Nine Rules to Break When Romancing a Rake (44 page)

A delightful new romance from debut author
Sarah MacLean

Kiss someone passionately, fire a pistol, attend a duel…

Lady Calpurnia Hartwell has had enough. Sick and tired of following rules and never having any fun, the inveterate spinster decides it’s time to throw caution to the wind…at least just this once. But when a little fun leads her into the arms of a devastating rake, good Lady Callie must decide if she’ll retreat to the life she knows…or succumb to a most ruinous temptation.

Who are you?” The Marquess of Ralston’s eyes narrowed in the darkness, taking in the soft angles of Callie’s face. “Wait…” She imagined his eyes flashing with recognition. “You’re Allendale’s daughter. I noticed you earlier.”

She could not contain her sarcastic response. “I’m sure you did, my lord. It would be rather hard to miss me.” She covered her mouth immediately, shocked that she had spoken so boldly.

He chuckled. “Yes. Well, it isn’t the most flattering of gowns.”

She couldn’t help her own laughter from slipping out. “How very diplomatic of you, my lord. You may admit it. I look rather too much like an apricot.”

This time, he laughed aloud. “An apt comparison. But I wonder, is there ever a point where one looks enough like an apricot?” He indicated that she should resume her place on the bench and, after a moment’s hesitation, she did so.

“Likely not.” She smiled broadly, amazed that she wasn’t nearly as humiliated by his agreement as she would have expected. No, indeed, she found it rather freeing. “My mother…she’s desperate for a daughter she can dress like a fashion plate. Sadly, I shall never be such a child. How I long for my sister to come out and distract the countess from my person.”

He joined her on the bench. “How old is your sister?”

“Eight,” she said mournfully.

“Ah. Not ideal.”

“An understatement.” She looked up at the star-filled sky. “No, I shall be long on the shelf by the time she makes her debut.”

“What makes you so certain you’re shelf-bound?”

She cast him a sidelong glance. “While I appreciate your chivalry, my lord, your feigned ignorance insults us both.” When he failed to reply, she stared down at her hands and replied, “My choices are rather limited.”

“How so?”

“I seem able to have my pick of the impoverished, the aged, and the deadly dull,” she said, ticking the categories off on her fingers as she spoke.

He chuckled. “I find that difficult to believe.”

“Oh, it’s true. I’m not the type of young lady who brings gentlemen to heel. Anyone with eyes can see that.”

“I have eyes. And I see no such thing.” His voice lowered, soft and rich as velvet as he reached out to stroke her cheek. Her breath caught and she wondered at the intense wave of awareness coursing through her.

She leaned into his caress, unable to resist, as he moved his hand to grasp her chin. “What is your name?” he asked softly.

She winced, knowing what was to come. “Calpurnia.” She closed her eyes again, embarrassed by the extravagant name—a name with which no one but a hopelessly romantic mother with an unhealthy obsession with Shakespeare would have considered saddling a child.

“Calpurnia.” He tested the name on his tongue. “As in, Caesar’s wife?”

The blush flared higher as she nodded. “The very same.”

He smiled. “I must make it a point to better acquaint myself with your parents. That is a bold name, to be sure.”

“It’s a horrible name.”

“Nonsense. Calpurnia was Empress of Rome—strong and beautiful and smarter than the men who surrounded her. She saw the future. She stood strong in the face of her husband’s assassination. She is a marvelous namesake.” He shook her chin firmly as he spoke. “It is a name to be lived up to. And I think you are well able to do so, if only you would attempt it.”

She was speechless in the wake of his frank lecture. Before she had a chance to reply, he continued. “Now, I must take my leave. And you, Lady Calpurnia, must return to the ballroom, head held high. Do you think you can do that?” He gave her chin a final tap and stood, leaving her cold in the wake of his departure.

She stood with him and nodded, starry-eyed. “Yes, my lord.”

“Good girl.” He leaned closer and whispered, his breath fanning the hair at her nape and sending a thrill through her, warming her in the cool April night. “Remember, you are an empress. Behave as one and they will have no choice but to see you as such. I already do…” He paused, and she held her breath, waiting for his words. “Your Highness.”

And with that, he was off, disappearing deeper into the maze and leaving Callie with a silly grin on her face. She did not think twice before following him, so keen she was to be near him. At that moment, she would have followed him anywhere, this prince among men who had noticed her, not her dowry or her horrible dress, but her!

If I am an empress, he is the only man worthy enough to be my emperor.

She did not have to go far to catch him. Several yards in, the maze opened on a clearing that featured a large, gleaming fountain adorned with cherubs. There, bathed in a silvery glow was her prince, all broad shoulders and long legs. Callie held her breath at the sight of him—exquisite, as though he himself had been carved from marble.

And then she noticed the woman in his arms. Her mouth opened in a silent gasp, her hand flying to her lips as her eyes widened. In all her seventeen years she’d never witnessed something so…wonderfully scandalous.

The moonlight cast his paramour in an aethereal glow, her blond hair turned white, her pale gown gossamer in the darkness. Callie stepped back into the shadows, peering around the corner of the hedge, half wishing she hadn’t followed, entirely unable to turn away from their embrace. My, how they kissed.

And in the deep pit of her stomach, youthful surprise was replaced with a slow burn of jealousy, for she had never in all her life wanted to be someone else so very much. For a moment, she allowed herself to imagine it was she in his arms: her long, delicate fingers threading through his dark, gleaming hair; her lithe body that his strong hands stroked and molded; her lips he nibbled; her moans coursing through the night air at his caresses.

As she watched his lips trail down the long column of the woman’s throat, Callie ran her fingers down the same path on her own neck, unable to resist pretending that the feather-light touch was his. She stared as his hand stroked up his lover’s smooth, contoured bodice and he grasped the edge of the delicate gown, pulling it down, baring one high, small breast to the night. His teeth flashed wickedly as he looked down at the perfect mound and spoke a single word, “Gorgeous,” before lowering his lips to its dark tip, pebbled by the cool air and his warm embrace. His paramour threw her head back in ecstasy, unable to control her pleasure in his arms, and Callie could not tear her eyes from the spectacle of them, brushing her hand across her own breast, feeling its tip harden beneath the silk of her gown, imagining it was his hand, his mouth, upon her.

“Ralston…”

The name, carried on a feminine moan, sliced through the clearing, shaking Callie from her reverie. In shock, she dropped her hand and whirled away from the scene upon which she had intruded. She rushed through the maze, desperate for escape, and stopped once more at the marble bench where her garden excursion had begun. Breathing heavily, she collected herself, shocked by her behavior. Ladies did not eavesdrop. And they certainly did not fantasize in such a manner.

Besides, fantasies would do her no good.

She pushed aside a devastating pang of sorrow as the truth coursed through her. She would never have the magnificent Marquess of Ralston, nor anyone like him. She felt an acute certainty that the things he had said to her earlier were not truth, but instead the lies of an inveterate seducer, carefully chosen to appease her and send her blithely off, easing his dark tryst with his ravishing beauty. He hadn’t believed a word of it.

No, she was not Calpurnia, Empress of Rome. She was plain old Callie. And she always would be.

SARAH MACLEAN grew up in Rhode Island, obsessed with historical romance and bemoaning the fact that she was born far too late for her own season. Her love of all things historical helped to earn her degrees from Smith College and Harvard University before she finally set pen to paper and wrote her first book.

Sarah now lives in New York City with her husband, their dog, and a ridiculously large collection of romance novels. She loves to hear from readers. Please visit her at www.macleanspace.com.

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NINE RULES TO BREAK

WHEN ROMANCING A RAKE

THE SEASON

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, organizations, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

NINE RULES TO BREAK WHEN ROMANCING A RAKE. Copyright © 2010 by Sarah Trabucchi. All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, down-loaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins e-books.

Excerpts from How I Met My Countess copyright © 2010 by Elizabeth Boyle; Viking in Love copyright © 2010 by Sandra Hill; The Vampire and the Virgin copyright © 2010 by Kerrelyn Sparks; Nine Rules to Break When Romancing a Rake copyright © 2010 by Sarah Trabucchi

EPub Edition © February 2010 ISBN: 978-0-06-198794-6

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