Chapter One
“I know I promised not to meddle in your personal affairs, Ben, but the season begins in six days and you’re the ton’s most eligible bachelor!”
Benjamin West, His Grace Duke of Colchester, glanced up from his wooden pawn to his sister, then, without a word, returned to the chess match.
“Ben!”
she shrieked loud enough to startle his opponent and long-time friend, Simon Hamilton, Earl of Sudbury.
“Just think about attending my ball.
All the ton will be here, and they all want to see you.”
Ben closed his eyes and called for patience.The very last thing he wanted to do was meet a dozen ladies and their mothers all bent on snagging him as a husband.
“Prudence,”
he said with a tinge of steel in his gaze.
“I’m not going.
I’ve told you dozens of times.
I want no part of–”
“I’m doing this to help you,”
she lamented.
“Do you want to fulfill Father’s last wish or not, Benjamin? Besides that, you’re eight and twenty! You’re only going to continue to get older!”
At this, Lord Sudbury smiled.
“She isn’t amusing,”
Ben murmured, watching the earl move his knight.
“I disagree,”
Sudbury replied and looked up to smile at her.
Everyone in Colchester House knew Sudbury was in love with Lady Prudence West.
Only Ben knew that Sudbury planned to ask her to wed him when his tour of fighting for the king was over the following year.
Ben moved his pawn to black to drive back the knight, also securing an outpost square to defend against enemy knights.
Sudbury sighed and dropped his chin into his palm.
“I was distracted.”
“I know,”
Ben looked the board over and then lifted his dark gaze to his friend.
“And you went straight for my throat,”
Sudbury accused playfully.
“Throat, heart…”
Ben shrugged his indigo velvet-clad shoulders … “whatever takes you down.”
“Benjamin!”
his sister shrieked.
He rolled his eyes just before he closed them.
He should let Sudbury win the game since the poor sot had to be mad to care for her.
“You’ve attracted the attention of the most elite,”
the meddlesome wench wore on.
“I hear that even the king’s niece is interested in you.
Think of Father’s will, and of how proud he would be of you if you wed the king’s niece! You're rich, handsome, and unwed.
I’m sure she would fall right into your arms.”
Prudence knew he didn’t want a wife, but she didn’t know why.
There would be some time to tell her.
“Colchester,”
his friend said and shook his head staring at the board.
“How did you capture my knight again! How do you do it every time, and while your sister distracted you?”
“If you truly want to learn, study your surroundings and what I’m doing.
We’ve played enough times.
I won’t just tell you my strategy.”
“Benjamin,”
his sister sniffed.
“I don’t have peace because of you.”
He turned his cool gaze on her.
“Why would you say that?”
“Because it's true.”
Now, tears streamed down her face.
“How can I have peace when my brother will disappoint our father’s unfortunate spirit by not marrying into an influential family? When my brother, the only family I have, has no one to care for him?”
Ben drew in a deep breath, having heard it all a thousand times, and mated Sudbury’s king, pushing it to the edge of the board.
“Let’s end this,”
he told his friend.
“Your heart isn’t in it.”
The earl rubbed his fingers over his throat while Ben rose from his chair.
“You’re speaking of the game, eh?”
“Pru,”
Ben addressed his sister instead of his friend.
“I’ll attend your ball–”
He had to stop and wait until he could pry her off him.
“But, if I don’t find anyone there to my liking, you’ll forget this matchmaking obsession of yours and let me live how I wish to live, as we agreed.”
“Alone?”
Her big eyes, the same color chestnut as her hair, grew rounder.
“If that’s what I want,”
he said woodenly.
He gave her a slight smile, then waited for Sudbury to join him and left the solar.
When he shut the door behind him, he shot his friend a menacing look.
“I should have let one of her other suitors wed her and take her from under my feet instead of waiting for you to finish your duty to the king.
Before taking her to her new home.”
Sudbury shook his head in disgust.
“Think of how your sister would feel if she heard you say that.”
“She’s heard me say it a dozen times,”
Ben let him know and then left his friend to go have break his fast.
Part of the reason he allowed his meddlesome sister to stay was she didn’t want to leave Colchester House.
He understood that she loved it here where they grew up, where the memories of their parents lived on no matter how many years passed.
He loved it the same way.
Turning to look down the torchlit hall on his left, he saw the ghost of his father, Lieutenant-colonel Richard West of the Royalist Army on one of the rare times he was home.
He walked slowly, barely looking up from a pamphlet while his children scurried around him, his mother hurrying after her children to keep them from disturbing their father.
Ben knew his sister had the same memories.
He was too compassionate.
That was his problem.
One of the conditions of him agreeing not to marry her off was that she wouldn’t interfere in his personal life.
Well, he scowled, she’d gone back on her word.
He growled low in his throat.
A ball. A ball with every marriageable woman from Colchester to London attending. All hungry and willing to do or say anything for a nibble.
He hooked his finger under his cravat and pulled.
He didn’t want or need a wife, especially not just because she came from a rich and powerful family.
Still, he didn’t want to disappoint his father, who had included his wishes in his will.
Ben was also a little insulted that his sister thought he needed someone to take care of him.
Had she forgotten that it was him who looked after her, though she was two years older than him, when they were made orphans by radical followers of James Stuart? Ben didn’t need any help.
What he needed was to go back to the chaos of the battlefield.
It was the only place exactly like him.
He missed it.
He needed it after being forced to retire after almost losing his arm while saving King George from the rebellious Jacobites three years ago.
It was the third and last time he saved the king while fighting for him.
Ben still had hopes of returning to the king’s military service once his arm was strong enough to fight again.
Being idle had almost cost him his purpose, which he believed was to fight.
It had to be to fight.
With all the darkness he felt inside himself over his parent’s death, there wasn’t any room for happiness or love.
All he felt was hatred since he was eleven years old.
It’s what drove him, joining Queen Anne’s army when he was sixteen, training and fighting under the brilliant strategist the Duke of Marlborough for the next eight years, after which time he fought for the new king, George of Hanover.
The army had helped relieve the roiling pressure of his anger.
He needed to go back.
He headed to the dining Hall for some refreshment.
Around him, servants scurried about, but he didn’t stop or pause.
He merely nodded an acknowledgement to some and barely that to others.
“Your Grace,”
said an older man who appeared at his side when he entered the great Hall.
“I trust you beat Lord Sudbury.”
Ben glanced at Stephen, his long-time steward.
“I should lose next time just to perplex you.”
Stephen followed him but stood at his side when Ben sat at the largest of three trestle tables and called out for water.
“You look as if you need something stronger,”
Stephen remarked, sizing him up.
“The sun just came up an hour ago.”
“And at night, you don’t partake because you say Tories might attack.
Sir, if I may say, you are no longer in the military.
There’s no need for such rigidity.”
Ben shot his steward a cool look.
“I’m not rigid, Stephen.
I’m disciplined.
There’s a difference.”
“Good morn to you, Your Grace!”
called out one of his vassals.
The greeting was repeated six more times by others.
Ben had learned long ago how to drown out most voices else he’d never hear the important matters.
“And you have to meet with the earl of Ardleigh, Lord Brambley about escorting his daughter to London next month for the–”
Ben held up his hand to stop him.
“Yes, yes, I know.”
Ben’s father had desired a union between his family and the Brambleys.
Or, according to his will, any high-powered family.
His father had given him until the age of nine and twenty to find a well-bred wife.
After that half of his inheritance would go to Prudence if he didn’t fulfill the stipulations of his will.
Let her have it all he thought to himself.
He wanted the battlefield.
He didn’t want to take Louisa Brambley for his wife, whether his father wished it or not.
She was stuffy and said little, yet somehow she made Ben feel less than enough.
He’d agreed to escort her to a new playhouse in London for his father’s sake but this was the last time.
After this, he would inform her father that he didn’t wish to see her again.
He raked his gaze over the people occupying his dining Hall.
They were his men and the wives of those who were wed.
There were troubadours set up in the northeast corner, hired by his sister.
They weren’t playing, but eating his food.
No matter, they would play during supper or they’d be kicked out on their arses.
He reclined in his seat when the female server brought him a jug of water and two cups to go with it.
She leaned over to pour his and let her gaze drift to him.
She was pretty, with plump cheeks and blonde braids swinging over each shoulder.
Briefly, he wondered what Prudence would think of him wooing a servant.
She smiled into his eyes and let out a little sigh, then knocked the cup over into his lap.
He sprang to his feet, wiping a few droplets of water from his lap.
“Oh, forgive me, Your Grace! Forgive me!”
He held up his hand to stop her from crying.
It didn’t work.
He slipped his gaze to Stephen for help.
“Now there, Miss…”
his steward comforted like a father–the way he’d always comforted Ben.
They’d met in the early years of Ben’s enlistment.
Stephen wasn’t a soldier or a noble, he was the queen’s scribe, who traveled everywhere with the royal army.
They had become friends.
When Ben was injured and had to leave the current king’s army, Stephen went with him.
Ben was glad he had, for he was there in Ben’s darkest days of being away from the battlefield.
“Patrice, Sir,”
the server informed them while her cheeks filled with blood.
“Yes, of course, Patrice,”
Stephen said, a master at putting others at ease.
Well, it seemed his steward was doing what he did best.
There was no reason for Ben to linger about.
While Stephen convinced the girl that the duke wasn’t angry, Ben slipped out of the Hall without eating, and then strode directly out of the house before anyone stopped him.
It was a warm day without even a breeze to stir the hundreds of flowers when he opened the gate to the garden.
He liked it here, where the calls of birds took the place of the mundane duties of an idle duke, where he could be alone deep in the garden, nestled on a bench draped with vines festooned with small peach-colored roses.
Pity he didn’t bring a book to read this morning.
His ears picked up the sound of a cat meowing.
He liked cats.
They weren’t needy animals.
He took a step forward, then paused.
It was a human voice.
He turned to it and the direction of the huge cross memorial he'd built for his parents.
“Please.
Ooh, please, Lord,”
a woman begged, “bring me back to the twenty-first century.
I’ll do anything.
And please stop that man from chasing me.
He scares me–”
Ben came upon her kneeling in front of the memorial.
Standing behind her, he could only see her long waves hanging to her waist.
In the sun, gold and autumn bronze puddled in soft copper waves.
He could see her wrists and hands as she lifted them in prayer.
She appeared as delicate as the lilies around her.
Someone was chasing her.
She was afraid. He took a step a little closer.
He moved his gaze over what he could see of her clothing.
Her legs seemed to be bare but for her torn black hose beneath pants that only reached her thighs.
She wore odd boots that came to mid-calf and appeared to be made of some sturdy material.
“I don’t know how I got here but I can’t stay here,”
she continued to pray.
“That man scares me.
Don’t let him find me, Lord.
I’m afraid that if he does, he’ll–”
She must have sensed him behind her because she stopped praying and turned slowly to look over her shoulder at him.
Ben was prepared to offer her help, but when he looked at her every other thought but one fled from his mind.
She was beautiful and…oddly clothed, as if she didn’t come from Colchester.
Perhaps even from England.
She stood to her feet slowly and turned around to face him fully, confounding him further.
She moved with caution, like a feral kitten, ready to flee.
Ben couldn’t take his eyes off her.
She was petite, more like a mythical garden creature than a human woman.
Her skin was milky white with smudges of dirt on her cheeks and chin.
She stared at him with large, pale blue-green eyes that slanted upward at the outer corners like a cat.
“What do you want?”
she asked him, ready to spring away.
Ben had the ridiculous urge to smile at her.
No.
She deserved a scowl for entering his garden uninvited.
“This is my garden.”
She eyed him suspiciously then took a step to leave.
“Oh, sorry for trespassing.
I didn’t mean to--
“Is someone following you?”
She nodded and gave him a desperate look.
“He…he put his sword to my throat.
I’ve been running for days.”
Her belly made a loud sound, and she rubbed her palm across it.
“I’m starving, Mister.
I’ve been hungry before but not like this.”
She lifted the back of her hand to her forehead and closed her eyes.
“Maybe just a little water?”
He didn’t want to get involved.
“Follow me,”
he muttered and began to turn toward the house.
He saw her falling from the corner of his eye and reached for her, catching her in the crook of his arm.
She felt fragile and weak and he was overcome with the unwanted desire to protect her.
He pulled her a little closer.
“Please,”
she whispered weakly.
Her eyes were beginning to close.
“Don’t hurt me.”
She closed her eyes and her head lolled back over his arm.
“Damnation,”
Ben breathed out.
Now what was he supposed to do? He lifted her, in both arms, ignoring the pain to cradle her.
“Miss? Miss?”
He gave her a little shake but she didn’t respond.
He looked toward the house and then hurried to the back door.
“Stephen!”
he called out.
The steward appeared while Ben carried the woman to the back of the kitchen and the empty cot in the corner, half hidden by pots of herbs and spices, along with sacks of apples.
“Bring water,”
he told the steward as he set her down and then stood over her.
Her fiery hair spread out around her head as if it were the sun behind her.
“Who is she, Sir?”
“Water first,”
he ordered, then found a wool blanket and covered her with it.
Yes, he thought while Stephen hurried to his task, who was she? She was clothed in nothing his eyes had ever seen before.
Who was following her and why? His curiosity was piqued–and nothing had piqued it in so long, he’d almost forgotten what it felt like.
He lifted one of the kitchen torches from the sconce on the wall and bent beside the cot.
He held the torchlight near her face, over the alluring curves of her jawline and the pert tilt of nose.
Studying her made him feel something warm and inviting.
Who was chasing her? Why would anyone want to hurt such a fragile being? He’d prefer it if she didn’t die.
He wanted her to open her eyes again so he could ask her why she had asked the Lord to bring her to the twenty-first century.
No.
He didn’t care why. He shouldn't get himself more involved than he already was.
When Stephen returned with the water, he helped Ben sit her up.
Ben had to sit at the head of the cot and nestle her head between his chest and his arm to keep her steady while he wet her lips and then her tongue.
He told Stephen and his sister, when she joined them, where he’d found her and what she had been doing.
“It doesn’t look like there is much we can do for her,”
Prudence said, “Benjamin, I don’t know why you would lay her in our food supply seeing how filthy she is.
We should put her out.”
“We’re not putting her out,”
Ben rested the woman’s head on the cot and stood up.
“I’ll decide what to do with her when she wakes up.
For now, Stephen, assign someone to watch over her.”
“Yes, Sir,”
the steward said as his lord left the kitchen.
Ben left the house again and surveyed the area around the house and garden for any sign of a man lingering about.
After almost an hour he was satisfied there was no man close by who didn’t belong here.
He returned to the kitchen and went to the back where she still lay sleeping on the cot.
One of the servants, Edith was her name if Ben remembered correctly, was sitting with her.
When she saw him, she leaped back and almost fell over backwards in her chair.
“Oh, Your Grace, I didn’t see you,”
she told Ben as he righted her.
“Has she improved at all?”
Edith shook her head.”She’s cold, Sir.
Cold as death.
Here, feel for yourself.”
She snatched Ben's hand and deposited the sleeping woman’s hands into it.
He stared down at them, small, slender, delicate—like her.
Edith was correct, the mysterious woman was freezing.
Ben covered her hands with both of his and rubbed.
“Get her more blankets, and have braziers brought in.”
“But, Sir, I have been putting braziers in her bed all morning,”
Edith told him.
“She’s still has not warmed.”
Ben closed his eyes for an instant and then looked up to heaven when they opened again.
He was never going to hear the end of this from Prudence.
No matter.
He was heir to his father’s estate.
The money was mostly his.
“Call for the physician.
Tell him it’s urgent.”
“Yes, Sir,”
Edith bowed and hurried away.
Alone with the sleeping beauty behind piles of fruits, grains, and fresh herbs, Ben sat in the chair Edith had left empty.
He let his dark gaze rove over the woman’s form, her face.
Her complexion was paler than it had been earlier.
Was she getting sicker? Why had she chosen his garden to pray and then to faint in his arms? Why had he taken her in? Was he responsible for her now? He ran his hand down his face.
He was responsible to the king.
He touched his hand to his shoulder as he rolled it.
That was enough. He didn’t want to take this woman in, as if she were some helpless cat that needed a home, and protect her from a man who was chasing her. What did the man intend to do if he caught her?
“No.”
He leaped up at the sound of her then leaned down with his ear close to her lips.
When she remained quiet and still, he turned his face to see her and felt her breath blend with his.
He was too close.
“Don’t try to speak. Rest.”
He didn’t know if she heard him or not, or why his voice had gone soft when he spoke to her.
It made him want to grumble under his breath, but Stephen told him he did it often and it was unbecoming to a soldier.
“No! Leave me alone!”
She didn’t cry out, seeming to only have enough breath and strength to speak quietly.
“Stop! No…you can’t have it.
I have to find…a way home.”
“Lady?”
he said just as quietly.
But she didn’t respond.
Who was she running from? Her husband? Father? Whoever he was, he’d put a sword to her throat.
Bastard.
Where was her home?
“Your Grace,”
Edith rushed back to the bed.
In her arms, she carried four folded blankets.
“The physician is on his way.”
She dropped the extra blankets onto the bed, then unfolded the first to spread over the woman.
Her gaze fell to something on the bed and she cast him a curious look.
He followed her gaze to where his hand grasped the mystery woman’s own hand.
He pulled it away.
For a moment, he felt as if he were standing on a ledge and his next step could be life or death.
What was wrong with him? A woman in trouble falls into his arms and he can’t seem to leave her bedside? He needed more purpose, he told himself.
He’d gone from the frightening thrill of being on the battlefield, blood rushing through his veins from his constantly pounding heart to being idle for a large part of the day.
Either boredom or–
“Do you think she could be ill and it could be contagious?” he asked.
Edith blinked and took a step back.
“Leave the diagnosis to the physician, not to a servant, eh?”
Barnaby Greeves, the town’s physician, entered the kitchen and strode to the back of it.
Prudence and Sudbury followed behind him.
“Are you going to pay for a physician for her?”
Prudence gave him a slight sneer while the physician examined the woman in the bed and removed her footwear.
“Yes.”
The sneer faded and worry creased her brow.
“Why? Who is she? Who is her family?”
He clenched his jaw and kept his gaze on the patient.
“Should I toss her to the side of the road?”
“Why wouldn’t you?”
she asked, sincerely perplexed.
When it came to helping others, his sister only helped those who could benefit her.
There was no use trying to answer her question.
“Benjamin?”
she demanded when he didn’t answer her.
“Prudence?”
The earl of Sudbury stepped forward.
“What are you doing? You will not badger him about his code.
Not another word or I’ll carry you out over my shoulder.”
He stared down at her from all six feet seven inches of him.
He never used his size to intimidate her before.
Ben was glad he stepped in now.
“Her body temperature is very low,”
the physician announced, stepping back.
“But I don’t think the cause is anything nefarious.
She seems to be suffering from hunger and severe fatigue.
She has traveled a great distance.
Look here at her feet.”
The physician pulled back all her blankets and exposed her bare legs and feet.
The latter were rubbed raw.
Both feet suffered the same blistered, bloody condition.
Ben’s stomach knotted and his chest felt tight.
Prudence sighed and looked away.
“I’d like for her to stay rested,”
the physician continued.
“Don’t move her, save only to try to get her to eat.
Begin with soup today.
Her stomach is weak from not eating and anything other than liquid could do more harm than good.”
Edith nodded.
“How long must we care for her?”
Prudence asked the physician and was promptly hauled over Sudbury’s shoulder and taken away.
Ben looked down at the sleeping woman.
He’d done everything he could.
There was nothing left for him to do but trust her to Edith’s care.
As he was practicing his swordplay, he couldn’t help how often he thought about her.
But he tried with all his might to refocus on his task at hand.
He needed to become stronger.
and he wouldn’t deviate from it. The old hatred clung on tight and wouldn’t let him forget. He needed to fight.
Priding on himself on his self-discipline, he forced himself not to think of her while he practiced, swinging and ducking, blocking and parrying, nor when he ate supper that night alone in his room.
As he laid down to sleep, he was plagued with questions about the beautiful stranger that left him restless as he got up and began to pace his chambers.
Her clothing was strange, where did she come from? What happened to her petticoats and what were her boots made of? They were as strong as thick leather with especially thick soles.
Who had been chasing her? and why?
He groaned.He had to stop troubling himself with her.
To prove that he could, he returned to his bed and closed his eyes, vowing not to open them again until he had slept.
But all he could see was her face behind his eyes.
Finally, he left his bed and went to the kitchen.
She was still asleep.
He stood over the bed until the sun broke through the window.
He hoped she would live.
He thought he might be the only person cheering for her.
Maddeningly, it made him want to reach out and run his fingers over her hair, her face.
She was far from home.
Her feet testified to it. But as each moment passed, his head talked his heart out of whatever spell he’d fallen under. “There’s no place in my life for you,”
he whispered.
“I must rein in my intrigue and my desire to protect you and stay away.
So, get well, my lady.
Get well and live.”