“Well, it could start with an apology for your ungracious behavior at the Three Feathers,” she said.
“No, you shan’t get it. I don’t regret kissing you. I didn’t then and I don’t now. I can’t change, brown hen. I’m a shameless fellow, even if I do have the misfortune to be an earl.”
“I don’t mean for the kiss, sir. I mean for not telling me you had fought in the Peninsula with Richard and for thinking I could possibly know anything about blackmail. You were not at all honest with me.”
He opened his eyes to gaze up at the white roses. “We were strangers, and I was unforgivably foxed. But my kiss at least was honest.”
“As was mine,” Eleanor said desperately. “You must know that I’ve been in love with you ever since. For God’s sake! If you have been careless enough to arouse unsuitable passions in the breast of a schoolgirl, pray enjoy your amusement in secret. Don’t come here to compound it with more idle flirtation.”
He turned to face her. His fingertips gently stroked her cheek. “No, I didn’t know. But if you mean it, you offer me a depth of happiness I surely don’t deserve. But who said anything about idle flirtation? This is a very serious flirtation, I assure you.”
She rubbed like a kitten against his knuckles. “It can’t be.”
“Why not?”
“Because you have barely hidden your condescension and intolerance from the beginning.”
“Oh, Lord! What I have barely hidden, my dear, is that I conceived an equally unsuitable passion for you. A bastard, whatever his secret feelings, could never in honor declare himself to Lady Eleanor Acton. So for these past months, I have been fighting the strongest desire to carry you off and imprison you myself. It was only the tattered shreds of my honor that made me desist. In fact, I would very much like to ravish you here on the spot, but I am prepared to marry you first.”
“Really?” she said. “Surely not! Not when I am about to accept Lord Ranking.”
“For God’s sake, brown hen, can’t you believe that I love you?”
“Why would you? Now you’re Lord Hawksley, you can choose any lady you like.”
“Well, so I could. However, I would like to share the consequences of that happy accident with the lady of my heart, who—if I remember correctly—just declared herself to me. So pray allow me the honor to begin a simple courtship.”
“I’m not too much of a virago?”
He looked puzzled for a moment, then he laughed. “I intend to teach you in exquisite detail exactly why I had to say that, because it has everything to do with the most absolute desire I ever felt in my life—and still feel, to my shame.” He picked up her fingers and idly stroked them. “I was protecting myself at your cost and humbly beg your forgiveness.”
“If you will forgive me,” she said. “I was mad with fear—”
“As was I—”
“But I was more at fault than you.”
“No, no! And you are most certainly not a virago. As it happens, I love your spirit and your determination. Nor do I find you plain, brown hen. I find you irresistible.”
“I think this courtship is still very odd.”
“Indeed, it is backward, isn’t it? It should begin with a dance.”
“I won’t dance with you out here on the patio. There’s no music.”
“Very well. Then it must proceed with a walk in the park, or perhaps a drive in my gig.”
“Do you have a gig?”
“No, as a matter of fact, I don’t. And we have done enough private walking together, don’t you think?”
Eleanor laughed. “As I recall, at times without exchanging two words.”
“I was struck dumb by your beauty.”
“So the next stage is compliments?”
“Of course, to be followed by flowers.”
“I have enough of those,” she said, catching up some of the roses that lay scattered over her skirt.
“And then I must kiss you.”
“Must you?” Eleanor looked up at him. She couldn’t disguise her longing. “But we’ve already passed that stage, too.”
“No, we haven’t. For it lasts forever. Please say you will marry me, brown hen. I believe I have loved you since you first tried to light the candles at the Three Feathers, and then so bravely faced me down over your locket. I still beg your forgiveness for every word I ever said since that was intended to drive you away. But for every careless word, I offer you a lifetime of caring ones, though I admit that it won’t do either of us harm to clash upon occasion. There is no one in the world, however, that I would rather argue with than you.”
“You’re not going to India?”
“Nor Timbuktu, unfortunately. I shall be very much in evidence at Hawksley Park. You cannot avoid me, Eleanor, and I shall continue to seek your hand until you give in.”
“Have you resigned your commission?” she asked faintly.
A subtle shudder moved over his spine. She knew with sudden insight that it would be the only acknowledgment she would ever get of what he had just been through.
“Forever,” he said firmly. “Now, do you think we have covered all the necessary stages of courtship, for I can’t wait much longer. I love you with a depth of feeling that scares me. Sweet brown hen, will you do me the honor to become Lady Hawksley?”
“I’d have married plain Mr. Campbell,” Eleanor said simply. “If he’d thought to ask me.”
* * *
Richard and Helena walked together through the blue room, then stopped by the French windows. He held his arm around his wife’s generous waist and she laid her head on his shoulder.
“It would seem that your friend is having his way with your sister,” Helena said with a smile.
He pulled his wife gently back into the room, then caught her to him and kissed her with passionate hunger on the lips.
“I don’t suppose she’d be kissing him like this, if they hadn’t just agreed to marry,” he said at last.
“Oh, I wouldn’t be too sure of that.” Helena leaned back into the circle of his arm. “I thought the man was a notorious rake?”
“He is,” Richard said. “So I thank God I’m so sure they will wed. Otherwise I’d have to call him out for so abusing my sister, and the man’s not only a rogue, he’s a devilishly good shot.”
Author’s Note
Rogue’s Reward is the third book in my series involving Wellington’s intelligence officers, a group of men the Iron Duke claimed were invaluable in his fight against Napoleon. Charles de Dagonet, hero of Scandal’s Reward, and Richard Acton, hero of Virtue’s Reward, each returned from the Peninsula with a problem to solve. Dagonet must clear his name of scandal. Richard carries a dangerous secret that leads him to marry a stranger. Lee’s dilemma, of course, has its roots in his childhood, but the men are all friends, and they reappear upon occasion in future books.
The sentences that Eleanor’s little sister Milly must learn about the Malays and Patagonia are exact quotes from a Regency geography text, published in 1816. The ‘Pearl of Brittany’ refers to Princess Eleanor Plantagenet, granddaughter of Henry II, imprisoned for life in 1202. She had committed no crime, but her imprisonment negated her claim to various titles—as well as to the throne of England.
There was a real trial during the Regency that provided me with the details for Lee’s demand for trial by wager of battle. It occurred in April, 1818, three years after my story takes place. A Mr. Ashford accused a Mr. Thornton of murder, and the latter demanded trial by combat. After extensive research in the law books, the judges decided that trial by battle had never been repealed. Only a technical flaw prevented the fight from being conducted. As Richard Rush, the American Minister at the Court of St James, reported in his diary, the case caused a sensation in society, and a statute was soon passed which finally repealed this ancient right.
The news of Waterloo did indeed disrupt Mrs. Boehm’s ball, just as I have described. She was most put out at the ruin of her plans and the waste of her “sple
ndid supper.” A guest reported that the Prince Regent in a “womanish hysteric” had to be revived first by water and then by wine.
The next book in this series is Valor’s Reward, where Michael, Lord Deyncourt, makes the mistake of shooting Miss Jessica Whinburn.
I hope you enjoy their adventures.
Please visit me at www.jeanrossewing.com or www.juliaross.net.
Thank you, readers!
Copyright © 2015 by Jean R. Ewing
Originally published by Zebra Books (ISBN 978-0821751466), October 1995
Electronically published in 2015 by Belgrave House/Regency Reads
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED
No portion of this book may be reprinted in whole or in part,
by printing, faxing, E-mail, copying electronically or by any
other means without permission of the publisher. For more
information, contact Belgrave House, 190 Belgrave Avenue, San
Francisco, CA 94117-4228
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This is a work of fiction. All names in this publication are
fictitious and any resemblance to any person living or dead is
coincidental.
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