by Amanda Quick
Bantam Books by Amanda Quick
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AFFAIR
DANGEROUS
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MISTRESS
MYSTIQUE
RAVISHED
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SCANDAL
SEDUCTION
SURRENDER
WITH THIS RING
I THEE WED
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More Praise for Amanda Quick
“One of the hottest and most prolific writers in romance today … Her heroines are always spunky women you’d love to know, and her heroes are dashing guys you’d love to love.”
—USA Today
“Engaging and sympathetic … heroines, and fast-paced plots propelled by a series of well-calculated revelations are the hallmarks of Quick’s bestselling novels.”
—Publishers Weekly
“Amanda Quick’s Regency-period romances continue to wear exceedingly well.”
—Kirkus Reviews
“Amanda Quick seems to be writing … better and better.”
—Chicago Tribune
“Wit is Quick’s middle name.”
—The Atlanta Journal and Constitution
“Quick’s characters are clever and her plot … superior.”
—Booklist
For Irwyn Applebaum,
with great respect and admiration.
Your commitment to publishing popular fiction has altered the landscape of the book world. You have brought new writers with fresh, new voices and a legion of enthusiastic new readers into mainstream publishing. But, then, you always understood that telling a good story was what it was all about.
My thanks.
Prologue
Midnight: London
Charlotte never knew what it was that awakened her in the early hours before dawn. Perhaps her sleeping brain had registered the squeak of a floor tread or a man’s muffled voice. Whatever the cause, she opened her eyes abruptly and sat straight up in bed. She was consumed with a sense of overwhelming urgency. A cold foreboding permeated her entire body.
It was the housekeeper’s night off. Her stepfather, Winterbourne, never came home before dawn these days. Charlotte knew that she and her sister, Ariel, should have been alone in the house.
But someone had just climbed the staircase and walked down the hall.
She tossed aside the covers and stood, shivering, on the cold floor. For a moment she had not the least notion of what to do next.
Another floorboard groaned.
She went to the door, opened it a few inches, and gazed out into the darkened corridor. Two figures shrouded in voluminous greatcoats hovered in the dense shadows at the end of the hall. They stood in front of Ariel’s door.
One of the men held a candle. The light revealed Winterbourne’s thick, dissipated features.
“Be quick about it,” Winterbourne said in a slurred growl. “And then be on your way. It’s almost dawn.”
“But I wish to enjoy this rare pleasure. It is so seldom that one has the opportunity to savor a genuine virgin descended from such excellent bloodlines. Fourteen, did you say? A good age. I intend to take my time, Winterbourne.”
Charlotte bit back a scream of rage and fear. The second man’s voice was a darkly played musical instrument, a thing of grace and power even when pitched at a whisper. It was a voice that could have soothed wild animals or sung hymns but it was the most terrifying sound she had ever heard.
“Are you insane?” Winterbourne hissed. “Hurry and be done with it.”
“You do owe me a great deal of money, Winterbourne. Surely you do not expect to settle the debt by allowing me only a few minutes with my very expensive little innocent. I want an hour at the very least.”
“Impossible,” Winterbourne muttered. “The older girl’s just down the hall. She’s a bitch. Absolutely ungovernable. If you wake her, there’s no telling what she’ll do.”
“That is your problem, not mine. You are the master in this household, are you not? I shall leave it to you to deal with her.”
“What the devil do you expect me to do if she awakens?”
“Lock her in her room. Bind her. Put a gag in her mouth. Beat her senseless. I care not how you manage the matter, just see to it that she does not interfere with my pleasures.”
Charlotte eased her bedroom door closed and whirled around to gaze wildly about her moonlit bedchamber. She took a deep breath, collected her panic-stricken senses, and hurried across the carpet to a chest that stood near the window.
She fumbled with the lock of the chest, got it open, and yanked aside the two blankets on top. The case that contained her father’s pistol lay at the bottom of the chest.
Charlotte grabbed the case, opened it with trembling fingers, and removed the heavy weapon. It was unloaded. There was nothing she could do about that. She lacked the necessary powder and ball as well as the time to figure out how it all went into the pistol.
She went to the door, flung it open, and stepped out into the hall. She knew intuitively that the stranger who intended to rape Ariel was the more dangerous of the two men. She sensed that he would be emboldened by any show of anxiousness or uncertainty, let alone a glimpse of the raw panic that was coursing through her.
“Stop at once or I will shoot,” Charlotte said quietly.
Winterbourne lurched about in surprise. The flame of his candle revealed his gaping mouth. “Hell’s teeth. Charlotte.”
The second man turned more slowly. His greatcoat swirled around him with a soft, rustling sound. The weak flame of Winterbourne’s candle did not cast any light on his features. He had not removed his hat. The wide brim, together with the high collar of his coat, obscured his face in deep shadows.
“Ah,” he murmured. “The older sister, I presume?”
Charlotte realized that she was standing in a stream of moonlight that poured from her window through the open door. The stranger could likely see the outline of her body silhouetted through her white linen nightgown.
She wished with all her heart that the pistol she held was filled with a ball and a strong charge. She had never hated anyone as much as she hated this creature. Nor had she ever been so frightened.
In that moment her imagination threatened to run roughshod over her intelligence. Some elemental part of her was convinced that it was not a mere man she faced, but a monster.
Guided only by instinct, Charlotte said nothing. She wrapped both hands around the pistol, raised it with deliberate precision, just as though it were fully loaded, and cocked it. The unmistakable sound was very loud in the quiet hall.
“Damnation, girl, are you mad?” Winterbourne surged forward and then came to a shambling halt a few feet away. “Put down the pistol.”
“Get out.” Charlotte did not allow the weapon to waver. She kept her whole attention focused on the monster in the black greatcoat. “Both of you. Get out now.”
“I do believe she means to pull the trigger, Winterbourne.” The monster’s mellifluous voice oozed honey and venom and a terrifying degree of amusement.
“She would not dare.” But Winterbourne took a pace back. “Charlotte, listen to me. You cannot be so foolish as to think that you can simply shoot a man in cold blood. You will hang.”
“So be it.” Charlotte held the pistol steady.
“Come, Winterbourne,” the monster said softly. “Let us be off. The chit means to lodge a bullet in one of us and I rather think she intends to make me her victim. No virgin is worth this much trouble.”
“But what about my vouchers?” Winterbourne asked in a quivering voice. “You promised you would give them b
ack to me if I let you have the younger girl.”
“It would appear that you must find some other way to pay your debts.”
“But I have no other resource, sir.” Winterbourne sounded desperate. “There is nothing left to sell that will fetch enough to cover my losses to you. My wife’s jewelry is gone. Only a bit of the silver remains. And I do not own this house. I am merely renting it.”
“I’m sure you will come up with some means of repaying me.” The monster walked slowly toward the staircase. He did not take his attention off Charlotte. “But make certain that whatever it is, it does not require me to get past an avenging angel armed with a pistol in order to secure my payment.”
Charlotte kept the pistol trained on the stranger as he went down the stairs. By avoiding Winterbourne’s candle, he managed to keep himself cloaked in shadow the entire time. She leaned over the banister and watched as he opened the front door.
To her horror, he paused and looked up at her. “Do you believe in destiny, Miss Arkendale?” His voice floated up to her from out of the night.
“I do not concern myself with such matters.”
“Pity. Given that you have just demonstrated that you are one of those rare persons with the power to shape it, you really ought to pay more attention to the subject.”
“Leave this house.”
“Farewell, Miss Arkendale. It has been amusing, to say the least.” With a last swirl of his greatcoat, the monster was gone.
Charlotte was able to breathe again. She turned back to Winterbourne.
“You, too, sir. Begone, or I shall pull this trigger.”
His heavy features worked furiously. “Do you know what you have done, you stupid bitch? I owe him a bloody fortune.”
“I do not care how much you have lost to him. He is a monster. And you are a man who would feed an innocent child to a beast. That makes you a monster, too. Get out of here.”
“You cannot throw me out of my own house.”
“That is just what I intend to do. Leave, or I shall pull this trigger. Do not doubt me, Winterbourne.”
“I’m your stepfather, by God.”
“You are a wretched, contemptible liar. You are also a thief. You stole the inheritance that my father left for Ariel and me and you have squandered it in the gaming hells. Do you think I feel any loyalty to you after what you have done? If so, you are quite mad.”
Winterbourne was incensed. “That money became mine when I married your mother.”
“Leave this house.”
“Charlotte, wait, you do not comprehend the situation. That man who just left is not to be trifled with. He has demanded that I repay my gaming debt tonight. I must settle my affairs with him. I do not know what he will do to me if I fail.”
“Leave.”
Winterbourne opened his mouth and then closed it abruptly. He stared helplessly at the pistol and then, with an anguished groan, he hastened toward the staircase. Clutching the banister rail for support, he went down the steps, then crossed the hall and let himself out.
Charlotte stood very still in the shadows at the top of the stairs until the door closed behind Winterbourne. She took several deep breaths and slowly lowered the pistol.
For a moment the world seemed to waver and shift around her. The sound of carriages rattling past in the street was distant and unreal. The familiar shape of the hall and the staircase took on the quality of an eerie illusion.
Ariel’s door opened at the end of the corridor. “Charlotte? I heard voices. Are you all right?”
“Yes.” Charlotte held the empty pistol against her thigh so that her sister would not see it. She turned slowly and summoned a shaky smile. “Yes, I am fine, Ariel. Winterbourne came home drunk, as usual. We argued a bit. But he has left the house now. He will not be back tonight.”
Ariel was very quiet for a moment. “I wish Mama was still here. Sometimes I am very frightened in this house.”
Charlotte felt tears sting her eyes. “Sometimes I am frightened, too, Ariel. But we shall soon be free. In fact, we shall take the stage to Yorkshire tomorrow.”
She hurried toward her sister and put one arm around her. She pushed the pistol deeper into the folds of her nightgown. The cold iron burned against her thigh.
“You have finished selling the silver and what was left of Mama’s jewels?” Ariel asked.
“Yes. I pawned the tea tray yesterday. There is nothing left.”
In the year since their mother’s untimely death in a riding accident, Winterbourne had sold off the best pieces of the Arkendale jewels and most of the larger silver items in order to pay his mounting gaming debts.
But when she had realized what was happening, Charlotte had stealthily hidden a number of small rings, brooches, and a pendant. She had also tucked away bits of the silver tea service. During the past few months she had surreptitiously pawned them.
Winterbourne spent so much of the time in an inebriated state that he did not even realize how many of the household valuables had disappeared. When he did, on occasion, notice that something had gone missing, Charlotte informed him that he, himself, had pawned it while drunk.
Ariel looked up. “Do you think that we shall enjoy Yorkshire?”
“It will be lovely. We shall find a little cottage to rent.”
“But how will we live?” Even at the tender age of fourteen, Ariel displayed an amazingly practical streak. “The money you got for Mama’s things will not last long.”
Charlotte hugged her. “Do not fret. I shall think of a way to make a living for us.”
Ariel frowned. “You will not be obliged to become a governess, will you? You know how terrible things are for ladies in that career. No one pays them very much and they are often treated very shabbily. And I shall likely not be able to stay with you if you go into service in someone else’s house.”
“You may be certain that I shall find some other way to support us,” Charlotte vowed.
Everyone knew that a governess’s lot was not a pleasant one. In addition to the low wages and the humiliating treatment, there were risks from the men of the household who considered the governess fair game.
There had to be another way to support herself and Ariel, Charlotte thought.
But in the morning, everything changed.
Lord Winterbourne was found floating facedown in the Thames, his throat slit. It was assumed that he had been the victim of a footpad.
There was no longer any reason to escape to Yorkshire but there was still a need for Charlotte to invent a career for herself.
She received the news of Winterbourne’s death with vast relief. But she knew that she would never forget the monster with the compellingly beautiful voice that she had encountered in the hall.
Midnight: The coast of Italy, two years later
“So, in the end you chose to betray me.” Morgan Judd spoke from the doorway of the ancient stone chamber that served as his laboratory. “A pity. You and I have much in common, St. Ives. Together we could have forged an alliance that would have brought us both undreamed of wealth and power. A great waste of a grand destiny. But, then, you don’t believe in destiny, do you?”
Baxter St. Ives clenched his fingers fiercely around the damning notebook that he had just discovered. He turned to face Morgan.
Women considered Judd to be endowed with the countenance of a fallen angel. His black hair curled naturally in the carelessly stylish manner of the Romantic poets. It framed a high, intelligent brow and eyes the impossible blue of glacial ice.
Morgan’s voice could have belonged to Lucifer himself. It was the voice of a man who had sung in the choir at Oxford, read poetry aloud to enthralled listeners, and charmed high-ranking ladies into bed. It was a rich, dark, compelling voice, a voice shaded with subtle meanings and unspoken promises. It was a voice of power and passion and Morgan used it, as he did everything and everyone, to achieve his own ends.
His bloodlines were as blue as the ice in his eyes. They flowed from one of En
gland’s most noble families. But his elegant, aristocratic mien belied the true circumstances of his birth.
Morgan Judd was a bastard. It was one of the two things that Baxter could say they truly had in common. The other was a fascination with chemistry. It was the latter that had brought about this midnight confrontation.
“Destiny is for romantic poets and writers of novels.” Baxter pushed his gold wire spectacles more firmly in place on his nose. “I’m a man of science. I have no interest in such metaphysical nonsense. But I do know that it is possible for a man to sell his soul to the devil. Why did you do it, Morgan?”
“You speak of the compact that I have made with Napoleon, I presume.” Morgan’s sensual mouth curved faintly in cold amusement.
He took two steps into the shadowy chamber and halted. The folds of his black cloak swirled around the tops of his gleaming boots in a manner that reminded Baxter of the wings of a large bird of prey.
“Yes,” Baxter said. “I refer to your bargain.”
“There is no great mystery about my decision. I do what must be done to fulfill my destiny.”
“You would betray your country to fulfill this mad notion of a grand destiny?”
“I owe nothing to England and neither do you. It is a land governed by laws and unwritten social rules that combine to prohibit superior men such as you and I from taking our rightful place in the natural order.” Morgan’s eyes glittered in the candlelight. His voice crackled with bitter rage. “It is not too late, Baxter. Join me in this endeavor.”
Baxter held up the notebook. “You want me to help you finish formulating these terrible chemical concoctions so that Napoleon can use them as weapons against your own countrymen? You truly are crazed.”
“I’m not mad, but you are most definitely a fool.” Morgan produced a pistol from the enveloping folds of the black cloak. “And blind in spite of your eyeglasses, if you cannot see that Napoleon is the future.”
Baxter shook his head. “He has tried to grab too much power. It will destroy him.”