Page 1 of Every Rogue Has His Charm

Chapter 1

September 1802

On the rare occasions when his conscience troubled him, Maximilien Grant reminded himself that all noblemen were thieves.

A man did not become a duke or an earl without claiming a right to things that were not truly his: land, the labor of those who worked the land, even the very bodies of those who labored. Distance—a few thousand miles, a few generations—made the provenance of their extraordinary wealth murky, allowed mere bandits to call themselves gentlemen. Some, he felt certain, had even persuaded themselves that their hands truly were clean. Nevertheless, every nobleman Maxim had ever met had something in his possession he ought not to have. Including Lord Earnshaw.

Otherwise, why would the man keep his library door locked?

Maxim had tested the door whenever he passed down the corridor—a dozen times at least. Never once had it been open. Strange behavior indeed, especially when at least a few of the guests at this infernal house party must be in want of something to read. It had been raining steadily for more than three days, and surely billiards and whist and even gossip could not stretch to fill eighty-two hours and some odd minutes.

Of course, several of the guests were content to while away the time in a supine position, either asleep, or—if the groans and giggles he had heard as he’d slipped from his chamber and passed silently through the west wing were any indication—awake and with a willing partner.

He’d not graced a house party in so long, he had forgotten the favored pastime: sex.

If he had remembered it, it would have been another excuse for turning down Earnshaw’s invitation. Not that he objected to the occasional tumble, something to work off his frustrations and clear his head. But the sort of ladies one met at a house party were not his sort at all—which was to say, they were ladies, with expectations of gentlemanly behavior and the power to compel entanglements. He had no intention of being caught in either trap.

Good God, why had he listened to General Scott and come to Hertfordshire?

Two reasons, if he were honest. First, the damned Treaty of Amiens had somehow managed to bring about peace between Britain and France after nearly a decade of war, and Maxim had forgotten what to do with himself when he wasn’t on assignment for the Crown. He’d hoped the party would offer something to counter his boredom.

(It hadn’t. Perhaps because the boredom that plagued him was no ordinary sort. Perhaps it was not boredom at all, that deep pit inside him that nothing could fill. The war at least had been a distraction from it. The companionship and coziness on display at the house party had only made matters worse, providing a vivid reminder of what he lacked, of something he would never have.)

Second, he’d felt certain Scott had pressed him to accept the invitation to Earnshaw’s estate for reasons that had nothing to do with a fortnight’s leisure and everything to do with a suspicion that the earl was hiding something.

(He was. He must be. What other reason did Maxim have for being here? Why else was the damned library door always locked?)

The corridor was dim, the single sconce that had been left burning too far from the entrance to the library to provide either assistance or exposure as Maxim slipped a hand into his breast pocket and withdrew a set of lock picks in a worn leather case.

The thin metal implements had become old friends, having secured both his survival and his reputation at various points of his life. He could open a door or a drawer swifter than a rake could divest a virgin of her honor—and with fewer scruples. Other people’s secrets were never safe with him. With practiced fingers, blunt and bold, he reached out to trace the keyhole. Earnshaw would regret—

At the slightest touch, the door swung inward a few inches, the only sound the catch of shock in Maxim’s throat. Confronted with the unexpected liberty to search, he was suddenly no longer sure what he really sought. After sending a glance over his shoulder, he sidled through the narrow opening into the library and shut the door behind him.

For half a moment, he fancied he was alone in the pitch-black room.

Then he caught a whiff of smoke, the acrid hint of a recently snuffed candle.

“Who’s there?”

The voice—a young woman’s—came from across the room and to his left. He turned toward her automatically. “You’d have your answer already, ma’am, if you’d kept your candle lit.”

She laughed, a low, genuine sound he had not expected.

Over the past week and a half—eleven days, to be precise—he had become well acquainted with the species of feminine laughter known as a giggle. From what he had been able to make out, giggling was intended to attract the gentlemen’s notice, an effort in which it nominally succeeded, for such a grating noise proved difficult to ignore. A pity that no one seemed to have explained to the young women that what they really sought was a gentleman’s unwavering attention.

Well, this young woman had his attention now. Her throaty laugh shot through him, accompanied by a bolt of lust.

“An excellent point, sir,” she conceded, her voice closer now. The room must be familiar enough to her that she could navigate around its furnishings without benefit of sight. She had the advantage of him, then; he still could make out nothing. Only a trio of tall windows on the opposite wall hinted at anything less than utter blackness. “I put out the light because I thought you were my father, come to order me back to bed.”

He’d been introduced to every one of Earnshaw’s guests. But in his mind, the half dozen or so young women were still an undifferentiated huddle of silliness. In the drawing room and at dinner, clad in pale gowns, their feathered headdresses tipped together, they reminded him of nothing so much as an unruly brood of clucking hens.

Now, he found himself wishing he had looked closer. Or listened more carefully. Then he might have been able to recognize this one, despite the darkness.

“I’m not your father.” He spoke low, his gravelly voice little more than a growl.

He bit back the temptation to make some remark about ordering her to bed anyway.

Another laugh, this one a shade less confident. Almost a giggle. Perhaps she’d begun to consider the risks of being a young woman alone, in the dark, with a stranger.