Page 3
Chapter One
The Castle, Christmas 1818
It was one of those crisp, clear winter mornings with the sun glinting off the frosted ground and the icicles hanging from the trees. There had been a light dusting of snow overnight, but not enough to make riding dangerous, and Jerome gave his stallion, Herod, his head across the rising meadow, aiming for the hedgerow on the ridge that would take them into the next field. Both his and his mount’s breath puffed white in the chill air as the horse gathered itself for the jump and flew over the fence, landing neatly on the other side.
And to Jerome’s horror, missing the figure kneeling in the snow on the other side by a hair’s breadth.
The bonneted head looked up as the horse flew almost directly over her head and Jerome pulled Herod around to the right away from her.
“Ava! What the bloody hell—”
“Ravenshaw!” she said with relief in her voice. “Thank goodness. Please, you have to help—” Her voice was cut off by the screams of a creature in pain.
She moved, and he could see then the frantic movement of the animal caught in a trap. A badger. The poor thing was distressed, growling and shrieking, and trying to free itself. The trapped leg was bloodied.
He slid from the saddle, letting Herod’s reins fall slack, and dropped to his knees beside her. “Move back out of the way,” he said.
Ava moved back, uttering a small whimper at the continued shrieks and growls of the distressed beast.
“Damned gin traps!” he muttered, grasping the spring mechanism and depressing it, thus releasing the jaws of the trap. The badger, realizing it was free, sprang away from the trap and limped rapidly into the underbrush with a waddling gate.
Ava watched it go. “Will it survive with that wound, do you think?”
“I don’t know. Possibly,” he said, carefully disarming the trap. Once he was sure it was safe, he sat back and looked at her. Her bonnet had fallen back onto her shoulders and she had a smear of dirt on her face. He smiled and shook his head, a gentle warmth settling in his chest. This was the old Ava, the little girl he’d helped with countless rescues such as this one. If there was an injured animal anywhere in her vicinity, trust Ava to find it. All the same, he asked, “How the hell did you stumble across this one?”
“Oh,” she righted her bonnet and retied the strings. “I jumped the fence just as you did and Diana shied. That’s when I saw it.”
He noticed her dappled mare Diana, cropping the grass a little way off beneath a tree. Herod had ambled in her direction. Rising, he looked down at his ruined breeches and helped her rise. She had stain marks on her gown, too. Fortunately Leyton, his excellent valet, was not of a highly strung nature. He would take this little incident in his stride.
Ava smiled up at him with her usual sunny grin, “Thank you, Galahad; always coming to my rescue.”
“Hasn’t happened for a while. I thought you had outgrown these escapades?”
“I will never outgrow rescuing animals,” she said firmly. “Will you ride with me? It’s a superb morning.”
“It is,” he agreed, leading her towards their mounts. He was about to bend to give her a lift into the saddle when she turned and put her hands on his shoulders and rising on tip toe, planted a soft kiss on his lips.
“Thank you,” she said softly. The gesture was fleeting, over almost before it began, but it ignited a flame of heat in his body that made his pulse race and his mind—which he had been trying to keep from noticing things like the delicious curve of her neck, her sparkling blue eyes, and the generous curve of her breast in the bodice of her blue velvet riding dress—lost the battle with propriety altogether.
The vivid flash of her golden hair spread out on a pillow beneath him imprinted itself into his system and gave him such a jolt, he actually stepped back. Conscious of the hardened heat in his groin, he looked away a moment to gather his composure, before saying with a lightness he didn’t feel, “You’re welcome.” He took a breath and went on with a faintly scolding tone, “You shouldn’t kiss me Ava, I know it’s only a gesture of affection between friends, but you’re not a girl anymore. If someone saw us, you would be ruined.”
She bit her lip and lowered her eyes a moment as if in contrition or disappointment, hard to tell which. Then she raised them again with that wicked sparkle of mischief in them and said, “Then you’d have to marry me! Wouldn’t that be a disaster.”
His heart, which was racing faster than it should, skipped at those words. To cover his discomposure, he bent, offering his hand for her foot which she placed in it. He tossed her into the saddle with a light quip. “Yes it would. For you! Imagine being tied to an old man like me with my rotten reputation.”
She gasped, grabbing the pommel. “You’re not old, Jerome!”
He smiled, but his cheeks ached, along with something in his chest. “I am compared to you, sweetheart. Save your kisses for a man who deserves them.”
He turned away to mount Herod and said, “Race you to the next fence!” And he took off across the field. He heard the thunder of hooves behind him as Ava spurred her mare in pursuit.
*
London, March 1819
Lady Ava Layne, performing a graceful twirl under the arm of her dance partner, knew the moment Ravenshaw entered the ballroom with the Ashfords and the Earl of Pendrell. Her gaze snagged on his splendid figure, immaculate in dark blue, with pristine white linen and a perfectly tied cravat. His dark hair was cut in the rather severe Brutus style made famous some years ago by Beau Brummel and which Jerome’s startling good looks carried with ease.
Ashford, his somewhat disheveled appearance notwithstanding, was one of her favorite people, and the fact that he was now married to her dear former governess, Annis Pringle, made it easy to request that her dance partner take her to them at the end of the set. Dismissing the poor man with a wave of her fan, she snagged Annis’s hand and squeezed it while pressing a kiss to her cheek.
