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“No, my Lord. Miss Elizabeth may not stay up later. It is already long past her bedtime, and you have thoroughly over excited her. Children need the security and certainty of proper hours. That is why you employed me, is it not?”

Georgette stared back into Lord Amberson’s beautiful face, refusing to be swayed by his insincere smile.

He might win the hearts of every debutante on the marriage mart, but Georgette knew what he was, and would not be taken in by his perfect features and charming manners.

Her duty lay with his daughter, a dear little creature desperately in need of a mother.

She was Mrs Merriam now, a governess and a formidable creature who never backed down, and she would do her duty by the child in her care, and ensure she was safe and loved.

Sadly, the poor child’s mama, the late Lady Amberson, had died six months ago. No doubt of a broken heart, Georgette thought in disgust. His Lordship was notorious for his many affairs and Georgette did not doubt he would make a May game of her if she let down her guard.

She vowed it would never happen.

―Excerpt of His Grace and Disfavour, by an anonymous author.

1 st December 1850, Goshen Court, Monmouthshire.

Damn, damn, damn, Pip thought savagely. He had not meant to do any of that, had not meant to take such appalling liberties with a woman in his employ.

Had she felt obliged to go along with it for fear of losing her job?

Had he pressured her? No. With his heart still thundering erratically, Pip took a moment to regard the woman beneath him.

Her beautiful hair had come undone—he vaguely remembered taking the pins out—and it spilled over her shoulders and fanned out over the carpet beneath her.

Though her gaze was wary now, no doubt waiting for his reaction , her skin was flushed pink with pleasure, her lips swollen from the fever of his kisses.

God, but she was lovely. Desire rose inside him again, fierce and hot, and he found he could not regret what he had done.

It had been too… too everything , so much more than anything he had known before.

Passion and desire and something else, something elusive and rare, had bloomed between them, and he did not want to let it go.

Mrs Harris—and he really had to stop calling her that—looked away from him suddenly, and he realised she was trembling.

Feeling like an utter brute, he hurried to retrieve a handkerchief and cleaned the evidence of his desire from her stomach before shifting beside her and gathering her into his arms. Her look of bewildered surprise and the rigid feel of her body struck him with some force, and he frowned at her.

“What?” he asked, wondering why she looked so shocked.

She stared at him for a long moment before letting out a soft laugh. “You keep surprising me,” she said, allowing herself to relax into his embrace.

Pip considered this, unsettled by her words. “What did you think I would do, tell you to pack your bags?” he asked, and then muttered a curse as she sent him a sheepish look. “Damn me, you do hold me in esteem.”

“Oh, no,” she said in a rush. “I do, truly, only—well, we’ve made a rather difficult situation for ourselves, haven’t we?”

He could hardly deny it and nodded. “It’s all your fault,” he said gruffly. “I was relying on the fact that you’d be disgusted with me and give me a terrific set down when I confessed how badly I wanted you. I never expected you to kiss me.”

“Oh, yes. I imagine that’s a terribly shocking reaction for you,” she drawled, her voice so heavy with irony that Pip snorted. “I expect women turn you down all the time. How disconcerting it must have been.”

“It was,” he insisted. “And you’re not like any of the other women. You don’t bat your eyelashes and agree with me even when I say the most nonsensical thing imaginable.”

“No, I don’t,” she said, looking up at him with amusement. Her mouth curved into a wide smile and a sudden burst of laughter broke from her that made her convulse against him.

“What?” Pip demanded, wondering what was funny. He didn’t doubt she was laughing at him, but couldn’t fathom why. Not that he minded; he rather liked it when she made fun of him.

“Oh, but you were so s-surprised,” she chortled, before giving a very unladylike snort as whatever it was amusing her struck her again. “The look on your f-face when I pulled you back and k-kissed you. It was the funniest thing. I’ll never forget it.”

Pip watched her, an odd feeling stirring in his chest as she spluttered and giggled, so free and uninhibited, not caring a whit what she looked or sounded like. It was utterly charming. She enchanted him.

She sobered suddenly, the laughter fading from her eyes and her expression growing serious.

“This can’t happen again,” she said, and though he knew she was right, his heart rebelled against the idea. The regret in her voice was audible, and that eased his pain a little, but not enough for him to accept it with equanimity.

He stared down at her, a desperate feeling growing in his chest. “We could be careful,” he said, knowing she would never agree and wanting to rail at her for being rational when what lay between them was so new and exciting and unexplored.

“Like now, for example?” she said with undisguised sarcasm. “No, my lord. What if Tilly had a bad dream and came to find me and I wasn’t there? What if she came to find you and discovered us like this?”

Pip blanched at the idea. She was right. He knew she was right, but the more sensible she was, the angrier he felt.

“Well, I’m glad to see you can dismiss me, this , with such ease. I was afraid I might have hurt your feelings,” he said bitterly, the words out before he could think better of them.

She started as though he’d slapped her, and Pip let out a curse.

He reached for her and pulled her back before she could move away.

“No. No, don’t go. I’m sorry. I didn’t mean it.

I know you are right, it’s just I don’t want to hear you talking sense.

I’m a bloody fool, but I want you to want this as much as I do. ”

She stared up at him, something that looked horribly like pity shining in her eyes.

“I do,” she said softly, reaching out and pressing her hand to his cheek.

Pip closed his eyes and turned into her touch, but she wasn’t done.

“I want this dream never to end, but real life is not a dream, my lord. We do not get a happy ever after just because we want one. I cannot afford to lose this job, and you know Tilly would be devastated if I had to leave her. I will not hurt her, or myself, by prolonging the agony when I know it will end anyway. I am not for you, and you are not for me. It’s impossible.

Better to finish it now, to remain on good terms, and to walk away with a memory that I, at least, will always cherish. ”

“You think I won’t?” he demanded, frustration bringing all the emotions he usually hid so carefully to the surface. “You think I could forget?”

She stared at him, startled by his reaction, and to realise that was exactly what she thought hurt more than he could articulate.

Instead, riled up and confused by things he did not wish to feel, he grasped the back of her neck and pulled her to him, kissing her with such ferocity she gasped.

She did not back down though, or shrink away.

No, she met him with a furious passion that revealed she was not so calm and self-possessed as she appeared.

He wanted that, he wanted her to rage and protest the unfairness of life, of this appalling situation, but she would not.

She was too pragmatic for that, too strong to weep over things that could not be changed, but she would give him this.

This bold, intriguing woman whom he wished he could know better, gave herself to him and took everything he had with such fervour, such greedy delight, that he knew she felt it too.

Their joining was frantic, desperate, and he knew he would relish the marks her nails made down his back, the only evidence she would allow him that this had even happened.

He was no fool, and knew that tomorrow morning she would return to the no-nonsense, sensible governess he had known for so many years.

Once again, she would be the woman who had irked him and bothered him and nagged at the edges of his mind for so long, until finally he had seen her, discovered what had been right beneath his nose.

But how was he to unsee her? That was what he did not know and did not wish to discover.

For now, he could do nothing but imprint the feel of her body upon his mind so he could never forget.

He would remember every sensation, every kiss, the lush heat of her enveloping him, the sounds she made as he loved her, and the scent of her skin.

These details he would gather and keep like a miser hoarding gold, and never let them go. Unlike her.

He would let her go, because there was no other choice.

Regina woke later than usual but still could not force her unwilling body out of the warmth of her bed.

Sleep clung to her, as did the dream. It was only a dream, she told herself sternly, though the evidence of the earl’s passion was impossible to ignore.

Her body ached from his attentions, making it difficult to pretend her dream lover was anything other than flesh and blood and muscle.

Recalling the events of last night made her skin flush both with remembered pleasure and the knowledge she must face him again.

She must look him in the eye and converse with him and pretend nothing had happened.

This day, this week, and every day and week and month that followed, must come and go without her ever giving herself away, without him ever suspecting that she had given him far more than her body last night.