Table of Contents
Title Page
Quote
Copyright
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Other Collette Cameron Books
Dedication
Acknowledgements
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Epilogue
About the Author
From the desk of Collette Cameron
Other A Waltz with a Rogue Novellas
THE WALLFLOWER’S WICKED WAGER
A Waltz with a Rogue Novella #5
Collette Cameron
Blue Rose Romance
“I’ve prayed for a man like you my whole life.” ~Miss Shona Atterberry
The Wallflower’s Wicked Wager
A Waltz with a Rogue Novella #5
Copyright © 2017 Collette Cameron
Cover Design by: Teresa Spreckelmeyer
This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, place, and incidents are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is coincidental.
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Other Collette Cameron Books
Castle Brides Series
The Viscount’s Vow
Highlander’s Hope
The Earl’s Enticement
Conundrums of the Misses Culpepper Series
Brooke: Wagers Gone Awry
Blythe: Schemes Gone Amiss
Brette: Intentions Gone Astray
Heart of a Scot Series
To Love a Highland Rogue
Highland Heather Romancing a Scot Series
Triumph and Treasure
Virtue and Valor
Heartbreak and Honor
Scandal’s Splendor
Passion and Plunder
Seductive Scoundrels Series
A Diamond for a Duke
A Waltz with a Rogue Novella Series
A Kiss for Miss Kingsley
Bride of Falcon
Her Scandalous Wish
To Tame a Scoundrel’s Heart
The Wallflower's Wicked Wager
Boxed Sets
Embraced by a Rogue
To Love a Reckless Lord
Dedication
An author’s most treasured gift—when a reader becomes a dear and beloved friend.
The Wallflower’s Wicked Wager is for you Dee.
For all that you’ve done for me, for all of your unfailing support, for being a girly-girl like me, and most of all, for your precious friendship.
Love you bunches!
Collette
Acknowledgements
Firstly, I have to thank my VIP Reader Group, Collette’s Cheris, for helping me pick The Wallflower’s Wicked Wager’s title. As always, when I run ideas past you, you give me honest and helpful feedback. I adore you!
The characters Aunt Barbara and Kandi are named after two of the group’s members who won a contest. Thanks ladies for the privilege, and I hope you enjoyed getting to know the characters I borrowed your names for.
Beta Babes, as always you came through for me. Your suggestions never fail to make my stories better. I appreciate the time you take to read, critique, edit, and share your opinions!
Huge accolades to my cover artist, Teresa Spreckelmeyer for The Wallflower’s Wicked Wager’s cover, and my most sincere gratitude to my assistants for all that you do so that I may write!
Finally, to Travess for letting Mom put you on one of her covers. Thanks, sweetie.
Chapter One
Davenswood Court, Buckinghamshire
August 1819
A droplet of perspiration trickled between Shona’s breasts leaving a dribbly, sticky trail despite her frantic fanning and the conservatory’s open doors.
Would this summer’s sweltering temperatures never cease?
How was she to appear dignified and fresh when moisture beaded every part of her person, from her brow to her toes tucked into quaint new turquoise slippers?
Desperate for relief, and despite the impropriety, she’d removed her bonnet and gloves—who would know anyway? They, along with her parasol and the book she’d thought to read but abandoned, now lay atop a charming wrought iron bench situated beside the far door.
Cloying tendrils of hair stuck to her temples, and she feared her Indian sprigged muslin gown—chosen specifically for the fabric’s airiness—exhibited humiliating damp spots in mortifying places.
Fingers spread, she held one hand beneath the miniature waterfall cascading from the upper level of the burbling fountain centered in the greenhouse. Even the water felt warm to her touch, and she would’ve forsaken shortbread for a month if she could stand beneath the Falls of Bruar’s gushing flow at this very moment.
She patted her forehead and then her cheeks with her wet fingers.
The lush greenery and colorful flowers artfully displayed throughout Davenswood Court’s hothouse, including a lemon and an orange tree, thrived in the tropical atmosphere.
Not so Shona. She wilted like a pansy plopped in freshly-poured oolong tea.
Selecting the most humid building on the estate to steal a few moments alone hadn’t been the wisest of decisions. But even amidst this torrid heat, she relished the peace and privacy she’d filched by doing so.
Truth to tell, she’d also fled Miss Rossington and her two cohorts, the Dundercroft sisters. That trio of mean-spirited chits had been nothing but malicious since Shona had arrived yesterday.
Lacy fan splayed in her left hand, and lifting her skirts to a most indelicate height with her right, Shona ventured to the conservatory’s other door. Once there, she covertly surveyed D
avenswood Court’s sprawling, neat-as-a-tailor’s-seams lawns. She saw no one addlepated enough to attempt a stroll beneath the late-afternoon sun’s punishing rays.
Excellent.
A bittersweet smile tipped her mouth. She wasn’t ready to face the house party’s growing throng just yet.
Never would, truth be told.
She was, to say the least, completely, hopelessly, and chronically socially inept.
Oh, put her in a room with family members or close friends, and she produced the wittiest dialogue, the most intelligent, thought-provoking conversations. Even humorous ripostes. But amongst casual acquaintances or, worse yet, strangers?
Utterly hopeless.
A chair cushion or a teacup displayed more finesse and cleverness.
A wistful sigh escaped her as she eyed the sparkling indigo lake beyond the well-tended greens.
Bordered by a grove of towering, thickly-leafed, gnarly-branched oaks, the refreshing water beckoned. What she wouldn’t give to strip her stockings and slippers from her sweaty legs and feet and soak her toes in the cool depths.
Out of the question, of course.
More’s the pity.
Despite the heat, an icy shudder scythed across her shoulders.
Och. Just imagine the elevated brows, pinched mouths, and censured superior glances from the hoity-toity upper crust even now mingling within the manor house. The upper ten thousand weren’t all pretentious and judgmental, of course. Regrettably, she seemed to be a magnet for those who were.
Hence, Shona had determined to remain as inconspicuous and innocuous as possible for the interminable seven days, eleven hours, and—she squinted at the blazing sun—however many torturous odd minutes remained before her zealously anticipated departure.
Too bad this wasn’t Wedderford Abbey, her Scottish estate—her blessedly temperate, mild-weather home. There she could frolic about barefoot, gown hiked to her thighs, or swim naked as a robin if she wished.
Which, naturally, being a reserved and modest creature of twenty—one-and-twenty tomorrow—and possessing a title in her own right, she didn’t.
Verra much. Verra often.
Last evening, several male guests—originally dismissing her as a frumpy, somewhat plump, beneath-their-touch Scot—became comically attentive and moon-eyed upon learning of her position and not-so-modest fortune. Worse than hunting hounds in full cry, once they’d caught the scent of her money and power.
A lady Lord of Parliament.
Shona had finally stopped trying to explain the complicated title to the cod-pated popinjays. She wished the Scots referred to the noble rank as a barony like the English did. So much simpler.
And why, for heaven’s sake, couldn’t whoever dreamed up the classification have created a feminine equivalent for women holding the rank?
Because in that, as in most things, men deem women irrelevant, incapable, or insignificant.
A movement caught her eye, and suddenly tense and alert, she swung her wary consideration toward the motion.
A tall man, his rather longish hair glinting with bronze streaks, strode with animal-like grace across the clipped lawn.
Headed straight for the lake, she’d be bound.
The stranger held one bare hand angled against his forehead, no doubt shading his eyes from the unrelenting sun. Still, his profile’s silhouette revealed the sharp blade of a patrician nose, the slashing angle of high cheeks, and a sculpted chin.
A strong face. Ruggedly handsome. Arresting, in a sort of untamed, almost predatory way.
As he marched along, anger exuded from him in every stalking step of his powerful legs.
The fuggy air stalling in her lungs, like a doe in a hunter’s sights, Shona stood stock still, fearful of detection.
Or so she told herself.
What other rational reason could there be for her breath to snag and her pulse to pitter-patter?
She was a sensible miss.
Not a totty-headed nincompoop given to histrionics, giggling, pouts, waterworks, swooning, or any other absurd feminine dramatics. No indeed. No coy twirling of parasols, fluttering of fans, artfully-dropped gloves. Good thing she had no inclination to flirt, for the artifice was so far beyond her scope, her maladroitness would bring further shame upon her.
Nevertheless, despite her complete and total lack of feminine wiles, her dratted attention remained curiously—disturbingly—riveted on the gentleman.
His jacket’s fabric strained against his biceps and shoulders, and with each long stride, the back of his coat hitched up, revealing what was surely one of the finest manly behinds she’d ever had the pleasure of observing.
Not that she made a regular habit of inspecting gentlemen’s posteriors. Generally, when dashing men were near, she seldom lifted her focus from the floor or her slippers’ toes.
She needn’t have fretted he’d catch her staring, for not once did he glance her way.
His Spanish brown coat, biscuit-colored pantaloons, and ebony boots blended with the oaks’ tawny-gray trunks, and in a few moments, he disappeared.
Suddenly, a touch cross and uncertain why, she muttered, “Too much to hope, I suppose, that the country air would be cooler than London.” She fervently resumed waving her fan and gave her face a brisk cooling.
A much-coveted breeze wafted past, carrying the essence of several late-blooming flowers and vines. Her nostrils quivered, and she drew in an appreciative breath.
At least it smelled scads better here.
Town reeked most days. However, in the summer, the stench became intolerable. If required to venture outdoors, she often covered her nose with an orange-blossom scented handkerchief. She far preferred the fresh, invigorating air of the country—the Highlands in particular.
Wheels crunching on gravel drew her reluctant attention to the ostentatious mansion’s circular drive. The portentous sound meant only one thing.
More guests for the Viscount and Viscountess Wimpletons’ week-long house party.
An almost intractable, child-like frown pulled her brows together and turned her mouth downward.
Why did the Wimpletons have to be such gracious hosts and all-around nice people? Favorites amongst the upper echelons, to be sure.
Three dust-coated carriages rumbled to a stop, and half a dozen maroon-and-black liveried footman rushed down the stairs to assist with the passengers’ luggage.
Over sixty of Society’s finest had descended on Davenswood Court already, and the party didn’t officially commence until tomorrow and then concluded with a grand ball.
A masque ball, at that.
Such a wonderful, if somewhat small, reprieve.
A strip of satin across Shona’s eyes would allay her discomfiture a touch, and was a trifle better than hovering in an alcove or hiding behind potted plants and vast columns. Or the humiliating awkwardness of sitting—overlooked and disregarded—with the other wallflowers and spinsterish misses. False smiles dredged from their pitiful reserve of pride couldn’t conceal the hope warring with disappointment in their half-lowered gazes.
Despite a masque’s welcome anonymity, she awaited the dance with the same enthusiasm as she might anticipate having a molar extracted or a carbuncle lanced. Not, mind you, that she’d ever experienced either. But Mama had, and she’d been a veritable bear for days before and afterward.
Mama is a crotchety, unreasonable, demanding bear all of the time.
Over one hundred guests, plus their servants, were expected, according to the maid helping Shona dress this morning.
For a week.
A whole, unbearably long, uncomfortable, angst-ridden, sure-to-make-a-cake-of-herself week. With the haut ton’s elite members milling about, constantly underfoot, noting every little faux pas or gaffe. And likely not another peaceful, relaxed moment to herself until she reached Wedderford Abbey.
Depending on how many guests did, indeed, accept the invitation to the Wimpletons’ much-coveted annual summer event, Shona might very well
be obligated to share her assigned room with a stranger.
God help her if she found herself saddled with a chit of Miss Rossington’s petulant ilk.
What a perfectly horrid notion.
Perhaps she could feign an illness?
No need to pretend. Shona swallowed the dread-induced queasiness throttling to her throat.
Why did she have to be such a coward?
Nae, not a coward.
Just wretchedly cow-handed and fearful of making social blunders. Which she did with astonishing regularity and generally humiliating results.
Chagrin-born flames licked her face.
Perfect.
Now her round cheeks even more resembled two ripe, riddy apples.
Stepping through the doorway, mindful to remain within the building’s shade lest the sun reach her easily-freckled skin, she worried her lower lip. How she wished to escape to the lake for the rest of the afternoon.
Probably some social rule against unaccompanied, unmarried females wandering the estate. Until such a female was soundly on the shelf, and then the restrictions were eased a smidge.
Not enough to suit her, by thunder and turf.
Most people thought her an insipid milk-and-water miss, which wasn’t accurate in the least. But neither was she a piss-and-vinegar chit either. She actually possessed a rather vibrant spirit—a verve she studiously kept subdued beneath her bashful mannerisms. But nothing so forward or unacceptable as actual brazenness, or—
What was that colorful expression she’d overheard the stable hand mutter last week? Nose scrunched, she shut her eyes.
Ah, that was it.
The cheeky boldness of a bloke with bull-sized ballocks.
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