Romancing the Duke

And for as long as she could remember, Izzy had been waiting—with dwindling faith and increasing impatience—for that part of her life to begin.

Her cravings for romance were gone. Now she’d settle for bread. What fairy tales were left over for a plain, impoverished, twenty-six-year-old woman who’d never even been kissed?

This castle didn’t welcome or enchant.
It loomed.
It menaced.
She almost worried it might pounce.

There were things in nature that took their beauty from delicate structure and intricate symmetry. Flowers. Seashells. Butterfly wings. And then there were things that were beautiful for their wild power and their refusal to be tamed. Snowcapped mountains. Churning thunderclouds. Shaggy, sharp-toothed lions.

This man silhouetted before her? He belonged, quite solidly, in the latter category.

“That’s it,” he said, at length. “You’re leaving this place the same way you came in.”

He ducked, caught her by the legs, and threw her over his shoulder—with the ease of a man who’d tossed many a woman over his shoulder. This was definitely not his first go at lady-tossing.

He bounced her weight, plumping her backside with his forearm. “There’s so little to you.”

“You’re wrong,” she said. “There’s a great deal to me, Your Grace. More than you know. More than anyone supposes. You can carry me outside, if you like. I’ll come back in. Again, and again. As many times as it takes. Because this is my castle now. And I’m not leaving.”

She poked around, making busy clanging noises. “I don’t suppose there are eggs? If I do say it myself, I make a very good pancake.”
Oh, no. This just grew worse and worse.
I make a very good pancake.
Appalling.
What was even more appalling was that Ransom found himself suddenly hungry for a very good pancake. Starving. Ravenous. Damn it, he was faint with yearning for a very good pancake.

Get out now. The threat is coming from inside the castle.

The armored riders dismounted in unison, and the carriage doors opened, spilling forth about a dozen young ladies in medieval dress. Banners waved briskly in the morning breeze.

Once again, she woke to darkness, her heart pounding with terror and her throat scraped raw.
Strange noises assailed her from all sides.

“There’s a rule about sunsets in this castle, Miss Goodnight.”
“There is?”
“Yes.” He turned her to face him. “And a man and a woman standing in this very place are compelled to heed it. No choice. There’s only one thing to be done.”
“What’s that?”
Her pulse stumbled. Surely he couldn’t mean to...
He lowered his head and made his voice a seductive whisper. “Duck.”
Duck?

“Oh, no.” She stiffened. “Those can’t be...”
They were.
Bats.
An entire colony of them had been roosting in the highest reaches of the canopy. Now they took wing one by one, then ten by ten...and then hundreds all at once.

The Lord Archers of the world didn’t want Izzy to be a grown woman with her own set of likes and dislikes, dreams and desires. They wanted her to be the wide-eyed young girl of the stories. That way, they could continue to read and reread their beloved tales, imagining themselves in her place.

He might be wealthy, powerful, angry, and big. But on at least one score, Izzy had him outmatched. Buoyancy. She knew how to handle prickly creatures, and she knew how to make the best of a less-than-ideal situation.
When thrown in the pond, she learned how to swim.

But was this truly all that was left of him? A cruel, unfeeling brute who would cast a defenseless young woman out into the night?
He didn’t want to believe that. Not yet. He didn’t surrender anything lightly, and that included what few shards remained of his broken soul.

It was so foreign to him, this unsolicited tenderness. Incomprehensible. And much as he craved it, it scared him like hell. With every caress he permitted, he was piling up debts he could never repay.
You don’t deserve it, came that dark, unforgiving echo. He’d heard the words so many times, they were part of him now. They lived in his blood, resounding with each hollow beat of his heart. You don’t deserve this. You never could.

If not for her, this room would still be filled with rats and bats. If not for her, he’d be sitting unshaven and drunk in the great hall, morosely counting his steps to nowhere. And if not for her, he would have no reason to fight this battle at all.

She growled in frustration. “I know I’m not. It makes no sense at all. I’m not a silly little girl who dreams of knights. I’m a woman. A woman who’s inconveniently, completely, and for the first time in her life, in lust. Just burning with desire for the worst possible man. A profane, bitter, wounded duke who refuses to leave her house. Oh, you are dreadful.”

Her grip tightened on his shirtfront. “You’re not going to ruin my first kiss. I won’t let you. You’re going to kiss me again, right now. And make it better.”
He shook his head, incredulous. “It’s over. It’s already done. Even if I did kiss you again, it wouldn’t be your first kiss anymore.”
“It counts,” she said. “So long as it’s part of the same embrace, it all counts as one.”
Bloody hell.

Somehow, he’d wound a lock of her hair about his finger. There it was. Right This Moment. And he had no recollection of doing it, either.
What was he coming to, when a woman sat in his lap, he gave her a stern what-for...and then ten seconds later, oopsy-daisy and la-di-dah, he went and twirled a finger in her hair?
That was not ducal behavior.