Review
"Leslie LaFoy delivers wonderful, witty characters and breathless romance."
--Celeste Bradley, USA Today bestselling author
--Celeste Bradley, USA Today bestselling author
"Leslie LaFoy is intelligent, sexy, fun."
--Kasey Michaels, New York Times bestselling author
--Kasey Michaels, New York Times bestselling author
"The lures of Lafoy's writing are not just great characters, fantastic storytelling, and heightened sexual tension, but also the subtle ways she plays on your emotions so that you are completely invested in the book. No reader…can ignore the deep and intense emotions that emanate from the pages of this masterful romance."
--Romantic Times (4-1/2 stars, Top Pick)
"Leslie LaFoy delivers wonderful, witty characters, and breathless romance."
--Celeste Bradley, author of The Charmer
--Romantic Times (4-1/2 stars, Top Pick)
"Leslie LaFoy delivers wonderful, witty characters, and breathless romance."
--Celeste Bradley, author of The Charmer
Product Description
Tristan Townsend has come home to London to assume his duties as the Marquis of Lockwood after all the men in his family have died. Desperate to rid himself of the "Lockwood curse" and restore his family's honor, marriage is the furthest thing from Tristan's mind…until he lays eyes on an enchanting stranger and vows to make her his…
Lady Simone Turnbridge--beautiful, bold, and with a scandalous past--is not eager to be some wealthy man's bride. Some men want her hand in marriage; others merely want her in their beds. She mocks them all with a twinkle in her eye, knowing not one of them can tame her…
Tristan will do anything to have Simone in his bed and his ring on her finger. Simone, who has sworn to let no man control her, is held in thrall by her fascination with this forbidden Lockwood. But it's too late to walk away now--when the promise of passion is so wanton, wicked, and thoroughly wonderful….
From the Back Cover
A WAYWARD ROGUE
Tristan Townsend has come home to London to assume his duties as the Marquis of Lockwood after all the men in his family have died. Desperate to rid himself of the "Lockwood curse" and restore his family's honor, marriage is the furthest thing from Tristan's mind…until he lays eyes on an enchanting stranger and vows to make her his…
A willful womanLady Simone Turnbridge--beautiful, bold, and with a scandalous past--is not eager to be some wealthy man's bride. Some men want her hand in marriage; others merely want her in their beds. She mocks them all with a twinkle in her eye, knowing not one of them can tame her…
A WILD DESIRe
A willful womanLady Simone Turnbridge--beautiful, bold, and with a scandalous past--is not eager to be some wealthy man's bride. Some men want her hand in marriage; others merely want her in their beds. She mocks them all with a twinkle in her eye, knowing not one of them can tame her…
A WILD DESIRe
Tristan will do anything to have Simone in his bed and his ring on her finger. Simone, who has sworn to let no man control her, is held in thrall by her fascination with this forbidden Lockwood. But it's too late to walk away now--when the promise of passion is so wanton, wicked, and thoroughly wonderful….
"LESLIE LAFOY IS INTELLIGENT, SEXY, FUN."
--Kasey Michaels, New York Times bestselling author
"LESLIE LAFOY IS INTELLIGENT, SEXY, FUN."
--Kasey Michaels, New York Times bestselling author
About the Author
LESLIE LaFOY grew up loving to read and living to write. (This was a significant factor in her becoming the unofficial poster child of over-education. In the Liberal Arts no less.) After teaching high school history for many years, she focused her creative energies on her life-long dream of writing full time. When not made completely oblivious to reality by her current work in progress, she dabbles in every handicraft known to womankind and, twice a week and ever other weekend, dons her cape to be Hockey and Lacrosse Mom. You can visit her at www.leslielafoy.com
Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.
Chapter One
London, England
March 1886
It was a simple choice: either smoke a cheroot or kill someone. Simone drew the flame into the end of the tightly twisted length of tobacco, puffed in utter relief, and shook out the match. Not, she silently mused, shoving the burnt match into the dirt and leaning back against the garden wall, that there weren't a few people whose death would make the world a better place. And not that anyone would think it appropriate to see it in that light or to thank her for the improvement.
She considered the open doors of the mansion through a moonlit haze of sweet smoke and shook her head. Another night, another ball. The third night of her official first Season and she was already bored out of her mind. She arched a brow and watched Lord Puff and Fluff come out onto the balcony and make a beeline for the shadows. Where, as it turned out, the wife of Lord Tinkle happened to be taking a respite from the dizzying gaiety of the ball--and the pathologically possessive eye of her husband.
Ah, the not-so-secret lives of the peerage. Simone blew out a stream of smoke and smiled wryly. If she got caught smoking in the garden, the news would be all over London within the hour. No one would be surprised, of course. But they would be beyond delighted to have what they'd consider irrefutable proof of her low breeding. As though proof of any sort was required before they expressed their opinions.
Simone sighed and watched Lord Puff and Fluff bend Lady Tinkle backward over the balustrade while simultaneously trying to liberate her breasts and choke her to death with his tongue. If they got caught at it, there would be some clearing of throats, some hasty rearranging of clothing, and a thoroughly proper gentlemen's agreement that nothing would ever be said of the awkward moment.
Unless of course it was Lord Tinkle who caught them. That would be ugly. He'd rage over his wife's fickle and faithless nature, beat Puff and Fluff to a bloody pulp, and then drag Lady Tinkle home by her hair to lock her up for the next aeon or two. She'd contemplate throwing herself out an upper-story window and it would never occur to Lord Tinkle that there might be just a bit of hypocrisy in his continuing weekly visits to Whitechapel and the madam with the Indian rubber sheets.
And no one in Society would ever utter so much as a word about any of it in public. "Why would they?" Simone whispered on a sigh as she jabbed the end of the cheroot into the dirt beside the used match. "When they have me to talk about?"
Fishing a peppermint from her beaded reticule, she stepped from behind the cover of a flowering shrub of some sort and made her way along the path leading back to the mansion. The tortures one accepted for the sake of appearances and in the name of family. . . . Cruelly uncomfortable clothes, stupid shoes, and inane conversation were bad enough, but having to deal with all that and stifling hot and perfume-cloyed ballrooms . . . She really deserved a medal of some sort.
Simone gathered her skirts and climbed the steps to the balcony, ignored the spectacle in the shadowed corner, and stopped two feet inside the brightly lit ballroom. Snapping open her fan, she did what she could to produce a cooling breeze while considering the entirely too bejeweled and oh so publicly circumspect crowd. The actual London Season was just a few months long, she reminded herself. She could endure it.
The question, really, was whether Society could endure her. She smiled and fluttered the fan faster, wondering what unspoken message she was sending with it this time and what ninny had come up with the entire convoluted system of signs. God forbid that people actually say what they thought or--horror of horrors!--clearly and honestly articulate what they wanted. No, if people did that, the world would come to some sudden, hideously crashing end.
Simone's smile widened. According to her older sister, the matrons were saying that Simone was far more interested in courting Armageddon than she was in letting any of the peerage's money-chasing bachelors catch her. It really was amazing how perceptive the old hens could be. And how utterly overwhelmed some of the chicks are, Simone added as she watched one of her fellow sufferers sneak a quick peek from behind a potted palm in the far corner. Poor Emmaline. Being pretty, petite, blond, blue-eyed, and the daughter of a marquis didn't seem to have done much for her confidence; she was considerably more mouse than girl.
Simone closed her fan and made her way along the edge of the crowd. Emmaline certainly wasn't what she considered a friend. No, not at all. They'd met only twice. The first time had been three days ago at St. James's Palace while they were both waiting--wearing ridiculous panniers and hideously tight corsets--for their formal presentation to the queen. Emmaline had nearly fainted from the strain. Bracing her had been an instinctive thing--which had led to an obligatory bit of conversation once the girl had recovered her breath and balance.
It was only because Emmaline hadn't been the least bit peerish in that first meeting that there'd been a second. At Lady Somebodyorother's ball the night before last. Neither Emmaline nor Simone had wanted to be there. And while they had vastly different reasons for their aversions, it was at least something they had in common. Which, Simone knew, was far more than could be said for her and anyone else at this evening's ordeal.
"Hello, Emmaline," she said, slipping behind the potted plant.
"Oh, Simone," the other gasped, throwing her arms around Simone's shoulders and giving her a hard hug, "I was so hoping you would be here."
"That makes you the only one," she replied, chuckling as she was released. She checked her arms to make sure that she hadn't been pierced by any of Emmaline's hundreds of pale pink sequins. "Are you hiding for a specific reason or is it more a precautionary measure?"
Emmaline sagged back against the wall and stared down at the floor. "I pled a headache last night and was allowed to stay home. Unfortunately, Mother wouldn't believe it could happen two nights in a row."
It wasn't an answer to the question, but Simone didn't press. Neither did she point out that a second evasion might have been possible if Emmaline had been creative enough to develop a different ailment. "My sister insisted that I had to be here, too," Simone supplied, watching the eddying crowd through a veil of palm fronds. "Why, I don't know. But then, I consider this entire coming-out process to be one of life's great mysteries. And torments."
"Has anyone asked you to dance?"
Simone grinned and stepped back to help Emmaline hold up the wall. "The trick is to keep moving, to look as though you have somewhere important to go, and that you'll knock them down if they get in your way."
"Oh, I couldn't possibly do that."
"Do what?"
"Knock them down," Emmaline clarified. "You could and would and they know it. It makes all the difference, you know."
Yes, she did. Just as she knew from their brief encounters that the girl didn't have the foggiest notion of how to hold her own in a crowd of strangers. How to go about angling a shoulder for proper impact would be completely beyond her. The things some people didn't teach their daughters. Someone really should take poor Emmaline under their--
"Would you like to learn how to do it?" Simone offered, buoyed by the prospect of a diversion that could well last for months. For the entire Season! "I'd be glad to teach you."
"I don't think I can--"
"Nonsense," Simone happily interrupted. "I'm living proof that anyone can learn to be and do anything."
Emmaline's smile was weak at best. "I appreciate the offer, Simone, but there is no hope of success and the effort would leave you no time for your own . . ." She glanced through the fronds and then made another pathetic attempt to smile. "Pursuits."
Dear God, the girl was her own worst enemy. Did she ever utter a sentence that didn't contain a version of "not"? "I like challenges. As for my pursuits . . ." Simone laughed softly and then leaned closer to confess, "I'm going through all of this just to make my sister and guardian happy. Well, that and I got the horse I wanted for being agreeable. I have absolutely no intention of ending the Season tied elbow, hip, and ankle to some man."
Emmaline stared at her wide-eyed for a long second. Eventually she blinked, swallowed, and said breathily, "Truly? I'm going to marry the first man who asks for me so I don't ever have to do this again."
That is desperate. "Well," Simone ventured, undeterred, "they have to know you exist before they can ask for you."
"I suppose you're right."
Simone ignored the plaintive sigh. "I'm always right, Emmaline," she assured her, coming off the wall. "Trust me."
Emmaline looked as though she were being asked to walk the plank, but she did take a deep breath, and that was close enough to consent for Simone. She extended her hands and held them there until Emmaline reluctantly put hers in them.
"Now lift your chin," Simone instructed once she had the girl planted squarely on her feet. Emmaline looked up at the ceiling. "Not that high. Unless you want a crick in your neck and people looking up your nose."
Emmaline brought her chin down to give her a horrified look.
"Remember how Victoria held hers during the presentation?" Simone suggested. She grinned as Emmaline mimicked it perfectly. "You've got it, my dear. Now square your shoulders."
Bless the girl, she really had no concept of a midpoint on anything. Considering her ample chest . . . "That's not square," Simone observed, trying desperately not to laugh. "That'...
London, England
March 1886
It was a simple choice: either smoke a cheroot or kill someone. Simone drew the flame into the end of the tightly twisted length of tobacco, puffed in utter relief, and shook out the match. Not, she silently mused, shoving the burnt match into the dirt and leaning back against the garden wall, that there weren't a few people whose death would make the world a better place. And not that anyone would think it appropriate to see it in that light or to thank her for the improvement.
She considered the open doors of the mansion through a moonlit haze of sweet smoke and shook her head. Another night, another ball. The third night of her official first Season and she was already bored out of her mind. She arched a brow and watched Lord Puff and Fluff come out onto the balcony and make a beeline for the shadows. Where, as it turned out, the wife of Lord Tinkle happened to be taking a respite from the dizzying gaiety of the ball--and the pathologically possessive eye of her husband.
Ah, the not-so-secret lives of the peerage. Simone blew out a stream of smoke and smiled wryly. If she got caught smoking in the garden, the news would be all over London within the hour. No one would be surprised, of course. But they would be beyond delighted to have what they'd consider irrefutable proof of her low breeding. As though proof of any sort was required before they expressed their opinions.
Simone sighed and watched Lord Puff and Fluff bend Lady Tinkle backward over the balustrade while simultaneously trying to liberate her breasts and choke her to death with his tongue. If they got caught at it, there would be some clearing of throats, some hasty rearranging of clothing, and a thoroughly proper gentlemen's agreement that nothing would ever be said of the awkward moment.
Unless of course it was Lord Tinkle who caught them. That would be ugly. He'd rage over his wife's fickle and faithless nature, beat Puff and Fluff to a bloody pulp, and then drag Lady Tinkle home by her hair to lock her up for the next aeon or two. She'd contemplate throwing herself out an upper-story window and it would never occur to Lord Tinkle that there might be just a bit of hypocrisy in his continuing weekly visits to Whitechapel and the madam with the Indian rubber sheets.
And no one in Society would ever utter so much as a word about any of it in public. "Why would they?" Simone whispered on a sigh as she jabbed the end of the cheroot into the dirt beside the used match. "When they have me to talk about?"
Fishing a peppermint from her beaded reticule, she stepped from behind the cover of a flowering shrub of some sort and made her way along the path leading back to the mansion. The tortures one accepted for the sake of appearances and in the name of family. . . . Cruelly uncomfortable clothes, stupid shoes, and inane conversation were bad enough, but having to deal with all that and stifling hot and perfume-cloyed ballrooms . . . She really deserved a medal of some sort.
Simone gathered her skirts and climbed the steps to the balcony, ignored the spectacle in the shadowed corner, and stopped two feet inside the brightly lit ballroom. Snapping open her fan, she did what she could to produce a cooling breeze while considering the entirely too bejeweled and oh so publicly circumspect crowd. The actual London Season was just a few months long, she reminded herself. She could endure it.
The question, really, was whether Society could endure her. She smiled and fluttered the fan faster, wondering what unspoken message she was sending with it this time and what ninny had come up with the entire convoluted system of signs. God forbid that people actually say what they thought or--horror of horrors!--clearly and honestly articulate what they wanted. No, if people did that, the world would come to some sudden, hideously crashing end.
Simone's smile widened. According to her older sister, the matrons were saying that Simone was far more interested in courting Armageddon than she was in letting any of the peerage's money-chasing bachelors catch her. It really was amazing how perceptive the old hens could be. And how utterly overwhelmed some of the chicks are, Simone added as she watched one of her fellow sufferers sneak a quick peek from behind a potted palm in the far corner. Poor Emmaline. Being pretty, petite, blond, blue-eyed, and the daughter of a marquis didn't seem to have done much for her confidence; she was considerably more mouse than girl.
Simone closed her fan and made her way along the edge of the crowd. Emmaline certainly wasn't what she considered a friend. No, not at all. They'd met only twice. The first time had been three days ago at St. James's Palace while they were both waiting--wearing ridiculous panniers and hideously tight corsets--for their formal presentation to the queen. Emmaline had nearly fainted from the strain. Bracing her had been an instinctive thing--which had led to an obligatory bit of conversation once the girl had recovered her breath and balance.
It was only because Emmaline hadn't been the least bit peerish in that first meeting that there'd been a second. At Lady Somebodyorother's ball the night before last. Neither Emmaline nor Simone had wanted to be there. And while they had vastly different reasons for their aversions, it was at least something they had in common. Which, Simone knew, was far more than could be said for her and anyone else at this evening's ordeal.
"Hello, Emmaline," she said, slipping behind the potted plant.
"Oh, Simone," the other gasped, throwing her arms around Simone's shoulders and giving her a hard hug, "I was so hoping you would be here."
"That makes you the only one," she replied, chuckling as she was released. She checked her arms to make sure that she hadn't been pierced by any of Emmaline's hundreds of pale pink sequins. "Are you hiding for a specific reason or is it more a precautionary measure?"
Emmaline sagged back against the wall and stared down at the floor. "I pled a headache last night and was allowed to stay home. Unfortunately, Mother wouldn't believe it could happen two nights in a row."
It wasn't an answer to the question, but Simone didn't press. Neither did she point out that a second evasion might have been possible if Emmaline had been creative enough to develop a different ailment. "My sister insisted that I had to be here, too," Simone supplied, watching the eddying crowd through a veil of palm fronds. "Why, I don't know. But then, I consider this entire coming-out process to be one of life's great mysteries. And torments."
"Has anyone asked you to dance?"
Simone grinned and stepped back to help Emmaline hold up the wall. "The trick is to keep moving, to look as though you have somewhere important to go, and that you'll knock them down if they get in your way."
"Oh, I couldn't possibly do that."
"Do what?"
"Knock them down," Emmaline clarified. "You could and would and they know it. It makes all the difference, you know."
Yes, she did. Just as she knew from their brief encounters that the girl didn't have the foggiest notion of how to hold her own in a crowd of strangers. How to go about angling a shoulder for proper impact would be completely beyond her. The things some people didn't teach their daughters. Someone really should take poor Emmaline under their--
"Would you like to learn how to do it?" Simone offered, buoyed by the prospect of a diversion that could well last for months. For the entire Season! "I'd be glad to teach you."
"I don't think I can--"
"Nonsense," Simone happily interrupted. "I'm living proof that anyone can learn to be and do anything."
Emmaline's smile was weak at best. "I appreciate the offer, Simone, but there is no hope of success and the effort would leave you no time for your own . . ." She glanced through the fronds and then made another pathetic attempt to smile. "Pursuits."
Dear God, the girl was her own worst enemy. Did she ever utter a sentence that didn't contain a version of "not"? "I like challenges. As for my pursuits . . ." Simone laughed softly and then leaned closer to confess, "I'm going through all of this just to make my sister and guardian happy. Well, that and I got the horse I wanted for being agreeable. I have absolutely no intention of ending the Season tied elbow, hip, and ankle to some man."
Emmaline stared at her wide-eyed for a long second. Eventually she blinked, swallowed, and said breathily, "Truly? I'm going to marry the first man who asks for me so I don't ever have to do this again."
That is desperate. "Well," Simone ventured, undeterred, "they have to know you exist before they can ask for you."
"I suppose you're right."
Simone ignored the plaintive sigh. "I'm always right, Emmaline," she assured her, coming off the wall. "Trust me."
Emmaline looked as though she were being asked to walk the plank, but she did take a deep breath, and that was close enough to consent for Simone. She extended her hands and held them there until Emmaline reluctantly put hers in them.
"Now lift your chin," Simone instructed once she had the girl planted squarely on her feet. Emmaline looked up at the ceiling. "Not that high. Unless you want a crick in your neck and people looking up your nose."
Emmaline brought her chin down to give her a horrified look.
"Remember how Victoria held hers during the presentation?" Simone suggested. She grinned as Emmaline mimicked it perfectly. "You've got it, my dear. Now square your shoulders."
Bless the girl, she really had no concept of a midpoint on anything. Considering her ample chest . . . "That's not square," Simone observed, trying desperately not to laugh. "That'...
