To Taste Temptation (31 page)

“I suppose I can,” he said musingly. “But there’s no guarantee that he’ll accept it.”

“Oh, he will,” she said with certainty. “Thank you, Samuel.”

“You’re welcome,” he replied. They were at her bedroom door now. “Good night.”

“Good night.” She watched as he turned toward his own rooms. “You will speak to Lady Emeline, won’t you?” she called anxiously after him.

But he didn’t seem to hear.

T
HE SUN WAS
shining through her window when Emeline woke the next morning. She stared at it dreamily for a moment before its full import hit her.

“Oh, dear Lord!” She jumped from the bed and rang frantically for a maid. Then, afraid the summons would take too long, opened her door and bellowed down the hallway like a common fishwife.

She turned back to her room, found a soft bag to pack, and began flinging things into it willy-nilly.

“Emeline!” Tante Cristelle stood in the doorway, hair still in braids, looking horrified. “What has possessed you?”

“Samuel.” Emeline stared at the open bag, clothing spilling out, and realized there wasn’t any time for packing. “His ship leaves this morning. It may have already left. I have to stop him.”

“Whatever for?”

“I have to tell him that I love him.” She abandoned the bag and instead ran to the wardrobe to draw out her plainest frock. By this time, Harris had arrived in the room. “Quickly! Help me dress!”

Tante Cristelle sank onto the bed. “Why there is such a hurry, I do not know. If that man doesn’t know already that you have a
tendre
for him, he is an imbecile most severe.”

Emeline struggled up from folds of dimity. “Yes, but I told him I didn’t want to marry him.”

“And so?”

“I do want to marry him!”

“
Tiens!
Then it was very silly of you to become engaged to Lord Vale.”

“I know that!” Good Lord, she was wasting time arguing in circles with Tante Cristelle when Samuel’s ship might be sailing down the Thames right now. “Oh, where are my shoes?”

“Right here, my lady,” Harris said unperturbedly. “But you haven’t any stockings on.”

“I don’t care!”

Tante Cristelle threw her hands up in the air, imploring God in French to come to the aid of her so-deranged niece. Emeline thrust her bare feet into her shoes and hurried to the door, nearly running down Daniel.

“Where are you going, M’man?” her only offspring asked innocently. His eyes dropped to her bare ankles. “I say, do you know you haven’t any stockings on?”

“Yes, dear.” Emeline pressed an absentminded kiss to Daniel’s forehead. “We’re going to America, and they don’t wear any stockings there.”

Emeline left Daniel yelling huzzahs while Tante Cristelle and Harris tried to quiet him. She ran down the stairs, calling for Crabs as she went.

That imperturbable gentleman ran into the hallway looking startled. “My lady?”

“Bring the carriage ’round. Hurry!”

“But—”

“And my cloak. I’ll need a cloak.” She looked frantically about the hall for a clock. “What time is it?”

“Just past nine o’clock, my lady.”

“Oh, no!” Emeline covered her face. The ship would’ve left by now. Samuel would be out at sea. What was she to do? There was no way to catch him, no way to—

“Emeline.” The voice was deep and sure and oh so familiar.

For a moment, she didn’t dare hope. Then she dropped her hands.

He stood in the entrance to her sitting room, his coffee-brown eyes smiling just for her.

“Samuel.”

She rushed at him, and he folded his arms about her. Still she made sure to get a good grip on his coat.

“I thought you’d left. I thought I was too late.”

“Hush,” he said, and kissed her, soft brushes of his lips over her mouth and cheeks and eyelids. “Hush. I’m here.” He drew her into the sitting room.

“I thought I’d lost you,” she whispered.

He kissed her with determination, as if to prove his existence real. His lips gently parted hers, and he tilted her head back. She grasped his shoulders, reveling in this freedom to kiss him.

“I love you,” she gasped.

“I know.” His lips wandered over her brow. “I was going to stay here in your sitting room until you admitted it.”

“Were you?” she asked distractedly.

“Mmm.”

“How very intelligent of you.”

“Not so intelligent.” He pulled back his head, and she saw that his eyes had grown dark and serious. “It was a matter of survival. I’m cold without you, Emeline. You’re the light that keeps me warm on the inside. If I left you, I think I’d freeze into a solid block of ice.”

She pulled his head back to hers. “Then you’d better not leave me.”

But he resisted her urging. “Will you marry me?”

Her breath caught in her throat, and she had to swallow before she replied huskily, “Oh, yes, please.”

His eyes were still grave. “Will you come with me to America? I can live here in England, but it would be easier for my business if we lived in America.”

“And Daniel?”

“I’d like him to come, too.”

She nodded and closed her eyes because it was almost too much. “I’m sorry. I never cry.”

“Of course not.”

She smiled at that. “It’s not the usual thing, to keep a boy by his mother’s side, but I’d very much like to have him with me.”

He touched the corner of her mouth with his thumb. “Good. Then Daniel comes with us. Your aunt is welcome to come as well—”

“I will remain here,” Tante Cristelle said from behind them.

Emeline swung around.

The older woman was standing just inside the doorway. “You will need someone to handle the estates, the money, these things, yes?”

“Well, yes, but—”

“Then it is decided. And, of course, you will make the journey across the ocean every few years so that I might see my great-nephew.” Tante Cristelle nodded with satisfaction at having ordered everything and left the room, closing the door softly behind her.

Emeline turned back to Samuel to find him watching her.

“Will it be all right?” he asked. “Leaving all this behind? Meeting new people? Living in a new country, one not quite as sophisticated as this?”

“It doesn’t really matter where we live as long as I’m with you.” Emeline smiled slowly. “Although, I plan to set a new standard for sophistication and wit in Boston. After all, no one there has been to one of
my
balls.”

He grinned at her then, a wide happy smile that with all his bruises made him look like a pirate. “They won’t know what hit them, will they?”

Emeline mock frowned, but then she drew Samuel’s head back down to hers so that she could kiss him. Sweetly, happily. And as she did, she murmured one more time against his lips.

“I love you.”

“I love you.”

As Iron Heart’s words left his lips, there came a scream from the wicked wizard.

“No! No! No! It cannot be!” The terrible little man’s face reddened until steam began to shoot from his nose. “I’ve waited seven long years to steal your iron heart and make its strength mine! Had you ever spoken in those seven years, I would’ve won it, and you and your wife would be damned to hell. It isn’t fair!”

And the wicked wizard spun in a circle, enraged that his spell was forfeited. He spun, faster and faster, until sparks flew from his whirling body, until black smoke billowed from his ears, until the very ground quaked beneath him, and then,
BANG!
he was suddenly swallowed by the earth! But the white dove upon his wrist flew up as he vanished, the golden chain broken, and when the bird alit, it turned instantly into a squalling baby—Iron Heart’s son.

And then what rejoicing there was in the Shining City! The people cheered and danced in the streets with happiness at the restoration of their prince.

But what of Iron Heart and his cracked heart? Princess Solace looked down at her husband, held still in her arms, afraid that he was already dead, only to find him whole and smiling back at her. So she did the only thing a princess can do in such a case: she kissed him.

And though many in the Shining City are of the opinion to this day that Iron Heart’s heart healed when the wicked wizard’s spell was broken, I myself am not so sure. It seems to me that it must have been Princess Solace’s love that revived him.

For what else can mend a broken heart but true love?

Elizabeth Hoyt
was born in New Orleans, where her mother’s family has lived for generations, but she was raised in the frigid winters of St. Paul, Minnesota. Growing up, her family traveled extensively in Britain, spending a summer in St. Andrews, Scotland, and a year in Oxford. She earned a bachelor of arts degree in anthropology at the University of Wisconsin, Madison. Wisconsin was also where she met her archaeologist husband—on a dig in a cornfield. Continuing the cornfield theme, Elizabeth and her husband live in central Illinois with their two children and three dogs. She is an avid gardener with over twenty-six varieties of daylilies in her multiple gardens and more hostas than any one person can count. The Hoyt family enjoys taking family vacations that invariably end up at an archaeological site.

Elizabeth loves to hear from her readers. You may e-mail her at: [email protected] or mail her at: PO Box 17134, Urbana, Illinois 61803. Please visit her Web site at elizabethhoyt.com for contests, book excerpts, and author updates.

Where authors give you the inside scoop!

From the desk of Elizabeth Hoyt

Gentle Reader,

Lady Emeline Gordon, the heroine of my book, TO TASTE TEMPTATION (on sale now), is an acknowledged expert at guiding young ladies safely through the labyrinth of London high society. So when the notorious and notoriously
wealthy
American merchant Mr. Samuel Hartley needs a chaperone for his younger sister, naturally he arranges for an introduction to the lovely, widowed Lady Emeline. Well . . . at least her social expertise is the reason Sam
gives
for asking for an introduction to Lady Emeline. In any case, whilst researching the book, I examined closely Lady Emeline’s own handwritten papers. Amongst them I found the following artifact, which I hope will be of interest to you, my Gentle Reader.

Some Rules for a Young Lady Wishing to Sail the Turbulent Waters of High Society without Wrecking Her Vessel against the Rocks of Misfortune.

1. A young lady’s costume is of the utmost importance. Her gown, hat, gloves, fichu, and shoes—
especially
her shoes—should show Good Taste but not Excessive Taste.

2. A lady should
never
talk to a gentleman not introduced to her. Some men—I will
not
call them gentlemen—will attempt to circumvent this rule. A young lady must not let them.

3. The kind of Male Rogue mentioned above is, in fact, best handled by a Lady of Mature Years and Quick Wit.

4. A young lady may never let a gentleman who is not a relative embrace her.
Note:
Naturally this rule does not apply to a Lady of a Certain Age.

5. If a lady of any age lets a gentleman embrace her, the lady should be certain that he is a Very Good Kisser indeed. She may require several sessions to be entirely certain.

6. Beware of country house parties.

7. When at a country house party it is imperative that a young lady
not
become cloistered with a gentleman. People with too much imagination may think she is engaging in an Affaire de Coeur.

8. Affairs should
only
be conducted by a Lady of a Mature and Not Easily Heated Disposition.

9. However, it is desirable that the
gentleman
in the above mentioned Affair become Very Heated indeed.

10. Whatever she does, a lady engaging in an affair must never,
never
fall in love with her paramour.

That way lies disaster.

Yours Most Sincerely,

www.elizabethhoyt.com

From the desk of Sarah McKerrigan

Dear Reader,

If you’re as much of a fan of medieval romance as I am, you know the plots often involve Lady So-and-So being forced to wed Lord What’s-His-Name for political gain. But what about the rest of the folk— the butcher, the baker, the candlestick-maker—the commoners, who were free to marry for love?

Sometimes, instead of Brad and Angelina, I’d like to hear about the courtship of John the trucker and Mary the kindergarten teacher. That’s what inspired me to write DANGER’S KISS (on sale now). I wanted to weave a tale I could relate to, where the hero and heroine don’t live in an ivory tower, don’t dine on sweetmeats, and don’t always play nice.

DANGER’S KISS is sort of a Sheriff of Nottingham meets The Artful Dodger adventure in which Nicholas Grimshaw, upstanding officer of the law, living happily alone in his thatched cottage, makes the mistake of taking mercy upon a beautiful scam artist by the name of Desiree. And, instead of hanging her for her thievery, indentures her as his servant.

Sleight of hand and sleight of heart ensue as the two clash over what’s
right
versus what’s
just,
and moral lines become blurred as lawman and outlaw fall recklessly in love. Yet in the end, these two simple folk prove more honorable than their superiors as they work together to foil a nefarious noblewoman’s treacherous scheme.

To research DANGER’S KISS, I mingled with a great bunch of peasants—medieval reenactors with fascinating “lives,” who were delighted to share their stories. In fact, a marvelous magician named Silvermane showed me the clever sleight of hand tricks that Desiree uses in the book!

I hope readers will find DANGER’S KISS an earthy, refreshing glimpse into medieval times, and I’m wagering the romance and adventure will keep you up all night! Let me know if it did at www.sarahmckerrigan.com

Enjoy!