During the Georgian and Regency eras, and even earlier, most women who were “breeding” worried a great deal, as these were the most dangerous years of their life. Two of Jane Austen’s brothers lost their wives in childbirth, so she understood pregnancy could lead to death. There was a general concern for a woman’s welfare during breeding, including avoidance of unnecessary travel. In Sense & Sensibility, Mrs. Jennings tells Elinor that her daughter Charlotte Palmer expects to be “confined” in February and should not have taken the long (undoubtedly bumpy) journey to Barton Park. In January, Charlotte is back in London, busily entertaining guests and taking the Dashwood sisters shopping. She apparently does not allow her delicate condition to interfere with her social life, probably laughing it off.
The following month, the newspapers announced to the world, that the Lady of Thomas Palmer, Esq. was safely delivered of a son and heir… an event highly important to Mrs. Jennings’s happiness. She spends every day with Charlotte and attributes her daughter’s well doing to her own care. (S&S, Chapter XIV)
Jane Austen does not describe the actual details of Charlotte’s lying-in. Most women of the upper classes gave birth at home, assisted to some extent by female relatives and female servants, but all these were subordinate to the midwife who was summoned once labour had begun.
I did extensive on-line research about the history of midwifery before writing The Midwife Chronicles series. Midwives have been around since Biblical times. These women cultivated healing herbs and passed down their formulas from generation to generation. Although denied the advantage of formal education, being barred from books and lectures, early midwives learned birthing skills from each other and passed on knowledge to their daughters and granddaughters. In France, where my first novel takes place, midwives were called sage femmes (wise women).
Midwife of Normandy (Book One ofThe Midwife Chronicles series)
Not every young maiden in 17th century France dreamt of becoming a midwife, butmy strong-willed protagonist Clare Dupres was anxious to learn the skills of midwifery passed down from her ancestors, including the secret formula for a “magic” elixir, which provided a pain-free birthing experience. By offering the elixir exclusively to aristocratic women, Clare saw a way to rise from poverty and achieve female independence by engaging in a profession. She was highly successful and rewarded handsomely with gold coins and jewels. One of her wealthy patients was Lady Louise, Marquise of Montjardin who had befriended Clare.
The following excerpt from Midwife of Normandy occurs when Clare is summoned to Chateau Montjardin for the impending birth of Lady Louise’s fourth child. A Catholic priest sits outside the door, praying for the soul “struggling to be born in there.” He tries to convince Clare, a Huguenot, to convert, but she slides by him and enters the room.
(Charlotte Palmer’s birth chamber likely matched the description in this excerpt.)
Chapter 18 (excerpt)
Clare almost choked at the stifling-hot atmosphere. Lady Louise’s room had been transformed by the servants into a traditional confinement chamber. The fire was blazing, the shutters closed, and heavy drapery covered all doors and windows. Even the keyholes were plugged, to keep evil spirits from stealing the breath of the newborn, along with other superstitions that made no sense to Clare.
She folded back the shutters and cracked open the window, letting in fresh air and natural light. Just as Maman had taught her.
Lady Louise was calmly sitting up in bed, dressed in a soft linen shift edged with lace. Around her shoulders was a brightly patterned shawl woven of fine English wool, which Clare recognized as one of Jacques’s imports. Louise was busy buttering a roll.
“Why, look at you!” Clare scolded. “I thought you sent for me at this ungodly hour because you were in travail.”
“The pains stopped and I grew hungry.”
“Put down that roll and let me examine you. Can you still feel the child kicking?”
“Yes, very strongly,” she said. Clare removed her gloves and put her hands on Louise’s swollen abdomen. She was reassured to feel movement. Next, she pulled a horn-shaped implement from her birthing bag, pressing one end on the stretched skin and the other end to her ear. To her relief, there were no evident sounds of distress.
“Does it sound like a male child? I do so long for a boy!”
Clare laughed. “I know of no sounds that indicate the sex of the unborn child. I listen for other reasons.”
“Monsieur le Marquis would be delighted if it were a son, after the disappointment of the three daughters I have given him. You would receive a generous reward for a boy,” she said enticingly. Then a shadow crossed her face. “I’m aware my husband has fathered several male children by his mistresses, but he needs a legitimate son to inherit his title.”
“Dear friend,” Clare responded, “if I had the power to determine the sex of a child, I would only deliver baby boys. Then indeed I should become famous and exceptionally wealthy. But alas, an equal share of baby girls is necessary to ensure future wives for the baby boys.”
Lady Louise looked perplexed for a moment. Then she nodded. “Oh, I see. How clever of you, Clare, to figure that out. Now if only you could find a way to tell the sex of this child kicking my insides.”
“Well, we will have to wait.” Clare spread a clean cloth on the table next to the bed and began to set out her birthing tools. This might be a false alarm, but best tobeprepared. Seeing the growing concern on Louise’s face, she pulled over a chair and tried to distract her until the pains resumed.
Leaning toward her friend’s left ear, Clare whispered, “I think Father Benedict is listening at the door. Did you send for him?”
“No. I didn’t realize he was here. He often invites himself for dinner, but rarely bestirs himself for breakfast. I wish he would leave. There is no need for him to be standing outside my bedchamber.”
“Let’s confound him by speaking in English,” Clare suggested quietly, wanting a chance to chat with her friend without being overheard.
“Yes, let’s! He can be meddlesome at times.”
Clare remembered her English from Pierre’s books. As a young girl, Louise had the benefit of an English governess. The two friends began conversing in the foreign tongue. Had they been able to see the priest’s consternation as he held his ear to the door, they would both have been amused.
“Perhaps your cousin thinks I will try to convince you to become a Huguenot,” said Clare.
“How shocking that would be! But highly unlikely, my dear friend. I would be banned from Court. You and I both know how King Louis feels about his heretic subjects.”
Clare frowned, remembering the royal edict that had prevented Pierre from studying law, forcing him to leave the country. But then again if Pierre had stayed, she might never have met Lady Louise. Strange how things sometimes work out.
“You don’t think of me as a heretic, do you?” Clare asked.
Louise hesitated for a second, then said, “Of course not. I know you are a Christian. But wouldn’t life in France be easier for you if you agreed to convert to the Church of Rome?”
“It might, but Jacques would get rid of me and keep me from ever seeing my children again.”
“I understand. To lose one’s children would be a terrible loss for any mother.” It was a troublesome thought, but true. Both women knew that in France, fathers legally owned their offspring—mothers had no right to them.
“Speaking of children,” said Clare, “how are your three daughters doing?”
“Praise the Lord, they are all in good health. My husband is already arranging suitable marriages for them.”
“Already? Surely, the eldest cannot be yet eight years of age?”
She shrugged. “They are ten, five and two. It is not too early for their betrothals. And what of your son and daughter, Clare?”
“They thrive on the country air. Jean-Pierre resembles his father, physically and mentally. Slow, patient, and deliberate. He wants to be a soldier someday—sometimes he sits for hours, playing with his tin soldiers. Lately, though, he has developed a stutter and fear of the dark, claiming there is a ghost who roams the nursery at night.”
“You are fortunate to have a son,” said Louise. “What of your daughter?”
“She has an innate curiosity of the world around her, constantly asking questions. She can outrun her older brother and learned to read before he could master his letters. Lucina is destined to become a midwife one day―already wraps her baby dolls in swaddling cloths, as my mother taught her.” Clare choked back a sob. Maman had died last year, and the memory of the loss was still fresh in her mind.
“Lucina, such an unusual name,” remarked Louise. Her three daughters had common French names: Daphne, Marie-Thérèse, and Hélène. Although Louise was a friend, Clare felt it best not to tell her that little Lucina was named after a pagan goddess, so she simply said her mother had chosen the name.
~ ~ ~
After conversing in English for several hours, Clare began pushing up her sleeves. “Louise, it is possible that you became alarmed by false, early pangs. Since I traveled all this way, I will examine you to see if you are in true travail. But first I must wash my hands.”
“You there,” Clare called to the wet nurse―the wife of a farmer, who had recently given birth to her own child, but had been hired to suckle the Montjardin child. “Ask the servants to fetch Madame Dupres a basin of hot water and a bar of soap.”
When the wet nurse left to do the lady’s bidding, Louise asked Clare why she engaged in such unusual practice. “My other midwives never washed their hands.”
Despite the extreme heat in the room, Clare felt a chill. She bit her lower lip and considered how to respond to this question. Her impulse was to laugh and say, “To keep the demons at bay.” But this was not the time to jest. She thought back to Maman’s admonitions. Never voice superstitious ideas to a woman in travail. What if something were to go wrong in the birthing process? You could be blamed and branded a witch. You could be brought to trial and those carelessly uttered words used against you.Do not forget the memory of your great-great-grandmother—may she rest in peace—who was burned at the stake because the woman she attended was brought to bed of a deformed infant.
Clare knew there were still ignorant, uninformed people who believed midwives were witches due to their skills in an area of life that was a mystery to many people—especially men, since midwifery was a profession dominated exclusively by women. So, Clare was careful with her words.
“Is handwashing really such a strange practice, my friend? Do you not wash your own hands before meals?”
“Yes, I suppose I do.”
“Washing my hands when attending a birthing is simply a habit taught me by Maman. I do not know if cleanliness helps, but I do it anyway. What harm can it do?”
“Oh, I see,” said Louise. Clare thought her patient looked like a fragile porcelain doll, sitting in the sumptuous bed.
The servant carried in a steaming basin, along with a fragranced bar of luxurious milled soap. As Clare scrubbed her palms, fingers, and arms, she heard a loud moan.
“Ohhhhh. The pains have started again and I feel like I’m sitting in a puddle of rainwater.” Clare moved quickly to the bed and checked―clear fluid, no blood—all good signs.
“Louise, your water has broken. Your child is ready to greet the world.”
A shadow passed over Lady Louise’s face. She reached for Clare’s hand. “I am suddenly very, very afraid. Mon Dieu. Will I die?”
“There’s always a slight possibility. It’s in God’s hands. But with His help, I will do my utmost to save you and the child―with as little discomfort as can be managed.” She poured a small, carefully measured dose of elixir, because Louise was petite, and pressed the potion to Louise’s lips, urging her to swallow.
Louise grimaced and turned her head away. “Ugh, it smells rotten.”
“Yes, and it tastes worse than it smells. I know from my own experience at Lucina’s birth. But I promise, it will help you bear the pain.”
~ ~ ~
Four hours later, Clare finished delivering the child. Why, she thought with deep satisfaction, I believe I could do this in my sleep. As she wrapped the leavings and the pink ribbons in her birthing bag, she heard angry voices out in the corridor. She recognized the Marquis’s loud voice demanding to know why Madame Dupres was with his wife. Had he not given explicit instructions to call Madame Larque, the Catholic midwife, if his wife went into travail during his absence?
~ ~ ~
About Carole Penfield
I am a retired attorney, turned novelist. I live in Northern Arizona with my husband Perry Krowne and two overly friendly cats. The Midwife Chronicles series was released last month; all three books are available on Amazon in paperback and eBook format. https://www.amazon.com/dp/1737807912
Books Two and Three involve the continuing saga of the Dupres midwives; after fleeing France for England, they meet the Austens, and their lives become intertwined. Especially the close friendship between Lucina Dupres and Jane Austens’ great-grandmother Eliza. To learn more, please visit my website https://www.carolepenfield.com
This post first appeared on the Austen Authors’ blog on 9 September 2021. Enjoy!!!
Mrs. Bennet is one of Jane Austen’s most memorable characters. Clearly Austen wants us to laugh at her histrionics and her constant, blatant husband hunting, and we feel sorry for her daughters when her antics push away eligible suitors. But we are also frustrated by her lack of manners and wish she would at least try to discipline Lydia once in a while! Does Mrs. Bennet deserve laughter, scorn, or some other reaction? Let’s make a list of her good and bad qualities.
We might as well start with her bad qualities because, let’s face it, they’re what we know the best.
Mrs. Bennet openly plays favorites with her daughters, preferring Lydia and Jane over the others.
She is a terrible judge of character. If Mrs. Bennet likes a particular person it’s likely there is something seriously wrong with them. Think Wickham and Collins here.
She has no filter. She openly (and loudly!) discusses gentlemen’s incomes in public, and she doesn’t try to conceal her opinions of other people’s looks and manners even when they can hear her.
She is mercenary. She is more concerned with how rich her daughters might be after marriage, rather than how happy they would be.
She is self-centered. There is no family drama that can’t be made worse by her sudden fainting fits, palpitations, and pains in the side.
She has little self awareness, contradicting herself frequently.
She spends too much money.
She does not try to control or correct her daughters’ wild behavior, which almost brings about the family’s social ruin.
But Mrs. Bennet has her good points as well.
She is practical. She knows that her daughters must have a way to support themselves by the time their father passes away, and she is determined to make that happen.
She’s friendly. She likes throwing a party and attending events organized by others. Networking is important when you’re trying to get your daughters noticed by eligible men!
She herself was successful in the marriage market. She made a good match with a wealthy member of the gentry and married out of the working class. You go girl!
She may be a shameless gold digger, but at least she’s doing *something* to try to secure her daughter’s future. That’s more than we can say for her husband!
Speaking of husbands, when Mrs. Bennet’s husband openly ridicules her (for shame, Mr. Bennet!), she does not respond in kind. In fact, she sometimes praises her husband when he exerts himself on behalf of their daughters.
She’s observant. She knows when her daughters have caught a young man’s eye, and she usually judges their interest accurately.
She appears to be the only member of the Bennet family who recognizes the absurdity of the entail that requires a male heir. “I do think it is the hardest thing in the world, that your estate should be entailed away from your own children; and I am sure, if I had been you, I should have tried long ago to do something or other about it.”
Against all odds, she eventually succeeds in her mission: her two oldest daughters marry rich, handsome men! Let’s face it: if she hadn’t managed to get Jane and Bingley alone together, would they have ever gotten together on their own?
Considering all these things, I think it’s fine to laugh at Mrs. Bennet a little bit, and perhaps even cheer her on in her husband hunting, at least when she’s not embarrassing her daughters. She may be silly and shallow and yes, sometimes vulgar. But she definitely wants what is best for her daughters, and she is willing to go to some lengths to make that happen. Here’s to all mothers who want only the best for their children!
I tend to be a history geek, thriving on snippets of history of which I had no prior knowledge. One of my grandkids is equally as interested in history as I; therefore, I love to find snippets I can share with him. I was checking out the “First Families” pages on The White House website and came across a piece on Margaret Mackall Smith “Peggy” Taylor. It caught my eye because my mother’s name was “Peggie,” no Margaret nickname, just “Peggie.” Anyway, I found the piece very interesting. You may find the whole matter HERE.
Margaret married Zachary Taylor when he was still an Army lieutenant. The life as an Army wife was quite different from their aristocratic backgrounds, but she adapted quite well, according to all reports. Historian Elizabeth Thacker-Estrada said of Margaret: She was a “tough, careworn pioneer woman and peripatetic military wife transplanted from her cultured eastern roots. Margaret did not want her husband “Old Rough and Ready” Taylor to run for President. After following him about for 40 years, she had set her mind on a “retirement” of sorts on their plantations, and she definitely did not wish to take on the responsibilities of being the “First Lady.”
She passed off many of the social responsibilities to her 23-year-old daughter, Betty. Meanwhile, Margaret received visitors in an upper room at the White House, claiming “delicate health” issues, although an explanation of those issues was hard to come by. “Though Peggy Taylor welcomed friends and kinfolk in her upstairs sitting room, presided at the family table, met special groups at her husband’s side, and worshiped regularly at St. John’s Episcopal Church, she took no part in formal social functions. She relegated all the duties of official hostess to her youngest daughter, Mary Elizabeth, then 25 and recent bride of Lt. Col. William W.S. Bliss, adjutant and secretary to the President. Betty Bliss filled her role admirably. One observer thought that her manner blended ‘the artlessness of a rustic belle and the grace of a duchess.'”
Because she avoided the “limelight,” so to speak, there are few anecdotal accounts of her service as First Lady, making her both more mysterious and more likely to know unscrupulous remarks about her.
Margaret Taylor, like many women, did not enjoy having her image taken. In fact, the engraver for the image of her husband’s death was quite upset with the fact she held a handkerchief over her face. Her prediction of her husband’s death had come true. Two years into his term, Zachary Taylor died of cholera. Margaret became the first First Lady to serve during the death of her husband.
Margaret Mackall Smith “Peggy” Taylor served as First Lady from 1849 to 1850 as the wife of the 12th President, Zachary Taylor. She followed her husband in death, dying two years later. A New York Times obituary listed her not as the former First Lady or even by her given name, but as “Mrs. General Taylor.”
The biographies of the First Ladies on WhiteHouse.gov are from “The First Ladies of the United States of America,” by Allida Black. Copyright 2009 by the White House Historical Association.
The Collegiate Church of St Peter at Westminster is a large Gothic abbey church in the City of Westminster, London, England, situated to the west of the Palace of Westminster. It was a Benedictine monastic church until the monastery was dissolved in 1539. Between 1540 and 1556, the “abbey” was referred to a “cathedral.” However, since 1560, the building is no longer an abbey or a cathedral, instead, Westminster Abbey, as it is so called today, holds the status of a Church of England “Royal Peculiar,” an honor bestowed upon the site by Elizabeth I, meaning a church directly responsible to the sovereign. [A “peculiar” is applied to those ecclesiastical districts, parishes, chapels or churches that are outside the jurisdiction of the bishop and archdeacon of the diocese in which they are situated.] Beginning in 1066, with the coronation of William the Conqueror, all coronations of English and British monarchs have been held at Westminster Abbey. Since 1100, there have also been 16 royal weddings conducted within its walls.
According to a tradition first reported by Sulcard in 1080, a church was founded at the site, known as Thorn Ey, in the 7th century, when Mellitus was a Bishop of London. King Henry III gave the orders for the construction of the present church. The recorded origins of the Abbey date to the 960s or early 970s, when Saint Dunstan, Bishop of London and later Archbishop of Canterbury, and King Edgar of England installed a community of Benedictine monks on the site.
One of the legends of the church has to do with its origin. It stands on Thorn Ey, or Thorn Island. The “island” is about two miles to the west of the old Roman city of London. It is where two branches of the River Tyburn come together. Some believe, pagan King Saberht (c. 604 – c. 616) of the East Saxons found religion and had a hand in the building of a episcopal church in London. In 604, the Gaulish churchman Mellitus was consecrated by Augustine as bishop in the province of the East Saxons, which had a capital at London, making him the first Bishop of London. Bede tells that Sæberht converted to Christianity in 604 and was baptised by Mellitus, while his sons remained pagan. Sæberht then allowed the bishopric to be established. (Saberht of Essex)
A long-standing tradition says that “St Peter appeared to a young fisherman and demanded that a church dedicated to him be constructed on Thorney Island – and it was. Another story had St Peter appearing to Mellitus on the day when Sebert’s church was consecrated and conducting the ceremony himself. In later centuries, Thames fishermen regularly gave gifts of salmon to the abbey on St Peter’s Day, June 29th, and the Fishmongers’ Company still presents a salmon to Westminster Abbey every year.” (History.com)
When Edward the Confessor was crowned King of England in 1042, a Benedictine community resided upon Thorny Island. After 1013, Edward had spent much of his early days in Normandy because England had been taken over by the Danes under Sweyn Forkbeard and then Cnut. Invited back by the last Danish king, who was his half-brother, Edward succeeded peacefully to the English throne in 1042.
While in Normandy, Edward had made a vow to go on pilgrimage to St Peter’s in Rome to give thanks for his restoration to the English throne, but was released by his vow by Pope Leo IX on condition that Edward build or restore a monastery and dedicate it to St Peter. Edward was a deeply pious man and he accepted the obligation with exemplary thoroughness. He chose the Benedictine monastery on Thorney Island and to make sure things were done properly he installed himself in a palace close to the abbey, between the river bank and what is now the street called Whitehall. The monks and lay brothers had diligently cleared Thorney Island of its thorns and made it a more habitable place. Edward now appointed a new abbot, brought in more monks and decided to build a far grander abbey church in the Norman style of the day. It was there that he intended to be buried.
The church was formally consecrated on 28 December 1065. Edward did not live to enjoy the fruits of his efforts. He died on 5 January 1066. Even so, he was buried in front of the high altar. After the Battle of Hastings, William the Conqueror had himself crowned and anointed King of England, the ceremony taking place on Christmas Day 1066 in Westminster Abbey, as a symbol to all that he was Edward the Confessor’s legitimate successor.
“Edward the Confessor was canonised as a saint in 1161. In 1245 his fervent admirer, Henry III, began a massive programme of rebuilding and enlarging the Confessor’s church. He spent a fortune on it and it was Henry who gave Westminster Abbey its lasting architectural character. In 1269 he helped to carry the Confessor’s remains to a special chapel behind the high altar where they have remained through all the centuries since. When he died in 1272, Henry was buried in St Edward’s chapel.” (The Consecration of Westminster Abbey)
Yesterday, December 26, twenty-seven of my non-JAFF titles went on sale for my annual Twelfth Night Sale! The sale runs from December 26, 2021, to January 5, 2022. Fill up your eReaders!!!! All books will be $0.99. These books are historical romantic suspense, Regencies, and a couple of contemporary choices. Moreover, many are available to read for FREE on Kindle Unlimited. MERRY CHRISTMAS!!!!! [For Jane Austen Fan Fiction titles, see Friday’s post, December 24, 2021.]
(Disclaimer: This book is the self-published version of The Scandal of Lady Eleanor.)
The men of the REALM have served their country, while ignoring their responsibilities to home and love, but now Bonaparte is defeated, they each mean to claim their portion of a new and prosperous England. However, their long-time enemy Shaheed Mir has other plans. The warlord believes one of the Realm has stolen a fist-sized emerald, and the Baloch intends to have its return or his revenge.
JAMES KERRINGTON, the future Earl of Linworth left his title and his infant son behind after the death of his beloved Elizabeth, but he has returned to England to tend his ailing father and to establish his roots. With Daniel as his heir, Kerrington has no need to marry, but when Eleanor Fowler stumbles and falls into his arms, Kerrington’s world is turned upon its head. He will do anything to claim her.
LADY ELEANOR FOWLER has hidden from Society, knowing her father’s notorious reputation for debauchery has tainted any hopes she might have of a happy marriage. And yet, despite her fears, her brother’s closest friend, James Kerrington, has rekindled her hopes, but when Sir Louis Levering appears with proof of Eleanor’s participation in her father’s wickedness, she is drawn into a world of depravity, and only Kerrington’s love can save her.
The first fully original series from Austen pastiche author Jeffers is a knockout. – Publishers Weekly
Jeffers’s characters stay in the reader’s heart and mind long after the last page has been turned. – Favored Elegance
After years away from England, members of the Realm return home to claim the titles and the lives they once abandoned. Each man holds on to the fleeting dream of finally knowing love. For now, all any of them can hope is the resolutions of their previous difficulties before Shaheed Mir, their old enemy, finds them and exacts his revenge. Mir seeks a mysterious emerald, and he believes one of the Realm has it.
No one finds his soul mate when she is twelve and he seventeen, but BRANTLEY FOWLER, the Duke of Thornhill, always thought he had found his. The memory of Velvet Aldridge’s face was the only thing that kept him alive all those years he remained estranged from his family. Now, he has returned to Kent to claim his title and the woman he loves, but first he must obliterate the memory of his infamous father, while staving off numerous attacks from Mir’s associates.
MISS VELVET ALDRIDGE always believed in “happily ever after.” Yet, when Brantley Fowler returns home, he has a daughter and his wife’s memory to accompany him. He promised her eight years prior that he would return to make her his wife, but Thornhill only offers her a Season and a dowry. How can she make him love her? Make him her “knight in shining armor”? Regency England has never been hotter or more dangerous.
MARCUS WELLSTON never expected to inherit his father’s title. After all, he is the youngest of three sons. However, his oldest brother Trevor is judged incapable of meeting the title’s responsibilities, and his second brother Myles has lost his life in an freak accident; therefore, Marcus has returned to Tweed Hall and the earldom. Having departed Northumberland years prior to escape his guilt in his sister’s death, Marcus has spent the previous six years with the Realm, a covert governmental group, in atonement. Now, all he requires is a biddable wife with a pleasing personality. Neither of those phrases describes Cashémere Aldridge.
MISS CASHEMERE ALDRIDGE thought her opinions were absolutes and her world perfectly ordered, but when her eldest sister Velvet is kidnapped, Cashé becomes a part of the intrigue. She quickly discovers nothing she knew before is etched in stone. Leading her through these changes is a man who considers her a “spoiled brat.” A man who prefers her twin Satiné to Cashémere. A man whose approval she desperately requires: Marcus Wellston, the Earl of Berwick. Toss in an irate Baloch warlord, a missing emerald, a double kidnapping, a blackmail attempt, and an explosion in a glass cone, and the Realm has its hands full. The Regency era has never been hotter, nor more dangerous.
SOLA’s Seventh Annual Dixie Kane Memorial Awards, 3rd Place, Historical Romance
“Jeffers’s close look at the dark secrets of Regency society instills a sense of realism.” – Publishers Weekly
After years away from England, members of the Realm return home to claim the titles and the lives they had previously abandoned. Each man holds onto the fleeting dream of finally know love and home. For now, all any of them can hope is the resolution of his earlier difficulties before Shaheed Mir, their old enemy, finds them and exacts his revenge. Mir seeks a mysterious emerald, and he believes one of the Realm has it.
GABRIEL CROWDEN, the Marquis of Godown, can easily recall the night that he made a vow to know love before he met his Maker. Of course, that was before Lady Gardenia Templeton’s duplicity had driven Godown from his home and before his father’s will had changed everything. Godown requires a wife to meet the unusual demands of the former marquis’s stipulations. Preferably one either already carrying his child or one who would tolerate his constant attentions to secure the Crowden line before the deadline.
MISS GRACE NELSON dreams of family died with her brother’s ascension to the title. Yet, when she meets the injured Marquis of Godown at a Scottish inn, her dreams have a new name. However, hope never has an easy path. Grace is but a lowly governess with ordinary features. She believes she can never earn the regard of the “Adonis” known as Gabriel Crowden. Besides, the man has a well-earned skepticism when it comes to the women in his life. How can she prove that she is the one woman who will never betray him? The Regency era has never been hotter.
Members of the Realm have retuned to England to claim the titles they left behind. Each holds to the fleeting dream of finally knowing love, but first he must face his old enemy Shaheed Mir, a Baloch warlord, who believes one of the group has stolen a fist-sized emerald. Mir will have the emerald’s return or will exact his bloody revenge.
A devastating injury has robbed AIDAN KIMBOLT, Viscount Lexford, of part of his memory, but surely not of the reality that lovely Mercy Nelson is his father’s by-blow. Aidan is intrigued by his “sister’s” vivacity and how easily she ushers life into Lexington Arms, a house plagued by Death’s secrets–secrets of his wife’s ghost, of his brother’s untimely passing, and of his parents’ marriage: Secrets Aidan must banish to finally know happiness.
Fate has delivered Miss MERCY NELSON to Lord Lexford’s door, where she quickly discovers appearances are deceiving. Not only does Mercy practice a bit of her own duplicity, so do all within Lexington Arms. Yet, dangerous intrigue cannot squash the burgeoning passion consuming her and Viscount Lexford, as the boundaries of their relationship are sorely tested. How can they find true love if they must begin a life peppered with lies?
The REALM has returned to England to claim the titles they left behind. Each man holds to the fleeting dream of finally knowing love and home, but first he must face his old enemy Shaheed Mir, a Baloch warlord, who believes one of the group has stolen a fist-sized emerald. Mir will have the emerald’s return or will exact his bloody revenge.. Aristotle Pennington has groomed
SIR CARTER LOWERY as his successor as the Realm’s leader, and Sir Carter has thought of little else for years. He has handcrafted his life, filled it with duties and responsibilities, and eventually, he will choose a marriage of convenience to bolster his career; yet, Lucinda Warren is a temptation he cannot resist. Every time he touches her, he recognizes his mistake because his desire for her is not easily quenched. To complicate matters, it was Mrs. Warren’s father, Colonel Roderick Rightnour, whom Sir Carter replaced at the Battle of Waterloo, an action which had named Sir Carter a national hero and her father a failure as a military strategist.
LUCINDA WARREN’s late husband has left her to tend to a child belonging to another woman and has drowned her in multiple scandals. Her only hope to discover the boy’s true parentage and to remove her name from the lips of the ton’s censors is Sir Carter Lowery, a man who causes her body to course with awareness, as if he had etched his name upon her soul. Cruel twists of Fate have thrown them together three times, and Lucinda prays to hold off her cry for completion long enough to deny her heart and to release Sir Carter to his future: A future to which she will never belong.
For two years, BARON JOHN SWENTON has thought of little else other than making Satiné Aldridge his wife; so when he discovers her reputation in tatters, Swenton acts honorably: He puts forward a marriage of convenience that will save her from ruination and provide him the one woman he believes will bring joy to his life. However, the moment he utters his proposal, Swenton’s instincts scream he has made a mistake: Unfortunately, a man of honor makes the best of even the most horrendous of situations.
MISS SATINE ALDRIDGE has fallen for a man she can never possess and has accepted a man she finds only mildly tolerable. What will she do to extricate herself from Baron Swenton’s life and claim the elusive Prince Henrí? Obviously, more than anyone would ever expect.
MISS ISOLDE NEVILLE has been hired to serve as Satiné Aldridge’s companion, but her loyalty rests purely with the lady’s husband. With regret, she watches the baron struggle against the impossible situation in which Miss Aldridge has placed him, while her heart desires to claim the man as her own. Yet, Isolde is as honorable as the baron. She means to see him happy, even if that requires her to aid him in his quest to earn Miss Satiné’s affections.
Sacrifice and honor, betrayal and redemption, all make for an exceptionally satisfying romance. A Touch of Honor is a mesmerizing story of extraordinary love realized against impossible odds. – Collette Cameron, Award-Winning Author
A Touch of Emerald: The Conclusion of the Realm Series
Four crazy Balochs. A Gypsy band. An Indian maiden. A cave with a maze of passages. A hero, not yet tested. And a missing emerald.
For nearly two decades, the Realm thwarted the efforts of all Shaheed Mir sent their way, but now the Baloch warlord is in England, and the tribal leader means to reclaim the fist-sized emerald he believes one of the Realm stole during their rescue of a girl upon whom Mir turned his men. Mir means to take his revenge on the Realm and the Indian girl’s child, LADY SONALI FOWLER.
DANIEL KERRINGTON, Viscount Worthing, has loved Lady Sonalí since they were but children. Yet, when his father, the Earl of Linworth, objects to Sonalí’s bloodlines, Worthing thinks never to claim her. However, when danger arrives in the form of the Realm’s old enemy, Kerrington ignores all caution for the woman he loves.
His American Heartsong: A Companion Novel of the Realm Series
The Deepest Love is Always Unexpected.
LAWRENCE LOWERY, Lord Hellsman, has served as the dutiful son since childhood, but when his father Baron Blakehell arranges a marriage with the insipid Annalee Dryburgh, Lowery must choose between his responsibilities to his future title and the one woman who makes sense in his life.
Although her mother was once a lady in waiting to the Queen, by Society’s standards, MISS ARABELLA TILNEY is completely unfit to be the future baroness: Bella is an American hoyden who demands that Lowery do the impossible: Be the man he always dreamed of being.
When the Earl of Greenwall demands his only son, ADAM LAWRENCE, Viscount Stafford, retrieve the viscount’s by-blow, everything in Lawrence’s life changes. Six years prior, Stafford released his mistress, Cathleen Donnell, from his protection; now, he discovers from Greenwall that Cathleen was with child when she returned to her family. Stafford arrives in Cheshire to discover not only the son of which Greenwall spoke, but also two daughters, as well as a strong-willed woman, in the form of AOIFE KENNICE, who fascinates Stafford from the moment of their first encounter.
Set against the backdrop of the early radicalism of the Industrial Revolution and the Peterloo Massacre, a battle begins: A fight Lawrence must win: a fight for a woman worth knowing, his Irish Eve.
Lady Joy and the Earl: A Regency Christmas Romance
Award-Winning Finalist in the Fiction: Novella category of the 2019 International Book Awards
They have loved each other since childhood, but life has not been kind to either of them. James Highcliffe’s arranged marriage had been everything but loving, and Lady Joy’s late husband believed a woman’s spirit was meant to be broken. Therefore, convincing Lady Jocelyn Lathrop to abandon her freedom and consider marriage to him after twenty plus years apart may be more than the Earl of Hough can manage. Only the spirit of Christmas can bring these two together when secrets mean to keep them apart.
Second Place in Short Historical Category ~ 2019 International Digital Awards
She is the woman whose letters to another man kept Simon alive during the war. He is the English officer her late husband claimed to be incomparable. In her, his heart whispers of finally being “home.” In him, she discovers a man who truly stirs her soul. Unfortunately for both, the lady fears no longer being invisible to the world and assuming a place at his side. Can Major Lord Simon Lanford claim Mrs. Faith Lamont as his wife or will his rise to the earldom and his family’s expectations keep them apart? “This was both a heart-breaking and heart-warming second chance love story, made all the more satisfying by the Christmas setting.” – Calico Hearts Review
She is the woman whose letters to another man kept Simon alive during the war. He is the English officer her late Scottish husband praised as being incomparable. Even without the spirit of Christmas, she stirs his soul; in her, his heart whispers of being “home.” However, the lady wishes to remain invisible and in her place as her cousin’s companion. Can Major Lord Simon Lanford claim Mrs. Faith Lamont as his wife or will his rise to the earldom and his family’s expectations keep them apart?
“Lady Joy and the Earl”
They have loved each other since childhood, but life has not been kind to either of them. James Highcliffe’s arranged marriage had been everything but loving, and Lady Joy’s late husband believed a woman’s spirit was meant to be broken. Therefore, convincing Lady Jocelyn Lathrop to abandon her freedom and consider marriage to him after twenty plus years apart may be more than the Earl of Hough can manage.
Bonus Story: “One Minute Past Christmas” (from George T. Arnold and Regina Jeffers) An Appalachian grandfather and his granddaughter are blessed with a special ability—a gift that enables them briefly to witness a miraculous gathering in the sky each year at exactly one minute past Christmas. The experience fills them with wonder, but they worry their secret “gift” will end with them because, in forty-four years, no other relative has displayed an inclination to carry it on to a new generation.
Courting Lord Whitmire: A Regency May-December Romance
At the bend of the path, an unexpected meeting.
She is all May. He is December.
But loves knows not time.
Colonel Lord Andrew Whitmire has returned to England after spending fifteen years in service to his country. In truth, he would prefer to be anywhere but home. Before he departed England, his late wife, from an arranged marriage, had cuckolded him in a scandal that had set Society’s tongues wagging. His daughter, Matilda, who was reared by his father, enjoys calling him “Father” in the most annoying ways. Unfortunately, his future is the viscountcy, and Andrew knows his duty to both the title and his child. He imagines himself the last of his line until he encounters Miss Verity Coopersmith, the niece of his dearest friend, the man who had saved Andrew’s life at Waterloo. Miss Coopersmith sets Whitmire’s world spinning out of control. She is truly everything he did not know he required in his life. However, she is twenty-two years his junior, young enough to be his daughter, but all he can think is she is absolute perfection.
JACKSON SHAW, the Marquess of Rivens, never considered the “gypsy blessing” presented to his family during the time of Henry VIII truly a blessing. He viewed it more as a curse. According to the “blessing,” in his thirtieth year, at the Christmas ball hosted by his family, he was to choose a wife among the women attending. The catch was he possessed no choice in the matter. His wife was to be the one who proved herself to be his perfect match, according to the gypsy’s provisions: a woman who would bring prosperity to his land by her love of nature and her generous heart. In his opinion, none of the women vying for his hand appeared to care for anything but themselves.
EVELYN HAWTHORNE comes to River’s End to serve as the companion to the Marchioness of Rivens, his lordship’s grandmother. However, Lady Rivens has more than companionship in mind when she employs the girl, whose late father was a renown horticulturalist. The marchioness means to gather Gerald Hawthorne’s rare specimens to prevent those with less scrupulous ideas from purchasing Hawthorne’s conservatory, and, thereby, stealing away what little choice her grandson has in naming a wife, for all the potential brides must present the Rivenses with a rare flower to demonstrate the lady’s love of nature. Little does the marchioness know Hawthorne’s daughter might not only know something of nature, but be the person to fulfill the gypsy’s blessing.
Courting Lord Whitmire: A Regency May-December Romance
At the bend of the path, an unexpected meeting.
She is all May.
He is December. But loves knows not time.
Colonel Lord Andrew Whitmire has returned to England after spending fifteen years in service to his country. In truth, he would prefer to be anywhere but home. Before he departed England, his late wife, from an arranged marriage, had cuckolded him in a scandal that had set Society’s tongues wagging. His daughter, Matilda, who was reared by his father, enjoys calling him “Father” in the most annoying ways. Unfortunately, his future is the viscountcy, and Andrew knows his duty to both the title and his child. He imagines himself the last of his line until he encounters Miss Verity Coopersmith, the niece of his dearest friend, the man who had saved Andrew’s life at Waterloo. Miss Coopersmith sets Whitmire’s world spinning out of control. She is truly everything he did not know he required in his life. However, she is twenty-two years his junior, young enough to be his daughter, but all he can think is she is absolute perfection.
Last Woman Standing: A Clean Regency Romance
She is simply his grandmother’s companion.
However, when the Christmas ball ends, the last woman standing wins the marquess.
JACKSON SHAW, the Marquess of Rivens, never considered the “gypsy blessing” presented to his family during the time of Henry VIII truly a blessing. He viewed it more as a curse. According to the “blessing,” in his thirtieth year, at the Christmas ball hosted by his family, he was to choose a wife among the women attending. The catch was he possessed no choice in the matter. His wife was to be the one who proved herself to be his perfect match, according to the gypsy’s provisions: a woman who would bring prosperity to his land by her love of nature and her generous heart. In his opinion, none of the women vying for his hand appeared to care for anything but themselves.
EVELYN HAWTHORNE comes to River’s End to serve as the companion to the Marchioness of Rivens, his lordship’s grandmother. However, Lady Rivens has more than companionship in mind when she employs the girl, whose late father was a renown horticulturalist. The marchioness means to gather Gerald Hawthorne’s rare specimens to prevent those with less scrupulous ideas from purchasing Hawthorne’s conservatory, and, thereby, stealing away what little choice her grandson has in naming a wife, for all the potential brides must present the Rivenses with a rare flower to demonstrate the lady’s love of nature. Little does the marchioness know Hawthorne’s daughter might not only know something of nature, but be the person to fulfill the gypsy’s blessing.
Angel Comes to the Devil’s Keep: Book 1 of the Twins’ Trilogy
2013 SOLA’s Eighth Annual Dixie Kane Memorial Awards, 3rd Place, Historical Romance
2017 finalist in the Daphne du Maurier Award for Excellence in Mystery/Suspense
2017 finalist Derby Award for Fiction
Huntington McLaughlin, the Marquess of Malvern, wakes in a farmhouse, after a head injury, being tended by an ethereal “angel,” who claims to be his wife. However, reality is often deceptive, and Angelica Lovelace is far from innocent in Hunt’s difficulties. Yet, there is something about the woman that calls to him as no other ever has. When she attends his mother’s annual summer house party, their lives are intertwined in a series of mistaken identities, assaults, kidnappings, overlapping relations, and murders, which will either bring them together forever or tear them irretrievably apart. As Hunt attempts to right his world from problems caused by the head injury that has robbed him of parts of his memory, his best friend, the Earl of Remmington, makes it clear that he intends to claim Angelica as his wife. Hunt must decide whether to permit her to align herself with the earldom or claim the only woman who stirs his heart–and if he does the latter, can he still serve the dukedom with a hoydenish American heiress at his side?
The Earl Claims His Comfort: Book 2 of the Twins’ Trilogy
2016 Hot Prospects Award Finalist, Romantic Suspense
Hurrying home to Tegen Castle from the Continent to assume guardianship of a child not his, but one who holds his countenance, Levison Davids, Earl of Remmington, is shot on the road and left to die. The incident has Remmington chasing after a man who remains one step ahead and who claims a distinct similarity—a man who wishes to replace Remmington as the rightful earl. Rem must solve the mystery of how Frederick Troutman’s life parallels his while protecting his title, the child, and the woman he loves.
Comfort Neville has escorted Deirdre Kavanaugh from Ireland to England, in hopes that the Earl of Remmington will prove a better guardian for the girl than did the child’s father. When she discovers the earl’s body upon road backing the castle, it is she who nurses him to health. As the daughter of a minor son of an Irish baron, Comfort is impossibly removed from the earl’s sphere, but the man claims her affections. She will do anything for him, including confronting his enemies. When she is kidnapped as part of a plot for revenge against the earl, she must protect Rem’s life, while guarding her heart.
Lady Chandler’s Sister: Book 3 of the Twins’ Trilogy
Award-Winning Finalist in the Fiction: Romance category of the 2019 International Book Awards
Sir Alexander Chandler knows his place in the world. As the head of one of the divisions of the Home Office, he has his hand on the nation’s pulse. However, a carriage accident on a deserted Scottish road six months earlier has Sir Alexander questioning his every choice. He has no memory of what happened before he woke up in an Edinburgh hospital, and the unknown frightens him more than any enemy he ever met on a field of battle. One thing is for certain: He knows he did not marry Miss Alana Pottinger’s sister in an “over the anvil” type of ceremony in Scotland.
Miss Alana Pottinger has come to London, with Sir Alexander’s son in tow, to claim the life the baronet promised the boy when he married Sorcha, some eighteen months prior. She understands his responsibilities to King and Crown, but this particular fiery, Scottish miss refuses to permit Sir Alexander to deny his duty to his son. Nothing will keep her from securing the child’s future as heir to the baronetcy and restoring Sir Alexander’s memory of the love he shared with Sorcha: Nothing, that is, except the beginning of the Rockite Rebellion in Ireland and the kidnapping of said child for nefarious reasons.
An impressive ending to the beautifully crafted Twins’ Trilogy – Starr’s ***** Romance Reviews
Love. Power. Intrigue. Betrayal. All play their parts in this fitting conclusion to a captivating, romantic suspense trio. – Bella Graves, Author & Reviewer
STERLING BAXTER, the Earl of Merritt, has married the woman his father has chosen for him, but the marriage has been everything but comfortable. Sterling’s wife, Lady Claire, came to the marriage bed with a wanton’s experience. She dutifully provides Merritt his heir, but within a fortnight, she deserts father and son for a baron, Lord Lyall Sutherland. In the eyes of the ton, Lady Claire has cuckolded Merritt.
EBBA MAYER, longs for love and adventure. Unfortunately, she’s likely to find neither. As a squire’s daughter, Ebba holds no sway in Society; but she’s a true diamond of the first water. Yet, when she meets Merritt’s grandmother, the Dowager Countess of Merritt creates a “story” for the girl, claiming if Ebba is presented to the ton as a war widow with a small dowry, the girl will find a suitable match.
LORD LYALL SUTHERLAND remains a thorn in Merritt’s side, but when the baron makes Mrs. Mayer a pawn in his crazy game of control, Merritt offers the woman his protection. However, the earl has never faced a man who holds little strength of title, but who wields great power; and he finds himself always a step behind the enigmatic baron. When someone frames Merritt for Lady Claire’s sudden disappearance, Merritt must quickly learn the baron’s secrets or face a death sentence.
What happens when a lady falls in love, not with her betrothed, but rather with his cousin?
Miss Priscilla Keenan has been promised to the Marquess of Blackhurst since her birth. The problem is: She has never laid eyes upon the man. So, when Blackhurst sends his cousin to York to assist Priscilla in readying Blackhurst’s home estate for the marquess’s return from his service in India, it is only natural for Priscilla to ask Mr. Alden something of the marquess’s disposition. Yet, those conversations lead Cilla onto a different path, one where she presents her heart to the wrong gentleman. How can she and Alden find happiness together when the world means to keep them apart? Inspired by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow’s “The Courtship of Miles Standish,” this tale wants for nothing, especially not a happy ending, which it has, but that ending is not what the reader anticipates.
Hendrake Barrymore, Lord Radcliffe, is a typical male, a bit daff when it comes to the ways of women, especially the ways of one particular woman, Miss Adelaide Shaw, his childhood companion, a girl who plays a part in every pleasant memory Drake holds.
Yet, since he failed to deliver Addy’s first kiss on her fifteenth birthday, his former “friend” has struck him from her life just at a time when Radcliffe has come to the conclusion Adelaide is the one woman who best suits him.
This tale is more than a familiar story of friends to lovers for it presents the old maxim an unusual twist.
I Shot the Sheriff: A Tragic Characters in Classic Lit Series Novel
How does one reform the infamous Sheriff of Nottingham? Easy. With Patience.
William de Wendenal, the notorious Sheriff of Nottingham, has come to London, finally having wormed his way back into the good graces of the Royal family. Yet, not all of Society is prepared to forgive his former “supposed” transgressions, especially the Earl of Sherwood.
However, when de Wendenal is wounded in an attempt to protect Prince George from an assassin, he becomes caught up in a plot involving stolen artwork, kidnapping, murder, and seduction that brings him to Cheshire where he must willingly face a gun pointed directly at his chest and held by the one woman who stirs his soul, Miss Patience Busnick, the daughter of a man de Wendenal once escorted to prison.
I Shot the Sheriff is based on the classic tales of Robin Hood, but it is given a twist and brought into the early 19th Century’s Regency era. Can even de Wendenal achieve a Happily Ever After? If anyone can have the reader cheering for the Sheriff of Nottingham’s happiness, it is award-winning author Regina Jeffers.
Captain Stanwick’s Bride: A Tragic Characters in Classic Lit Series Novel
“Happiness consists more in conveniences of pleasure that occur everyday than in great pieces of good fortune that happen but seldom.” – Benjamin Franklin
Captain Whittaker Stanwick has a successful military career and a respectable home farm in Lancashire. What he does not have in his life is felicity. Therefore, when the opportunity arrives, following his wife’s death, Stanwick sets out to know a bit of happiness, at last—finally to claim a woman who stirs his soul. Yet, he foolishly commits himself to one woman only weeks before he has found a woman, though shunned by her people and his, who touches his heart. Will he deny the strictures placed upon him by society in order learn the secret of happiness is freedom: Freedom to love and freedom to know courage?
Loosely based on Henry Wadsworth Longfellow’s “The Courtship of Miles Standish” and set against the final battles of the War of 1812, this tale shows the length a man will go to in order to claim a remarkable woman as his.
Seven stories of Regency heroines and heroes finding love in the face of obstructions: mayhem, malice, and mischief.
Varying heat levels, both in the text and during the English summertime. Seven best-selling and award-winning authors team up to delight your summer holiday reading.
A Maiden for a Marquess by Arietta Richmond
A scandal, and interfering grandmother, an unavoidable marriage, dark family secrets revealed, an ever-present threat, a love that thrives despite it all.
Saracen’s Gift by Janis Susan May
An American heiress fulfilling her father’s last wish, Miss Clarissa Wentworth wasn’t sure what to expect of his childhood home, and her grandfather. The reality was beyond anything she might have imagined – in the worst possible way. Now, she finds herself a prisoner, trapped in her grandfather’s schemes. Can one kind neighbour, and the most magnificent horse she has ever seen, save her? Will she find love, or despair?
Seaside Summer by Victoria Hinshaw
Miss Veronica Montgomery desperately wishes to avoid the aristocratic suitor that her mother thrusts upon her. But when the family summer holiday brings her to Weymouth, and the returned soldier who manages the hotel, her perspective on everything changes. Can they overcome the difference in their stations and the machinations of others, to find love?
The Jewel Thief and the Earl by Regina Jeffers
The daughter of a renowned thief, Miss Everley lives quietly, funding charity – oh, and occasionally plying some unique skills on behalf of the government. But when the search for a lost necklace forces her to work closely with the man she has long admired, they both find far more than the missing jewels.
Wildflowers and Wiles by Summer Hanford
Miss Ellie Ellsworth only wanted to help her sister… but somehow, a small deception became a larger one, and now, she is trapped. The man she loves believes her someone else… and it appears that he is not who she thought him to be, either. Can they untangle the truth from the lies, before families and lives are ruined, not to mention their love?
The Journey by Becca St. John
The love of childhood has been pushed aside, and Lady Katherine has resigned herself to watching the man she adores marry someone else. Until a plot gone wrong puts them in an accidental compromise. Now, married to him, and off on a ship to save another, she is most unhappy – and then the murders start. Can the threat be unravelled? Will saving his life also save their love?
Weekend at Baron E’s by Ebony Oaten
Miss Jane Bartholomew, innocent and dutiful, has just been married to a Baron more than three times her age. A Baron with grown children who resent her existence, and the threat to their inheritance she represents. She knows that she needs to bear him an heir as soon as possible, even if that looks to be challenging to achieve. But when the Baron expires at the worst possible moment, Jane, with the help of the most handsome footman she has ever seen, must take desperate measures to keep the truth from the rapacious relatives, lest she, and all of the staff, end up cast out, penniless. Will desperation lead to love? or disaster?
If you love regency romance, and stories where love triumphs, despite the interference of everyone else, then you’ll love these!
Seven delightful Regency Christmas stories from best selling and award winning authors.
Each one of these stories involves, in some way, a letter – letters which set in train a series of events that lead to unexpected adventures and, of course, eventually to love and Happy Ever Afters!
Seven delightful Regency Christmas stories from best selling and award winning authors.
Each one of these stories involves, in some way, a letter – letters which set in train a series of events that lead to unexpected adventures and, of course, eventually to love and Happy Ever Afters!
This anthology contains
Lady Augusta’s Letters by Arietta Richmond
A letter misplaced, a ship wrecked on foreign shores, a love thought lost, a journey through terrible hardship, faith rewarded by love regained.
When letters written are not always delivered as they should be, fate can intervene in the best and worst of ways.
His Christmas Violet by Regina Jeffers
They have loved each other since they were children, but how does Sir Frederick Nolan convince Lady Violet Graham to marry him, when she is most determined never again to permit any man dominion over her person?
Heartache and Holly by Summer Hanford
For seven years, Roslyn has carried on a secret engagement with the love of her life, William, with only the letters they exchange to sustain her. Now, William is back on English soil but the letters have stopped. With their time to be together at hand, has he suddenly changed his mind?
The Letter by Janis Susan May
Two correspondences intercepted and diverted, ten years apart, create a tangle which destroys lives. Can Antonia’s well intentioned intervention save them all, or will it make the situation worse?
A Letter for Miss Brixton by Emma Kaye
Miss Brixton has fallen in love. There is just one small difficulty standing between her and happiness. The entire courtship has been carried out through letters – and both she and her love have, from the start used pseudonyms. And to make matters worse, his letters have stopped coming…. How can she find him? Is there no hope for their love? Or has there been a secret plan behind it all, from the start?
Miss Remington’s Steely Resolve by Ebony Oaten
Ladies of the quality do not engage in anything approaching trade. Well, unless they have the camouflage of a widowed aunt to be the face of an enterprise, and grant it respectability. Amelia believes that she will continue as she has been, helping others find the perfect match, and never marrying herself. It is a belief which is sorely challenged by a most unusual customer, and a series of events which begin to unravel everything she has built for herself. Can she trust the solution she is offered? Or is love too much to risk?
The Marquess’ Christmas Match by Olivia Marwood
Becoming a governess seems the best way to save her family from penury, and allow her sisters a Season, as well as allowing Georgiana to avoid the unwanted advances of the cousin who inherited her father’s title. Except… the unpleasant new title holder continues his pursuit. Can the Marquess whose sisters she cares for help her unravel the puzzle, and win her heart? Or will ruin come to everything she cares for?
If you love Regency Romance, and Christmas, then this is the holiday read for you!
Second Chances: The Courtship Wars(Contemporary Romance, Psychology, Sexology, Reality TV, Downs Syndrome, Eccentric Hermits)
Rushing through the concourse to make her way to the conference stage, GILLIAN CORNELL comes face-to-face with the one man she finds most contemptible, but suddenly her world tilts. His gaze tells stories she wants desperately to hear. As he undresses her with his eyes, Gillian finds all she can do is stumble through her opening remarks. The all-too-attractive cad challenges both her sensibility and her reputation as a competent sexologist.
DR. LUCIAN DAMRON never allows any woman to capture his interest for long. He uses them to boost his career and for his pleasure. Yet, Lucian cannot resist Gillian’s stubborn independence, her startling intelligence, and her surprising sensuality. Sinfully handsome, Lucian hides a badly wounded heart and a life of personal rejection.
Thrown together as the medical staff on “Second Chances,” a new reality TV show designed to reunite previously married couples, Lucian and Gillian soon pique the interest of the American viewing public, who tune in each week, fascinated by the passionate electricity coursing between them. Thus begins an all-consuming courtship war, plagued by potential relationship-ending secrets and misunderstandings and played out scandalously on a national stage.
One Minute Past Christmas: Tale of an Appalachian Christmas Miracle [short story, Appalachia, holidays, Christmas, family relationships, legends]
One Minute Past Christmas is the story of a Greenbrier County, West Virginia, family in which a grandfather and his granddaughter share a special ability — they call it a “gift”– that enables them to briefly witness each year a miraculous gathering in the sky. What they see begins at precisely one minute past Christmas and fills them with as much relief as it does wonder. But they worry that the “gift” — which they cannot reveal to anyone else — will die with them because it has been passed to no other relative for forty-four years.
I came to this story late in the aspect that the nucleus of it was written by my former journalism professor. When I read it, I liked it, but I had the feeling that something was missing. Even so, I kept my mouth shut on the subject for some two years. When he decided to add a new cover and post the story on other seller sites (other than Amazon), I suggested that we work on the story together. That is how it came about.
When George Arnold originally wrote the story, it involved a grandfather telling his granddaughter the family secret. I changed the story so said granddaughter is now a grandmother herself and sharing that same secret with her granddaughter. We kept all of George’s scenes, making them flashbacks. By doing so we had a three-dimensional story: Layers on layers, but all tied together by this special “secret.”
The story is a contemporary one, set in West Virginia, as both George and I are West Virginia natives. It is set around his hometown of Beckley, a town set on two interstates: Interstate 64, going east and west, and Interstate 77, going north and south. The family in the story owns a tree farm, one which has been in the family for multiple generations.
If you are looking for a quick, easy read that will restore your faith in the spirit of Christmas, this is the story for you. It is a novella of some 20,000 words.
Introducing One Minute Past Christmas
One Minute Past Christmas is the story of a Greenbrier County, West Virginia, family in which a grandfather and his granddaughter share a special ability — they call it a gift — that enables them to briefly witness each year a miraculous gathering in the sky. What they see begins at precisely one minute past Christmas and fills them with as much relief as it does wonder. But they worry that the “gift” — which they cannot reveal to anyone else—will die with them because it has been passed to no other relative for forty-four years.
Enjoy this excerpt from “One Minute Past Christmas”
She climbed the steps to the attic a bit more slowly than she did previously. Jessica claimed her sixty-fifth birthday in September, and even though both the Nicholas and Lawrence families traditionally lived well into their late seventies and early eighties, Jessica could not shake the idea that her days were shorter than she hoped.
“Where to look?” she murmured as she pulled the chain to turn on the bare overhead bulb to illuminate the space once used as a drying room, but which now held the family “treasures.”
Hanna joined Jessica to look around in bewilderment.
“I did not realize there were so many boxes.”
“Several lifetimes chronicled here,” Jessica said as she scanned the markings on the side of many of the boxes.
She turned slowly to inspect the many configurations.
“You used to like to play among all the boxes,” Jessica reminded her granddaughter. “We made castles for you to crawl through.”
“Really?” Hanna asked in surprise, and Jessica could not disguise her scowl of disapproval.
“I don’t wish to think upon the values you lost by movin’ away from your family home,” she pronounced in chastisement. “Yes, your father found a viable position, but your family abandoned so much more.”
“Oh, Gram, don’t be going there again. Papa is accounted one of the best mechanics in the area. He has fifteen men working for him.”
“Financial success doesn’t keep a person warm in the same way as one’s memories do,” Jessica countered.
Her granddaughter rolled her eyes in the way of all young people who think they know everything.
Discarding her frustration with what she could not change, Jessica gestured toward several rows of boxes against the far wall.
“You look over there. I’ll take this side. The boxes are labeled, but it wouldn’t hurt to take a peek into each to make sure the contents match the labels.”
“Do you think there are mice in here?” Hanna asked tentatively.
Her granddaughter lifted a box from the top of the stack to investigate the inside.
“You know nothin’ of livin’ in the country,” Jessica remarked as she adjusted her glasses upon her nose so she could read through the bifocals.
“Your grandfather and I have three of the best mousers in the county. Nothing gets past those cats.”
“I thought you kept the cats because they were treasured pets,” Hanna said in distraction before searching through the first box.
Jessica thought, Not likely, but she said, “No. The cats earn their keep.” Like everyone on this farm.
Silence fell between them as they searched. Hanna made quicker work of the task than Jessica. Reminiscing over one of Jeremy’s toy trucks or a favorite picture frame belonging to her mother required time. Recollections required time. Her grandfather Jared Nicholas taught Jessica that time only bent for those God granted a miracle. When Hanna was born, Jessica thought to teach her granddaughter something of the magic, but Jeremy and Molly snatched the child away from Jessica before she could show the girl what made the child one of God’s chosen beings.
“Any luck?” Hanna called out.
“Not yet,” Jessica murmured as she caressed each of the precious items before returning them to the box.
Hanna stood to scan the stacks.
“Do you recall anything of how the dress was put away?” the girl asked.
Jessica watched Hanna work her way behind what appeared to be an artificial Christmas tree box along the wall.
A smile of recognition claimed Jessica’s lips.
“I recall now,” she said before crossing the small space to spin the box meant for a fake tree around where she could tear away the tape holding it closed.
“There is no need for an artificial tree on a Christmas tree farm,” she declared. “My mother thought it a good joke to store a family heirloom in a hoax of a box.”
Stripping the masking tape away, Jessica placed the box upon the floor and opened the flaps.
“Ah, here it is.”
Jessica lifted the garment bag, which was closed at the bottom with more tape to keep moisture and air from ruining the dress.
“There are mothballs in the box,” she said with a laugh. “We may need to air the dress out.”
Jessica slowly unzipped the bag.
“I imagine my mother covered the hanger before returning the dress to it. My mama, bless her soul, was most particular about the gown. It was the most expensive dress anyone in the family ever owned. I think her cautions and her protestations nearly persuaded your mama not to marry our Jeremy.”
“Will you be as crazy with my wearing it?” Hanna asked half in a tease and half in fear.
“Count on it,” Jessica said smartly as she lifted the dress from the bag.
Beneath the heavy garment carrier was a dry cleaning bag covering the gown and its layers of soft lace.
“Thanks for the warning,” Hanna retorted in what sounded like cynicism.
The girl reached for the bottom of the bag and lifted the plastic to reveal a dress with all the glamour of the 1920s.
“It is like something right out of The Great Gatsby,” Hanna gasped. “It is perfect. We can do the wedding as if it’s high tea in the Hamptons.”
Jessica was more practical.
“We must check all the seams. The lace has yellowed a bit, but not enough to hurt the look of the dress. We may need to find some replacement lace for the sleeves, but matching it shouldn’t be too difficult. It’s a common rose-and-ivy pattern. I do not want you to think of making this a flapper look. My mama and my grandmother would roll over in their graves. Grandma Lily ordered this dress special, based on a picture of her mother’s wedding dress in the old country. Grandpa Jared spent his last penny to please Lily Hardwick. During their first few years of marriage they had nothing to live on but love, but that was enough. Even later, during the Great Depression, they never considered selling the dress or the lace.”
“I promise I’ll treat it properly,” Hanna swore, crossing her heart with her index finger.
“I’ll return the dress to the bag, and we’ll take it downstairs for a closer look. Later, we’ll go into town for lace and whatever else we might need.”
Jessica reached for the box.
“Help me set the empty carton from the way.”
“Yes, Ma’am.”
Jessica thought it ironic that the prospects of wearing her great-great-grandmother’s dress brought a return of Hanna’s manners.
“What’s that?” Hanna asked as she lifted the box to hear a thud hit the floor a second time.
“Best we find out.”
Jessica draped the bagged dress over the back of a chest of drawers, which should be donated to one of the shelters, before she knelt to dig into the bottom of the tree box.
“Well, I’ll be,” Jessica swore with a chuckle. “I haven’t seen these since before Grandpa Jared passed. I thought them long gone. I wonder who put them in this box.”
“You must have put whatever it is there, Gram,” Hanna said with a bit of impatience, common of young people dealing with the older generation.
Jessica’s frown lines met.
“You are assuming I am suffering from early ‘old timer’s’ disease, but it’s not true. I thought these were long gone.”
She withdrew two composition notebooks with hard covers.
“Love poems written to Grandpa Bob?” Hanna teased with a raised eyebrow.
Jessica clutched the two books to her chest as she stood.
“No, they contain a story my Papaw Jared thought should be kept alive to be shared sometime after our deaths.. He was in his eighties when he asked me to record his tale, a story I shared with him. Although he could read and write, Papaw Jared was not much for his letters. He worried too much about correct spelling and such. His teacher was quite strict, striking his hands many times for his poor penmanship, and I often helped with legal papers and the such as I grew older. Eventually, Papaw told his tale into an old tape recorder, and I transcribed it for him.”
Jessica shot a quick glance at her granddaughter, and hope lodged in Jessica’s heart. She long regretted not knowing for certain whether Hanna could be the answer to a family mystery. With the absence of Jeremy’s family during t0hose years when the girl might show herself, Jessica remained uncertain about how to approach the subject.
“I’d like very much to share the story with you,” she said tentatively. “There’s a bit about you in it.”
Hanna’s nose twitched in what appeared to be disapproval, but she said, “As you’re willing to help me with the dress, it’s the least I can do.”
Jessica knew that was likely the best she would earn from her granddaughter. Since her son’s family took “Reading and Writing and Route 23” to the North, there was a chasm of misconstructions between them.
My story, “The Courtship of Lord Blackhurst,” is heavily influenced by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow’s “The Courtship of Miles Standish.” Many of the characters names, for example, derive from the poem. However, in Longfellow’s narrative, John Alden speaks to Priscilla Mullins because his friend, Miles Standish, wishes to marry Priscilla. In the Longfellow poem, Standish simply wishes to marry Priscilla because his wife, Ruth, has died, and, obviously, at the Plymouth Colony, few English women were available. Yet, it is John Alden who loves Priscilla, and, astutely, she loves John in return.
I did not want my story to follow Longfellow’s tale too closely, just to be influenced by it. Why? You may ask. The reason this tale has captured my attention all over again is John Alden, the Assistant Governor of Plymouth Colony, is my 10th Great Grandfather on my maternal side through Alden’s daughter Rebecca.
Alden was born in approximately 1599, most likely in Harwich, Essex, England. Although there are several other possibilities for his heritage, the Aldens of Harwick were related by marriage to the Mayflower‘s master Christopher Jones. Alden would have been about 21 years of age when he hired to be the cooper (barrel-maker) for the voyage. Once those aboard the Mayflower reached America, Alden chose to remain rather than to return to England. Priscilla Mullins, the woman he eventually married was from Dorking, Surrey, England. Her parents, William and Alice Mullins, and her brother Joseph, all died during their first winter at Plymouth.
As members of the original voyage, both Alden and Priscilla held shares in the company financing the establishment of Plymouth Colony. Priscilla’s shares were many due to the deaths of her family members. John Alden was elected an assistant to the Colony’s governor in 1631. “He was one of the men who purchased the joint-stock company from its English shareholders in 1626, and was involved in the company’s trading on the Kennebec River. [In 1626, the colony’s financial backers in London, known as the Merchant Adventurers, disbanded. This left the colonists in a quandary as to how to settle their significant debts to those who had funded the effort. Eight of the Plymouth colonists, including John Alden, agreed to collectively assume, or undertake, the debt in exchange for a monopoly on the fur trade from the colony. These men who averted financial ruin for the colony became known as the ‘Undertakers.’ The fact Alden was among them is indicative of his growing stature in the colony.] John Alden, along with Myles Standish and several other Plymouth Colonists, founded the town of Duxbury to the north of Plymouth. Evidence suggests the men began constructing their houses as early as 1629.
About 1653, he, along with his son Captain Jonathan Alden,built the Alden House, which is still standing and is maintained by the Alden Kindred of America. By the 1660s, John and Priscilla Alden had a growing family of ten children [Elizabeth, John, Joseph, Priscilla, Jonathan, Sarah, Ruth, Mary, Rebecca, and David]. Combined with his numerous public service duties (which were mostly unpaid positions) he was left in fairly low means. He petitioned and received from the Plymouth Court various land grants, which he distributed to his children throughout the 1670s. He died in 1687 at the age of 89, one of the last surviving Mayflower passengers.” (Mayflower History)
What happens when a lady falls in love, not with her betrothed, but rather with his cousin?
Miss Priscilla Keenan has been promised to the Marquess of Blackhurst since her birth. The problem is: She has never laid eyes upon the man. So, when Blackhurst sends his cousin to York to assist Priscilla in readying Blackhurst’s home estate for the marquess’s return from his service in India, it is only natural for Priscilla to ask Mr. Alden something of the marquess’s disposition. Yet, those conversations lead Cilla onto a different path, one where she presents her heart to the wrong gentleman. How can she and Alden find happiness together when the world means to keep them apart? Inspired by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow’s “The Courtship of Miles Standish,” this tale wants for nothing, especially not a happy ending, which it has, but that ending is not what the reader anticipates.
Cilla knocked on the door to her father’s study. “You sent for me, Papa?” She knew quite well what the subject of today’s meeting was to be, for she had observed the marquess’s mark on the express delivered a half hour removed to her father on a silver salver. Ironically, she had been raised with a strong sense of independence, but, today, she was to be maneuvered into accepting a man she had never met—to be the pawn in a chess match where everyone would win, but her.
“Come in, Priscilla. I have additional news from Lord Blackhurst.”
She swallowed her sigh of resignation as she made herself do as her dear Papa said; yet, she was not pleased with the situation. Until Lord Blackhurst had shocked her by sending word to her father that he was prepared to meet the arrangements between the marquess’s family and hers and marry her, Cilla had only heard mention of the man and his family because one of the marquessate’s many properties marched along with her father’s main estate.
Most assuredly, she had heard more than a few tales of the previous Marquess of Blackhurst. Lord Robert Keyes had been her father’s most loyal chum growing up in this part of Yorkshire, and Lord Edward Keenan had often sung the man’s praises. Since learning of the arrangement between her father and Robert, 10th Marquess of Blackhurst, Cilla had often thought if her prospective groom had been the father, instead of the son, she would have held no qualms about marrying the man. Even if only half of her father’s tales were true, there was much to admire in the former marquess.
His son, however, possessed quite a different reputation. Unbending. Sanctimonious. Harsh. Empty of humor. Being forced to marry a man she could not respect was beyond the pale. “Has his lordship changed his mind about taking a complete stranger to wife?”
Her father looked up from the letter resting upon his desk and frowned. “Do you realize how fortunate you are? You are a mere ‘miss,’ the daughter of a baron. His lordship’s agreement to marry you is a rare opportunity for one of your station. Customarily, a duke or a marquess would court daughters of earls—women who are addressed as ‘Lady So-and-So,’ not ‘Miss Keenan.’ Your marriage to Blackhurst will make you a marchioness, one of the leaders of English society.”
She rarely spoke disrespectfully to her father, who had turned his life upside down to raise his five children properly after the loss of his beloved wife. However, in this matter, Cilla could not agree. “What good will it be to become a marchioness if Lord Blackhurst means to clip my wings? I shall not be allowed my own thoughts on anything more important than the color of a pillow in my favorite drawing room.” She worried if she would be allowed to continue to compose music once she married. She had already sold two pieces to Mr. McFadden in London, and she hoped the fugue she was writing would be the third such piece to know authorship.
“Such nonsense,” her father grumbled. “Blackhurst is not an ogre.”
Her brow crinkled in objection. “In the newsprints, he is depicted as a man with a stick down his trousers and not in the front,” she declared in bold tones.
“Priscilla Rebecca Elizabeth Keenan, I will not tolerate such language in this house! Do you understand me?” her father chastised in sharp tones.
She wished to remind him it was she who oversaw the horse breeding upon the estate and knew something of the nature of stubborn stallions and resistant mares, and she was well aware of what the caricatures meant, but, instead, she bowed her head in submission and said, “Yes, Papa. I beg your forgiveness.” Cilla paused before daring to ask, “When was the last time you laid eyes upon his lordship? Perhaps the man you knew is not the man who has returned to London after years in India.”
Her father’s frown lines deepened in concentration. “Blackhurst was perhaps twelve or thirteen. The last few years of Robert Keyes’s life, the family lived on the property belonging to the late Lady Blackhurst through her marriage settlements. Her ladyship preferred Devon to the wilds of Yorkshire, and Lord Blackhurst adored his wife as much as I did your mother. He allowed her to determine his home seat, but the abbey is Blackhurst’s traditional home.”
“More than seventeen years,” she said triumphantly. “Since reaching his majority and leaving university, the current Lord Blackhurst has spent his years in India. For all we know, he would still be there if his father had not passed. And, might I remind you, that was nearly two years removed. His lordship made no effort to rush home to claim this peerage. We know nothing of the type of man he has become other than the tales found in the newsprints of his years of service to the East India Company, most of which are quite unflattering. I cannot believe you mean to send off your only daughter on the arm of a man who is a complete stranger.”
Turbulent emotions reflected upon his countenance, and Cilla realized he was not as pleased with this arrangement between her family and that of the marquess, as she once thought. Her father sighed heavily. “A contract exists between our families. Would you have me know dishonor? Or ruin? I could not afford a large penalty for breaking the agreement. I have your four brothers to consider.”
“I would have you also consider your only daughter,” she said defiantly.
I began this story in response to readers’ requests to know more of Adam Lawrence, Viscount Stafford, the heir to the Earl of Greenwall and the hero of this novel. Stafford is a like-able rake about Town: Women flock to his masculine charms, and men know envy in his presence.
Adam Lawrence has made an appearance in many of my story lines. He is the character who ties several of my stories together for he is the constant. For example, Viscount Stafford meets Brantley Fowler and Velvet Aldridge at the infamous Vauxhall Gardens in A Touch of Velvet. In A Touch of Grace, Gabriel Crowden, the Marquis of Godown, despises Stafford’s rakish ways, and although Godown knows Lady Anthony as one of his conquests, the marquis objects to the woman also keeping company with Stafford. They often vie for the attentions of the same women in London, and it smarts for Godown to lose to Stafford. In A Touch of Mercy, Adam Lawrence assists Aidan Kimbolt, Viscount Lexford, rescue Miss Mercy Nelson, and he provides Baron John Swenton some much needed advice in A Touch of Honor, regarding Swenton’s war with priority and his desire to claim the woman he loves. Stafford also makes an appearance in His American Heartsong, the companion novel to the Realm series. He visits a house party hosted by Lawrence Lowery, Sir Carter’s older brother. In the book, he assists in disguising Lowery’s indiscretion that would destroy the reputation of Arabella Tilney, a respectable, but a bit hoydenish American, who serves as the heroine of the tale.
In each of these “walk through” roles, my readers’ interest in Adam Lawrence piqued. Therefore, the viscount became a major character in my Austenesque novel, The Phantom of Pemberley. A cozy mystery set as a sequel to Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice, Phantom brings Adam Lawrence and his mistress Cathleen Donnel to the steps of Pemberley.
When a blizzard blankets Derbyshire, Fitzwilliam Darcy reluctantly provides the couple shelter. Lawrence’s presence proves an asset in the Darcys in solving a most unusual mystery. At the end of the novel, Viscount Stafford generously releases Cathleen from his protection. Cathleen travels alone to Cheshire to support her family following the passing of her uncle. Yet, the connection between Adam Lawrence and Cathleen Donnel is not complete. Phantom takes place in 1813, while His Irish Eve is set against the radicalism of 1819. For six years, the life-changing events at Pemberley have haunted Adam Lawrence’s steps. Loneliness dogs Stafford while the viscount searches for the one thing in his life, which will fill him with contentment. Little does Adam Lawrence know what Fate has in store for him.
Blurb:
When the Earl of Greenwall demands his only son, Viscount Stafford, retrieve the viscount’s by-blow, everything in ADAM LAWRENCE’s life changes. Six years prior, Lawrence had released his former mistress Cathleen Donnell from his protection, only to learn in hindsight that Cathleen was with child. Stafford arrives in Cheshire to discover not only a son, but also two daughters, along with a strong-minded woman, who fascinates him from the moment of their first encounter.
AOIFE KENNICE, the children’s cousin and caregiver, appears impervious to Stafford’s masculine charms, as one of England’s most infamous rakes. In truth, Aoife is not as immune as she pretends, but she cannot imagine herself as the object of more than a flirtation on the part of the viscount, and Aoife cannot lose her pride, as well as her heart. On balance, they are world’s apart: Aoife is daughter of a minor Irish baron and the opposite of her beautiful cousin Cathleen, who possessed all the skills to lure in a handsome viscount. To make matters worst, Aoife maintains the family’s sheep farm to support Stafford’s family. A “lady,” Aoife is not.
Set against the backdrop of the radicalism of the Industrial Revolution and the devastation of the Peterloo Massacre, a battle begins: A fight Adam must win–a fight for the heart of a woman worth knowing, his Irish “Eve.”
Excerpt:
Chapter 1 “Respect was invented to cover the empty place where love should be.” – Leo Tolstoy
Late May 1819–Cheshire
“Bloody hell!”
Adam Lawrence cursed as his horse bucked again, each ripple of thunder sending the skittish stallion turning in circles. The skies opened unexpectedly in mid-morning, and Lawrence traveled in the rain for nearly an hour. He rode into the storm, the weather following along the God-forsaken emptiness of Cheshire. He knew little of the area except of the Cheshire cheese he often consumed at some of London’s best parties and of the Trent and Mersey Canal, which connected rural Cheshire to the industrial Midlands. Now, as he passed what appeared to be abandoned farmlands, Lawrence took pleasure in noting the aristocracy’s end, at least, the aristocracy his father preached.
In fact, it was his father who sent him out in this torrential downpour. When the Earl of Greenwall summoned his son to Leicestershire, Adam thought he would receive the usual lecture on financial responsibility. Instead, Robert Lawrence delivered a different edict.
“You will bring the boy to me.” The earl narrowed his gaze to rest censoriously on Adam.
Adam stiffened with the unspoken threat. His father’s tone was hardly encouraging.
“Plan to replace me, Father?”
In matters of his father, Adam always expected the worst. Cynicism cloaked Adam’s shoulders so long that no trust remained in his repertoire. Greenwall’s expression signaled his father’s frustration with their renewed confrontational state.
“You leave me no choice.”
Adam heard what sounded of a hint of regret in his father’s tone. It bothered Adam that his lifestyle brought disdain to Greenwall, but Adam would never admit as such.
“You disregarded your obligation to the title, Adam,” His father spoke with cold indifference. “What am I to do? Turn everything over to your cousin? Atticus Duncan will ruin Greenwall with his taste for extravagance.”
“Worst than mine, Your Lordship?” Adam challenged.
Ignoring his finely tailored clothes, he flopped in a chair.
The earl ignored Adam’s provocations. He shuffled through a stack of papers. “I will not give credence to a debate on your and Atticus’s reputations.” His father extended a letter for Adam’s perusal. “This is from your own man of business. Mr. Jennings corresponded with the young lady who demands the money from you.”
Adam studied the page. His first thought was the letter wreaked of blackmail. “How are we to prove this woman even knows Cathleen Donnel? My God! I have not seen or heard from Cathleen for over six years–not since I put her on a public coach to Cheshire. I released my mistress to her family. Even gave her a generous settlement.” Adam’s eyes searched Jennings’s letter for details. “Where in bloody hell is Mobberley?”
“It is south of Manchester, some fifteen miles,” his father supplied.
Adam asked the question he avoided from the beginning.
“What will you do with the boy? How do we explain the sudden appearance of my son? Of your grandson? A child of whom we held no knowledge? A by-blow cannot inherit an entailment, Father.”
“It will be my concern.” The earl closed the conversation. “All you must do is confirm that the boy is yours and then bring the child to Greene Hall. I will see to the arrangements.” With that, his father stood, picked up his gloves, and prepared to take his leave. “A bank draft is available for the woman–repay her for her kindness toward the child.”
“Pay the lady for her silence, you mean,” Adam snarled.
Greenwall’s brow rose in contention.
“Believe what you wish, Adam. All I ask of you in the matter is to provide the child safe passage. Then you may return to whatever entertainment is your latest avocation.”
It was typical of his father’s orders: They spoke of disappointment. No matter what Adam did, he never pleased the earl. Somewhere along the way, Adam quit trying. It spoke profusely of their relationship that his father would welcome an illegitimate child into his home in hopes of salvaging the title. “As you wish, Sir.” Adam leisurely stood. “Incidentally, I may require an advance on my next quarter’s allowance.”
The earl’s eyes narrowed in disapproval.
“Bring the boy, Adam, and we will discuss it.”
Deep in thoughts of Greenwall’s purpose in this madness, Adam did not react fast enough to prevent the disaster about to beset him. From the mud, an apparition rose to appear before his rain-blinded eyes It eerily spread its wings, opening first one appendage and then another before sending Adam’s mount pawing the air to fight off the attack. Before Adam could react to the manifestation’s appearance, he found himself sliding rear first from the saddle to land unceremoniously in a river of brown ooze. Somewhere in the recesses of his mind, he heard a shriek of surprise, but Adam could not tell whether it came from him or from the dark specter.
* * *
A sudden summer thunderstorm caught everyone in the village unawares, but now only Aoife Kennice fought Mother Nature. She hurried along the muddy road from Mobberley to the small cottage she shared with her late cousin’s three children. The cousin passed from pneumonia two years prior, and since that time, Aoife cared for the children, who were all born on the wrong side of the blanket. That fact might mean something to London aristocrats, but to Aoife the babes were simply the mac and iníons of her col ceathrar–the son and daughters of her cousin.
Although Aoife’s family departed Ireland when she was seven, Aoife often thought and spoke her parents’ native language: Another characteristic, which Aoife shared with her cousin Cathleen. Dear Cathleen, who left home at twenty to join a light opera company. Years later, when Cathleen Donnel passed, Aoife discovered her beloved cousin had, in reality, lost her way and became the mistress of one rich aristocrat after another. When Cathleen returned home briefly following the passing of Aoife’s father, Cathleen brought a tale of a marriage and a husband in the British military. It was only after Cathleen’s untimely demise that Aoife learned the truth. Cathleen’s illness and her trust in the wrong people left nothing for the care of the children, nothing but a few personal belongings; and when no one else stepped forward to care for them, Aoife did not hesitate when the call for assistance went out. She sent for Daniel, Aileen, and Elaine right away.
Today, Aoife made the trek to Mobberley in hopes that the solicitor she contacted in London finally sent word. She desperately needed to locate the children’s father. Realizing the small nest egg her parents left her nearly gone, Aoife abandoned her pride and made a plea for financial assistance. Three growing children could go through clothes and food at an astounding rate. When Aoife contacted the solicitor, Louis Jennings, a man whose name she found in her cousin’s papers, Aoife prayed for a monthly stipend from Cathleen’s former protector, anything to make their lives easier.
In addition to seeking word from Mr. Jennings, among her other errands on this particular day, Aoife dutifully mailed a teaching application to a girls’ school near Newcastle, where her brother was a village vicar.
Now, as the mud practically sucked her worn half boots from her feet, she rued her decision to walk to the village. Not a stitch of her clothing remained dry, and her serviceable bonnet drooped on all sides, permitting a steady stream of water to run down Aoife’s back and between her breasts. A deep rumble of thunder did not threaten her any more than the rain, but knowing Elaine’s fear of storms, Aoife quickened her efforts to reach the cottage.
The water stood on the road, the ditches lining the hardened pathway overflowing. Light-brown ooze filled every nook and crevice as Aoife trudged toward the cottage. As miserable as she every remembered being, she made herself say her daily prayers of thanksgiving, hoping praise would replace the curses fighting to escape. When her foot sank several inches into yet another mud hole, Aoife did not anticipate being slammed face first into the mud and the gook.
Spitting muck and wiping sludge from her eyes, Aoife did not see the stranger before she staggered to her feet, but by then it was too late. All Aoife could do was shield her face with her arms as the animal clawed the air about her head. Impending doom circled about her head. Without thinking, she screamed at the top of her lungs.
Frozen in place, waiting for the worse to happen, Aoife’s mind, initially, did not register the sound of the man hitting the ground. A guttural grunt announced the impact, which knocked the air from his lungs. The curse followed, as his ankle popped, when his weight came down on it at an odd angle.
* * *
Adam struggled momentarily for a coherent thought and a complete breath before realizing the muddy ghost was actually a woman wrapped in a dark cloak.
“Bloody Bedlam,” he yelled over the pounding rain. “Do you plan to stand there like a damn statue or will you offer me your assistance?”
As Adam sprawled on the ground, the woman lowered her arms and stared at him. He grappled with bringing himself upright. Two heartbeats later, she was by his side.
“I beg your pardon, Sir.” She reached for him, realizing too late that mud covered her hands. “What may I do to assist you?”
With the storm swirling around them, the woman spoke close to Adam’s ear, and he recognized the satiny tone of her words. It made him think of silken scarves and luscious fruit spread out before him. Unfortunately, the steady drip of the water from his hat sliding down the back of his shirt carried a taste of reality Adam had no wish to claim.
Adam emitted several expletives regarding the stupidity of the locals before he shouted, “Can you bring my horse around?”
Without hesitation, the stranger nodded her agreement, but Adam watched in doubt as the girl looked up, her bonnet flopping in unladylike pursuits. Muddy trails streamed down her face and seeped slowly into her day dress’s high neckline. When she finally spotted the animal at a short distance, to his amusement, she hiked the swirls of her wet skirt around the upper part of her legs and sloshed off after it.
When the woman stepped over Adam’s outstretched leg, he took a closer look at her. Adam assumed her a farmer’s wife, but after the delectable view of her mud-spattered legs, he certainly hoped the woman belonged to no one. The legs were thin, but muscular, and although he lay on his backside in filthy mud, Adam envisioned those legs wrapped around his body. His gaze rose higher to her small waist and the soft curve of her hips as the rain plastered the woman’s clothes to her lithe form. Even though he was soaked and cold, blood rushed to Adam’s groin, and a smile turned up his mouth’s corners. The natural lilt of the girl’s voice brought his attention to her efforts.
“Easy now,” she coaxed as she slowed her progress, moving closer to the animal. “Come on, my pretty. Is minic a rinne bromach gioblach capall cumasach,” she murmured, as she reached for the reins before patting his horse’s neck. “You are magnificent,” the girl whispered close to the stallion’s ear, and Adam prayed she might say the same thing of him.
The calming effect the woman had on the skittish animal did not escape Adam’s notice. Taking a hold on the harness, she turned the stallion and led it back to where he sat in the murky mess. Although it still came steadily, the intensity of the rain slackened, but both the woman and Adam moved as if it did not exist. Completely soaked and mud-spattered, they had no reason to protect themselves from the elements.
Without instructions, the girl brought the horse along side where Adam sat. He breathed a harsh sigh as he lifted his weight to his knees.
“Hold him still,” Adam demanded before employing the horse and saddle to pull himself to one leg, avoiding putting his weight on the swelled ankle. Using his upper body to right his stance, Adam managed to first stand and then to place his injured foot into the stirrup. Using the saddle’s horn, he lifted upward. Gritting his teeth, Adam placed his weight on the injured foot as he swung the other leg over the horse’s back and settled into the seat. Releasing a steadying breath, he ordered, “Come.” Adam extended his hand to the woman. “I will take you up with me.”
* * *
The rain having washed away much of the dirt that once covered her eyes, Aoife now fully saw the man. His wide shoulders tapered to a flat stomach–a muscular back supporting his frame and strong arms and thighs, which bunched as the stranger lifted his weight into the saddle, and for a moment she wondered how it would be to know such a man, a man of strength. Deep in thought of masculine arms, it took several heartbeats before the stranger’s words penetrated Aoife’s conscious mind. When she looked up to see his outstretched hand, she backed from him.
“I cannot, Sir,” she pleaded for his understanding. “We know not each other. Moreove, I am covered in mud. It would ruin your fine clothes.”
The absurdity of her contention amused him, and the gentleman offered his best seductive smile.
“I am Adam Lawrence. If you provide me your name, we will know each other, and as far as my clothes, my valet will wish to burn these when he sees them.”
Aoife found herself staring into steel gray eyes, mesmerizing orbs beneath dark brows. As handsome as the devil, she thought. Just looking at him sent her heart pounding uncontrollably in her chest.
“You are…you are Viscount Stafford?” she stammered.
A crooked smile indicated the man’s appreciation, but he retracted his outstretched hand. He chuckled as he stared down at her.
“I realize I hold somewhat of a reputation, but I did not think my fame spread to Cheshire.” He leaned down, crossing his arms over the saddle horn. “However, I will learn more of this vicious gossip later; for now, I wish to be from the rain, and I wish to tend my ankle. However, as a peer and a gentleman, I cannot leave you to tramp through this prank of nature.”
The man gestured to the stream of mud flowing down the road’s center.
“You will come with me, my unknown lady of the sludge; my gentleman’s consequence requires I see you safely to your residence.” Again, Lord Stafford pointedly offered Aoife his hand.
“I thought you said your reputation already poor, Sir?” she challenged. “I would not wish to contribute to your societal renown.”
Aoife watched as his eyes narrowed in disapproval.
“Miss Sludge, you will ride with me of your own free will, or I will take you up without your permission,” the viscount snapped.
Aoife’s chin rose in defiance.
“A threat lacks a choice, Sir.”
Noticeably frustrated with the dampness seeping into his bones and with the logic Aoife threw back at him, the viscount edged the horse forward and caught her upper arm. With a gargantuan effort, he lifted her first beside the horse where he took a better hold, and then Lord Stafford jerked Aoife to his lap, sitting Aoife decidedly before him before touching the horse’s flanks with his heels.
“That is better.” The man caught her around the waist and sat her upon his right thigh. “Now tell me your name, Miss Sludge, or would you prefer my endearments.” Lord Stafford whispered close to Aoife’s ear, permitting his lips to brush across her lobe.
Aoife sputtered from the viscount’s forwardness, but she managed to sit tall, very prim and proper before answering, “Aoife Kennice,” she said waspishly.
Apparently amused by his own consequence, the future earl only half listened. “Pardon me,” he said huskily. With his forefinger, he turned her chin in his direction.
“Did the mud affect your hearing, my lord?” Aoife answered with a smirk. “My name is spelled A-O-I-F-E. It is Irish for ‘Eve’ or for ‘Life.’ It is pronounced ‘Ee-Fa.’ My surname is Kennice, which means ‘Beautiful.’”
The viscount’s smile broke his mouth’s line, and Aoife thought if he smiled at every woman as such he must possess a sheik’s harem.
“Beautiful life. I like that much better than Miss Sludge.” Lord Stafford pulled her closer, where her left shoulder lined his chest’s muscular wall and her hips rested above his manhood. “I am Adam, and you may be my Irish Eve.”
Last Woman Standing first made its appearance in October 2019 as part of the Christmas anthology, A Regency Christmas Proposal. It is now a stand alone short romance available on Kindle and Kindle Unlimited.
JACKSON SHAW, the Marquess of Rivens, never considered the “gypsy blessing” presented to his family during the time of Henry VIII truly a blessing. He viewed it more as a curse. According to the “blessing,” in his thirtieth year, at the Christmas ball hosted by his family, he was to choose a wife among the women attending. The catch was he possessed no choice in the matter. His wife was to be the one who proved herself to be his perfect match, according to the gypsy’s provisions: a woman who would bring prosperity to his land by her love of nature and her generous heart. In his opinion, none of the women vying for his hand appeared to care for anything but themselves.
EVELYN HAWTHORNE comes to River’s End to serve as the companion to the Marchioness of Rivens, his lordship’s grandmother. However, Lady Rivens has more than companionship in mind when she employs the girl, whose late father was a renown horticulturalist. The marchioness means to gather Gerald Hawthorne’s rare specimens to prevent those with less scrupulous ideas from purchasing Hawthorne’s conservatory, and, thereby, stealing away what little choice her grandson has in naming a wife, for all the potential brides must present the Rivenses with a rare flower to demonstrate the lady’s love of nature. Little does the marchioness know Hawthorne’s daughter might not only know something of nature, but be the person to fulfill the gypsy’s blessing.
Excerpt from “Last Woman Standing”
Prologue
Battle of Guinegate
16 August 1513
“What shall it be, my Lord Rivens?” His Majesty King Henry VIII asked. “My gift of an earldom or the blessing offered by this gypsy hag?”
Hollister Rivens knew he should claim the earldom and forget the promises of the gypsy witch, but he had witnessed firsthand the apparent power the gypsy held, for it had been the Roma who had instructed the English to build five bridges overnight over the river Lys, thus allowing the English army free passage to the other side. With the bridges in place, Henry had moved his camp to Guinegate on 14 August, displacing a company of French horsemen who guarded the Tower of Guinegate, which led to the English victory at Guinegate. “May I not claim both, my King?” Rivens bravely asked.
Thankfully, Henry found the humor in Hollister’s bravado. “You are an odd one, Rivens, but I am thankful you have served me well today.” Hollister had been part of the Earl of Essex’s forces when Essex ordered the English men-at-arms and the heavy cavalry to charge. They had caught the French just as French army thought to execute a retreat, sending them into disorder. Hollister’s men had held the town of Thérouanne by driving off the French with cannon fire. “You will be from this day forward known as the Earl of Rivens, and you may choose to listen to the gypsy’s tale of woe.”
“Of blessing, my king,” Rivens said. “The gypsy promised me a blessing.”
“A blessing, then, it is, Rivens. Go hear what the hag has to offer you.”
Hollister quickly made his bows and crossed to the small hut where the gypsy had been given refuge. She bade him enter at his knock.
“I see a new man before me,” she said cryptically.
“I have been presented a new title by the King,” he explained.
“More land?” she asked in a mix of heavily-accented English and French.
“I did not ask. I am satisfied with the lands I hold,” he explained, “but a barony does not hold the same power as an earldom.”
“A man of reason,” she said. “Most men want both.”
“I chose both,” Hollister explained. “I chose the earldom and your blessing.”
She smiled then, and Hollister knew she understood his reason for coming. “You wish to know your fate.”
“I wish to know my fate and that of my descendants,” he corrected.
“An ambitious man, but one looking forward, not to the rear.”
“You can tell me this?”
“I can tell you what I see,” she cautioned. “I cannot tell you what to do with the message.”
“How do we go about this? Cards? Gold coins?” he asked in excitement.
“Just stand and close your eyes. I shall circle about you and tell you what I see.”
Feeling a bit foolish, Hollister closed his eyes tightly and stood in place. He could hear her steps drawing closer. She hummed an enchanting tune, one he had not heard previously. Finally, she began to speak. “Another step will be taken when the time comes, but it shall not be yours to take, but, rather, the steps of the relations of your great-greatson.”
“Then I will have an heir?” He asked opening his eyes.
She did not answer. Instead, she kept circling him and humming that delightful tune until he closed his eyes again. At length, she spoke again. “To know the blessings of love and prosperity, choose among those who nourish the earth to scent the air—find one who manipulates the light to comfort the planted seed and who blesses the sweet, soft rain that washes clean a troubled spirit, turning it into the blue of heaven.
“Blessings also come from those minding the cattle and the sheep and all the creatures of the earth. Blessings fall upon the roof and the chimney tall and the hearth blazing within. Blessings come from the one who is kind to both friend and foe, who opens wide the door to strangers and kin.
“Lying beside such a person brings a man dreams, possibilities, and promises at dawn and shelter to calm his soul at night. Love guides a person when his steps stray from the path.”
He heard her walk away from where he stood. Slowly opening his eyes, Hollister asked, “What does all that mean? Is Lady Rosalind my future or not?”
The gypsy smiled in amusement. “The only way to know for certain is to ask Lady Rosalind to bring you a flower.”
WILL THE GYPSY’S WORDS PROVE TO BE A BLESSING OR A CURSE FOR THOSE CALLED “LORD RIVENS”?
Today, I celebrate one of my favorite Christmas tales,”Lady Joy and the Earl.” It does not have the typical hero and heroine found in historical romances, for James Highcliffe, Earl of Hough, and Lady Jocelyn (Powell) Lathrop are middle aged. James and Jocelyn have known each other all their lives, for his family estate and hers march along together on one side. She was the pesky younger sister when James and her brother Emerson roamed the countryside as youths. However, by the time James was nineteen and Jocelyn, or “Joy” as her family calls her, was sixteen, they were in love. Unfortunately, when his father learned of the situation, Robert Highcliffe informed James he was betrothed to Lady Louisa Connick from the time of her birth. Joycelyn’s father then bargains her away to Lord Harrison Lathrop to pay his gaming debts. Lathrop, a viscount, wanted her substantial dowry and the connection to Lord Powell’s marquessate, but he never cared for her as a person.
When the story opens, James’s wife, Louisa, has been dead for some eighteen months, and Lathrop for a decade. Both James and Jocelyn have grown children and a boat load of misery to bring to the table. The question is whether their being forced to join their families together at his estate and the spirit of Christmas can finally place them where they always belonged: AS HUSBAND AND WIFE.
The story is set near Aberford, Yorkshire, in December 1815, some six months after the Battle of Waterloo. I chose Aberford because it was about halfway between London and Edinburgh on the Great North Road, and it was situated close to the town of Leeds. In the story, the hero, James Highcliffe, is attempting to demonstrate to Lady Jocelyn how they share many memories. He asks her to assist him in giving his family a real Christmas celebration, for his household has been in mourning for several years. They consider the “wassail bob,” “vessel maids,” and “Cristes Maesse.”
The service, known as “Christ’s Mass,” eventually became a description for celebrations of Jesus’ birth throughout the world. The word Christmas has its origin from the old English term Cristes Maesse, meaning “Christ’s Mass.” (Celebrating Holidays)
Traditional Customs and Ceremonies tells us, “The demise of this custom shows how easily common traditions can be lost. So popular was the custom that it had a place in the 11th edition of Encyclopedia Britannica:
“What is popularly known as wassailing was the custom of trimming with ribbons and sprigs of rosemary a bowl which was carried round the streets by young girls singing carols at Christmas and the New Year. This ancient custom still survives here and there, especially in Yorkshire, where the bowl is known as `the vessel cup,’ and is made of holly and evergreens, inside which are placed one or two dolls trimmed with ribbons. The cup is borne on a stick by children who go from house to house singing Christmas carols.”
“In the 1800s up to around 1920s, local children around the midlands and northern England, County Durham, Lancashire, and particularly Yorkshire, would enact a curious custom like a mix between carol singing and May Dolls. The custom had many names, often localised Wesley Bob, a Wassail Bob, a Vessel Cup, a Pretty Box or a Milly Box. When the custom was done varied. Visitation days recorded in accounts in Yorkshire emphasize this variation, for example, in Thorpe Hesley it began at Christmas Eve and went on for two to three days. Whereas, Hoyland Common practiced it only on Christmas day morning. In West Melton and Hemingfield, it was Boxing Day, and in Rawmarsh, it was New Year’s Day. Generally though the tradition would begin at Advent or more often St. Thomas’s Day, although in some areas it was November, suggesting there is nothing new in the early celebration of Christmas!
“How the custom was organized differed from place to place. Sometimes it was a private form of begging and at others organized by the church. The basic approach was as follows: two girls would be the ‘vessel maids’ and they carried a box, decorated with evergreens and often fruit and spices, covered in a white cloth. At the people’s homes, the girls would sing a carol and solicit the homeowner for some money, usually a penny, to reveal what was under the sheet. This was a scene of the Holy Family.
Clement Miles in his Christmas in Ritual and Tradition notes that:
“At Gilmorton, Leicestershire, a friend of the present writer remembers that the children used to carry round what they called a “Christmas Vase,” an open box without lid in which lay three dolls side by side, with oranges and sprigs of evergreen. Some people regarded these as images of the Virgin the Christ Child and Joseph.”
“Lady Joy and the Earl: A Regency Christmas Novella”
They have loved each other since childhood, but life has not been kind to either of them. James Highcliffe’s arranged marriage had been everything but loving, and Lady Joy’s late husband believed a woman’s spirit was meant to be broken. Therefore, convincing Lady Jocelyn Lathrop to abandon her freedom and consider marriage to him after twenty plus years apart may be more than the Earl of Hough can manage. Only the spirit of Christmas can bring these two together when secrets mean to keep them apart.
The story is available on Kindle and Kindle Unlimited.
This is how the use of these traditions play out in the story:
He had spotted her in the upper gardens on his return to Hough House, and at that moment, James was thankful young Lathrop had insisted on examining the new mill James and Lord Powell had built together across the river separating their lands. Mr. Locke, James’s steward, had agreed to provide the Lathrop brothers a tour after the young lord began asking questions on the operation.
Dismounting, James left Sultan to munch the grass along the hedgerow and entered the garden off the nature trail to cross to where she studied one of the fountains.
“Good day, Joy,” he called as he came near.
“Oh, Lord Hough.” She jumped as if he had frightened her.
“Woolgathering, my dear?” he said with a smile.
“Simply considering something Lady Hough and your aunt mentioned earlier.”
“And what might that be?” An odd shot of desire crawled up James’s spine. Every time he looked upon Jocelyn, a primal demand overcame his good sense, and it was all he could do not to catch her up in his embrace and kiss her senseless.
“They spoke of your wife’s illness and of her slow death,” she confessed.
James frowned. “They should not have bothered you with the particulars of Louisa’s decline.”
As was typical for Jocelyn, she ignored his warning tones. Instead, she said, “I was astonished to learn of Lady Louisa’s propensity to—”
“To what?” he demanded.
Jocelyn hesitated, her gaze landing hard upon his countenance. “I have spoken from form. Your relationship with the late Lady Hough is none of my concern.”
James swallowed the retort rushing to his lips. If he expected to learn what occurred in her marriage, he must be more forthright in discussing his. He made himself respond in even tones. “I have nothing to hide. Louisa and I never fit. Despite what some may tell you, at least, in the beginning, I came to like her; she is the mother of my children, and for that fact, I owe her my kind regard. That being said, my wife and I held little in common. We were of the nature of distant cousins, each holding on to a relationship forced upon us and attempting to make the best of what we had been handed. I said earlier ‘in the beginning’ when I spoke of my caring for my countess. As time passed, we drifted further apart. Our attempts to make the best of our situation vanished. We differed on every point. If Meredith fell in the mud and soiled her dress, I would find my daughter’s actions amusing, praising her for her strong imagination and willingness to fight the dragon as fiercely as did her brother, whereas Louisa would look on the incident and my reaction with abhorrence.”
“Lathrop would have also found Lady Meredith’s actions repugnant,” she disclosed. “Poor Michael knew his father’s strap more than one time for returning home with muddy boots.”
James attempted to disguise his interest in Lathrop’s high-handedness. “Then Michael favors you in more than just his features,” he said cautiously, watching for Jocelyn’s reaction. “I recall your crossing muddy fields, chasing after Emerson or simply enjoying the day, your skirt tail three inches deep in mud.”
She laughed lightly. “My poor maid. Always scrubbing my petticoats. And, yes, Michael favors my temperament.” She looked past his shoulder as if expecting to see someone behind him. “Where are my sons?”
“I pointed out the new mill your brother and I had built at the mouth of the river. Mr. Locke rode out with us this morning, and he agreed to provide Andrew and Michael a tour of the facility. I believe young Lathrop hopes to borrow some of his uncle’s ideas for the Kent estate.”
She sighed heavily. “I am pleased Andrew seeks both your and Emerson’s advice, but I wish he would occasionally place his responsibilities for his title aside and simply enjoy a few days of family. Both of my sons, but Andrew, in particular, have difficulty separating Harrison’s exacting ways from those of the rest of the world.”
James wished to know more, but he had learned not to push Jocelyn for answers. She related more details each time they spoke, and he must practice patience. Instead, he used the opportunity to put forward his plan to bring her family and his together. “Then perhaps we can join forces to indulge our families, for I have promised Sebastian and Meredith a proper Christmastide celebration. Louisa’s long illness and eventual demise kept my household dark for four years. My children requested we celebrate in the manner of their youth, and I mean to see it done. Sebastian has recently met his majority, and Meredith is already asking for a Season. Soon they will claim their own families. I would have them carry happy memories of Hough House with them when they are elsewhere, not the ones of their mother wishing her life away. Please say you will seriously consider being a part of my plan. Surely you wish the same for Andrew and Michael.”
She eyed him suspiciously. “What did you have in mind?”
“The typical things: holly and mistletoe and a yule log, plus Yorkshire pudding and a turkey, as well as the annual hunt. All the things we had growing up here.” He spread his arms wide. “Anything we care to imagine. Tell me, Joy, what are some of your favorite memories of Christmastide at Powell Manor?”
She sighed dreamily. “Spiced cider and charades and visiting neighbors and children singing carols and a proper Yorkshire Christmas pie and the Wassail bob and ‘Cristes Maesse.’ Oh, I am certain some of these are no longer practiced; after all, I have been gone away for two decades, but you understand, do you not?”
James laughed conspiratorially. “I doubt if the new vicar would approve of vessel maids calling upon households and asking each party to pay a penny to view her unwrapping one of the cloth-covered figures of the nativity. Although I do understand the tradition is still accepted over near Haworth, the good people of Leeds and the surrounding area long ago abandoned the practice, despite the good fortune it is said to bring to the households which participate.”
“But you hold no objections to the others?” she insisted.
James’s expression softened when he looked upon her. “My dearest Jocelyn, if you wished for Lathrop and Michael to view the Wassail bob, I would hire a whole troop of vessel maids to entertain them.” He wagged his eyebrows at her. “Nothing is too lavish for such honored guests.”
Her frown lines deepened. “Do not be foolish, James. What kind of mother parades vessel maids before her sons?”
“None that I know personally,” he teased. “Although, I did hear of a most outrageous mother when I was still at university. The chaps spoke of her often. Some opera dancer who married a baron. DeLong, I believe the name was.”
“You are outrageous, my lord.” She laughed prettily. It was a sound James had longed to hear since they had become reacquainted. Her laughter was a sound that reminded him of all the things he missed about her.
“Then you promise to aid me in my quest?” he implored.
“You truly wish my assistance?” she inquired.
“Naturally, my mother will volunteer, but, I fear, even with Aunt Mary’s assistance, Lady Hough cannot handle all the preparations. She contracted consumption some four years removed. Although she thankfully recovered, my mother still tires easily.”
“Why do we not each create a list of favorites and then compare them? Certainly, the young people will also have favorites. We should not ignore their suggestions.”
James caught her hand and placed it on his arm. “It is chilly, and I believe my mother will have ordered tea by now. Let us go in and consult with Lady Hough. She will be thrilled with your involvement. And, of course, your mother will arrive later today. We will make a jolly group, will we not?”
Introducing 
I began this story in response to readers’ requests to know more of Adam Lawrence, Viscount Stafford, the heir to the Earl of Greenwall and the hero of this novel. Stafford is a like-able rake about Town: Women flock to his masculine charms, and men know envy in his presence.
Every Woman Dreams... 
