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Praise for USA TODAY bestselling author
Courtney Milan and Proof by Seduction
‘One of the finest historical romances I’ve read in years.
I am now officially a Courtney Milan fangirl.’
—Julia Quinn
‘A brilliant debut … deeply romantic, sexy and smart.
I couldn’t put it down.’
—Eloisa James
‘Historical romance fans will celebrate Milan’s powerhouse
debut, which comes with a full complement of humour,
characterisation, plot and sheer gutsiness …’
—Publishers Weekly (starred review)
‘A dazzling debut by a multi-talented author who thrills
readers with a twist on a traditional plot and truly
unforgettable characters.’
—RT Book Reviews
‘With a tender, passionate romance, a touch of sly humour,
and a gruff and incredibly sexy hero, Courtney Milan’s
Proof by Seduction is a delicious read from the first page all the way to the very satisfying ending.’ —Elizabeth Hoyt
‘Sexy, hilarious, and deeply, deeply touching. Courtney
Milan writes with the keenest understanding of the heart.
It is a cliché to say so, but I laughed and I cried.
And I cannot wait to read her next book.’
—Sherry Thomas, author of Private Arrangements
‘Courtney Milan is a blazing new talent in the romantic
stratosphere … Warm, witty, wonderful and wise,
Proof by Seduction will steal your heart away.’ —Anna Campbell
Dear Reader,
If you are anything like me, you’ve done something in your past that you wish you could forget. No matter how successful you may be, you still remember that one time (if you’re me, it’s more like those twenty-seven times) you did that really embarrassing thing.
You desperately hope nobody else remembers.
Ned Carhart, the hero of this book, has made mistakes in his past. Those of you who read my first book, Proof by Seduction, already have some idea what I’m talking about, but if you haven’t, rest assured: you’ll find out soon enough.
Imperfect as Ned was, I knew those same mistakes would make him an extraordinary hero once he had time to mature. He would be strong, sensitive … and very, very determined to prove that he’d moved beyond his past.
I give all my books code-names as I am writing them. This book was called “Dragon-Slayer,” even though there are no dragons in it. I hope you have fun finding out why!
Courtney Milan
Trial by Desire
Courtney Milan
MILLS & BOON
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For Teej. Because when I had to make Ned a hero,
I gave him a little bit of you.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
I’ve heard before that second books are hard. This one was … very hard. I am first and foremost grateful for all the readers who contacted me demanding Ned’s story. Without your encouragement and enthusiasm, I might have given up on this.
As always, I am deeply grateful for Tessa and Amy, who offered support, encouragement and advice. Elyssa Papa and Kris Kennedy gave valuable feedback on various drafts. Franzeca Drouin saved me from about a billion errors. And Kim Castillo truly is an author’s best friend.
Kristin Nelson, my awesome agent, and all the Nelson Agency staff—Sara Megibow, Julie Kerlin, Anita Mumm and Lindsay Mergens—provided the absolute best support an author could want.
A great many people who put up with my whining about this book: the Pixie Chicks, the Vanettes, the Bon Bons, and my favourite debut loop ever.
Margo Lipschultz, my wonderful editor, provided the proper balance of encouragement and gentle prodding, and Ann Leslie Tuttle let me know when I was going off the rails. I wish I had space to thank everyone on the entire team at Harlequin Mills & Boon by name for the amazing job they have all done launching my career—from the extraordinary sales force, to the marketing department, to the editorial enthusiasm at my publisher—but that would take pages and pages.
And last but never least, there’s my husband, who never once complained about my writing while he did the dishes, made me dinner and took care of the dog.
PROLOGUE
London, 1838
LADY KATHLEEN CARHART had a secret.
Truth be told, she had more than one—but the secret she had in mind as she sat across from her husband at breakfast had arrived only today. It was wrapped in paper and had been set carefully atop her chest of drawers. And if her husband knew what it was …
She suppressed a faint smile.
Across the table from her, he set the paper down and fixed his gaze on her. His eyes were a liquid brown, three shades beyond her breakfast chocolate. They stood out, uncannily dark against the sandy brown of his hair. He had no notion what it did to her when he looked at her like that. Her toes curled. Her hands clasped together. All he had to do was look at her, and she found herself wishing—wanting—no, desiring. And therein lay the root of her problem.
“I had a talk with my cousin a few days ago,” he said.
Around London, a thousand couples might have been having a similarly prosaic conversation. Kate’s mother had cautioned her to be practical about marriage, to accept that she and her husband would share a genteel, friendly politeness.
But then, Kate hadn’t married the average London gentleman. Mr. Edward Carhart did nothing properly or politely—nothing, that was, except his newly acquired wife.
“What did Blakely have to say?” Kate asked.
“You know that some of our holdings are in the East India Company?”
“Aren’t everyone’s? It’s a good investment. They trade in tea and silk and saltpetre…. “ Her voice trailed off into roughness.
If he’d known what flitted through her mind when she said the word silk, he’d not sit there so sanguine. Because she’d purchased a filmy night rail on Bond Street. It was made of imported silk and fastened together in front by means of lavender ribbons. Those scraps of opaque fabric were perhaps the garment’s only concession to modesty. It lay on her chest of drawers, simply beseeching Kate to wear it one evening.
“Silk,” Ned said, looking off into the distance without seeing her lean forward, “and other things. Like opium.”
“Opium was not on my shopping list.”
He didn’t smile. Instead he glanced away as if uncomfortable. “In any case, Blakely and I were talking about the recent events in China.” Ned shook his paper at her. “And we decided it would behoove someone to personally inquire into what was going on over there.”
For once, he sounded serious. Kate frowned at him. “By someone, you mean Mr. White, and by over there, you mean the office on—”
“By someone,“ Ned said distinctly, “I mean me, and by over there, I mean China.”
He set the newspaper down and bit his lip. The morning sun suddenly seemed too bright. It blasted in from the window behind him, casting his features into shadow. She couldn’t make out his eyes. He had to be joking. At any moment, he was going to grin at her.
She gingerly relinquished her hold on her teacup and essayed a small smile. “Have a lovely journey. Will you be home in time for tea?”
“No. The Peerless is leaving St. Katharine’s at noon, and I intend to be on it.”
Not just the light was blinding. She raised her eyes to him, and his sincerity finally penetrated. “Oh, God. You really meant it. You’re leaving? But I thought—”
She’d thought she had time for that silk night rail, folded carefully in paper.
He shook his head. “Kate, we’ve been married three months. We both know that the only reason we wed was because people found us alone together and imagined more had happened. We married to stave off the scandal.”
Put so baldly, her impractical hopes sounded even more foolish than she’d supposed.
“The truth is,” he continued, “neither of us is ready to be married, not really.”
Neither of them?
He stood and pushed back his chair. “I’ve never had the chance to prove myself to anyone. And … “ He trailed off, his hand scrubbing through his hair. “And I want to.”
He set his serviette atop his plate and turned around. The world swirled around Kate.
He was walking away, as if this had been normal breakfast conversation on a regular day.
“Ned!” Kate vaulted to her feet. The word seemed as like to hold back the breaking floodwaters of her marriage as the insubstantial silk gown waiting upstairs.
His shoulders tensed, two sharp blades beneath the wool of his coat. He stopped in the doorway on the verge of escape.
She didn’t have the words to capture the cold tremor that ran through her. She settled on “I wish you wouldn’t. I wish you would stay.”
He tilted his head, just enough to see her over his shoulder. For just that one second, he looked at her the way she’d dreamed about: with a deep hunger, an almost open yearning, as if she were more to him than a name written under his on their marriage license. He exhaled and shook his head.
“I wish,” he said quietly, “I could, too.“ And then he turned and left.
She wanted to run after him, to say something, anything. But what rooted her in place was a realization. He was as restless as she’d once been.
And she knew well enough that she couldn’t fill that up, not with any number of silken gowns.
At least this way he could imagine her quiet and practical, not hurt in the slightest by his leaving. She’d kept the secret of her attraction all too well, wrapped up in paper.
She’d kept all her secrets, and it was too late to explain.
CHAPTER ONE
Berkshire, three years later
A SHOULDER-HIGH WALL hugged the dirt road that wound its way up the hill Kate was climbing. Last night, when she and the nursemaid had crept by on foot, the dark stones of the wall had seemed menacing, hunched things. She’d imagined Eustace Paxton, the Earl of Harcroft, crouching behind every rock, ready to spit vile curses at her.
But through the diffuse morning fog, she could see little yellow-headed wildflowers growing between the rocks. Even this aging edifice had become friendly and bright. And Harcroft was thirty miles away, in London, unaware of her involvement in his latest misfortunes. She’d won a respite, and for the first time in two weeks, she breathed easily.
As if to belie her certainty, the plod of horse hooves carried to her on a breeze. She turned, her heart accelerating. Despite the flush of heat that rose in her, Kate clutched her heavy cloak about her. She’d been discovered. He was here …
There was nothing behind her but morning mist. She was imagining things, to think that Harcroft would have uncovered her secret so quickly. She let out a covert breath—and then gulped it back as the creak of wooden wheels sounded once more. This time, though, it was evident that the noise came from up the road. As she peered ahead of her, the dark form of a cart lumbering up the hill resolved in the mist.
The sight was as calming as it was familiar. A blanket of fog had obscured the sound’s origin. The cart moved slowly, drawn by a single animal. As Kate trudged up the hill, her calves burning with the exertion, she made out more details. The conveyance was filled with heavy wooden kegs, marked with a sigil she could not make out from here. The animal that pulled this cargo seemed some nondescript color, unidentifiable in the mist. From this distance, its coat appeared to be both spotted and striped with light gray. It strained uphill, bone and muscle rippling underneath that oddly colored pelt.
Kate sighed with relief. The man was a common laborer. Not Harcroft; therefore, not someone who posed a threat if he discovered the role she’d played last night. Still, Kate pulled her hood up to shield her face. The scratchy wool was the only disguise she had.
As if in reminder of the nightmare that Louisa had escaped, a whip-crack sounded in front of her. Kate gritted her teeth and continued up the hill. Half a minute later, and a number of yards closer, the whip cracked again. She bit her tongue.
She had to be practical. Lady Kathleen Carhart might have had sharp words for the man. But right now Kate was wrapped in an ill-fitting cloak, and the servant she was pretending to be would keep her eyes downcast. A servant would never speak up, not to a man with a horse and a whip. He would never believe her the lady of the manor, not dressed as she was.
And besides, the last thing Kate needed if she intended to keep her secrets was for society to hear that she’d been skulking about, dressed as a servant. As she climbed the hill, the lash continued to fall. She gritted her teeth in fury as she drew abreast of the cart. Perhaps that was why, at first, she didn’t hear it.
Above the complaining rumble of the cart wheels, the noise had been at first indiscernible. But the wind shifted, and with it brought the rhythmic sound of a gentle canter to her ears.
Kate glanced behind her. A horseman was coming up the hill.
A simple carter might once have caught a glimpse of Lady Kathleen at a harvest festival—a close enough look to boast, over a tankard of ale, perhaps, about seeing a duke’s daughter. He wouldn’t recognize her when she was swathed in a heavy cloak and a working woman’s bonnet.
But a man on horseback could be a gentleman. He might, in fact, be the Earl of Harcroft, come looking for his missing wife. And if Harcroft came upon Kate dressed in this fashion—if he recognized her—he might guess the role she’d played in his wife’s disappearance.
All he would have to do was trace her path back a few miles. That shepherd’s cottage wasn’t so very far away.
Kate pulled the hood of her cloak farther over her eyes and slunk closer to the wall. Her hand brushed against grit on its uneven surface. Even though she huddled in her cloak, she set her chin. She was not about to surrender Louisa to her husband. No matter what he said or did.
The man on horseback came into view through the mist just as Kate crested the hill. Shreds of fog splashed around his horse’s hooves, like gray, slow-moving seawater. The horse was a gentleman’s beast: a slim mare, gray as the wisps of vapor that clung to its legs. Not Harcroft’s chestnut stallion, then. Reassured, Kate studied the gentleman himself.
He wore a tall hat and a long coat; the tails flapped behind him in rhythmic counterpoint to the fall of his mare’s hooves. Whoever he was, his shoulders were too broad to belong to Harcroft. Besides, this man’s face was covered by a sandy beard. Definitely not Harcroft, then. Not any man she recognized.
That didn’t mean he wouldn’t recognize her, or that he wouldn’t carry stories.
Slowly she let out her breath and turned to look forward. If she didn’t draw attention to herself, he wouldn’t notice her. She looked like a servant; she would be virtually invisible to a man of his class.
The mare’s light hoofbeats pattered up the hill. It moved in effortless contrast to the other poor animal, which was still dragging its Sisyphean burden to the summit. But Kate had her own burden to concentrate on. Out of the corner of her eye she saw the horseman pull ahead of the cart. The tails of his coat flapped briefly across the beast’s blinkered vision. A foot or so of fabric; nothing more.
The horse pulling the cart, however, stopped and shied, pinning its ears against its head in a gesture of equine distress. Kate pressed against the wall as the cart’s wooden shafts creaked. Another flap of the coattails in the wind; when the whip cracked again, Kate winced. The carter’s horse did more than that: it let out a frightened cry and reared up on its hind legs. The cart tilted precariously; the hooves thundered down. Kate heard the crashing splinter of wood, and she whirled to face the animal.
One of the cart shafts had split down the middle. The horse was tangled in halter and traces, and no matter how it strained, it could not escape. When frightened, horses ran; and when they couldn’t run—
Kate caught a glimpse of a dark eye rolled back, ears flattened against the long head. The horse’s blinkered gaze momentarily fixed on hers. Crack went the whip, and the horse reared in response. It was so close, Kate could see its iron shoes as it pawed the air above her head. She felt frozen in that moment, as useless as a rabbit cowering in the grass with a hawk plummeting down. Her hands went cold. Her mind moved sluggishly. She might have counted the horse’s ribs, every prominent ridge, as the hooves descended toward her.
And then the moment of fear passed, and practical considerations overtook her disbelief.
She dropped to the ground in a crouch, just as those massive hooves hit the crumbling wall where her head had been. Once, and bits of stone and crumbling grout rained on her head; twice, and flying chips of rock struck her cheek. The animal whinnied and reared again.
Before the hooves could land a third time, someone stepped in front of her. Whoever it was jerked her to her feet—the sockets of her arms twinged in protest. His body pressed against hers momentarily, a brief imprint of hard muscle fitting against her curves. He turned his back to the beast, shielding her from those iron-clad hooves. It was the horseman—the gentleman with the gray mare. He must have dismounted and come to offer assistance.
She had no chance to protest, even had she wanted to, no opportunity to pull away. His hands clasped her waist, and he lifted her up, up, until her palms scrabbled along the top of the wall behind her. She pulled herself atop it, heart thumping, and glanced down. The horseman was looking up at her. His eyes, liquid brown pools, sparkled at her over that shaggy beard, as if this were the best excitement he’d come upon in weeks. For one instant, she felt a sick thrill of recognition.
I know this man.
But he turned away, and that feeling of familiarity slipped through her fingers, as hard to contain as the gritty pebbles on the wall she clung to.
Whoever he was, he had no notion of fear. He turned back to the careening beast. He moved on his toes with a graceful economy of motion. It was almost as if he were leading the horse in a waltz. The man sidestepped another furious stamp of those hooves.
“There now, Champion.” His voice was quiet but carrying. “I don’t want to crowd you so closely, but you’ll never calm down if I can’t cut the traces.”
“Cut the traces!” protested the carter, clutching the handle of his whip. “What the devil do you mean, cut the traces?“
The gentleman paid him no mind. Instead, he made a half turn, and stepped behind the animal.
The carter held his whip back, his mouth pursed in ugly disapproval. “What in blazes do you think you’re doing?”
The gentleman turned his back on the furious driver. He was talking—murmuring, actually. Kate couldn’t hear his words, but she could catch the tone of his voice, soft and soothing. The beast pawed the air once more, and then danced from hoof to hoof. It whipped its head to the side, trying to keep its eyes on the gentleman behind it. A swipe with his knife, then another; one final adjustment of leather, and the animal came free of the cart.
“What the devil are you doing? That’s my animal you’re freeing, it is!”
The horse surged forward. The carter still held the reins in one hand, and so it couldn’t bolt far. But without the bits of cart swinging around it—and more important, with the carter left to impotently clutch his whip now that the beast was out of range—the horse pranced, pawed the ground in distress once and then, eyeing the people around it, lapsed into a restive silence.
“There,” the gentleman said, “that’s better, isn’t it?”
And like that, it was better. All the other sounds of the autumn morning seemed to resume with his words: the thump of Kate’s heart, the horse’s uneasy stamp on the dust road below her, the impatient sound of the carter beating the handle of his whip against his other hand. She clutched the wall beneath her.
“You gentlemen are all alike. You’re coddling it,” the carter complained. “Stupid animal.”
The last was directed at the horse, which still trembled despite the so-called coddling, its ears flat against the sides of its head. The bearded gentleman—and by the cultured drawl of his voice and the fashionable cut of his coat, he was surely a gentleman—turned to face the carter. He walked toward him and then reached down and gathered the animal’s reins in his hand. The carter relinquished them, staring in front of him in stupefaction.
“Coddling?” the fellow said gently. “Champion here is an animal, not an egg. Besides, I make it a point to be kind to beasts that are large enough to stomp me to bits. Particularly when they are frightened enough to do so. I’ve always thought it foolish to stand on principle, when the principle is about to trample you to death.”
That evanescent sense of familiarity came to her again, troubling as an unidentified smell on the wind. Something in his voice reminded her of something, someone—but no, she would remember that tone of quiet command if ever she’d heard it.
Kate took another deep breath—and froze. She’d seen the beast only in sidelong glances up until now. In the fog, that strange coloration, those odd white spots, had seemed as if they were some curious form of natural marking. But from her vantage point atop the wall, she could see the marks for what they were: scars. Scars where a whip had drawn blood; scars where an ill-fitting harness had rubbed over the course of who knew how many years.
No wonder the poor animal had rebelled.
The carter was holding his hands out. “Here now,” he complained. “It don’t hurt him. My mam always used to say that tribulation was sent to make you stronger. It’s in the Bible. I think.” The carter trailed off, giving the horseman a hapless shrug.
“How curious.” The fellow smiled disarmingly; even through that thick beard, his grin was infectious, and the carter echoed it with a gap-toothed smile. “I cannot recall the commandment to beat animals. But then, I disagree with the premise. In my experience, tribulation doesn’t strengthen you. It’s more like to leave you with a bronchial inflammation that lingers for years.”
“Pardon?”
The gentleman waved a hand and turned back to the animal. “Never trust aphorisms. Any sentiment short enough to be memorable is undoubtedly wrong.”
Kate suppressed a smile. As if the gentleman could see her, his lips twitched upward. Of course, focused as he was on the trembling cart-horse, she doubted he even knew she was still here. Slowly, she slid from the top of the wall to the ground.
The gentleman fished in his pockets and pulled out an apple. The animal’s nostrils widened; its ears came forward slightly. Kate could see its ribs. They were not prominent enough to indicate starvation, but neither were they covered with a healthy amount of skin and muscle. Underneath those healed lacerations, its coat might once have been chestnut. But coal dust and road mud, stretched over scarred skin, had robbed the pelt of any hint of gloss.
“Oh, don’t feed it, for the love of all that is precious,” the carter protested. “The beast is useless. I’ve had it for three months, and no matter how I beat it, still it shies away from every last mother-loving noise.”
“That,” said the gentleman, “sounds like an explanation, rather than an excuse. Doesn’t it, Champion?” He tossed the apple on the ground next to the horse and then looked away into the distance.
He seemed good with the beast. Gentle. Kind. Not that it mattered, because whoever he was, she couldn’t speak to him. No matter how kind he was, he couldn’t know what Lady Kathleen had been doing, not if she intended to keep her secrets safe. Kate began to sidle away from the scene.
“Champion? Who’re you calling Champion?”
“Well, has he got another name?” The man had made no move to get closer to the horse. He stood, a rein’s distance from the beast, looking away from the valley. Toward Berkswift, actually. Kate’s home, just beyond one last rise and a row of trees.
“Name?” The carter frowned, as if the very concept were foreign. “I’ve been calling it Meat.“
“Meet?” The gentleman frowned down at the reins gathered in his hands. “As in a championship meet? A tourney?”
“No. Meat. As in Horse Meat. As in I could get a ha’penny per stringy pound from the butcher.”
The gentleman’s fingers curled about the reins. “I’ll give you ten pounds for the whole animal.”
“Ten pounds? Why, that’s barely what the knacker—”
“If Meat here panics on the way to the knacker, you’ll be out far more than that in property damage.” The man glanced at Kate, where she’d been sneaking away from the battered cart.
It was the first time he’d looked at her directly, and Kate felt his gaze settle against her, disturbing and familiar all at once. She pressed against the wall.
The gentleman simply shook his head and looked away. “You should be brought up on criminal charges, for endangerment.” He reached into his pocket, produced a small purse, and began to count coins.
“Here, now. I haven’t agreed. How am I supposed to move my cart?”
The gentleman shrugged. “With that shaft broken? I don’t imagine a horse would prove much help.” But as he spoke, he added a few more coins from his purse and then dropped them on the cart driver’s seat. “There’s a village yonder.”
The carter shook his head and collected the pile. Then he stood and left his cart, trudging on toward the village. The gentleman watched him go.
While the man was still distracted, Kate began to walk away. The horse was safe, and if she left now, her secret—Louisa’s secret—was safe, too. Whoever this man was, he couldn’t have recognized her. No doubt he thought her some servant, off on her mistress’s errands. An unimportant thing, as nondescript as the beast he’d rescued.
He touched his hat at her, and then turned back to his own manicured steed, which waited in nonchalant obedience ten yards down the track.
Kate had supposed the newly purchased beast would follow docilely in the gentleman’s footsteps, beaten-down specimen that it was. But it did not hang its head; instead as the fellow led it back to where he’d loosely tossed the reins of his steed, Horse Meat tossed its ragged mane. It lifted one lip in disdain and stamped its bone-thin, lacerated legs.
The gray mare ducked its head and backed away a step.
“Do you suppose they’ll walk calmly together?” the gentleman asked.
With the carter gone, there was nobody else around. He had to be addressing her.
Kate glanced at him, in the midst of her escape. She didn’t dare speak. Her voice would betray her as a lady, even if her clothing hadn’t. She shook her head.
Horse Meat curled its lips at the mare, showing teeth. It could not have communicated more clearly, had it spoken: Stay away from me. I am a dangerous stallion!
The gentleman looked from animal to animal. “I suppose not.” A soft smile of bemusement passed over his lips, and he turned to meet Kate’s eyes, once again halting her forward progress.
There was a restless vitality about those eyes that resonated with her. Something about him—his voice, his easy confidence—set her skin humming in recognition. She knew him.
Or maybe she just wanted to know him, and she’d invented this subtle sense of familiarity. She would have remembered a man like him.
Unlike other gentlemen, underneath his hat, his skin was sun-warmed gold. His shoulders were broad, and not by any artifice of padding. He was walking away from his steed, toward Kate.
No, she couldn’t possibly have forgotten a man like him. His gaze on her made her feel uneasy, as if he knew all her secrets. As if he were laughing at every last one.
“Well,” he said, “this is a pretty pickle, my lady.”
My lady? Ladies did not wear itchy gray cloaks. They didn’t cower under shapeless bonnets. Had he seen the fine walking dress she wore underneath when he lifted her up? Or did he know who she was?
His eyes flicked up and down, once, an automatic male survey of her figure, before returning to her face.
Kate was not fool enough to wish he’d let the horse trample her. Still, she wished he’d been on his way earlier. At least he didn’t remark on her outlandish garb. Instead …
“This,” he told her, gesturing with the reins of the animal he’d just acquired, “puts me in mind of one of those damnable logic puzzles a friend of mine used to pose when we were at Cambridge. ‘A shepherd, three sheep and a wolf must cross a river in a boat that fits at most two….’”
Understanding—and disappointment—took root. No wonder he wasn’t courting her ire by asking inconvenient questions about her cloak and her lack of companionship. He was one of those men. He addressed her with easy intimacy. A tone of expectation warmed his voice, entirely at odds with his formal “my lady.” She recalled his hands on her waist, that brief flash of heated contact, body to body. At the time, she’d noticed nothing more than a fleeting impression of hard muscle pushing her out of harm’s way. Now her skin prickled where he’d touched her, as if his gaze had sparked her flesh to life.
If he knew her well enough to attempt to win that wager, then he knew her well enough to gossip. He knew her well enough to spread the word in town, and well enough for that word to travel round until it reached Harcroft’s ears. It was no longer a question of if Harcroft would hear about this episode; it was a matter of what and when.
