Chapter One

 The first time Jameson laid eyes on her, he was convinced she was an angel sent to earth to torment him.

It didn’t help that he was ensconced in Bath Abbey, shifting uncomfortably in the hard wooden pew as the priest droned on and on about redemption and forgiveness in the eyes of the Lord.

A topic with which Carrington assumed he would never be on a first name basis with the Lord on, judging from this personal history in the last few years.

As he shifted again, he caught sight of that tumble of blonde locks a few rows ahead of him, a head bowed reverentially in prayer. Moments later, the head came up and looked around, as though sensing his gaze boring in her back.

When he saw the piercing blue eyes, the porcelain skin, the hair like sunshine-kissed gold, Carrington’s breath caught in his throat, his groin tightening of its own accord.

He nearly choked a moment later when he saw who was seated beside the angelic woman – his old friend, Fitzwilliam Stafford, the Viscount of Carborough.

Could this heavenly creature be his wife? Or, even more impossibly, his little sister?

Surely not.

She was but a girl when he left on the campaigns…

Carrington was going to make it his mission to find out who she was, as soon as these bloody prayers were over.

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Carrington sped his footfalls towards the heavy wooden doors, his eyes locked on the back of Stafford, hoping to catch him before he alighted into his waiting carriage. “Stafford!” he called, and Fitzwilliam whirled around at his name. “Is that really you, old man?”

Stafford’s face broke into a wide smile. “Carrington?” he asked with an edge of incredulity. “Is that you? Are you back from the mainland, then, quite the hero?”

Carrington smiled, coming to stand next to one of his oldest friends. “Well, not sure about the hero part, but my return is true enough. How are you?”

Stafford grinned, slapping Carrington on the back warmly. “I’m well, I’m well. Are you in Bath for the whole Season?”

Carrington nodded. “At least until business calls me back to the north,” he said. “Are you here for the Season as well?”

Stafford nodded with an air of resignation. “Balls and parties every night, hoping we can escape with our lives intact, if not with a wife or two in tow,” he said with a wry grin.

Carrington nodded his agreement, his eyes drifting towards the blonde beauty at Stafford’s side, again marveling at her beauty, now even more stunning as he was only a few feet away. “But tell me, surely this isn’t… little Madeline?”

“I tend to prefer Lady Madeline,” she said tartly, but with a warm smile that belied her harsh tone. “I find being called little Madeline a bit damaging to my ego – and my reputation.”

Carrington grinned, for though she was much grown – but then he had been gone for years – she still had that sparkle in her eye and the easy smile he remembered from his youth, when he would visit Stafford at his estate, the two of them being followed around by that pesky younger sister.

That pesky younger sister had grown into a handsome woman indeed, he mused.

He did the math in his head – he was two and thirty, which made Madeline five and twenty? Or six and twenty? He realized with surprise that she was older than he thought, and wondered why she was at church with her brother, and not…

 “My apologies, Lady Madeline,” he said, putting an emphasis on her title. “It’s lovely to see you again after all these years. You are well grown,” he said, taking her proffered hand and pressing a kiss to the warm skin of her hand.

And then, he recoiled slightly.

She had a thin gold band on her ring finger.

The penny drops.

He silently chastised himself – he knew it was too much to ask that a beautiful creature like her be unattached, available for the first dance at the Marquess Cecil’s ball tonight.

“Still as charming as ever,” she said with a shy smile, withdrawing her hand slowly. “And I was afraid the campaigns would make you hard.”

Carrington nearly squeezed his eyes shut at her innocent words, picturing something else altogether even as he felt a heavy pressure in his trousers at her melodious voice.

And in a church, no less.

He truly was soulless.

Stafford, however, interrupted those forbidden thoughts and the flash of images that went with them in Carrington’s mind. “Are you going to the ball at Cecil’s this evening? We can catch up then?”

Carrington nodded his assent. “I’ll be in attendance. Perhaps the Lady Madeline will allow me the pleasure of a dance – if your husband doesn’t object.”

Madeline colored slightly, a rosy pink rising in her cheeks, a shiver working down her spine as a breeze kicked up around them, tousling a lock of hair from her neat bun and drifting across her cheek. “I…”

“We’ll see you tonight, Carrington. Come, Maddy, let’s get you out of this windy weather,” Stafford said, taking his sister’s elbow and walking her towards their carriage, waiting near the doors. “We’ll catch up then.”

Indeed we would, Carrington thought, puzzled by the Lady Madeline’s curious reaction to her husband’s mention.

Perhaps there was hope after all, he mused as he spun on his heel and walked swiftly towards his own waiting carriage.

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