Praise for Lisa Kleypas:

‘Kleypas launches the Friday Harbour trilogy with a delightful portrait of a picturesque town where people know everything about everyone and look out for each other… She enchantingly weaves together additional connections with relatives and friends, leaving many dangling threads that will lead the reader straight to book two’ Publishers Weekly

‘Flawlessly written… Kleypas brings together richly nuanced characters, an emotionally riveting plot, and a subtle touch of the paranormal to create an unforgettable romance that is pure reading magic’ Booklist

‘Magical’ RT Book Reviews

Lisa Kleypas is the author of a number of historical and contemporary romance novels that have been published in fourteen languages. In 1985, she was named Miss Massachusetts and competed in the Miss America pageant in Atlantic City. After graduating from Wellesley College with a political science degree, she published her first novel at age twenty-one. Her books have appeared on the New York Times bestseller lists. Lisa is married and has two children.

Visit Lisa Kleypas online:

www.lisakleypas.com 

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Also by Lisa Kleypas

Crystal Cove

Dream Lake

Rainshadow Road

Christmas Eve at Friday Harbour

Seduce Me at Sunrise

Mine Till Midnight

The Wallflower Series

A Wallflower Christmas

Scandal in Spring

Devil in Winter

It Happened One Autumn

Secrets of a Summer Night

The Travis Family Series

Sugar Daddy

Blue-Eyed Devil

Smooth Talking Stranger

Brown-Eyed Girl

COPYRIGHT

Published by Piatkus

978-0-3494-0761-6

All characters and events in this publication, other than those clearly in the public domain, are fictitious and any resemblance to real persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.

Copyright © 2015 by Lisa Kleypas

The moral right of the author has been asserted.

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, without the prior permission in writing of the publisher.

The publisher is not responsible for websites (or their content) that are not owned by the publisher.

PIATKUS

Little, Brown Book Group

Carmelite House

50 Victoria Embankment

London, EC4Y 0DZ

www.littlebrown.co.uk

www.hachette.co.uk

To my wonderful and gifted editor, Carrie Feron –

thank you for making my dreams come true!

Love always,

L.K.

Chapter 1

Hampshire, England

August 1875

“The devil knows why my life should be ruined,” Devon Ravenel said grimly, “all because a cousin I never liked fell from a horse.”

“Theo didn’t fall, precisely,” his younger brother, Weston, replied. “He was thrown.”

“Obviously the horse found him as insufferable as I did.” Devon paced around the receiving room in restless, abbreviated strides. “If Theo hadn’t already broken his damned neck, I’d like to go and break it for him.”

West sent him a glance of exasperated amusement. “How can you complain when you’ve just inherited an earldom that confers an estate in Hampshire, lands in Norfolk, a house in London —”

“All entailed. Forgive my lack of enthusiasm for land and properties that I’ll never own and can’t sell.”

“You may be able to break the entailment, depending on how it was settled. If so, you could sell everything and be done with it.”

“God willing.” Devon glanced at a bloom of mold in the corner with disgust. “No one could reasonably expect me to live here. The place is a shambles.”

This was the first time either of them had ever set foot in Eversby Priory, the ancestral family domain built over the remains of a monastic residence and church. Although Devon had become ennobled shortly after his cousin’s death three months ago, he had waited as long as possible before facing the mountain of problems he now confronted.

So far he had seen only this room and the entrance hall, the two areas that were supposed to impress visitors the most. The rugs were worn, the furniture threadbare, the plaster wall moldings dingy and cracked. None of this boded well for the condition of the rest of the house.

“It needs refurbishing,” West admitted.

“It needs to be razed to the ground.”

“It’s not so bad —” West broke off with a yelp as his foot began to sink into a depression in the rug. He hopped away and stared at the bowl-shaped indentation. “What the deuce…?”

Devon bent and lifted the corner of the rug to reveal a rotting hole in the flooring beneath. Shaking his head, he dropped the rug back into place and went to a window fitted with diamond-shaped panes. The lead came that joined the window glass was corroded, the hinges and fittings rusted.

“Why hasn’t that been repaired?” West asked.

“For want of money, obviously.”

“But how could that be? The estate comes with twenty thousand acres. All those tenants, the annual yields —”

“Estate farming is no longer profitable.”

“In Hampshire?”

Devon sent him a dark glance before returning his attention to the view. “Anywhere.”

The Hampshire scenery was green and bucolic, neatly divided by bottle-green hedgerows in bloom. However, somewhere beyond the cheerful huddles of thatched-roof cottages and the fertile tracts of chalk down and ancient woodland, thousands of miles of steel track were being laid out for an onslaught of locomotive engines and railcars. All across England, new factories and mill towns had begun to appear faster than hazel catkins in the spring. It had been Devon’s bad luck to inherit a title just as a tide of industry was sweeping away aristocratic traditions and entitled modes of living.

“How do you know?” his brother asked.

“Everyone knows, West. Grain prices have collapsed. When did you last read an issue of the Times? Have you paid no attention to the discussions at the club or the taverns?”

“Not when the subject was farming,” came West’s dour reply. He sat heavily, rubbing his temples. “I don’t like this. I thought we had agreed never to be serious about anything.”

“I’m trying. But death and poverty have a way of making everything seem rather less amusing.” Leaning his forehead against the windowpane, Devon said morosely, “I’ve always enjoyed a comfortable life without having to perform a single day of honest labor. Now I have responsibilities.” He said the word as if it were a profanity.

“I’ll help you think of ways to avoid them.” Rummaging in his coat, West pulled a silver flask from an inside pocket. He uncapped it and took a long swallow.

Devon’s brows lifted. “Isn’t it a bit early for that? You’ll be stewed by noon.”

“Yes, but it won’t happen unless I start now.” West tilted the flask again.

The habits of self-indulgence, Devon reflected with concern, were catching up with his younger brother. West was a tall and handsome man of four-and-twenty, with a wily intelligence that he preferred to use as seldom as possible. In the past year, an excess of strong drink had lent a ruddy cast to West’s cheeks, and softened his neck and waistline. Although Devon had made a point of never interfering in his brother’s affairs, he wondered if he should mention something about his swilling. No, West would only resent the unwanted advice.

After replacing the flask in his coat, West steepled his hands and regarded Devon over the tips of his fingers. “You need to acquire capital, and sire an heir. A rich wife would solve both problems.”

Devon blanched. “You know I’ll never marry.” He understood his limitations: He wasn’t meant to be a husband or father. The idea of repeating the travesty of his childhood, with himself in the role of the cruel and indifferent parent, made his skin crawl. “When I die,” he continued, “you’re next in line.”

“Do you actually believe I’ll outlive you?” West asked. “With all my vices?”

“I have just as many.”

“Yes, but I’m far more enthusiastic about mine.”

Devon couldn’t hold back a wry laugh.

No one could have foreseen that the two of them, from a far-flung branch of the Ravenels, would be the last in a lineage that could be traced back to the Norman Conquest. Unfortunately, Ravenels had always been too hot-blooded and impulsive. They yielded to every temptation, indulged in every sin, and scorned every virtue, with the result that they tended to die faster than they could reproduce.

Now there were only two left.

Although Devon and West were wellborn, they had never been part of the peerage, a world so rarefied that the highest levels were impermeable even for minor gentry. Devon knew little of the complex rules and rituals that distinguished aristocrats from the common masses. What he did know was that the Eversby estate was no windfall, but a trap. It could no longer generate enough income to sustain itself. It would devour the modest annual income from his trust, crush him, and then it would finish off his brother.

“Let the Ravenels come to an end,” Devon said. “We’re a bad lot and always have been. Who will care if the earldom goes extinct?”

“The servants and tenants might object to losing their incomes and homes,” West said dryly.

“They can all go hang. I’ll tell you how what’s to be done: First I’ll send Theo’s widow and sisters packing; they’re of no use to me.”

“Devon —” he heard his brother say uneasily.

“Then I’ll find a way to break the entailment, split the estate apart, and sell it piecemeal. If that’s not possible, I’ll strip the house of everything valuable, tear it down, and sell the stone —”

“Devon.” West gestured to the doorway, where a small, slim woman veiled in black stood at the threshold.

Theo’s widow.

She was the daughter of Lord Carbery, an Irish peer who owned a stud farm in Glengarrif. She had been married to Theo only three days before he had died. Such tragedy coming on the heels of a customarily joyful event must have been a cruel shock. As one of the last few members of a dwindling family, Devon supposed he should have sent her a letter of sympathy when Theo’s accident had occurred. But somehow the thought had never translated into action, only stayed in his mind like a bit of lint caught on a coat lapel.

Perhaps Devon might have forced himself to send condolences if he hadn’t despised his cousin so much. Life had favored Theo in many ways, gifting him with wealth, privilege, and handsomeness. But instead of being grateful for his good fortune, Theo had always been smug and superior. A bully. Since Devon had never been able to overlook an insult or provocation, he had ended up brawling with Theo whenever they were together. It would have been a lie to say he was sorry that he would never see his cousin again.

As for Theo’s widow, she had no need of sympathy. She was young and childless, and she had a jointure, which would make it easy for her to marry again. Although she was reputed to be a beauty, it was impossible to judge; a heavy black veil obscured her in a mist of gloom. One thing was certain: After what she had just overheard, she must think Devon despicable.

He didn’t give a damn.

As Devon and West bowed, the widow responded with a perfunctory curtsy. “Welcome, my lord. And Mr. Ravenel. I will provide a list of the household inventory as soon as possible, so that you may loot and pillage in an organized fashion.” Her voice was refined, the cut-glass syllables frosted with dislike.

Devon watched alertly as she came farther into the room. Her figure was too slender for his taste, wandlike in the heft of mourning clothes. But there was something riveting about her controlled movement, a subtle volatility contained within stillness.

“My condolences for your loss,” he said.

“My congratulations for your gain.”

Devon frowned. “I assure you, I never wanted your husband’s title.”

“It’s true,” West said. “He complained about it all the way from London.”

Devon sent his brother a damning glance.

“The butler, Sims, will be available to show you the house and grounds at your leisure,” the widow said. “Since I am, as you remarked, of no use to you, I will retire to my room and begin to pack.”

“Lady Trenear,” Devon said curtly, “we seem to have started off on bad footing. I apologize if I’ve given offense.”

“No need to apologize, my lord. Such remarks are no less than what I expected of you.” She continued before Devon could reply. “May I ask how long you intend to stay at Eversby Priory?”

“Two nights, I expect. At dinner, perhaps you and I could discuss —”

“I’m afraid my sisters-in-law and I will not be able to dine with you. We are overset by grief, and shall take our meals separately.”

“Countess —”

Ignoring him, she left the room without another word. Without even a curtsy.

Stunned and outraged, Devon stared at the empty doorway with narrowed eyes. Women never treated him with such contempt. He felt his temper threatening to break loose. How the hell could she hold him at fault for the situation when he’d had no choice in any of it?

“What did I do to deserve that?” he demanded.

West’s mouth twitched. “Aside from saying you were going to cast her out and destroy her home?”

“I apologized!”

“Never apologize to women. It only confirms that you were wrong, and incenses them further.”

Devon would be damned if he’d tolerate the insolence of a woman who should have been offering to help him, instead of heaping blame on his head. Widow or not, she was about to learn a much-needed lesson.

“I’m going to talk to her,” he said grimly.

Lifting his feet onto the upholstered settee, West stretched out and arranged a pillow beneath his head. “Wake me when it’s over.”

Devon left the receiving room and followed the widow with long, ground-eating strides. He caught a glimpse of her at the end of the hallway, her dress and veil rippling as she sped away like a pirate ship at full sail.

“Wait,” he called after her. “I didn’t mean what I said earlier.”

“You did mean it.” She stopped and whirled to face Devon in an abrupt motion. “You intend to destroy the estate, and your family legacy, all for your own selfish purposes.”

He stopped in front of her, his hands gripped into fists. “Look here,” he said coldly, “the most I’ve ever had to manage is a terrace apartment, a cookmaid, a valet, and one horse. And now I’m expected to look after a foundering estate with more than two hundred tenant farms. I would think that merits some consideration. Even sympathy.”

“Poor you. How trying it must be, how inconvenient, for you to have to think about someone other than yourself.”

With that parting jab, she tried to leave. However, she had stopped near an arched niche in the wall, intended for the display of statuary or art objects on pedestals.

Devon had her now. Deliberately he braced his hands on either side of the recess, blocking her retreat. He heard her breath catch, and – although he wasn’t proud of it – he felt a bolt of satisfaction at having unnerved her.

“Let me pass,” she said.

He didn’t move, keeping her captive. “First tell me your name.”

“Why? I would never give you leave to use it.”

Exasperated, he studied her shrouded form. “Has it occurred to you that we have more to gain from mutual cooperation than hostility?”

“I’ve just lost my husband and my home. What precisely do I have to gain, my lord?”

“Perhaps you should find out before you decide to make an enemy of me.”

“You were the enemy before you ever set foot here.”

Devon found himself straining to see through the veil. “Must you wear that blasted head covering?” he asked irritably. “It’s like conversing with a lampshade.”

“It’s called a weeping veil, and yes, I must wear it in the presence of a visitor.”

“I’m not a visitor, I’m your cousin.”

“Only by marriage.”

As he contemplated her, Devon felt his temper begin to subside. How small she was, as fragile and quick as a sparrow. He gentled his tone. “Come, don’t be stubborn. There’s no need to wear the veil around me unless you’re literally weeping, in which case I would insist that you put it back down immediately. I can’t abide a woman crying.”

“Because you’re secretly soft-hearted?” she asked sarcastically.

A distant memory stung him, one he hadn’t allowed himself to think about in years. He tried to shake it off, but his mind stubbornly retained the image of himself as a boy of five or six, sitting at the closed door of his mother’s dressing room, agitated by the sounds of weeping on the other side. He didn’t know what had made her cry, but it had undoubtedly been a failed love affair, of which there had been many. His mother had been a renowned beauty who often fell in and out of love in a single night. His father, exhausted by her caprices and driven by his own demons, had rarely been at home. Devon remembered the suffocating helplessness of listening to her sob but not being able to reach her. He had settled for pushing handkerchiefs under the door, begging her to open it, asking repeatedly what was wrong.

“Dev, you’re sweet,” she had said through her sniffles. “All little boys are. But then you all grow up to be so selfish and cruel. You were born to break women’s hearts.”

“I won’t, Mummy,” he had cried in alarm. “I promise I won’t.”

He had heard a laughing sob, as if he’d said something foolish. “Of course you will, poppet. You’ll do it without even trying.”

The scene had been repeated on other occasions, but that was the one Devon remembered most clearly.

As it had turned out, his mother had been right. Or at least, he’d often been accused of breaking women’s hearts. But he had always made it clear that he had no intention of marrying. Even if he fell in love, he would never make that kind of promise to a woman. There was no reason for it, when any promise could be broken. Having experienced the pain that people who loved each other could inflict, he had no desire to do that to anyone.

His attention returned to the woman in front of him. “No, I’m not soft-hearted,” he said in answer to her question. “In my opinion, a woman’s tears are manipulative and even worse, unattractive.”

“You,” she said with certainty, “are the vilest man I have ever met.”

Devon was amused by the way she enunciated every word as if it had been shot from a bow. “How many men have you met?”

“Enough to recognize a wicked one when I see him.”

“I doubt you can see much of anything through this veil.” He reached out to finger the edge of the black gauze. “You can’t possibly like to wear it.”

“As a matter of fact, I do.”

“Because it hides your face when you cry,” he said rather than asked.

“I never cry.”

Taken aback, Devon wondered if he had heard her correctly. “You mean not since your husband’s accident?”

“Not even then.”

What kind of woman would say such a thing, even if it were true? Devon gripped the front of the veil and began to hike it upward. “Hold still.” He pushed handfuls of the crepe back over the little headpiece that anchored it. “No, don’t pull away. The two of us are going to stand face-to-face and attempt a civilized conversation. Good God, you could rig a merchant ship with all this —”

Devon broke off as her face was uncovered. He found himself staring into a pair of amber eyes that tilted at the outer corners in a catlike slant. For a moment he couldn’t breathe, couldn’t think, while all his senses struggled to take her in.

He had never seen anything like her.

She was younger than he had expected, with a fair complexion and auburn hair that looked too heavy for its pins. A set of wide, pronounced cheekbones and a narrow jaw imparted an exquisite feline triangularity to her features. The curves of her lips were so full that even when she pressed them together tightly, as she was doing now, they still looked soft. Although she was not conventionally beautiful, she was so original that it rendered the question of beauty inconsequential.

Her mourning dress was slim and tightly fitted from the neck to the hips before flaring into a series of complex pleats. A man could only guess at the figure encased in all that boning and ruching and intricate stitching. Even her wrists and hands were obscured by black gloves. Aside from her face, the only visible skin was at her throat, where the front of her high collar parted with a U-shaped notch. He could see the vulnerable movement of her swallow. It looked so very soft, that private place, where a man might press his lips and feel the rhythm of her pulse.

He wanted to start there, kissing her throat, while he undressed her like an intricately wrapped gift until she was gasping and squirming beneath him. If she were any other woman, and they had found themselves in any other circumstances, Devon would have seduced her on the spot. Realizing that it would not do to stand there gaping a landed trout, he searched through his hot, disordered thoughts for some conventional remark, something coherent.

To his surprise, she was the first to break the silence. “My name is Kathleen.”

An Irish name. “Why do you have no accent?”

“I was sent to England as a child, to live with family friends in Leominster.”

“Why?”

A frown knit between her winged brows. “My parents were very much occupied with their horses. They spent several months of each year in Egypt to purchase Arabian bloodstock for their farm. I was… an inconvenience. Their friends Lord and Lady Berwick, who were also horse people, offered to take me in and raise me with their two daughters.”

“Do your parents still live in Ireland?”

“My mother has passed away, but my father is still there.” Her gaze turned distant, her thoughts chasing elsewhere. “He sent Asad to me as a wedding present.”

“Asad,” Devon repeated, puzzled.

Refocusing on him, Kathleen looked perturbed, color sweeping from her neck to her hairline.

Then Devon understood. “The horse that threw Theo,” he said quietly.

“It wasn’t Asad’s fault. He was so badly trained that my father bought him back from the man who had originally purchased him.”

“Why give a problem horse to you?”

“Lord Berwick often allowed me to help him train the young colts.”

Devon ran a deliberate glance over her fine-boned frame. “You’re no bigger than a sparrow.”

“One doesn’t use brute force to train an Arabian. They’re a sensitive breed – they require understanding and skill.”

Two things that Theo had lacked. How bloody stupid he had been to risk his neck and a valuable animal along with it.

“Did Theo do it on a lark?” Devon couldn’t resist asking. “Was he trying to show off?”

A glint of searing emotion appeared in those luminous eyes before it was quickly extinguished. “He was in a temper. He wouldn’t be dissuaded.”

That was a Ravenel for you.

If anyone had ever dared to contradict Theo, or refuse him anything, it had ignited an explosion. Perhaps Kathleen had thought she could manage him, or that time would mellow him. She couldn’t have known that a Ravenel’s temper usually outweighed any sense of self-preservation. Devon would have liked to consider himself above that sort of thing, but he had succumbed to it more than once in the past, throwing himself into the volcanic pit of consuming fury. It always felt glorious until one had to face the consequences.

Kathleen folded her arms tightly, each small, black-gloved hand forming a clamp around the opposite elbow. “Some people said I should have had Asad put down after the accident. But it would be cruel, and wrong, to punish him for something that wasn’t his fault.”

“Have you considered selling him?”

“I wouldn’t want to. But even if I did, I would have to retrain him first.”

Devon doubted the wisdom of allowing Kathleen anywhere near a horse that had just killed her husband, albeit inadvertently. And in all likelihood, she wouldn’t be able to stay at Eversby Priory long enough to make any progress with the Arabian.

However, now wasn’t the time to point that out.

“I’d like to see the grounds,” he said. “Will you walk with me?”

Looking perturbed, Kathleen retreated a half step. “I’ll arrange for the head gardener to show them to you.”

“I would prefer you.” Devon paused before asking deliberately, “You’re not afraid of me, are you?”

Her brows rushed downward. “Certainly not.”

“Then walk with me.”

Ignoring his proffered arm, she slid him a wary glance. “Shall we invite your brother?”

Devon shook his head. “He’s napping.”

“At this hour of the day? Is he ill?”

“No, he keeps the schedule of a cat. Long hours of slumber interrupted by brief periods of self-grooming.”

He saw the corners of her lips deepen with reluctant amusement. “Come, then,” she murmured, brushing by him to walk briskly along the hallway, and he followed without hesitation.