Willing

Don’t miss Susan Johnson’s

sensationally romantic new novel

WHEN YOU LOVE SOMEONE.

Published this month by Brava.

A short time later, Julius and Amanda dismounted before the house and were met at the door by a young manservant.

“The Marquis of Darley and Lady Bloodworth,” Julius said. “Come to see Lord and Lady Grafton.”

“I’ll see if my lord and lady are in.”

“No need. We’re old friends,” Julius had no intention of being turned away. He gestured the man forward.

The servant had no choice, of course, as Julius well knew.

Moments later, the flunkey opened the drawing room door and announced their names.

Lady Grafton looked up from penning a letter and went pale.

Taking note of their hostess’ stunned look, Amanda quickly said, “I thought I’d take the opportunity to call on you, Lady Grafton.” Advancing into the drawing room with a warm smile, she added, “My family has a race box in Newmarket. I believe you know the marquis.” She glanced at Julius who had followed her in. “I hope we’re not intruding.”

“No—that is…my husband is at the stables. I’ll have him summoned.” Elspeth turned to her maid as she rose to meet her guests, high color having replaced her pallor. “Sophie, have Lord Grafton called in.”

“No need to interrupt his lordship,” Amanda smoothly interposed. “We won’t stay long. We were out for a ride and found ourselves near your house.”

“I’m sure Lord Grafton would like to see you,” Elspeth countered, signaling her maid to fetch the earl. She couldn’t chance he’d find out later that she’d had guests without his permission. “Would you like tea?” It was impossible not to observe the social graces, although she found herself hoping her visitors might refuse.

“That would be lovely,” Amanda replied with a smile.

“Sophie, tea as well,” Elspeth ordered, trying to avoid eye contact with the marquis. She could feel her cheeks flushing with embarrassment. Or excitement. Or something else entirely.

“What a lovely view,” Amanda exclaimed, walking over to the row of windows overlooking a bucolic vista of green fields and grazing horses. “Do you have a favorite mount you like to ride?”

Whether intentionally or unwittingly, Amanda’s words incited an outrageously lewd image. Struggling to displace her wholly inappropriate thoughts, Elspeth found herself at a loss for words.

Aware of Lady Grafton’s overlong silence, Julius smoothly interposed, “I’ve been trying to persuade Lady Grafton to take Skylark out for a ride.”

Amanda spun around. “Skylark? You’ll absolutely adore him! He’s powerful and swift, yet gentle as a lamb. Tell her, Julius, how he took me over ten miles at top speed without even breathing hard.”

“He has enormous staying power. It’s characteristic of the Atlas Barb breed. You’d enjoy trying him out, Lady Grafton.”

Elspeth tried not to misinterpret the marquis’s comments. Get a grip, she told herself. Everyone was simply discussing horses and she was reacting like an agitated adolescent to the most benign remarks. “If it were possible, I’m sure I’d enjoy riding Skylark, my lord. However, we lead a quiet life since my husband’s illness. But thank you for the offer. Won’t you sit down,” she politely offered when she would have preferred pushing her guests out the door and avoiding any further complications. From her husband and otherwise.

“Oh, look!” Amanda exclaimed, gazing out the window. “The most precious basket of violets! I adore violets!” Contriving a moment alone for Julius, she opened the terrace door and stepped outside to inspect the willow basket on the balustrade.

“Why did you come?” Elspeth hissed the second Amanda closed the door behind her. “I’m sorry—how rude…please forgive me,” she stammered, blushing furiously at her graceless behavior. “I shouldn’t have said—I mean…I don’t know what came—”

“I couldn’t stay away.” Uncharacteristically blunt words for the marquis who only played at love. And if Grafton wasn’t about to appear at any moment, Julius would have taken her in his arms and kissed away her trepidation.

“You shouldn’t have come. He might—that is…you don’t understand my…situation.” Nervously surveying the door to the hallway, Elspeth visibly trembled. “My husband”—she took a sustaining breath—“is very difficult.”

“I’m sorry.” She was so obviously alarmed he felt a twinge of conscience—a rarity for him. This frightened child was clearly not equipped to undertake any amorous games. He shouldn’t have come. “I’ll fetch Amanda and we’ll be on our way,” he offered, moving toward the terrace door.

“No.”

It was the merest whisper. His pulse quickened despite his newfound conscience and he turned back.

“God help me—for not having more restraint,” she breathed, her hands clasped tightly to still their tremors. “I shouldn’t be talking to you or even thinking what I’m thinking or—”

“Will your husband be here soon?”

She nodded, a jerky, skittish movement.

“We’ll talk later, then,” he calmly said when he wasn’t feeling calm in the least. When he was contemplating taking the lovely Lady Grafton to bed and keeping her there until he’d had his fill or couldn’t move or both. “Please, sit down.” Offering her a chair with a wave of his hand, he swiftly walked to the windows, knocked on a pane and beckoned Amanda in. Turning back, he smiled. “Don’t be nervous,” he gently said. “Relax. We’re just here on a friendly visit. Tell me something about your father’s parish. I understand he was a vicar.”

The marquis’s voice was incredibly soothing, as though they were indeed friends. She felt an instant lessening of her anxiety. “I suppose you do this all the time,” she murmured, taking a seat. “Rumor has it, you’re—”

“I never do this,” he said. In fact, the mindless craving he was experiencing was so outré, he thought he might still be feeling the aftereffects of last night’s drink. Taking a seat a respectable distance away, he added with almost an unbecoming brusqueness, “You affect me in a most unusual way.”

Have a look at MaryJanice Davidson’s

hilariously romantic novella

“Cuffs and Coffee Breaks” in

VALENTINE’S DAY IS KILLING ME.

Available now from Brava.

“W ell, this is it.” Julie Kay tossed her keys on the kitchen counter. “Home sweet hell.”

“It’s nice,” he commented, glancing around the small house she rented from her brother-in-law. “I used to live in Inver, back when I was a student at the U.”

“Yeah, what, six weeks ago?”

“Oh, you’re hilarious.”

“I hate apartments. I always feel like a bee in a hive. So when my brother-in-law moved into a bigger place, he let me rent this one. It’s worked out for everyone.”

“Mmm.” Scott was prowling around the living room and dining area like a big, brunette panther. “I have an apartment, and I know what you mean. But I’m almost never there.”

“Where are you?”

“Work, usually. That’s why I was really glad when you decided to go out with me. I mean, I have no social life.”

“But you’re so…” Gorgeous. Delicious. Fabulous. Tall. “…smart.”

He shrugged. “I was always the tallest kid in my class, and the skinniest. But I was bad at sports. So who’d want to go out with a big gork like me?”

Oh, I dunno, anyone with half a brain?

“Uh, let me see if I can find something better than my old cardigan.” She turned to go into her bedroom, but he came up behind her and put a hand on her shoulder, gently turning her around.

“It’s fine,” he said. “It’s the least of my problems, believe me. What the hell am I going to do about that poor guy at the restaurant?”

“Uh…well, I…uh…” Blue eyes were filling her world, her universe. They were getting closer and closer. There was nothing else: no house, no living room, no cardigan, no dead guy.

She felt his lips on hers and she put her arms around him—she could hardly reach, his shoulders were so broad. Her mouth opened beneath his and his tongue touched hers, tentatively and then with more assurance, licking her teeth and nibbling her lower lip. She pulled and the cardigan was on the floor, and her hands were running across his fine chest, and…

(Dead guy, dead guy!)

…she yanked herself away. “Stop that! This is totally inappropriate!”

“Hey, you kissed me.”

“I did not!” Oh, wait. Maybe she did. “Well, it doesn’t matter. This isn’t the time or place.”

“I know. That’s why I didn’t kiss you. Although, I have to say,” he added cheerfully, “I’ve been dying to all night. But you’re right, this isn’t the right time. Bad, sweetie.”

“Oh, like you were really fighting it!”

“It seemed rude to give you the brush-off,” he said, sounding wounded. “You know, me being a guest in your home and all.”

“Well, never mind that. Let’s stay focused. Put your sweater back on.”

“I didn’t take it off,” he grumbled, but did as she asked.

“Let’s figure this out. We have to be back there in fourteen hours. So, if you didn’t kill the guy—”

“Charley Ferrin.”

She gasped. “You know him?”

“No, no.” He held his hands up, palm out. “Calm down, don’t have a coronary.”

“I’ll have one if I damn well please!”

“It’s not like that. Detective Hobbes told me his name. I swear, I have no idea who he is. The name meant nothing to me.”

“Okay, okay.” She forced herself to calm down. He was right, this was no time to burst a blood vessel. “So, if you didn’t do it, who did? Who had a motive and could do it quick, and avoid the cops, and stick you with a murder charge?”

“Honey, I got nothin’. I’ve been trying to figure it out all night. I was minding my own business, waiting for you, and the next thing I know, I’m wearing handcuffs. And not in a good way.”

She felt the blood rush to her face as she pictured him cuffed to her headboard. “All right. Did you overhear any arguments? See anybody fighting? Anything weird at all?”

“No.”

“Come on. There must be something.”

He shook his head. “No. And no, and no. I told the cops all this already.”

“Well, now tell me,” she snapped.

“Don’t boss me!”

“I’ll boss you if I like! If it wasn’t for me, you’d still be rotting in jail!”

“The hell. My lawyer would have vouched for me.”

“Yeah, I could tell what a great job he did by the way it took him hours and hours to not show up.”

“Listen—mmph!”

She had kissed him again. What was wrong with her?

“Not that I mind,” he gasped, extricating himself from her grip, “but, again, don’t you think this is a little inappropriate? Given the circumstances?”

She got up to pace. “Of course it’s inappropriate—it’s nine kinds of inappropriate! What the hell is wrong with me?”

He opened his mouth, but she beat him to the punch. “I’ll tell you, it’s this fucking holiday! It’s killing me! It’s making me act in ways I would never normally act! God, I hate it, I hate it, I hate Valentine’s Day!”

Here’s a scintillating peek at Sylvia Day’s

“Stolen Pleasures”

in her new anthology

BAD BOYS AHOY.

Available February 2006 from Brava.

British West Indies, February 1813

H e’d stolen a bride.

Sebastian Blake gripped his knife with white-knuckled force and kept his face impassive. If the beauty in front of him was to be believed, he’d stolen his own bride.

He watched as her chin lifted with defiance and her dark eyes met his without fear. She was tall and slender with blond curls tumbling down from a once-stylish arrangement. Her lovely watered-silk dress was torn at the shoulder, revealing a tempting display of creamy breast. There was a sooty hand-print marring her flesh, and unable to stop himself, Sebastian reached out and rubbed the offending mark away with gentle strokes of his thumb. She stiffened and lifted her bound hands to knock his away. He met her gaze and held it.

“Tell me your name again,” he murmured, his hand tingling just from that simple contact with her satin skin.

She licked her bottom lip and his blood heated further. “My name is Olivia Blake, Countess of Merrick. My husband is Sebastian Blake, Earl of Merrick and future Marquis of Dunsmore.”

He lifted her hands and stared at her ring finger, noting his crest etched in the simple gold band she wore.

He scrubbed a hand over his face and turned away, striding to the nearest open window for a deep breath of salt-tinged air. Staring out at the water, he spied the debris from her ship bobbing in the waves. “Where is your husband, Lady Merrick?” he asked, keeping his back to her.

Hope tinged her voice. “He awaits me in London.”

“I see.” But he didn’t, not at all. “How long have you been married, my lady?”

“I fail to see—”

“How long?” he barked.

“Nearly two weeks.”

His chest expanded with a deep breath. “I remind you that we are in the West Indies, Lady Merrick. It is impossible that you were married only a fortnight ago. Your husband would not be able to await you in England if that were true.”

She was silent behind him and finally, he turned to face her again. It was a mistake to have done so. Her beauty hit him with the force of a fist in his gut.

“Would you care to explain?” he prodded, relieved he sounded so unaffected.

For the first time her bravado left her, her cheeks flushing with embarrassment. “We were married by proxy,” she confessed. “But I assure you, he will pay whatever ransom you desire despite the unusual circumstances of our marriage.”

Sebastian moved toward her. His calloused fingers caressed the elegant curve of her cheekbone and entwined in her hair. Her breath caught, and her lips parted in response to his gentle touch. “I’m certain he would pay a king’s ransom for beauty such as yours.”

Through the smoky smell that clung to her, he could detect the arousing scent of soft woman, warm and luxurious. He reached for the blade strapped to his thigh and withdrew it.

She flinched it away.

“Easy,” he soothed. Sebastian held out his hand and waited patiently for her to step forward again. When she did, he sliced through the rope that tied her hands together and sheathed his knife. He rubbed the marks on her delicate wrists.

“You are a pirate,” she murmured.

“Yes.”

“You have taken my father’s ship and all of its cargo.”

“I have.”

Her head tilted backward on the slender neck and she gazed up at him with melting chocolate eyes. “Why then are you being so kind to me, if you intended to rape me?”

He caught her fingers and placed them on his signet ring. “Most would say a man cannot rape his own wife.”

She glanced down and gasped at the heavy crest that mirrored her own band. Her eyes flew up to his. “Where did you get this? You can’t possibly…”

He smiled. “According to you, I am.”

Olivia stared up into the intense blue eyes and felt certain her heart would burst from her chest. Her mind faltered, stumbling over the shocking revelation that the notorious Captain Phoenix was claiming to be her husband.

She backed away from him in a rush, and he reached to steady her when she would have fallen. A whimper escaped as his touch burned her skin. The day’s events had shaken her, but it was the gorgeous face of the infamous pirate that made her weak-kneed.

Tall and broad shouldered, his presence sucked all of the air from the tight confines of the cabin. His black hair was unfashionably long and the darkness of his skin betrayed how much time he spent outdoors. He was wild, untamed—a man of the elements.

She’d watched, fascinated, as he’d swept onto her ship and took command of it within moments. Phoenix had executed the attack with brilliant precision—not one man was seriously injured and no one had been killed. Having spent most of her childhood on her father’s ships, Olivia recognized singular skill when she saw it.

The way he’d used his sword and barked commands, the way loose tendrils of his hair had blown across his face, the way his breeches delineated every stretch of his muscular thighs…she’d never experienced anything so thrilling. So exciting.

Until he’d touched her.

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Copyright © 2006 by Lucy Monroe

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