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Chapter One

“Oh… God…”

My head.What have I done?

Miss Selina Gouldsmith, daughter of the Dowager Viscountess Langham, had never felt such nausea. Her stomach churned—that feeling that there was a storm raging through her guts and trying to escape from her mouth. Her head throbbed. Perhaps a little man had crawled into her ear last night and was now beating her skull with a mallet? And even with her eyes closed as they were, she could feel the room spinning around her.

“What on earth…” she groaned as she forced her eyes open.

The early morning sun seared her eyeballs, and she gasped, throwing up her arm to shield them. Mouth as dry as a desert tundra, she attempted to swallow, but her tongue was thick and heavy and coarse. Slowly, her head now spinning—bearable, compared to the headache—she pushed herself up in a desperate effort to get her bearings.

The first thing she noticed was that the room she had slept in was not her own. She recognized it as one of the spare rooms in her home. Strange that she had slept here rather than returning to her quarters.

The second thing she noticed was that she was dressed, thankfully, in a nightgown. The thin garment clung to her sweaty body, which was strange, as she was shaking as if cold.

And the third thing she noticed?—

“Oh!” She sprung suddenly from the bed in a panic, landing on the timber floor with a heavy thump.

She was not alone in the room.

Lying in bed beside her, out cold and wrapped in the same blanket that Selina had just been sleeping beneath, was a man!

“Urgh…” A groan escaped his not-asleep body. “What in the name of all things…”

Selina jumped to her feet in a state of panic. Her hangover had her moving slower than she might have liked, and it clouded her mind in a way that made it impossible to think, let alone act!

She stood frozen in shock, staring wide-eyed as the strange bedfellow slowly turned around, opened his eyes, saw her watching him, frowned to himself in confusion, closed his eyes and shook his head, opened them again, frowned further…

“Who the devil are you?” he asked, his voice thick and husky. “And what are you doing in my room?”

Her mouth hung open in a way that she imagined made her look like a fish trying to breathe on dry land.

“Well?” He sat up and scowled at her. “Speak, woman! Or do you make a habit of sneaking into men’s rooms as they try and slumber?”

“I… I… I…” she stammered stupidly.

Selina’s mind raced as she tried to piece together how this could have happened. The previous evening, her mother had thrown a house party and invited every eligible bachelor in London to attend. The goal was to acquaint them with Selina in the hopes that one might take an interest and court her this Season. Selina could remember meeting many decent fellows, drinking plenty of wine, and then… that was where things turned fuzzy.

“Oh, great, she’s simple,” the man groaned and rubbed his eyes. “And I have a splitting headache—what was in that wine? Make yourself useful, will you, and fetch me a glass of water. And be quick about it.”

He did not recognize her, mistaking her for a maid. Selina suspected that his hangover was to blame, for his sweat-drenched skin and sunken eyes suggested that he was in a similar state to her own. A shame then that she recognized him… oh, how she did.

His name was Edmund Seymour, the younger brother of Benedict Seymour, the Duke of Northwick. Vague memories of speaking to the man last night flashed through her mind, but they were blurry and sporadic and impossible to piece together. As was any sense of how the two had ended up in bed together.

How much did I drink last night?

“Well?” he grunted as he massaged his temples. “Now would be preferable.”

Selina almost snapped at him, for he was not a very nice gentleman, and ordinarily, she would not stand for such rudeness. But there was nothing ordinary about this situation.

“Y-Yes,” she stammered stupidly instead. “I will be right back.”

It didn’t matter how this had happened. All that did matter was that nobody found out. For if someone did…

Selina spun about quickly, intending to sprint out of the room and never look back. She barely took a single step before Lord Edmund spoke again.

“Wait a minute,” he called. “What are you wearing?”