Her Valentine's Secret: A Georgian Romance, #2

By Beverley Oakley

A beautiful French emigree in London in the aftermath of the French Revolution is torn between her heart's desire and her desire for justice...

Lady Athelton's St Valentine's Ball is a place for love, not vengeance.

 

But when the gentlemen of the ton select their partner for the evening from a silver bowl of ladies' names, the once-carefree Lisette uses the opportunity to settle old scores.

 

In an accident of chance – or design - Lucien Monteil, handsome Vicomte and darling of post-revolutionary France, is the man with whom Lisette is to spend the evening.

 

He is also the man who betrayed her father, sending him to the guillotine.

 

And the man who stole her heart so many years ago.

Now Lisette must fight the rising tide of her passions, torn between her heart's desire and her desire for justice.

Read this exciting tale of betrayal, love, and second chances, and be transported to an age of danger, excitement and honor!

• Language: English
• Publisher: Beverley Oakley
• Release date: Jun 14, 2019
• ISBN: 9781386402008

Beverley Oakley

Beverley Oakley was seventeen when she bundled up her first her 500+ page romance and sent it to a publisher. Unfortunately drowning her heroine on the last page was apparently not in line with the expectations of romance readers so Beverley became a journalist. Twenty-six years later Beverley was delighted to receive her first publishing contract from Robert Hale (UK) for a romance in which she ensured her heroine was saved from drowning in the icy North Sea. Since 2009 Beverley has written more than thirteen historical romances, mostly set in England during the early nineteenth century. Mystery, intrigue and adventure spill from their pages and if she can pull off a thrilling race to save someone’s honour – or a worthy damsel from the noose – it’s time to celebrate with a good single malt Scotch. Beverley lives with her husband, two daughters and a Rhodesian Ridgeback puppy the size of a pony opposite a picturesque nineteenth century lunatic asylum. She also writes Africa-set adventure-filled romances tarring handsome bush pilot heroes, and historical romances with less steam and more sexual tension, as Beverley Eikli.

Book preview

Her Valentine’s Secret

Her Valentine’s Secret

Beverley Oakley

Sani Publishing

Copyright © 2019 by Beverley Oakley

All rights reserved.

No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

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Contents

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

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Chapter 1

M y love, he has come. James’s breath chilled Lisette’s cheek, his urgent murmur forcing her to turn her head in the direction he indicated.

Lucien Monteil.

Older and more handsome than she remembered. Devastatingly so.

With a shiver of anticipation, she touched the locket concealed below the line of her bodice, and steeled herself to betray no emotion as her cousin rose from his ironic bow and melted into the sumptuously dressed crowd. James had alerted her to their quarry, yet there’d been no danger she might fail to recognize Lucien. In seven years, he’d had not changed. It was she who was now unrecognizable.

The Vicomte de Monteil grows handsomer by the year. The dowager to whom Lisette was speaking followed her gaze to the landing halfway up the sweeping staircase where, with one elegant hand upon the banister, the young vicomte had paused to rake the occupants of the ballroom with his cool gray eyes.

You have met him? With an effort, Lisette maintained her public smile—light, amused, deferential—as she went on to compliment the latest addition to their group, young Madame Pasquier, on her feathered headdress, before nodding at the flirtatious and possibly inebriated Comtesse de Silvain, who raised her champagne coupe as she passed by on the arm of an ageing British Rear Admiral.

Lord Athelton’s ballroom was bursting with French émigrés tonight. They were easy to spot amongst the English. They possessed a certain style, a sophistication and elegance in their dress and manner, though it was not that alone which set them apart. There was, too, an edge to their gaiety—those who’d chosen gaiety as their façade. A more diligent observer would have noticed in some the fragility of a smile; the haunted look in the eyes of others for whom pleasure-seeking was a recourse against the violence and blood-letting they’d so narrowly escaped. Lisette did her best to conceal such signs, but the memories of what she had lost were always with her.

It was why she was here tonight.

Alas, a desire as yet unfulfilled, replied the dowager with a disappointed moué, before Madame Pasquier took up the adoring refrain Lisette was weary of hearing.

There he is talking to the Duc de Joubert. Monteil saved his life, you know. But then, of course you do. She fanned herself rapidly as she added with a sigh, And I see Monsieur and Madame Lafour are discreetly awaiting an opportunity for an audience. I believe he diverted the tumbrel taking them to Madame La Guillotine and put them on a boat to England. He is deserving of the gratitude he receives.

And the title and enormous riches he has since acquired. Lisette tried to keep the acid from her tone before downing her champagne to hide her outrage. Monteil’s reputation as a hero of the revolution only added injury to insult, when she knew the truth of his villainy. His perfidy. She toyed with her crystal glass. I knew him when I was still a child. She cleared her throat, adding, When he was penniless.

Madame Pasquier’s eyes flashed with excitement. She tilted her head enquiringly. Was he as handsome and noble then?

Lisette was familiar with such signs of excitement when the vicomte’s name was mentioned. The girl’s cheeks were suddenly flushed, and her intake of breath pushed up her breasts beneath the sheer fabric of her daring Empire-line dress.

Scandalous, her own mother would have said just years before. But that was another age, another lifetime ago. The new millennium that had ushered in such fashions—"and an uneasy peace—seemed a world away from the heavy brocades and corsetry of the previous century.

Just as Lisette’s new life under her distant cousin James’s protection was a world away from the security, comfort, and wealth she’d known living with her mother and father in the ancient family chateau near Lyons.

Was he always so handsome? Lisette repeated the question as if weighing up her reply. I thought so when I was thirteen. It was still difficult to speak of the past. He worked for my family. Out of the corner of her eye, she watched Lucien’s progress as he wove his