Love For The Lady A Lord's Rules Regency Romance

By Charlotte Stone

Love is in the air Regency style. You will love this wonderful book filled with 2 parts of 2 different regency romances because it will leave you filled with love.
 

Dashing dukes, lavish ladies and enough romance to fill a season. Grab this amazing value book to be swept away by dashing dukes and handsome lords.

Four inspirational regency stories. Journey with these ladies as they choose the man of their dreams and find their happy ever after.
 

Part 1: Trapping The Duke

Part 2: The Earl of Huntingdon's Runaway

 

If you're a fan of clean regency romance, you will love this book.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Charlotte Stone
• Release date: Aug 12, 2020
• ISBN: 9781393914457

Charlotte Stone

In a near cynical world which we are currently living in, Charlotte finds comfort in the readings of Regency Romance writings, one of her favourite would be Laura Kinsale’s Flowers from the storm where the female character loves and saves the male lead character who is a stroke victim. It was such writings which inspired her to be an author herself. In Charlotte’s writings, the characters are able to see beyond the imperfections of each other and to accept and love one another, just the way one is. Isn’t this true of our inner self? To be able to find someone who is able to see the beauty in us, in spite of all imperfections we might have. Isn’t this true of what love really should be? Ever accepting, ever loving, ever seeking. May you find love and acceptance in Charlotte’s writings.

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Love For The Lady

a regency romance book

––––––––

CHARLOTTE  STONE

Copyright

Copyright © 2020 by

Charlotte Stone

All Rights reserved.

No part of this book may be reproduced, scanned, or distributed in any printed or electronic form without permission. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

*   *   *   *   *

Cover Style by  Sanja Gombar

www.bookcoverforyou.com

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Table of Contents

Copyright

Find Out More

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

Chapter 23

Chapter 24

Chapter 25

Chapter 26

Chapter 27

Chapter 28

Chapter 29

Chapter 30

Chapter 31

Chapter 32

Chapter 33

Chapter 34

Chapter 35

Chapter 36

Epilogue

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Publisher Notes

Trapping The Duke

chapter 1

*   *   *

London

March 1814

My goodness, Emily, are you quite sure you don’t want to borrow my fichu? That dress is... well, when I begged Almack’s vouchers off of Lady Castlereagh, I’m sure she did not imagine you wearing something quite like that.

It’s quite in fashion, Aunt Winnie. The modiste said that all the smart young women were wearing green this year.

Well, the green is lovely, no one is going to disagree with you there, but it was not the green I was referring to! Are you not cold?

They say you must suffer to be beautiful, Aunt Winnie, and frankly, I need all the help I can get.

Emily’s aunt pursed her lips, peering at her through her own decidedly unfashionable monocle.

You’re more than passable, my love. You would do well even if you were not so stylish.

Emily, who had never cared a whit for dresses before this past December, shrugged.

Passable doesn’t get husbands, Aunt Winnie, and time is rather of the essence.

Winnie sighed and nodded reluctantly.

You are right. Come. Shall we enter the fray?

Emily took a deep breath. The wall behind her had provided a safe haven when they entered Almack’s assembly hall. The events at Almack’s were commonly called crushes, and even this early in the evening, it was easy to see why. The place was already filled up, and there were more arriving at the door with every moment that passed. The majordomo barely got to take a moment’s break before he was announcing Marquess That or Earl This, and somehow, they were still coming. The whole thing made Emily want to curl into a little ball and roll all the way back to Swandon and her own snug rooms at Everly, but she was here for a reason, and she straightened her shoulders and tilted her chin up.

All right, Aunt Winnie, I believe I am ready.

As they started forward arm in arm to make a circuit of the room, Emily couldn’t help but compare herself to the other girls in the room. Not so long ago, she would have pronounced them all swans and run away, but now she forced herself to look at them with a critical eye.

She’s wearing a similar dress, but the color on mine is better. She’s smaller than me. Oh, goodness, that’s a duke’s daughter, and they all seem so very young...

Emily was twenty-four, old for her first season. She knew that some of the girls were eyeing her in turn and dismissing her as a country spinster, and they would not be far wrong. Her dress was fashionable, but the rest of her was of old-fashioned English country stock. When her father, the Marquess of Ellsford, was still alive, he fondly called her his little Saxon girl. Emily was tall and blond with round pale shoulders and a shape that curved like the Ell River itself. Her hair did all right, she supposed, especially after Aunt Winnie’s French maid had curled it up prettily for the evening, but she towered over most of the girls and even some of the gentlemen.

It doesn’t matter. It cannot matter. I am an Allensby, and we do not give up or fail our families. We simply do not. I will find a husband.

Fortunately, Winnie was taking this as seriously as she was. She tugged Emily around the room, introducing her to this earl or that baron, and then whisking her away before Emily could grow too awkward or tongue-tied.

Best to keep them wanting more, Winnie whispered. Keep a list in your head of the likely ones. Then when the dancing starts, we shall thin it out and permit the approach of those favored.

You would put the Duke of Wellington to shame, Emily said with a smile. He should have had you at Vitoria.

Hmph. He may be a war hero, but the Duke of Wellington never had to navigate a crowded ballroom in shoes that were too small and tight stays. Of course, I would. Now look sharp, my dear, here is the Marquess of Westwick. Old title, old money, a little fond of the drink, but not so bad overall...

Then it was more smiling, more stiff-backed curtsies, more keeping her voice soft while still trying to be heard over the din, and they hadn’t even gotten to the dancing yet. Emily’s feet were already aching in her new stiff shoes, and she was afraid that if she smiled any wider, her lips were going to crack.

Aunt Winnie, I think I need to stop for a bit.

Already? Well, I suppose it is better you do it now than during the dance. There’s a table around back with some pitchers of lemon water. I see Lady Swifte over there, and I shall go and inquire whether her daughter-in-law was in fact carried off by the dropsy. As I recall, her son was a rather likely lad.

Aunt Winnie, that’s horrid!

That is the game, my dear, and if the Duke of Wellington did not apologize for Vitoria, then I will not apologize either. Here, take your dance card, and if you are sitting still, make sure you know the dances that are being played tonight.

Emily couldn’t repress a small smile at her aunt’s spirit. Winnie Caverly had always been a part of her life, and after her parents’ death, she had practically adopted Emily, coming to stay in Swandon with her and never quite returning to London until... well, now.

My goodness, I wish I were at home.

But she wasn’t, and she refused to return until she could return home in triumph.

A footman dressed in pale velvet poured her a small paper cup of lemon water. Drinking it did make her feel better. When she felt as if she could take a breath without wanting to faint, she glanced down at her dance card.

It was a plain little cardboard booklet printed with the date and Almack’s Assembly. Inside was a list of dances and a space after for a partner to sign his or her name, and hanging from a piece of colorful thread was a pencil stub.

Oh, that is quite clever. Let’s see, they are starting with a waltz, I believe I shall stay out of that, but right after is Jenny Pluck Pears, and then Black Alman, and I can do those well enough...

She was interrupted from her brief reverie by a pair of young women bumping into her from behind. Emily yelped in a most unbecoming fashion, they cried out, and after everyone was set right again, Emily had had enough. If she had to spend one more moment in the crowded assembly hall, she was going to lose her mind. Her first disastrous impulse was to dash into the street, but she remembered the small alcoves in the wall underneath the musicians’ balcony.

I can just get a breath there. Get out of the crowd, take a few breaths, try not to cry, and jump back into it.

She knew she was being ridiculous. She had come here with a purpose. She had a plan. The problem was that all her careful planning had not reckoned on a quiet life of twenty-three years crashing willy-nilly into the height of London’s Beau Monde.

Emily made her way to the alcoves, so relieved to be out of the crush that she could have wept. One was half-sheltered from the room by a long silk curtain, and she darted in, looking behind her to make sure that no one was regarding her untoward escape.

Oof!

"Have a care, damn it!’

It felt like walking into a stone wall dressed in a deep navy-blue jacket. Emily almost bounced off the gentleman who was standing in the alcove already, and she might have fallen if he hadn’t roughly grabbed her arms and set her on her feet again.

What the hell are you doing here?

Emily gaped at the man, staring up at him in shock. She was in the heart of London, and this man had spoken to her as if she were a junior maid running wild in the streets. He glared down at her as if she owed him an explanation. His blond hair was a shade or so darker than hers, but his eyes were black, almost hellishly so, and the scar that arched down the side of his face, from temple to jaw, gave him a diabolical look.

When she met his eyes, Emily felt a peculiar shiver run through her body, from the crown of her head to the soles of her feet. For a brief moment, everyone around them seemed to fall away, leaving them alone in an echoing silence. She wondered wildly whether that scar pained him, what it would be like to touch it. She found herself wondering what it would be like to kiss him, and she shook herself hard to break herself out of this strange spell.

Whatever had happened to her, he was obviously unaffected by it, as he was still glaring at her quite fiercely.

Did your friends put you up to this? he demanded when she continued to stare at him.

At the same time, they realized that she was holding her dance card up like it was a shield. With a snorting sound, the man took it from her.

Here, he snapped, writing something with a flourish before snapping it shut and returning it to her. Consider your curiosity satisfied.

He strode off as she stared after him, still reeling from what had happened. Everyone said that London moved fast, but this was ridiculous. At least he had left her the alcove, and Emily could relax for a few minutes.

It seemed to take Winnie no time at all to find her, however, and she burbled over with news.

Now, step lively, my pet, I believe that Arthur Witting, Baron Sunderland, may be interested in dancing with you this evening, as is Whitney Faber, Count Netherville...

Emily was just opening her dance card for the first time after her encounter with the strange man. When she saw the scrawl inside it, she made a face.

Well, so long as it is not the waltz. It looks like I’m doing that with Sommerset, whoever that is.

*   *   *

chapter 2

*   *   *

Victor Sommerset, decorated colonel, reluctant duke, and frankly damned irritated, looked around at the assembly hall with distaste.

Come now, old friend, you are going to scare off the young ladies and their mothers.

If scaring them off will give me some space, I certainly will not mind it.

Charles Hartley, Earl of Wendington laughed as if Victor had made some kind of clever joke rather than simply behaving like an uncouth churl.

Get used to it, Wellford, you are back in the smoke now. And who knows, the pearl who will grace your household and bear your sons might be right here at Almack’s tonight.

If she is, she ought to make herself known so we can get it over with.

My dear Victor, you are not on the battlefield now, and though London debutantes are famous for a certain amount of sharp dealing, they can hardly be more vicious than the French. I took some trouble to get us into Almack’s so soon after you were invested with your title. The least you could do is look a little eager.

Charles sighed as Victor gave him a flat and unimpressed look.

"Well, if you’re going to stand there and look dour, I’ll take myself off to fill my dance card. All of your money woes might have disappeared, but I need a girl with an inheritance."

I never had any money woes before, Victor growled, but Charles was gone, off charming a dark-haired miss in blue.

I feel like a damned monkey in a suit. How the hell do London men tolerate this?

Charles was meant to be making introductions for him, but Victor was fairly relieved with his friend gone. He knew he had a duty to marry and to secure the title that had unexpectedly fallen to him, but perhaps he didn’t have to do it tonight. He frowned reflexively, and a young woman arm in arm with her mother gasped. The pair skittered around him, and he wanted to throw his hands up and storm out.

The scar was not helping matters. He had never considered himself so very handsome before he had gotten on the wrong side of a French saber, and now it gave him a positively demonic demeanor. Soldiers followed a scarred commander better than they did one whose face and body were unmarked, but he had a feeling he couldn’t say the same for eligible Society women.

Victor knew it wasn’t just the scar, however. Wherever he went, he heard whispers of his title and his rank, and more than one person, male and female alike, shuddered. It was all he expected from the Beau Monde, insulated as they were from the ravages of the Peninsular War, but it struck a deep and angry chord inside him.

He knew that anger came through when he was cautiously greeted by some casual acquaintances, and apparently, even the lure of his new titles and holdings were not enough for the older women, who took their young charges by the elbow and steered them away.

That was bad enough, but the girls who seemed fascinated by him were almost worse. The ones who slipped away from their guardians to stand as close as propriety permitted, who watched him with wide and avid eyes, they were equally frustrating in their own way. When one asked him what it was like to be in the heat of a battle and kill a man, Victor excused himself abruptly and walked away.

Give me an honest brothel in the Sierra Morena any day. The girls there would steal the fillings from your teeth, but they are still less mercenary.

Victor was catching his breath under the musicians’ gallery when another girl crashed into his chest. He had a moment to appreciate her pretty face, golden hair, and curvy form before he saw her dance card, and he scowled. He grabbed his temper by the tail, gave the girl the dance she had obviously been dared to take, and stormed away.

It was the only dance that he had asked for that night, and as poorly as the evening was going, he was leaving straight after, no matter how hard Charles had worked to get the vouchers.

Princess Esterházy called the assembly to order and announced the dancing was about to begin. For a moment, Victor thought he had lost the girl whose card he had signed, and then he caught sight of her on the sidelines, composed and with a slightly arrogant lift to her chin. She was an old-fashioned kind of beauty, he thought grudgingly, fair as cream. When he approached and bowed slightly, she inclined her head in a regal nod and took his hand. Victor felt a strange shock run through his body when they touched, and some voice inside his head said, quite clearly, ah, I have been waiting for you.

He brushed both off and escorted her onto the dance floor as the musicians struck the first notes of the waltz. Despite the intimacy of the dance, she said nothing, and Victor began to feel bad.

I apologize if I was short with you earlier.

If you were? Do you mean you do not know, your grace?

You are sharp-tongued with me.

I can be. You do not know who I am, and it can hardly come back to me if I am.

Victor found himself smiling a little at her tart response, and she was proving to be a better than fair dancer. They traced the figures of the waltz easily, and Victor remembered a little reluctantly that he did after all like dancing.

"That’s hardly appropriate for a woman who is looking to make a good match. You called me your grace. I assume you must know who I am."

My aunt has told me all about you. You are quite the catch.

And yet you still will not tell me your name.

I am Lady Emily Allensby, not that you bothered to get a proper introduction before asking me to dance, and I have decided, your grace, that you are not a catch for me.

Victor wondered why that stung a little. He had to assume that it was sheer perversity that made him even more intrigued with the chit.

And why is that?

Why, because I am very particular about the husband I will have, your grace, and you meet none of my requirements.

Then your requirements must be very high indeed.

She batted her long surprisingly dark eyelashes at him, giving him a dry smile.

How very perfect for you that a woman who finds you undesirable must have requirements that are ‘very high.’

Instead of being offended, Victor laughed, the first time he had done so, it felt like, since he’d returned to England and discovered the mess of inheritance waiting for him.

And I don’t think you find me so undesirable as all that.

He watched in fascination as her cheeks turned bright red, and she looked away.

No sharp words?

Not... at the moment.

Well, then.

The waltz ended, and as the other gentlemen guided their partners to the sidelines, Victor stood still in the center of the room with Emily. He found himself reluctant to let her go, and he tried to tell himself it was only because she was nearly the first person to talk to him as if he were a real person in ages.

Thank you for the waltz, Lady Emily.

You’re very welcome, your grace.

For a single mad instant, instinct got the better of him. Victor stepped forward, hand curling around Emily’s lower back. He could sense the way she bent toward him for a moment, warm and pliant. He wanted to kiss this girl, kiss her, taste her... Dear god, this was the middle of the Almack’s dance floor.

Your grace! Emily hissed, two patches of rosy color high on her cheeks, and he drew back at once, blinking at his own impulse.

Forgive me, he said stiffly.

He escorted her back to her fretting guardian, aware the whole time of the way the assembly was watching them, their eyes heavy and bright. Victor didn’t give a damn about the censure of the ton, but he abruptly decided that he was done. This evening had been a disaster, and there was a chance he had harmed an innocent girl’s reputation on top of it. Charles could make his apologies. With a curt nod, he strode toward the exit.

* * *

Emily didn’t know what had happened. For a moment, on the dance floor, the Duke of Wellford looked as if he was going to... she didn’t even have a word for it. He looked as if he wanted to devour her, and in his gaze, there was a kind of immolation that drew her in. She felt shaky on her feet at the memory, and she clung to Winnie for a moment before letting go to stand on her own two feet.

My goodness, what were you talking to the Duke of Wellford about? asked Winnie, wide-eyed.

Nothing, Emily insisted, but had it been nothing? He was quite out of the question as a match