The Runaway Countess

He remembered how it had felt that first time he took her hand, as if her warmth and innocence could be his. As if the life he had always led, the only life he knew, wasn’t the only way he had to be. That he could find another path—with her.

Maybe it was this place, this strange, ramshackle, warm-hearted place, that had given his wife that air of laughing, welcoming life. Because here she bloomed. With him she had faded, and he had faded with her. Yet here she was his Jane again.

His hope. And he had never, ever wanted to hope again.

BANCROFTS OF BARTON PARK

Two sisters, two scandals, two sizzling love affairs

Country girls at heart, Jane and Emma Bancroft are a far cry from the perfectly coiffed, glossy debutantes that grace most of Society.

But soon they come to realise that, country girl and debutante alike, no lady is immune to the charms of a dashing rogue!

Don’t miss this enthralling new duet from Amanda McCabe

starting with Jane’s story

THE RUNAWAY COUNTESS

Look for Emma’s story

coming in December 2013

RUNNING FROM SCANDAL

About the Author

AMANDA MCCABE wrote her first romance at the age of sixteen—a vast epic, starring all her friends as the characters, written secretly during algebra class. She’s never since used algebra, but her books have been nominated for many awards, including the RITA®, RT Book Reviews Reviewers’ Choice Award, the Booksellers Best, the National Readers’ Choice Award, and the Holt Medallion. She lives in Oklahoma, with a menagerie of two cats, a pug and a bossy miniature poodle, and loves dance classes, collecting cheesy travel souvenirs, and watching the Food Network—even though she doesn’t cook.

Visit her at http://ammandamccabe.tripod.com and www.riskyregencies.blogspot.com

Previous novels by the same author:

 TO CATCH A ROGUE*

 TO DECEIVE A DUKE*

 TO KISS A COUNT*

 CHARLOTTE AND THE WICKED LORD

(in Regency Summer Scandals)

 A NOTORIOUS WOMAN†

 A SINFUL ALLIANCE†

 HIGH SEAS STOWAWAY†

 THE WINTER QUEEN

(in Christmas Betrothals)

 THE SHY DUCHESS

 SNOWBOUND AND SEDUCED

(in Regency Christmas Proposals)

 THE TAMING OF THE ROGUE

 A STRANGER AT CASTONBURY**

 TARNISHED ROSE OF THE COURT

And in Mills & Boon ® Historical Undone! eBooks:

 SHIPWRECKED AND SEDUCED†

 TO BED A LIBERTINE

 THE MAID’S LOVER

 TO COURT, CAPTURE AND CONQUER

 GIRL IN THE BEADED MASK

 UNLACING THE LADY IN WAITING

 ONE WICKED CHRISTMAS

 AN IMPROPER DUCHESS

*The Chase Muses trilogy

†linked by character

**Castonbury Park Regency mini-series

Did you know that some of these novels are also available as eBooks? Visit www.millsandboon.co.uk

AUTHOR NOTE

I was so excited to find out this year is the 200th anniversary of the publication of Pride and Prejudice! It was discovering the world of Jane Austen that introduced me to the wonders of the Regency period. I found a battered paperback copy of Emma tucked away on a shelf in my grandmother’s house when I was about ten and, after reading it, immediately ran to the library to see what else this mysterious Jane Austen had written. The librarian gave me all the other novels, as well as two Austen biographies and a book called Life in Regency England. I was hooked.

I’ve always loved the settings and themes of Austen’s timeless stories—family, community, characters struggling to find ways to stay true to themselves and still meet the expectations of the society around them. And heroines determined to marry for love and find happiness in the face of overwhelming pressure to find stability at all costs. It’s been so much fun to explore the same ideas with the Bancroft sisters, Jane and Emma, and their handsome heroes! That’s the best part of writing historical romance—exploring a world so different from my own, but also so very similar in our emotions and dreams (just with better clothes!).

And I have Jane Austen—and the wonderful librarian who recognised a new Austen mania and helped me make it grow—to thank for all those hours of delight and joy. Happy anniversary, Lizzie and Darcy!

The Runaway Countess

Amanda McCabe

www.millsandboon.co.uk

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DEDICATION

To librarians everywhere,

for working so hard to open the world to us…

Prologue

London—1810

The most spectacular marriage in London…

Jane Fitzwalter, the Countess of Ramsay, almost laughed aloud as she read those words. They looked so solid in their black, smudged newsprint, right there in the gossipy pages of the Gazette for everyone to see. If it was written there, so many people thought, it had to be true.

Once she had even believed in it herself, for a brief moment. But not now. Now the words were hollow and false, mocking her and all her silly dreams.

The beautiful Ramsays, so young, so wealthy, so fashionable. They had a grand London house where they held grand balls, great crushes with invitations fervently sought by every member of the ton. A grand country house where they held grand shooting parties, and the laughter and merriment went on until dawn. Lady Ramsay’s hats and gowns, stored in their own grand wardrobe room, were emulated by all the ladies who aspired to fashion in London.

And everyone knew the tale of their marriage. How the young Lord Ramsay glimpsed the even younger Miss Jane Bancroft across the crowded salon full of tall, waving plumes at her Court presentation and strode past the whole gawking gathering to demand an introduction. How they danced together at two private balls and once at Almack’s and went driving once in Hyde Park, and Lord Ramsay insisted she marry him. Her guardian wasn’t sure, having doubts about the couple’s youth and short acquaintance, but they threatened to elope and the next thing society knew they were attending a grand, glittering wedding at St George’s.

Grand, grand, grand. The life of the beautiful Ramsays was the envy of everyone.

But Lady Ramsay, now slightly less young and much less naïve, would gladly sell all that grandness for a farthing. She would give it all away to go back to that sunny day in Hyde Park, her shoulder pressed close to Hayden’s as they sat together in his curricle and laughed. As they held hands secretly under the cover of her parasol. On that day the world seemed to stretch before her in glorious, golden promise. That day seemed to promise everything she had dreamed of—love, security, a place to belong, someone who needed her.

If only they could start again there and move forwards in a whole different way. But sadly that was impossible. Life would simply go on again as it had done already, because they were the Ramsays and that was the way of their world.

But she was heartily sick of this world of theirs. She had expected that Hayden’s title would give them security in the world, a security she never had with her own family, but she had been foolish. She hadn’t realised how a title took over everything else, became everything. That a title gathered empty friends, empty marriages.

Jane let the paper fall to the floor beside her bed and slid back down amid the heaps of pillows. It was surely very late at night by now. Her maid had tried to close the satin curtains at the windows, but Jane wouldn’t let her. She liked seeing the darkness outside, it felt safe and comforting, like a thick blanket wrapped around her. The moon, a silvery sliver sliding towards the horizon, blinked at her.

Out there beyond her quiet chamber there were balls still twirling on with music and dancing and wine, laughter and conversation. Once she would have been in the very midst of one of those balls, laughing and dancing with the rest or gaily losing in the card room. Now the thought of it made her feel faintly ill.

She rolled on to her side to face the crackling blaze in the marble fireplace and her gaze fell on the bottle of laudanum the doctor had left for her. It would take away all the memories, draw her off to a dream-land, but she didn’t want that, either. She had to think now, to face the truth no matter how painful it was.

She pressed her hand to her stomach, perfectly flat again beneath her linen nightdress. The tiny bump that had been growing there, filling her with such joy, was gone. It had been gone for days now, vanished as if it had never been. Lost in a flurry of agonising spasms—and Hayden was not with her. Again. When she lost their child, the third child she had lost so early, he was off gambling somewhere. And drinking, of course. Always drinking. Now there was only that hollow ache to remind her. She had failed in her duty. Again.

She couldn’t go on like this any longer. She was cracking under the pressure of their grand lie. She had thought she was getting a new family with Hayden, yet she felt lonelier than she ever had before.

Suddenly she heard a sound from downstairs, a crash and a muffled voice. It was explosively loud in the silent house, for she had sent the servants to bed hours ago. Hayden wasn’t expected back until dawn.

But it seemed he had come home early. Jane carefully climbed out of her bed and reached for a shawl to wrap around her shoulders. She slowly made her way out to the staircase landing and peered down to the hall below.

Hayden sat sprawled on the lower steps, the light of the lamp the butler had left on the pier table flickering over him. He had knocked over the umbrella stand, and parasols and walking sticks lay scattered over the black-and-white tiles of the floor.

Hayden studied them with a strangely sad look on his handsome face. The pattern of shadows and light carved his starkly elegant features into something mysterious, and for a moment he almost looked like the man she had married with such hope. Could it be possible he was as weary of this frantic life as she was? That they could somehow start again? Despite her cold disillusionment, she still dared to hope. Still dared to be irrational.

Jane took a step down the stairs and at the creak of the wooden tread Hayden looked up at her. For an instant she saw the stark look on his face, but then he grinned and the brief moment of reflection and hope was gone.

He pushed back a lock of his tousled black hair and held out his hand to her. The signet ring on his finger gleamed and she saw the brandy stain on his sleeve. ‘Jane! My beautiful wife waits to greet me—how amazing.’

As Jane moved slowly down the stairs, she could smell the sweet-acrid scent of the brandy hovering around him like a cloud. ‘I couldn’t sleep,’ she said. She hadn’t been able to sleep for days and days.

‘You should have come with me to the Westin rout, then,’ he said. ‘It was quite the crush.’

Jane gently smoothed back his hair and cupped her palm over his cheek. The faint roughness of his evening whiskers tickled her skin and the sky-blue of his eyes glowed in the shadows.

How very handsome he was, her husband. How her heart ached just to look at him. Once he had been everything she had ever wanted.

‘So I see,’ she said.

‘Everyone asked about you there,’ he answered. He turned his head to press a quick, careless kiss into her palm. ‘You’re missed by our friends.’

‘Friends?’ she murmured doubtfully. She barely knew the Westins, or anyone who had been there tonight. And they did not know her, not really. She always felt shy and uncomfortable at balls, another way she failed at being a countess. ‘I don’t feel like parties yet.’

‘Well, I hope you will very soon. The Season is still young and we have a brace of invitations to respond to.’ He kissed her hand again, but Jane had the distinct sense he didn’t even feel her, see her. ‘I hate it when you’re ill, darling.’

Feeling a tiny spark of hope, Jane caught his hands in hers and said, ‘Maybe we need a little holiday, a few weeks in the country with just us. I’m sure I would feel better in the fresh air. We could take my sister, Emma, from school to come see us. It’s been so long since I was with Emma.’

As she thought about it she grew more excited. Yes, she was sure a holiday would be a wonderful thing. A time in the country at Barton Park, just the three of them, no parties, no brandy. She and Hayden could talk again, as they used to, and be together—maybe make a new baby. Try one more time, despite her fears. They could leave the grand Ramsays behind and just be Hayden and Jane. That was what she had once hoped for so much.

But Hayden laughed at her words, as if she had just made some great joke. He let go of her hands and sprawled back on to the steps. ‘Go off to the country now? Jane darling, it’s the very midst of the Season. We can’t possibly leave now.’

‘But it could be—’

Hayden shook his head. ‘Staying in London would do you more good than burying yourself in the country. You should go to parties with me again, enjoy yourself. Everyone expects it of you, of us.’

‘Go to parties as you do?’ Jane said bitterly as her faint, desperate hope faded away. Nothing had changed. Nothing would change.

‘Yes, as I do. As my parents always did,’ he said. ‘It’s better than wallowing in misery alone at home.’

Jane wrapped her arms around herself, feeling suddenly hollow and empty. Cold. ‘I am tired. Perhaps I will go away by myself to visit my sister. Poor Emma writes that she doesn’t like her school and I miss her. I just need some time away from London. I want to go home to Barton Park for a while.’

Hayden closed his eyes as if he was weary of her and this conversation. Weary of her emotions. ‘If you like, of course. You will have to return before our end-of-Season ball, though. Everyone expects that.’

Jane nodded, but she already knew she would not be back for any ball. She couldn’t return to this life at all. She needed to find her own soul again, even if she couldn’t make Hayden see that he needed to save his.

He gave a faint snore and Jane looked down to find that he had drifted to sleep right there on the stairs, in the middle of their conversation. His face looked so beautiful and peaceful, a faint smile on his lips as if he had already floated out of her life and into the one he had chosen for himself long before he met her. She leaned down and softly kissed his cheek and smoothed back his hair one last time.

‘I’m sorry, Hayden,’ she whispered. ‘Forgive me.’

She rose to her feet and stepped over him, going back to her chamber and closing the door quietly behind her. It didn’t even make a sound in the vast house that had never really been hers.

Hayden stared up at the ceiling far above his head, not seeing the elaborate, cake-icing whorls of white plaster. He barely felt the hard press of the stairs at his back, either, or the familiar feeling of a headache growing behind his eyes. All he could see, all he could think about, was Jane.

He closed his eyes and listened carefully, but she was long gone. There was only silence since she had tiptoed away and softly closed her chamber door behind her. Even his butler, Makepeace, had given up on him and left him lying there on the stairs. Cold air swept around him from the marble floor of the hall.

He had truly become what he never wanted to be—his parents.

Not that he was really like his father, oh, no. The elder earl had been all about responsibility and proper family appearances. It was Hayden’s mother who had liked the parties, liked the forgetfulness of being in a noisy crowd. But they had both liked brandy and port too much and it killed his father in the end.

His mother, rest her giddy soul, was done in by childbirth, trying one last time to give his father another son.

A spasm of raw, burning pain flashed through Hayden as he remembered Jane’s face, as white as the sheets she lay on after the first baby was gone, thin and drawn with pain.

‘We can try again, Hayden,’ she had said, reaching for his hand. ‘The doctor says I am truly healthy, there’s no reason it won’t work next time. Please, Hayden, please stay with me.’

And he’d taken her trembling hand, murmured all the right, reassuring things, but inside he was shouting—not again. Never again. He couldn’t hurt her again, couldn’t see her go through what his mother had.

When he first saw Jane, saw the young, hopeful light in her pretty hazel eyes and the sweet pink blush in her cheeks, he felt something he had thought long dead stir inside of him. A curiosity, maybe, an excitement about life And what might happen next. It was more intoxicating than any wine, that feeling Jane gave him. And when he touched her hand, when she smiled up at him…

He only wanted that feeling she gave him to last for ever. He had to have her and he never stopped to think of the consequences. Until he was forced to.

He’d done Jane a great wrong in marrying her so quickly after they met, before she could see the real him. No matter what he did now it seemed he could not make her happy. He couldn’t even see what she wanted, needed. She always looked at him so expectantly, so sadly, with those eyes of hers, as if she was waiting for something from him. Something he couldn’t even begin to fathom.

So he ran back to what he did know, his friends and their never-ending parties. And Jane grew sadder, especially when the babies were lost. Three of them now.

Hayden pushed himself slowly to his feet and made his careful way up the stairs. There was no sound beyond Jane’s door, just that perfect, echoing silence. He pushed the door open and peered inside.

Jane lay on her side in the middle of the satin-draped bed countesses had slept in for decades. Her palm was tucked under her cheek, her thick, dark braid snaking over her shoulder. The moonlight fell over her face and he saw she was frowning even in her sleep. She looked so small, so vulnerable and alone.

Hayden knew he had let her down very badly. But he vowed he would never do it again, no matter what he had to do. Even if it meant letting her go.

‘I promise you, Jane,’ he whispered as she stirred in her sleep. ‘I will never hurt you again.’

Chapter One

Three Years Later

Was it an earthquake in London?

That was surely the only explanation for the blasted pounding noise, because Hayden knew that no one in his household would dare to disturb him with such a sound in the middle of the night.

He rolled over on to his back in the tangled bedclothes and opened his eyes to stare up at the dark green canopy above his head. Pinpricks of light were trickling around the edges of the tightly closed window curtains, but surely it was still the middle of the night. He remembered coming home from the club with Harry and Edwards, stumbling through the streets singing, and somehow he had made it up the stairs and into bed. Alone.

Now he felt the familiar ache behind his eyes, made worse by that incessant banging noise.

The room itself wasn’t shaking. He could see that now that he forced himself to be still. So it wasn’t an earthquake. Someone was knocking at the bedroom door.

‘Damn it all!’ he shouted as he pushed himself off the bed. ‘It is the middle of the night.’

‘If you will beg pardon, my lord, you will find it is actually very near noon,’ Makepeace said, calmly but firmly, from the other side of the door.

‘The hell it is,’ Hayden muttered. He found his breeches tangled up amid the twisted bedclothes and impatiently jerked them on. His shirt was nowhere to be found.

He glanced at the clock on the fireplace mantel, and saw that Makepeace was quite right. It was going on noon. He raked his hands through his tangled hair and jerked open the door.

‘Someone had better be dead,’ he said.

Makepeace merely blinked, his round, jowly face solemn as usual. He had been with Hayden’s family for many years, having been promoted to butler even before Hayden’s parents died when he was twelve. Makepeace had seen too much in the Fitzwalter household to ever be surprised.

‘To my knowledge, my lord, no one has shuffled off this mortal coil yet,’ Makepeace said. ‘This letter just arrived.’

He held out his silver tray, which held one small, neatly folded missive. Hayden stared at it in disbelief.

‘A letter?’ he said. ‘You woke me for that? Leave it with the rest of the post on the breakfast table and I’ll read it later.’

He started to slam the door to go back to bed, but Makepeace adroitly slid his foot in. He proffered the tray again. ‘You will want to read this right away, my lord. It’s from Barton Park.’

Hayden wasn’t sure he had heard Makepeace right. Perhaps he was still in bed, having a bizarre brandy-induced dream where letters arrived from Barton Park. ‘What did you say?’

‘If you will look at the return address, my lord, you will see it’s from Barton Park,’ Makepeace said. ‘I thought you might want to see it right away.’

Hayden couldn’t say anything. He merely nodded and took the letter carefully from the tray. He closed the door and stared down at the small, neatly folded missive. It glowed a snowy white in the dim, gloomy room, like some exotic and deadly snake about to strike.

It did indeed read ‘JF, Barton Park’ in a neat, looping handwriting he remembered all too well. The last time he received a letter from that address had been three years ago, when Jane wrote a brief note to tell him she had arrived at Barton Park and would be staying there until further notice. Since then he had sent her monthly bank drafts that were never cashed and he hadn’t heard from her at all. He would only know she was alive because his agents reported it to him on a periodic basis.

Why would his estranged wife be writing to him today? And why did he feel a blasted, terrible spark of hope as he looked at the paper? Hope wasn’t something he deserved. Not when it came to Jane.