Harlequin Historical July 2021--Box Set 1 of 2 Read online

  ‘Until this moment they hadn’t.’ It was Charity who quickly answered. ‘So this bizarre coincidence has caused them both quite a shock. Poor Lord Thundersley wasn’t even aware that the Miss H. from Bloomsbury was even a Brookes. Isn’t that funny?’ The sunny smile she shot him suggested that while she was determined to have her mother see it as coincidental, she wasn’t similarly convinced.

  The older woman smiled tightly. ‘Then welcome to Bloomsbury, my lord. I am Mrs Roberta Brookes.’ Then she stopped and posed regally as if that in itself were a great achievement.

  ‘I am delighted to meet you, Mrs Brookes. I have been meaning to call to introduce myself properly but the last few days have been hectic as I am sure you can imagine.’

  The suspicion had now been replaced by politeness. ‘Indeed I can, my lord. Moving house is such an ordeal and there is always so much to do. My poor nerves were shot to smithereens when we moved in here five years ago, so you have my sympathies.’ Her eyes flicked to her youngest and paused while they conveyed a silent message he couldn’t begin to decipher. ‘But where are my manners, my lord? You must come in and join us for tea.’

  Backed some way away from the human barricade which was Mrs Brookes and Miss Charity, Hope pulled a face and shook her head, her eyes pleading before she covered it with an expression of polite blandness. ‘The poor man was on his way out when I collided with him, Mama, and clearly in a rush to be somewhere.’

  Luke nodded like a deranged woodpecker. ‘Sadly, that is true. I have urgent business with my solicitor this afternoon, so I must decline your kind invitation for now.’ Which oddly disappointed him.

  ‘Oh, that is a shame!’ Mrs Brookes took a determined step closer. ‘Another day then? Tomorrow perhaps? Which will likely be better as my husband will be home and I know he will want to meet you and welcome you to Bedford Place properly. Our cook bakes the most delicious cakes if you have a sweet tooth. Her queen cakes in particular are splendid, my lord, and she has such a way with the batter, they come out as light as a feather. I shall have her bake a batch first thing. Does around three suit?’

  Behind her Hope rolled her eyes before she nodded so he bobbed his head as well. ‘I shall count the hours, Mrs Brookes.’ And likely would too, though worryingly not for the light-as-a-feather queen cakes.

  CHAPTER FIVE

  When he checked for the umpteenth time, she was finally on her balcony much later that evening. They needed to talk, not least to get their stories straight, but he also wanted to talk to her simply because he rather liked doing so.

  For a few indulgent moments, Luke watched her through the glass door. She was writing again, her back to him, her quill moving briskly as she leaned her cheek heavily against her other hand. The balcony was covered in candles that picked out the fiery copper and red in her hair which hung down between her shoulder blades in a single thick plait. A few loose, messy tendrils had escaped and were curling slightly in the warm night air. She paused for a moment and stared out into the night, tapping the feathered end of her pen aimlessly against her chin before she bent back to her writing again and scribbled furiously.

  It was an arresting sight. Made all the better by the way the soft fabric of the pretty summer dress she hadn’t bothered changing out of perfectly silhouetted her shape. The soft muslin emphasising her small waist, the curved flare of her hips and the magnificent rounded peach of her bottom. After another never-ending dinner meeting with his crusty old solicitor, during which the fellow droned on and on about still more unfathomable stocks and bonds in his inherited portfolio, right now, she was just the distraction he needed from the strange world he had been thrust into. Where people either sycophantically kowtowed to him, imperiously looked down their nose at him or, as he had discovered with the few tradesmen he had talked to, seemed hell-bent on swindling him.

  But Hope was fun to talk to. Interesting. Beguiling.

  Intriguing.

  In case he startled her again, he lit a lamp and turned it up full before he noisily opened the door. Forewarned, forearmed and much too brazen for her own good, she didn’t move anything but her pen across the paper when he stepped on to his balcony.

  ‘Good evening, Lord Trouble.’

  ‘Hello again, Hope. Isn’t it a bit late and a bit dark to be working?’

  ‘I like the quiet of the night. I always have.’

  ‘What are you writing this time?’ He was still talking to her back.

  ‘The same thing I was writing yesterday before you ruined my peace with your soggy and unwelcome interruption, unashamedly all in the altogether like a savage.’

  ‘Which makes me none the wiser.’ He liked that she had no respect for his new rank. ‘Therefore, I must assume that you are being so cryptic and writing it so clandestinely because it is your secret diary... Filled with all your private thoughts and dreams...and deeds so shocking that you would end up being thrown out of your nunnery if anyone ever read them. In which case, it begs the obvious question...’ Because he knew it would vex her, he lowered his voice to a silky whisper. ‘Am I in it?’

  Finally, she turned, feigning an irritation which did not reach her lovely eyes. ‘Why on earth would I put you in my diary?’

  ‘Perhaps because I am the most exciting thing that has happened of late in your dull and pious life?’

  ‘Exciting? Not the adjective I would have chosen to describe you. Irritating perhaps...if you weren’t so instantly forgettable that is.’ Her plump lips curved ever so slightly, ruining her regal attempt at blandness as she put him in his place.

  ‘Then I am in it. Your rehearsed disdain and disinterest prove it.’ He folded his arms for good measure, making sure he looked smug so that she had to react. A woman as tart and intelligent as she wouldn’t be able to allow such arrogant male superciliousness to pass unchecked.

  ‘If you must know, it’s a story.’ The withering glance was a little more convincing than the blandness. ‘A novel actually.’ Then she looked a little unsure and embarrassed to be admitting it, so she dismissed it with a casual flick of her wrist. ‘I have lofty ambitions of getting one published some day.’

  He was impressed. ‘I’ve never met a novelist before. You are officially my first.’

  ‘I am not sure one can officially call oneself a novelist until one’s words are bound in leather with one’s name emblazoned on the front and sold in Hatchard’s in Piccadilly—but perhaps I will be one day.’ She smiled wistfully. ‘Perhaps... If I ever write something deemed worthy enough by the illustrious publishers who control such things.’ The way she said that sounded not so much angry as resigned. ‘But alas, so far, all my endeavours to that end have proved fruitless and all my lofty ambitions are merely that.’

  ‘What’s the old adage? If at first you don’t succeed, try and try again.’ From the huge pile of covered pages at her feet, held down by a heavy paperweight this time, and the faded inkstains smattering her fingers, she wrote frequently and that too impressed him. They suggested she was both diligent and tenacious in her ambitions as well as hard working. Qualities of which he approved.

  ‘That is what I try to tell myself. That and to make a dreadful pest of myself until they finally relent. Unless it is one of those days when I am so worn down by it all that I am ready to just give up all my vain ambitions of seeing my name in Hatchard’s and accept somebody else’s in its stead.’

  ‘Why would you do that?’

  She huffed a little as she shrugged, now clearly more annoyed than resigned. ‘Because apparently Henry is a more palatable name on the front of a novel than Hope. In fact, apparently no name at all is better than the name Hope. Readers, I am frequently told in the most patronising and condescending of tones by the gentlemen in charge of such things, do not buy books written by girls.’

  This was news to him. ‘Why ever not?’

  ‘Your guess is as good as mine, Lord Trouble, but
I fear it is true. Can you name a female author?’ She snapped her fingers as if it were a quick test.

  ‘Mrs Radcliffe.’ That he could clearly surprised her.

  ‘And another?’ He scanned his memory for a good half a minute before he shrugged, defeated. ‘Exactly! That is the sort of prejudice I am dealing with.’

  ‘I am sure there are plenty of female authors out there.’ Although for the life of him he couldn’t think of any. It was hard to think straight when she was staring directly at him and looking so effortlessly seductive that his mind kept wandering. ‘Perhaps it is a case of you not finding the right publisher yet who appreciates your story.’

  ‘Yet one claimed they would appreciate them if Henry wrote them. I’d probably be in Hatchard’s now if I relented on that petty publisher’s insistence on a pseudonym.’

  He had no answer for that. Unless the publishers were using that as an excuse to fob her off gently because her prose were actually awful and they didn’t want to upset her. Being capable of writing copious pages did not necessarily guarantee the quality of writing and Luke was forever tossing dull books to one side because the dry plots bored him senseless. ‘What is it about?’ Because maybe that would enlighten him to the real cause of her rejection. ‘Is it a cautionary, moral tale or does it involve knights in shining armour and damsels in distress?’

  ‘Because obviously all women need a man to save them?’ She rolled her eyes as she shook her head. ‘I am disappointed you are so predictable in your assumptions, Lord Trouble.’

  ‘It’s a moral tale then. One warning of the dangers of straying from your chosen path of righteous piety. A predictably nun-like novel from a woman made of your unblemished moral fibre.’

  The bookshops seemed to be stuffed with those dreadful tomes of late. They sat side by side on the shelves with the reams of nonsensical etiquette books which laid down the strange rules everybody in society seemed to put great stock in. Abigail was a huge fan of them and had been in the midst of reading one with the ludicrous title of The Discerning Gentleman’s Guide for Selecting the Perfect Bride when he had left her. Or at least he assumed she was reading it because he kept finding it lying around everywhere. Although now, with the benefit of hindsight, he wouldn’t have put it past her to have left it lying around intentionally to encourage him to heed the stupid advice on the strategically opened pages and select her as his bride before she had had to ask. That dawning realisation made him wince at his own naivety. Because of course that is what Abigail had done.

  Hope folded her arms as she stared at him. It did wonderful things to her figure. ‘You are the only man I have met who has ever compared me to a nun. For the life of me, I cannot fathom why.’

  ‘When one is cursed to look like trouble, one understands that looks can be deceiving. And just because you happen to look like sin itself, doesn’t necessarily mean you would act in a sinful manner.’ Although despite the exceedingly modest fichu in an already modest dress, she had kissed him back, so perhaps she wasn’t quite as prudish as he was making out. Before his mind aimlessly wandered down that seductive trail of thought, Luke gestured to the neat pile of paper. ‘Besides, I wouldn’t have to make such predictable assumptions if you simply put me out of my misery and told me what it’s about.’

  ‘I suppose it is a cautionary tale...’ She bristled at his obvious disappointment. ‘Though not in the traditional sense. It is about secrets and lies. Deceit and betrayal and greed. If there is a moral, it is that people cannot always be trusted and that you should always be wary of a man’s motives until you know him well enough to be sure of his character.’ He stifled a yawn to vex her and enjoyed the way her feline green eyes narrowed as she pretended to look down her nose at him as she carried on undeterred. ‘It’s set here in the capital, in the notorious rookery of St Giles, and centres around the gory and seemingly senseless murders of four women.’

  ‘Murder?’

  ‘But not just any old murders, Lord Trouble, but murders most foul. The foulest in fact. Murders so dreadful, so gruesome, so inhuman in their execution that the terrified residents of the slum believe that a hideous monster prowls their streets at night. One sent by the Devil himself to punish them.’ Those green eyes sparkled.

  ‘To begin with, the gory murders seem random, but it soon becomes apparent that they aren’t. There is a calculated method to my monster’s madness and my heroine has to unmask the killer before she becomes his next unwitting victim.’

  ‘Oh...’ Now he really was impressed. ‘That sounds...intriguing.’ And right up his alley. ‘And, if you don’t mind me saying, a tad macabre for a genteel and proper young lady such as yourself.’

  ‘It is exceedingly macabre.’

  ‘Like Walpole’s The Castle of Otranto or The Mysteries of Udolpho by the aforementioned Mrs Radcliffe?’

  She seemed surprised. ‘You know those books?’

  ‘Now who’s making predicable assumptions? I might look like a ne’er-do-well and a scoundrel—but I can read, Hope. To be frank, there’s not much else to do in winter in my sleepy corner of Cornwall so I am pretty certain I have read everything. I read The Monk at twelve and it scared the death out of me. Especially the bit where he’s ripped apart by eagles and dropped over a cliff and left to die in agony on the sharp rocks as the tide comes in. There are a lot of cliffs in Cornwall and I live practically on the edge of one, but I deftly avoided them all for at least a year afterwards, including the one on my own doorstep.’

  Her lovely face was appalled. ‘Who on earth gave you that book at twelve?’

  ‘Nobody. I found it on the dusty top shelf in the local vicar’s study after he had left me there to contemplate my actions when he caught me scrumping apples from his orchard.’ He smiled at the memory. ‘So I only have myself to blame.’

  ‘You really are trouble if you stole from a vicar!’

  ‘I borrowed from a vicar and put the book back after dark one night while he was sleeping.’ He couldn’t help grinning when her eyes widened. ‘We don’t tend to lock doors in Cornwall and I can assure you he was none the wiser. And I prefer the term youthful high jinks than trouble. Pinching a few apples from trees groaning from the sheer weight of their plentiful fruit is hardly in the same league as murder most foul.’

  ‘It’s still appalling.’ But she was amused, he could tell despite trying to pretend she wasn’t. He already knew she was nowhere near as standoffish as she wanted the world to think. ‘I am glad you had nightmares. It served you right for stealing The Monk.’

  ‘Is your book as terrifying as that?’

  Her mouth curved as she stared down her delightful nose at him. ‘I sincerely hope so. Worse, in fact. It’s grisly and bloodthirsty, not the least bit suitable for incorrigible twelve-year-olds or forgiving vicars. Or even irritating marquesses from the sleepy wilds of Cornwall for that matter either.’

  ‘Then I should definitely love to read it. Despite my lifelong fear of eagles, I do enjoy a good Gothic novel. Books should always elicit an emotional response and I haven’t read anything except my brother’s dusty ledgers in months.’ Reading, like home and the occasional raucous night in a tavern with his old friends, was simply another joy which now had to be sacrificed.

  Pity instantly swirled in her eyes. ‘Forgive me... I should have offered my condolences before... I am so very sorry about your brother.’

  ‘Not as sorry as I am.’ Although more for himself than out of actual grief. It was difficult to mourn a stranger, especially such a callous, inhumane and cruel one. ‘They are proving to be big shoes to fill.’

  ‘My father only painted him last year and at that time your brother was in rude health.’

  The penny dropped. ‘Your father is Augustus Brookes?’

  She nodded and beamed properly for the first time, leaving him once again staggered at just how beautiful she was. ‘And my mother is Roberta Brookes the fam
ous soprano, who was obviously a little put out when you didn’t realise it earlier. Now even my elder sister Faith is making a name for herself in the art world, so I know all about big shoes to fill.’ Her expression momentarily clouded. ‘It can be daunting...particularly if you share none of their obvious talents and none of them quite understands yours.’

  ‘I have no idea what I am doing.’ The words tumbled out before he could stop them. ‘I was never meant to inherit, I certainly never expected to and nobody prepared me for it. I was perfectly content running my little slate quarry and fixing my own ancient and leaky roof in the middle of nowhere, but now I have land and tenants, stocks, shares, employees and property coming out of my ears and none of it makes any sense to me at all and I have no clue what to do with it.’

  ‘Don’t you have an estate manager or something?’

  ‘Oh, I have managers, three of them, and I am sure they would much prefer that I left them all to it like my brother did, but I am not built that way. I’ve never been one to rest on my laurels, I have always had to work for my living and I am used to understanding everything that is my business to know. I hate feeling so beholden and out of control.’ Being out of control made him feel sick and scared and impotent again like he had when they had locked his mother away and he couldn’t rescue her. But why the blazes he was telling her all this, he had no idea, other than he had the overwhelming compunction to tell someone and she was the only person he had met in London that he felt comfortable discussing it with. Something—probably extreme tiredness—told him she would understand.

  ‘I can’t even find someone decent to redecorate this house who doesn’t want to swindle me. Upstairs looks like a brothel...’ Should he be saying the word brothel in the presence of a lady? ‘And downstairs looks like a tart’s boudoir.’ He definitely shouldn’t be saying that, but he currently didn’t have the capacity, the energy or the wherewithal to filter out the inappropriate.