He swept her an elegant bow. “My deepest gratitude, madam, for coming to my rescue. You saved my life.”

She had not seen his face clearly before, and now Miranda stared at him, stunned by the jolt of feeling that ran through her. The man was undeniably handsome. Never before had she felt that sizzle of excitement, that elemental pull of lust—or the strange, deep connection, as if somehow she knew him. Crazily, the thought that had come into her mind was that this was the man she wanted to marry.

“Perhaps you ought to let us take you home,” Miranda suggested. “My carriage is right there. I insist on driving you. You have received a blow to the head.”

He smiled faintly. “Perhaps you are right.”

As they rode in the carriage, Miranda considered the situation. Could the man she had rescued be the man she had been supposed to meet tonight? Was it possible that this handsome, rather charming man who was good with his fists was the Earl of Ravenscar? And what would have happened if he had not been late to the party tonight? One thing she was certain of: if this man had been there, she would not have left early!

So Wild A Heart
Candace Camp

www.millsandboon.co.uk

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So Wild a Heart

Contents

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

Chapter 16

Chapter 17

Chapter 18

Chapter 19

Chapter 20

Epilogue

1

She reached up toward him, arms outstretched, eyes wide and pleading, mouth contorted in a death grimace. She was pale, her skin white with an undertone of gray, and water coated her skin and clothes. Dark seaweed wrapped around her chest, seemingly pulling her down into the roiling water.

“Dev! Help me! Save me!” Her shrill words echoed through the darkness.

He reached out for her, but her hand was inches from his, and he could not move forward. He stretched, straining every fiber of his being but she remained frustratingly beyond his reach.

She was sinking into the black water, her eyes closing.

“Don’t!” he yelled, grabbing futilely for her. “Don’t! Let me help you!”

Devin’s eyes flew open, blank at first, then slowly gaining understanding. He had dreamed about her again.

“Christ!” He shivered, feeling cold to the bone, and lanced around. It took a moment for him to realize where he was. He had fallen asleep sitting up in his bedroom, dressing gown wrapped around him. A bottle of brandy and a gracefully curved snifter sat on the small table beside his chair. He picked up the bottle and poured some into the glass, his hand trembling so hard that the bottle clinked against the rim.

He took a quick gulp of the drink, warming as the fiery liquid rushed down his throat and exploded in his stomach. He ran his hand back through his thick black hair and took another drink. “Why didn’t you tell me?” he murmured. “I would have helped.”

He was still cold, despite the aid of the brandy, and he stood up and walked over to the bed, his gait a trifle unsteady. How much had he had to drink last night? He couldn’t remember. Clearly it had been enough that he had fallen asleep sitting up instead of crossing the few feet to his bed. It was no wonder, he told himself, that he had had bad dreams.

He crawled into bed, the covers having been neatly turned back by his valet before he left last night, and wrapped the blankets around him. Slowly, between the brandy and the warmth of the bedspread, his shivers slowed down, then stopped. It was June, not really that cold, even for sleeping in only one’s dressing gown, but Devin knew that his bone-chilling coldness had less to do with the temperature than with his most persistent and discomfiting nightmare.

It had been years. He had thought the dream would have stopped recurring by now. But he could depend on it popping up here and there throughout the months, at least two or three times a year. Devin grimaced. He could not seem to keep a farthing in his pocket, but a bad dream he could hold on to for years.

The shivering ceased, and his eyes drifted closed. At least, after all these years, he could sleep after the dream. When he’d first had it, he had stayed awake all night. Time might not heal all wounds, but apparently, with a little help from brandy, it could make them more easily forgotten. With a faint sigh, he slid into sleep.

It was several hours later and the sun was well up when his valet shook his arm gently and whispered, “My lord. My lord. I am sorry to awaken you, sir, but Lady Ravenscar and Lady Westhampton are below, asking for you.”

Devin opened one eye and rolled it up to focus with bloodshot malevolence on his servant, hovering at the side of his bed. “Go away,” he muttered succinctly.

“Yes, my lord, I quite understand. ‘Tis a dreadfully early hour. The thing is, her ladyship is threatening to come up here and wake you herself. And one feels it beyond one’s duties to physically restrain your lordship’s mother.”

Devin sighed, closing his eye, and rolled onto his back. “Is she weeping or warlike?”

“No sign of tears, my lord,” his valet responded, furrowing his brow in thought. “I would say more…determined. And she brought Lady Westhampton with her.”

“Mmm. Makes it harder when my sister joins forces with her.” “Just so, my lord. Shall I lay out your clothes?”

Devin groaned. He felt like hell. His head was pounding, his body ached, and the inside of his mouth tasted as foul as a trash bin. “Where was I last night, Carson?”

“I’m sure I couldn’t say, sir,” his valet replied blandly. “I believe that Mr. Mickleston was with you.”

“Stuart?” Devin summoned up a faint memory of a visit from his longtime friend. It seemed that Stuart had been uncharacteristically flush in the pocket. That explained the hangover. They had probably visited half the hellholes in London last night, celebrating his good fortune—and no doubt disposing of at least half of it.

He sat up gingerly, swinging his legs out of the bed, and waited for the rush of nausea to subside. “All right, Carson. Lay out my clothes and ring for shaving water. Did my mother indicate what she wanted?”

“No, sir. I spoke to her myself, but she was quite reticent as to the object of her visit. She would say only that it was imperative that she see you.”

“No doubt.” He looked at his valet. “I think a cup of strong tea would be in order.”

“Indeed, sir. I will fetch it myself.”

Thirty minutes later, shaved, impeccably dressed in the plain black suit and crisp white shirt that he favored, cravat knotted fashionably under his chin, Devin Aincourt made his way downstairs, looking every inch the sixth Earl of Ravenscar.

He walked into the drawing room, decorated tastefully in masculine tones of beige and brown by the selfsame sister who sat there now. An attractive woman in her late twenties, she had the black hair, green eyes and well-modeled features that were characteristic of the Aincourt family’s handsomeness, and was possessed of a charming dimple in her cheek. She looked up at his entrance and smiled. “Dev!”

“Rachel.” He smiled back at her despite the low-grade pounding in his head. She was one of the few people who was dear to him. The smile faded as he turned toward his mother, a slender blond woman whose exquisite taste in clothes and regal carriage elevated her looks above an ordinary prettiness. He bowed formally toward her. “Mother. An unexpected pleasure.”

“Ravenscar.” His mother nodded to him. She had always preferred formality even in dealings with her own family, believing that to behave otherwise would undermine one’s importance—and whatever had befallen the Aincourt family over the years, they were important.

“I am relieved to see you alive,” Lady Ravenscar went on dryly. “Given the reaction of your servants to the thought of your receiving us, I was beginning to wonder whether you were.”

“I was still asleep. My servants are understandably reluctant to pull me out of bed.”

His mother raised her eyebrows. “It is almost one o’-clock in the afternoon.”

“Exactly.”

The older lady sighed resignedly. “You are a heathen. But that is not the issue at hand.” She waved the matter away.

“I presumed not. Precisely what matter has brought you into this den of iniquity? It must be of great urgency.”

Lady Ravenscar made a little moue of distaste. “I suppose that is your idea of a jest.”

“Very faint, I will admit,” Ravenscar said in a bored tone.

“What brings me here is your marriage.”

His eyebrows rose. “My marriage? I am afraid that I have no knowledge of any marriage.”

“You should,” his mother retorted bluntly. “You are desperately in need of one. You should have been casting about for a suitable girl these ages past. But since you have not made the slightest push in that regard, I have found one for you.”

Devin cast a look at his sister and murmured, “Et tu, Rachel?”

“Dev…” Rachel began in an unhappy voice, looking abashed.

“Don’t be nonsensical,” Lady Ravenscar interrupted crisply. “I am serious, Devin. You must marry—and soon—or you shall find yourself in debtors’ prison.”

“I am not run off my legs yet,” he said mildly.

“You are not far from it, if I understand your vulgar expression correctly. Your estate is in dreadful shape, and Darkwater is literally falling down about our heads. As you would know if you ever made the least effort to visit your lands.”

“It is very far away, and I am not fond of visiting places that are about to come down around my head.”

“Oh, yes, it is easy for you to jest about it,” Lady Ravenscar returned feelingly. “You are not the one who has to live there.”

“You do not have to live there,” he pointed out. “Indeed, I believe you are residing in London right now, are you not?”

“Renting a house for the Season,” his mother said in the tone of one suffering the utmost humiliation. “We once had a house in Town, a lovely place where we could hold the most elegant parties. Now I can rent a house for only two months, and it’s of such a size that I can barely have a dinner for over eight people. I haven’t thrown a decent rout in years.”

“You could live with me,” Rachel told her.

“I already live on your husband’s charity enough. I have him and Richard to thank for the clothes on my back. That is enough without making Westhampton put me up, as well. It is Devin’s responsibility. He is the Earl of Ravenscar.”

“So I must marry to give you a house in Town?”

“Don’t be obtuse, Devin. It doesn’t become you. You have a duty—to me, to your name—to yourself, for that matter. What is to happen to Darkwater? To the Aincourt name? It is your duty to marry and produce heirs—how else are the name and title to continue? And what about the house? It’s been standing since Queen Elizabeth was a child. Are you going to let it fall into complete ruin?”

“I am sure the title will go on.”

“Oh, yes, if you don’t mind that rat-faced little Edward March succeeding to your title. A third cousin, I ask you—and he hasn’t the least idea how to conduct himself, I assure you.”

“I would have said that you thought I hadn’t the least idea how to conduct myself, either.”

His mother cast him a long, pointed look. “You haven’t. But at least you are direct in line. And you don’t resemble a weasel.” She sighed. “It pains me to think of a rodenty Ravenscar. Whatever else one might say about them, at least the Earls of Ravenscar were always handsome creatures.”

“So I am to be the sacrificial lamb on the altar of family, is that it?”

“There is no need to be dramatic. It isn’t as if it isn’t done every day. Love matches are for the lower classes. People like us make alliances. It is what your father and I did. And look at your sisters. They married as they should. They didn’t whine, they just did what the family needed. As head of the family, I can scarcely see how you can do any less.”

“Ah, but doing less is something I am remarkably good at.”

“You are not going to divert me with your jests.” His mother pointed her index finger at him.

“I can see that,” Devin replied wearily.

“You have wasted your entire inheritance since you came into it,” Lady Ravenscar went on relentlessly. “How can you think that you should not be the one to recover it?”

“Mother, that’s not fair!” his sister cried. “You know that every Earl in memory has squandered his money. The blame isn’t all to lay at Dev’s door. If you will remember, it was actually Papa who sold the house in Town.”

“I remember it quite well, thank you, Rachel. You are right. The Aincourts have never been good with money. That is why they always married well.” Having made her point, she folded her hands in her lap and waited, watching Devin.

He rubbed his temple, where the throbbing had picked up in both speed and intensity. “And who is it you wish me to shackle myself to? Not that gaptoothed Winthorpe girl, I hope.”

“Vivian Winthorpe! I should say not. Why, the settlement her father will lay on her would do little more than pay off your debts. Besides, the Winthorpes would never agree to tying their name to yours—they cannot abide scandal. You can scarcely expect a father to agree to give his daughter to a man who…well, who has had the sort of liaison you have had for years.” Lady Ravenscar’s lip curled expressively.

“Who, then? A widow, I suppose.”

“I am sure that you could win one of them over if you put your mind to it,” the older woman agreed dispassionately. “But it would require dancing attendance on her, and frankly, I doubt you would carry through on it.”

“Your faith in me is astounding.”

His mother went on, ignoring his sarcasm. “The girl I am thinking of is perfect. Her fortune is huge, and her father is hot for the match. He fancies his daughter being a countess. You should have seen the way his eyes lit up when I started talking about Darkwater. It seems there’s nothing he wants more than the chance to restore an old mansion.”

“You’re talking about a Cit?” he asked, surprised.

“No. An American.”

“What?” He stared at her blankly. “You want me to marry an American heiress?”

“It is a perfect situation. The fellow made a ludicrous amount of money in furs or some such thing, and he is willing to spend it on the estate. The man is enamored of a title. And because they don’t live here, they don’t know a thing about your reputation.”

“You astound me. You want me to tie myself to some fur trapper’s daughter—someone who cannot speak proper English and probably doesn’t even have any idea which fork to use, and who no doubt looks as if she just stepped out of the backwoods.”

“I have no idea how she looks or acts,” Lady Ravenscar replied, “but I am sure that Rachel and I can clean her up. If she’s a complete embarrassment…well, I am sure she will be happy living in Derbyshire with her father putting Darkwater in order. Honestly, Devin, don’t you realize that everyone who is anyone in this country knows that you are steeped in sin? It pains me as a mother to have to say this, but no self-respecting Englishwoman would be willing to marry you.”

Devin made no reply. He knew as well as his mother that her words were true. Since adulthood, he had led a life that had scandalized most of the people of his social class. There were several hostesses who would not receive him, and the majority of the others did so only because he was, after all, an earl. Fortunately, he had no desire to mingle with most of the peerage and their disapproval left him unmoved. He had also years ago accepted the fact that his mother shared Society’s opinion of him—and his father had considered him blacker of soul than everyone else did.

“I don’t know why you should worry about the American’s social blunders, anyway,” his mother plowed on. “I am the one whose standing could be ruined by a rustic daughter-in-law.”

“Let me remind you that I am the one who would be legally bound to her. I can see her now—too homely to catch a husband back home, even with all her money, wearing clothes ten years out of date, and not an interesting bit of conversation in her head.”

“Really, Devin, I am sure you are exaggerating.”

“Am I? Why, then, did they come to England for a husband? To find someone with a crumbling estate and a vanished fortune, desperate enough to marry anyone with money! Really, Mother, that is the outside of enough. I won’t do it. I’ll find some way to get along. I always have.”

“Gambling?” his mother retorted. “Pawning your watch and your grandfather’s diamond studs? Oh, yes, I know how you’ve scraped by the last few months. You have sold everything that isn’t encumbered and has any value. We’ve laid off half the staff at Darkwater. You have lived a ruinous, licentious, extravagant lifestyle, Devin, and this is the consequence.”

Devin turned toward his sister, who had held her silence through most of the conversation. “Is this what you want for me, Rachel? To marry some chit I’ve never laid eyes on? To have the same sort of happy marriage you do?”

His sister stiffened, tears springing into her eyes. “That is cruel and unfair! All I want is your happiness. But how happy are you going to be when you have to give up this house and live in some one-room flat? You know how much money you spend, Devin. I dare swear it’s far more than what Strong sends you from the estate, and that is only going to get smaller and smaller. You have to put some of that money back in to your lands if you want to keep them profitable, and neither you nor Father ever did that. I know that when Papa cut you off you scraped by on your card-playing skills and the money Michael and Richard gave you. But you won’t want to do that the rest of your life.”

He looked away from her, his silence an assent. Finally he said, “I am sorry, Rachel. I shouldn’t have said that.” He glanced at her, and a faint smile warmed his face. “I have a damnable headache, and it goads me into sarcasm. I know you sacrificed your happiness for the sake of the family.”

“What nonsense,” Lady Ravenscar put in exasperatedly. “Rachel is one of the most envied women in London. She has an exquisite house, a lovely wardrobe and a most generous allowance. A large number of women would be quite happy to have made that sort of ‘sacrifice.’”

Devin and Rachel glanced at each other, and amusement glinted in their eyes. Happiness for Lady Ravenscar would indeed consist of just such things.

“As for you, Devin, I am not asking you to offer for the girl. I merely ask that you consider the proposition. I am having a dinner tonight at my home, and I have invited her to come. The least you can do is come to dinner and meet her.”

Devin let out a low groan. A dinner at his mother’s house ranked almost as low on his list of preferred things as meeting an American heiress.

“I will be there, too,” Rachel put in encouragingly. “Do say you’ll come, Dev.”

“Oh, all right,” he said grudgingly. “I will come tonight and meet the girl.”

The “girl”—much to Lord Ravenscar’s astonishment, if he had known it—was at that very moment engaged in a war of words with her family along the same lines.

“Papa,” Miranda Upshaw said firmly, “I am not marrying a man I’ve never even seen, no matter how eager you are to get your hands on a British estate. It’s positively medieval.”

She crossed her arms over her chest and looked at her father implacably. Miranda was a pretty woman, with large, expressive gray eyes and a thick mane of chestnut hair. Her figure was small and compact, nicely curved beneath the high-waisted blue cambric gown she wore, but her force of personality was such that people often came away with the impression that Miranda was a tall woman.

Joseph Upshaw gazed back at his daughter, his arms and face set in a mirror image of hers. He was a barrel-chested man not much taller than his daughter, whose lithe build had obviously come to her from her mother. He was as used to having his way as his daughter was, and they had gone head-to-head with each other on more than one occasion.

“I’m not asking you to marry him tomorrow,” he said now in a reasonable tone. “All you have to do is go to his mother’s house tonight and meet the man. After that, you can take all the time you want getting to know him.”

“I doubt I shall want to get to know him. He probably has spindly calves and squinty eyes and…and thinning hair. Why else is his family so eager to marry him off? Even without money, an earl should be a good catch. Surely there are wealthy Englishmen who would be willing to sell their daughters for a title.”

“Are you saying I’m selling you?” her father retorted indignantly. “That’s a fine thing to say about a man who’s trying to give you one of the oldest and best names in this country. If there’s any selling going on, I’m the one buying him for you.”

“But I don’t want him.” Miranda knew as well as her father did that in reality he was wanting to buy a son-in-law for himself more than a husband for Miranda. Ever since Miranda could remember, Joseph had been an Anglophile, reading everything he could get his hands on about the English aristocracy—their rankings, their histories, their estates. He was fascinated with English castles and mansions, and wanted desperately to get his hands on one.

“How can you turn him down when you haven’t even seen the man?” he asked her now. “He’s an earl. You would be a countess! Just think how pleased Elizabeth would be. As soon as she’s feeling not so under the weather, I’m going to tell her all about it. She will be thrilled.”

“I am sure she will,” Miranda replied dryly. Her stepmother, Elizabeth, herself English, was even more enamored of the idea of Miranda marrying British nobility than Joseph was. She had come from a ‘good family’ herself, she was fond of telling whoever would listen; and the improvident, impetuous husband who had brought her to New York, then committed the final folly of catching a chill and dying, leaving her stranded in the New World with a baby daughter, had come from a family even higher up the social scale. Her dream was for her daughter Veronica, now fourteen, to live in the world of British aristocracy—to have her coming out, to hobnob with the members of the Ton, to marry a suitably noble husband. The easiest method of accomplishing this dream, she had decided, was for Miranda to marry into the aforesaid aristocracy and then bring Veronica out in a few years.

“You know how fond I am of Elizabeth,” Miranda went on. “She is the only mother I’ve ever known, and she has always been quite kind to me.” Possessed of a kind, easygoing, and rather lazy nature, Elizabeth had never mistreated her stepdaughter or tried to take away control of the household from her. Indeed, Elizabeth much preferred letting someone else handle all the troublesome details of keeping a large house with numerous servants running, for it allowed her to concentrate on her various “illnesses.” “And I love Veronica, too.”

“I know you do.” Her father beamed at her. “You’ve always been like a little mother to that child.” “But that doesn’t mean,” Miranda went on firmly, “that I am going to marry someone just because Elizabeth wants Veronica to make her debut in London society.”

“That’s not the only reason,” Joseph protested. “There’s a grand estate in Derbyshire. And a house—not a castle, grant you, but almost big enough to be one. Darkwater. Now there’s a name for you. Doesn’t it conjure up history? Romance? The Earl of Ravenscar. My God, girl, is your heart dead?”

“No, Papa, it is not. And I will be the first to admit that it’s a very romantic name—although, I might point out, a wee bit spooky.”

“All the better. There are probably ghosts.” Her father looked delighted at the thought.

“Happy thought.”

“Yes, isn’t it?” Joseph Upshaw was immune to irony at the moment. His eyes sparkled and his face positively glowed as he began to talk about the house he had spent the evening before discussing with Lady Ravenscar. “The house was built by one of Henry VIII’s closest friends and supporters. He built the main hall during Henry’s reign. Then, when his son inherited and grew even more prosperous during Elizabeth’s rule, he added two wings onto it to form the classic E-shaped Elizabethan mansion. It’s grand, but it’s falling into complete ruin. Rot in the wood…tapestries in shreds…stone crumbling.” He related the problems of the house with zest, ending, “And we can restore it! Can you imagine the opportunity? The house, the grounds, the estate. We could rebuild it all.”

“It does sound delightful,” Miranda agreed truthfully.

Real estate was one of her primary interests. During her father’s years of dealing with John Jacob Astor, she had had many conversations with that shrewd gentleman, and she had wisely followed his advice and had invested much of her father’s profits in real estate in Manhattan. The risks had already paid off handsomely, and Miranda was sure they would provide even more income in the future. The speculation of buying land to sell at a future date for high profits was fun, but what she truly enjoyed was developing projects—buying land and building something on it that she could then rent to someone, or investing in another’s plan to build or expand or create.

So the thought of restoring a grand old house to its former glory did appeal to her, and she had lived with her father for too long not to have absorbed a great deal of interest in British history and architecture. But she did not want to renovate an estate so much that she was willing to marry to acquire it.

With the look of one delivering the coup de grace, her father went on proudly, “It even has a curse.”

Miranda raised her eyebrows. “A curse? That would be splendid, I’m sure.”

“Oh, it is indeed. ‘Tis a wonderful curse. There was a powerful abbey in Derbyshire, you see—Branton Abbey—and during the Dissolution, when Henry VIII seized all the monastic lands and goods, he took this abbey and gave it to his good friend Edward Aincourt. Well, the abbot at Branton was a tough old coot, and he didn’t go easily. As they dragged him out of the church, he cursed the king and he cursed Aincourt. He cursed the very stones of the abbey, saying that nothing would ever prosper there and ‘no one who lives within these stones shall ever know happiness.’”

He looked at her triumphantly.

“Well. That is an impressive curse,” Miranda admitted. She knew her father’s love of drama and romance too well to be surprised to think that he would find a ruined, cursed house the perfect spot for his beloved daughter to live. To Joseph Upshaw, such a place would be a treasure.

“Isn’t it? They say that Capability Brown did the original gardens. Miranda…how can you pass up an opportunity like this? It isn’t only the house and grounds that need restoring, you know. Apparently the whole estate is also a financial wreck. You could rebuild that, as well. It could be one of your projects.”

Miranda chuckled. “That all sounds very delightful, I’m sure, but there is still the fact that in order to get my hands on the house and the estate and all that, I would have to marry a complete stranger.”

“He wouldn’t have to be a stranger by the time you married him,” Joseph pointed out. “You could have a long engagement, if you wish. We could start to work on the house in the meantime.”

Miranda smiled at her father and shook her head. “I am not marrying, Papa, just because you are bored. Talk about wanting a project…”

“But this would be the project of a lifetime! And it’s not just because I’m bored since I sold out to Mr. Astor. You know I’ve wanted to get my hands on a grand old house like that for years.” He paused, considering her, then went on in a wheedling tone. “Anyway, Miranda, my love, I’m not asking that you marry the fellow tonight. All I want is for you to meet him. See what he’s like. Consider the possibilities.”

“Yes, but then you’ll be asking me about how I feel and ‘couldn’t you just give the man another chance’ and wanting me to go to this Darkwater place to see it, and…”

Her father put on a shocked face. “Miranda! You do say the most terrible things about me. As if I would badger you…”

Miranda quirked an eyebrow at him, and Joseph had the grace to smile. “Well, all right, I do badger you sometimes. I admit it. But not this time—I promise. Just meet the man. It will be nothing but going to an elegant dinner party and making polite conversation and taking a little look-see at him. Couldn’t you do that much for Elizabeth and me?”

Miranda sighed. “Oh, all right. I guess I can meet the man. But I’m not promising anything. You understand?”

“Of course, of course!” Joseph agreed happily, coming over to his daughter and enveloping her in a bear hug.

“Oh, my,” said a soft voice from the doorway. “What joyous thing has occurred?”

The two of them turned at the sound of Mrs. Upshaw’s voice. Miranda smiled at her stepmother, and Joseph beamed. Elizabeth Upshaw was a short blond woman who fluttered whenever she walked—hands, hair, ribbons, laces, the ends of her shawl. When Joseph had met her, she had been a pretty young woman, but over the years, time and inactivity had taken their toll on her, blurring the lines of her face and figure with fat. With a matronly cap on her head and wrapped in shawls as she always was, she looked several years older than her actual age. Though only ten years separated them, there were many who assumed upon meeting them that Elizabeth was Miranda’s mother.

“Elizabeth!” Joseph exclaimed, going to take his wife’s elbow and escort her to the sofa as if she were too weak to walk. Elizabeth had long suffered from a variety of real and imaginary illnesses, and her husband entered happily into her presentation of herself as a fragile woman. Miranda could not quite understand why Elizabeth enjoyed spending her life reclining on couches and beds, bearing her ills with a gentle smile, but if that was the way Elizabeth chose to live, it didn’t bother her. She was quite fond of her stepmother, whose kind heart more than made up for her litany of gentle complaints.

“The grandest thing has happened,” Joseph went on, settling his wife on the couch and making sure her shawl, an afghan and several pillows were settled around her. “I didn’t want to wake you this morning to tell you, not as poorly as you’ve been feeling from crossing the Channel.”

“I know. I’ve always been sadly affected by mal de mer,” Elizabeth Upshaw agreed in a die-away voice. “I dread returning to New York because of it.”

“Perhaps you won’t have to,” Joseph said happily. “Or at least, not for some time.”

“Why? Whatever do you mean?”

“Miranda just may marry an earl.”

“An earl!” Elizabeth exclaimed, sitting up so straight in her interest that her shawl slid down from her shoulders unnoticed.

“Papa!” Miranda said in exasperation, putting her hands on her hips. “There you go. I told you I would meet the man. I have no intention of marrying him.”

“But an earl!” her stepmother breathed, one hand going to her chest as though the news were too much for her heart. She looked wide-eyed at Miranda. “You would be a countess. Oh, Miranda, that is more than I ever hoped for.”

Miranda sighed inwardly, wishing that she had not let her father wheedle her into agreeing to meet this nobleman. Joseph would not have to badger her; after this news, her stepmother would take care of that for him.

Elizabeth’s eyes sparkled, and her face was lit with an animation unusual for her. “Just think—the parties, the wedding—” A thought struck her, and she turned toward her husband. “Do they have a house in Town?”

“No, the Countess told me last night that her husband had to sell it. I believe her son, the Earl, keeps a small bachelor house, but she has to lease a home during the Season. It sounded to be a sore trial to her.”

Elizabeth nodded sagely. “It would be. Having to give up one’s no doubt magnificent home and make do with a rented house every summer. Knowing that everyone knows it…It’s too bad not to be able to have the wedding party in a grand house.” She brightened. “But you can buy one, dear. I mean, we will have to have a house in London if we are to stay here any length of time, and—”

“Elizabeth, please,” Miranda put in gently. “I’m not planning to marry the Earl of Ravenscar. I just said—”

“What?” Her stepmother stared at Miranda, her face suddenly pale and her eyes wide. “What did you say? Who?”

“The Earl of Ravenscar,” Joseph put in. “That’s the fellow we’re talking about Miranda’s marrying—er, that is, meeting. Devin Aincourt’s his name.”

“Oh, my God.” Elizabeth rose to her feet, her hands clenching together. “You cannot marry him. The man is a devil!”

2

This pronouncement had the effect of rendering her audience speechless, as Miranda and her father stared at Elizabeth. Under their gaze, Elizabeth colored a little self-consciously and sat back down.

“That is, well, I mean, I don’t think that it would be a good idea for Miranda to marry him. He is, well, he has a…an unsavory reputation.”

“Do you know him, dear?” her husband asked.

“Oh, no. He was far above my touch, of course. But…I had heard of him. Everyone had heard of him. He had a scandalous reputation. That was before he was the earl, of course. His father was Ravenscar then.”

“What was wrong with him?” Miranda asked curiously. “What did he do?”

“Oh, the usual things that young noblemen do, I imagine,” Elizabeth replied vaguely. “Not the sort of thing suitable for your ears.”

Miranda grimaced. “Oh, Elizabeth, don’t be stuffy. I am twenty-five years old and not a bit fainthearted. I am not going to collapse in shock.”

“Yes, what did he do, Elizabeth?” Joseph prodded.

“Well, he gambled and…consorted with unsuitable types.”

The other two waited expectantly, and when she said nothing more, Miranda asked disappointedly, “Is that all?”

Elizabeth shifted uncomfortably. “He was, they say—” her voice dropped “—a womanizer. He seduced young women, led them astray.”

She colored at speaking so plainly and began to ply her fan.

“Ha!” Joseph let out a short bark of laughter. “I’d like to see him try anything with my Miranda. Besides, if he’s marrying her, you can scarcely worry about him ruining her reputation.”

“I suspect she is worried more about his faithlessness, Papa,” Miranda pointed out wryly.

“Faithless? To you?” Joseph’s brows rushed together, and he said again, “I’d like to see him try! Trust me, my dear, I’ll make sure he knows what’s expected of him.”

“Nothing is expected of him,” Miranda stuck in pointedly. “I’m not marrying him.”

“Of course, dear, not unless you want to,” Joseph replied easily. He turned to Elizabeth. “Besides, Lizzie, that was years ago. He was just a boy then. Lots of men are wild in their salad years, but they straighten out as they get older.”

“Yes, I know.” Elizabeth agreed, but her forehead remained creased with worry.

“Besides, we would make sure it was all wrapped up right and tight before she married him. You know we would not allow a wastrel to endanger Miranda’s fortune.”

“It wasn’t her fortune I was thinking of,” Elizabeth retorted with an unusual touch of asperity. “It was her happiness.”

“I know.” Touched by her stepmother’s putting Miranda’s happiness over her own desire for her to marry a peer of the realm, Miranda went to Elizabeth and sat down beside her, taking her hand. “And I appreciate that. Truly.”

“Miranda can hold her own with any man,” Joseph said confidently.

“Yes, I can,” Miranda replied with a grin. “And that includes you…so don’t go thinking that you’ve won me over.” She squeezed Elizabeth’s hand. “I only agreed to meet this earl, and I have no intention of marrying him, I assure you.”

Her stepmother retained her worried expression. “But you haven’t seen him yet. He’s, well, the sort who can change anyone’s mind.”

“Handsome, is he?” Joseph asked. “Well, that’s good, isn’t it, Miranda?”

“And charming—or so I understand,” Elizabeth added.

“That was fourteen years ago,” Miranda pointed out. “Fourteen years of dissipated living can do a lot to change one’s looks.”

“That’s true.” Elizabeth brightened a little.

“Anyway, I am not about to be swayed by a pretty face. You must realize that. Remember how angelic looking that Italian count was? And I wasn’t the least tempted to accept his offer.”

Elizabeth did not look entirely reassured, but she smiled faintly at Miranda. “I know. I can still see the shock on his face when you turned him down.”

“And this one will look the same,” Miranda told her confidently. “You’ll see.”

Devin could not get the idea of the American heiress out of his mind after his relatives left. Finally he picked up his hat and left the house. He walked, hoping that the air would clear his still-aching and foggy head, but when he arrived a few minutes later at Stuart’s apartment, he felt little better. Stuart’s valet answered the door and looked a trifle shocked when Devin suggested he awaken his master.

With an impatient noise, Devin pushed past him and took the stairs two at a time up to Stuart’s room, the valet running at his heels, squawking anxiously. The noise awakened Stuart, and he was sitting up in his bed, sleeping cap slipping to the side, looking both annoyed and befuddled, when Devin opened the door and stepped into the room.

“Hallo, Stuart.”

“Good Gawd, Ravenscar,” his friend replied without any noticeable appreciation of his visit. “What the devil are you doing here? What time is it?”

“It’s two o’clock in the afternoon, sir,” the valet put in, wringing his hands. “I beg your pardon, sir, I could not keep him out.”

“Oh, give over.” Stuart waved the nervous man out of the room. “I’m not blaming you. No one can keep Ravenscar out if he decides to come in. Just go fetch me some tea. No, make that coffee. Very strong.”

“Very good, sir.” The man backed subserviently out of the room.

“When did you get him?” Devin asked, strolling over to a chair and flopping down in it. “Nervous sort.”

“Yes. I know. Afraid I’ll let him go. I will, too,” Stuart went on meditatively, “if he don’t stop messing up my ascots. I miss Rickman. Damn that Holingbroke for stealing him away from me.”

“Hardly stealing,” Devin pointed out mildly. “I believe he offered to actually pay the man.”

Stuart grimaced, muttering, “No loyalty.” He rubbed his hands over his face and sighed. “Damn, Dev, what are you doing here? I have the most ferocious headache.”

“Mmm. Not feeling too well myself. But my mother and sister visited me an hour ago.”

“No excuse to inflict yourself on me,” his friend pointed out reasonably.

“Lady Ravenscar wants me to marry.”

Stuart’s eyebrows rose. “Anyone in particular?”

“An American heiress. Fur trader’s daughter or some such thing.”

“An heiress, eh? Some people have all the luck. What’s her name?”

“I have no idea. I have no intention of marrying her.”

“Good Gawd, why not? You’re on your last legs. All of London knows it.”

“I’m not done in yet,” Devin protested.

Stuart snorted. “You owe at least three gentlemen of our acquaintance gambling debts, and you know your name will be blackened if you don’t pay them soon. Last night we had to leave by your back door, if you’ll remember, because that damned bill collector was hanging about out front. No need to pay a tradesman, of course—won’t ruin your name. But it’s a damned nuisance, tripping over those fellows all the time.”

Devin sighed. “I know. It’s worse than it was that time Father cut me off. At least then everyone knew I had an inheritance coming when he died. Between gambling and putting people off, I did all right.”

“Not the same now, though. There’s no blunt lying in your future. I’ve experienced it for years—younger son, they know I won’t inherit, never give me an inch. It’s bloody unfair, but there you have it. Tailors are the worst. As if it don’t bring them plenty of other business, my wearing their suits.”

Devin smiled faintly at his friend’s logic. “That’s true. It’s terribly selfish of them to want to get paid.”

“That’s what I told that Goldman chap, but he just kept chattering about payment. Finally had to give him a few guineas to shut him up.” He brightened a little. “Mayhap I’ll pay him off, now that I won that pot.” He stopped, frowning. “But no, there’s that gold-handled cane I saw yesterday—rather spend it on that. What’s the use of paying for something you already have?”

“Good point. I am sure Goldman will understand.”

“Oh, no.” Stuart, not given to sarcasm, especially upon waking, shook his head. “He’ll squawk. I may have to start going to another chap. Pity. Fellow knows how to make the shoulders of my coats exactly as I like them.”

“Padded?”

Stuart rolled his eyes. “Why did you say you came here?”

“The American heiress.”

“Oh, yes. Are you saying you’re thinking of not jumping on the offer?”

“The last thing I want is a wife.”

“Yes. Damned nuisances, usually. Still…hard to argue with having coins in your pocket. What else are you going to do, anyway? You’ve run through your entire fortune. Told me so yourself.”

“Such as it was. The earls of Ravenscar have been improvident for years. Even my father, holy soldier that he was, spent money like water.”

“There you have it. Have to do something to recoup the family fortunes. It’s your duty as an Aincourt and all that. That’s the good thing about being a younger son. Don’t have to worry about family duty much. Usually involves doing something boring, duty does.”

“Yes.” Dev was silent for a moment, then said quietly, “What about your sister?”

“Leona?” Stuart looked at him uncomprehendingly. “What does it have to do with her?”

Dev raised an eyebrow and looked at him pointedly.

“Oh, that. Well, it makes no difference if you’re married, does it? Leona’s shackled to Vesey. Been that way this whole time, hasn’t she? Why shouldn’t you be married, too? This fur trapper’s daughter won’t change anything. Get an heir on her and pack her off to Darkwater and enjoy her money.” He looked up as the door opened and his valet entered with a tray. “Ah, there you are. Set it on the table and fetch my dressing gown. Dev, be a good chap and look in that cabinet. There should be some Irish whiskey in it. Make the coffee palatable.”

“Of course.” Devin went over to the small Oriental cabinet and rummaged about in it until he found a small bottle of whiskey. He didn’t know why he worried about such things, he thought as he pulled out the bottle and added liberal splashes of alcohol to the cups of coffee the valet had poured for them. Stuart, and nearly everyone else he knew, would not give a moment’s thought to marrying this woman. And if they did hesitate, it would be only at the thought of mingling their blue blood with her common sort. Once they were married, he would, of course, have control of her money, and there would be nothing to stop him from leaving her at Darkwater as Stuart suggested, while he went back to his life in London—with Leona. Nor would he be technically disloyal to Leona. She was married, after all. And one could hardly expect him to let the line of Aincourts fail just because he loved a married woman.

It was foolish of him to balk, he told himself. It was scarcely as if he lived the life of an honorable man. He lived, as his father had pointed out many times, among the dregs of polite society, consorting with cardsharps, drunkards and bawdy women. It seemed absurd to hesitate about taking a wife because of his mistress—or because he would undoubtedly make this rustic heiress miserable.

“You’re right, no doubt,” he told Stuart, taking a sip of the liberally laced coffee. His stomach shuddered a little when the strong mixture hit it, but then it calmed, and the rest went down smoothly.

“’Course I am. You going to offer for her?”

“I’m not sure. I told Mother I would meet her. Dinner at Lady Ravenscar’s tonight.”

“Grim.” Stuart made a face at the thought. “Much better go with us. Boly and I are visiting Madame Valencia’s.”

“I am sure a brothel would be more entertaining,” Devin agreed. “But I ought to meet this chit, I suppose.”

“Well, if you don’t offer for her, give me her name,” Stuart told him, grinning. “I’ll take her—squint, bow legs, spotty skin and all. I’m always short of the ready.”

“I shall keep you in mind,” Devin told him gravely, and they settled down to the far more enjoyable business of drinking and discussing a curricle race they had attended the week before.

Miranda leaned closer to her father and whispered in his ear, “I believe this little dinner to meet Lord Ravenscar might have been more of a success if Lord Ravenscar had actually attended it.”

“Now, Miranda, my love,” Joseph said ingratiatingly, “he might still come. It’s only—” he sneaked a glance at his pocket watch “—ten-thirty.”

“The invitation was for nine,” Miranda reminded him. The party had waited for Lord Ravenscar for almost thirty minutes before they went in to eat. But the elaborate, multicourse dinner had now drawn to a close, and the company had retired to the music room, where one of the guests, a blond, rather toothy woman, was butchering Mozart.

“Unless the man was run over by a wagon or something of equal severity,” Miranda went on in a whisper, “he is at the very least excessively rude. Personally, I am putting my money on his not showing at all.”

The female pianist stopped, and everyone applauded graciously. Fortunately, she did not offer to play another piece. Lady Westhampton turned in her seat so that she was facing Miranda and smiled. “Miss Upshaw, I am so sorry,” she said sweetly. “I must apologize for my brother. I cannot imagine what has detained him.”

“From what I have heard about him, I imagine it was a game of cards,” Miranda replied crisply.

“Miranda!” Joseph turned to Rachel. “I beg your pardon, Lady Westhampton. My daughter is not usually so…so…”

“Truthful?” Miranda put in helpfully. “No, I’m afraid that I am, Papa. But I am sorry, Lady Westhampton, if I offended you. I like you a great deal. You are by far the nicest member of the Ton that I have met.”

Rachel smiled. “Thank you, Miss Upshaw. And I have to admit that I understand perfectly your feelings at the moment toward my brother. It is terribly impolite of Devin to be this late.” She looked pained. “You are probably thinking that he will not make an appearance at all, and you may be right. You can see that he needs someone to take him in hand.”

“No doubt he does. However, I am not looking for a husband, let alone one who must be schooled like a child. I came here only because my father was eager for me to meet Lord Ravenscar, and I feel that I have done enough to satisfy my obligation to him. Papa?” She turned to Joseph. “I am ready to take our leave now.”

“Oh, surely, not,” Joseph protested immediately. “Why, there’s, uh…”

“Cards, later, in the drawing room,” Rachel supplied. “I believe Lady Ravenscar promised your father a game of whist.”

“Yes, that’s it. Whist. Quite looking forward to it.”

“Very well, then,” Miranda said reasonably. “I shall take the carriage home and send it back for you later.”

“Please.” Rachel reached out impulsively and took Miranda’s hand. “Can I not persuade you to remain a few minutes longer? My brother is rude, I agree, but he is a good man at heart, I promise you. He is, as you doubtless are, reluctant to enter into this sort of relationship.”

“I must think the more highly of him for that,” Miranda agreed. “However, if he is reluctant and I am reluctant, there seems little purpose in our meeting. No doubt he realized it, and that is why he did not come tonight. But it would be foolish of me indeed to linger here in that case.”

Rachel sighed. Miranda squeezed her hand and smiled. She had liked Lord Ravenscar’s sister from the moment she met her. The young woman had a pensive, lovely face, her big green eyes touched by a hint of sadness, and there was a quiet warmth in her manner that made her seem approachable despite her beauty, and her fashionable hair and attire.

“Lady Westhampton, I truly do like you,” Miranda went on. “And I think more of your brother that he is reluctant to attach himself to any rich woman who comes along. However, like him, I have no desire for this marriage, and it seems quite useless for me to remain.”

“I would so like for him to meet you. Now that I have met you myself, I—I am even more in favor of his marrying you. He is a very charming man, really. You would be bound to like him. And he would be so sur—well, pleased to meet you.”

“Surprised, you started to say?” Miranda asked, a smile curving her mouth. “Why? Did he think I was an untutored rustic?”

Color rose in the other woman’s cheeks. “It’s…well…possible. You see, we didn’t know.” She sighed and raised her hands in a gesture of surrender. “I am sorry. I am making even more of a hash of it. But I admit, I had not expected you to be…so fashionably dressed or to speak so, well, almost like an Englishwoman.”

“My stepmother is English,” Miranda replied. “She always made certain we spoke correctly and behaved politely.”

“Oh, I see.” Rachel colored even more. “Now I feel even more the fool. I—is your stepmother here? I don’t remember meeting her.” Rachel glanced around the room.

“No. She wasn’t feeling quite the thing this evening. She is often a trifle ill, I’m afraid.”

“I’m sorry.” Rachel looked at her for a moment, then said, “Miss Upshaw, may I be quite frank with you, as you were with me a while ago?”

“I prefer it.”

“I am afraid that we seem very different to you, this way we marry for alliances rather than for love. It is somewhat cold, I admit. But that is the way it has long been among us—the aristocracy, I mean. We have a duty to our family, our name, the very house where we were born and all the people who work there, who live there. We are not always able to do as we choose. I, too, married as my parents wished.”

Miranda wondered curiously how that marriage had worked out. She had not met a Lord Westhampton here tonight.

As if seeing Miranda’s thoughts on her face, Rachel added, “You have not met my husband. Lord Westhampton resides at our country estate most of the year.” She hesitated, then went on, “Surely you can see that sometimes it is a necessity to marry well, not to marry as one desires. It seems that you would encounter the same sort of thing in the United States. Your father’s business will need someone to take his place when he dies, will it not? If you did not have a brother or uncle or whoever to run the business, then wouldn’t you feel the obligation to marry someone who could take it over?”

“I have no brother or uncle. But when my father dies, I will take over his business. I will not need a husband to do so.”

Rachel stared at her for a long moment. “You will run it?”

“Yes, of course. There is no one who knows more about it than I. I have been helping my father with his work since I was seven years old and totted down the numbers and prices for furs when he was trading with the trappers. I know the fur business from the ground up, and now that he has sold it to Mr. Astor, frankly, the business that he has now is more my doing than his. I invest the majority of his money for him in real estate and businesses and such.”

“But I—You deprive me of speech, Miss Upshaw. I am amazed.”

“It will be mine one day, mine and Veronica’s. It would seem very foolish not to know all I can about it. Besides, it’s quite a bit more interesting than paying calls all day. Oh! I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to imply…”

“That what I do is useless and boring?” Rachel finished her sentence for her. “Don’t worry. I’m not angry. It’s the simple truth. What I do is rather useless and often boring.” She smiled, a dimple popping into her smooth cheek. “But I am afraid I would not have the slightest idea how to run the estate or how to make money to repair it. And, besides, here it would not be considered proper.”

“Oh, I doubt it is considered proper where I live,” Miranda replied cheerfully. “But if I lived my life by what society matrons considered proper, I would scarcely ever get to do anything I enjoyed. I am not a very proper person, I’m afraid, so you can see that it is just as well that your brother does not marry me, for I would doubtless be forever doing things that would shock everyone.”

Rachel smiled. “But life would be much more entertaining for us.”

“Perhaps.” Miranda smiled back and rose to take her leave.

Lady Ravenscar came over at her daughter’s signal, smiling in her rather stiff way and saying, “Oh, no, you must not leave us so soon, Miss Upshaw. Why, you have not yet met my brother. Rupert…” She turned and gestured toward an older gentleman standing a few feet away. “Do come here and meet Miss Upshaw. This is my brother, Rupert Dalrymple, Miss Upshaw.”

Rupert Dalrymple was an affable gentleman, far more genial than his sister, a trifle portly, with an almost completely bald pate, which he strove to make up for by cultivating a luxuriant white mustache that curved down far past his upper lip. He, too, strove valiantly to convince Miranda to stay, offering card games and more music as amusements and assuring her that his nephew Dev was one who tended to lose track of time—“no insult intended to you, I can assure you”—and would soon appear.

Miranda smiled but stood her ground, and a few minutes later she was outside Lady Ravenscar’s door, waiting for her carriage to pull up in front.

Lady Ravenscar’s house, for all her complaining about its inadequacies, was a pleasant white house of the Queen Anne style, and, while not large, it sat on a crescent-shaped street, the other side of which held a small park, protecting the little street from a larger thoroughfare. After the carriage pulled up and Miranda climbed into it, they drove forward, curving around the crescent and joining the large thoroughfare, empty of traffic at this time of night.

Miranda pulled back the curtain to look out into the night. Most people, she knew, preferred the privacy of the curtains, but on such a pleasant night as this, warm and not rainy, it seemed a shame to sit in a stuffy, enclosed carriage. She would frankly have preferred to walk the few blocks home and enjoy the balmy evening up close, but the sort of soft evening slippers she wore were not made for walking, and, besides, she knew that her stepmother would suffer a collapse at the thought of Miranda walking alone at night amid the dangers of London.

As her driver turned right at the next street and started up the block, Miranda saw a man strolling down the street toward them. He was dressed in elegant evening attire, his hat set at a rakish angle on his head. Miranda noticed that as he walked along, his steps were less than straight. Though he did not stagger or lurch, he was, Miranda decided, definitely “bosky.” There was something about the overly careful way he strode along, his steps meandering first one way and then the other.

A gentleman coming home from his club, she thought, and wondered if he was walking in the hopes that the evening air would sober him up a bit before he had to face his wife. She had noticed the propensity of the aristocracy to drink, but it was a trifle early for a gentleman to be quite this far in his cups. He must have started rather early.

He passed a narrow strip of black that indicated a passageway between two of the houses, and as he did so, three men erupted from the little alley and launched themselves at him. He fell to the ground under their attack, the others on top of him. It was scarcely a fair fight, even if the man under attack had been sober, and Miranda’s innate fairness was aroused. Sticking her head out the window, she shouted at her driver to hurry toward the knot of men.

“But, miss!” the driver exclaimed, shocked. “They’re fighting. You don’t want to—”

“Do as I say,” Miranda replied crisply. “If you favor keeping your job.”

Having driven the Upshaw family for a week now and having a fair idea how things stood with them, the driver did not hesitate to obey Miranda. He shouted to his horse, slapping the reins, and they clattered forward. Miranda glanced around the inside of the carriage for a weapon, and her eye fell upon an umbrella in the corner, kept handy for the inevitable rain. She grabbed it, threw off her light shawl, and, when the carriage pulled to a halt, she opened the carriage door and leapt down, shouting to the driver to follow.

She ran to the knot of men, who were rolling across the sidewalk, punching and kicking. Without hesitation, she raised her umbrella, grasping the shaft with both hands, and brought it down hard, handle side down, onto the back of the nearest assailant. He let out a cry of surprise and pain and whirled around, rising to his knees as he did so. It was a foolish move, for it exposed his front without giving him the leverage of height, and Miranda quickly took advantage of his move. She whipped the umbrella around so that she held the heavy curved handle and thrust it hard into the attacker’s midsection. His initial expression of outrage was quickly followed by one of astonishment upon seeing that it was a well-dressed woman who had hit him and then by one of intense pain as the pointed end of the umbrella poked into his belly.

He rose with a howl of pain and grabbed for the umbrella, but Miranda stepped neatly backward and whacked the umbrella shaft across his outstretched arm. At that moment the carriage driver, having paused to secure his horses, arrived at the fight, carrying the short, thick club that he always kept tucked beneath his seat. He used it now to good effect, bringing it down on the back of Miranda’s opponent’s head just as he managed to grab the other end of Miranda’s umbrella. The ruffian’s eyes rolled up, and he slumped to the ground without a sound.

Meanwhile, the drunken gentleman landed a fist in the gut of the third man, who rolled away, gasping for breath and holding his stomach, while the gentleman was able to pull away and stagger to his feet. He reached down and jerked the man up by the front of his shirt, punching him in the stomach and finishing it with a quick right to the jaw. The man crumpled and went down. The gentleman turned toward the first assailant, as did the coachman. The ruffian, seeing the two of them coming toward him, quickly jumped up and ran off.

The gentleman grinned at the other man’s flight. He dusted off his clothes as he turned to the carriage driver. “My thanks, sir.” His voice was deep and well-modulated, only a slight slurring indicating his inebriation.

He turned past the coachman to face Miranda and stopped, his expression one of comical surprise. “A lady!”

Quickly recovering, he swept her an elegant bow. “My deepest gratitude, madam, for coming to my rescue. You saved my life.”

She had not seen his face clearly before, and now Miranda stared at him, stunned by the jolt of feeling that ran all through her. She was at once breathless, tingling all over, and so giddy she wanted to giggle. The man was undeniably handsome. His thick black hair, tousled from the fight, dangled down over his forehead; that, coupled with the twinkle in his eyes, gave him an undeniably rakish look. His face was strong, with a firm chin and square jaw, and cheekbones that looked sharp enough to cut paper. The almost fierce lines of his face were softened, however, by a full, sensual mouth, curved now into a grin, and by the thick black lashes that framed his eyes. He was tall and leanly muscled, his shoulders inside the black evening suit impressively wide. A red mark blazed on his cheek where one of the men had hit him, and blood trickled down from a split lip, but even those marks could not detract from his appeal.

However, it was not just the fact that he was handsome that made her feel as if she had been hit by a bolt of lightning. She had seen good-looking men before. But never before had she felt that sizzle of excitement, that elemental pull of lust—or the strange, deep connection, as if somehow she knew him. Crazily, the thought that had come into her mind was that this was the man she wanted to marry.

That, of course, was absurd, she knew. It was just a strange quirk of thought. However, he was certainly intriguing. He was unlike any aristocrat she had met so far in Europe or England. He was as handy with his fists as any man she had met among the trappers in the backwoods, and there was an impish humor that gleamed in his eyes. He was dressed fashionably but with none of the extremes of a dandy, and the admirable set of his clothes on his body owed more to the firmness of his muscles than to the padding of shoulders and legs that she had seen on other gentlemen. Obviously surprised to find that he had been rescued by a woman, he had managed not to spoil his thanks with any remark about the impropriety of her doing so.

“You seemed handy enough with your fists,” she replied, glad to find that her voice came out more casually than she felt.

“They caught me unaware, however, and, I confess, not at my best.” Again the charming smile lit his face, encouraging her to smile back. “I am fortunate that you were gallant enough to stop.”

“I could scarcely drive by when there were three of them to your one,” Miranda pointed out. “Hardly fair.”

“Indeed. I think that was the idea.”

“Did you know them, sir?” the coachman asked, going over to one of the unconscious men and peering down into his face. “Aright vicious-lookin’ one, this ‘un.”

“No, I’ve never seen them before.” The man shrugged. “No doubt they were simply thieves hiding in wait for the first person to happen by.”

“Not usually an area for thieves,” the coachman remarked, glancing around at the expensive houses on both sides of the street.

“No,” the man agreed without much interest. “They must be growing bolder.”

He dusted off his coat again, without much success. “I am afraid my valet will be quite perturbed to see what I have done to his careful work.”

“You are bleeding,” Miranda observed, fishing her lace-trimmed handkerchief out of her pocket and stepping forward to wipe away the blood that trickled down from his mouth.

It was unnerving to stand this close to him. She could feel the heat of his body, smell the liquor on his breath. Miranda looked up into his face. She could not see the color of his eyes in this dim light, but they were warm and compelling…and, at the moment, somewhat unfocused. He swayed a little, and Miranda grabbed his arm to steady him.

“Sir? Are you all right? Beldon…” she called to the coachman, and he came up to close his large hand around the man’s other arm.

“Yes. Yes, I’m fine. Just a moment’s dizziness, that’s all.”

“Perhaps you ought to let us take you home,” Miranda suggested. “My carriage is right there.”

“Miss…” the driver said warningly.

“Yes, yes, I know,” Miranda said impatiently. “It wouldn’t be the thing for me to give a stranger a ride. But I don’t think he is going to harm me. I mean, really…”

“You are a woman of warmth and courage,” the gentleman said, “but you need not worry. I can make it without help. I am only going another block or so, to my mother’s.” He looked in the direction from which Miranda had come, then frowned and said, “Well, perhaps not. I am a trifle late. I fear I stayed too long with my friends. And in this condition…But it isn’t far back to my house, either. I shall be fine.”

“I insist on driving you. You have received some blows to the head, I warrant, and even with a hard head, that is bound to affect you.”

He smiled faintly at her jest. “Perhaps you are right. I must admit, it is beginning to pound—though I’m not entirely sure if that is due to fists or to too much brandy.”

He went with them to the carriage, but, agreeing with the driver that it would not be seemly for the lady to ride with a stranger, he opted to climb up beside the coachman. They drove the few blocks to the address he gave them, and as she rode in the carriage, Miranda considered the situation. He had said he was going to his mother’s and had pointed in the direction of Lady Ravenscar’s house. Could the man she had rescued be the man she had been supposed to meet tonight? Was it possible that this handsome, rather charming man who was good with his fists was the Earl of Ravenscar? It made sense. And his state of inebriation would certainly explain his tardiness, as well as match what she had heard of him. And Elizabeth had said he was charming and handsome—though mere words could not convey the intensity of his roguish appeal. There had been a strange moment when her entire being had thrilled to him, when she had thought that she belonged with him…This was the sort of man who could make a woman forget all else.

They came to a stop in front of his house: a small, graceful abode in the fashionable district, just the sort of house a bachelor of means and name might live in. The gentleman climbed down with the coachman’s help, and Miranda opened the door of the carriage and leaned out.

“Good night, sir.” She was reluctant to let him go, she found, another odd sensation for her. If only she knew if he was the Earl of Ravenscar… But she did not want to introduce herself to him. If he was Ravenscar, she did not want him to know that she was the heiress he had spent the evening drinking to avoid.

“Madam.” He bowed again, but she noticed that he was rather more unsteady now. “You are an angel from heaven.”

“That is a rather large exaggeration, but I thank you,” Miranda replied wryly.

He turned and made his weaving way up the steps of the house. A moment later, the door opened, and he went inside.

“Let’s go home, Beldon,” Miranda said, and the carriage rolled forward.

As she drove home, her thoughts circled around the man she had just rescued. Was he Ravenscar? And what would have happened if he had not been late to the party tonight? One thing she was certain of: if this man had been there, she would not have left early.

3

“Good evening, sir.” Carson, Devin’s valet, opened the door. He took in his employer’s disarray, more alarmed by the rumpled cravat and the rent in his coat than by the marks of fighting on Ravenscar’s face. “I say, my lord, are you all right? Did something happen?”

“Bit of a dustup,” Devin admitted. “A cold cloth for my face would be nice.”

“Of course, sir.” The servant hurried off to do his bidding.

Devin sighed and ran his hand back through his hair. He wondered if it had been simple thieves, as he had assured his fair rescuer. The coachman was right in saying that it wasn’t an area where thieves and ruffians were wont to linger. There were one or two of his creditors whom he would not be surprised to find were behind the attack. He suspected that if his rescuers had not routed the fellows, they might have told him to pay up if he didn’t want more of the same.

He would have to be more careful now…perhaps carry his little pistol, though that would mar the line of his coat. Carson would protest.

His thoughts wandered to his rescuers, and he smiled to himself. What an odd sort of woman! He had been somewhat distracted by his own fight, but he was almost sure that she had waded right into the melee and whacked one of the miscreants with her umbrella. A pretty thing, too. He wished the light had been better—and his vision not so impaired by alcohol. Her hair had been brown, and he had been unable to determine the color of her eyes, but they had been large and bright, and she had had a merry, laughing mouth. He remembered more distinctly the generous curve of her breasts above the neckline of her evening gown. He remembered, too, the unmistakable response of his body when he looked at her.

He wondered if she was a member of the demimonde. She had spoken and dressed like a lady, but he could not imagine any lady of his acquaintance wading into a fight like that. And there had been something odd about her speech. He could not quite put his finger on it, but there had been a certain inflection that was not quite right. Perhaps she had taught herself to speak like a lady, and an attractive bird of paradise could easily have a carriage and dress well. It would explain the actions, so unlike a woman of aristocratic breeding.

He toyed with the idea of trying to find out the woman’s name. She intrigued him. In general, Leona didn’t squawk about his brief dalliances with other women. She knew that he would never stray far. But, he remembered with a sigh, there was the lowering thought of the state of his finances. He could never hope to lure some ladybird from her obviously generous patron when his own pockets were to let. And the way to remedy that lay back at his mother’s house where, he suspected, he was something of a persona non grata at the moment.

His failure to appear tonight was something that could be remedied, he supposed, with some effort on his part, but, as always, he rebelled at the thought. Something inside him quailed at the idea of spending the rest of his life shackled to a woman for whom he felt at best indifference…and, at worst, active dislike. He had seen enough loveless marriages made for the sake of name and family—including that of his own parents, not to mention Rachel’s and Leona’s—to know that he did not want that state for himself. He was not, he hoped, such a romantic fool as to wish for love in a marriage—or, at least, he had not been for many years. However, he was fairly sure that it was better not to marry at all than to live in the sort of quiet loneliness that was Rachel’s and Westhampton’s lot.

Carson returned, carrying a cool, damp cloth on a small silver tray. Devin took the cloth and held it against the cut on his lip, remembering as he did so the way the woman tonight had wiped away his blood with her handkerchief. He could smell again the faint scent of roses that had clung to the lace-trimmed cotton. He wondered if she, too, smelled of roses.

“A note arrived for you tonight, sir,” Carson said and went over to the small table in the foyer, where another small salver held a square white piece of paper, folded over and sealed. “Ravenscar” was all that was written on the front, in the bold, loopy handwriting that he recognized instantly as Leona’s.

A familiar sense of anticipation snaked through him as he took the note from the tray Carson offered him. He split the seal and unfolded the note.

Darling,

Tonight after midnight. I have a surprise for you.

It was a message typical of Leona—brief, unsigned and faintly mysterious—and it immediately wiped out all thoughts of the woman he had met earlier this evening.

“What time is it, Carson?”

“Why, a bit after eleven, I believe.”

“Good. We have enough time. I need to clean up before my visitor arrives.”

Both of them knew who that visitor was, but neither would, of course, say it aloud. His relationship with Leona existed behind a veil of secrecy, however flimsy that veil might be. Though every gossip in London society knew about them and whispered about their long-standing affair behind their backs, it was still only gossip and not proven fact as long as they maintained their secrecy. Lord Vesey did not care what his wife did—they went their own ways quite happily—as long as he was not subjected to public ridicule.

So, as it had been for many years, Devin saw Leona only now and then in public—perhaps making one of her party at the theater or opera, or attending a ball to which she was also invited—never by a word or gesture indicating that she was anything other than a friend. He did not go to her house except when he went with her brother Stuart. They met late at night when she left her house or whatever party she was attending and, thoroughly hidden in a hooded cloak, took a hack to his house, slipping around the side and entering through the garden door. At those times, he waited for her by the fire in his bedroom as he would tonight, a glass of brandy on the small table before him, his pulse thrumming with expectation.

There were evenings when she did not come. One never knew with Leona—it was one of the things that kept any relationship with her from becoming mundane. Sometimes she could not get away. And sometimes she simply liked to keep matters unsettled. Over the years, Devin had reached the point where her absences no longer drove him nearly mad, but he had never been able to quite get rid of the prickle of jealousy, the thought that she had not come because of some other man—her husband, who, despite their avowed disinterest in each other, still had first call on her, or perhaps a new swain, some fresh-faced lad who hoped to attract the attention of the most desirable lady in London. Earlier in his career, Devin had settled matters with one or two of them. His blood no longer ran so hot or so fast, but still, the thought of her being with another man, even just to talk, carried a sting.

The secrecy and mystery, that sting of jealousy, the uncertainty of their rendezvous, all had served to keep alive the excitement of their affair through the years that they had known each other.

He took the stairs two at a time, his valet trailing after him, and went to his room. It did not take him long to clean up, and even though Carson was meticulous to the point of irritation about his ascot being tied just so, he was also nimble-fingered about it, and so, several minutes before midnight, he was once again impeccably dressed and groomed. He sent Carson off to bed and settled down before his fire to wait, pouring himself a small snifter of brandy.

He had a good deal of time to wait. It was almost one o’clock before there was the soft scrape of a shoe outside in the hall and the door to his room opened. Devin rose to his feet as a woman slipped inside. She closed the door behind her and turned to him, reaching up slowly to push the hood back from her face. As many times as it had happened this way, his pulse still beat a little faster. Leona looked at him, a faint smile hovering about her lips.

She was aptly named, Devin had always thought, with her tawny golden hair, rounded, sherry-gold eyes, and lioness spirit. Leona was a wild creature, barely tamed by the rules and strictures of English society. She paid them lip service and nothing more, in private going her own way.

Devin had met her when he was eighteen and first came to London from his father’s estate. The world had opened up to him then, the sophistication of the city replacing the stultifying life he had known at Darkwater. Instead of his father’s prayers and moralizing, there had been gambling and boon companions and late nights spent in clubs and taverns. Instead of daily lessons, there had been hours of time to do with as he wanted. And instead of boring country misses, there had been…Leona.

He first saw her at a ball at Lady Atwater’s. She had been wearing a dress made of gold tissue that clung to her every curve, and her skin had gleamed in the candlelight, her eyes reflecting the glitter of her dress. He had wanted her with a rush of lust he had never before experienced. She had played him like the green lad that he was. Looking back on it, Devin could see that, but, these years removed, the fact that she had done so only amused him. He had stumbled all over himself, trying to get her into his bed, but she had teased and eluded him for over a year, rejecting him until he was on the verge of giving up, then subtly sparking his desire into flame again with a look, an accidental brush of her bosom against his arm, a quick kiss in the garden.

His pursuit of the married Lady Vesey had been a scandal, of course—one of the many scandalous things he had done in Town that brought down his disapproving father’s wrath, driving an ever-widening wedge between the two of them. But he had not cared for scandal. Most of the things he enjoyed in life, he found, were a scandal. As Leona had pointed out to him, he and she were not like other people.

“Hello, Dev,” Leona said in her distinctive, throaty voice.

“Leona.” Devin strolled over to her, his eyes roaming over her face and down her throat to her chest, where the full globes of her breasts swelled up over the neckline of her dress. Leona, like some of the other “wild” set of ladies, often dampened her thin dresses, so that they clung to her voluptuous body more tightly. Tonight he could see the dark circles of her nipples through the thin material of her virginally white muslin dress, and his loins tightened in response. Trust Leona to dress like a maiden making her debut, yet somehow manage to look like a wanton.

He bent and brushed his lips against hers. “You are looking lovely tonight.”

It amazed him sometimes how well she had kept her looks. He did not know the hours and expense that were put into creams and cosmetics and hennas. Nor had he realized that in the past two or three years, he had almost never seen Leona in full daylight, their times together kept to evenings lit by softening candlelight.

He cupped his hand beneath her breast and trailed his thumb across her nipple, so that it hardened and pointed. “Did you wear this to a party?”

“Yes. Nearly caused a riot at Lady Blanchette’s soiree—or at least one would think so, from the freezing way she talked to me. But the men all seemed to enjoy it.”

“I am sure they did.” He chuckled, and his hands dropped to her waist, pulling her to him for a kiss. He winced slightly as their lips touched, and Leona drew back.

She looked up into his face, her eyes going to his lip. “What happened? Does it hurt?”

He shrugged. “Some men jumped me, but I got away. It bled a little, but it’s all right.”

Leona’s eyes darkened seductively, and she went up on tiptoe until her lips were only a breath away from his. “I never minded a little taste of blood,” she murmured, and her tongue flicked out to run across his lips.

He pulled her hard against him and buried his mouth in hers. After a long, thorough kiss, he released her. Leona leaned back, looking seductively up into his face. “Mmm. I have a surprise for you tonight,” she purred.

His loins tightened. “Do you?” Leona’s surprises were always sensual delights, worth the teasing she usually insisted upon before revealing them. “A pleasant one, I hope.”

“Most pleasant.” She smiled, walking her fingers down his chest. She hooked her hand in the waistband of his trousers, then pushed him away from her. “But first, I think, a bit of brandy would be in order.”

“Of course.” He had learned to enjoy Leona’s cat-and-mouse games, enjoying the mounting pleasure and anticipation, even the frustration, knowing that it would lead to intense pleasure. He turned away easily and poured her a glass of brandy.

She took the snifter from him and gestured to him to sit down in the chair. He did so, and she took a seat on his lap, turning sideways. She sipped at her drink, then set it aside. She began to play idly with the buttons of his shirt, undoing them slowly one by one and slipping her hands in between the edges of his shirt.

“I heard about your American heiress,” she said after a moment, tweaking one of his nipples.

“What? I don’t have an heiress, American or otherwise.”

“I heard differently. It was all the talk at Lady Blanchette’s. The daughter of a clothier, I believe.”

“He deals in furs.” Devin smiled. “Jealous, my love?”

“Me? Jealous of a fur trader’s daughter?” Leona asked scornfully. “Hardly. Interested, more like. Does she really want to marry you?”

“According to my mother, the father is panting for it. Wants to get his hands on an earl’s estate.” Devin picked up Leona’s discarded drink from the small table beside the chair and drank from it. “They are, apparently, swimming in money. They could save Darkwater.”

“Oh, Darkwater.” Leona dismissed the estate with a wave of her hand. “They could save us.”

“Save us?” Devin looked at her, a trifle taken aback by her words.

“Yes. From financial ruin.” Leona stretched, arching her back so that her breasts thrust even more boldly against the sheer material of her dress. Then she slipped her hand inside Devin’s shirt and let her hand roam freely over his chest as she talked. “Vesey says he refuses to pay any more of my gambling debts. He says Croesus himself could not keep up with my spending habits.” Her fingers settled on his nipple, caressing and squeezing it, circling it teasingly. “I reminded him that I scarcely married him for his charming manner. He was to supply the funds, and I would provide the veil for his, uh, true sexual proclivities. But he said that no amount of behavior on his part could possibly be worth the amount of money I waste.”

Leona’s full mouth settled into a luscious pout. “Do you think this dress is a waste?” She stroked her fingertips across the neckline of her dress.

“Not on you,” he replied, his eyes following the movement of her fingers. His hand slid up her body to cup her breast and caress it, his eyes glittering with desire as he watched her nipple tighten in response to his touch.

“But, then, nothing over fourteen attracts Vesey’s notice,” Leona added with a shrug. “I mean, really…I find a schoolboy exciting now and then—there is something quite stimulating about that wide-eyed eagerness. But as a steady diet?” She shook her head. “But I am straying from the subject.” She stretched up to brush her lips against his. “We were talking about your American heiress.”

“I told you, she’s not my American heiress,” Devin responded. “I have no desire to marry her.”

“Of course you don’t. Don’t be silly. Who would want to marry some boring little chit from the back of beyond? But…needs must.”

“’Needs must?’” Devin repeated in some astonishment. His hand went up to cup her chin, tilting her face so that she had to look into his eyes. “Are you saying you think I should marry this girl?”

“Of course,” Leona replied reasonably. “What else are you going to do? What else are we going to do? Much as I love the taste of you, my pet, we cannot live on it. We need money to survive. You haven’t a cent. You told me what your uncle said the last time you asked about the estate. It loses money and has for years. Your funds have long since been depleted. What are you going to do—take up clerking?”

“I know how little money I have,” Devin growled. “Everyone has been kind enough to remind me of it. Certainly marriage would solve that problem. But then I would have a wife.”

“A minor inconvenience, surely.” Leona waved her hand airily, dismissing the problem. “Many men have wives, and one would scarcely know it. Send the boring little colonial off to Darkwater and let her live there. No doubt she will be quite happy living there—she’s spent her whole life in a backwater, after all. She wants to be Lady Ravenscar, and she will have that. She will have her little ‘domain,’ and the poor naive creature will probably think she is living the life of the Ton. Heavens, Dev, I doubt she would be able to live anywhere except immured at Darkwater. She probably can’t keep up a minute’s conversation on any topic but housekeeping or some such thing, and she would be lost trying to determine what to do with an oyster fork. Can you imagine taking the chit out into Society? Let your mother take her to Darkwater and oversee her education.”

“Perhaps that is not the life she imagines,” Devin pointed out. He stood up abruptly, setting Leona aside. “What if she wants to live in London and foist herself on Society in all her rustic glory?” Devin asked. “Am I to endure my wife making a laughingstock of the Aincourt name?”

“Don’t be absurd. What will it matter what she wants? Once you are married to her, her money is yours. You are her husband, her lord and master. She will do as you say.”

“Mmm. No doubt just as you do what your lord and master says.”

“How absurd—to compare me with a fur trapper’s daughter.” Leona laughed, her rather short upper lip pulling back charmingly over white, even teeth. “Really, Dev, you make me laugh.”

“I am glad you find it so amusing,” Devin replied sourly. “I thought you, of all people, would not urge me to marry this chit. Does it bother you not at all to think of my having a wife? Of my bedding her and producing heirs?”

“Really, Dev, don’t be so plebian. Your getting a few puling brats on some insipid cow has nothing to do with us. What could it possibly matter?” She went to him, sliding her arms about his waist and leaning her head upon his chest. “I can remember more than once when you have had another woman…even at the same time. As I remember, we both found that rather stimulating.”

“It was a different matter altogether,” he said gruffly, his mind involuntarily going back to the debauched evening she had mentioned. His loins stirred at the memory. “I did not marry the other woman. I had no obligation to her, no ties beyond money.”

“And what binds you to this one besides money?” Leona returned. She slid her hands down the small of his back and onto his buttocks, digging in with her fingertips. “Come, enough talk. I think it is time for my surprise, don’t you?”

He bent and kissed her in agreement. Leona slipped out of his arms and went to the door. She opened it and stuck her head out, then came back in. A moment later, a figure wrapped in a hooded cloak entered the room. The person was small; he assumed from the stature that it was a woman. The only other noticeable thing about her was that her dainty feet were small, tanned and bare.

As he was taking in this unusual fact, Leona closed and locked the door into the hall and came back to Devin. She took his hand and led him to the bed. Taking off their shoes, they climbed onto the high bed, where Leona directed him to lie on his side. She snuggled up behind him, propping herself up on her elbow so that she could see.

The cloaked woman padded over to the side of the bed, taking up a place a few feet away from them. She untied the cloak and pulled it off, revealing herself as a small dark woman dressed in a brief top that covered only her breasts and loose trousers made of gauzy material that gathered at her ankles. Slender gold chains hung at her bare waist and around her neck, and looped across the narrow top. Tiny bells hung in a row around the hem of the top and across the waistband of her trousers. They dangled from a ribbon braided into her thick black hair, and on bracelets and anklets. With every movement they tinkled musically. Over her flimsy garments were wrapped a multitude of colorful scarves, all of the same flimsy material. Just looking at her sent a jolt of desire through Devin’s loins.

She looked downward almost shyly as she raised her arms above her head and began to click her fingers together, making a rhythmic metallic sound with tiny cymbals. Then her hips began to move in an undulating motion, setting up the jangle of the bells. She began to dance, her feet and hips moving rhythmically. She moved in a small space, swaying and writhing and twisting.

“Stirring, isn’t she?” Leona whispered into his ear, her breath sending shivers through him. She took the edge of his ear between her teeth and worried at it gently. While the girl danced, Leona’s hand slipped beneath the open sides of his shirt and began to roam his chest, and the combination of the erotic sight and Leona’s touch made the pulse begin to roar in his head.

The girl danced on, her hips pumping, breasts jiggling, setting all the tinny bells dancing, punctuated by the rhythmic clicking of the cymbals on her fingers. And Leona stroked him, her fingers teasing over his chest and stomach, then down over the cloth of his trousers. She let out a low, throaty laugh at the tumescence pressing against the fabric.

“Would you like more?” Leona breathed against his ear. “Perhaps you want to see her more clearly?” Raising up a little, she clapped once sharply.

The dark-haired dancer reached up, never stopping the movement of her hips, and detached one scarf. She let it fall, drifting slowly down over her legs to puddle at her feet. Slowly, as she twisted and turned, undulating to the rhythm of her cymbals, she undid the scarves one by one.

Devin watched her undress, his breath rasping in his throat, the heat rising in him, as Leona caressed him, her hand slipping beneath his trousers to wrap around him.

“Mmm,” she murmured. “Still hard as you were as a lad. I like that.” Her tongue flicked out and traced the whorls of his ear, sending a long shudder through him. “What does it matter if you take a wife when we will still have this? Who cares if some peasant from the colonies can claim to be your wife? Go to Darkwater once a year and bed her for an heir, then return to me…and all the pleasures you are used to.”

“Leona…” Devin let out a laugh of disbelief and turned to look her in the face. “I cannot believe that even you—you are seducing me into asking another woman to marry me.”

“I am asking you to make it possible for us to continue as we always have,” Leona snapped back, her eyes flashing. “I told you Vesey is limiting me to a paltry allowance. If my lover, too, is without funds…”

His eyes narrowed. “Are you threatening to take another lover? He won’t last long if I call him out.”

“Don’t be absurd. I would do what I had to. Because you refuse to do what you should.”

“Dammit, Leona, if you dare…”

“I wouldn’t replace you, darling. You would always have a place in my bed. I would simply have to give you less time.”

“Christ! You talk like a whore.” He pulled away from her, rising to his feet.

The dancing girl stopped and stepped back uncertainly, her eyes going up to Devin’s suddenly stony face.

“Oh, Dev, stop acting like a spoiled child.” Leona slipped off the bed, too, making a quick motion with her hand to the dancer to continue.

The woman began to dance again. Leona walked over to her and, as the girl slowly undulated, she slid her hand over the other girl’s chest, now slick with perspiration, and unfastened another of the scarves. Leona looked up at Devin, her face challenging, her eyes lit sensually. “Come, Dev, my love, you know what I am. I have never pretended to be anything else.”

As she talked, she caressed the other woman’s body, setting scarf after scarf adrift, until the woman was clothed only in the sheer pants, brief top and delicate gold chains. “I am wicked,” Leona went on. “And so are you. You enjoy this, just as I do. Just as you enjoy all the things we do—things no decent person enjoys.”

He watched her, no more able to look away from the erotic scene than he was to suppress the hot pulsation in his manhood. His eyes were glued to Leona’s nimble fingers as they unfastened the top and pulled it away, leaving only the gold chains draped over the woman’s small tanned breasts. She caressed the woman’s breasts delicately, circling each nipple with her forefinger.

“Don’t you want to take her now, Dev?” Leona purred. “Don’t you want to drive yourself into her? I’d like to see it. You’d like me to watch, wouldn’t you? Do you think that’s normal? It’s wicked. Wicked, the way you and I are.”

With an abrupt, fierce movement, she jerked at the waistband of the sheer harem trousers, opening them, and let them fall down to the dancer’s feet. “What do you think, Dev? Will you take her?” She stepped away from the woman. “Or would you rather take me?”

She unbuttoned the front of her dress and peeled it back, revealing her breasts, firm and full, centered by large dark nipples, pointed with desire. She pushed the dress back off her shoulders and let it fall to the floor, revealing her naked body beneath. Running her hands provocatively down her body, she looked at him, arching one brow.

“Well, Dev, do you want me? Or maybe you want both of us. Or are you too pious, like your father?”

“Damn you,” he growled, reaching out and pulling her to him. “You know I want you.”

Leona smiled and rubbed her body against his. “Then admit it. Admit that you are wicked. You don’t give a damn about that silly American chit or whether she enjoys living at Darkwater. You don’t give a damn about the Aincourt name. Not as long as you can have plenty of money. And this.” She looped one leg around his, rubbing herself suggestively against him. “Well, Dev, do you?”

“You know I don’t,” he replied thickly, swinging her up into his arms and dropping her none too gently on the bed. “You’re right. We’re steeped in sin,” he said as he unbuttoned his trousers and peeled them off. “And I will marry the damned heiress, if that is what you want.”

4

Miranda settled her spectacles on her nose and suppressed her sigh. For once, the accounts in front of her bored her past speaking. She had been feeling faintly blue all day. She knew that the feeling had to do with the stranger she had met last night. The more she thought about it, the more she was convinced that the man who had been attacked was the very man whom her father had wanted her to meet. It should have been a fortuitous thing that that man had turned out to be the first man who had sparked her interest since she had been in England. Instead, it was rather depressing, since it was clear that he obviously was so set against her that he had not even been willing to attend his mother’s party to meet her. Of course, she had felt pretty much the same, so she could hardly hold it against the man. In fact, it showed that he was not the weak, shallow sort that she had assumed him to be. However, she could not help but feel a trifle miffed, no matter how silly she told herself that was.

She would never admit such a thing to anyone, of course. Indeed, she had not even told her father that she thought she had actually met the elusive Earl of Ravenscar the night before. If he knew that she had found his candidate for a husband in any way intriguing, he would never let up his campaign to get her to marry the man. And, of course, she had no intention of doing anything like that, no matter how attractive she had found the earl. She still felt the same way. She could never marry a man whom she did not love. She wanted the kind of marriage her father and Elizabeth had—they had been devoted to one another from the day they met. And while she certainly was not the sort of dependent, clinging female that her stepmother was, she wanted to experience that same sort of firm, long-standing feeling.

She wanted her eyes to shine every time she saw her husband the way that her father’s did whenever Elizabeth came into the room. She wanted to miss him when he was away and greet him with unfeigned delight when he returned, the way she had seen Elizabeth do with her father. Otherwise, what use was marriage? She could do very well on her own without a husband. She was used to taking care of things herself, and she had an ample fortune. She did not need to marry the way most women did, and she certainly did not feel, as Lady Westhampton had said about herself, that she must marry out of duty to her family. She might want to please her father, but it would not harm him or the Upshaw name if she did not.

She had told herself that she was being uncharacteristically foolish about the matter of the man she had rescued last night, and so, after picking her way through her breakfast, she had decided to spend the remainder of the day doing something useful—as well as something that usually kept her thoroughly engrossed. So she had pulled her hair back into a plain, no-nonsense bun and slipped into one of the older, much washed sacque dresses that she was accustomed to wearing when she did the accounts or wrote business letters. She was far too likely to get splotches and smudges of ink on her clothes when she worked to wear one of her nicer dresses. Then she had gone downstairs to the study, put on the small round spectacles that she wore when she did close work, and settled down to work with her father’s assistant, Hiram Baldwin.

Much to her dismay, she had found that she could not seem to shake her mood. Worse, she could not get interested in the sheets of numbers that Hiram had laid out before her. Usually she and Hiram shared an abiding interest in financial dealings, but today his voice droned on unmercifully, and she found her attention wandering back to the events of the evening before. Time and again she had to pull her mind back and apply it to the business at hand.

It was something of a relief when the door opened early in the afternoon and her father bustled in, grinning from ear to ear. Miranda smiled back at him; it was difficult not to, when her father smiled like that. Besides, she was more than ready to have a legitimate reason to be distracted from her work.

“Hello, Papa,” she greeted him. “You certainly look like the cat that ate the canary.”

“Indeed?” Her father’s grin grew even broader. “Well, I have every reason to be, my girl. I’ve been talking with a gentleman, and it seems he would like to pay his addresses to you. I told him I was amenable to it, of course.”

“What?” Miranda jumped to her feet. “What are you talking about? What gentleman? Papa, what have you done? If you have found some other puffed-up nobleman to try to shackle me to, I swear I’ll—”

“No, no,” Joseph hastened to assure her. “It’s no new gentleman. It’s the same gentleman. Lord Ravenscar.”

Miranda stared. “What? Here?” Her hand flew to her hair. She must look like a fright! Her hair was not arranged becomingly at all, and the dress she wore was so old and outmoded that she was embarrassed to be seen in it. “Papa! No! I can’t—he mustn’t.”

“Pish-posh, girl,” Joseph replied cheerfully. “I’ve already told him he could speak to you. Wouldn’t be polite to send him packing now. Won’t take but a minute.” He turned and walked toward the door. “Come, Hiram, you and I had better leave the girl alone.”

Hiram, with a single puzzled glance at Miranda, who was standing as if turned to stone, stuck his pen back into the inkwell and followed his employer out the door.

“No, wait!” Miranda hurried toward the door. She couldn’t let Ravenscar see her like this! But she had not even reached the doorway when it was filled by a large, well-dressed gentleman.

Miranda’s first thought was that she had been right. The man standing before her, handsome and tall, was the same man whom she had helped to escape his attackers last night. Her second thought was to wonder what had happened to all that man’s charm.

This man’s face was faintly bored and settled into lines of aristocratic hauteur. He was handsome, certainly, and his figure was slim and well-muscled in his perfectly tailored clothes, but the green eyes held no laughter or excitement now as they flickered coldly around the room and settled on her briefly.

“Miss Upshaw,” he drawled as he made an elegant bow in her direction.

“Lord Ravenscar,” Miranda replied in a tone as cool and distant as his face. She wondered if the excitement of the evening before had addled her brain that she had been drawn to this man. The Earl of Ravenscar seemed to be like every other arrogant nobleman she had met—if not worse.

Devin glanced at Miranda again. He hated being here. It was humiliating, degrading. It grated at his soul to be reduced to this—for however Leona or his mother or Rachel might phrase it, it still boiled down to his selling himself for this woman’s money. It was proof, he knew, of just how low he had sunk. Well, as Leona had pointed out, he was in the mire now, had been for years; he might as well wallow in it.

Still, it was hard for him to do. He had felt shamed as he had spoken to the girl’s father; he felt even more so now, facing the girl herself. But he had enough pride left that he would not allow them to see the way the humiliation scored his soul. His family, he reminded himself, had walked and talked with kings; he was not about to let some fur trapper or his daughter see him humbled. He lifted his chin and cast another look at the homely creature before him.

She was much as he had imagined her: dowdy in an old-fashioned, rather shapeless dress, her hair skinned back into an unfashionable bun, a pair of spectacles perched on her nose. She was without mistake a spinster, a plain woman who would be married only for her money. No doubt her speech and manners would be just as bad as her looks—a grating American accent and no idea what to do or say in polite company.

His eyes skimmed away again as fast as they had settled on her. He could not bear to look at her as he did this, so he fixed his gaze on a point just over her left shoulder and began his speech. “Miss Upshaw, I have asked your father’s permission to pay my addresses to you, and he graciously gave it to me.” He drew a breath and plunged on. “It would give me great pleasure if you would do me the honor of consenting to be my wife.”

He paused, waiting. Miranda stared at him for a long moment, scarcely able to believe what she had heard. She was so furious, she could hardly make a coherent sentence.

Finally, flatly, she said, “No.”

His mouth dropped open comically, and for the first time he stared straight at her. “What?”

His look of astonishment was so great that Miranda let out a giggle. “I said, ‘No,’ Lord Ravenscar,” she repeated.

“You are refusing me?” Not only that, the silly cow had the nerve to laugh at him!

“Yes, I am.”

“Good God, woman!” he burst out. “I hope you don’t think that you are going to receive a better offer!”

“My dear sir,” Miranda said crisply, “any offer would be better than the one you just made me.”

She whipped off her spectacles and strode forward until she was standing only a foot away from him. She looked pugnaciously up into his face. “I have never heard a more graceless speech in my entire life. I can assure you that there is not a woman on earth who would marry you if you approached her like that. Who do you think you are? Do you think that any woman would just fall down in gratitude before you because you had decided to let her be your wife? You are the rudest, most arrogant man I have ever had the misfortune to meet, and I would rather live and die alone than to tie myself to the likes of you!”

Dev looked down into the wide gray eyes, snapping with fury, and he had the second great surprise of the afternoon. “You! Why, you are the woman who—”

“Yes,” Miranda replied crisply. “I am the woman who saved your unworthy hide last night. If you were not so thoroughly arrogant and conceited, no doubt you would have realized it sooner. And I can tell you that I am rapidly regretting that I made the effort. A drubbing at the hands of those ruffians would probably have done you a world of good. Indeed, I am inclined to think that perhaps they were hired by some other woman who you insulted with a marriage proposal.”

“Insulted!” Devin exclaimed, fury surging up in him. He wasn’t sure what annoyed him more—this woman’s disdain, or the fact that his body remembered quite suddenly and vividly the desire that had stirred in his loins last night when he had looked at her. “You dare to say that I insulted you by asking you to marry me? I am the sixth Earl of Ravenscar. I can trace my bloodlines back to the twelfth century. I dare swear you would be hard put to know who your grandfather was.”

“That is a colossally foolish argument,” Miranda said dispassionately. “Everyone’s ancestors go back that far. The fact that you know the names of yours means nothing except that your family kept good records. The Lord only knows what sort of man your ancestor was—he may very well have been the most evil fellow around. And it certainly doesn’t mean anything about your character. That is something that you make yourself, and from the things I have heard, you have not done a very good job of it.”

“You dare—” Ravenscar looked at her through narrowed eyes. “Good God, if you were a man, I’d call you out for that.” He moved even closer, glaring down into her face.

“Another supremely silly thing to bring up, since I obviously am not,” Miranda pointed out, standing her ground. She was not about to let him intimidate her by looming over her this way. Her temper was up, and she was enjoying herself. This man deserved to be taken down a peg or two, and she was quite happy to be the one to do so. Lifting her chin defiantly, she glared back at him, only inches away from his face.

“You impudent little—” Ravenscar broke off his words, and suddenly his hands went around her arms like steel. He jerked her up and into him, and his mouth came down on hers.

Miranda stood stock-still for a moment, unable to move. She had never been treated like this before in her life, handled so roughly or kissed so thoroughly. No other man would have had the arrogance—or the courage. Indignation shot through her. But at the same time, every fiber in her being thrilled to the sensations that coursed through her. His mouth was hot and demanding, and the taste of it intoxicated her. His lips pressed into hers, fervent, velvety, searing. Then his tongue was in her mouth, invading her. A tremor of excitement shot through her, a vibration that sizzled down every nerve ending in her body in a way that she had never experienced—indeed, had never even imagined existed.

An ache started low in her abdomen, warm and pulsing, insistent. She sagged against him, lost in the heat and pleasure, her anger and indignation burned away by the desire that swept through her. Her breasts felt full and soft, the nipples prickling with longing, and she was aware that she wanted to feel his hands on them, to have him touch her everywhere. She shuddered, her moan swallowed by his voracious mouth.

Then, suddenly, shockingly, his mouth was gone from hers. He pulled back and looked down into her passion-softened face. His eyes glittered, green as glass.

“There,” he muttered huskily, his hands falling away from her arms. “Now you know what you could have had but were too much a fool to take.”

His caustic words cut through the haze of pleasure, and Miranda’s spine stiffened. Anger and a fierce self-dislike seized her. She lifted her hand and slapped him hard.

“Get out,” she snapped. “Get out of this house, and never show your face here again.”

“With great pleasure,” he responded sardonically and turned on his heel to stride out of the room.

Miranda’s knees were suddenly too weak to stand, and she sank down in the nearest chair. Dear God, what had just happened?

In an instant her whole life had been turned upside down. She coursed with fury and indignation and a fire that was completely new to her. Her hand stung from slapping him. She was glad she had; she wished he were back here so she could slap him again. At the same time, her insides felt jumbled and hot and hungry, and she wanted to feel again the pleasure that had surged in her when he kissed her.

The man was arrogant and rude—no, he was beyond arrogant and rude; he was something so irritating and provoking that she could not think of a name for it. She hated him, and she hated him all the more because she had thrilled so to his kiss. She had weakly wanted to lean against him, had wantonly wished that the kiss would go on and on forever. She had enjoyed it, even though everything in her screamed not to. She had wanted him with a fierce and urgent ache that she had never felt for any other man. And it was infuriating that he had made her feel that way quite against her will.

The man was the very devil, she thought, and she hoped that she would never have to see him again. But, no, she realized immediately, that was not true. She hoped she would see him again—and soon—so that she could tell him exactly how much she despised him!

Devin strode down the street, his feet keeping pace with the rapid tumbling of his brain. The nerve of the wench! To slap him, to tell him he was not good enough to be her husband! Who did she think she was? He was an Aincourt of Darkwater, and she was a nobody, puffed up in importance just because her father had made a pile of gold selling animal skins—as if that made her anyone of consequence!

He thought of a dozen scathing things he should have said to her. He should have told her how little her refusal of his proposal had meant to him. He had not wanted to ask her to marry him in the first place—he had only done it because everyone kept hounding him to. He should have pointed out to her that she was no prize for any man, least of all an earl. But, damnation, she had felt so soft and yielding against him. And her lips had tasted of honey, and the scent of roses that clung to her had filled his nostrils in the most delightful, heady way.

He let out a growl of frustration, startling a passerby and making the man move quickly to the opposite side of the street. It seemed too bizarre, too absurd, that she could possibly be the fetching woman who had rescued him last night. He had been in his cups, of course, and he’d had only a hazy memory of the woman’s face, but he’d remembered those wide, expressive gray eyes and the way they had lit with laughter and excitement. How could she have been the same person as that drab, infuriating creature he had forced himself to propose to this afternoon?

It had been the woman from last night who had responded to his kiss. He had felt the warmth and excitement in her, the same passion that yesterday had sent her flying into the midst of a fray. He smiled a little as he thought about the kiss, remembering the warmth of her lips, the sweet eagerness. He wasn’t sure why he had done it—he had wanted to get back at her in some way. She had been so infuriating, so cold and controlled, so contemptuous of him, that he had wanted to show her that he had the upper hand. And he had done so, despite the slap. The slap only showed how much he had struck a nerve with her; he suspected that she was more furious at herself for responding than anything else.

He knew, too, that he could make her respond again. Hell, if he put an effort into it, he could make her fall in love with him. Devin knew that he could be charming. There had been many women over the years who had succumbed to that charm—even some who most people would have said were far too circumspect to have anything to do with a rake such as Devin Aincourt. Generally, he simply did not make the effort to woo a woman who resisted him; there were too many others who were quite happy to climb into his bed…and there was, of course, Leona, who always retained first hold on his affections.

But this time, he thought, this time it just might be worth the trouble. So the American wench thought that he was poor husband material…. Any other proposal would be better than his. He wondered how she would feel about that after a few days of determined wooing. The smile that touched his lips at that thought was not pleasant. He would be charming and attentive; he would seduce her with great care and tenderness. It wouldn’t be difficult, not with the kind of passion that he had felt in her this afternoon. And when he had her deeply in love with him, telling him that she wanted more than anything to marry him…well, then he would smile and say that he was sorry, he never offered more than once.

Just the thought of the scene brought him a great feeling of satisfaction. He was, he thought, a wicked man at heart, just as Leona had said last night. Breaking the American chit’s heart had a great deal more appeal for him than marrying her.

He changed the direction of his path, heading now for his sister’s town house, a stately white affair that took up most of a block in Mayfair. The footman knew him and merely bowed as Devin walked past him and took the stairs to his sister’s sitting room upstairs. He was relieved to find her alone rather than receiving callers, frowning over a framed circle of needlework.

She looked up at the sound of his footsteps, and a smile broke across her face. “Dev!” She rose quickly to her feet and started toward him, holding out both her hands. “I am so happy to see you—although I should scold you for what you did last night, or, I should say, didn’t do. It was terribly embarrassing. I felt a fool trying to tell Miss Upshaw that you were really a very nice man.”

“No need to lie about me, Rachel,” Devin said with a smile, greeting his sister with a kiss on the cheek. “You know I am anything but a nice man.”

“Well, everyone else in Town will tell her that. I was hoping to present a counterargument. But it was a little difficult when you did not even have the courtesy to show up.”

“Well, I made up for it today. I went to her house and asked her father for her hand.”

“Dev!” Rachel’s green eyes, a warmer, feminine version of her brother’s, lit with delight. “You never did! Really? Oh, I am so happy. I liked Miss Upshaw on sight. I think she will make you a wonderful wife. I know this is the right thing—you will be so happy.”

“Not if my happiness depends on marrying her. She turned me down.”

“Turned you down?”

Devin chuckled. “Well, it soothes my wounded feelings somewhat to see you look so shocked at the notion. I am sure our esteemed mother will tell me that it serves me right.”

“Well, it probably does,” Rachel admitted. “But, oh, this is so disappointing. I had really hoped…”

“Don’t give up hope, my love. I have a plan.”

“A plan?” The look Rachel turned on him was tinged with suspicion. “What do you mean? A plan for what?”

“For turning the tables on our Miss Moneybags,” Devin replied lightly. “I intend to woo the chit. Get her to take back her refusal.”

Rachel frowned. “But why? I thought you didn’t want to marry her anyway? I would have thought you would be glad she turned you down.”

“Glad to have an American nobody tell me I was not good enough for her?” Devin asked coolly. “I think not, dear sister. I am happy not to shackle myself to her, but that doesn’t mean I was pleased to be rejected.”

Rachel’s frown deepened. “Devin…”

“What?” He looked at her with great innocence. “I thought you would be happy for me to make a push to fix her interest.”

“I would be if I thought you were serious. But it sounds as if it is a game for you, and it seems a cruel game.”

“Don’t worry about the American. Just think of all that lovely money waiting for us to snatch it up.”

“Devin! You make us sound so…”

“So what? Mercenary? Well, aren’t we? Haven’t we always been aimed in the direction of money? Was it not the prime objective of your marriage? And Caroline’s? Haven’t I always been the slackard who would not do his family duty of wedding an heiress? The Aincourt coffers, after all, are a bottomless pit.”

“I hate it when you talk that way,” Rachel said, her face saddening. “Caroline and Richard loved each other. He has been heartbroken ever since her death, and you know it.”

“I know.” His face softened a trifle. “And I am a wretch to remind you of your own sacrifice. Especially when I have always been too selfish to match it.”

“I don’t want you to sacrifice your life, Dev. I want your happiness. That is all that I care about.”

“Well, it will make me happy to win over your Miss Upshaw. And that is why I want you to have a party and invite her to it.”

“Have a party?”

“Yes. A party which I shall attend—and where I will endeavor to repair the damage I have done to Miss Upshaw’s opinion of me.”

Rachel gave her brother a long, considering look. The hard light in his eyes frightened her a little, and she wondered if she would be doing the American girl a serious disservice by helping Devin try to charm her into accepting him. But then she thought about Miss Upshaw and their conversation of the night before, and it occurred to her that Miranda Upshaw was capable of holding her own with anyone, including Devin.

“All right,” she said finally. “I shall throw a ball for Miss Upshaw. She can scarcely refuse to attend a party designed to introduce her to the Ton.”

“Thank you, dear sister.” Devin threw her a playful bow. “I am eternally in your debt.”

“I shall hold you to that promise,” Rachel retorted in the same vein, then added, more thoughtfully, “It will be interesting to see which one of you wins out.” Perhaps, with any luck, they both would.

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