TESSA DARE is the New York Times and USA Today bestselling author of twenty historical romances. Her books have won numerous accolades, including Romance Writers of America’s prestigious RITA® award (twice) and the RT Book Reviews Seal of Excellence. Booklist magazine named her one of the ‘new stars of historical romance’, and her books have been contracted for translation in more than a dozen languages.

A librarian by training and a booklover at heart, Tessa makes her home in Southern California, where she lives with her husband, their two children, and a trio of cosmic kittens.

Girl Meets Duke

The Duchess Deal

The Governess Game

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The Wallflower Wager

Tessa Dare

www.millsandboon.co.uk

ISBN: 978-0-008-26827-5

THE WALLFLOWER WAGER

© 2019 Eve Ortega

Published in Great Britain 2019

by Mills & Boon, an imprint of HarperCollins Publishers 1 London Bridge Street, London, SE1 9GF

All rights reserved including the right of reproduction in whole or in part in any form. This edition is published by arrangement with Harlequin Books S.A.

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, locations and incidents are purely fictional and bear no relationship to any real life individuals, living or dead, or to any actual places, business establishments, locations, events or incidents. Any resemblance is entirely coincidental.

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Because little girls don’t stay little forever

Contents

Cover

About the Author

Booklist

Title Page

Copyright

Note to Readers

Dedication

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

Epilogue

Acknowledgments

About the Publisher

Chapter One

Over her years of caring for unwanted animals, Lady Penelope Campion had learned a few things.

Dogs barked; rabbits hopped.

Hedgehogs curled up into pincushions.

Cats plopped in the middle of the drawing room carpet and licked themselves in indelicate places.

Confused parrots flew out open windows and settled on ledges just out of reach. And Penny leaned over window sashes in her nightdress to rescue them—even if it meant risking her own neck.

She couldn’t change her nature, any more than the lost, lonely, wounded, and abandoned creatures filling her house could change theirs.

Penny gripped the window casing with one hand and waved a treat with her other. “Come now, sweeting. This way. I’ve a biscuit for you.”

Delilah cocked her plumed head and regarded the treat. But she didn’t budge.

Penny sighed. She had no one to blame but herself, really. She’d forgotten to cover the birdcage completely at sundown, and she’d left a candle burning far too late while she finished a delicious novel. However, she’d never dreamed Delilah could be clever enough to reach between the bars with one talon and unlatch the little door.

Once the parrot had escaped her cage, out the window she flew.

Penny pursed her lips and whistled. “See, darling? It’s a lovely biscuit, isn’t it? A gingersnap.”

“Pretty girl,” the parrot chirruped.

“Yes, dear. What a pretty, pretty girl you are.”

Delilah made a tentative shuffle sideways. At last, progress.

The bird came closer . . .

“That’s it. Here you come, sweetheart.”

Closer . . .

“Good girl.”

Just a few more inches . . .

Drat.

Delilah snatched the biscuit from Penny’s fingers, scuttled backward, and took a brief flight, coming to land on the windowsill of the next house.

“No. Please. No.”

With a flutter, Delilah disappeared through the open window.

Drat and blast.

The old Wendleby residence had lain vacant for years, save for a few servants to watch over the place, but the property had recently changed hands. The mysterious new owner had yet to make an appearance, but he’d sent an architect and a regiment of laborers to make several noisy, dusty improvements. A house under construction was no place for a defenseless bird to be flying about in the dark.

Penny had to retrieve her.

She eyed the ledge connecting the two houses. If she kicked off her slippers, climbed out onto the ledge, clung to the narrow lip of mortar with her bare toes, and inched across it . . . the open window would be within reach. The distance was only a few feet.

Correction: It was only a few feet to the window. It was twenty-odd feet to the ground.

Penny believed in a great many things. She believed that education was important, books were vital, women ought to have the vote, and most people were good, deep down. She believed that every last one of God’s creatures—human or otherwise—deserved love.

However, she was not fool enough to believe she could fly.

She tied her dressing gown about her waist, jammed her feet into slippers, and padded downstairs to the kitchen, where she eased open the top-left drawer of the spice cabinet. Just as she remembered, all the way at the back of the drawer, affixed to the wooden slat with a bit of candle wax, was a key.

A key that opened the Wendlebys’ back door.

Penny removed the ancient finger of metal and flaked away the wax with her thumbnail. Her family and the Wendlebys had exchanged keys decades ago, as good neighbors were wont to do. One never knew if an urgent situation might arise. This counted as an urgent situation. At this hour, waking the staff would take too much time. Delilah could fly out the way she’d entered at any moment. Penny could only hope that this key still fit its proper lock.

Out into the night she went. In one hand, she carried Delilah’s empty cage. With the other, she drew her dressing gown tight to keep out the chill.

Skulking past the front door of the house, she made her way down to the servants’ entrance. There, obscured by shadows, she slid the key into the lock, coaxing it past the tumblers. Once she’d inserted it all the way, she gave the key a wrenching twist.

With a click, the lock turned. The door fell open.

She paused, breathless, waiting for someone inside to raise the alarm.

There was only silence, save for the thudding of her heart.

Here she was, a complete stranger to criminal activity, about to commit prowling, or trespassing, or perhaps even burglary—if not some combination of the three.

A faint whistle from above underscored the urgency of her mission.

Closing the door behind her, Penny set the birdcage down on the floor, dug into the pocket of her dressing gown, and withdrew the taper and flint she’d stashed there before leaving her house. She lit the slender candle, lifted Delilah’s brass cage with the other, and continued into the house.

She made her way through the servants’ hall and up a flight of stairs, emerging into the house’s main corridor. Penny hadn’t been in this house for several years now. At that time, what with the Wendlebys’ reduced circumstances, the place had fallen into a state of genteel decay.

At last, she beheld the result of several months’ construction.

If the new owner wanted a showplace, he had achieved one. A rather cold and soulless one, in her opinion. But then, she’d never been one for flash. And this house not only flashed—it blinded. The entrance hall was the visual equivalent of a twenty-four-trumpet fanfare. Gilded trim and mirrored panels caught the light from her candle, volleying the rays back and forth until they were amplified into a blaze.

“Delilah,” she whispered, standing at the base of the main staircase. “Delilah, where are you?”

“Pretty girl.”

Penny held her candle aloft and peered upward. Delilah perched on the banister on the second-floor landing.

Thank heaven.

The parrot shifted her weight from one foot to the other and cocked her head.

“Yes, darling.” Penny took the stairs in smooth, unhurried steps. “You are a very, very pretty girl. I know you’re grieving your mistress and missing your home. But this isn’t your house, see? No biscuits here. I’ll take you back home where it’s warm and cozy, and you shall have all the gingersnaps you wish. If you’ll only stay . . . right . . . th—”

Just as she came within an arm’s reach, the bird flapped her wings and ascended to the next landing.

“Pretty girl.”

Sacrificing quiet in favor of speed, Penny raced up the steps and arrived on the landing just in time to glimpse the parrot dart through an open doorway. She was sufficiently familiar with the house’s arrangement to know that direction would be a blind end.

She entered the room—a bedchamber with walls recently covered in lush silk damask and anchored by a massive four-poster bed. The bed was large enough to be a room unto itself, and cocooned by emerald velvet hangings.

Penny quietly shut the door behind her.

Delilah, I have you cornered now.

Cornered, perhaps, but not yet captured.

The bird led her on a chase about the room, flitting from bedpost to wardrobe to bedpost to mantel to bedpost—heavens, why were there so many bedposts?

Between racing up the stairs and chasing about the room, Penny was out of breath. If she weren’t so dedicated to saving abandoned creatures . . .

Delilah alighted on the washstand, and Penny dove to rescue the basin and ewer before they could crash to the floor. As she replaced them, she noticed several other objects on the marble table. A cake of soap, a keen-edged razor, a toothbrush and tooth powder. Evidence of recent occupation.

Male occupation.

Penny needed to catch that parrot and flee.

Instead of perching on a bedpost, Delilah had made the mistake of flying beneath the canopy. Now she found her escape stymied by the voluminous draperies.

Penny rushed toward the bed, took a flying leap, and managed to grasp the parrot by one tiny, taloned foot.

There. I’ve got you.

Catching the parrot would have been a triumph to celebrate. However, as her luck would have it, Penny immediately found herself caught, too.

The chamber’s connecting door swung open. A candle threw light into the room. She lost her grip on Delilah’s leg, and the bird flapped out of reach once again—leaving Penny sprawled across a stranger’s bed in her nightclothes, birdless.

As she turned her head toward the figure in the doorway, she sent up a prayer.

Please be a maid.

Of course she could not be so fortunate. A man stood in the connecting room doorway. He was holding a candle, and wearing nothing at all.

Well, he wasn’t truly naked, she corrected. He was clothed in something. That “something” was a damp scrap of linen clinging so precariously to his hips that it could slide to the floor at any moment—but it qualified as clothing of a sort.

And everyone was naked beneath their clothing, weren’t they? This wasn’t so different. Why be missish about it? After all, he didn’t look embarrassed. Not in the least.

No, he looked magnificent. Magnificently irate.

“Where the hell did you come from?”

His tone of voice was understandably angry. It was also knee-erasing.

Penny scrambled out from the bed hangings and all but tumbled to the floor. “I’m from next door. Where I live. In my house.”

“Well, I own this house.”

“I didn’t realize the new owner was in residence.”

“As of this evening, I am.”

“Yes. So I see.”

She saw a great deal. Far more than was proper. Yet she couldn’t tear her gaze away.

Lord, but he was a big, beautiful beast of a man.

There was just so much of him. Tall, broad, powerfully muscled. And utterly bare, save for that thin bit of toweling and his thick, dark hair. He had a great deal of hair. Not only plastered in damp curls on his head, but defining the hard line of his jaw. And lightly furring his chest.

He had nipples. Two of them.

Eyes, Penny. He has two of those, too. Focus on the eyes.

Sadly, that strategy didn’t help. His eyes were chips of onyx. Chips of onyx dipped in ink, then encased in obsidian, then daubed with pitch, then thrown into a fathomless pit. At midnight.

“Who are you?” she breathed.

“I’m Gabriel Duke.”

Gabriel Duke.

The Gabriel Duke?

“Pleased to make your acquaintance,” she said out of habit, if only because she could hear her mother tut-tutting all the way from India.

“You shouldn’t be pleased. No one else is.”

No, they weren’t. The papers had exhausted an ocean of ink on this man, who came from unknown origins and now possessed untold influence. Ruthless, said some. Shameless, said others. Sinfully wealthy, they all agreed.

They called him the Duke of Ruin.

From somewhere above, Delilah gave a cheeky, almost salacious whistle. The parrot swooped out from beneath the bed hangings and flew all the way across the room, alighting on an unused candle sconce on the opposite wall. Placing herself directly behind Penny’s new, impressively virile neighbor.

Oh, you traitorous bird.

He flinched and ducked as the parrot swept overhead. “What the devil was that?”

“I can explain.”

I just don’t particularly want to.

“It’s a parrot,” she said. “My parrot.”

“Right. And who are you, again?”

“I . . . erm . . .” Her hands couldn’t decide where to be. They merely displayed the panicked desire to be anywhere else.

Water dripped from some hard, slick part of his body, counting out the beats of her mortification.

Drip. Drip. Drip.

“I’m Lady Penelope Campion.”

Lady Penelope Campion.

The Lady Penelope Campion?

Gabe tilted his head to one side, shaking the last bit of bathwater from his ear. He could not have heard her correctly. Surely she meant to say she was a servant in the house of Lady Penelope Campion.

“You can’t be Lady Penelope.”

“I can’t?”

“No. Lady Penelope is a spinster who lives alone with dozens of cats.”

“Not dozens,” she said. “A touch over one dozen at the moment, but that’s only because it’s springtime. Kitten season, you know.”

No, he didn’t know. None of this made any sense whatsoever.

Lady Penelope Campion was the main reason he’d acquired this property. New-money families would pay outrageous amounts to live next door to a lady, even if said lady was an unappealing spinster.

How on earth was this woman a spinster? She was an earl’s daughter, surely possessed of a large dowry. If none of the title-hungry, debt-ridden layabouts in Mayfair had seen fit to propose marriage, simple logic dictated there must be something remarkably off-putting about her. An unbearably grating voice, perhaps. A snaggletooth, or poor personal hygiene.

But she displayed none of those features. She was young and pretty, with no detectable odor. Her teeth were a string of pearls, and she had a voice like sunshine. There was nothing off-putting about her whatsoever. She was . . . on-putting, in every way.

Good God, he was going to sell this house for a bloody fortune.

Assuming the lady wasn’t ruined, of course.

At her level of society, being ruined didn’t take much. Strictly as a random example, she could be ruined by being found alone and scarcely clothed in the bedchamber of the aristocracy’s most detested, and currently most naked, villain.

“You need to leave,” he said. “At once.”

“I can’t. Not before retrieving—”

“Wait here. I’m going to dress, and then I’ll see you home. Discreetly.”

“But—”

“No argument,” he growled.

Gabe had clawed and climbed his way out of the gutters, using the ruined aristocrats of London as stepping-stones along his way. But he hadn’t forgotten where he came from. He’d learned how to talk and walk among people who would think themselves his betters. But that lowborn street urchin still lived within him—including the rough cutpurse voice that had genteel ladies clutching their reticules. When he chose to use that voice, it seldom went unheeded.

Lady Penelope Campion wasn’t paying attention at all.

Her gaze was focused on something behind him, over his shoulder. He instinctively began to turn his head.

“Stop,” she said with perfect calm. “Don’t move.”

He heard a strange flutter, and in the next moment it happened.

A bird landed on his shoulder. A parrot, she’d said? The creature’s toes prickled along his skin. His muscle twitched with the urge to shrug it off.

“No, don’t,” she said. “I’ll come for her.”

Usually, Gabe would balk at taking orders from a lady—or from anyone else. However, this was a decidedly unusual situation.

“Pretty girl,” the bird squawked.

Gabe set his jaw. Do you think I haven’t noticed that, you cursed pigeon with pretensions?

She crept toward him, padding noiselessly over the carpet, step by silent step. And as she came, sweet words fell from her lips like drops of raw honey.

“That’s it, darling,” she murmured.

The fine hairs on the back of his neck lifted.

“Stay . . . right . . . there.”

The hairs on his arms lifted, too.

“Yes,” she breathed. “Just like that.”

Now she had the hairs on his calves involved. Damn it, he had too many hairs. By the end of this they would all be standing at attention.

Along with other parts of him.

“Don’t stir,” she said.

He couldn’t speak for the parrot, but Gabe was doing some stirring. One part of him had a mind of its own, especially when it came to beautiful women in translucent chemises. He hadn’t lain with a woman in some time, but his body hadn’t forgotten how.

He couldn’t help himself. He stole a glance at her face. Just a half-second’s view. Not long enough to pore over every detail of her features. In fact, he didn’t get any further than her lips. Lips as lush as petals, painted in soft, tender pink.

She was so close now. Near enough that when he breathed, he inhaled a lungful of her scent. She smelled delicious. A faint hunger rose in his chest.

“I know you’re feeling lost. And not a little frightened. You miss her terribly, don’t you? But I’m here, darling. I’m here.”

Her words sent a strange ache spreading from his teeth to his toes. A painful awareness of all his hollow, empty places.

“Come home with me,” she whispered. “And we’ll sort out the rest together.”

He couldn’t take any more of this. “For God’s sake, get the damned thing off me.”

At last, she collected the feathered beast. “There we are.” Cradling it in her arms, she carried the parrot to its birdcage and tucked it within.

Gabe exhaled with relief.

“She’d settle more if I covered her cage,” his beautiful intruder said. “I don’t suppose you have a towel?”

He glanced at the linen slung about his hips. “How badly do you want it?”

Her cheeks flushed. “Never mind. I’ll be going.”

“I’m going to walk you.”

“Truly, you needn’t do that. It’s only next door. No more than twenty paces down the street.”

“That’s twenty paces too many.”

Gabe might not operate by polite society’s rules, but he understood them sufficiently to know this situation violated at least seventeen of them. And anything that damaged her reputation would decrease the profit he stood to collect on this house.

Until he sold this property, her worth was intertwined with his.

“You’re no doubt accustomed to having your way, Your Ladyship. But I’ve ruined enough lords, baronets, knights, and gentlemen to fill the whole of Bloom Square.” He arched an eyebrow. “Believe me when I say, you’ve met your match.”

Chapter Two

Penny watched in silence as the Gabriel Duke turned and stalked to his dressing room.

Then she melted into a quivering pool on the floor.

Heavens.

He’d left the door ajar. As his towel dropped to the floor, she caught a glimpse of taut, muscled backside before tearing her gaze away.

Oh Lord oh Lord oh Lord.

Once she’d latched and relatched Delilah’s cage for good measure, Penny stood and attempted to piece herself back together.

She glanced at her dressing gown. The faded toile print was years behind the fashion, and the ends of the sash were hopelessly frayed—the casualty of many a playful kitten’s swipe. And her hair . . . Oh, she could only imagine the state of her hair after this adventure.

She peered into the dressing-table mirror. Worse than she’d feared. Her plait made Delilah’s ruffled crest look sleek. Penny quickly unknotted the bit of muslin around her braid and combed her hair with her fingers before rebraiding it and tying off the end.

She squinted into the mirror again. Better, she judged. Not a great deal better. But better.

“Pretty girl!”

From the dressing room, Mr. Duke gave an annoyed groan.

“I’m so sorry for the imposition,” she called. “Delilah only came to live in Bloom Square a few weeks ago. Her mistress passed away. Parrots are loyal and intelligent, and they often outlive their human companions. So she’s not only been uprooted from her home, she’s in mourning.”

“I must say, she doesn’t sound particularly aggrieved to me.”

“She does say the most amusing things, doesn’t she? ‘Pretty girl,’ and ‘yes,’ and—Do you hear that one? ‘Fancy a . . .’ what? I never can catch what she’s saying at the end. It’s certainly not biscuit. ‘Fancy a cuppa,’ perhaps? But who gives a parrot tea? It sounds a great deal like ‘fancy a foxglove,’ but that makes even less sense. I don’t mind saying the mystery is driving me a bit mad.”

“Fuck.”

She froze. “I’m not that upset about it.”

He returned to the bedchamber, now clothed in a pair of trousers and an unbuttoned shirt. “It’s what the parrot’s saying. ‘Fancy a fuck, love.’ That bird came from a whorehouse.”

She spent a few moments in scandalized silence. No one had ever spoken to her in such a manner—but that wasn’t the disturbing part. The disturbing part was how much she liked it.

“That can’t be,” she said. “She belonged to a little old lady. That’s what I was told.”

“Bawds turn into little old ladies, too.”

“Pretty girl.” Delilah gave a cheeky whistle. “Fancy a f—”

Penny pressed a hand to her mouth. “Oh, no.”

“Yes! Yes! Ooh! Yes!”

Mr. Duke sat to pull on his boots. “Please tell me I don’t need to translate that for you.”

Penny couldn’t think of anything she might say to make this exchange less horrifying. She couldn’t have said anything at all. It wasn’t that she’d lost her tongue. Her tongue had curled up and died.

Boots donned, he strode to the door and held it open for her. Penny gratefully lifted the birdcage and hurried to escape.

“I know how fragile a lady’s reputation can be,” he said. “Just so it’s understood—no one can ever know you were here.”

“Lady Penelope?”

Penny jumped in her skin.

The housekeeper, Mrs. Burns, stood in the corridor. Her eyes slid to her employer. “Mr. Duke.”

Mr. Duke cursed under his breath. If she were the sort to use profanity, Penny would have cursed, too.

Mrs. Burns had managed the Wendleby house for as long as Penny could remember. When she was a girl, the housekeeper had terrified her.

Little had changed in that regard. The woman was even more frightening now, clad in black from head to toe with her hair parted severely down the center. The candle she held threw macabre shadows across her face.

“Is there some way I can be of service?” she solemnly intoned.

“My parrot flew in through the window and I came over to retrieve her,” Penny hastily explained. “Mr. Duke was kind enough to help. Mrs. Burns, perhaps you’d be so good as to accompany me home?”

“That would be prudent.” The housekeeper gave her a disapproving look. “In the future, my lady, might I suggest you wake a servant to let you in the house.”

“Oh, this won’t happen again.” Penny slid a glance toward Mr. Duke as she moved to leave. “I can promise you that.”

In fact, Penny had formed a simple plan to cope with this situation.

Thank the man for his help . . .

Calmly make her retreat . . .

And then never, ever leave her house again.

As the owner of properties all over Britain—hotels, town houses, mines, factories, country estates—Gabe was accustomed to awakening in unfamiliar rooms. Three things, however, never altered.

He always woke with the dawn.

He always woke hungry.

And he always woke up alone.

He had a set of rules when it came to sexual congress—he didn’t pay for it, he wouldn’t beg for it, and he damned well wasn’t going to wed for it. When based in London, he found casual lovers with no difficulty, but lately he’d been moving from place to place so often he simply couldn’t find the time.

On this particular morning, he sat up in the bed, gave himself a shake, and familiarized himself with his surroundings. Mayfair. Bloom Square. The house that ought to bring a satisfying profit, once it was finally ready to be sold.

The house next door to her. Lady Penelope Campion—the aging, frazzled, unsightly spinster who . . .

Who wasn’t any of those things. Not by a mile. As fortune would have it, Lady Penelope Campion turned out to be a fair-haired, blue-eyed beauty.

In his mind’s eye, he could still see her sprawled across this bed in her dressing gown. Like an all-grown-up Goldilocks, having crept into his house uninvited to test the mattress. Too soft, too hard . . . ?

He didn’t know her opinion, but Gabe’s reaction was the latter. His cock was in its usual morning prime, standing at full mast.

He scrubbed his face with one hand and stumbled to the bathroom.

He’d been too weary from travel to inspect the new fixtures yesterday, but all looked to be in order this morning. Tiled marble floor and an immense copper tub, complete with taps for running water—both hot and cold.

Last night he’d settled for a quick, cold dousing. Today, he meant to have a hot bath. He settled into the tub and turned the tap marked with an H. The tap shivered, but refused to give up any water. Gabe gave it a gentle shake, then a firm slap. Nothing.

In all his life, he’d never backed down from a fight, but this had to be his most inane confrontation yet: fisticuffs with a water tap.

He banged on the pipe, and it finally gave way with a rattle and groan. A blast of cold water sprayed him in the face. Needles of ice speared him in the eyes, the mouth. Bloody hell, even up his nose.

Round one to the water tap.

Blocking the spray with one hand, he closed the H tap with the other. Annoyed, he reached for the one marked with a C. A cold bath did have its benefits. After a few minutes of scrubbing in the bollocks-shrinking bathwater, he’d rinsed his mind of his neighbor’s soft, pink lips.

Mostly.

The remainder of his morning toilette was simple. He brushed his teeth, shaved, combed back his stubborn shock of hair, and dressed.

Before leaving the room, he reached for the dull silver coin on the dressing table—a single shilling, rubbed smooth—and tucked it in the pocket of his waistcoat. Over the years, a shilling had become his talisman. A reminder of where he’d come from, and how far he’d climbed. Gabe never went anywhere without one.

He opened the door and bellowed. “Hammond!”

His architect appeared a minute later, huffing from the climb up the stairs. “Good morning, Mr. Duke.”

“It might be a good morning, if the hot water taps I paid hundreds to install were functioning.” He shook his head. “This house should have been complete months ago.”

“I know that was your hope, sir.”

“It was my expectation,” Gabe corrected. “I spent three years wrangling in Chancery to gain possession of the place. I’m spending thousands to bring it up to modern standards. But I can’t turn a profit until I sell it.”

“As I indicated in my correspondence, Mr. Duke, there have been a few obstacles.”

“You call them obstacles. To me, they sound like excuses.” He gestured at the water basin. “You told me this is the latest innovation. Hot running water.”

“It is the latest innovation. It’s so new, in fact, that this is only the second boiler of its kind in England. There’s only one man on this side of the Channel who knows how to perform repairs.”

“So get that man in here to repair the cursed thing.”

“Yes, well, here we come to the obstacle.” Hammond pushed both hands through his silver hair. “That particular man is dead.”

Gabe swore. “Get the other one on a ship, then.”

“Already under way.”

As they strode down the corridor, Gabe stopped to peer through the open doors, surveying the progress in each chamber. No wallpaper in this one, unfinished molding in another . . .

Unacceptable.

“So tell me about these other ‘obstacles’ you’ve encountered.”

Hammond stared down the staircase and lowered his voice, speaking through unmoving lips. “I’m looking at one of them now.”

Gabe peered in the same direction. “The housekeeper?”

“Oh, good,” he muttered. “You see her, too.”

“Should I not?”

“I don’t know. I’m not certain she’s human. Sometimes I think she’s a ghost who’s been haunting the place for centuries.”

Gabe gave his architect a worried look. Maybe Hammond needed a holiday. The man was getting on in years.

He assessed the housekeeper in the light of day. The woman carried herself with a strict demeanor, and her appearance might as well have been sketched in charcoal—from her severely parted black hair, down her black buttoned frock, all the way to her polished black shoes.

“She looks like the typical housekeeper if you ask me.”

“There is nothing typical about that woman,” Hammond said. “You’ll see. I swear, she moves through walls. Materializes out of thin air. You’ll be walking down a perfectly empty corridor. Suddenly, there she is right in front of you.”

Gabe had to admit, she’d certainly appeared out of nowhere last night.

“I’m an architect. If there were secret corridors in this house, I’d know—and there aren’t. I’m telling you, she’s some kind of spirit. I’m hoping you’ll sack her, but I’m not certain it would work. You’ll need an exorcism, I think.”

“Finding and training a suitable replacement would be a monumental task on its own.” Gabe knew the value of a competent employee—and after last night, he wasn’t giving the woman any reason to go spreading vindictive rumors about. “So long as she’s loyal, she stays.”

“She’s much too loyal. She doesn’t want anything changed. Projects that were done one day will be mysteriously undone the next morning.”

“So she’s meddling?”

“That, or working incantations.”

“I’m not going to sack her. When people are competent in their posts, I keep them on.” He gave Hammond a look. “Even if they are annoying.”

“I worried you’d say as much.” Hammond sighed. “Whatever else can be said for the creature, she does know this house. Better than you know the face of a shilling.”

I doubt that.

“But when she has you scared out of your wits,” Hammond said, “don’t come knocking at my door in the middle of the night. I won’t let you in.”

“How disappointing.”

They made their way down the remainder of the stairs and into the breakfast room. A bowl of fruit sat on the table, waiting. Gabe’s mouth watered, and yet—as always—his instinct was to hesitate.

Don’t touch it, boy. That’s not for the likes of you.

No matter how much wealth he amassed, it seemed he would never banish that voice. And no matter how much he devoured, satisfaction eluded him. The hunger never went away.

He reached for an apple, shined it on his waistcoat, and took a defiant bite.

“And then there’s your third problem.” Hammond nodded at the window. “Just out there, on the green. Lady Penelope Campion.”

Gabe strolled to the window. She looked different this morning. Different, but no less pretty. The spring sunshine lent her fair hair a golden sheen, and a simple frock skimmed the contours of her tempting, graceful curves. Even from here, he could see her smile.

Lovely as she might be, she wasn’t Gabe’s usual sort. He wanted nothing to do with delicate, pampered misses possessing no knowledge of the world beyond Mayfair. They were painted china on a high shelf, and he was the bull charging through the shop.

All the more worrisome, then, that Lady Penelope was working her way under his skin.

He took another bite of his apple, snapping the crisp sweetness down to the core.

Gabe watched her move to the center of the green. In one gloved hand, she clutched a leash. The other end of the leash was attached to . . . something furry and brown that rolled.

“What is that?”

“That would be a mongrel with two lamed hind legs. Apparently, Her Ladyship’s friend devised a little chariot for his rear half, and the dog careens around the neighborhood like a yapping billiard ball. If you think that’s strange, wait until you see the goat.”

“Hold a moment. There’s a goat?”

“Oh, yes. She grazes it on the square every afternoon. Doesn’t precisely elevate the atmosphere of Bloom Square, now does it?”

“I see the problem.”

“I’m only getting started. Her Ladyship has single-handedly set us back a month on the improvements.” Hammond pulled a collection of letters from a folio. He held one aloft and read from it. “‘Dear Mr. Hammond, I must request that you delay completion of the parquet flooring. The fumes from the lacquer are dizzying the hens. Sincerely yours, Lady Penelope Campion.’”

He withdrew another. “‘Dear Mr. Hammond, I’m afraid your improvements to the mews must be temporarily halted. I’ve located a litter of newborn kittens in the hayloft. Their mother is looking after them, but as their eyes are not yet open, they should not be displaced for another week. Thank you for your cooperation. Gratefully yours, Lady Penelope Campion.’”

Gabe sensed a theme.

“Oh, and here’s my favorite.” Hammond shook open a letter and cleared his throat for dramatic effect. “‘Dear Mr. Hammond, if it is not too great an imposition, might I ask that your workers refrain from performing heavy labor between nine o’clock in the morning and half-three in the afternoon? Hedgehogs are nocturnal animals, and sensitive to loud noises. My dear Freya is losing quills. I feel certain this will concern you as much as it does me. Neighborly yours, Lady Penelope Campion.’” He tossed the folio of letters onto the table, where they landed with a smack. “Her hedgehog. Really.”

Outside, Her Ladyship coaxed her dog back toward the house, lifting both dog and cart up the few steps to her door. Gabe turned away from the window, rubbing his temples.

“The situation is untenable, and that makes the house unsellable. No one wants to live next to a barnyard. I’ve tried reasoning with her, but when it comes to those animals, she’s surprisingly tenacious.”

Tenacious, indeed. And sufficiently reckless to trespass in a house after midnight and recover a parrot from a near-naked stranger’s shoulder.

However, even that degree of tenacity had poor odds against sheer ruthlessness. Lady Penelope Campion had a softness for animals. Gabe had no softness at all.

“You make certain the work is done and bring in potential buyers.” Gabe tossed the apple core into the fireplace grate. “I’ll handle Lady Penelope Campion.”

Chapter Three

By society’s standards, Penny was rather lacking in accomplishments. As the daughter of an earl, she’d been given the best possible education. Governesses fluent in three languages, a full two years at finishing school, then private tutors in art, music, dancing.

None of it seemed to take. She’d never found an instrument willing to give up a tune for her, no matter how she strummed, plucked, or begged it. She’d attained only marginal competence in sketching.

And dancing? Impossible.

Penny did, however, emerge from adolescence with unparalleled accomplishment in one pursuit.

Caring.

Nothing pleased her more than looking after those around her. Feeding them, warming them, protecting them, giving them a home. She doled out affection from an endless supply.

The only problem was, she was running out of people to claim it.

She had her family, of course. But first her parents had gone to India as diplomats. Her eldest brother, Bradford, lived in Cumberland with his wife and managed the family estate. Timothy, the middle child of their threesome, had joined the Royal Navy.

Still, she had the most wonderful friends. Never mind that the finishing school girls had scorned her. Penny welcomed the misfits of Bloom Square. Emma, Alexandra, Nicola. Together, they made the rounds of the bookshops, walked in the park, and gathered at her house for tea every Thursday.

Or at least they had done so, until her friends began to start families of their own. First, Emma’s marriage to the Duke of Ashbury had transformed from a convenient arrangement into passionate devotion. Next, Alex had bewitched London’s most infamous rake and became Mrs. Chase Reynaud. As for brilliant, inventive Nicola . . . ?

Penny scanned the note she’d just received, peering hard to make out the breathless scrawl of ink.

Can’t today. Biscuits burned. Breakthrough near. Next Thursday?

Love, N

Penny laid aside the charred scrap of paper and regarded the tray of sandwiches on the tea table, all trimmed of their crusts and ready for a gathering that wouldn’t take place.

Fortunately, in this house, food seldom went to waste.

Taking a sandwich, she crouched near to the floor and whistled. Bixby scampered down the corridor, his two front paws clicking over the floorboards and his lamed hind legs following right behind, rolling along in an ingenious chariot of Nicola’s design.

After several excited sniffs, the dog gave the crustless triangle a cautious lick.

“Go on,” she urged. “It’s a new recipe. You’ll like it.”

Just as Bixby sank his dart-point teeth into the sandwich, the doorbell rang. Penny rushed to answer it. At the last moment, she hesitated with her hand on the door latch.

Could it be him?

It wouldn’t be him, she told herself.

But what if it was?

Sensing her unease, Bixby whined and nosed at her ankles. Taking a deep breath to calm her nerves, Penny opened the door.

“Oh,” she said, trying not to sound dejected. “Aunt Caroline.”

Her aunt entered the house in her usual manner—like a snobbish traveler disembarking on a foreign shore, visiting a land where the native people spoke a different language, exchanged different currency, worshipped different gods. Her eyes took in the place with a cool, smug sort of interest. As though, while she had no desire to truly understand this alien culture, she’d been reading up.

Most of all, she was careful where she stepped.

When she’d completed her quiet survey of the drawing room, she gave a weary sigh. “Oh, Penelope.”

“It’s lovely to see you, too, Aunt.”

Her aunt’s eyes fell on the quilt-lined basket near the hearth. “Is that still the same hedgehog?”

Penny decided to change the subject. “Do sit down, and I’ll ring for a new pot of tea.”

“Thank you, no.” Her aunt plucked a tuft of cat hair from the armchair, pinching it between her thumb and forefinger and holding it away from her body. Frowning at the bit of fluff, she released it and watched it waft to the floor. “What I have to say won’t take long, anyhow. I’ve had a letter from Bradford. He insists you return to Cumberland.”

Penny was stunned. “For the summer?”

“For the remainder of your life, I believe.”

No.

No, no, no.

Her aunt lifted a hand, barricading herself against dissent. “Your brother has asked me to tell you he’ll be traveling to London in a month’s time. He asked me to be certain you’re prepared to join him for the return journey.”

Penny’s heart sank. She was a grown woman, and therefore could not be ordered to pick up and move to the farthest reaches of England. However, the snag was this—even if she was a grown woman, she was still a woman. This house belonged to her father, and while her father was out of the country, Bradford had control. Penny lived in Bloom Square at his pleasure. If he demanded she remove to Cumberland, she would have little choice in the matter.

“Aunt Caroline, please. Can’t you write back and convince him to change his mind?”

“I’ll do no such thing. I happen to agree with your brother. In fact, I ought to have suggested it myself. I did promise your parents I would look after you, but now that the war is over I intend to travel the Continent. You shouldn’t be living alone.”

“I’m six-and-twenty years old, and I’m not living alone. I have Mrs. Robbins.”

Wordlessly, her aunt picked up the bell from the tea table and gave it a light ring.

Several moments passed. No Mrs. Robbins.

Aunt Caroline craned her neck toward the main corridor and lifted her voice. “Mrs. Robbins!”

Penny crossed her arms and sighed, fully aware of the point her aunt meant to make. “She’s always looked after me.”

“She isn’t looking after you any longer. You are looking after her.”

“Just because the old dear is a touch hard of hearing—”

Aunt Caroline stomped on the floor three times—boom, boom, boom—and shouted, “MRS. ROBBINS!”

At last, the sound of aged, shuffling footsteps made its way from the back of the house to the drawing room.

“My word!” Mrs. Robbins said. “If it isn’t Lady Caroline. I didn’t know you’d dropped by. Shall I bring tea?”

“No, thank you, Robbins. You’ve served your purpose already.”

“Have I?” The older woman looked confused. “Yes, of course.”

Once Mrs. Robbins had quit the room, Penny addressed her aunt. “I don’t wish to leave. I’m happy living in Town. My life is here. All my friends are here.”

“Your life and your friends are . . . where?” Aunt Caroline looked meaningfully at each one of the unoccupied chairs, at the trays of cold tea and uneaten sandwiches, and, finally, at the three kittens shredding the draperies with their tiny claws.

“I have human friends, as well,” Penny said defensively.

Her aunt looked doubtful.

“I do. Several of them.”

Her aunt glanced at the silver tray in the entrance hall. The one where calling cards and invitations were heaped—or would be, if Penny ever received them, which she didn’t. The tray was empty.

“Some of my friends are out of Town.” Aware of how absurd she sounded, she added, “And others are mad scientists.”

Another pitying sigh from her aunt. “We must face the truth, Penelope. It’s time.”

It’s time.

Penny didn’t need to ask what her aunt meant by that. The implication was clear.

Aunt Caroline meant it was time to give up.

Time for Penny to return to the family home in Cumberland and resign herself to her destiny: spinsterhood. She must take on the role of maiden aunt and stop embarrassing both the family and herself.

After nine years in Town, she hadn’t married. She hadn’t even entertained any serious suitors. She rarely mingled in society. If she were being honest, she would strike “rarely” and replace it with “never.” She didn’t have any intellectual pursuits like art or science or poetry. No bluestocking salons, no social reform protests. She stayed home with her pets and invited her misfit friends to tea, and . . .

And outside her tiny sphere, people laughed at her.

Penny knew they did. She’d been an object of pity and ridicule ever since her disastrous debut. It didn’t bother her, except—well, except for the times that it did.

As a person who wanted to like everyone, it hurt to know that not everyone liked her in return.

Society had long given up on her. Now her family, as well.

But Penny was not giving up on herself. When her aunt moved to leave, she grasped her by the arm.

“Wait. Is there nothing I can do to change your mind? If you advocated on my behalf, I know Bradford would reconsider.”

Her aunt was silent.

“Aunt Caroline, please. I beg you.”

Penny could not return to Cumberland, back to the house where she’d passed the darkest hours of her life. The house where she’d learned to bottle shame and store it in a dark place, out of view.

You know how to keep a secret, don’t you?

Her aunt pursed her lips. “Very well. To begin, you might order a new wardrobe. Fur and feathers are all well and good—but only when they are worn on purpose, and in a fashionable way.”

“I can order a new wardrobe.” It wouldn’t include fur and feather adornments, but Penny could promise it would be new.

“And once you have a new wardrobe, you must use it. The opera. A dinner party. A ball would be preferable, but we both know that’s too much to ask.”

Ouch. Penny would never live down that humiliating scene.

“Make an appearance somewhere,” her aunt said. “Anywhere. I want to see you in the society column for once.”

“I can do that, too.” I think.

Considering how long she’d been out of circulation, invitations to dinner and the theater would be harder to come by than a few up-to-current-fashion gowns. Nevertheless, it could be accomplished.

“Lastly, and most importantly”—Aunt Caroline paused for effect—“you must do something about all these animals.”

“What do you mean, ‘do something’ about them?”

“Be rid of them. All of them.”

“All of them?” Penny reeled. Impossible. She could find homes for the kittens. That had always been her plan. But Delilah? Bixby? Angus, Marigold, Hubert, and the rest? “I can’t. I simply can’t.”

“Then you can’t.” Her aunt tugged on her gloves. “I must be going. I have letters to write.”

“Wait.”

Surely there was a way to convince her aunt that didn’t involve abandoning her pets. Perhaps she could trick her by hiding them in the attic?

“I hope you’re not thinking you can hide them in the attic,” her aunt said dryly. “I’ll know.”

Drat.

“Aunt Caroline, I’ll . . . I’ll try my best. I just need a little time.”

“According to your brother, you have a month. Perhaps less. You know as well as I, it takes the mail the better part of a week to arrive from Cumberland.”

“That leaves only three weeks. But that’s nothing.”

“It’s what you have.”

Penny immediately began to pray, very hard, for rain. Come to think of it, considering the amount of rain England typically saw in springtime, she probably ought to pray for something more. Torrential, bridge-flooding, road-rutting downpours. A biblical deluge. A plague of frogs.

“If, by your brother’s arrival, I am convinced there’s something keeping you in London other than an abundance of animal hair . . . ? Then, and only then, I might be persuaded to intervene.”

“Very well,” Penny said. “You have a bargain.”

“A bargain? This isn’t a bargain, my girl. I’ve made you no guarantees, and I’m not convinced you’re up to the challenge at all. If anything, we have a wager—and you’re facing very long odds.”

Long odds, indeed. After her aunt had gone, Penny closed the door and slumped against it.

Three weeks.

Three weeks to save the creatures depending on her.

Three weeks to save herself.

Penny had no idea how she would accomplish it, but this was a wager she had to win.

Chapter Four

After that miserable encounter with her aunt, Penny could not have dreamed her day could grow any worse. But here worse came, in the form of Mr. Gabriel Duke, walking across the green directly toward her, right in the middle of Marigold’s daily constitutional.

The Duke of Ruin, they said. Penny didn’t know if the man lived up to his scandal-sheet moniker, but he was certainly the Duke of Ruining Her Afternoon.

“Lady Penelope.” He inclined his head in the grudging suggestion of a bow.

Penny needed a few moments before she could look him in the eye. She took in his appearance from the ground up. His fine attire said “gentleman.” The remainder of his appearance subtracted “gentle” and simply said “man.” Though he must have shaved between last night and this afternoon, stubbly whiskers ranged up his throat and over his sharply cut jaw.

“Well?”

Drat. He must have asked her a question, and she’d been wandering so deep in the dark forest of his whiskers, she hadn’t heard it.

She resolved to ignore his effect on her. Her resolution lasted approximately nine seconds.

When he spoke again, his voice was deliciously deep and intimate. “We need to have a chat.”

She cringed. She’d been afraid he would say that. ”Can’t we agree to forget last night ever happened?”

“I’m afraid it was rather unforgettable.”

With that, she could not argue. “I’m sorry about the parrot. And the trespassing. And the breaking and entering.”

“I’m not here to talk about the parrot. Right now, my concern is the goat.”

“Why would you care about Marigold?”

“Let me begin with this: I’m different from most men of your acquaintance.”

She nearly laughed aloud. What an understatement.

Penny wasn’t unused to men, but there was a difference between friendly acquaintance and a close-range confrontation with sheer masculine physicality. It felt like someone had taken a mallet to a gong of femininity hidden deep in her belly, and now the vibrations traveled through her bones, summoning an ancient, primal force.

Penny could think of only one name for it: lust.

It made no sense. She’d always been a romantic. She cheered on her friends’ unlikely matches. She believed in destiny, soul mates, love at first sight.

Penny didn’t want any of those things from Gabriel Duke. She wanted to tear off his clothes and look at him—all of him—the way she had last night. It had been too dark in the room, and she hadn’t found the courage to stare. When would she see a man so very big, wearing so very little, again?

Never, that was when.

The thought made her irritable and sulky.

Good Lord, Penny. He’s a person. Not merely a collection of muscles with an intriguing distribution of hair.

“Unlike most gentlemen, I did not inherit a fortune,” he continued. “I built one. I did that by acquiring things that are undervalued, and then selling them for more than I paid. Hence, a profit. Do you follow me?”

“If you’re asking whether I comprehend basic mathematics, then yes. I follow you.”

“Good.” He looked in the direction of the house that so inconveniently abutted hers. “When the Wendlebys could not pay their debts, I acquired their property. Now I mean to sell it at a profit.”

“And therefore you’ve undertaken several months of improvements.”

“The improvements to the house will add to its value, but the property’s main selling point is right here.”

“You mean the square?”

“I mean you.”

His words took her by surprise. “Me?”

“Yes, you. Do you have any idea how much a social-climbing family would pay to take up residence next door to a lady?”

“No.”

“Well, I do. And it’s an outrageous figure. They envision themselves rubbing elbows with the elite, climbing the rungs of society, living in elegance and luxury. If they gaze out the drawing-room window and see their aristocratic neighbor playing goatherdess on the green like some absurd imitation of Marie Antoinette? It ruins the effect.”

“People run their dogs on the green all the time.”

“Dogs are pets.”

“Marigold is a pet, too. And she needs to browse. She can’t subsist on alfalfa alone. She’s prone to bloating.”

“Bloating?” he echoed, incredulous.

“She has sensitive digestion.”

“That doesn’t look like bloating to me.” He tilted his head and regarded Marigold’s swollen underbelly. “That looks like breeding.”

Penny stepped back, offended. “She is not breeding. It’s impossible. There are no bucks for miles.”

“You’re certain of that?”

“Yes, I’m certain. No one keeps goats in the middle of Mayf—” She bit her tongue before she made his argument for him. “I’m telling you, it’s impossible. If she’s not in the mews or the back garden, I keep her on a short lead.”

His eyebrow quirked with derision. “Spoken like the guardian of many a ruined young female in this neighborhood, I’d wager.”

“I beg your pardon. Marigold is not that kind of goat.”

“Whatever you say. I don’t care about the creature’s virtue. I just want her removed from the square.”

“I told you, she needs to browse. Her diet requires shrubs and fresh grasses. Hay and corn are well enough for Angus, but—”

“Hold a moment. Angus?”

“Angus is a Highland steer. I rescued him when he was a calf, but he’s three years old now. Grown and healthy as anything.”

He blinked at her. “You have a fully grown bull—”

“A steer.”

“—living in your back garden.”

“Don’t be silly. Angus lives in the mews. The otter is in the back garden.”

“An otter?” He grumbled something that sounded like Holy immaculate mother of goats. “This is ridiculous.”

“Mr. Duke, the variety of pets I keep may be unusual, but an attachment to animals isn’t. Have you never had a pet of your own?”

“No.”

“Don’t you like animals?”

“Certainly, I like animals. Roasted animals. Fried animals. Minced-and-baked-in-a-pie animals.” He gestured expansively. “I like all kinds of animals.”

Oh, this man was impossible.

No, Penny corrected. The man was not impossible. Even the most untamed, ill-mannered creatures could be won over with a bit of patience. She’d made pets of worse beasts than Gabriel Duke.

She simply wasn’t up to the effort this afternoon, that’s all.

“Listen,” he said, “I don’t have time to compromise. They have to go. All of them. The goat, the cow, the otter, the parrot, that hedgehog, and whatever else you have in your rafters. I need them all gone.”

“What a coincidence you should say that.”

Ever since her aunt had left, Penny had been turning it over and over in her mind. She would have to find the animals new homes. Either she did so quickly and succeeded in convincing her aunt, or else she would be forced to leave Bloom Square—in which case, there would be no taking her pets with her. Bradford would never take them to Cumberland. If she defied her brother’s wishes, one of Penny’s friends would surely welcome her to stay with them—but she couldn’t ask them to take in a few dozen animals, too.

One way or another, she would have to bid them farewell. And if she wanted any hope of remaining in Bloom Square, she must not only find her pets new homes, but undo a decade of social seclusion. In three weeks.

It all seemed hopeless.

“As it happens, Mr. Duke, you are going to get your wish. The animals will be gone within the month, one way or another.”

“Good.”

“In fact, it’s entirely possible that I’ll be gone, too.”

“Wait.” His eyebrows converged in a frown. “What did you say?”

“My brother is demanding I go home to the ancestral estate in Cumberland. He’s coming to collect me in three weeks. That means I’ll be leaving Bloom Square, too. Unless I work a miracle.”

He swore under his breath. “This is unacceptable.”

“I’m not happy about it, either, but I’m afraid neither of us has much say in the matter. I must be going.” She gathered Marigold’s lead. “Come along, sweeting.”

He cut off her path. “The miracle.”

“What?”

“You said you’ll be leaving unless you work a miracle. Tell me about the miracle.”

“I don’t know why you should care.”

“Oh, I care,” he said. “I care a great deal. What ever this ‘miracle’ is, I will work it.”

“You couldn’t possibly.”

“I can, and I will.”

Heavens. His dark, intense stare nailed her slippers to the gravel path. Her heart pounded in her chest. And then he spoke the gruff, possessive words Penny had started to doubt she’d ever hear.

“I need you, Lady Penelope Campion. I’m not letting you go.”

Chapter Five

When he made this firm declaration, Gabe had not been expecting Lady Penelope’s reaction. First she looked surprised, and then she looked—

She looked hopeful?

“You . . .” Her cheeks flushed pink. “You need me?”

He would need to tread carefully here. She was sheltered, naïve. And she did not want to be a spinster. So much was clear from simply staring into her china-blue eyes. She’d been saving that soft, blushing sweetness for years, waiting to lavish it on the right man.

Gabe was not, and never would be, the right man. Not for her, not for anyone. If Her Ladyship had formed any notions otherwise, she was a fool.

“I need you,” he clarified, “to continue residing in Bloom Square if I’m to sell the house at a handsome profit. Which I fully intend to do.”

She blinked several times in succession. “Yes, of course. I knew that. It’s kind of you to offer your help, that’s all.”

Kind?

What an innocent she was. If she could glimpse the ugliness in his past, the ruthless hunger that consumed his mind, the blackness of his heart, she would learn the enormity of her mistake. But he’d never allow anyone near the yawning, empty pit of his soul. Posted warnings were the best he could offer. For her own sake, she had better heed them.

“Listen to me,” he said sternly. “My motives are never kind. Neither are they generous or charitable or good. They’re money-driven and entirely selfish. You’d do well to remember that.”

So would he.

“So,” he said, “what are the terms of this miracle you’ve mentioned?”

“My aunt has promised she’ll try to change my brother’s mind about taking me home to the country—but only if I meet her conditions.”

“And those would be . . . ?”

“A new, fashionable wardrobe, to begin.”

“Well, that’s not even a challenge. Certainly nothing approaching a miracle.”

“It’s the easy part, yes. My dear friend Emma was a seamstress before she married. I know she’d help.” She took a deep breath. “But there’s more. I also have to begin moving in society again.”

He shook his head. “Do we have different definitions of the word ‘miracle’? Because that doesn’t sound difficult, either.”

“You don’t understand. I haven’t socialized within the ton in almost a decade. By now, they’ve forgotten I even exist. Yet somehow I’m meant to make my grand reentrance. She wants to see me in the society column.”

Gabe was forced to admit that sounded a touch more complicated than the first condition, and it certainly wasn’t something well-suited to his own talents. He wouldn’t be caught dead at a ball, and despite his many mentions in the papers, none was in the society column.

Nevertheless, the task was well within the realm of possibility. There were several lords and gentlemen in his debt he could press for invitations, if it came to that.

“You mentioned a third thing your aunt’s demanding.”

“The same thing you’re demanding. Be rid of the animals.” She gave the goat a fond scratch behind the ear. “It will break my heart, but I have no choice. I must find them new homes.”

“Done.”

“Done?”

He shrugged. “As good as done, anyway. I’ll find them homes. All of them.”

“Just like that.”

“Just like that. It’ll take a week, at the most.”

“I don’t think you understand,” she said. “My pets came to me wounded, abandoned, untamed. They’re the animals no one else wanted. It won’t be an easy task finding them safe, loving homes, with people who’ll treat them as part of the family.”

Part of the family? She lived in a fantasy land. Even if such “safe, loving” homes existed in the real world, Gabe wouldn’t know how to recognize them. Fortunately, he wasn’t above a falsehood or two.

“Not to worry. Leave it to me. I’ll find them excellent homes.”

She scanned him with narrowed, doubting eyes. “Forgive me, Mr. Duke, but I’m not at all convinced you’re qualified to take on this sort of—”

Her all-too-perceptive statement was interrupted by a flurry of barking. This would not have been remarkable, had said barking not been emanating from the pavement in front of her house.

She turned toward the noise. “Oh, no. Not again.”

Again? Barking pavement was a regular occurrence outside her house? Of course it was.

“Hold this.” She pressed the goat’s leash into Gabe’s hand, and then left the two of them standing there while she ran toward the noise.

As he looked on, utterly baffled, Lady Penelope Campion—daughter of an earl—knelt on the ground and shouted into the small, round iron plate embedded in the pavement. The coal hole.

“Bixby? Bixby, is that you?”

From below, a dog whined in response.

She cupped her hands around her eyes and peered through the hole in the iron plate. “Don’t worry, darling. Be brave and hold tightly. I’m coming for you straightaway.”

Lady Penelope picked herself up from the pavement, hiked her skirts with both hands, and disappeared into her house.

After a moment’s internal debate, Gabe followed. The scene had piqued his curiosity, to say the least. Not to mention, his alternative seemed to be milling about the square tending the goat.

The hell he would.

“Come along, you,” he grumbled.

He pulled the goat up the stairs and through the door Lady Penelope had just bashed open.

As he entered, the infernal parrot squawked at him from an adjacent room. “Yes! Yes! Yes!”

Gabe closed the front door behind him and loosed the goat to make a meal of something unfortunate. Hopefully the bird.

“I’m coming, Bixby!” Lady Penelope called in the distance.

Gabe followed the sound down the corridor and then down a flight of stairs. He emerged into the kitchen. There were no servants to be seen, and a kettle looked to be boiling dry on the hob. A jumble of felines curled by the fireplace.

“I’m here, Bixby! Just hold on a little longer.”

A heavy door at one end of the kitchen stood ajar. Gabe crossed to it and nudged it open further.

Nothing but darkness.

A darkness that scurried.

After blinking a few times, he could discern that this was the coal store, and it sat directly beneath the iron plate she’d been shouting through a few moments ago. A small mountain of coal rose at a steep angle, leading from the ground to the coal chute at the top.

And there—somewhere in the darkness at the top of the heap—was Bixby, presumably. The dog emitted a feeble whine.

“Nearly there.” Lady Penelope attempted to scale the mountain, scrambling up the heap on hands and knees, pushing aside loose chunks of coal as she went.

Gabe shook his arms free of his coat and flung it aside. “What the devil has he done?”

“He’s stuck. It’s happened before. He finds a rat, and then he chases it into the store and up to the chute, and then his cart gets stuck on the coal hole hook, and—”

Yes, the cart. So this was the rolling dog.

“His back legs are lamed, and—” She scrambled higher, dislodging yet more coal. “There’s no time to explain. I have to unhook him, or he could slip and hang himself.”

Gabe yanked open his cuffs and pushed his sleeves to his elbows. “I’ll do it.”

“I’m almost—” She lost her footing and slid back to the ground, losing all her progress.

He reached for a shovel propped against the wall. “Stand aside.”

At last, she relented, backing away from the mountain of coal. Gabe climbed as far as the ceiling would allow and dug into the coal, lifting a shovelful of sooty lumps from the top and heaving them to the cellar floor.

Once he found a rhythm, he made quick work of it, jabbing the spade into the coal heap again and again, employing not only the force of his arms, but his back and legs, as well. His muscles retained the memory of what he’d tried to forget. Shoveling coal was nothing he hadn’t done before. Just something he’d sworn to never do again.

While Gabe worked, she called out encouragement from below. Not to him, of course. To the dog.

“Just a bit longer, Bixby!”

The dog’s whines grew mournful.

Gabe could nearly reach him now. He tossed the shovel aside and cleared more coal from beneath the chute. When he’d created enough space, he flattened himself on his belly and wriggled over the coal, using his elbows to drag himself forward until he’d reached the spot beneath the chute.

There he was, the little mongrel. Scarcely bigger than a rat himself. He was caught on the iron hook of the coal hole plate, hung up by a bit of leather strap and struggling against the dead weight of his stumpy hind legs and cart.

“Easy, there. Easy.” Gabe stretched his hand up the chute, twisting for the best angle. Couldn’t quite reach. Even if he could, he had no idea what he was reaching for. How did this cart fit together? Was there a buckle or button he’d need to undo in order to free the dog? If so, it was hopeless. He didn’t have enough light or space to complete any maneuver requiring dexterity.

“Very well, dog. You’ll have to do your part.” Gabe turned onto his side and reached up into the chute again, this time fumbling blind. When his fingertips brushed against fur, he lifted the dog’s weight in his palm and pushed upward, straining his shoulder nearly out of its socket, hoping he’d give Bixby enough slack to wriggle free.

“Come on, you little bastard,” he said through gritted teeth. “I’ve destroyed a full suit of clothing on your account, and I’m not handing your mistress a dead dog at the end of it.”

Thank God. It worked.

Gabe knew the moment Bixby was free, because the dog slid down the chute and landed on his face. With a scrabble of sharp little claws, he fled to his mistress. By the time Gabe disengaged the abandoned cart from the hook and made his way down, he found her seated on the kitchen floor, cooing over the soot-covered dog in her arms.

“Bixby.” The pup licked at her neck and face. “You are a naughty, naughty, naughty boy, and I love you so very much.”

Gabe cleared his throat. “Cart’s broken.”

“My friend Nicola will mend it.”

He set the mangled contraption to the side and shut the door to the coal store.

The moment he turned around, Lady Penelope flung herself at him and wrapped her arms around his shoulders. “Thank you.”

Gabe winced, pulling free of her embrace.

“You’ve hurt your shoulder.”

“It’s nothing.”

“It’s not out of joint, I hope?” She prodded his shoulder, undeterred by his grimace. “When we were children, my brother Timothy dislocated his shoulder when he fell out of a tree. Even after it healed, he could pop it in and out of joint whenever he pleased. He used to do it just to make me scream.”

“It’s not out of joint. Let it alone.”

Ignoring his protests, she pushed him toward a kitchen stool and made him sit. After unknotting his cravat with bossy motions, she circled to stand behind him and slid her hand inside the collar of his shirt.

Holy God.

“You’ve a cramp in your muscle.” She stroked her fingertips along his shoulder until she found the source of his pain. He sucked a breath through his teeth. “Oh, dear. That does hurt, doesn’t it?”

Yes. Yes, it bloody well hurt. He flinched from her touch.

She shushed him. “Be still. It won’t release until you’ve calmed.”

“Your Ladyship, you are anything but calming.”

“You’re not particularly cuddly yourself,” she said. “Luckily, I have some experience soothing prickly beasts.” She pressed her fingers against the knot of muscle, kneading gently. “That’s it,” she whispered. “Just breathe.”

Her fingers weaved through his hair, stroking it back from his brow. He was painfully aware of his soot-smeared, perspiring state. It made him feel like a starving boy again, dressed in rags and covered in dirt, salivating over food on the hob and discarded crusts on the gin house tables. He’d worked so hard, come so far to leave that childhood behind.

Resentment rose in his chest, pumping his heart at a furious pace. Red anger clouded his vision and his pulse filled his ears.

Gabe shrugged off her hands and pushed to his feet. He needed to leave before he vented his emotions in her direction. She might be part of this elite, privileged world he despised, but she hadn’t chosen it. No more than he’d chosen to be born in the gutter.

She circled back, standing before him. “There now. Better?”

He gave a reluctant nod.

“Can you move your arm in all directions?”

He rolled his shoulder to prove it. “Yes.”

“What about your grip?”

“My grip is strong.”

“Perhaps I should wrap the arm in a sling.”

“I do not need a sling.”

“Wait here. I’ll dash upstairs to fetch some linen and—”

“For the love of God, woman. My shoulder is fine.” He took her by the waist and lifted her straight off the floor, until they were eye to eye. “There. Believe me now?”

She nodded, wide-eyed.

“Good.”

In his hands, she was delicate, breakable. Her hair was a golden treasure he should never, ever touch. And oh, how he hungered for those soft, pink lips.

The familiar voice echoed in his ears.

Don’t touch, boy. She’s not for the likes of you.

Put. Her. Down.

But before Gabe could lower those beribboned pink slippers to the floor, she captured his sooty, sweaty face in her hands—

And kissed him on the lips.

Chapter Six

The kiss lasted a triumphant, beautiful instant.

Then he dropped her to the floor.

Penny, you fool.

It was only a distance of a few inches, but the impact shivered up her legs and made her knees weak. She had to cling to him for balance, which naturally made it all the more awkward.

“I’m sorry,” she said, releasing him. “That was an accident.”

His eyebrow quirked.

“I mean, it wasn’t an accident. People accidentally bump heads, don’t they. Or knees. No one bumps lips on accident. I did it purposely.” She could hear herself blathering, but she couldn’t seem to stop. “I was grateful for your help with Bixby, and more than a little overwhelmed by that display of brute strength. All that flexing.”

He stared hard at her mouth, likely in disbelief at the nonsensical words streaming out of it.

She bit her lip. “Would you believe me if I said I was dizzy from the altitude?”

“No.”

“Very well, I . . .” She squeezed her eyes shut. “I wanted to kiss you. I can’t explain why. I have no excuses. At any rate, don’t worry. It was clearly a mistake, and I promise it won’t happen agai—”

Again.

He kissed her again.

Or rather, he kissed her for the first time—and he was so much better at it than she.

This kiss could not be mistaken for an accidental collision of mouths. Oh, no. He kissed with purpose. His lips had ideas. His tongue had plans.

She closed her eyes and melted against him, flattening her hands on his muscled arms. He brushed his lips to hers in a series of chaste, yet masterful kisses. He swept a hand up her spine and into her hair, where he twisted and gathered the tangled locks in his fist. Then he tugged sharply, tipping her face to his and sending electric sensation over her every nerve.

When her mouth fell open in a gasp, he reclaimed her lips, sweeping his tongue between them. Her first instinct was to shy away, but Penny fought against it. She reached higher, lacing her arms about his neck and holding tight.

His tongue stroked hers, slow and insistent. He tasted of soot and salt and . . . and of apples, strangely. Tart, smoky, just a hint of sweet.

A lush, decadent pleasure unwound within her, snaking through her veins—as though it had lain coiled in anticipation for years. Waiting on this moment.

Waiting on this man.

And then, in a voice rough with yearning, he whispered a single word against her lips. “Inventory.”

Penny’s eyes snapped open. “What?”

“Send me an inventory,” he said, releasing her from his embrace. “A list of the animals. I’ll start on finding them homes.”

He gathered his discarded coat and folded it over his arm. After a look at his soot-smeared cravat, he tossed it into the fire.

Suddenly, he was all business. Penny was all confusion.

When he left the kitchen and mounted the stairs, she followed him, because what else could she do?

“While I’m working on the animals,” he went on, “confer with your seamstress friend. You can’t attend balls and such until you have a gown to wear. And if you want to make the society column, it had better be a stunning one.”

“If anyone can create something stunning, it’s Emma.”

“Good.” He opened the front door. “We’re all sorted, then.”

“Are we?”

“I’ll await your list.” With a nod, he exited the house and shut the door behind him.

How irritating. Penny was still reeling and breathless from their kiss, and he . . . wasn’t, apparently. Surely a considerate man would at least pretend to be a bit unmoored.

Then the door reopened, and he entered again. “Your Ladyship, I—”

After a lengthy pause, she prompted him. “You . . . ?”

He frowned at the floor. “We.”

We.

He said this as though it were a complete sentence, but even after several moments of contemplation, Penny could not make sense of it.

With an annoyed shake of his head, he wrenched open the door for the third time, stormed through it, and slammed it behind him with such decisive force that the portraits rattled on the wall.

Penny smiled to herself.

With that, she could be satisfied.

Tap. Tap. Tap.

The next day, Gabe found himself sitting in his office. In fact, he’d been sitting there for hours now. Not reviewing any of the many papers, contracts, or ledgers awaiting his attention, but merely staring into space and tapping a shilling against the desk.

Tap. Tap. Tap.

She’d meant to kiss him. She’d wanted to kiss him. She’d said as much, explicitly, and she’d seemed perfectly content to be kissed in return. More than content.

He hadn’t taken advantage of her.

He’d just been colossally stupid.

With a creaking groan, he allowed his head to slowly fall forward until his brow met the desk blotter. And then he stayed there, trying not to recall the sweet freshness of her kiss or the hot joy that had blazed through him when her breasts met his chest.

Colossally. Stupid.

“Mr. Duke, you’ll never guess what—”

Gabe lifted his head.

Hammond fidgeted in the doorway. “I’d something to show you, but perhaps this isn’t a good time.”

“No, no.” Gabe launched to his feet. “It’s a good time.”

It was, in fact, the best possible time. He’d never been so happy to be interrupted.

Hammond led him to the upstairs bath, where he gestured expansively toward the tub. “Behold, the latest in modern conveniences. Hot running water.”

“You’re certain this time?”

“The tradesman repaired the boiler yesterday. I tested it just this morning. Piping hot.”

As his architect turned the tap, Gabe crossed his arms and kept a safe distance. He’d let Hammond take the chances today.

Happily, the tap did not explode like a cannon packed with icy shrapnel.

Unhappily, what pooled in the bathtub was a trickle of rusty sludge.

“Deuce it.” Hammond closed the tap and kicked at the tiled floor. “I swear on everything holy, this was working an hour ago. Burns probably hexed it.”

“The housekeeper? Don’t start in on that nonsense again.”

“I tell you, she’s unnatural. I don’t know if she’s a ghost, a witch, a demon, or something worse. But that woman is of the Devil.”

“Ahem.”

Startled, both Gabe and Hammond wheeled around.

There stood Mrs. Burns. Even Gabe had to admit, these sudden appearances were growing unsettling.

Hammond raised his fingers in the shape of a cross. “I rebuke thee.”

“Good afternoon, Mrs. Burns,” Gabe said. “We didn’t hear your footsteps.”

“I was always taught, Mr. Duke, that servants should draw as little attention to themselves as possible.”

She certainly had their attention now.

Wordlessly, Hammond lifted his arm, extended a single finger, and poked the housekeeper in the shoulder.

Mrs. Burns stared at him. “Yes, Mr. Hammond?”

“Solid corporeal form,” he muttered. “Interesting.”

Gabe gave him an elbow to the ribs, sending the architect’s “corporeal form” stumbling against the sludge-filled tub. “Is there something we can do for you, Mrs. Burns?”

“I only came to inform you that you have a letter, sir. It’s just arrived.”

“The post came this morning.”

“This letter didn’t come through the post, Mr. Duke. It’s from Lady Penelope Campion.”

* * *

Dear Mr. Duke,

As requested, here is an inventory of the animals in my care:

 Bixby, a two-legged terrier.

 Marigold, a nanny goat of unimpeachable character, who is definitely not breeding.

 Angus, a three-year-old Highland steer.

 Regan, Goneril, and Cordelia—laying hens.

 Delilah, a parrot.

 Hubert, an otter.

 Freya, a hedgehog.

 Thirteen kittens of varying colors and dispositions.

Gabe leafed through the report in disbelief. It went on for pages. She’d given not only the names, breeds, and ages of every misbegotten creature, but she’d appended a chart of temperaments, sleeping schedules, preferred bedding, and a list of dietary requirements that would beggar a moderately successful tradesman. Along with the expected hay, alfalfa, corn, and seed, the animals required several pounds of mince weekly, daily pints of fresh cream, and an ungodly number of sardines.

The steer and the goat, she insisted, must go to the same loving home. Apparently they were tightly bonded, whatever that meant, and refused to eat if parted.

The laying hens did not actually lay with any regularity. Their previous owners had grown frustrated with this paltry production, and thus they had come into Her Ladyship’s care.

And the lucky bastard who accepted a ten-year-old hedgehog? Well, he must not only provide a steady supply of mealworms, but remain ever mindful of certain “traumatic experiences in her youth.”

He had to read that bit three times to believe it.

Traumatic experiences in her youth.

Unbelievable.

The world teemed with children who received less food and attention than she gave the least of these creatures. Gabe knew it well. He’d been one of them. At the workhouse, he’d subsisted on broth, bread, and a few morsels of cheese every week—when his diet hadn’t been restricted as a punishment for misbehavior, which it usually was.

He didn’t have time for this, and he didn’t trust himself to linger over the task, either. That would mean calling on Lady Penelope at least as many times as there were creatures on this list. Considering they had less than a month to resettle the animals, that would mean seeing her virtually every day. Too many opportunities for stupidity.

Loving homes, his eye. He was tempted to escort all the creatures on a loving journey to the nearest butcher. What Her Ladyship didn’t know wouldn’t hurt her.

Then again, if Her Ladyship happened to discover it later, it would likely come back to hurt him. And even Gabe wasn’t quite so ruthless as to send an innocent hedgehog to slaughter.

Not the butcher’s, then. But there had to be somewhere he could take them all in one go. He didn’t suppose a menagerie would be interested in an ancient hedgehog or a trio of nonlaying laying hens. Releasing a compromised goat and its best friend, Angus the Highland steer, into the middle of Hyde Park . . . ? That seemed unlikely to go unnoticed.

A city the size of London offered few, if any, possibilities.

What he needed was a farm.

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