by Jill Hughey
“He wants me to meet her,” David said cautiously. “He wants me to come to Bavaria.”
The END
A note from the author
I hope you have enjoyed your journey in David and Rochelle's world. If you did, one of the most wonderful things you can do for an independent author like me is to write a review on Amazon .
Second Love: A Short Historical Romance Story tells Ingrid and Samuel’s story. The 10,500 word story is chronologically set between the last chapter and epilogue of Unbidden.
Please continue reading for a quick excerpt from Redeemed, Doeg's story and book two in the Evolution Series. Can a quiet widow help our damaged villain find redemption?
The third book in the Evolution Series is Vain, the story of Theophilus, who discovers unexpected companionship with his tailor’s daughter.
If you'd like to try a sweet (clean) romance set in Arizona Territory in the 1880s, please check out my book called Sass Meets Class, in which an American girl with plenty of common sense can't resist a member of the British nobility.
All my books are available in print from Amazon or Createspace.
Thank you for reading Unbidden! If you liked it, I'd really appreciate a review at Amazon, or on your favorite website for readers like Goodreads or Shelfari, or just mention it to your friends.
If you would like to connect with me, I am on Facebook (www.facebook.com/jillhugheyromance), I maintain a blog (http://jillhughey.blogspot.com), and also tweet @jillhughey.
Happy Reading!
Jill Hughey
May 2013
For your reading pleasure, here is an excerpt from Redeemed, Book Two in the Evolution Series. Does Doeg deserve at least a chance at his own happily-ever-after?
January 834
Doeg’s requirements in a prospective wife seemed simple enough when he started the search. He had learned in the last three years to examine his goals and break them into finite steps of surmountable size. He’d done just that, determining his essential needs in a spouse and discarding all other considerations. For example, he would not demand wealth, having turned over a new leaf to be an independent man. Intelligence was not needed and in fact, could be much over-rated where a woman was concerned. He also did not care if she was graceful, well spoken, or religious. And physical attractiveness had no bearing on it whatsoever. She could be tall, gaunt, and toothless since he had no intention of looking at her very often. He would not insist on a particular age as long as she would outlive him because he could not imagine ever going through this again.
No, he never wanted to waste another ten months of his life in the apparently futile search for the one woman in Bavaria who could meet his two requirements, which at the beginning of the hunt last March had seemed so elementary he had expected to be married by April.
And the two requirements were so obvious to the naked eye that he couldn’t believe so many females had failed. He only wanted a woman who could, firstly, identify his problem and secondly, enact an immediate plan to solve it. Simple.
The fire in the center of the room cracked and Doeg glared at it. It was January. No one found a wife and got married in January. Nor would he, which meant he faced another spring of searching and probably another summer without the spouse he desperately needed. When something skittered across the toe of his short leather boot he instinctively kicked out, knowing the little vermin was long gone, hidden in some mouse-hole in the great hall of Doeg’s very own house.
His clerk Guy sauntered out of the kitchen, eating an apple tart carefully positioned so the pebbly crumbs fell on the floor instead of his gray wool tunic. His dark hair was, as always, parted to one side, a section swooping over his forehead like the wing of a vulture. He knew of Doeg’s quest, though no one knew of the two requirements. Guy and Doeg's overseer Ermold had silently watched the parade of women through spring and autumn, and neither could fathom why one woman after another had been rejected as soon as she’d entered the house. A single question was all Doeg had asked before thanking the miss or madam for her time and turning her over to Guy until her entourage could leave again.
“Perhaps you should give the one from early November another go, sir,” Guy offered helpfully as he licked his becrumbed fingers. Doeg didn’t know why he bothered. The tarts had been tasteless as always.
“Not likely,” Doeg replied. The one from early November had answered the question wrongly then sat in a chair for a week, refusing to budge until he’d informed her of the imminent arrival of the next prospect who had also answered the question wrongly then burst into hysterics when she found a spider in her bed. Both November candidates clearly lacked the fortitude to deal with his problem.
“Then how about October,” Guy ventured. At Doeg’s blank look, he added some description. “You know, the one with the big teeth and bigger….” He cupped his hands in front of his chest suggestively.
“Never,” Doeg growled. That one had offered to come to bed with him and God knew he wasn’t looking for attention of that sort.
Guy stared at him for a good long time.
Doeg didn’t care for such impertinent scrutiny. “Have you more to say before you hie yourself to bed? You have your own hut a short distance from here if I recall.”
“Well, sir, I have been hesitating to mention someone I know.”
Doeg ears perked. “Go on.”
“I have been hesitating because I don’t want you to think I’m trying to saddle you with people from my family.”
“Go on.”
“She is a cousin….”
Fine. Doeg kept his thoughts to himself but nodded to encourage Guy to continue after each piece of information..
“About three years older than me.”
Don’t care.
“Widowed.”
Don’t care.
“And she was comely enough the last time I saw her.”
Don’t care.
“The thing is….” Guy did not seem inclined to finish this sentence.
“Go on,” Doeg ordered curtly.
“The thing is…she appears to be barren.”
Perfect. “Go fetch her tomorrow, Guy. How many days will it take you to return?”
HISTORICAL NOTES AND CREDITS
It is challenging to write in a time period some 1,200 years ago, but it was also exciting to discover a new setting I’ve never seen in a historical romance. I’ve been as accurate as I can, with the acknowledgement of a few liberties taken in order to make the story exciting and readable.
The language spoken in 831 was a “vulgar” or common form of Latin that was probably in the infant stages of evolving into both French and German. I have tried to give a sense of time and place by inserting some period terminology, but I also strived to avoid writing a book that sounded too Roman, or falling back on formal British English that would not have even existed.
Different sources have different translations or spellings for various words. For consistency’s sake, I chose to defer to a fairly comprehensive source, Daily Life in the World of Charlemagne, by Pierre Riché, in questions of spelling and other areas. I also used Marriage and the Family in the Middle Ages by Frances and Joseph Gies.
Rochelle had such a difficult time mounting a horse on her own because stirrups had not yet been invented.
Fireplaces and chimneys were only just being invented. Most homes had central hearths with open holes in the roof.
Louis the Pious was briefly deposed by his sons in 831. He regained the throne in autumn and one can only imagine the furor surrounding him at that time. His court was always bustling, but full assemblies were usually held in the spring before he convened the army. I think it believable he would have surrounded himself with loyal noblemen as he re-established his authority in 831.
Strategic marriages and rewards of land were commonplace. I do not know for a fact that Louis the Pious arranged marriages and gave land in order to protect the interests of his son, Charles. The empire remained in turmoil due to
familial infighting through all of Louis the Pious’s reign.
I radically expanded the idea of a judicial duel for the tournament.
Aix-la-Chappelle, or Aix, is also known as Aachen.
The church described in Ribeauville is based on Saint Justinus’ church in Frankfurt-Höscht, Germany, built around 830.
I appreciate the indulgence of scholars of the Carolingian Empire on any other errors or omissions inadvertently made.
Table of 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
Chapter Twenty-Three
Chapter Twenty-Four
Chapter Twenty-Five
Chapter Twenty-Six
Chapter Twenty-Seven
Chapter Twenty-Eight
Chapter Twenty-Nine
Chapter Thirty
Chapter Thirty-One
Chapter Thirty-Two
Chapter Thirty-Three
Chapter Thirty-Four
Chapter Thirty-Five
Chapter Thirty-Six
Epilogue
A Note from the Author
Excerpt from Redeemed
Historical Notes
