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The moment seemed to last forever, and yet it was over much too soon.
Then he’d made her a dashing bow, bid her adieu, and strolled away with Messier’s Catalogue of Star Clusters and Nebulae, leaving Alexandra holding an insipid book of stories for “obedient girls.”
End of scene.
Or at least, it should have been the end.
Alex resolved to scrub the encounter from her mental slate, but Penny—the incurable romantic among them—wouldn’t allow it. Since he hadn’t given his name, Penny anointed him with increasingly ridiculous titles. First he was merely the Bookshop Rake, but as the weeks wore on, he made a rapid ascent up the rungs of the peerage. Sir Read. Lord Literature. The Duke of Hatchard’s.
Stop, Alex told her again and again. That was ages ago, and I haven’t thought of him since. He certainly hasn’t thought of me. It was nothing.
Except that it wasn’t quite nothing. Some idiotic corner of her memory embellished the encounter with rainbows and sparkles until it resembled . . . something. Something too mortifying to ever admit aloud, even to Penny, Emma, and Nicola. In truth, Alex avoided admitting it to herself.
From that day forward, whenever she visited Hatchard’s—or the Temple of Muses, or even the Minerva Library—she looked for him. Imagining that they might collide once again, and he would confess, over afternoon tea that lingered into dinner, that he’d been haunting the bookshops, too—hoping to meet with her. Because, naturally, in those two minutes of painful one-sided conversation, he’d divined that an incoherent, clumsy, working-class girl small enough to fit into the average kitchen cupboard was everything he’d always yearned to find.
You’re exactly what I’ve been searching for.
Now that I’ve found you, I’ll never let you go.
Alexandra, I need you.
Common sense, feh.
Alex worked for her living, setting clocks in the homes of wealthy customers, and she didn’t have time for dreams. She set goals, and she worked to achieve them. Feet on the ground, shoulders squared, and head on straight.
She would not—absolutely not—be carried away with romantic fantasies.
Sadly, her imagination ignored this memorandum. In her daydreams, the afternoon tea led to walks in the park, deep conversations, kisses under the stars, and even—Alexandra’s dignity wilted just thinking of it—a wedding.
Truly. A wedding.
Do you take this man, Anonymous Bookshop Rake with Horrid Taste in Children’s Literature, to be your wedded husband?
Absurd.
After months of attempting to quash this madness, Alex gave up. At least the fantasies—foolish as they might be—were hers to keep secret. No one else need ever know. In all likelihood, she would never meet with the Bookshop Rake again.
Until, of course, the morning that she did.
Chapter One (#u4fc783d2-94ad-5d57-ba14-150cc7d31447)
The morning began in the same way as most of Chase’s mornings lately. With a tragic demise.
“She’s dead.”
He turned onto his side. As he blinked, Rosamund’s face came into focus. “What was it this time?”
“Typhus.”
“Charming.”
Using the sofa’s upholstered arm for leverage, he pushed to a sitting position. As he did so, his brain sloshed with regret. He rubbed his temples, ruing his behavior the night before. And his licentiousness in the very early morning. While he was at it, he decided he might as well regret his entire misspent youth, too. Clear a bit of his afternoon schedule.
“It can wait until later.” Once his head ceased ringing and he’d washed off the cloying scent of French perfume.
“It must be now, Daisy says, or else the contagion could spread. She’s preparing the body.”
Chase groaned. He decided it wasn’t worth arguing. Might as well have it done with.
As they began climbing the four flights of stairs to the nursery, he interrogated his ten-year-old ward. “Can’t you do something about this?”
“Can’t you?”
“She’s your little sister.”
“You’re her guardian.”
He grimaced, rubbing his throbbing temple. “Discipline isn’t one of my particular talents.”
“Obedience isn’t one of ours,” Rosamund replied.
“I’ve noticed. Don’t think I didn’t see you pocket that shilling from the side table.” They reached the top of the stairs and turned down the corridor. “Listen, this has to stop. Quality boarding schools don’t offer enrollment to petty thieves or serial murderesses.”
“It wasn’t murder. It was typhus.”
“Oh, to be sure it was.”
“And we don’t want to go to boarding school.”
“Rosamund, it’s time you learned a harsh lesson.” He opened the nursery door. “We don’t always get what we want in life.”
Didn’t Chase know it. He didn’t want to be guardian to a pair of orphaned girls. He didn’t want to be next in line for the Belvoir dukedom. And he most assuredly did not want to be attending his fourth funeral in as many days. Yet here he was.
Daisy turned to them. A veil of dark netting covered her straw-colored curls. “Please show respect for the dead.”
She waved Chase forward. He dutifully crossed to her side, bending down so that she could pin a black armband around his shirtsleeve.
“I’m sorry for your loss,” he said. So very sorry. You don’t know how sorry.
He took his place at the head of the bed, looking down at the deceased. She was ghostly pale and swaddled in a white shroud. Buttons covered her eyes. Thank God. It was damned unnerving when the eyes looked up at him with that glassy, empty stare.
Daisy reached for his hand and bowed her head. After leading them in a recitation of the Lord’s Prayer, she poked Chase in the ribs. “Mr. Reynaud, kindly say a few words.”
Chase looked to the heavens. God help him.
“Almighty Father,” he began in a dispirited tone, “we commit to your keeping the soul of Millicent. Ashes to ashes. Sawdust to sawdust. She was a doll of few words and yet fewer autonomous movements, yet she will be remembered for the ever-present—some might say permanently painted—smile on her face. By the grace of our Redeemer, we know she will be resurrected, perhaps as soon as luncheon.” He added under his breath, “Unfortunately.”
“Amen,” Daisy intoned. With solemnity, she lowered the doll into the wooden toy chest, then closed the lid.
Rosamund broke the oppressive silence. “Let’s go down to the kitchen, Daisy. We’ll have buttered rolls and jam for our breakfast.”
“You’ll breakfast here,” he corrected. “In the nursery. Your governess will—”
“Our governess?” Daisy gave him a sweet, innocent look. “But we don’t have a governess at the moment.”
He groaned. “Don’t tell me the new one quit. I only hired her yesterday.”
Rosamund said proudly, “We were rid of her in seventeen and a quarter hours. A new record.”
Unbelievable.
Chase strode to the world map on the wall and plucked a tack from the border. “There.” He stabbed an unsuspecting country at random, then pointed at it with authority. “I am sending you to boarding school there. Enjoy”—he squinted at the map—“Malta.”
Fuming, Chase quit the room and made the journey back down the four flights of stairs, and then down a half flight more and through the kitchen—all the way to his private retreat. Upon entering, he shut and locked the door before exhaling a lungful of annoyance.
For a gentleman of leisure, he was damned exhausted. He needed a bath, a shave, a change of clothing, and a headache powder. Barrow would arrive in an hour with sheaves of papers to look over and bank drafts to sign. The club had a bacchanalian revel this evening. And now he must hire yet another governess.
Before he could face any of it, he needed a drink.
As he made his way to the bar, he navigated a card table draped with a dustcloth and a stack of paintings propped against the wall, waiting to be hung. The apartment was a work in progress. He had a well-furnished bedchamber upstairs, of course, but for now he needed a space as far away from the nursery as architecturally possible. The arrangement was for the girls’ benefit as much as his own. He would rather not know what mischief his wards wrought at the top of the house, and they must never learn of the devilry he practiced at the bottom of it.
He uncorked a bottle of wine and filled a large glass. A bit early in the day for burgundy, but what of it. He was, after all, in mourning. Might as well lift a glass to Millicent’s memory.
He’d downed half the glass in one swallow when he heard a light knock at the door. Not the door to and from the kitchen, but the door that opened onto the side street.
Chase cursed into his burgundy. That would be Colette, he supposed. They’d had their fun the other night, but apparently neither his well-established reputation nor the parting bouquet he’d sent had communicated the message. He would be forced to have “the talk” with her in person.
It’s not you, darling. It’s me. I’m an irredeemable, broken man. You deserve better.
All of it was true, as hackneyed as it sounded. When it came to relationships, sensual or otherwise, Chase had one rule.
No attachments.
Words to live by, words to make love by. Words to send wards to boarding school by. When he made promises, he only caused pain.
“Come in,” he called, not bothering to turn around. “It’s unlocked.”
A cool draft swept across his neck as the door opened, then shut again. Like the whisper of fingertips.
He took another glass and filled it. “Back for more, are you? Insatiable minx. I knew it was no accident you left your stocking here the other”—he turned, holding the wineglasses in his hands and fixing a roguish half smile on his face—“night.”
Interesting. The woman who’d entered was not Colette.
She was very much not Colette.
A small, dark-haired young woman stood before him. She clutched a weathered brown satchel in her hands, and her eyes held abject horror. He could actually watch the blood draining from her face and settling at the base of her throat as a hot, fierce blush.
“Good morning,” he said amiably.
In reply, she made an audible swallow.
“Here.” Chase extended his left hand, offering her a glass of wine. “Have this. You look as though you could use it.”
Him.
It was him. She would know him anywhere. Those features were etched in her memory. He was indelibly handsome. Roguish green eyes, mussed dark hair, and that lopsided smile so seductive, it could steal a woman’s virtue from across a crowded room.
Alexandra found herself standing toe-to-toe (she was too small-statured to manage face-to-face) with the Bookshop Rake, in the flesh.
So. Much. Flesh.
Sleeves rolled to the elbow, open shirt, no cravat . . . Alexandra dropped her gaze to keep from staring. Good Lord. Bare feet.
“I . . . I . . . Forgive me, I thought this was the servants’ entrance. I’ll leave straightaway.” She ducked her head to hide her face, praying he wouldn’t recognize her. If she left now, and quickly, this encounter might be survivable.
“You weren’t mistaken. It was the servants’ entrance until a few weeks ago. I’m adapting the space for my own purposes. A sort of gentleman’s retreat.”
She swept her gaze about the room. His “purposes” were easy enough to discern. Well-stocked bar. Plush chaise longue. Plum-colored velvet drapes. A rug fashioned from the hide of some shaggy beast. On the wall, a rack of antlers.
And there it was, the aforementioned forgotten stocking. Draped over one of the stag’s forked prongs like a white banner of surrender.
She’d wandered into some sort of pleasure dungeon.
Embarrassment seared her from the inside out. A sheen of sweat broke out on her brow. “I’m clearly intruding. I’ll return another time.” She tightened her grip on her satchel and attempted to sidle around him.
But he wouldn’t be sidled so easily. He was too quick, too tall. Too muscled and male. He slid sideways, blocking her path to the door. “Believe me, I am delighted to see you.”
I’d be delighted if you didn’t see me at all.
Alex shielded her face with one hand and slanted her gaze to a painting propped against the wall. It featured a woman bare to her skin, save for a strategically positioned fan. “I left a card last week. I meant to speak with your housekeeper about offering my services.”
“Yes, of course.”
“Then perhaps you could direct me to her.”
“I conduct all the interviews myself. Saves time, I find.”
She looked up in surprise. It was beyond unusual for the gentleman of the house to interview his own employees—let alone an employee whose sole duty would be to adjust the clocks to Greenwich time once a week.
“Forgive me. I’ve run ahead of myself.” He inclined his head in a perfunctory bow. “Chase Reynaud.”
Chase Reynaud.
Mr. Charles Reynaud.
Mrs. Alexandra Reynaud.
For the love of God. Stop.
