenscar himself. To her, he was not frightening or gruesome, but thrilling and alluring beyond anything she had ever known. After meeting him, she knew just how her villain would look and act, and she could not wait to put him to paper.

Her pulse leaping with excitement, Prudence sat down to pattern him after the Devil Earl’s descendant.

Chapter Three

“Well, you have cut quite a swath, have you not?” Sebastian asked, in that cool, detached tone of his, and James cringed.

The earl had barely taken the time to remove his greatcoat and nod to the housekeeper before dragging James after him into the library with that imperious gaze of his. As long as James could remember, his brother had dictated to him in that cold manner, and, lately, he felt he had stomached quite enough of it.

“Please interrupt me, if I fail to include all your exploits in my recitation,” Sebastian said, in a sarcastic tone that set James’s blood to boiling. “Let’s see…You were turned out of Oxford Then, instead of coming home to Yorkshire to inform me of this turn of events, you went to London and fell in with companions I can only describe as creatures of the lowest sort. You spent several weeks wenching and drinking and gaming in the worst of hells, losing all your money, totting up bills of every imaginable variety, and finally handing your vowels to the basest of moneylenders, thereby compounding your problems tenfold.”

Sebastian paused long enough to pin him with a piercing gray stare, and James had to resist the urge to squirm. “Am I giving a fair account?”

“Yes, sir,” James muttered through gritted teeth. Why did his brother always seem so deadly and yet so controlled? It was wholly unfair. He had gone to London with the hopes of acquiring a dash and sophistication that would put him on a footing with Sebastian. Instead…

“And then, rather than notify me of these new doings, since I might well be expected to foot the bills for your wild extravagances and your gambling losses, you turn tail and run to hide out here in Cornwall—” Sebastian’s hard gaze bored into him, while James swallowed thickly, for he had never meant to “—like a coward.”

The accusation made James’s temper snap. “I am not a coward!” he shouted. “I came here to think, to decide what to do! I only expected to stay a day or two before…” he finished lamely.

“Before what, James? I am curious to see just how you planned to extricate yourself from this mess,” Sebastian said, and James realized that his arrogant brother was not so composed as he seemed. A muscle in the earl’s cheek jumped, giving away his anger.

Swamped with remorse at the enormity of mistakes so grave as to make Sebastian’s legendary control slip, James hung his head. “I…I thought I might…join the army—”

“Without a commission?”

James glanced away. “Or the navy.”

“Without a sponsor?”

James cleared his throat. “I thought it would be best to start over, try and make my own way…”

“In His Majesty’s forces?” Sebastian’s infamous slanted brows rose swiftly. “Do you really think you are up to it, whelp?” he asked with barely suppressed fury. “And just how did you intend to settle the bills from your old life on a soldier’s pay?” The question hung in the air, unanswerable, until Sebastian spoke again.

“Although you have never evidenced the slightest interest in such matters, I might as well inform you right now that I am not so wealthy that I can pay your debts without taking a loss. The army, good God!” Sebastian’s contempt was palpable. “And I suppose I have the little blond creature to thank for your reprieve?”

James leapt to his feet. “Now, just wait a minute, Sebastian-”

“Have you got a bastard between her legs, that I must pay her off, too, or—”

Such slander against his sweet, innocent Phoebe was the straw that finally broke his back, and James felt a lifetime of small resentments toward his titled brother gather and coalesce, until he was filled with an indignant rage that he had never known before. His inbred caution, so recently eroded by London, and his innate respect for his sibling, flew to the winds as James threw himself at his elder.

Although Sebastian, not James, had been the recipient of many a boxing lesson at Gentleman Jackson’s rooms, the attack caught the more experienced man off guard, and James managed to bloody his brother’s lip. They were sprawled across the desk, both of them a little stunned by the encounter, when the housekeeper entered, gasping loudly at the sight of the two of them brawling like schoolboys.

“Sirs! My lord, pardon me!” she babbled, rattling a tray as if she were in danger of dropping it. James did not doubt that Sebastian could placate Mrs. Worth, but he did not wait around to see it. Sliding to his feet, he rushed past the startled woman, into the hallway and through the front door, into a raging storm that seemed as naught compared to his own turbulent emotions.

Prudence was so engrossed in her work that she did not hear either the approach of a carriage or the arrival of a visitor. Only the urgency in Phoebe’s voice forced her attention away from her writing and into the present.

“Prudence! Prudence, do hurry. Mrs. Bates is here, and she looks nigh to bursting.” With a sigh of annoyance, Prudence turned toward her sister and knew an urge to hide. Her book was coming along so well now that she was loath to interrupt it for the dubious honor of Mrs. Bates’s company. Perhaps it was not too late to pretend that she was out or resting?

Prudence looked hopefully at Phoebe, but her sister knew her too well; apparently Phoebe was already guessing at her thoughts and would have none of them. Folding her arms across her bosom in an implacable pose, Phoebe shook her head, sending her golden curls bobbing about her face.

“No doubt Mrs. Bates has already heard of your bold foray to the abbey yesterday and is planning to give you a scold. And I refuse to take responsibility for what was all your doing, Prudence!”

With another sigh of regret for the novel that she must abandon, however briefly, Prudence put her pen aside and stood. Phoebe was right, of course. It would be unfair to expect her sister to suffer the brunt of Mrs. Bates’s displeasure. Although Prudence did not spare a moment’s worry over the upcoming reprimand, nonetheless, she hoped that the visit would be quickly concluded.

“And just look at you, with ink all over your face!” Phoebe chided, dabbing at Prudence with a handkerchief. “You have been chewing on your pen again,” she said accusingly. “And you know how Mrs. Bates feels about your writing. You really should wash your hands, too.”

“Nonsense,” Prudence said briskly. “If Mrs. Bates wishes to see me, she will see me as I am, ink and all.” Patting the small cap that covered her hair, she headed toward the hall, barely registering Phoebe’s sigh behind her.

Mrs. Bates did seem extremely agitated, Prudence noticed at once. The matron was red-faced, and her bosom heaved as she gasped for breath. Although the day was not particularly warm, she fanned herself rapidly, making Prudence wonder how anyone could work herself up over something so trifling as a small social indiscretion.

“My dear girls! Oh, my dear girls!” Mrs. Bates said, in a high voice that revealed the degree of her disturbance. Prudence eyed the matron with new interest, for she could not believe that her simple walk to the abbey could have caused such a stir.

“I fear that I have bad news. Ill tidings. Oh, that this should occur here, right in our own small, comfortable corner of the world! It is too dreadful, my dears. My dear girls…”

Instantly, Prudence recognized that real distress was mixed in with the titillation evident in Mrs. Bates’s voice. Obviously, some misfortune had occurred, but the depth of the tragedy had not dampened the woman’s enthusiasm for gossip.

“What is it?” Phoebe asked, leaning forward anxiously in her seat.

“Oh, poor, dear Phoebe, that I must be the one to tell you…” Mrs. Bates lifted a handkerchief to the corner of her eye in a theatrical gesture.

Prudence’s patience had run its course. “Mrs. Bates, your manner is upsetting Phoebe. Perhaps you had better tell us your news right now.”

The older woman shot Prudence a quelling glance, which had no effect upon her. Apparently realizing that she could not drag out the dramatic moment any longer, Mrs. Bates heaved a great sigh. “Well,” she said. “It is young Penhurst.”

Phoebe gasped and clutched at her throat. “What?”

Gazing worriedly at her sister, Prudence prodded their guest to explain further. “Well?”

Mrs. Bates, in no hurry to give up her news, dabbed at her eyes again, prolonging the silence until Prudence felt a bizarre urge to strike the woman. Something of her thoughts must have shown upon her face, for Mrs. Bates suddenly scowled at her and spoke.

“He is gone,” she said.

“Gone?”

“Last night. I had it from my maid, who got it from the cook, who is a cousin to Mrs. Worth, the housekeeper up there,” Mrs. Bates said. She glanced out the window at Wolfinger and shuddered before leaning forward in conspiratorial pose.

“She saw the whole thing, mind you. The earl came sweeping in like a fiend upon the wings of the storm. He had but entered the ghastly old place when the two of them started fighting, battling like demons! Then Ravenscar chased his brother outside.” Mrs. Bates paused significantly, her mouth set tightly in disapproval, her eyes wide. “And only he came back.”

The words held a grim finality that made Phoebe gasp in horror. Hearing the distress in her voice, Prudence rose and went to Phoebe’s side, taking the younger girl’s hand. “What are you saying?” Prudence asked Mrs. Bates sternly. “That young Penhurst was lost in the storm? That he ran off?”

“I am saying,” Mrs. Bates replied, in a clear voice intended to put Prudence in her place, “that the Ravenscar blood runs true. Just as the old Devil Earl was murdered by his own wife, so the evil doings continue up at that monstrous place.”

The matron eyed Prudence smugly, as if determined to overset the older girl as she had young Phoebe. “I am saying,” she continued, “that the earl of Ravenscar killed his brother on the cliffs last night and tossed the body into the sea.”

Phoebe fell back against the chair in a faint, and Prudence frantically snatched their guest’s fan in an effort to bring her back to awareness.

“There now, ma’am, I hope you are well pleased with the results of your gossip,” Prudence said as she tried to rouse her sister.

“Well!” Mrs. Bates huffed and puffed as if she were a swelling toad. “I cannot help it if the gel is not strong enough to withstand ill news, and I cannot like your rude speech, either. One can easily tell that you have not had the benefit of a guiding hand, Miss Prudence Lancaster!”

Ignoring her, Prudence laid her palm against Phoebe’s cold cheek. “Phoebe! Wake up, darling!” She was rewarded by the flicker of her sister’s long yellow lashes.

“Oh! Prudence, say it isn’t so! Mr. Penhurst…”

“No doubt it is not so,” Prudence assured her sister. “I suspect that Mr. Penhurst has simply gone to cool off for a while, and shall soon return.”

“Humph!” Mrs. Bates made a noise that resembled nothing so much as a porcine snort. “And what do you know of it, Prudence, I might ask?”

Prudence was surprised to find herself more than mildly annoyed with the matron. Not given to fits of temper, she quelled her irritation and gazed at the woman calmly. “I am sure that the earl of Ravenscar is not quite so dull-witted as to murder his brother in front of the housekeeper and then hurry out into a raging storm to scramble along the slippery cliffs in an effort to toss him off.”

Mrs. Bates frowned and sniffed. “Wits have nothing to do with it, miss. It is the bad blood of the Ravenscars, running true.” She sent a swift, sour glance toward Phoebe. “For your information, young Penhurst had but recently been sent down from Oxford and was deeply in debt, which, no doubt, precipitated the argument.”

Phoebe moaned softly, but Prudence ignored it, turning instead to face their guest in a pensive pose. “But killing the boy would not solve anything. It makes no sense,” she argued. Pausing momentarily in consideration, she added firmly, “I simply do not believe it.”

“It is not supposed to make sense, gel! It is—” Mrs. Bates hesitated before rushing on. “Passion—plain and simple!”

Prudence blinked at the bold speech, Phoebe made a strangled sound, and even Mrs. Bates looked as if she thought she might have said too much. With a gravelly noise, she lifted her bulk from the chair.

“Well, I have lingered long enough. I must be about,” she said. Waving away Prudence’s gesture of help, she headed toward the door that Mary hastened to open for her. She stopped on the threshold, however, to catch her breath and to have the final say in the matter.

“Mark my words, Ravenscar will not get away with it,” she said, brandishing a lacy handkerchief. “The days of the Devil Earl are past. When the boy’s body washes up, as it must eventually, he’ll pay for his crimes. And it will be a payment long overdue.”

With that Gothic pronouncement, the matron took her leave in a swish of dark skirts, leaving Prudence to stare after her, still clutching the borrowed fan. “Well,” she said, half to herself, “Mrs. Bates must be in a hurry to spread the story throughout the parish. It is not every day that she has such a juicy bit of gossip.”

A soft sound from Phoebe made Prudence pat her sister’s hand in a comforting gesture. “There, there,” she whispered, although she was inclined to believe that her tenderhearted sister was reacting to the news with an excessive display of distress.

It seemed to Prudence as if the day were destined to be a disaster. First, she had been forced to listen to Mrs. Bates, and then she had spent precious hours caring for Phoebe, who was taking Mr. Penhurst’s disappearance more grievously than Prudence thought warranted. And now, when she was finally fully immersed in her work, Mary was harrying her again.

With a sigh, Prudence laid down her pen and turned away from her writing desk, where her new villain was wreaking havoc among her pages of foolscap. “Yes, what is it, Mary?” she asked.

The young maid’s eyes were as wide as saucers, reminding Prudence instantly of one of her put-upon heroines. In fact, Mary looked as if she had seen a specter herself and could hardly bear to describe it, for her mouth trembled and she stumbled over her words.

“That…that…Oh, miss, he is here. At the door…in the parlor…wanting to see Miss Phoebe,” Mary said, wringing her sturdy hands in front of her and peering over her shoulder, for all the world as if the devil himself were behind her.

“Well, whoever it is, simply tell him that Miss Phoebe is unwell. I put her to bed, and I do not think she should be disturbed,” Prudence answered. She would have turned back to her work, were it not for the alarm evidenced on the maid’s plain features.

“Oh, but, miss, he will not take no for answer, and I… Come, miss, you talk to him, for I cannot bear to!” she wailed.

Mary had all her attention now. “Who the dickens is it?” Prudence asked, intrigued.

“It is…it is him, miss,” Mary said in a hushed tone. Looking about her furtively, she leaned close to whisper, “The one what murdered his brother.”

For a moment, Prudence could only stare in astonishment. Then she spoke the revered name in a rush. “Ravenscar! Are you telling me that the earl is here…in our parlor?” Prudence asked, with no little amazement. At Mary’s nod, she nearly clapped her hands in delight. “Oh, but this is wonderful!” she said, rising from her chair.

“If you say so, miss,” Mary replied skeptically. And with that she disappeared hastily into the kitchen, while Prudence stood, straightened her gown as best she could, and hurried off to meet the man of her dreams.

He was standing with his back to her, staring out the window, and Prudence took advantage of the opportunity to study him. She noted again how tall he was, well above six feet, and lean, but broad-shouldered. No need for padding in his coats or his hose, she decided, as her gaze traveled down well-muscled thighs encased in doeskin to the tops of his shining Hessians. He wore a coat as simple and black as the straight hair that trailed along his collar. No dandy, this one, she mused with approval.

Just as her gaze moved up his body, Ravenscar turned his head to pin her with a cold gray stare so intense that Prudence nearly took a step back. Her blood, already stirred by the mere sight of him, roused further to flow through her with alarming speed. Here was a man to reckon with, she thought giddily. Here was a man.

“Where is she?” he asked suddenly. And Prudence, for the first time in her life, felt strangely stupid.

“Who?” she whispered.

His scowl was positively ferocious, and she could see a small muscle working in his jaw. Unleashed fury, she realized, was held in check within that composed exterior, though why he should be angry at her, Prudence had no idea.

“Your…sister,” Ravenscar said, investing the word with both derision and skepticism.

“Phoebe?” Prudence asked. Her brain was still working sluggishly, though the rest of her insides seemed to be moving at a remarkable pace.

“That is the name the maid gave me,” Ravenscar said, his face a dark mask of disdain.

Prudence quelled a tiny shiver of excitement at his unyielding manner. She wondered where he had gotten the scar under his eye. A duel, perhaps? He overwhelmed the room with a personal presence far stronger than anything she had ever seen before, and for an instant, she felt as though she were one of her own heroines, struggling against the compelling force of a mysterious villain.

Rather reluctantly, Prudence gave herself a shake and returned to reality. She was, after all, not Millicent, and the man before her, whatever his reputation, was no fiend, but an earl, and she had yet to greet him properly.

“Please, sit down, my lord,” she said evenly. “I had sent Phoebe off to rest, but if you wish to see her, then I shall, of course, summon her at once.”

To her disappointment, he nodded curtly, his lips moving into a cold, contemptuous smile that in no way reached those startling eyes of his. They, more than anything else, proclaimed him a dangerous man, hinting at untold depths and experiences that Prudence could not pretend to comprehend.

More than the starkly handsome cast of his features or the lean appeal of his tall form, they drew her to him, and Prudence ignored his blatantly threatening stance to stare at him once more. He looked, she decided, as if he had stepped right out of her pages and into the parlor.

What the dickens did he want with Phoebe?

Chapter Four

Why was she staring at him like a simpleton? Sebastian glared at her more fiercely. He was accustomed to a certain sort of response from people, and this was not it. Finally, as if she could hardly bear to tear herself away from his presence, she turned to call for the maid, and Sebastian felt a measure of relief.

At last! By all means, summon the girl from her “rest” for me, he thought with a malicious smile. Now he was finally getting somewhere, and the strange female was starting to make sense.

Looking around him, Sebastian had to admit that the small, tidy and slightly worn cottage did not look like any fancy house he had ever seen, but perhaps business was poor along this isolated coastline and appearances of propriety were maintained. His gaze traveled to the straight back of the slender, bespectacled creature who appeared to run the place, and he decided he had never seen a less likely looking abbess in his life.

Surely she did no personal business with the customers! He could hardly imagine any young bucks, or even a desperate old member of the local gentry, slavering over that one. And yet she was somehow attractive, in a rather sterile way. Perhaps that was her appeal, Sebastian decided. A man could peel her like an orange, layer by layer of stuffy clothing disappearing to reveal the choice center of the fruit.

Surprised by the tenor of his own thoughts, Sebastian turned away to look out the window again, where Wolfinger rose from a curling mist, a dark wonder in cool stone. He had forgotten the sheer beauty of the place. But he had been a young man when he last saw it, and then only briefly. Raised at his family’s modest estate in Yorkshire, he had done little enough traveling until his uncle, the previous earl, took an interest in him. And, certainly, Otho had no love for the abbey, preferring the hells and bawdy houses of London to these lonely, windswept shores.

Sebastian’s jaw tightened as his thoughts were brought forcibly back to the matter at hand. Apparently, despite all his best efforts, the Ravenscar blood was running true. James had inhented the family’s penchant for wine, women and cards. And debts.

“Here she is, my lord, my sister, Phoebe. Phoebe, you remember Lord Ravenscar, of course.”

Of course, Sebastian thought, pivoting on his heels to fasten his gaze on the girl. In the light she looked even younger, a frothy bit of fluff of the sort that could be had a hundred times over in town. She had a good figure, he would give her that, but she was too tiny and blond and bland-looking for his taste. He could see, however, how she had captured young James’s attention. No doubt she gazed at him in adoration with those bright blue eyes and nodded eagerly, bouncing her pretty little curls like a mindless doll at whatever he might say.

“Where is he?” Sebastian asked, without preamble.

The girl cringed, obviously frightened, and stepped back against the older one. Miss Prudence, the maid called her, which Sebastian thought as absurd a name for a Cyprian as he had ever heard.

“Who?” the so-called Prudence asked, eyeing him with a level gaze that he was forced to admire. Obviously, she was the sharp one. Very sharp. He wondered how long it would be before she would mention money…

Sebastian stalked across the room toward them, stopping just short of the small one. He towered over her, and she shrank back against her elder. “My brother,” he said, in a softly threatening tone that had the girl fairly trembling.

“Your brother?” Far from being intimidated, Prudence stepped toward him, so quickly that the girl leaning against her nearly fell upon the floor. Catching herself, the child took the opportunity to hide behind the elder’s skirts like an infant, disgusting him further. How the devil could James find such a creature pleasing?

The tall one, on the other hand…Sebastian paused to peruse her. She had enough of the look of the other to pass for a sister, but her beauty was of a far different, starker nature. What he could see of her hair was darker, with streaks of gold that disappeared under a silly, spinsterish cap. Her eyes, hidden by the ridiculous glasses, were not an insipid blue, but a lovely hazel that gleamed like her hair. Looking closer, he thought he saw just the barest hint of green…

“Why should Phoebe know anything of your brother?” she asked him, interest blazing behind those ridiculous spectacles. Sebastian had the distinct impression that her eyes would window her soul, if only he could remove what shielded them. He fought a nagging desire to do so.

The rest of her face, Sebastian decided, was as fine and distinctive as a rare wine. She had high cheekbones and clear skin and a wide mouth that was infinitely more intriguing than the dainty Cupid’s bow her sister sported, and he found his interest lingering on it. He forced himself to look away.

“Why, indeed?” he asked her. Her eyes appeared unafraid, and so guileless that for a moment Sebastian thought he must surely be mistaken about her. His lips tightened into a grim line. “Perhaps because James had made use of her…services…recently.”

“Services?” She gazed up at him with such puzzlement that he almost believed her to be innocent.

“Must I make it more plain, Miss…Prudence?” Sebastian asked, circling around her like a cat stalking its prey. In the corner of his vision, he saw Miss Phoebe sink into a chair with a strangled moan, but Prudence only turned, gracefully, to meet his stare.

She was fearless, Sebastian confirmed, for he had spent years cultivating his own special brand of intimidation. It had served him in the fight for his title and position, as well as in the less-than-savory places in which he had often found himself. In all his long memory, he could never recall meeting a woman who could withstand the full force of his enmity for long. Yet this one, instead of cowering or fleeing or making a gallant retreat, was returning his gaze calmly, her back straight, her eyes openly curious.

He would have thought her wholly unaffected, but for the rapid rise and fall of her small but shapely bosom, which gave the lie to her seeming composure. The girl felt something, Sebastian thought with an odd sort of triumph. He gave her a sly smile, but she only appeared more confused.

“Perhaps you should speak more plainly, for I fear I am failing to follow you,” she said finally.

Sebastian whirled away, so that he could watch them both react. “Very well. I am speaking of James paying for the privilege of climbing under your…sister’s skirts.”

The stunned looks on both their faces took him aback. Surely, these two must be the most accomplished of actresses, wasting their talents away here in Cornwall, or. Sebastian narrowed his eyes, unwilling to consider the alternatives. Just as he began to feel an eerie sense of dismay that he had not known since his youth, he heard laughter, clear and golden as a sultry summer afternoon

He knew who it was immediately, of course. James’s dainty damsel would not be capable of such a robust sound; she would undoubtedly giggle annoyingly, if amused. Prudence, on the other hand…Prudence was laughing gaily, while Phoebe, her face red, was clutching her throat as if she might expire momentarily upon the worn cushion of her seat.

“Oh, my!” Prudence said. Obviously she thought his erroneous assumption sincerely funny, for she put a slender hand to her mouth and gulped for air in an unladylike fashion that struck a chord deep within him. Suddenly Sebastian felt as if he had been run down by a coach and four. His breath caught, his vitals tightened and his head spun; the reaction was so unlike his usual bored detachment that it left him incredulous.

And she was the c .use of it.

A lock of shiny hair escaped her silly cap, and her spectacles slipped down her straight nose, making Sebastian battle an urge to remove them entirely. He watched her long, slim fingers in fascination as they moved the glasses back into place. Were those ink stains on her hand? How could he ever have thought her a doxy?

“Oh, my! I am sorry, but I guess we cannot blame you. Mrs. Bates warned us that we must not live alone, just us two, but I am so very old, you see, that I thought it would be quite all right,” she said.

For a moment, Sebastian simply stared at her, taking in her absurd explanation as he let his gaze travel from her flawless features down over her straight shoulders, shapely breasts and narrow waist to her gently flaring hips. Being so tall, she would have long legs that went on forever, that could wrap around a man—Abruptly Sebastian returned his attention to her face. “You, Miss Prudence, are definitely not old,” he replied, his voice strained.

Her laughter died, and Sebastian saw her return his regard with a wary but definite interest, so unexpected that it stunned him. With surprising intensity, his body responded, and he turned toward the window to hide the effects. He rested his hands upon the sill and looked out at Wolfinger rising in the distance.

“I apologize for my obviously incorrect assumptions,” he said. “I can only offer the excuse that my brother’s behavior has addled my wits.”

“We were so sorry to learn of his disappearance, my lord,” Prudence said. “But you know young men often behave precipitately. I am sure he will reappear soon enough.” Sebastian heard her voice, gentle and reasonable, and wanted to lean into it. What was the matter with him? With her? Surely she could know nothing of him, or she would not speak to him in such a fashion.

“I am certain that, as usual, he does not realize the repercussions of his actions,” Sebastian said tightly. He turned to face her again, his odd passion for her under control now. “I know James does not care for Wolfinger, so when I saw your…charming sister, I suspected that she might be responsible for his lingering stay. He seemed quite taken with her, and I thought he might have confided in her.”

Actually, Sebastian originally had feared an elopement, but he was not about to mention that, when the situation was so glaringly not what he had anticipated.

Prudence nodded in agreement, her expression serious and sympathetic, and he felt a ridiculous urge to unburden himself to this strange woman. He was fighting it when Phoebe, reclining ignored upon her chair, let out a soft wail and burst into tears.

He could see that Prudence was as startled as he by the noise. She paused briefly, as if surprised to find anyone in the room but Sebastian and herself, then went to kneel by the younger girl. “What is it, Phoebe?” she asked, taking her sister’s hands, and Sebastian was stricken by a bizarre jealousy. He wished she was touching him with those gentle fingers, looking at him with eyes full of understanding and succor. Good Lord, he was losing his mind!

“He did confide in me! He was w-w-wonderful!” Phoebe whimpered.

“Who?” Prudence asked.

“Mr. Penhurst! He w-walked with me.”

“What?” At Prudence’s tone, Sebastian realized that her alarm was genuine. Apparently she was not so sharp as to see the attraction between the two young people that had been so conspicuous to him. He watched her consideringly, sensing that there were complexities to Miss Prudence Lancaster that begged for further study.

His interest in her was definitely out of the ordinary. Usually he limited his dealings with women to a certain sort, who were very easily read. He liked having the terms well understood before engaging in any liaison, the payments and expectations agreed upon beforehand. Although his title gave him access to the rich and pampered ladies of the ton, most of them barely tolerated his presence, and those few who were interested struck him as far more calculating than any of the demimonde.

But Prudence would hardly qualify as either. She was, it seemed, a woman of decent birth, good manners and high morals—the kind who would be comfortable with the local gentry or at the vicarage. He had forgotten that such simple, kind-hearted people existed, for it had been a long time since he had associated with his parson or the squire’s vast brood—a very long time.

“Oh, do not scold me, Prudence!” Phoebe cried. “I could not bear it! We simply walked along the beach. It was I-lovely, and we talked, and Mr. Penhurst was every bit a gentleman. He never said anything about going away.”

Sebastian saw Prudence’s frown and knew a new surge of irritation with his brother. Had the whelp no thought for those who would be affected by his disappearance? He wanted to thrash James for causing her distress, then nearly laughed aloud at the bizarre impulse. A little late for him to play the hero, was it not? His role had been cast long ago, and the part did not appeal to women like this bespectacled, ink-stained creature.

“I think there is a lot you do not know about Mr. Penhurst,” Prudence said to her sister in that same gentle voice. “And nothing to excuse you from walking out alone with a gentlemen—” she shot Sebastian a quick, pained glance “—without telling anyone.”

Phoebe pouted prettily. “There was no harm done, and no one else to walk with me, with Mary and Cook being too busy, and you always at your desk writing and not wanting to be disturbed,” she whined piteously.

With a scowl, Sebastian recognized James’s well-worn tactic of trying to turn the blame back upon one’s elder. Prudence, apparently oblivious of this manipulation, was hugging the little schemer and murmuring softly in comfort.

Taking matters into his own hands, Sebastian stepped closer and snagged dainty Phoebe with his stare. “And what exactly did James say? Did he mention his plans for the future, or anywhere he might want to go? Was he to meet you somewhere, perhaps?”

The blue-eyed creature cringed and whimpered and buried her head against the curve of her sister’s breasts. For a moment, Sebastian let his gaze linger there, wondering what the mild-mannered Miss Prudence would be like without her glasses and all those clothes. Then, with a frown of annoyance at his absurd thoughts, he turned his attention back to her sister.

“Are you sure, Miss Phoebe?” he asked, using his most malevolent tone. “Just in case he talked you into eloping, I must advise you right now that my brother is penniless. He is, in fact, deeply in debt, and can no more support a wife than any other wayward schoolboy.”

The little blonde let out a wail that belied her small size, and set up sobbing afresh. Although Prudence’s arms automatically tightened around her sister, she glanced up at Sebastian, hesitating, as if torn between the two of them.

Since he knew of no earthly reason why this strange woman should show him any loyalty, Sebastian was more than a bit surprised by her behavior, and yet he felt a surge of unfamiliar emotion in reaction. What would it take to earn Prudence Lancaster’s trust—and devotion?

Something he did not possess, Sebastian told himself, and his thoughts were confirmed when Phoebe clung to her, easily reclaiming her regard. “Prudence! Oh, make him stop talking to me so! He frightens me! He is responsible for all of these dreadful happenings!”

Sebastian stiffened immediately. Although he had heard such allegations as the girl’s often enough before, and had sometimes even found a kind of perverse enjoyment in his own wicked reputation, he realized that he did not like listening to them here in this quiet parlor—in her sister’s presence.

“Now, Phoebe, stop that at once,” Prudence muttered, a bit awkwardly, but it was too late. Already Sebastian felt his brief animation fading away, and his usual ennui taking its place.

“It is true!” Phoebe argued. “Mr. Penhurst would never, ever leave without telling me. It is as Mrs. Bates said. I know it is! That—that fiend there,” she said, pointing at Sebastian, “murdered his own brother!”

Sebastian smiled coldly, the ranting of a dim-witted little blonde sliding effortlessly off his thick skin. However, he could not so coolly dismiss her sister, and he realized suddenly, painfully, that he did not want to see the change come over her face, to see the open, serious features look upon him with fear and loathing, the straight shoulders shrink back in horror and disgust.

He did not want to see Prudence Lancaster’s disapprobation.

Before he could witness it, Sebastian spun on his heel and stalked from the room, saving them the effort of asking him to leave. He knew there was no use in trying to deny the charges against him; he had wasted many long years in such vain efforts. Finally, he had come to understand that there was no recourse for him. People assumed the worst, and Prudence Lancaster would, too.

He nearly laughed aloud at his brief flirtation with humanity. He must be growing feeble, to attach some sort of importance to the reaction of a woman who wore spectacles and sported ink stains on her hands.

Not waiting for the frightened maid to do it for him, Sebastian opened the door himself and strode outside. He welcomed the cool mist that met him, dampening his absurd ardor and chilling his deadened spirit. His steps were sure, despite the fog, and he did not falter even when he imagined her calling after him.

That was something Sebastian would not do, for he had learned long ago never to look back.

Prudence nibbled the end of her pen, frustrated, yet again, with her writing. She had finished her second novel, Bastian of Bloodmoor, in record time, and, according to her publisher, it had met with even greater success than her first effort. But now, her energies were flagging. She suspected that she needed renewed inspiration.

With a sigh, Prudence turned toward the window—and Wolfinger. The dark edifice seemed doubly lonely after its short occupation, and she felt it calling to her anew, as if she held the key to its future. Prudence shook her head, rather sadly, for even in her wildest dreams she could not pretend that was true. If she could not manage to gain entry to the abbey, how could she fill it with life and people?

Five months after his disappearance, James Penhurst was still missing, and his brother, the earl, had long since departed Cornwall. Prudence had learned, afterward, that he had left the very day he visited the cottage, his black coach and four sweeping from the abbey on the wings of another storm, leaving age-old superstitions and gossip in its wake.

They called him a murderer, anyone who dared, and yet, since his brother’s body had never been found, nothing was done—or said—officially. Still, everyone else talked, and Prudence had heard awful rumors that painted Ravenscar as black as his ancestors. As a gothic authoress, Prudence found the tales rather thrilling. As someone who had met the earl, however, she could hardly countenance them.

How often had she been tempted to write to the man! And how often, just as quickly, had she dismissed the notion. Although Prudence longed to give the earl the support she sensed he needed desperately, she could not gather her courage to do so.

What would she say? Offering comfort to one such as Ravenscar would be no easy task, Prudence knew. And how would it reach him? One simply did not send an unsolicited letter to an earl, she mused with a frown, especially one as arrogant as Ravenscar. No doubt he would toss her message away, amused by her provincialism, Prudence decided, and she forced herself to put the matter aside.

“Prudence!” A loud shriek made her spit out her pen. Good heavens, was that Phoebe? Prudence rose from her chair in surprise. Poor Phoebe had fallen into a fit of the dismals after Mr. Penhurst’s disappearance, and had yet to fully recover, so Prudence was pleased to hear her sounding so cheerful. When she turned to see a pink-cheeked Phoebe, bubbling with excitement, she smiled with relief.

“Pru! Just look at the size of this bank draft!” Ignoring the obvious—that her sister had opened her post—Prudence glanced down at the amount, and was stunned by what she saw. Apparently her last book had been more than well received, if her success could be measured by the amazing sum staring up at her.

They were flush! The knowledge was dizzying.

When Prudence had begun to write, they had not been starving. Indeed, they could always have lived, if meagerly, on the small stipend left from their grandmother, but they had been forever scrimping, and had had little left over for trifles. Then she had sold her first work, The Mysterious Alphonse. It had done far better than she expected, allowing them to fix up the cottage and still put something by.

They had settled in, quite comfortably, but now…Now they had more than enough to see to their needs. Prudence gaped, dumbfounded, at the figure, while Phoebe whirled round and round, finally coming to rest before her sister with glowing features.

“You are plump in the pocket, Prudence! What are you going to do with all of it?” Phoebe asked, waving the paper happily. Before Prudence could answer, her sister showed her white teeth and bit her lower lip. “Better yet, tell me, what is your heart’s desire, for you may now have anything?”

Smiling absently at her sister’s play, Prudence let her gaze drift from the handsome draft toward the window. Her fondest wish? In a sudden, weak moment, she envisioned herself not as the head of the family, but as the young, funloving girl Phoebe was—and she had never been.

In the distance, the black walls of Wolfinger rose out of the mist like a living thing, pulsing with its distinctive power, calling to her like some siren’s song, and Prudence felt herself drift into her own imagination. Abruptly she knew, without a doubt, what she most desired. “I wish to visit Wolfinger,” she said softly.

“Oh, pooh! That old place!” Phoebe said, obviously disappointed with both her choice and her serious tone. Phoebe did not like anything somber, least of all the abbey. She shivered and pouted prettily. “That is impossible, anyway. You must choose something that your newfound money can buy.”

“All right,” Prudence answered. Well used to giving in to her younger sibling, she turned her back on the ancient structure and faced Phoebe with a smile. “Then I would wish for a season in London for you!”

“Oh, Pru! Really? Do not tease me!” Phoebe begged.

“Really.”

“Oh, Pru!” Phoebe cried as she threw herself into Prudence’s arms. Engulfed in a cascade of pale blond curls and her sister’s sweet feminine scent, Prudence put her mind to the practical aspects of their trip. Spring was coming on quickly, and if they were to go to London this season, she had lots of preparations to make.

Once there, she would have to forget about her writing to concentrate on finding Phoebe a suitable husband. It was just what Mrs. Bates had suggested, and the perfect thing to drag her sister out of the doldrums. Indeed, Phoebe had been begging for a London trip for years.

Unfortunately, Prudence could find little to please herself in the prospective visit, but she pushed her spectacles back into place and smiled at her sister’s happiness, just as she had always done, knowing that when she returned, Wolfinger would be waiting.

Chapter Five

Mrs. Bates clicked her tongue in disapproval. “Well, there is no mistaking me this time, Miss Prudence Lancaster. You simply must have a chaperone.”

Prudence sighed. “I am afraid you are right, Mrs. Bates,” she admitted. “I have written my cousin Hugh, and he is most adamant upon the subject.”

Mrs. Bates made one of her odd noises, which managed to sound critical even though she soon voiced her agreement. “I should hope so! It appears that there is at least one Lancaster with some sense.” With that, she settled herself more firmly in her seat, which meant, Prudence noted dismally, that she was preparing herself for a lengthy visit.

As if confirming Prudence’s worst fears, Mrs. Bates took a deep breath and gave her a superior look. “There are all manner of people who prey upon country visitors, and not all of them are easily discerned. If you truly hope to find a proper husband for Phoebe in London, then you simply must appear to be above reproach. Otherwise, you shall surely draw the wrong kind of fellow—shabby genteel, fast, or worse! And I am sure you cannot trust to the gel herself to judge,” she added with a snort.

Prudence opened her mouth to come to her sister’s defense, but then snapped it closed again, being well aware of Phoebe’s blessings—and her flaws. Phoebe had the lion’s share of the family’s beauty, while Prudence possessed the majority of the intelligence. Luckily, their natures seemed well suited to the arrangement, and, having had many years in which to become accustomed to it, they were both contented.

However, Prudence knew well that because she was the oldest, the flightier Phoebe was her responsibility. She could not afford to make any mistakes, especially after her sister had behaved so unwisely with Mr. Penhurst. Despite her own contempt for convention, Prudence was not about to let Phoebe ruin herself by walking out unchaperoned—or worse—in town. And, as much as she loved her sister, Prudence suspected that Phoebe was capable of getting herself in much deeper trouble, if she was allowed free rein.

“Of course, I cannot say much for your judgment, either,” Mrs. Bates commented, scowling at Prudence. “Living alone, when I have warned you against it. And entertaining gentlemen! When I think of that poor Mr. Penhurst coming here, not to mention the Devil Earl himself!”

It was Prudence’s turn to frown. Although she had said nothing of Ravenscar’s visit to the cottage, she had not been able to prevent Mary and Cook and a distraught Phoebe from spreading the news, and Mrs. Bates had made much of it too many times for Prudence to listen again.

“He is not the Devil Earl,” she said simply. “The Devil Earl died nearly two hundred years ago.”

“Humph! Died? Murdered in that ghastly abbey by his very own wife, in payment for his sins!” Mrs. Bates retorted. She shot a disapproving glance out the window toward Wolfinger. Its dark stone gleamed malevolently, as if to spite her. “And now his descendant follows in his footsteps. Bad blood runs true, my girl, make no mistake!”

Prudence put down her cup and placed her hands in her lap, tamping down an unruly urge to toss the cantankerous matron from the cottage. “I hardly see the connection, Mrs. Bates,” she said firmly. “The Devil Earl locked his wife in the tower room for years because she was mad, or so the story goes.”

“Humph! As if he did not drive her to it! Wickedness, excess and madness,” she proclaimed in a ringing voice. “That is the legacy of the Ravenscar earldom.”

“Nonsense,” Prudence replied calmly. “Mr. Penhurst has run off, as young boys do, and will show himself when he is over his sulks. Then everyone will regret maligning Lord Ravenscar.”

Mrs. Bates gasped, obviously outraged by her hostess’s dissent. “Prudence Lancaster! How can you say such a thing? Why, even your own sister knows the boy was murdered!”

“Phoebe’s judgment has been clouded,” Prudence said, without elaborating.

Mrs. Bates pursed her lips in annoyance. “And what of your Lord Ravenscar’s black past, Prudence? Surely, you cannot sit here and defend a man who gained his title under such circumstances? Or have you not heard that this murder was not the first he has committed?”

Since Mrs. Bates had breathlessly related this rumor during an earlier visit, Prudence did not deign to reply, but she did not need to do so. The matron had worked herself into a fine temper, and showed no signs of stopping long enough for Prudence to fit in a word of her own.

“The man killed his own uncle, ran him through to gain the earldom, and now he has done his brother in, too! Mark my words, Prudence, he is a wicked one who will come to a bad end, for all that he casts about London now, as if he has done nothing wrong. He will not be so high-and-mighty for long, with his nose in the air! I have heard that he is finally being shut out of his high circles, as well he should be, the devil.”

Mrs. Bates paused to catch her breath, but Prudence could not have uttered a sound, even if she had wanted to speak. She had stopped breathing when the matron mentioned that Ravenscar was in London.

Her guest forgotten, Prudence gazed up at Wolfinger. Its windows were like sightless black eyes staring back at her silently. While she watched, the sun gleamed off a pane of old glass, and it seemed as if the building itself winked at her in imagined accord. The very air in the neat little cottage seemed to gather and swirl around her like the abbey’s perpetual fog, and she tingled with anticipation while she dared to let herself think the unthinkable—that she might possibly see him again.

Her spectacles slid down her nose, and Prudence moved them back into place with a trembling hand. Really, she was being too silly, she told herself firmly. As Mrs. Bates said, the earl undoubtedly moved in the uppermost social environs, where she would have no chance of meeting him.

“But, there now, I have upset you,” Mrs. Bates said in a mollified tone. “Let us forget that horrid man and be about your business. We must find you a chaperone, young lady!”

Prudence picked up her cup and took a sip of her tea in an effort to steady herself. London was a very big place, with so many people that one individual would be as difficult to find as a needle in a haystack! And yet, there were many public places where two persons might run into one another, she thought, a bit giddily. The gardens at Vauxhall, the various parks, Ackermann’s Repository…the names of famous sites she had only heard about leapt to Prudence’s mind swiftly. Surely, there was a possibility, albeit a small one.

“Of course, I could come with you myself.” Mrs. Bates’s casual comment made Prudence nearly choke, and she put a hand to her throat as she struggled to swallow. “But I have no liking for town—such a nasty, dirty place—nor do I for those who have a tendency to think too well of themselves by half! However, as I have said before, there are respectable ladies who can be employed for just such occasions.”

She smiled slyly, and Prudence forced away thoughts of Ravenscar to give all her attention to her guest. She had often suspected that Mrs. Bates’s sole ambition was to control everyone else, and when the woman looked contented, it surely boded ill for someone, on this occasion most probably herself and Phoebe.

“Once I was apprised of your plans, I took the liberty of writing a very dear friend of mine, who can be counted upon for the very best judgment. And she has sent me a prompt reply,” the matron said. Digging in her massive reticule, she soon brandished a piece of paper and handed it, triumphantly, to Prudence.

“Mrs. Broadgirdle, in Gardener Street,” she said, huffing proudly from her exertions. “There, now, Prudence, you have your chaperone, and a very fine one, I am assured. And just think, you will be doing the woman a service by hiring her!”

Although Prudence had misgivings about letting Mrs. Bates direct anything in her life, she nodded reluctantly. After all, the girls were in need of an older woman to stay with them, and their cousin Hugh, being an established bachelor, did not know anyone who could fill the position.

“Very well,” she said firmly. “Thank you, Mrs. Bates.” Rising from her seat at long last, the older woman fairly beamed with her success—or her mastery, Prudence mused. Ushering her to the door, Prudence assured her that they would, indeed, make arrangements with the chaperone at once.

When the door finally closed behind the meddlesome woman, Prudence pushed her spectacles back up upon her nose and glanced again at the direction in her hand. With the instincts of a pinch-penny, she wondered just how much the cost of Mrs. Broadgirdle would add to their expenses—and whether the lady would be worth the price.

Prudence eyed her new employee with decided misgivings. Had she not known otherwise, Prudence would have suspected that Mrs. Bates had personally chosen their would-be chaperone with the sisters’ discomfiture in mind. In total defiance of her surname, Mrs. Broadgirdle was a tall, bony woman, thin as a rail, who looked upon them with a superior air that Prudence found most disconcerting in a paid companion.

Having traveled by public coach, the girls had been tired and rumpled by the time they arrived at the London inn where Mrs. Broadgirdle was to meet them. Though they longed for nothing more than to reach their cousin’s residence before nightfall, they were first forced to endure the woman’s critical scrutiny.

And, from the looks of her, they definitely came up wanting. Although Mrs. Broadgirdle’s gaunt face, with its sharp features, little resembled Mrs. Bates’s plump visage, Prudence nonetheless recognized that the two matrons were kindred spirits. Mrs. Broadgirdle would, no doubt, attempt to make their stay as miserable as possible.

Right now, she was emitting a strange hissing sound, presumably to convey her disapproval, as she eyed her new charges. “Your clothes, of course, proclaim your country origins,” she said bluntly. Prudence ignored the insult, having never evinced the slightest interest in matters of wardrobe, but she saw that the pointed words had their desired effect upon Phoebe, who looked down at her wrinkled muslin in dismay.

“New clothes must be the order of the day,” Mrs. Broadgirdle said. Then she sent a sharp glance toward Prudence. “Unless you cannot afford them.”

Prudence smiled. “We are not without funds, and if different gowns are called for, then we shall certainly have some made up for us.”

Although Mrs. Broadgirdle only nodded sullenly, Prudence could have sworn she heard Mrs. Bates’s “Humph” echoing in her tired brain. This would not do at all.

“Perhaps it would be best to make myself clear at the outset,” Prudence told the woman. “If your wish is to make us unhappy, then, by all means, you may try, but I should warn you that you may find yourself without employment.”

Mrs. Broadgirdle’s startled black eyes flew to hers, reassessing her boldly, and, finding that Prudence would not be intimidated, she frowned sulkily. Prudence hid her answering smile. Although she had often been taken to task for her plain speaking, she found it the easiest and speediest way to resolve such problems. And, as Grandmama had often told her, it was always better to begin as you meant to go on.

The girls took a hackney cab to their cousin’s apartments, to Mrs. Broadgirdle’s horror, though why someone who had to hire herself out for a living should have such haughty airs, Prudence could not imagine.

“I have no knowledge of the country, but in town, all is appearance,” Mrs. Broadgirdle explained in strained accents. “If anyone should see you riding in such a… conveyance, they will mark you as inferior, not only to the elite, but to the gentry! And all hopes of securing successful marriages will be lost,” she added, eyeing Prudence with especial scorn.

Prudence laughed. “You need not concern yourself with me, madame, for I am well past the marrying age. It is Phoebe who will attract all the admirers.”

Mrs. Broadgirdle nodded curtly, apparently mollified now that the monumental task of finding a husband for Prudence no longer weighed upon her shoulders. Although she thought herself well past caring about such nonsense, Prudence was surprised to feel a dull pain at being considered so unappealing. But then Phoebe began to chatter about the sights, and her own brief blue devils disappeared in the glow of her sister’s delight.

Although the chaperone proclaimed Hugh Lancaster’s residence to be hardly fashionable, Prudence found nothing lacking in the small town house. The neighborhood was neat and quiet, the accommodations were quite spacious, to her mind, and the manservant who directed them to the drawing room was suitably polite.

Upon entering, Prudence looked around curiously. The furniture was sparse but handsome, the setting tasteful. Even Mrs. Broadgirdle could find no fault with the interior, though Prudence’s writer’s imagination deemed the place rather dull. There were none of the paintings and ornaments that crowded their own little cottage, making it homey and welcoming. However, bachelor establishments might well strive for another atmosphere entirely, Prudence realized, so she withheld her judgment.

“My dear cousins! What a pleasure to meet you!” Prudence turned to see Hugh Lancaster, and relief washed through her. Although they had corresponded sporadically since Grandmama’s death, Prudence had not been quite sure what to expect, and a part of her had dreaded that Hugh might be a copy of Mrs. Broadgirdle, wizened and bitter.

He was not. Hugh was much younger than she had imagined, not too many years older than herself, she guessed, with a hearty voice that welcomed them nicely. He had the Lancaster look about him, with blond hair nearly as bright as Phoebe’s, but beginning to recede from his forehead. His blue eyes were a different shade from Phoebe’s, yet, really, he looked more her sister’s sibling than she did—in a masculine way, of course.

“Prudence!” he said, moving unerringly toward her. “I cannot tell you how much I have enjoyed your letters. When one has so few family, those left to him become doubly precious.”

Smiling, Prudence murmured her thanks and introduced her cousin to Phoebe and Mrs. Broadgirdle. He seemed well pleased with the sharp-faced woman, and again evinced his concern that they have adequate supervision in town.

“I am afraid I am not at all proud of much of what goes on here in London,” he said, with a saddened expression. “And I would protect you as best I can from those unsavory elements”

Phoebe looked at him with wide-eyed wonder, while Mrs. Broadgirdle nodded sagely. Good heavens, could it be that the woman actually liked someone? Prudence wondered why she did not feel heartened to find that that someone was Cousin Hugh.

“Yes, even in Cornwall, we have heard of some of the dreadful conditions among the poor,” Prudence commented.

Hugh, who had been studying Phoebe contentedly, turned to eye her sister in surprise. “The poor? Why, yes, I suppose so, but I am speaking of those who should be showing a sterling character to the world, and fall far short of their responsibilities.” Clasping his hands behind him, Hugh leaned back upon his heels. “It is a sad state of affairs when our country’s very leader appears to be lacking any moral restraints.”

From there he launched into a long and stultifying speech detailing the prince regent’s failings and the general decay of society, which made Prudence wonder if he had perhaps missed his calling as a member of the clergy. Although she was, of course, in general agreement with his opinions, she could not help but think that, throughout its long history, England had been blessed with very few upright monarchs. She suspected that the position itself tested one’s qualities far more than she could ever imagine.

From the corner of her eye, she saw Mrs. Broadgirdle settle back approvingly, while Phoebe looked totally baffled by the lengthy address. As for herself, she would much rather have heard about London and the places they were to see. She was also tired and hungry, but how could she politely convey those feelings to their host, when they had only just arrived?

With a sigh, Prudence settled back in her chair and tried to construct some scenes for her novel in her mind. However, Hugh’s voice kept intruding on her thoughts, and she could not help but wonder if she would regret spending her windfall upon this trip.

Sebastian stepped into Hatchards, number 187, Picadilly, and drew deeply on the scent of books—a most pleasant aroma, to his mind. He had always enjoyed reading, but lately, it seemed to be the only thing that relieved the increasing sense of ennui that plagued him.

London bored him. His usual haunts he found even more stifling than before, but he had been forced to come to town to talk to a Bow Street Runner to look for James, and to settle the boy’s debts. Or most of them. Sebastian had used all his ready cash and then some, selling his art collection to produce more. He was stretched as far as he could go, and still a couple of James’s obligations hung over his head.

His steward had advised him to sell one of the properties, either Wolfinger or his own small estate in Yorkshire, but Sebastian was loath to relinquish either one. During his last visit, the abbey had interested him more than anything had in a number of years, and, truth be told, he had no desire to be the one Ravenscar in a long line of spendthrifts to lose the ancestral seat.

Neither did he want to dispose of his land in Yorkshire. It was the only home he had ever known, although the idea of clinging to the place like some cloying sentimentalist irked him. Damn! He just ought to put the old farm on the market, and yet, where would he put James when the whelp finally returned? If he returned. Sebastian felt a muscle in his jaw leap as he contemplated the mess his brother had made. Personally, he would gladly kill the scapegrace, if everyone did not already think he had done so.

Yes, the rumor had followed him to London, and, ultimately, had forced him to stay, for he had no intention of skulking away to the country when those who were spending the winter in town were talking about him. Such running and hiding would only ensure his social demise, and he would not stand still for it.

Sebastian had learned long ago that the only way to deal with gossip was to face it down, and he did, meeting cool stares with colder ones, and daring people to cut him. He was an old hand at it, and yet…he was getting tired, deathly tired, of it.

So he remained, ignoring the slights and sharpening his own black reputation until it glittered like a deadly blade. He found himself actually looking forward to returning to Yorkshire, where at least he might gain a reprieve from the endless parade of hypocrites who condemned him in hushed tones before adjourning to the newest brothel to bid on a twelve-year-old virgin.

And just when he thought he might repair to the country, he was faced with yet another irritant: the publication of The Book.

Sebastian’s eyes swept the room, searching for it, hoping that he would not find it, but there it was, its prominent placing proclaiming its popularity. He felt an atypical flash of annoyance that longed to find an outlet, but what could he do? Topple the heinous volumes? Buy them all? Any reaction from him would only confirm what everyone suspected—that The Book was about him.

Heading in the opposite direction, Sebastian casually walked through the store, his eyes flicking to the shelves, but his thoughts lingered on The Book. Had it been only a month ago that he began to hear new gossip about a gothic novel in which he, supposedly, figured as the villain? As usual, he had disregarded the talk, until it grew to outrageous proportions and someone finally offered him a copy to read for himself.

Sebastian had to admit there were similarities. The dark character whose exploits were chronicled carried a form of his own name and was described much like himself. Count Bastian also possessed a mysterious seaside stronghold that more than a little resembled Wolfinger Abbey, but there the parallels ended. The evil count’s main activity appeared to be luring helpless females to his impenetrable fortress, where he seduced and abandoned them, or worse, and the bodies of his victims filled up the family graveyard until the brave heroine exposed him.

Of course, anyone who knew Sebastian was aware that he spent his time in Yorkshire or London, never venturing to Cornwall or any other seaside domain. And although his lurid past was well-known, he had always confined his sexual activities to women of a certain persuasion, certainly not the sort of sweet innocents depicted in the novel. And most obvious to him was the fact that no one could really line his property with corpses and go unnoticed. The Book was fiction, pure and simple.

The ton, however, held a differing opinion. He had always been called a murderer, and this grandiloquent prose, following so rapidly upon the disappearance of his brother, titillated society all the more. The possibility that there might be a grain of truth in it made The Book a must-read on the order of Lady Caroline Lamb’s thinly disguised portrait of Byron.

Bastian of Bloodmoor was an unqualified success.

As he made his circuit of the room, his gaze searching the shelves for a possible purchase, Sebastian saw Lord Neville enter, and his annoyance reached a new level. That gossipmonger would, no doubt, try to engage him in a verbal battle for which Sebastian had no enthusiasm.

He felt suddenly tired, his brief interest in the shop replaced by his customary boredom. Only the flagrant display of The Book, which he was rapidly approaching, kept him from exiting immediately, for he did not care to have Sir Neville accuse him of avoiding the accursed volumes. With characteristic aplomb, he moved directly in front of the table where they were neatly piled.

Sebastian actually picked up a copy, wondering idly about the identity of the author of Bastian of Bloodmoor. Although several names had been bandied about, no one had taken credit for the work as yet. With a cold calculation that would not have surprised those who knew him, Sebastian decided he would like to get his hands on the man. Whether the fellow had knowingly painted him so ruthlessly or not, Sebastian would not mind closing his fingers around the bastard’s neck in a pleasurable parody of the plot.

Standing there absently stroking the binding, Sebastian remained lost in thought until a woman came to join him. He glanced toward her, jolted unexpectedly by the glint of spectacles perched upon her slender nose.

Damn! He drew in a deep breath, irritated by his reaction to the sight of a woman wearing glasses. Surely he was not pining away for that spinster in Cornwall? Sebastian’s annoyance reached a level that would have alarmed his acquaintances, while he tried to ignore the woman’s intrusion upon his senses. Unfortunately, she was not so easily dismissed. As he watched in amazement, she took hold of the book in his hands, as if to wrest it from him.

“Shall I sign it for you?” she asked.

Chapter Six

Sebastian swiveled around to face her, so furious that not only was he unable to summon his cool smile, he could not even call up his voice. And underneath the anger, like a shark circling, was a sharp sting of betrayal that he did not even want to examine, let alone feel.

He forced himself to deny it. This prim blonde meant nothing to him. His brief and ill-fated attraction to her did not give her any dominion over him, least of all the power to hurt him. Why, the very notion was laughable! No one could touch him, for the simple reason that he had been dead inside for longer than he could remember.

And yet, for the first time in years, he sensed something lapping at his inviolate self—something decidedly unpleasant. Sebastian had the eerie notion that it was despair, waiting to suck him down into blacker depths than he had ever known.

Ignoring it, Sebastian found his tongue, if not his usual grim aplomb. “You wrote this?” he asked her, with barely controlled venom, as he held the offending volume between them. “You tried to destroy me with it?” He conjured up a bitter laugh. “Others have failed at that task, Miss Prudence Lancaster. And let me warn you that I have a way of coming back to haunt those who would do me ill.”

Her response was to stare up at him in wide-eyed surprise, as if astonished by his manner, but the veil of innocence that clung to her only incited Sebastian further. He felt like grabbing hold of Miss Prudence Lancaster and shaking her until her teeth rattled—or until her glasses fell away and she was forced to abandon her spinsterish airs.

Violence throbbed in the air, in the muscle in his cheek and in the rapid rise and fall of her shapely breasts. By God, if they were not in a public place, he would show the author of Bastian of Bloodmoor just what her favorite villain was capable of doing to her. The idea, Sebastian realized, with stunning surprise, was more than a little stimulating.

And far from cringing away from his rage, the unusual Miss Prudence seemed enthralled by it. She was looking up at him with the oddest expression on her starkly beautiful face, and if he had not known better, Sebastian could have sworn he saw an answering flicker of excitement behind those ridiculous spectacles.

“Well, well, and what have we here?”

At the sound of Lord Neville’s voice, Sebastian automatically straightened and composed his features. Lord Lawrence Neville—Nevvy to his circle—was a parasite, a man with no discernible income of his own, who lived off the largesse of others. And why did anyone support him? Somehow, Neville had managed to set himself up as an arbiter of fashion, along the lines of Beau Brummel, only with a cruel streak a mile wide.

The jaded members of the ton enjoyed hearing Nevvy sharpen his tongue on their peers, as long as they were not his victims, and so each slavishly tried to please him. Thus he gained more power and grew more vicious.

Although Nevvy despised Sebastian for not playing his nasty little game, he rarely dared to make snide comments to the earl’s face, for he was not entirely foolish. Sebastian had made it clear that he would tolerate only so much, and Nevvy had a healthy regard for his own skin.

But, apparently, the public location and Sebastian’s escalating troubles had emboldened the fellow, for he stepped closer, smiling evilly, despite Sebastian’s dismissive glance. “Are you hawking your own book now, Ravenscar? Who is your poor victim?”

Without waiting for an answer, Nevvy turned to Prudence. “Have a desire to meet Count Bastian in person, do you, miss?” he asked. “Better beware—he’s a very dangerous man.” Laughing at his own joke, Nevvy obviously expected Prudence to join him, but she only stared at him openly.

Apparently she was a bit bemused by the fellow, for Sebastian watched her gaze travel past Nevvy’s quizzing glass to the absurdly high points of his shirt with more than polite interest. She appeared, Sebastian decided, to be making a character study of Sir Neville, for use in her next book. Suddenly, Sebastian felt in control of himself again, his extraordinary outburst replaced by an equally unusual interest—and no little amusement.

“I fear I do not follow you, sir,” she said.

Watching her brave Nevvy’s temper, Sebastian could not help but admire the chit. Most women would cringe if Nevvy turned his attention on them—or else fawn shamelessly over the toad. Prudence, refusing to be rattled by the man’s assessing look, remained her own, unique self, polite but poised in the face of his less-than-flattering scrutiny.

“My dear child,” Nevvy said, with one of his most unpleasant smirks. “Have you not heard? The book is about the earl here.”

Prudence looked so dumbfounded by Nevvy’s claim that Ravenscar felt light-headed. Or was it lighthearted? Could it be possible that the girl had not purposely vilified him? Perhaps Prudence, with her ink-stained hands and sometimes faraway gaze, had been so wrapped up in her writing that she was unaware of the similarities between her villain and the object of Cornwall’s latest scandal.

She turned to Sebastian, her eyes round behind the glass, her cheeks flushed a becoming rose color. “My lord, is this a jest?”

Sebastian gave her a cool smile. “Of course, Miss Lancaster, but you are not acquainted with Nevvy’s peculiar brand of humor. May I present Lord Lawrence Neville? Miss Lancaster.”

Nevvy nodded curtly, his lip curling contemptuously at the slight to his wit. “One wonders where you have been, Miss Lancaster, for all of London is talking about Bastian of Bloodmoor and his likeness to Ravenscar.”

There was no mistaking that Prudence was startled. Unless she was a very fine actress…She sent him a quick, alarmed glance that heartened him entirely too much before she regained her composure.

“I have been, Sir Neville, in Cornwall,” she replied. “You see, I fear there has been some mistake. This book is a work of fiction. It is not about anyone.”

Nevvy lifted his quizzing glass and peered through it, in order to give her the full force of his disdain. “Come, come, Miss Lancaster.” He clucked. “And how would someone buried along the coast know a thing about the latest literary offering?”

“I can readily answer that,” Prudence said, drawing a deep breath, “for, you see, I wrote it.”

Sebastian took one look at Nevvy’s expression and was surprised to feel genuine laughter building in his chest. Although the sensation was decidedly unfamiliar, it was uniquely satisfying, for watching the darling of society reduced to gaping like a chawbacon struck him as infinitely amusing.

“And I can assure you, it is not about Lord Ravenscar,” Prudence continued firmly. She lifted a hand, as if to reach for Sebastian, and he knew a brief but heady anticipation. She must have caught herself, however, for her gloved fingers fell before touching his sleeve, much to Sebastian’s disappointment.

Nevvy’s eyes narrowed, and Sebastian could almost see the man’s small mind working like a primitive gear. Undoubtedly, Nevvy would have liked to cut Prudence completely in payment for her audacious attitude, but, as the author of such a popular book, she was far too valuable a commodity to dismiss. It would be quite a coup for Nevvy to present her to society, and apparently Nevvy was coming to that conclusion, for he soon smiled at Prudence in an ingratiating fashion.

“What a pleasant surprise! I am thnlled to meet you, Miss Lancaster. I am honored, truly honored. You simply must let me introduce you to a select few of your admirers,” Nevvy gushed.

Listening to Nevvy’s invitation, Sebastian felt an unaccustomed surge of protectiveness. He knew an urge to grab Prudence by the arm and carry her off to his town house, or even to Wolfinger, as his namesake might have done. He shook it off. Why the devil did he care what became of a woman who, intentionally or not, had made a mockery of him?

“Prudence, are you all right?”

What now? Sebastian thought. He looked over Prudence’s blond head and Nevvy’s darker one, to see a pompous-looking man with thinning hair stepping toward them purposefully. Even more annoying than the man’s approach was the way Prudence turned to greet him with a bright smile. Who the devil was he? He looked like one of those dreadfully stiff, starched bores one saw seated at the edge of the shabbiest cardrooms, playing piquet for pennies.

“Yes, of course, Hugh. Lord Ravenscar, Lord Neville, I would like you to meet my cousin, Mr. Hugh Lancaster, and this is my sister Phoebe.”

Sebastian, who had not even noticed the arrival of the silly chit his brother had so admired, nodded coolly. She met his gaze with a mutinous expression that made it plain she still thought him a murderer. Habit made him glare at her until she glanced away fearfully, clutching at her reticule as if she thought he might snatch it from her in a burst of petty thievery.

“Mr. Lancaster, are you the one who coaxed your cousin to London? You cannot know how delighted I am to meet such a famous authoress!” Nevvy continued, fawning shamelessly over his prize.

Sebastian, whose initial interest was rapidly deteriorating into boredom, was pleasantly surprised by Hugh’s blank look. Apparently he was not the only one who noticed it, for Prudence colored again under Hugh’s curious gaze. The bright spots, Sebastian decided, were really quite becoming.

“I am not in the habit of revealing myself,” she explained hurriedly. “But I felt that circumstances warranted it today,” she added, shooting Sebastian another quick glance of apology that gave him a surreptitious thrill.

“You wrote this?” Sebastian heard the words cast up in an entirely different tone from that of his own venomous accusation, but they were still an accusation. Hugh Lancaster appeared shocked and a little disgusted, and his attitude engendered activity in Sebastian’s long-dormant emotions.

Although Hugh’s lack of taste assured Sebastian of his own superiority, he did not like to see Prudence hurt. By God, he had admired the book even when he had thought himself painted black upon its pages! The store around them was full of poorly written tripe that could not hold a candle to Prudence’s prose, and the doltish Hugh ought to give her the praise she deserved.

Unfortunately, he did not. “A gothic novel!” Hugh exclaimed in distressed accents. “I can hardly countenance it, Prudence. You seem so quiet and well mannered.”

While Sebastian fought a growing urge to forcibly remove the contempt from Hugh’s face, Prudence seemed unmoved. “I fail to see what manners have to do with writing ability,” she replied calmly.

And suddenly, Sebastian felt laughter building in his chest again. Prudence Lancaster, who exhibited more intelligence and poise than anyone in the motley group that surrounded her, needed no champion. She could handle the dreary Hugh very well herself, as was exhibited by her razor-sharp riposte.

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