Why Earls Fall in Love Read online

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  For Ramona Moorer Moody Driskell—

  beloved wife, mother, sister, aunt. A voracious reader who never gave up on me and my writing dream. And the only person in the world who still thought of me as “little.”

  Miss you, Mona.

  Acknowledgments

  As always, huge thanks to Editor Holly who is a rock star and deserves every bit of praise I can heap on her; Agent Holly who is always ready with a reassuring word when I need one; the awesome ladies of Kiss & Thrill, Rachel, Lena, Sarah, Krista, Amy, Sharon, Gwen, and Diana—love you guys! Lindsey, Janga, Julianne, Santa, and Terri—thanks for the hand holding, y’all, you’re the best. Stephen Catbert, Tiny (sweet kitties) and Charlie (good dog) for keeping me company while I’m thinking about faraway worlds instead of treats and scratching, with only a minimum of complaints. And last but not least, my family, who put up with cancelled dinners, missed phone calls, and myriad other annoyances while I’m on deadline. Love you.

  Contents

  Title Page

  Copyright Notice

  Dedication

  Acknowledgments

  Prologue

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Epilogue

  Coming soon from Manda Collins

  Also by Manda Collins

  Praise for Manda Collins

  About the Author

  Copyright

  Prologue

  “Put the knife down, your grace,” Mrs. Georgina Mowbray said firmly, infusing every bit of military command she’d ever heard during her time following the drum into her voice.

  She knew how absurd it was to try reasoning with a man who was clearly at the end of his rope—especially one like the Duke of Ormond who had undoubtedly been granted his every wish from childhood. Even so, she did try reason, hoping that the drunk, exhausted husband of her dear friend Perdita would not go through with his threat. “Killing your wife will not make you feel any better.”

  The only sign that Perdita felt genuine terror was the visible flutter of her pulse, only a hairsbreadth from the glinting blade at her throat.

  Georgina, Perdita, and the young duchess’s sister, Lady Isabella Wharton, had hoped to convince the duke—who was, admittedly, not the most reasonable of men—to allow his wife to leave his household and establish her own. Since Ormond spent most of his time indulging his love for hard living in places other than the ducal mansion in Mayfair, the ladies had hoped he’d not see the request for what it was—the first step in an attempt to disengage Perdita completely from her brute of a husband.

  Unfortunately they’d allowed their hopes to overreach their common sense.

  Of course Ormond had responded badly to their request, Georgie reflected, grateful to feel the weight of her small pistol through the fabric of her reticule. The ladies had been foolish beyond belief to think the man who had beaten his wife for wearing the wrong gown to a dinner party would possibly behave in a rational manner.

  His next words only confirmed it. “She wouldn’t be able to leave me if she was dead,” the duke slurred. His lips twisted with resentment. “She was fine before the two of you got hold of her with your lies about me.”

  Georgina exchanged a speaking look with Isabella. Both women were glad that Ormond had no suspicions that Perdita herself had been the one to broach the subject to them, rather than the other way around. After so many years of enduring Ormond’s cruelties, this week, Perdita had reached the point at which she no longer cared what her husband would do to retaliate against her for leaving. She only knew, she’d told her sister and Georgie, that if she did not leave now, she was unlikely to live for much longer.

  If this was how Ormond behaved when he suspected Perdita’s friends of luring her away, Georgie cringed to imagine what his response might be should he discover the notion had been his wife’s own.

  She was grateful for her own position firmly in the middle class. She’d been somewhat self-conscious when the tonnish sisters had befriended her at a charity group’s meeting, but once the three had discussed their similar situations—both Isabella and Georgie were widowed from men who had been quick to anger and free with their fists, while Perdita was still married to such a man—they’d formed an alliance. Since she’d been unable to confide in the friends she’d had among the other military wives who followed the drum, Georgina was enjoying, for the first time in her adult life, the relief of knowing that someone else in the world understood just what her life with her husband had been like.

  Now, of course, Georgie realized that though her own situation had been difficult to endure, at least her husband hadn’t been brought up to believe that his every decision was right and proper and that he could do whatever the bloody hell he liked. There was something to be said for the discipline of the military, which at least had meant that while her husband was doing his duty for king and country, he would not be focused on humiliating her. Poor Perdita never knew when and where the duke would strike.

  “I would never leave you, darling,” Perdita said, her calm demeanor belied by the slight hitch in her breath as Ormond’s shaking hand pressed the blade ever closer. “You know I love you.”

  Her lips tightening, Georgie knew that her friend would not be able to maintain her placid pose for much longer. Catching Isabella’s eye again, she glanced down at her left hand, curling all but her index finger inward, and lifting her thumb, making the shape of a gun. She watched Isabella’s eyes widen as she realized what Georgie was saying.

  The sisters had been slightly appalled when Georgina informed them of her habit of carrying the small pistol in her reticule, but once Georgie explained that she’d done so for her own protection in the peninsula, and it had simply become habit, the two women had reluctantly agreed that there were some occasions when having a pistol might be beneficial for a lady traveling alone in London.

  Now, Georgie was grateful to her father, who’d insisted upon buying it for her when she married. Little had she suspected she’d be using it to protect a friend instead of herself. Though at this point, she was simply grateful to have it.

  Nodding slightly at Georgie, Isabella began to speak—perhaps, it dawned on Georgie, to distract the duke while Georgie removed the pistol from her reticule.

  “Ormond,” she heard her friend say boldly, then perhaps realizing she sounded a bit too imperious, softened her tone. “Gervase,” Isabella said, switching to the duke’s Christian name, “we aren’t here to take Perdita away from you. We simply wish for you to perhaps be a bit gentler with her.”

  “Why?” the duke demanded petulantly, his bloodshot eyes bright with suspicion. “She’s not gentle with me. She scratched my face earlier. Damn her.” He gripped Perdita tighter, and she whimpered.

  Even as she closed her hand over the butt of the pistol, Georgina did not look away from the tableau before her. She did not wish to draw the duke’s at
tention to her in any possible way. She could see the nail marks on his face, but she was not moved to any sort of pity for the duke. He had been trying to force himself upon his wife when she’d defended herself with her nails. It was hardly punishment at all for such a heinous act, Georgie reflected grimly, slipping her index finger onto the trigger.

  Clearly disturbed by Ormond’s growing unrest, Isabella spoke again. Georgie hoped he would keep his attention on her friend while she, herself, gripped the pistol against her side, still not letting the reticule drop from around it, needing the element of surprise that would come when she pulled the trigger. The way he held Perdita just now, it would be impossible to hit the duke without injuring Perdita in the process.

  As if reading her friend’s mind, Isabella spoke up, her tone imperious now as she addressed her brother-in-law. “You should be gentle with her because she might be carrying the next Duke of Ormond.” Perdita hadn’t said anything of the sort to either Georgie or her sister, but Ormond had no way of knowing that.

  Moving as one, Georgina and Isabella stepped forward. Georgie felt the damp of sweat on her glove where she gripped the pistol.

  “There, now,” Isabella said, her voice placating, as if she were trying to soothe a skittish horse, “you don’t wish to harm your heir, do you?”

  But they’d no sooner stepped forward than it became clear Isabella’s words had been woefully miscalculated. Rather than being transported with joy, Ormond instead became angry. “What? Is this true?” he asked, turning Perdita in his arms so that he could look her in the face. “You lied to me?” he demanded, the knife trapped between Perdita’s arm and Ormond’s fist while he began to shake her. “You lying bitch! You told me it wasn’t possible!” he cried.

  “No!” Isabella shouted, rushing forward to pull him away from her sister. “Stop it! Stop it!”

  “Your grace,” Georgina said in a hard voice, stepping forward as she jerked the pistol upward. “I warn you to stop that at once.”

  As she watched in horror, Georgie saw Isabella grasp the duke by the shoulders and attempt to forcibly pry him away from her sister. When she managed to hook her arm around his neck, cutting off his airway, the duke gave a muffled growl and shoved his body backward as if trying to dislodge his attacker.

  Finally as they spun away from Perdita, Georgie saw she had a clear shot at the duke, and lifting her arm, she took aim and fired.

  At almost the same time, the knife, which had been held between Perdita’s body and Ormond’s hand, fell to the floor, and must, as Georgie later learned, have been in the right position at the right time, because when the duke fell mere seconds later it was upon the same blade with which he’d threatened his wife.

  That Georgina’s bullet pierced his chest at the same moment was mere coincidence. Having watched the man threaten her friend, Georgie didn’t much care which wound had done the trick.

  The Duke of Ormond was dead, and she for one was glad of it.

  One

  “It’s extraordinarily ugly, isn’t it?” Mrs. Georgina Mowbray asked her friend, and fellow army widow, Mrs. Lettice Stowe, as they stood before the latest painting to have taken Bath by storm in the fashionable Messrs. Oliver and McHenry Art Gallery in Clarges Street. “I do see that the artist has talent, but look at the expression on poor Cleopatra’s face! She looks more like she’s suffering from dyspepsia than the poisonous bite of an asp.”

  Lettice, who was rather less interested in art than Georgina, studied the painting, wrinkling her upturned nose in concentration. “I don’t know,” she said frowning, “I rather like it. It’s so dramatic, the way she’s draping herself across the chaise, her bosom exposed as the asp sinks its fangs into her. And who’s to say that the bite of an asp doesn’t feel like an attack of dyspepsia. You remember old Mrs. Lafferty whose husband was with the 23rd, who swore she was only suffering a bit of the ague when in fact she was having an apoplexy.”

  Georgina had to concede the point to her friend, though she was fairly certain Mrs. Lafferty had been suffering from both the ague and apoplexy. But she didn’t wish to quibble. Lettice was, after all, her only friend in Bath aside from her employer, Lady Russell, to whom Georgie served as lady’s companion.

  It had only been a few months since she’d come to the spa town and she missed her friends in London dreadfully. But unlike Isabella and Perdita, who were both the widows of noblemen, Georgie was the widow of a military officer who had been just as terrible at managing his finances as he had been at being a husband. And as a result, she needed to work to earn her keep.

  Today, her employer was taking tea with her niece while Georgie enjoyed her afternoon off. She would never have expected that the life of a paid companion would be so fulfilling, but it was. Georgie appreciated order and her life following the army had taught her to appreciate the well-managed life. Especially when her relationship with her husband had been anything but reliable.

  “Perhaps,” Georgie allowed. “Though I do still think it’s a remarkably ugly painting.”

  Shuddering, she asked, “Does it say who the artist is?”

  “I’m afraid that would be me,” said a male voice from behind them. A male voice she recognized.” And I agree, it’s a dreadful painting.”

  Georgina stifled a very unladylike curse before turning to greet the newcomer. Just as she’d known he would be, the Earl of Coniston stood behind them, one supercilious brow raised in amusement.

  He had been betrothed to her friend Perdita for a few short weeks earlier in the year, and during that time, Georgie had been forced to endure his company despite her dislike of him. He’d been good enough to Perdita—had even agreed to her dissolution of the betrothal without a fuss when she realized she wasn’t ready to marry again so soon after her husband’s death—but from what Georgie could tell, he was the very sort of dissolute, devil-may-care nobleman that she’d come to dislike during her time following the army. Especially given that the officers had often been handed their positions by dint of money and birth while the enlisted men under them were forced to do the real work.

  And, perhaps sensing her dislike, Coniston, or Con as he was called by his friends, had found great delight in teasing her whenever they were in company together.

  It was just Georgie’s luck that he was her employer’s favorite nephew, and would therefore be underfoot for her near future at the very least.

  “Lord Coniston,” she said, masking her dismay with a smile, “what a surprise to find you here.”

  “Not so surprising, surely, Mrs. Mowbray,” her nemesis said with a grin. “After all, you must have penned the invitations for my aunt for her house party this week.”

  “I meant,” she said, maintaining her poise, “this gallery, of course, not the city of Bath.” It was just like him to deliberately misunderstand her.

  Unchastened, he raised his brows. “Do you mean you think me such a cultureless fribble that I could not possibly have business in such a place? For shame, Mrs. Mowbray. Surely, I have made a better impression upon you than that.”

  “As a matter of fact,” Georgie began, before she was interrupted by Lettice. To her shame, Georgie had forgotten her friend was even there, such was the power of Coniston to overwhelm her good sense.

  “Do introduce me to your friend, Georgina,” Lettice said, her eyes alight with interest as she took in Coniston’s good looks and Georgie’s discomfort in his presence.

  Reluctantly, Georgie said, “Lord Coniston, this is my friend Mrs. Lettice Stowe. We followed the drum together.” Turning to Lettice, whose grin alerted Georgie to her amusement at the situation, she said, “Lettice, this is Lord Coniston, the nephew of my employer, Lady Russell.”

  She would have liked to find fault in Coniston’s reception of her friend, but Georgie was forced to admit that his bow and expression of pleasure at making the acquaintance were all that was proper.

  “What is it you dislike about this painting, my lord?” Lettice asked, returning them to their s
urroundings. “I should be interested to hear your opinion of it.”

  A dark curl brushed his brow, giving the earl a boyish air. “Where to begin, Mrs. Stowe?” he said gravely. “There are so many things wrong with it that I don’t quite know which to condemn first. I will say, however, that it is obviously one of the artist’s earlier works and doubtless he would prefer it to never be seen in public again.

  “I have told the owners of the gallery to remove it many a time,” he continued. “But they ignore my pleas to spare the good people of Bath from the horror of it.”

  Suddenly, a memory of her employer saying something about her nephew winkled its way into Georgie’s consciousness. Closing her eyes, she bit her lip in frustration. Of course.

  “It is yours, isn’t it?” she asked the earl in a flat tone. He’d overheard her criticizing his work. He’d never let her hear the end of it.

  To his credit, Coniston did not attempt to capitalize on her embarrassment. “It is indeed, I am sorry to say,” he admitted. “I gave it to a friend as a joke years ago, and the beastly fellow sold it to this gallery. Every time I come to Bath I attempt to buy it back from the owners but they refuse, claiming it’s one of their most popular display pieces.”

  Georgie couldn’t help but sympathize with him. “How unfortunate,” she said, looking once more at the hideous face of Cleopatra. “You have become a much better artist since you painted this,” she added, thinking how mortified she would be if one of her sewing samplers, which were truly awful, were to be hung up next to someone else’s neat and tiny stitching. “The landscape in your aunt’s sitting room is particularly fine.”

  Coniston gave her a puzzled look, as if he weren’t quite sure what to think of her when she was being generous with him. Georgie felt a tug of shame. Had she really been so difficult with him? she wondered.

  “It’s not so bad as all that,” Lettice said, again reminding Georgie of her presence. “I was just telling Georgie that—”

  But before she could finish, they were interrupted by another gentleman.