by Anne Stuart
ALSO BY ANNE STUART
HISTORICALS
SCANDAL AT THE HOUSE OF RUSSELL
Never Kiss a Rake
THE HOUSE OF ROHAN
The Wicked House of Rohan
Shameless
Breathless
Reckless
Ruthless
STAND-ALONE TITLES
The Devil’s Waltz
Hidden Honor
Lady Fortune
Prince of Magic
Lord of Danger
Prince of Swords
To Love a Dark Lord
Shadow Dance
A Rose at Midnight
The Houseparty
The Spinster and the Rake
Lord Satan’s Bride
ROMANTIC SUSPENSE
THE ICE SERIES
On Thin Ice
Silver Falls
Fire and Ice
Ice Storm
Ice Blue
Cold As Ice
Black Ice
STAND-ALONE TITLES
Into the Fire
Still Lake
The Widow
Shadows at Sunset
Shadow Lover
Ritual Sins
Moonrise
Nightfall
Seen and Not Heard
At the Edge of the Sun
Darkness Before Dawn
Escape Out of Darkness
The Demon Count’s Daughter
The Demon Count
Demonwood
Cameron’s Landing
Barrett’s Hill
COLLABORATIONS
Dogs & Goddesses
The Unfortunate Miss Fortunes
ANTHOLOGIES
Burning Bright
Date with a Devil
What Lies Beneath
Night and Day
Valentine Babies
My Secret Admirer
Sisters and Secrets
Summer Love
New Year’s Resolution: Baby
New Year’s Resolution: Husband
One Night with a Rogue
Strangers in the Night
Highland Fling
To Love and To Honor
My Valentine
Silhouette Shadows
CATEGORY ROMANCE
Wild Thing
The Right Man
A Dark and Stormy Night
The Soldier and the Baby
Cinderman
Falling Angel
One More Valentine
Rafe’s Revenge
Heat Lightning
Chasing Trouble
Night of the Phantom
Lazarus Rising / reprint as Here Come the Grooms
Angel’s Wings
Rancho Diablo / reprint as Western Lovers
Crazy Like a Fox / reprint as Born in the USA
Glass Houses / reprint as Men at Work
Cry for the Moon
Partners in Crime
Blue Sage / reprint as Western Lovers
Bewitching Hour
Rocky Road / reprint in Men Made in America #19
Banish Misfortune
Housebound
Museum Piece
Heart’s Ease
Chain of Love
The Fall of Maggie Brown
Winter’s Edge
Catspaw II
Hand in Glove
Catspaw
Tangled Lies / reprint in Men Made in America #11
Now You See Him
Special Gifts
Break the Night
Against the Wind
NOVELLAS
The Wicked House of Rohan
Risk the Night
Married to It (prequel to Fire and Ice)
The characters and events portrayed in this book are fictitious. Any similarity to real persons, living or dead, is coincidental and not intended by the author.
Copyright © 2013 Anne Kristine Stuart Ohlrogge
All rights reserved.
No part of this book may be reproduced, or stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without express written permission of the publisher.
Published by Montlake Romance, Seattle
www.apub.com
ISBN-13: 9781477849118
ISBN-10: 1477849114
Cover design by Mumtaz Mustafa
Library of Congress Control Number: 2013911410
For Sabra Jones and the Greensboro Art Alliance and Residency, with thanks for all the fun and sheer joy you’ve brought to my life
CONTENTS
CHAPTER ONE
CHAPTER TWO
CHAPTER THREE
CHAPTER FOUR
CHAPTER FIVE
CHAPTER SIX
CHAPTER SEVEN
CHAPTER EIGHT
CHAPTER NINE
CHAPTER TEN
CHAPTER ELEVEN
CHAPTER TWELVE
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
CHAPTER NINETEEN
CHAPTER TWENTY
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
CHAPTER ONE
Somerset, 1869
MADDY RUSSELL CURLED UP on the window seat in Nanny Gruen’s tiny, spotlessly clean cottage on the very edge of the former Russell estate in Somerset, looking at the drizzling mist of a spring day. Somewhere, a mile away, lay their country house, Renwick, a place of considerable beauty that had once been her haven when things were bad. Things were bad now, but the house was no longer theirs. It had reverted to the Dark Viscount, as her younger sister, Sophie, liked to call him, and if he knew that two of the daughters of the house’s former owner were hiding at their old nanny’s cottage he’d soon put a stop to it. In fact, he didn’t even have to honor the gift of this small house to the Russells’ retired retainer, but so far he had. He could always change his mind.
Nanny Gruen sat across from her on the faded sofa, her eyes focused on her needlework, but Maddy had no illusion that this was an easy silence.
“You’re the most hardheaded girl I’ve ever known,” Nanny Gruen said. “What happened to my sweet little Maddy?” she added plaintively, finally looking up at her former charge, all five foot seven of her.
Maddy grimaced. “Your sweet little Maddy had a father who absconded with a huge sum of money and then abandoned his three daughters, leaving us penniless, disgraced. I’ve been deserted by my worthless fiancé, my older sister, Bryony, has disappeared with only a cryptic note, my younger sister does nothing but complain, and I refuse to sit around and wait for things to happen, not any longer. Since Bryony’s run off with the Earl of Kilmartyn, it’s going to be up to us to find out who framed our father and murdered him, because that fall from the cliffs in Dartmoor was no accident. And right now it’s going to be up to me.”
“And what is it you’re thinking of doing, missy?” her old nursemaid demanded. “Running off and getting into trouble, that’s what I call it.”
“We are already in trouble, Nanny,” Maddy said in a deliberately calm voice. “And sitting around on my posterior isn’t going to make things any better.”
“Miss Madeleine!” Nanny said, shocked. “A lady doesn’t talk about her… her limbs.”
“My posterior is not a limb, Nanny. It’s my backside.”
Nanny shrieked, putting her hands over her ears. “Your sister will hear you.”
“I did hear her, Nanny,” Sophie called from the tiny kitchen where she was currently experimenting with scones. “And she’s right.”
“Don’
t you be using such language, Miss Sophia,” Nanny said sharply.
Sophie appeared in the doorway. She was coated with flour—Sophie didn’t consider her cooking adventures successful unless she ended up wearing half of her ingredients. “You don’t really think you’re going to follow Bryony.”
“Of course not!” Maddy said. “We can assume the Earl of Kilmartyn had nothing to do with Father’s disgrace and death since Bryony appears to have run off with him instead of finding proof of his guilt. That leaves Captain Morgan and Viscount Griffiths.”
“So go up to the big house and investigate the usurper,” Sophie said in dark tones.
“Viscount Griffith’s not a usurper—Somerset was built by his family, and we only lived there because Father won the rights to it in a gaming club,” Maddy pointed out fairly. “We were bound to give it up sooner or later if the mad viscount’s heir had the money to redeem the deed.”
“Well, apparently he did, thanks to the collapse of Russell Shipping,” said Sophie tartly. “Which seems awfully suspicious, given the circumstances. I think you should go after him.”
“Father had begun to distrust Captain Morgan. I don’t know if he was even aware of Viscount Griffiths. I certainly wasn’t,” Maddy said, stretching out her legs and climbing from her cozy perch, restless as always.
“Oh, and if you didn’t know, then no one must have,” Sophie shot back. “You don’t know as much as you think you do.”
“I know more than you, that’s a sure thing,” Maddy snapped.
“Girls!” Nanny Gruen said, and Maddy felt a flush cover her face. She was being childish, scrapping with her nineteen-year-old sister when she needed to be cool and controlled if she was going to succeed in their investigation.
“Sorry, Nanny,” she muttered.
“You should be apologizing to your sister.” As Sophie began to smirk Nanny turned to her. “And you should apologize right back, missy! The two of you—I wonder if you remember anything I taught you.”
Maddy crossed the small room and gave Nanny a kiss on her cheek. Sophie stuck her tongue out at her when Nanny couldn’t see, but Maddy ignored it. “Sorry, baby sister,” she said. “It’s easy to forget you’re a grown up.” That was just barbed enough to satisfy her annoyance. “But neither of you are changing my mind. Remember the note Father left? It said ‘never trust a pirate.’ ”
“Captain Morgan isn’t a pirate,” Sophie said, plopping herself down beside Nanny on the worn sofa. A cloud of flour billowed out from her peach-striped gown. “He was a privateer at one point in his long and checkered career, but he was hardly swinging a cutlass and making people walk the plank. You’ve read too many novels.”
“You’re the one who steals them from under my bed,” Maddy retorted. “And I have no illusions about Captain Morgan. I’ve met other captains Father employed. They’re old, weather-beaten, and have no use for women. Given what we know of Captain Morgan I expect he’s ancient—at least forty, and dull and dry. But there was a reason Father distrusted him, and I intend to find out why. We need to look at the facts clearly, without emotion. It appears as if Father embezzled a fortune from Russell Shipping, the very company he founded, ran off with the money, and then conveniently died on Dartmoor, with no sign of the money left behind, no word to his daughters. But why would he be heading for Devonport? If he’d simply been trying to escape from England he would have left from Dover. The captain is the obvious one to investigate first. I don’t know why Bryony decided to bother with Kilmartyn.”
“Because Kilmartyn was right there in London, you ninny,” Sophie said. “And the Dark Viscount is right here. It makes no sense to go haring off—”
“I’m not haring off. This is a well-thought-out plan, and I’ve even had Mr. Fulton’s assistance.”
“Our useless solicitor? What’s he done besides tell us that we’re penniless and disgraced and will never marry?”
Maddy could feel a nerve tick in her jaw. “We’ll marry,” she said grimly. “You’ll have men falling at your feet and they won’t care what our father did. But first I’m going to find someone titled and very wealthy, a baronet at the very least. Lord Eastham’s been writing me letters, you know. He’s got more than enough money to clean up our reputations.”
“But he’s so old! And what about Tarkington? Won’t he come back once he thinks about it?” Sophie said in a worried voice.
Maddy kept her face expressionless, ignoring the pain in her heart. “Tarkington is gone forever, and Godspeed. I’ve decided if I have to marry for the good of my family, it might as well be someone with a title and a bit more money.”
“I rather thought that was my job,” Sophie said. “You’re quite beautiful, Maddy, but you know I outshine you. People tend to prefer sweet, witless blondes to dark-haired viragoes.”
“I am not a virago!” Maddy was outraged.
“Girls!” Nanny said again, this time in a pleading voice. “You’re giving me a headache. Must you always bicker?”
“Things will be much more peaceful when I’m gone, Nanny, and by the time I return we can all leave and get out of your hair.”
“Now, Miss Madeleine, you know perfectly well I don’t want that!” Nanny Gruen said stoutly. “You can stay here as long as you like—for the rest of your lives if you wish.”
“Don’t worry—you won’t be stuck with us that long. It’s going to be fine. Mr. Fulton owes me a favor, after his total uselessness with Father’s estate. He happens to be acquainted with Captain Morgan, and he heard he was in need of a maid of all work. So I had Mr. Fulton tell him he knew just the girl.”
“You didn’t!” Sophie breathed, her bright eyes round.
“I did. And I know I can trust Mr. Fulton not to betray who I am. He feels guilty.”
“You could marry him and forget all this nonsense,” Nanny Gruen said sternly. “He’s a good-looking young man with prospects. A solicitor’s a respectable profession, not like a shopkeeper or something.”
“I have no intention of marrying anyone who has to work for a living,” Maddy said firmly. “If I don’t choose Lord Eastham then I’ll find someone with at least twenty thousand pounds a year and a title to boot. I’m not throwing myself away on a penniless solicitor.”
Sophie sighed dramatically. “Haven’t I already told you I’m the logical one to marry a title? You’re already twenty-two.”
Maddy resisted the completely childish urge to pinch her sister hard. “Then we can both marry titles. The more, the merrier. And I’m hardly at my last prayers.”
“Do you suppose Bryony really married Lord Kilmartyn?” Sophie said, clearly not realizing her imminent danger. “She always said she would never marry. And Kilmartyn could have anyone.”
“Are you suggesting that anyone’s more precious than our Bryony?” Maddy said in a dark tone. Sophie was going to end up black and blue at this rate.
“Of course your sister is suggesting no such thing. And shame on you, Miss Maddy, for even thinking your older sister would run off with a man without the benefit of matrimony. Miss Bryony isn’t going to do anything she ought not to do,” Nanny Gruen said with a determined tone they’d learned long ago not to thwart. “I know I can count on you not to do anything you shouldn’t. There’ll be a proper housekeeper there and all, won’t there?”
Maddy managed to hide her astonishment. She’d girded her loins, metaphorically speaking, for a major battle full of dire threats and recriminations. Instead Nanny Gruen seemed to be surrendering at the first shot across her bow.
“Of course there is,” she said soothingly. “Mrs. Crozier and her husband are in charge of the household, and there must be a boy for the heavy work. They just need extra help.”
“I can’t say that I like it, Miss Madeleine,” Nanny said in a worried voice. “But if there’s a respectable older woman in the house to look after the maids, and if young Mr. Fulton is going to be around, then I suppose I have no choice but to let you go. My mind won’t be easy until yo
u return, but at this rate if you two don’t kill each other then I may very well drown you both.”
“Thank you, Nanny!” Maddy said in a properly subdued voice, but the look the woman sent her was far too wise. They both knew there was nothing she could do to stop her. In the end she was going, whether her old nanny liked it or not.
“Well, I expect it’s going to be a dead bore,” Sophie said with a yawn. “Some prosy old sea captain stomping around smelling of snuff. Do you suppose he has a wooden leg? If he does and he gives you too much trouble you could always steal it.”
“Captain Morgan isn’t going to give me any trouble,” Maddy replied airily. “You forget—I’m used to seafaring men. Father used to let me accompany him to his office on occasion, and I met a fair number of the men who captained his vessels, though fortunately not Captain Morgan. He’ll probably be just like all the rest of them. Old and gruff and boring. The man has no wife and apparently never bothered to marry. The ocean probably arouses his passions, not the female sex.”
“Miss Maddy! Your language!” Nanny protested weakly, having given up the battle.
“Gender? Is that any better?” Maddy offered.
“A proper young lady wouldn’t bring up such things in the first place.”
“I don’t think we’re considered very proper anymore, Nanny,” Sophie pointed out. “We’re disgraced.”
“All the more reason to be above reproach.”
“I will be above reproach,” Maddy said cheerfully. “It’ll simply be in Captain Morgan’s household rather than here. Don’t worry—if the captain truly had something to do with destroying our father it won’t take me long to find it out. I’ll be back before you even know I’m gone. Trust me—one landlocked old man is no match for me.”
The man currently calling himself Thomas Morgan walked down the sun-bright streets of the seaside town of Devonport, at peace with the world. It had been a long time since he’d been Luca, half-gypsy street rat, and while deep inside he knew he could never be anyone else, the role of Thomas Morgan suited him well enough. It was a clear spring day, though the weather was crisp, and the breeze blew the salty smell of the ocean straight to him, a taunt from his jealous true love. It had been too long since he’d been out to sea. Ever since that bastard Russell had pulled him off his ship he’d been landlocked, and he cursed the lying, thieving old man every chance he got. Not that he hadn’t managed to profit in the end. He’d spent his twenty-nine years surviving one disaster after another, always coming out on top, as he had this time. With most of the assets of Russell Shipping disappearing into thin air the solicitors had had no choice but to put the few remaining resources, including the ships, up for sale, and he’d managed to buy two of them and was in negotiations for a third. It didn’t hurt that his fiancée’s father and his firm were in charge of settling Russell’s disastrous estate.