Regency Romance Collection: Regency Fire: The Historical Regency Romance Complete Series (Books 1-5)

by Bridget Barton

  Gabriel took her into his arms, pressing his body hard into hers before finally, he laid her down on the great fireside rug.

  Evelyn had always imagined being terrified at this moment, and yet there was no fear to be found. Gabriel Farrington would be hers, and she would be his, in every way.

  By the time they had dressed and composed themselves, there was still no sign of Stuart Penhaligon. He had undoubtedly decided to leave the pair alone until they had resolved their differences, and Evelyn found herself suddenly inordinately pleased at her cousin’s interference in her life. If Stuart had not done such a thing, she would not have just made love with Gabriel Farrington; the only man she would ever love.

  “I hear carriage wheels,” Gabriel said, suddenly.

  “I hear nothing,” Evelyn said, shaking her head and shrugging.

  “Listen.”

  Finally, Evelyn heard the faint rumble in the distance. She hastened to one of the large drawing room windows and gasped when she saw the carriage that the Duchess of Horndean routinely used rolling towards them.

  “Oh, my God!” Evelyn said, desperately. “I think it’s the Duchess of Horndean. She probably has Eleonora with her. They have found me out somehow.”

  “Perhaps they had called upon your parents’ home and wondered at your absence,” Gabriel said, shrugging.

  “It matters not, they have found me out, and they will ruin me.”

  “How can they ruin you now, my dear?” Gabriel said, reaching out to take her hands. “You are mine now. We shall be married, and there is nothing they can do to you.”

  “If they find me here with you, there is much they can do to ruin my family. They shall suffer enough at my breaking of the engagement without that.”

  “Then let us not give them the opportunity,” Gabriel said, smiling down at her.

  “What do you mean?”

  “Let us go now. Let us run to the stables, climb up on our horses and run.”

  “Run where?” Evelyn said, helplessly. “If they realise we have been here, and we are unmarried, it is over.”

  “When I say run, Evelyn, I mean elope. Let us go today, this minute, and find someone who will marry us. Even if we have to cross the border into Scotland, let us do it. Let us do it now before that carriage draws any closer.”

  “Should we really?” Evelyn said, her heart beating hard once more and her breath coming in shallow gasps.

  “I love you, Evelyn. I want you to marry me, and I want you to marry me today. Let us not wait, and let us not give them the chance to create a scandal.”

  “But there will be a scandal, Gabriel.”

  “But we shall be husband and wife already, and any scandal shall be slight in comparison.” He grasped her hand firmly and began to pull her towards the door. “What do you say?”

  “I say yes, my darling Gabriel, I say yes.”

  Epilogue

  Evelyn was surprised to find how readily the Farrington family had accepted her into their home, especially after the way she had become married to the Duke. However, Evelyn rather wondered if Gabriel’s four brothers weren’t simply pleased by the idea that she had helped them deliver a rather crushing blow to the Cunningham family. And yet, now that she had all that she wanted, Evelyn found herself caring very little and did nothing to put them straight on the matter.

  Of course, when they had returned from Scotland as man and wife, there was a flurry of scandal across the two Duchies. In truth, however, Gabriel had been right. The scandal had been short lived, and they had very much thwarted any ideas the Cunningham women had of heaping shame upon Evelyn. After all, their plan had been to create such a scandal as no man would want her, but since she was already married to the Duke of Calgarth, their plan had come to naught.

  Daphne Farrington, the Dowager Duchess, had been most welcoming of all. She had seen the love that her eldest son had for the beautiful young Evelyn and was simply pleased that their marriage had been forged from such a love, rather than Gabriel’s desire to destroy the Cunninghams.

  And yet, as she watched the two of them walking hand-in-hand through the grounds of the Calgarth estate, Daphne Farrington knew that the marriage could mean only one thing. The deepening of the dreadful feud and the awful idea that there seemed to be no end in sight. All that remained was for a concerned mother to worry what this would mean for the future of her family.

  The Lord she could not Trust

  Book 2

  Introduction

  Hugh Farrington, charming and handsome, had never been much interested in the feud which seemed to determine his family’s every movement. Aunt Verity, whose death had been the very cause of it all, was a woman unknown to him; she was so distant now as to seem little more than a fictional character.

  When his older brother, the Duke of Calgarth, sets him a mission to find out more about the copper mining interests of their greatest enemy, the Duke of Horndean, Hugh finds himself drawn towards another distraction entirely; Miss Serena Edison.

  Witty, intelligent, and beautiful, Serena wins his heart almost immediately, and Hugh can see his old ways slowly turning to dust.

  But can love really run so smoothly? Especially when their enemy knows of Hugh’s interference in their copper mining schemes, as well as his growing love for Serena.

  In the end, Serena must learn to trust in order to keep the one man she has truly connected with in her entire life, but how much will it take to overcome the interference of so cruel an adversary? And with his own heart at stake, can Hugh do whatever he must to stay loyal to his family and the decades-old feud?

  Chapter One

  Hugh Farrington thought the grounds of Rosedown Manor just about the finest he had ever been in. In truth, they were nowhere near as extensive as the grounds of the Calgarth estate, but still he thought the estate rather a large one for a Baron.

  It was obvious that Lord Edison, the Baron, was doing rather well, and it was likely that his family had done so for many generations. The country mansion of Rosedown Manor was rather old but well-kept and certainly a building of some beauty.

  Hugh was not particularly acquainted with Lord and Lady Edison, although he felt sure that they had attended a social event or two in common over the years.

  At first, Hugh had wondered if he would be a little out of place at the gathering, although garden parties were usually such large and sprawling affairs that a person could easily hide right there out in the open. And that, of course, was why he was there. Once again, his brother, Gabriel Farrington, the Duke of Calgarth, had sent Hugh out on a mission.

  Hugh had begun to wonder if his brother’s recent marriage hadn’t mellowed him a little regarding the decades-old feud between the Farrington and Cunningham families. However, now that Gabriel had settled down into married life, he seemed more determined than ever to find yet more ways of digging holes beneath his enemies.

  “I do not think I have even seen Nigel Pettigrew yet.” Charles Lockhart, an old friend of Hugh, appeared at his side with yet another glass of champagne in his hand. “Are you sure he is coming?”

  Hugh sighed inwardly, hoping his friend was not about to get drunk and talkative. The last thing he needed was for all present to realise his motivation for attending the garden party at Rosedown Manor.

  “No, I have yet to lay eyes upon him,” Hugh said, letting his eyes roam around the garden for any sign of the man.

  Nigel Pettigrew was one of the wealthiest men in the county. In truth, he was one of the wealthiest men for several counties across. Although not an aristocrat, he came from a very old and respected family. Initially bankers, the Pettigrew family soon became private investors, and their wealth seemed to rise exponentially.

  Nigel Pettigrew had an interest in all manner of industry as well as a great reputation for taking a person’s personal wealth and investing it wisely.

  Gabriel had decided that Nigel Pettigrew would be a firm ally to have and one of great use. Hugh, however, had not been sure.


  “But Gabriel, Nigel Pettigrew is a famously neutral sort of a man. He has dealt with the Cunninghams as much as he has dealt with us over the years, and he is not a man who gossips.”

  “The problem is, Hugh, that you see him as a neutral man interested only in business. I see him rather differently. I think that Nigel Pettigrew could fall either way, and I would much rather he fell on the side of Calgarth than fell on the side of Horndean.”

  “And so you would like me to sound him out to see if he has any knowledge of any interest in mining that the Cunningham family might currently be pursuing,” Hugh said with a sigh.

  “Yes, I do. And I am sure you will be able to do the thing discreetly. After all, you’re about the most charming man in the county, are you not?” Gabriel chuckled.

  “Only with the ladies, my dear man,” Hugh said and shrugged.

  As Hugh continued to look about the Rosedown Manor Gardens for any sign of Nigel Pettigrew, still he was not sure that Gabriel’s plan was the right one. He could not begin to imagine that Nigel Pettigrew would fall on either side of the feud, as Gabriel put it. Pettigrew had a head for business, and that was all. Hugh was certain that the man had no interest in the machinations of two warring families. However, Gabriel had obviously thought it an idea sensible enough to suggest that Hugh secure himself an invite to the home of Baron Edison.

  The only way that Gabriel had been able to manage that was through his close friend, Charles Lockhart. Charles Lockhart had enjoyed a rather long acquaintance with Lord Edison, and Gabriel had asked him to arrange an invite to the garden party. Charles being Charles, he had wanted to know the ins and outs of why on earth Hugh Farrington would be interested in attending the garden party of a minor aristocrat. In the end, Hugh could think of nothing inventive to say and had simply told his friend the truth. However, as Charles Lockhart began to sway a little, Hugh rather wondered at the sense of having done so.

  “I say, there’s old Pettigrew,” Charles said, a little too loudly for Hugh’s liking.

  “I say, Charles, do keep it down,” Hugh said, scowling at his friend. “I do not want the entire garden party to know my motives, after all.”

  “Terribly sorry, old boy,” Charles said with a boyish chuckle. “That’s the problem with champagne.”

  “Right, I am going to make my way over there before he gets in conversation with anybody,” Hugh said determinedly.

  In truth, Hugh had found the necessary small talk rather hard to make, and he began to wonder if he had already lost Nigel Pettigrew’s interest.

  “And your family are well, Sir?” He went on, rather wishing he had prepared a few lines of light and inconsequential conversation beforehand.

  “Indeed, they are well, Lord Farrington, I thank you,” Nigel Pettigrew said in rather a perfunctory manner.

  “And I trust the world of business treats you well,” Hugh ploughed on.

  “It has its ups and its downs, Lord Farrington, but I must admit, it has always been rather kind to me.” Pettigrew gave a grin; he always liked to talk about his investment successes.

  “Tell me, do you have many dealings by way of investment in mining? Not coal, you understand, but copper or tin.”

  “Well, I do like to keep an open mind,” Nigel Pettigrew said, somewhat cagily. “But I do not yet know of anything firm in the county. Many of the copper mines were played out years ago, Lord Farrington. Perhaps it would be unlikely that a rich seam would be found anywhere these days.”

  “But is it not true that the Duchy of Horndean has some little interest in copper at the moment?”Hugh knew that his question was clumsy but did not know how else to go about it.

  "Well, if they do have any interest, I daresay it is merely speculative at the moment,” Nigel Pettigrew said. “But I do not know. I suppose you would have to ask them, Lord Farrington.”

  Hugh rather thought that his initial assessment of Nigel Pettigrew had been proved correct. The man simply did not go in for gossip. No doubt he had, over the years, rightly assessed that a man did better in business if he did not jump down on either side of the fence. If a man kept himself neutral, then he could deal in business with everybody. No doors were closed to him. Well, it very much looked like the Duke of Calgarth had misjudged the man and, in a very small way, Hugh rather looked forward to telling his older brother that he had been wrong on this occasion.

  When Nigel Pettigrew moved on to some other company, it had come as rather a relief to Hugh. With his mission fully played out as far as he could tell, Hugh had decided to enjoy the rest of his afternoon. There certainly were many fine looking young ladies about the place, and it wouldn’t hurt to make a few new acquaintances.

  Charles Lockhart was nowhere to be seen, and Hugh could not help hoping that his friend was sitting down quietly somewhere and eating something that would soak up the champagne.

  Hugh made his way to one of the four large buffet tables set out in the garden. He collected himself a small plate of pastries, both savoury and sweet, and finally gave into having a glass of champagne.

  With his hands full, Hugh began to wander the grounds in search of a free table. Most, of course, had at least one or two people already sitting at them. If Hugh were to share, then he would much rather share with a pretty young lady or two, so he rather tried to narrow his search.

  As he continued to walk slowly, Hugh made eye contact with a young lady he rather recognised. He instantly looked away, however, remembering that she and the young lady sitting at her side had been in attendance at Lord and Lady Blunt’s ball when he himself had been a little worse for wear owing to a minor overindulgence in champagne.

  Hugh had flirted with the young women outrageously, and they had enjoyed every moment of it. Ordinarily, they would not have particularly interested him. However, the champagne had got to him, and he had spent much of the evening in their company.

  Not only were they the sort of women who did not particularly interest Hugh, but Cecilia Bunsen and Lady Louisa Wilson were renowned for rather tenacious husband hunting, if not title hunting. If they captured him now, any ideas for a pleasurable afternoon at the Rosedown Manor garden party would be sunk.

  However, Hugh realised that if he sat down anywhere at that moment, the two young ladies would find a way to sit with him. They were rather like hunting hounds in that respect.

  Hugh walked, still carrying his plate and champagne glass, casually past the tables, determinedly not making eye contact with Cecilia or Louisa. Instead, he looked airily about him and waited for the two ladies to avert their gaze for just a moment. The very moment they did, Hugh darted behind an enormous topiary peacock, expertly fashioned out of some lush green box hedging.

  Wondering just how long he would get away with hiding behind a giant leafy peacock, Hugh looked all around him for his next area of refuge. Just six feet away was yet another great hedge, also fashioned into a peacock, presumably intended to be the mate of the one he was hiding behind. Hugh chuckled to himself. When would he finally start to behave himself and not continually end up in awkward scenarios?

  He looked down at the pastries on his plate rather hungrily, but with a glass of champagne in his other hand, and nowhere to place it down, Hugh rather thought he would have to go hungry until he finally found a resting place.

  Driven on, he set off and walked rather smartly until he was entirely hidden behind the second leafy peacock. By the time he reached it, Hugh found that he was smiling to himself. After all, he had been sent to Rosedown Manor with a very specific task to perform. Whatever would Gabriel think to see him darting about the place and hiding behind sculptured hedging?

  Hugh looked about him and saw that the next two pieces of cover that he might take were more box hedging sculptures, both of which had simply been fashioned into immaculate spheres. Beyond them was a line of neatly cut hedging which formed rather a useful looking sort of a screen. Beyond that, Hugh could see another, smaller garden, with stone benches and beautiful camellias.
It looked like a fine place to sit down to enjoy his pastries and champagne.

  Peering out from behind the peacock to see if he would be observed, Hugh set off again, determined that he should, one way or another, gain the solitude of the private looking little garden beyond.

  Chapter Two

  Serena Edison looked about her in amusement, keen to see if she were the only witness to the curious behaviour of the young man hiding behind her mother’s topiary peacocks. The awful things were Lady Edison’s pride and joy, and yet Serena and her father could not abide them. However, the gardener was very much her mother’s man and had put a great deal of time and effort into maintaining the enormous birds.

  Serena moved a little out of the main throng of guests, standing alone and out of the way where she could watch the young man without being interrupted.

  She could see that he was holding a plate of food and a glass of champagne, and laughed when she saw him looking helplessly down at the food. For a moment, she almost decided to join him behind the peacock and offer to hold his champagne for him while he ate.

  However, she was keen to see what he would do next and found herself incredibly amused by his actions. When he moved from the second peacock, sneaking his way along until he came to rest behind the first of the two giant hedge spheres, Serena realised exactly what he was doing.

  For some reason, the young man wished to be away from the company he found himself in and was trying to make his way to the camellia garden. Chuckling to herself, Serena decided to make her way to the camellia garden before him. Approaching it from the opposite direction, she was able to keep out of sight while still maintaining a watch on the progress of the fleeing man.