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For Mamaw, who taught me to love books.
Acknowledgments
As with any publishing endeavor, I could not have made this book happen without a great deal of assistance from a great number of people. Thanks as always to my wonderful editor, Holly Ingraham, who gets what I’m saying even when I sometimes do not! To my savvy agent, Holly Root, who even when I’m at my most neurotic, always finds a way to make me feel like a rock star. To everyone at St. Martin’s Press who works on getting my books out to the readers, especially my publicist, Amy Goppert, the sales team, the art department, the folks at Heroes & Heartbreakers, and my lovely copy editor who has saved me from making egregious errors more times than I can count. Any errors are mine and mine alone. Thanks also to my dear Kiss and Thrill blogmates: Amy, Rachel, Diana, Sarah, Sharon, Krista, Gwen and Lena; my sister, Jessie; the entire Moody clan; Julianne, Janga, Santa, Terri, and Lindsey; and my furry writing companions, Charlie, Stephen, and Tiny.
Contents
Title Page
Copyright Notice
Dedication
Acknowledgments
Prologue
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Epilogue
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Prologue
“Put the knife down, Your Grace,” Perdita heard her friend Mrs. Georgina Mowbray say to Gervase as he held the penknife closer to her own throat.
She wasn’t sure how long they’d stood thus, her husband’s sour breath panting across her cheek as he held her in a death grip against his powerful body. A while, at least. Time seemed to get away from her when Gervase was in one of his moods. And Perdita had found long ago that ignoring such things would make it easier to pretend later that it had never happened.
Only this time, she wasn’t sure she’d need to pretend. If he killed her, she’d forget everything. Which for one blissful moment sounded as close to heaven as she’d ever come.
She’d known for a good while that things would come to this point. Gervase’s moods had risen and fallen with much greater speed than they had when she’d first married him five years before. Then he’d seemed—in retrospect—almost normal. And she thought she was the luckiest woman in the world. But like everything else in life, there was a before and an after. A point at which one was able to judge things had changed irrevocably. For Perdita, it had been the first time he hit her. And everything after that had been hastily reshuffled into the “after” pile.
If she hadn’t had the courage to confess her predicament to her sister and their friend Georgie, who had both endured their own bruises at the hands of abusive husbands, she would still be in constant reaction mode. Never making things happen herself, but only responding to what others did. And, as Gervase’s wife, that meant that she reacted to each blow, every threat, every insinuation that he held all the power while she held none.
Now, however, she’d learned to stand up to him. And finally, she and her sister and friend had judged it to be time for her to leave him. Perdita had known the discussion would not be an easy one, of course. She’d known he would lash out or worse, try to keep her from leaving. But even after years of his abuse she was still capable of being surprised. Which is what happened when he pulled the knife out and held it to her throat.
“Killing your wife will not make you feel any better.” Georgie’s voice was calmer than Perdita’s would have been had their situations been reversed. But then Georgie had grown up following the drum, so was used to sounding authoritative.
They’d only wanted this to be the first step, Perdita reflected as his arms tightened around her. She would leave Ormond House and set up her own establishment. Since Gervase spent much of his time away anyway, it shouldn’t be too taxing for him. It wasn’t as if Perdita would be in the Antipodes. If he needed her, she’d be in Mayfair a few streets over.
But, they’d miscalculated. Not only had Gervase been unhappy about the plan, he translated his unhappiness into physical retribution against his wife. Which concluded in his pressing the blade of a knife to the vulnerable skin of her neck. He was not going to let her go without a fight.
His next words only confirmed it. “She wouldn’t be able to leave me,” the duke slurred. His lips twisted with resentment. “She was fine before the two of you got hold of her with your lies about me.”
Afraid that he would turn his anger on her sister and friend, Perdita glanced over to see them exchanging a speaking look. To save them from being harmed by him, she considered telling him the truth, that she had chosen to make this appeal based on her own initiative. After so many years of enduring Ormond’s cruelties, this week Perdita had reached the point at which she no longer cared what her husband would do to retaliate against her for leaving. She only knew, she’d told her sister and Georgie, that if she did not leave now, she was unlikely to live for much longer.
If this was how Ormond behaved when he suspected Perdita’s friends of luring her away, though, his response to learning it had been Perdita’s own idea would send him over the edge.
Deciding that she had to appease him somehow, Perdita said, “I would never leave you, darling.” Trying desperately to remain calm even as she felt the press of his blade against her skin, she continued, “You know I love you.”
While she waited for him to reply—the alcohol had made him a bit slow today—she dared a look at Isabella and Georgina again. This time she saw Georgie silently make a figure with her thumb and forefinger. To anyone who knew her and her penchant for carrying a small pistol in her reticule for safety, it was obvious. Perdita felt her heart speed up as Isabella gave a quick nod to let Georgie know she understood.
Perdita and Isabella had been slightly appalled when Georgina first informed them of her habit of carrying the small pistol in her reticule, but Georgie explained that she’d done so for her own protection in the peninsula, and it had simply become habit. And the two other women had reluctantly agreed that there were some occasions when having a pistol might be beneficial for a lady traveling alone in London.
Perdita was unsure whether she felt relief at knowing her friend was armed, or terrified that somehow Gervase would learn of it and punish her friend for it. Or worse, use it on all three of them. Georgie had often accused her of being too pessimistic, but in this case, she knew whereof she spoke. No one knew her husband’s capacity for violence better than Perdita. And the Gervase she knew would not hesitate to shoot them if he decided it was what he wished.
Perhaps to distract him from Georgie and her pistol, Isabella began to speak. “Ormond,” she heard her sister say with the self-assurance that only Isabella could
muster. Then, perhaps thinking better of it, she softened her tone. “Gervase,” Isabella said, switching to the duke’s Christian name, “we aren’t here to take Perdita away from you. We simply wish for you to perhaps be a bit gentler with her.”
Perdita felt his arms tighten around her. “Why?” he demanded petulantly. “She’s not gentle with me. She scratched my face earlier. Damn her.” He shook her as he said those last words, and Perdita heard herself whimper.
Perdita’s mind raced, wondering if there was any possible way for her to get the knife out of his hand.
Isabella spoke up again, her tone imperious now as she spoke to her brother-in-law. “You should be gentle with her because she might be carrying the next Duke of Ormond.” Perdita bit back a gasp at the suggestion. She wasn’t enceinte, but he had no way of knowing that. And if it infused his heart with kindness and joy, so be it.
Unfortunately, her sister’s words only served to make him angrier. With a sound like a bull about to charge, he twisted Perdita’s arm up behind her back.
Moving as one, Georgina and Isabella stepped forward. Closing her eyes, Perdita sent up a swift prayer that they’d survive.
“There, now,” Isabella said, her voice placating, as if she were trying to soothe a skittish horse, “you don’t wish to harm your heir, do you?”
But they’d no sooner stepped forward than it became clear Isabella’s words had been woefully miscalculated. Rather than being transported with joy, Ormond instead became even angrier. “What? Is this true?” he asked, turning Perdita in his arms so that he could look her in the face. She tried with some difficulty not to cringe back from him. “You lied to me?” he demanded. In his haste to get his hands on her, he brought the knife down where it became trapped between Perdita’s arm and his own fist as he began to shake her. “You lying bitch! You told me it wasn’t possible!” he cried.
“No!” Isabella shouted, rushing forward to pull him away from her sister. “Stop it! Stop it!”
“Your Grace,” Georgina said in a hard voice, stepping forward as she jerked the pistol upward. “I warn you to stop that at once.”
In a blur, Perdita watched Isabella grasp the duke by the shoulders and attempt to forcibly pry him away from her. When her sister finally managed to hook her arm around his neck, cutting off his airway, the duke gave a muffled growl and shoved his body backward as if trying to dislodge his attacker.
Finally, as they spun away from her, Perdita saw Georgie lift her pistol, take aim and fire.
At almost the same time, the knife, which had been held between Perdita’s body and Ormond’s hand, fell to the floor, and must have been in the right position at the right time, because when the duke fell mere seconds later it was upon the same blade with which he’d threatened his wife.
Sliding to the floor in a heap, Perdita wept. Though she wasn’t sure why.
One
“A pair of prime goers, Lord Archer. The best I’ve ever seen at Tattersall’s.”
Lord Archer Lisle nodded and tried to look somewhat interested as the overeager Earl of Wrotham waxed rhapsodic over his new pair of matched bays. He was as fond of horseflesh as the next man, but tonight his mind was on another sort of flesh altogether.
He’d accepted the invitation to Lady Sumrall’s annual ball knowing that Perdita, Duchess of Ormond, would also be in attendance. In fact, Perdita’s presence was the sole reason he’d chosen to come at all. Since both her sister, the former Lady Isabella Wharton and now Duchess of Ormond, and her friend the Countess of Coniston had had their lives threatened by an as yet unknown assailant earlier in the year, the widowed duchess had become the sole focus of their attacks. So far the threats had come in the form of anonymous notes taunting the widowed duchess with the knowledge that he—Archer assumed this person was a he—knew what she’d done last season, when her deceased husband, the brutish sixth Duke of Ormond, had been killed. Never mind that the dead nobleman had been killed while attempting to cut his wife’s throat. Whoever this mastermind was, he’d appointed himself judge and jury and had found all three women guilty of the crime of killing Ormond. Never mind that there had been no suspicions, as far as Archer knew, from the authorities.
Thus far, the threats against her had not persuaded the headstrong Perdita to curb any of her normal activities, a resistance for which she was inordinately proud. But Archer, who had been there for the aftermath of the attempts on the lives of both the Duchess of Ormond and Lady Coniston, was not so happy about her resistance to any kind of curtailment of her behavior. Yes, he wished to see the coward who threatened her thwarted, and Perdita going about as if nothing were amiss did so, but knowing that her defiance put her life in jeopardy frightened him and he wasn’t afraid to admit it. And since Perdita refused to listen to reason—especially when it came from the mouth of Lord Archer Lisle—he’d decided to see to it that she remained safe whether she chose to listen to him or not.
At present Perdita was waltzing with Lord Dunthorp, a viscount of middling years who had spent the last few weeks dancing attendance on her. Her luxuriant strawberry-blond hair was dressed in a simple chignon that put the fussier styles of the other ladies to shame. And her gown, a cerise-colored silk that was simply cut but hugged her slim figure in all the right places, also put the others to shame. He’d seen Dunthorp’s eyes wander from her pretty face down to her impressive décolletage more than once since they’d taken to the floor—a circumstance that made Archer long to gut the other man, though it would be dashed bad manners toward his hosts.
He’d been half in love with her ever since they’d met. And it hadn’t taken long for that half to expand into a whole.
It wasn’t just because she was beautiful—though she was. No, though he appreciated her fine-boned loveliness, it was her spirit that solidified his affection for her. Perdita wasn’t an angel. What woman was? But she had a way about her. A sweetness in the way she dealt with people—he’d heard the servants at Ormond House speak of it—that set them at ease. Even her bad moods—which were rare—were short-lived and often ended with a self-deprecating remark.
But the thing that most endeared her to Archer was something she likely didn’t even recall. It had been a moment some three years earlier when one of the housemaids had fallen pregnant. There were few secrets in a household as large as Ormond House, and Archer had a strong suspicion that it had been the duke or one of his cronies who forced himself upon the girl. But when the housekeeper had informed Perdita, she’d handled the matter with kindness and compassion, giving the maid enough money to return home to the country and with the offer of a reference should she need one in the future. Perdita hadn’t considered the matter in terms of its reflection on herself. She’d only considered the little maid’s feelings. And it had been that bit of selflessness that did him in. From that moment on he’d been a goner. And in spite of himself he’d fallen all the way in love with his employer’s wife.
From the corner of his eye, he could see her red gown as they made the circuit of the Sumrall ballroom. He wasn’t jealous. How could he be when his position as private secretary to the Duke of Ormond made her virtually his employer?
No, Perdita was not for the likes of him. No matter how he might, in his heart of hearts, wish to declare himself to her.
“I say, Lord Archer,” Wrotham interrupted his thoughts. “I think Mrs. Fitzroy is attempting to get your attention.”
Pulling himself together, Archer glanced across the room to see that indeed the comely widow was casting a speaking glance his way. And if he were any interpreter of glances, hers was saying something that was not appropriate in mixed company. The lady had been trying to lure him into her bed for weeks now, but though Archer could appreciate the joys of the bedchamber as much as the next man, he was too busy protecting Perdita from herself to succumb. Then there was the whole unrequited business.
He snagged a glass of champagne from a passing footman and took a drink before he spoke. “I believe you’re correct, Wrot
ham,” he said, nodding to the other man. “But I’m afraid I have other plans this evening. Lovely though Mrs. Fitzroy may be.”
The other man touched his index finger to the side of his nose. “Say no more, old fellow,” he said with a knowing look. “Just between us, I’ve heard Mrs. Fitzroy is a bit possessive, so it’s probably just as well that you not try to juggle her with another woman, if you catch my meaning.”
Since it was impossible not to catch Wrotham’s meaning, Archer just nodded.
“I hope you won’t mind if I have a bit of a try at her,” the other man continued, straightening his cuffs as he placed his own empty champagne glass on an obliging side table. “It’s just that I’m in search of a new mistress and I like the look of your Mrs. Fitzroy.”
Archer would have told the other man to be his guest, but that would have implied that he did indeed have some sort of connection with her, so he simply nodded again and the two men parted ways.
The waltz having just ended, Archer threaded his way toward the side of the ballroom where Dunthorp had just left Perdita—presumably in search of champagne for her. But before he’d made it halfway there, their hostess clapped her hands from a position near where the musicians were set up. “Lords and ladies,” she said once the chatter in the ballroom had descended to a low murmur, “if I could have your attention, please!”
Not wishing to do her the discourtesy of walking while she spoke, Archer paused.
“I am delighted to tell you that I’ve arranged a wonderful bit of theater for you this evening, thanks to the gracious proprietors of the Theater Royale,” Lady Sumrall said. “For your enjoyment, we have not just one, but three superb actresses: leading lady of the stage Mrs. Alicia Lloyd; her charming understudy, Mrs. Pfeiffer; and the soon-to-be-famous ingénue, Miss Desdemona Wright. And playing opposite all three is the incomparable Mr. Charles Keating. All starring in a pantomime that is sure to bring everyone to rapturous applause!” As she introduced each of the actors, they stepped forward. Archer could see more than one gentleman eyeing the actresses, and Lord Carston, who was rumored to be Mrs. Lloyd’s current paramour, beamed, despite the fact that his wife was also present in the room.
Why Lords Lose Their Hearts Page 1
