about what he was doing.
She backed away a step and stood there, staring at him, those eyes of pure amethyst wide with confusion, her black lashes and brows stark against her skin, like ink strokes on a fresh white page. In an instant, her features changed from uncertainty to anger, and she hiked up her skirts and turned away. She walked off with a proud, graceful sway that sent Pierce’s blood hammering through his veins.
He couldn’t resist having the last word. “Good night, Lady Barnes-Finchley.”
At the sound of his voice she broke into a run like a startled doe, fleeing from him toward the house in a flurry of shimmering silk.
Pierce smiled grimly and walked back toward the south end of the grounds, where he had left his horse. Best to get this over with as soon as possible and pack her off to the authorities, before she caused him any further trouble. He flipped open his silver pocket watch. Nine-thirty. More than enough time to catch her on the North Road out of London. There was no reason to put this off, absolutely no reason.
He would capture her tonight.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~
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Bonus Content:
Excerpt from FOREVER HIS: A Time-Travel Romance
(The Stolen Brides Series, Book 1)
On New Year’s Eve, she tumbles 700 years back in time—and into the bed of a darkly handsome knight.
Sir Gaston de Varennes wanted a docile bride who would fit into his plans for vengeance and justice, but a trick of time finds him married to a thoroughly modern American lady who turns his castle, his life, and his heart upside down. Will her desperate secret tear them apart after only a few bittersweet weeks of stolen passion—or will they conquer mistrust, treachery, and time itself to discover a love that spans the centuries?
Winner of the National Readers Choice Award: Best Historical Romance of the Year
“Irresistible, right down to the surprise at the end... One of the best romances of the year.”
— The Detroit Free Press
“A Desert Isle Keeper. Touching, ingenious... I love this book. I’ve read it time after time, and even if I haven’t waited quite long enough between readings to forget all the details, I always get drawn back into the story so intensely that I can’t put it down. Grade: A (highest rating).”
— Ellen Hestand, All About Romance
France, 1300
“I do not remember taking you to bed last night.” He yawned and stretched and sat back down on the mattress. “Though I cannot say I regret it. Noisy though you may be, you felt most pleasing curled beside me.”
He chuckled, a low sound that did an odd little dance down Celine’s back and made her suddenly, uncomfortably aware of the warm spot on her shoulder where he had kissed her.
“You did not take me to bed!” she corrected.
“Truly, ma petite? It was you who seduced me, then?”
“No! I—”
“Come seduce me again.” He fell back on the pillows.
“Absolutely not!” Celine groped her way along the wall, trying to feel her way to the door. “Look, whoever you are, it sounds like you had too much to drink at the party. Maybe there was a power failure or something and you wandered into the wrong room by mistake.”
A power failure. That made sense. It would explain why there wasn’t a speck of light. Or heat. The air was so cold, it gave her goose bumps and stung her throat every time she inhaled. The furnace must have gone out.
He sighed and yawned again. “As I told you before, demoiselle, the chamber is mine.”
It took Celine a moment to realize that the wall felt strange: her hand encountered nothing but cold, clammy, bare stone. The paintings and tapestries that had hung in her room were missing. She tried to find the light switch. It wasn’t where it was supposed to be, either.
Suddenly her cheeks heated with an embarrassing thought: maybe he was right about this chamber being his. Maybe she was the one who had stumbled into the wrong room!
She didn’t remember getting into bed. In fact, the last thing she remembered was looking through her purse for an aspirin, then stepping toward the window as the moon went black. Rays of silver-white light had glanced off the glass and blinded her, sent her reeling, then...
She couldn’t remember anything after that. It was entirely possible that she had staggered out of her room, into