Edward nodded and ran a hand through his hair. “True.” He threw her a look that caused her to burn from within. “And what would we call ourselves?”
Celine bit her lip and thought. “Melinno was and always will be a part of me.”
“How about the Melinno Agency for Gruesomely Nailing Unsuspecting Spies?” Roland’s voice quavered unexpectedly through the cold air from the coach.
Celine blinked and a wide smile spread across her face. “Yes,” she breathed. Reaching up she wound her arms around Edward’s strong shoulders. “That’s what we shall call it.”
“All that?” Gunvald’s voice swept over her.
“Oh no.” Edward smiled as Celine pulled his head down towards hers, twining her fingers around the nape of his neck. He bent swiftly at the knees and pulled her up into his arms and walked to the door of the small cottage. He looked into her eyes, his face curling swiftly into the knowing smile, the carefree smile, the running in the woods smile all rolled into one. “We’ll call it MAGNUS for short.”
As the cheers rang out, Celine answered Edward’s smile with her own, her heart singing as her body pressed close to his, molding itself around the pocket watch he always kept close to his heart.
And as he kicked the cottage door shut behind them, she reached up and kissed him. Again. And again.
Read on for an exclusive extract from the next book in the Brambridge Novels Series by Pearl Darling.
FINAL FLIRTATION
FINAL FLIRTATION
BOOK SIX OF THE BRAMBRIDGE NOVELS
PROLOGUE
The smash of the laudanum bottle on the floor woke Lord Freddie Lassiter from his stupor. In irritation he rolled onto his side and willed his eyes to focus. The embarrassed face of his valet stared down at him.
“What are you doing down up there on the ceiling, Willson?” he asked politely.
The old ex-soldier, who was rumored to have taken out a man’s heart with a blunt spoon, coughed and shuffled his feet. “Well, sir, technically, I’m down here.”
Freddie closed his eyes and opened them again. The view was still the same.
“Please could you kindly explain to me, how you are down there, and I am up here, when you are patently on the ceiling?”
“Well, sir, it was after that envelope arrived in the post. The one with the bloody large key in it, please excuse my French.” Willson scratched his head.
“Ah yes, the key.” Freddie fiddled in his pocket and brought out the large iron key whose elephant handle kept catching on his clothes.
“You retired to your room with all the snuff bottles from your latest collection. And a bottle of laudanum.” Willson licked his lips as if unwilling to continue.
Freddie sighed. “Oh dear. Did I make a nuisance out of myself again? I need the laudanum for my leg.”
Willson blinked. “If you say so, sir.”
Freddie ignored Willson’s disapproving expression.
“You were singing, sir.”
Freddie frowned. “Yes that is indeed bad.”
“And you were hanging all your snuff bottles from the chandelier,” Willson added.
“Good grief.”
Willson shuffled his feet in the irritating two step dance again. “Those very expensive and ancient Chinese snuff bottles.”
Freddie threw his hand out expansively and drew it in very quickly as the world began to rock above him. “I must have been overcome by an artistic enthusiasm.”
Willson’s expression grew pained. “You then decided to climb onto the chandelier, my lord.”
Freddie jerked in surprise. To his astonishment the sound of the laudanum bottle smashing to the ground happened again. Willson ran to the corner of the ceiling and spread his arms along the wall. Freddie realized that he felt most uncomfortable.
“What exactly am I lying on, Willson? No. No. Wrong question. Where exactly am I, Willson?”
Willson coughed. “On top of the chandelier, my lord.”
Freddie smiled weakly. “Swinging from the chandeliers again eh? It must have been a good night.” Slowly, very slowly he hunched his shoulders and sighed as the ceiling, no, the floor beneath him moved again. “And just how many snuff bottles are left on the chandelier?”
Willson smiled. It was the smile of a man who had put up with his master’s habits for years. The smile of a man that had almost reached breaking point, and who could only take his small amusements where he could. “Well, you started with one hundred and twenty.”
“Yes, yes.”
Willson’s smile grew wider. “And—” he paused as Freddie shifted uncomfortably. The sound of glass smashing to the ground happened again. “—now there are only—two.”
“Oh good grief.” Freddie struggled to put his arms in front of himself, as his muscles began to scream. “Come and help get me down would you?”
Willson unpeeled himself from the wall and brought over the small step ladder that Freddie could just see in the corner. He extended the legs of the ladder and pushed the whole under the chandelier. “At least, sir, this will be easier to clear up than when you used all your Spanish tableware for target practice. Or even when you staged a military invasion of the garden with all that regalia you had in the front room.”
“Ho. Yes.” Willson was never anything but unfailingly positive. “What was I singing about this time, Willson?” Freddie asked conversationally as he climbed down over Willson’s head.
“Um. It was about Bisbal again I’m afraid.”
“Same old, same old then?”
“Bit of new too. That’s my hand, sir.”
“Oh sorry.”
“Yes. I believe the new verse was ‘If I’der come back, I woulder been dead, but still I’m alive with a duck on my head’.”
Freddie stepped to the floor and gingerly felt across the top of his head.
“It’s not there, my lord, it didn’t make it onto the chandelier.” Willson pointed at the remains of a stuffed duck lying on top of a scratched glass case. Slowly he began to dismount the ladder.
Freddie nodded. He didn’t correct his valet’s verses to Freddie’s song.
They should have actually sounded like, ‘If Hyder had come back, I would have been dead. But still I’m alive without luck instead’.
He swallowed a gulp of air. There was not one jolt of enthusiasm within his body. Not one piece of willingness to do what he knew needed to be done.
To find his friend Hyder, Hyder who had gone out and been killed in Bisbal because Freddie refused to go. Hyder who now was rumored to be alive, whilst Freddie was busy trying to kill himself, without one iota of luck.
What could he say to the man when he met him? Sorry, old man, I didn’t search for you. Sorry, old bean, you had to go out instead of me? Sorry, old friend, why don’t we go and search for your mother’s fortune instead before your murderous ex father tries to kill you again?
“It would be helpful,” Willson remarked. “At least then you wouldn’t be responsible for his death again.”
Freddie shook his head in surprise. Damn the laudanum. It always made his consciousness speak itself out loud.
“Alright, Willson. We’ll try and find him. Let’s first clean up this mess, and then we’ll draw up a battle plan.”
“Yes, sir, Major, sir.” Willson saluted delightedly. His hand dropped to his side slowly. “Err, did I mention one other thing, sir?”
Freddie glared at Willson. “What one other thing?”
“You have a guest waiting for you downstairs.”
Freddie could still feel the laudanum coursing through his veins, as an unfamiliar enthusiasm gripped hold of him. “I hope you gave them some tea.” He opened the door to the room and took the stairs two at a time. “Who is it?”
Willson’s steps hurried after him. “Wait, sir!”
“Oh come on, Willson, we’re going to save the day! Find my friend, find a fortune and—” Freddie threw open the drawin
g room door “—meet a guest.”
“That’s what I’ve been meaning to tell you!”
Freddie stepped into the drawing room. He could already feel the tendons in his neck stretching. He pointed at the guest and turned to Willson. “I thought I told you that she was never to be allowed in the house ever again!”
Willson cowered behind the door. “I don’t know how she got in! The door wasn’t open and the back door’s locked. I was busy trying to get you down from the chandelier and she just appeared at my shoulder!”
“You mean she saw me in that state, and she still didn’t leave?”
Willson shook his head, as Freddie’s guest turned and smiled, a beautiful, wide, calculating smile. “I’ve told you once, sir, and I’ll tell you again. Miss Fanthorpe is a very determined lady. She would put a general to shame!”
Miss Fanthorpe turned back and looked at the empty drawing room. “Oh dear, no chaperone,” she said in controlled tones.
She looked back at Freddie with a challenge in her eye. “Too bad you never made it to general, Freddie.”
“What does she mean, Willson?” Freddie asked frantically, clutching at his valet’s sleeve.
Willson’s smile had gone. A look of horror, but also a look of speculation crossed his face. “I think she means she’s outmaneuvered you, sir. You’ve only got one option.”
“What option?” Freddie’s befuddled brain refused to move as fast as he willed it, as the laudanum leached out of his blood.
Miss Fanthorpe stepped forward. Her hair gleamed in the light from the window. “He means you’ll have to marry me now, Freddie. There’s no more running for you.”
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Maddening Minx is the fifth book in the Brambridge Novels series. The other books currently available in the series are Somewhat Scandalous, Burning Bright, Dangerous Diana, Reckless Rules, Maddening Minx and Final Flirtation. Click on the titles to discover more about them, or visit www.pearldarling.com for my blog, books, and more.
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Pearl Darling
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