A Study In Seduction - By Nina Rowan Page 0,116

plates of food on him. Hot grits and sunny-side-up eggs never looked so good. I hope you enjoy the story of two people stumbling their way through life’s bumpy roads and landing smack-dab in the lap of love.

I love hearing from readers, so please come visit me at www.christie-craig.com; find me on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/christiecraigfans; or follow me on Twitter at @Christie_Craig.

Laugh, Love, Read.

From the desk of Nina Rowan

Dear Reader,

Confession #1: I’m terrified of math. I have been a math-o-phobe since first grade, when we learned basic addition and I had to count on my fingers to make sure I was getting the answers right. Confession #2: I still count on my fingers. Confession #3: I’m way, way beyond first grade.

Math and I have never found a groove. I’m okay with some numbers (2 and 5 are polite acquaintances of mine, if not exactly friends), but others make me nervous (7 is somewhat flinty, and 9 is plain evil). I never memorized the multiplication tables. I still can’t do long division. My son is now a first grader and completes his math homework faster than I can check it.

So what provoked me to create a heroine who is a brilliant mathematician? Lunacy, of course, and maybe a little bit of “Ha! I will confront you, Math, even though you scare me.” At least in writing about a mathematician, I could channel my fear into creating what I hope is a unique and memorable heroine.

If there is one thing Lydia Kellaway, the heroine of A STUDY IN SEDUCTION, does not fear, it’s numbers. Equations comfort her. She enjoys theorems, series, postulates. She understands them. They understand her. And I loved the idea of a Victorian woman who has a harmonious relationship with math and who is renowned for her extraordinary intelligence.

The seed of Lydia’s character came while I was researching nineteenth-century Russia and discovered information about Sofia Kovalevskaya (1850–1891), a prominent Russian mathematician who made major contributions to the field.

Despite the barriers she encountered in academia, Sofia earned a doctorate summa cum laude from the University of Göttingen, becoming the first woman in Europe to hold that degree. Personal and professional struggles did not prevent Sofia’s success, as she soon became the first woman in Northern Europe to hold a full professorship at the University of Stockholm. She published numerous papers, edited a mathematical journal, and received the competitive Prix Bordin from the French Academy of Sciences.

While Sofia Kovalevskaya inspired my idea of a heroine who is a mathematician, I wanted Lydia to be a unique character in her own right. I loved that she could immerse herself in numbers and find comfort in equations, but what did that mean for the other parts of her life? What would happen if Lydia had spent her years in lonely isolation, with only numbers as her faithful companions, and then was suddenly forced to confront the exact opposite of intellect—the pull of lust?

After her destructive early experiences, Lydia lives in safe comfort inside her head… until Alexander comes along to wreak havoc with all his hot Russian sexiness. He is fascinated not only by her body, but also by her brilliant mind. Writing about how Lydia’s affinity with math affects and changes their relationship was both a challenge and a pleasure.

Confession #4: I’ll never overcome my fear of math. Words I love, but numbers I’ll merely tolerate. I’ll always carry my portable calculator, and when my son’s math homework gets beyond me (which it soon will), I’ll either study with him or recruit someone else to be the homework helper. I’ll keep working at multiplication, especially the 7s and 9s, but in the meantime I take a small measure of comfort in Sofia Kovalevskaya’s remark to one of her teachers: “I was unfortunately weak in the multiplication table.”

Happy Reading!

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Contents

Welcome

Dedication

Acknowledgments

Author’s Note

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

A Preview of A Passion for Pleasure

The Dish

Newsletters

This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is coincidental.

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First e-book edition: August 2012

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ISBN 978-1-4555-0955-3

Table of Contents