Devil's Bride with Bonus Material

by Stephanie Laurens

  My principal and most imperative aim was to do justice to the previous two books and then make this final volume something extraspecial, a crowning delight for readers. I wanted the trilogy to end on a high note, so to speak. With such a trilogy, one that contains an overarcing story, each volume has a different job to do with respect to that overarcing storyline. The first book had to introduce it, show it getting underway, and reveal a little bit about that story and its principal protagonist without giving too much away. The second book had much more of that overarcing story in it, with more action, revealing more motivations and character, and ending with a major confounding event – the laird falling off the cliff in order to save Eliza and Jeremy. The third book had to wrap it all up, reveal and bring that overarcing story to a complete and satisfying conclusion – and to achieve that, the overarcing story had to be an integral part of the final romance. The third romance and the overarcing story had to merge so that the motivations from one lead to actions which lead to resolutions of the other. Angelica’s romance and the overarcing story had to essentially become inseparable, and that was a challenge – one I feel very happy about, because I think I pulled it off!

  Three heros, three rescues, three weddings is the trilogy tagline. You’ve spoken earlier of the challenge of writing multiple journeys, but were there any challenges associated with writing, one after the other, the tales of three sisters?

  My task was made much easier because, by the time I started the trilogy, I had a very clear idea of the differences in the characters of Heather, Eliza, and Angelica. Each had to possess the Cynster traits of courage, inner strength, curiosity, and determination, but beyond that I drew on my experience of siblings. Heather was in many ways the archetypal “oldest” – although she isn’t the oldest child in the family, she is the oldest girl, and both her brothers are quite a few years older again. So Heather presents as outwardly more confident and a touch more serious that her younger sisters – she is also the sister who forges the way, who steps out first on the sisters’ path to find their heros. Eliza meanwhile, is a typical middle sister, less assertive, and quieter all around, while Angelica is…Angelica. She’s an over-the-top youngest child in a brood – she has an unwavering belief in herself, in her ability to bend the world to her cause. And in large measure she’s successful, simply because her enormous self-confidence, backed by her self-belief, carries all before it. She’s intelligent, quick witted, and observant, as many youngest children are – very attuned to the people around them. I had great fun letting these three girls evolve and come alive through their stories, and their different characters are a major part of the reason for the different feel in each of the three romance-adventures.

  You’ve chosen to end the trilogy in the highlands – was there any special reason behind that decision?

  Yes, and no. As always, my characters lead me into the stories, and this trilogy, and in particular the story that arcs over all three books, starts in a castle in the highlands. Clearly, that overarcing story was going to end in the highlands, most likely at that same castle, as indeed proved to be the case. In addition, I’ve always wanted to write a full-length novel set in the highlands – which is quite possibly why that first opening scene was set where it was (yes, my mind works like that – works to somehow get me to where my story-brain wants to be). My first and only previous story set in the highlands is my novella, Rose in Bloom - I’ve always wanted to return to castle, loch, and glen, and spend more time there, and this trilogy with its atmosphere of sweeping adventure provided the perfect opportunity.

  You refer to various landmarks in Gaelic – how widely used was Gaelic in the highlands?

  As I discovered when I looked at maps from that time, Gaelic was still extensively used in the highlands, and most place names that were not towns – streams, mountains, topological landmarks – were still known by Gaelic names in 1829, the year of the trilogy. It was therefore necessary for the characters to use the Gaelic names when they referred to such landmarks, but while most highlanders would have had a working understanding of Gaelic, and possibly used it between themselves, English had already started to supplant it as the more widely used tongue, even in the highlands. Consequently, aside from problems due to accents, Angelica wouldn’t have had to immediately learn Gaelic to get by – the vast majority of people she came into contact with would have spoken English.

  You’ve described this book as: Elizabeth Bennet rescues Errol Flynn in the wilds of Scotland. Why?

  Ah…I have to be careful here to avoid spoilers, but suffice it to say that, speaking literally as well as figuratively, that is indeed what happens. I wanted a twist to the customary, expected plot line wherein the hero always rescues the heroine – why couldn’t a heroine rescue a hero? And when it came to the story itself, Angelica was clearly the sort of young lady to carry off such a challenge.

  The hero of this book is the head of a highland clan – how does his role differ from the head of a large family?

  After writing about the Cynster family for so long, this was an area of research that fascinated me specifically because of the parallels that emerged between, for instance, the role of Devil Cynster, Duke of St. Ives, the head of the Cynster family (whose members have often enough in multiple books referred to themselves as the Cynster clan) and the role filled by Angelica’s hero, the head of a Scottish highland clan. At one point, after examining her hero’s status and responsibilities, Angelica considers the comparison, and, indeed, the highland clans still surviving at that time may well have been very similar to her conclusion, which was that a highland clan operated on the same familial relationship lines as her extended Cynster family, but that the members of the clan were even more directly interdependent for their welfare and overall survival. Angelica concludes that clan is the equivalent of family taken to the extreme, and that seemed a valid description for a clan tucked away in an isolated glen, one that had managed to survive the earlier highland clearances intact.

  You refer to a story involving Sir Walter Scott and George, the Prince Regent. Was that story true?

  This was one of those serendipitious quirks. I sometimes wonder who it is who whispers in my head when I’m spinning a story! I needed a, for want of a better word, maguffin – an object of worth, a treasure of great meaning, something of the sort that could mean a great deal to my hero, and be important and valuable or powerful enough for others to want to possess it. I was typing away on the outline, and paused – then simply typed on because to me it was obvious, for reasons I had no clue about, that the object was XXX. (Again, I’m trying to avoid spoilers!) I finished the outline, then went back to research and check that there really had been, or at least might have been, an XXX. And lo and behold, I all but immediately stumbled across the story of Sir Walter Scott, novelist and patriotic Scotsman, and his great obsession, and how that tied in with the Prince Regent, a close friend of Scott’s, and…I swear I had never heard even a whisper of the story before, but there it was, with all the history, pomp, ceremony, and mystery I could possibly want, the perfect, true life basis for my maguffin! I am still seriously tickled that I could use such a fantastic yet true story – and yes, the story of Sir Walter Scott’s obsession is told, albeit in condensed fashion, in the book – to underpin my entirely fictious tale. For a novelist, this was a dream find.

  What was your feeling on reaching the end of the last story in the trilogy, and why did you end the final volume as you did?

  The ending of this book – the ending of the trilogy – was dictated by a rule all novelists know they have to follow: Deliver on the promise of the premise. In this case, the promise of the premise is contained in the trilogy tagline: Three heros, three rescues, three weddings. I had to deliver that, but I also had to deliver on the end of the overarcing plot, and tie off all the flapping story threads. Once I’d done that, then and only then could I turn to the grand finale – and after such a sweeping Errol Flynn/Elizabeth Bennet/Scottish highlands adventur
e-romance, the finale definitely had to be grand! The ending had to be over-the-top – it had to contain everything…but, of course, I couldn’t resist twisting that, too. Just a little. All in the interests of giving our three valiant heros and our three interpid heroines the weddings they deserve. I hope my readers enjoy my version of the ultimate in three weddings!

  THE CAPTURE OF THE EARL OF GLENCRAE

  Turn the page to read an excerpt

  Coming February 2012 from

  Stephanie Laurens

  and

  Avon Books

  Chapter One

  June 1, 1829

  Cavendish House, London

  “Oh. My. God.” Angelica Rosalind Cynster, standing to one side of Lady Cavendish’s salon with the bulk of her ladyship’s chattering guests at her back, stared at the long windows giving onto the unlit terrace and the dark gardens beyond, at the reflection of the gentleman who was staring at her from the opposite side of the room.

  She’d first felt his disconcerting gaze some thirty minutes before; he’d watched her waltz, watched her laugh and chat with others, but no matter how discreetly she’d looked for him, he’d refused to show himself. Irritated, with the musicians resting she’d worked her way around the room, moving from group to group, exchanging greetings and comments, smoothly shifting until she had him in her sights.

  Eyes wide, barely daring to believe, she whispered, “It’s him!”

  Her ill-suppressed excitement drew a glance from her cousin, Henrietta, presently standing beside her. Angelica shook her head, and someone in the group to the side of which she stood reclaimed Henrietta’s attention, leaving Angelica with her gaze locked on the most riveting man she’d ever beheld.

  She considered herself an expert in the art of assessing gentlemen. From her earliest years she’d been aware of them as “other,” and years of observation had left her with a sound understanding of their features and foibles. When it came to gentlemen, she had very high standards.

  Visually, the gentleman across the room trumped every one.

  He was standing with six others, all of whom she could name, but she didn’t know him. She’d never met him, had never even set eyes on him before. If she had, she’d have known, as she now did, that he was her one, the gentleman she had been waiting to meet.

  She’d always been unshakably convinced that she would know her hero, the gentleman fated to be her husband, the instant she saw him. She hadn’t expected that first sighting to be via a reflection across a crowded room, but the result was the same-she knew it was him.

  The talisman The Lady, a Scottish deity, had gifted to the Cynster girls to assist them in finding their true loves had passed from Angelica’s eldest sister, Heather, to her middle sister Eliza, who on her recent return to London with her new fiancé had handed the necklace to Angelica, the next in line. Composed of old gold links and amethyst beads from which a rose-quartz pendant hung, ancient and mysterious the talisman now lay beneath Angelica’s fichu, the links and beads against her skin, the crystal pendant nestling in her décolletage.

  Three nights ago, deeming her time, her turn, had come, armed with the necklace, her instincts, and her innate determination, she had embarked on an intensive campaign to find her hero. She’d come to the Cavendish soirée, at which a select slice of the upper echelon of the ton had gathered to mingle and converse, intent on examining any and all prospective males Lady Cavendish, a lady with an extensive circle of acquaintance, had inveigled to attend.

  The talisman had worked for Heather, now engaged to Breckenridge, and had brought Eliza and Jeremy Carling together; Angelica had hoped that it would help her, too, but hadn’t expected such a rapid result.

  Regardless, now she had her hero in sight, she wasn’t inclined to waste another minute.

  He hadn’t noticed, from his position on the opposite side of the room possibly couldn’t see, that she was studying him. Her gaze locked on his reflection, she visually devoured him.

  He was stunningly impressive, towering half a head taller than the men around him, none of whom were short. Elegantly attired in a black evening coat, pristine white shirt and cravat, and black trousers, everything about him from the breadth of his shoulders to the length of his long legs seemed in perfect proportion to his height.

  His hair appeared solidly black, straight, rather long, but fashionably styled with windblown, slightly ruffled locks. She tried to study his features, but the reflection defeated her; she couldn’t make out any details beyond the sharply defined, austere planes of his face. Nevertheless, his broad forehead, bladelike nose, and squared chin stamped him as the scion of some aristocratic house; only they possessed such hard, chiseled, coldly beautiful faces.

  Her heart was thumping distinctly faster. In anticipation.

  Now she’d found him, what next?

  If it had been in any way acceptable, she would have swung on her heel, marched across the room and introduced herself, but that would be too forward, even for her. Yet if after thirty and more minutes of watching her, he hadn’t made any move to approach her, then he wasn’t going to, at least not there, not that night.

  Which didn’t suit her at all.

  Shifting her gaze, she scanned the gentlemen in the loose circle in which he stood. He’d been listening to the conversations, but rarely contributing, merely using the interaction to cloak his interest in her.

  Even as she looked, one of the other men saluted the group and moved away.

  Angelica smiled. Without a word, she quit Henrietta’s side and glided into the crowd thronging the salon’s center.

  She caught the Honorable Theodore Curtis’s sleeve just before he joined a group of young ladies and gentlemen. He looked around, and smiled. “Angelica! Where have you been hiding?”

  She waved to the windows. “Over there. Theo, who is that gentleman in the group you just left? The very tall man I’ve never met.”

  Theo, a friend of her family who knew her far too well to entertain thoughts of her himself, chuckled. “I told him it wouldn’t be long before the young ladies noticed him and came swanning around.”

  Angelica played the game and pouted. “Don’t tease. Him who?”

  Theo grinned. “Debenham. He’s Viscount Debenham.”

  “Who is?” She gestured for more.

  “A capital fellow. I’ve known him for years—same age as me, came on the town at the same time, similar interests, you know how it goes. His estate’s somewhere near Peterborough, but he’s been away from the ton for. . .must be four years. Left because of family and estate business, and has only just returned to the drawing rooms and ballrooms.”

  “Hmm. So there’s no reason you shouldn’t introduce him to me.”

  Still grinning, Theo shrugged. “If you like.”

  “I would.” Angelica took his arm and turned him to where her hero, Debenham, still stood. “I promise to return the favor next time you want to steal a march with some new sweet young thing.”

  Theo laughed. “I’ll hold you to that.” Anchoring her hand on his arm, he led her through the crowd.

  While they tacked past various groups, nodding and smiling, pausing only when they couldn’t avoid it, Angelica conducted a rapid inventory of her appearance, checking that her pale teal silk gown was hanging straight, that the lacy fichu that partially filled in the scooped neckline was sitting properly and adequately concealing the necklace. At one point, she paused to re-drape her teal-and-silver silk shawl more elegantly over her elbows; she’d elected to make do without a reticule or fan, so she didn’t have those to fuss over.

  Her hair she didn’t dare touch. The slithering red-gold tresses were swept up in a complicated knot on the top of her head, anchored by innumerable pins and a pearl encrusted comb; from experience she knew that even a little jiggling could bring the entire mass cascading down. While no gentleman had ever minded her transformation to a clothed version of Venus rising from the waves, that wasn’t how she wished to appear before her hero for
the first time.

  He knew she was coming; she caught a glimpse of his face through the crowd. His gaze still rested on her, but even though she was now closer, she couldn’t read anything in his expression.

  Then Theo pushed past the last pair of shoulders, drew her to the group, and presented her with a flourish. “Heigh-ho! See who I found.”

  “Miss Cynster!” came from several throats in tones of pleased surprise.

  “I say, delightful fashionable ladies always welcome, don’t you know.” Millingham swept her a bow, as did all the other men in the group, bar one.

  After acknowledging the greetings, Angelica turned to Debenham; Theo had helpfully inserted her into the group by Debenham’s side. She raised her gaze to his face, eager to see, to study, to know. . .

  From her other side Theo said, “Debenham, old son, allow me to introduce the Honorable Angelica Cynster. Miss Cynster-Viscount Debenham.”

  Angelica barely registered the words, captured by, trapped in, a pair of large, well-set, heavy-lidded eyes of a stormy, pale-greenish-gray. Those eyes held her entranced; the expression, not in them so much as behind them, spoke of shrewdness, assessment, and cool, clear-headed cynicism.

  Her hero was still watching her, coolly studying, examining, and assessing her, and she couldn’t tell whether he was impressed with what he saw or not.

  That last snapped her back to the moment. Lips curving lightly, her eyes still on his, she inclined her head. “I don’t believe we’ve previously met, my lord.” She extended her hand.

  His lips barely relaxing from their noncommittally straight line, he raised a hand from where both rested, folded over the silver head of a cane-something she hadn’t seen from across the room-and clasped her fingers.

  His grip was cool, yet not impersonal, too definite, too firm to shrug off as the usual. She inwardly wobbled, some inner axis tilting as, still locked in his eyes, she absorbed the unexpected sensation-and the subtle but undeniable impression that he was in two minds over letting her go. Lungs suddenly tight, she curtsied.