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P en woke to an enormous racket of birds.

He sniffed the air and from outside his window smelled the sea and the morning mist rising from the river.

The day promised sun. He had lived here long enough to know the time by the slant of light, if the tide was coming or going, and whether the air carried rain.

Gwen lay with her head on his chest, her hair a wild tangle.

He was torn between waking her to talk to her and watching the complete innocence of her sleep.

When she came to his room last night, her face lit by the flickering candle, her expression unsure of her welcome, he hadn’t been concerned with explanations or just desserts.

It was as if he lost every instinct for self-preservation when she was around.

He craved the peace he found in her arms above every other thing.

He didn’t even care about her motives, though that made him a fool.

He would be a fool for her. She had rescued him the way she had so many others, knit his broken places, made him whole with that gift she had for life and strength and hope.

He’d never felt this contentment, this bone-deep ease with himself.

He had a roof over his head and nourishing food in his belly.

His body felt stronger than it had ever been from his days of honest labor, and his head was clearer without daily immersion in rum.

With Gwen in his arms, he found a part of himself he’d never known existed.

With her silken body beside him, her hair spilling over his arm, her quiet, steady breathing and her face angelic in sleep, he woke to a world made new.

The realization tilted the earth on its axis, made him dizzy though he lay in his bed.

There was his world with Gwen in it, and there was the world without her.

With her, his world was complete, even with the gaps in his memory. Without her, he wouldn’t survive.

Rather terrifying thought, that.

He still didn’t know how much she knew about him, or why she would withhold that knowledge from him. But he sensed it wasn’t what he had first feared, that she meant to humiliate him. No, what humiliated him was to have a man like Calvin Vaughn look past him as if he were nothing.

Calvin Vaughn had been his toady back in London, eager to lick Pen’s boots in hopes of courting his widowed sister-in-law, who had a sizeable jointure.

Vaughn had accompanied Pen on many nights of carousing at the theatre and gambling den.

He’d applauded Pen’s every win at cards, every insolent compliment to a lady, every barbed setdown of another man.

But here, just like that black spider of a solicitor who looked at Pen holding the wheelbarrow and saw filth, Vaughn had seen a laborer in a workman’s woolen jacket and cap and ignored him like the dirt under his feet.

Without his lord’s clothes and his lordly mien and his noble title, perhaps he was nothing. A worthless excuse for a man who preyed on others and expected the world to conform to his desires. Much like Vaughn.

In his real life, he had power. He could end livelihoods in an instant by closing a pension or turning tenants off an estate. He could improve the lot of thousands with a wise investment or cripple the lives of millions with an investment somewhere else. He was a bloody. English. Viscount.

And before he came to St. Sefin’s, he hadn’t possessed one quality that would make a man like Barlow, or Vaughn, respect him when the title was set aside.

The only thing he’d ever managed in his life was to not die on the beach at Tenerife, and that was due to the luck of grapeshot landing two inches shy of his heart, and the field surgeon binding his leg before he bled to death.

Gwen shifted and put a hand on his ribs. She met his eyes, blinking sleepily, and her slow, sweet smile hit him like a mallet in the chest.

“It’s noisy out there,” Pen murmured. “Is that the thrush?”

She tilted her head and listened. “Garden warbler. They like to nest in the cemetery next door.” She paused. “Behind it, the one that sounds like my harp, skylark. And there—that’s the swift. A sign that summer is near.”

He combed his fingers through her glorious hair, soft as spring grasses.

She was a wild creature, his Gwen. She would love his estate in Essex.

Acres and acres of woodland and pasture to tromp about in.

He would take her fishing and swimming in his favorite lake and he would eat whatever she wanted to pull out of the shrubbery.

The daughter of farmers and innkeepers. Finally, she’d told him the truth of her background.

It wasn’t the lowest possible birth, but not nearly high enough that he could raise her to a viscountess without damning them both to misery.

The judgments and contempt from those of his class would kill that free, independent spirit of hers that he loved.

People would cut her, despite her title, and he would be ridiculed for stooping so low.

He would be laughed out of Lords, shut out of his clubs, and when they were pariahs in his world, not invited anywhere, what then could he offer her?

If Edwin had been alive and doing his duty, damn his eyes, Pen could marry where he pleased.

He could marry a farmer’s daughter and everyone would think it another of his freaks, like when he had decided to live in a cave for one summer, or pretended there was a monster in the lake on their estate in Essex.

Like when he and his mates at school had painted a farmer’s entire herd of cows one night for a prank, or when he had bought a commission into the navy when extra Price sons had always gone into the law.

Rhydian’s way, his family called it, the mantra accompanied by a disappointed sigh.

But many men of his station kept mistresses.

It was practically de rigueur. The Penrydd townhouse had a carriage house where she could be close at hand, though those quarters were rather small.

Perhaps a house next door, or just off the square, would give them room to entertain when they wished.

He’d buy her a coach and pair and a roomful of gowns.

In a proper frock he could take her anywhere, the theatre, the pleasure gardens, dinners with his friends, and she would shine down any of the high-born women.

He’d be the envy of all who knew him. For once.

And he could take her with him when he traveled; many men of his class brought their mistresses to house parties.

Prince William, Duke of Clarence, lived openly with his actress, Mrs. Jordan, and they had a handful of little FitzClarences.

Pen would support any children and love them with his entire being.

He would settle a generous annuity on her and wouldn’t revoke it even if she wearied of him, as she was bound to do, since he seemed to be the sort that wearied people.

His heart tightened painfully as she scattered little, thoughtful kisses over his chest. Her lips were warm and soft as velvet.

What if he offered her everything he had, his life, what remained of his fortune, and she didn’t want him?

How could he bind this woman so deeply to him that she’d never let go?

He wanted to be sure of her before he made his move.

He wanted her to trust him enough to tell him the truth.

“Gwenllian ap Ewyas,” he said softly. “What are you doing to me?”

Her eyes widened, and she smoothed her hand down his belly, fingers moving in sure strokes. He let her play. He loved how bold and unashamed she was. The pleasure she took in him, with him, added to his satisfaction in ways he’d never experienced.

“Besides that, minx,” he said, his voice roughening.

She hesitated, and that shadow he hated came into her eyes. She was preparing to skirt his question.

“Do you want more than this?” she whispered.

What else mattered but the world they built together?

He liked the man he was with her. And he was fairly certain Gwen liked him better as plain, nameless, blank-slated Pen than anyone had ever liked him as the Honourable Rhydian Price, or Lieutenant Price, or The Right Honourable The Viscount Penrydd.

If she would only look at him like this all the time, be this easy and open and loving with him, then he didn’t need anything else.

But there were any number of people who depended on the Viscount Penrydd for their survival. He wasn’t at liberty to lark off to whatever corners of Britain he liked and hole up there with a pretty maid, leaving Ross to run the estate. Damn Edwin, damn him, damn him for dying.

He caught her roving hand and held it to his chest. “I want you,” he said roughly, “to tell me what you’re after.”

Her eyelids tensed, and he recalled that she still needed the money to pay off that lord who’d offered to sell the place.

Something tugged at the last blank spot in his mind.

His memory was coming back in long skeins, but the days before he’d showed up at St. Sefin’s were dark.

Probably due to the blows he’d taken to the head, though thanks to the pair who had accosted them at the bridge, Pen had a lead on who was responsible for the beating that had left him insensible in a boat in Newport.

Once he got that sorted and had his revenge, there was no reason to stay here. And no reason not to carry Gwen away with him when he left.

She had to come with him. Leaving Gwen would tear him apart worse than being shot on the beach at Tenerife.

She splayed her hand over his chest as if listening to the agonized rhythm of his heart.

She shifted and laid her body atop his, her breasts to his bare chest. The contact staggered his senses, as she always did.

Then she put her hands along his jaw in that way that made him want to bow his head and surrender to her completely.