Page 1 of To Wager with Love

Prologue

Dear Jemima,

I do hope that you are well. It’s been so long since any of us heard from you. I had hoped you would attend St Clair’s ball, but Kitty tells me you won’t be there. It’s an age since we saw you last. Is everything all right? I warn you I intend to call on you the moment I’m back in town and I shall expect an excellent excuse for your lack of correspondence. If anything is troubling you, you may confide in me. You know that, don’t you? I would help if you’d let me. Please do reply, Jem, dear. We worry for you.

―Excerpt of a letter from Miss Matilda Hunt to Miss Jemima Fernside.

The morning of the 31st August 1814. Holbrooke House. Sussex.

Harriet’s eyelids fluttered as the early morning light pierced her tender brain. Good Lord, but her head was pounding. She raised a hand, pressing tentative fingers against her aching temples. She must be unwell, she decided, realising that her stomach felt uncertain too; an unpleasant acidic swirl in her guts certainly boded ill. With a soft sigh, she shielded her eyes from the sun, intent on sleeping some more. The bed was deliciously warm, and she wriggled back, luxuriating in the comfort of its embrace. It even smelled good: a touch of bay rum, soap, and something musky and… masculine.

Wait.

What?

Harriet froze as she registered a contented murmur from behind her—from extremely close behind her.

She started awake, and looked down in horror to discover she was all but naked—wearing only her shift—and that a man’s muscular bare arm encircled her waist, just below her breasts. As she stared, the arm tightened, pulling her closer and, with growing alarm, her beleaguered brain registered the heat of a broad chest pressed close against her back, not to mention… not to mention….

Harriet squealed as the hot, hard length of a very masculine member pressed firmly against her bottom. Flailing with panic, she turned in the confines of the embrace that held her captive and came face to face with a pair of startlingly beautiful aquamarine eyes.

A very familiar pair of aquamarine eyes.

Oh, good God.

Harriet gasped, too stunned to say a word as Jasper St Clair gave her a crooked grin that was famed throughout the ton for having the ability to make sensible women lose their senses, and their virtue.

“No,” she breathed, too horrified to find anything more to say for the moment, though she felt sure an avalanche of words would follow just as soon as she gathered her wits… and her undergarments, which appeared to be scattered about the summerhouse.

Good heavens! They were alone together, in the summerhouse, and from the looks of things, they’d been there all night. What had they done? What had she done? Harriet racked her aching brain, but the wretched thing refused to cooperate. All she could remember was the feel of Jasper’s arms about her, the press of his lips against hers….

Oh no.

Oh, no, no, no, no….

“Good morning,” he said, his smile fading a little in the light of her obvious dismay.

“W-What—?” she began, only for them both to jolt in alarm at the sound of the summerhouse door opening, the recognisable scrape of the ill-fitting wood grating over the flagged stone floor.

Laughter and chatter reached them, too late for them to move, for them to hide or gather their things, and suddenly they had an audience.

Jasper reacted first, snatching up his coat from the floor beside their makeshift bed, which seemed to be compiled of a nest of assorted blankets. He covered Harriet as best he could and then held her to him, meeting the astonished gazes of the assembled company, who were staring at them with looks ranging from delight and amusement to appalled fascination.

The blush that scalded Harriet’s cheeks was so fierce she thought she might spontaneously combust, which seemed a rather happier outcome than facing Lady St Clair, Matilda and Mr Burton, Jasper’s brother Jerome, and two of his cronies from his school days whose names escaped her. She did remember one of them being the biggest tattle monger she’d ever come across.

Good God. She was ruined.

“Ah,” Jasper said, his voice a little less urbane than usual. He cleared this throat, and when he spoke again, the words were firm and very, very clear. “It seems you are the first to congratulate us. Harriet has agreed to marry me.”

Harriet’s head whipped around to stare at him again, open mouthed at the bare faced lie. Jasper just grinned at her and kissed her on the nose.

“Got you,” he whispered.

Chapter 1

Dear Papa,

I’m so excited for tonight’s ball. Everyone who is everyone will be there. Did you hear that our good friend, Kitty has married Luke Baxter—he is the heir to the Trevick earldom? The old earl died recently and now his heir is also dying and won’t last the year out. I’m afraid to say I can feel little sympathy for the man. He was not a kind or Christian soul. I’m so happy for Kitty though, and to think of her being a Countess! Such a romantic story. It makes one hope that such things are not restricted to fairy tales, and yes, Papa, before you ask, of course I shall keep my eye out for any eligible gentleman ready to sweep me off my feet.