by Ava Stone
The Lady Unmasked
Ava Stone
Night Shift Publishing
Contents
Copyright
Prologue
One
Two
Three
Four
Five
Six
Seven
Eight
Nine
Ten
Eleven
Twelve
Thirteen
Fourteen
Fifteen
Sixteen
Seventeen
Eighteen
Nineteen
Twenty
Twenty-One
Epilogue
Author’s Note
About Ava Stone
Ava Stone’s Scandalous Series
Ava Stone’s Regency Seasons Series
Ava Stone’s Desolate Sun Series
Copyright © 2016 by Ava Stone
Cover Design by Covers By Lily
All rights reserved.
No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.
ISBN: 978-1-311-35993-3
Created with Vellum
Prologue
October 1816 – The Merciful Widow Inn, Newmarket
“You’re really going to do this again?” Sidney Garrick asked, lighting the end of his cheroot and glancing up at Lord Quentin Post. “You’re not afraid of stirring up more of your dead ancestors?”
Quent dropped into a chair across from his friend. “Thorn told you my plan, did he?” Then he glanced briefly at David Thorn beside him, lifting a drink to his lips.
Garrick agreed with the nod of his head. “It just seems we barely got Lady Bradenham back from the other side in one piece. We might want to quit while we’re ahead.”
But this year’s event wouldn’t be anything like the previous year’s gala. Besides…“Since my great-grandmother has been banished,” Quent began, “I don’t think there’s anything for us to worry about. Anyway, now that Braden’s gifted me the place, I’d like to look it over with fresh eyes.”
“Fresh eyes,” David Thorn echoed under his breath. “You’re hoping to toss up the skirts of that mysterious angel of yours. And don’t pretend otherwise.”
There was no point in denying it. Ever since the Samhain masquerade party they’d hosted the previous year, and ever since Quent had danced with and kissed a masked angel at that particular party, he’d been slightly obsessed with finding the chit or ghost or whoever she was again. And he’d convinced himself that if they hosted the same party once again this year that his angel might reappear, be she mortal or otherwise.
If she was mortal, he did have every intention of tossing up her skirts. And if she turned out to be otherworldly…Well, perhaps he could toss up her ghostly skirts. Because the truth was, the kiss his angel had pressed to his lips had been the single most amazing kiss he’d ever experienced. And Quentin Post had enjoyed his fair share of kisses in his life. Though, perhaps not as many as David Thorn had enjoyed. “And yet you were very happy to hear I intended to open Marisdùn for another Samhain. Has that girl in Ravenglass still captured your attention, Thorn?”
She had done that, not that Thorn was about to admit as much to his friends. He had a reputation to consider, after all.
Garrick laughed. “There’s a girl in every village in every county who’s captured his attention. Though it’s generally for just a single night.”
“While Garrick is a veritable saint,” Thorn drawled before lifting a whiskey to his lips once more.
Garrick laughed again at the absurdity of that statement. And truly, of all the friends in their set, these three gentlemen were by far the most rakish of them all, more concerned with guilty pleasure than duty, thriving on reckless abandon instead of one’s honor, more inclined behave scandalously than properly if given the choice.
Of course, it was easy to be the most rakish in their set considering the fact that last year, they’d lost three of their compatriots to matrimony. A fate worse than death, certainly, even if the gentlemen in question all seemed rather happy with their respective lots in life.
But that unfortunate outcome would certainly not befall Garrick, Quent or Thorn. Not this year, perhaps not ever. No, no, no. These three fellows lived by the motto – ‘Eat, drink and be merry for tomorrow we die’. Of course at Marisdùn Castle, the veil between the living and the dead was quite thin, so who was to say that even in death the fun must come to an end?
“You will both be there, then?” Quent asked, looking from Garrick to Thorn.
“I’ve got a girl in every village in every county,” Thorn grinned. “Time to find the one who disappeared on me in Ravenglass.”
Garrick frowned. “You’ve got a disappearing girl too? How did I miss this?”
“Well, mine isn’t a figment of my imagination.” Thorn shrugged. And he hadn’t searched for her all season long like a Bedlamite either.
“I do feel left out all of a sudden,” Garrick added. “You don’t suppose it’s the same disappearing girl you’re both looking for?”
Thorn couldn’t help but laugh at the suggestion. It wasn’t even a possibility.
“No, no, no.” Quent shook his head. “Thorn’s girl is an artist, sketched him and then disappeared when he went for punch. There was no sketchpad on my angel. I would have discovered it.”
Garrick turned his full attention on Thorn. “A girl actually ran away from you? Are you losing your touch, old man?”
Thorn glowered at his friend. “I will find her, mark my words. And this time there won’t be any running away and there won’t be any sketching.”
“Ravenglass and its abundance of disappearing girls,” Garrick teased. “Rather surprised I didn’t find one of my own now that I think about it.”
“Does that mean you’ll be joining us at Marisdun Castle?” Quent asked.
“Well,” Garrick began with a slight twinkle in his eye, “if you’re both going…”
One
October 1816 ~ Ravenglass, Cumberland
* * *
Lord Quentin Post glanced out the coach window as the seaside village of Ravenglass came into view and anticipation danced across his spine. “Almost there,” he announced to his sisters.
It had been nearly a year since he’d stepped foot in Marisdùn Castle; but the last time he’d done so, the medieval property had belonged to his older brother Braden. And this time, when he crossed through the castle’s battlements, everything he’d see would belong to Quent instead. Other than a set of rented rooms in Piccadilly, Marisdùn was the only place Quent could truly claim as home, something that belonged to him alone. A bit of pride swelled in his chest at the thought.
A lot of people wouldn’t want to claim a haunted castle as home, but…Well, there was something about Marisdùn that called to him, something that had ever since his first visit to the place last year. He’d thought about it nearly every day since he’d left, nearly as often as he’d thought about his mysterious angel.
“I wish Braden would let us stay with you the whole time instead of making us go to Braewood just when the fun is about to begin.” His half-sister Hope, the wildest of the triplets pouted slightly, her attempt to pull at Quent’s heartstrings, no doubt.
Grace, however, snorted in response. “After what happened last year, we’re lucky Braden’s letting us attend at all.”
Last year, when a local girl had vanished right before Quent’s eyes into a hedgerow, taken by the spirit of his long-gone great-grandmother. It had taken all sorts of witchcraft and mysticism to return th
e girl to the land of the living. Honestly, Quent wasn’t ever certain how they’d managed to get Callie back on this side of the veil, not that it mattered any longer. “Mary Routledge’s spirit has been banished from Marisdùn, so I don’t think we have anything to worry about this year.” Then he flashed the trio a wide smile. “I wouldn’t ever put my three favorite sisters in peril, you know.”
Grace and Hope laughed, but Patience rolled her eyes. “We are your only sisters.”
That was true, at least as far as Quent was aware. “Yes, well, you are still my favorites.”
Grace shook her head. “You just want us to help you find this angel of yours.”
Quent could certainly use every bit of help he could get, though he wasn’t entirely sure if the triplets would be any real help in that regard. “Just let me know if you hear any whispers about her identity between any living and breathing chits, will you?”
“You think this girl, whoever she is, will say something to one of us?” Hope asked. “I highly doubt that.”
“If she was going to do that,” Grace added, “I’m sure she would have said something to someone during the season, don’t you think?”
Quent wasn’t truly certain what to think. He wasn’t certain why the girl, whoever she was, would have run off in the first place. He wasn’t even certain if she was of the living and breathing variety. There were, after all, quite a few spirits floating around the corridors of Marisdùn. In fact, one particular female ghost had set her sights on his friend Blake Chetwey last year.
“Unless…” Patience began, though her voice drifted off.
“Unless what?” Quent asked, focusing on his shiest sister.
“Unless saying something might cause some sort of scandal.” She shrugged. “She could be some other fellow’s wife. Or be betrothed to someone else. Or…”
“She could be lightskirt,” Hope tossed in.
“Or someone who didn’t make it to Town for the Season,” Patience added.
“Or a figment of your imagination,” Grace finished.
That last one was certainly Braden’s working theory. But Quent knew, without a doubt, that the masked angel he’d waltzed with and then kissed wasn’t someone conjured up out of his imagination. If that had been the case, he’d have done a whole lot more than just kiss the girl. He did, after all, have quite a vivid imagination.
“If you do find your angel,” Patience began, “what do you plan to do with her?”
Nothing he was about to admit to his innocent sisters. Quent shrugged. “I’ll have to find her first. See if the spark that was there that night is as strong as I remember.”
“How do you suppose you’ll recognize her?” Hope asked.
He’d asked himself that question more than once over the last year, whenever the memory of holding the girl in his arms flashed in his mind.
“It was a masquerade.” Grace frowned at him. “Recognizing her will be nearly impossible.”
“If I kiss her—” Quent leaned back against the squabs “—I’ll recognize her in an instant.”
Hope sighed. “That is the most romantic thing I’ve ever heard.”
“Romantic?” Grace snorted. “More like foolish. It’s not as though you can go around kissing every woman in attendance at this year’s masquerade, Quent.”
“If that’s what it comes to.” He shrugged.
“You can’t be serious.” Patience frowned at him as though he’d truly lost his mind.
The Post family crest. Lila Southward’s pulse began to race as she spotted the traveling coach emblazoned with a golden lion set against a sea of blue. The carriage had sped right past her on the lane, heading towards Marisdùn Castle.
Lila would know that crest anywhere and not just because her dearest friend in all the world had married into the Post family the previous year to become the new Marchioness of Bradenham. No, Lila’s heartbeat hadn’t increased because Callie and her marquess were due in the district any day. Lila’s pulse was racing because the particular traveling coach headed towards the old haunted castle wasn’t ostentatious in nature. And that meant the conveyance must belong to the marquess’ younger brother and not the marquess himself. It had to be Lord Quentin Post. The object of her affection for this past year, even if he’d barely paid her any notice at all.
The coach disappeared in the distance, turning onto the lane that lead directly to Marisdùn, and Lila couldn’t hide the ridiculously large smile that spread across her face. The very road she was on was where she’d first met his lordship the previous year, where he’d scooped her up in his strong arms and carried her all the way back to the vicarage. Of course, he’d scooped her up in his arms because she was bleeding and nearly fainted after his horse had thrown a rock, which had promptly hit her in the head. But Lila never focused on that bit. It didn’t matter why Lord Quentin had carried her. All that truly mattered was that he had done so and how her heart had leapt when she’d stared up into his hazel eyes and…that she’d quite simply fallen desperately in love with him that day.
And now Lord Quentin had returned to Ravenglass. He was here and perhaps, just perhaps, he’d kiss her again.
That thought had Lila lifting the edge of her skirts and rushing towards the castle. She didn’t give any thought as to what she might say or do once she reached Marisdùn. She thought only of seeing Lord Quentin again, of hoping that this time when they met that he’d look across the courtyard at her, realize his heart beat for her as much as hers beat for him and rush to hold her in those strong arms of his.
Fanciful nonsense. She knew in the pit of her stomach that it was fanciful nonsense, but she couldn’t help it. Lord Quentin had returned to Ravenglass and she had to see him. Just as quickly as she was able.
So she hastened her pace after the carriage, towards the castle gate, and through the battlements just in time to see Lord Quentin offer his hand to a pretty young blonde and help her from the traveling coach. Lila stopped in her tracks; her feet might as well have been glued to the pebbled drive. Her mouth fell open and her heart twisted painfully in her chest.
She’d known Lord Quentin was the new owner of Marisdùn, Callie had written a letter to that effect the previous month. But Lila’s dearest friend and Lord Quentin’s sister-in-law hadn’t mentioned the fact that he’d become attached to another girl. In fairness however, Callie had no idea that Lila was desperately in love with Lord Quentin. Still, she would think something that momentous would warrant at least a mention in Callie’s latest letter.
The pretty blonde giggled and smacked Lord Quentin playfully in the chest. Oh, they were quite familiar, weren’t they? Lila’s heart stung at the realization.
And then his lordship helped another girl from the coach, a girl who looked quite identical to the first, actually. And then…and then Lila breathed a sigh of relief. She knew who those girls were and if there was any question in her mind as to their identities, when Lord Quentin helped a third identical girl from the coach, all worry completely vanished from her mind.
Of course, his lordship was quite familiar with the trio of identical girls. They were his sisters, his younger half-sisters and identical triplets – Ladies Hope, Grace and Patience. Lila knew of them, she’d just never seen them before now.
She must have made some sort of sound in the courtyard because Lord Quentin looked away from his sisters, directly towards her. And then her heart really did stop beating. He was so handsome. Tall and strong, of course. He had light brown hair and warm eyes that always hinted at wickedness and of a clever mind. She thought it quite likely that she might drift right up to the clouds as his gaze fell upon her.
“Miss Southward?” he said, smiling with all his charm. “How good to see you again.”
Yes. How very good, indeed, it was to see him.
Two
Damn it. She was still just as pretty as Quent remembered. That dark hair he’d love to see tumbled down around her shoulders, her grey eyes that spoke of intelligence, and her plea
sant smile that made him just want to be near her. Yes, Lila Southward could be quite dangerous to any man who enjoyed his freedom, which Quent most assuredly did. But unfortunately, her father did not have a pleasant smile or disposition, and Quent had the feeling that too much time spent in Miss Southward’s presence would end up with his neck in the parson’s noose – her father being the parson in question. Besides, Quent hadn’t come back to Marisdùn to see Lila Southward, no matter how pretty or charming she was. He’d come back to Marisdùn to find his angel, the masked girl he’d danced with last year at the castle’s Samhain masquerade, the girl who’d kissed him before disappearing into the crowd, the girl Quent hadn’t been able to stop thinking about for nearly a year. And though he didn’t know who his angel was, he knew for certain she wasn’t Lila Southward. Her father, the humorless vicar, would never have allowed her to attend last year’s festivities or anything else amusing either.
Still, he remembered carrying Lila all the way back to the vicarage last year and he couldn’t help but smile at the memory. She’d been a tempting little bundle all the way, and he would have tried to steal a kiss if Callie hadn’t been present the whole time. But his now sister-in-law had been there and then he’d learned about Vicar Southward and his disposition, and Quent had pushed Lila from his mind. Of course, there was so much going on last year, Callie’s disappearance, all the activity surrounding the finding of her and returning her to the world of the living. He’d quite forgotten Miss Southward, but there she was, in his courtyard, looking even prettier than she had when he’d first met her.
Patience smacked him in the chest. “You are about to drool,” she muttered under her breath.
Grace cast him a questioning gaze as she rounded the edge of the coach and then waved at Miss Southward. “Our brother is quite ill-mannered on occasion,” she said. “I’m Grace Post.” Then she started towards the vicar’s daughter and gestured to her identical sisters. “Hope and Patience.”
