Redeeming the Reclusive Earl - Virginia Heath Page 0,105
six months of every year...after she’s worked her way up the ranks and learned the ropes, of course, the way I did. You can’t learn to be a sailor by reading. Just as you cannot become an antiquarian until you’ve done the drudge work.’
‘You expect your fiancée to begin as a cabin boy?’
‘She’s a clever thing.’ He pretended to ponder it, his sinfully talented mouth struggling to contain his smile. ‘I suppose she can come aboard as an ordinary seaman and I’ll only make her swab the decks on alternate Tuesdays.’ He turned to Effie, love, desire and mischief dancing an apt sailor’s jig in his beautiful dark eyes. ‘Meanwhile—Miss Not A Nithercott For Much Longer, thank the lord—I still seem to be waiting for that kiss. And as your occasional Captain...’ he tugged her into his arms and pulled the pencil out of the hair she had worn expressly for him and always would ‘...but never your lord and master...and in case that big brain of yours was wondering...after the night I’ve had, that’s an order.’
* * *
If you enjoyed this book, why not
check out these other great reads by
Virginia Heath
Lilian and the Irresistible Duke
And be sure to read The King’s Elite series
The Mysterious Lord Millcroft
The Uncompromising Lord Flint
The Disgraceful Lord Gray
The Determined Lord Hadleigh
Keep reading for an excerpt from The Matchmaker and the Duke by Ann Lethbridge.
WE HOPE YOU ENJOYED THIS BOOK FROM
Your romantic escape to the past.
Be seduced by the grandeur, drama and sumptuous detail of romances set in long-ago eras!
6 NEW BOOKS AVAILABLE EVERY MONTH!
The Matchmaker and the Duke
by Ann Lethbridge
Chapter One
1817
‘Jasper, it is high time you married.’
Jasper Simon Warren, Duke of Stone, Marquess of Felmont and Earl Blackmore, despised conversation at breakfast. He did not raise his gaze from his newspaper. ‘I see.’
‘Jasper, did you hear what I said? You have a duty to the dukedom.’
The sharp edge in her voice indicated Aunt Mary was not going to take the hint.
He lowered his newspaper a fraction. ‘Are you accusing me of neglecting my duties, Aunt?’ He let the ice in his tone sink into her awareness.
The spring sun, streaming through the windows of the ducal town house, gave no quarter to the elderly lady. Dressed in a forest-green gown and lace cap of the latest fashion, the wrinkles in her cheeks and around her mouth, the thinness of her carefully primped hair, proclaimed a woman well past her sixtieth year. ‘Certainly not, Jasper. I simply want you to be happy.’
He stared at her in astonishment. ‘I assure you, I am perfectly content.’
The creases in her forehead deepened. ‘Contentment is not the same as happiness.’
‘Who defines happiness? And since when has society latched upon the idea that happiness is vital to a person’s existence?’
After years of observing the marriages of his peers from the sidelines, he had few illusions.
And yet... ‘My parents were happy, were they not?’
‘I never heard anything to the contrary.’
Hardly a ringing endorsement. Had he perhaps imagined them as happy? Created a fantasy to ease the loss? Was he wrong to aspire to the sort of joy he recalled in their presence? And could he have been mistaken about the truth of it?
Aunt Mary made a sound of impatience. ‘Besides, no matter what, the dukedom needs an heir.’
The real reason for her fussing. ‘All in good time.’ He raised his paper, focusing on the article on the latest arguments for Parliamentary reform.
‘You are not getting any younger,’ she muttered.
Really! He folded his newspaper and put it down beside his plate where a few crumbs of toast and a smear of marmalade were all that remained of what had been a very fine breakfast. ‘I am thirty-five. Not exactly in my dotage.’
‘You will be thirty-six next month. I want to see things settled before I go to my final rest.’