It Takes a Hero

v2.0

January 23, 2007

PASSION BY THE BOOK

Rebecca Tate never intended to cause a revolution with her notoriously popular
Miss Darby
novels, merely to earn enough to support herself and her ailing uncle. But now it seems every eligible debutante in London is emulating her spunky heroine and refusing to marry…
ever!
Still, Rebecca's enjoying her newfound success as Miss Darby's anonymous creator, and she's not about to let anyone interfere—not even the rakishly appealing Raphael Danvers.

Having survived the perils of war and espionage, Rafe is less than thrilled by a disgruntled society matron's wish that he unmask the unknown author and halt the scandalous scribblings. The assignment becomes more attractive, however, when the trail leads to the enticing Miss Tate. Suddenly the dashing adventurer can't get enough of the charming troublemaker—and her resorting to some rather Darbyesque trickery to distract him only serves to intensify his desire. But will a rogue's determined pursuit result in a happy romantic ending… or lead them both into a dangerous intrigue?

Prologue

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

Chapter 16

Epilogue

To Matthew.

Thank you for the much-needed lessons

in patience and for teaching me the joy

that comes in the smallest of hugs.

^
»

Miss Emery's School for Genteel Young Ladies

Bath, England

December 1816

The hillside blared with the trumpet's strident cry.

"Ahead! Charge ahead!" cried Colonel Darby.

And his troops did so, with Lieutenant Throckmorten leading the brigade against the ruthless and barbaric Mughal hordes.

Miss Darby, seated astride Champion, watched the battle from the safety of the hillside, a spyglass to her eye. At her side, her ever faithful wolfhound, Ajax, stood at guard. Her breath caught in her throat as she watched her beloved Lt. Throckmorten rush into the thick of battle, the dust and smoke swallowing him immediately from her sight.

L
ady Lucinda Witherspoon paused in her reading and glanced up at her rapt audience. While the lights in their dormitory should have been out hours ago, the young ladies under Miss Emery's charge braved both the chill that seemed never to leave their school, as well as Miss Emery's ire, to huddle around Lady Lucinda's bed to hear this final chapter of
Miss Darby's Darkest Hour
.

Over the last two years they'd read all four volumes of Miss Darby's adventures just like this, hidden in Lady Lucinda's room beside a stub of candle one of them had pilfered from the music room or the parlor when none of their teachers was looking.

Miss Emery prided herself on economy, so the candles were hard to come by. And if frugality was a virtue in Miss Emery's world, then fiction, in the esteemed lady's estimation, was as close to the torments of hell as any young lady dare tread. The school's mistress had banned the
Miss Darby
tales from the first moment they started to appear, saying: "Miss Darby and her radical notions of independence and outlandish manners are unforgivable."

The girls at Miss Emery's disagreed.

"Botheration, Lucinda! Read on," complained Miss Geneva Thayer. While Lady Lucinda outranked Miss Thayer socially, Miss Thayer was an heiress and that counted for much in the pecking order of Miss Emery's establishment.

Besides, it had been Geneva's abundant pocket money that had ensured the illegal book could be smuggled into the dormitory.

"Oh, please go on, Lady Lucinda," one of the younger girls urged. Several heads nodded in agreement.

For in truth, no one could equal Lady Lucinda's dramatic flare for reading. Besides, it was essential she finish
Miss Darby's Darkest Hour
this very night. In the morning, school would be dismissed for the Christmas holidays, and most of the older girls, Miss Thayer and Lady Lucinda included, were to make their bows come spring and would not be returning.

Lady Lucinda drew the flickering candle closer.

"Find him, Ajax," Miss Darby shouted. The brave wolfhound forged into the fray, blazing a safe path for Miss Darby and Champion to follow. Despite the smoke and fighting on either side of her, Miss Darby continued her dangerous sally.

"Lieutenant Throckmorten!" she cried out. "Lieutenant Throckmorten, can you hear me?"

To her dismay, the lieutenant was nowhere to be seen.

Lady Lucinda paused again, this time to turn the page.

"Oh, dear," Lady Penelope Bittleman whispered. "I fear something dreadful has happened. I'm never wrong about these things. Mother says I have the sight."

"Pish!" Miss Mary Mavery said. "Lieutenant Throckmorten is a brave man. He'll be fine." She was the most practical of her classmates, but her admonition didn't stop a spate of tears from falling down Penelope's cheeks.

Lady Lucinda, at the renewed urging of the others, read on, this time with a bit of haste to her tenor.

Suddenly she saw him, her beloved Lieutenant Throckmorten.

"See, I told you," Miss Mavery said. Several heads nodded.

Then to their horror, Lady Lucinda, who had been scanning the lines ahead, gasped, "Oh dear. Oh, no!"

Not a girl moved, every pair of eyes riveted on the slim volume Lady Lucinda held. Nary a breath was drawn as she continued to read.

To her horror, she spied a tattered piece of blue silk.

"The scarf Miss Darby gave Lieutenant Throckmorten in
Miss Darby's Perilous Journey
, as a symbol of their undying respect for each other," one of the younger girls whispered.

Her beloved, her dearest betrothed lay on the ground, his scarlet coat tattered and bloodstained.

"Blood?" Lady Penelope repeated, then wobbled slightly before giving over to faint, toppling onto the girl next to her.

Lady Lucinda spared a glance at her friend then continued.

Miss Darby leapt from the back of her horse and knelt beside him, but even as she went to touch his cheek, she knew the Fates had dealt her a most heinous blow.

"No!" gasped Miss Thayer.

Lady Lucinda nodded. "I can't go on," she said, her voice quivering, tears welling up in her eyes.

"Oh, but you must!" one of the girls begged. "For us, for Miss Darby."

A handkerchief was produced and passed forward. Lady Lucinda accepted it gratefully. After regaining her composure, she read the fateful line:

Her beloved Lieutenant Throckmorten was dead.

Handsome, dashing Lieutenant Throckmorten dead? Could the world be so cruel?

"Lieutenant Throckmorten, my dearest Geoffrey," Miss Darby sobbed, holding the lifeless body of her beloved to her heaving breast. "I shall bear my grief to the world in memory of you. I shall never marry. Never."

For a time, none of them spoke, though heartbreaking sobs echoed through the dark chamber as they grieved with their favorite heroine for the heartwrenching loss of her betrothed.

Lady Lucinda glanced around at her schoolmates. "I shall never marry."

Most thought she was just repeating the line from the book, but as they saw a dangerous light glow to life in her eyes, they saw something else burning there.

A revolution of sorts.

If their dearest Miss Darby, the young woman whose adventures filled their dreary lives with romance and excitement, was determined never to marry, then neither would they.

Lucinda held out her hand, and one by one, every girl in the room placed hers atop the other.

"Never marry," they repeated like a sacred oath.

«
^
»

She held me spellbound from the first moment I spied her. For it was like a spark fell from heaven and lit my heart afire. I fear I will never be whole again without her in my life.

Lieutenant Throckmorten to

his batman, Thomas Rivers

in
Miss Darby's Daring Dilemma

London

T
he Season of 1817 should have begun like any other, in fact it should have been the most engaging Season in ages. Napoleon was no longer a threat. English officers and gentlemen alike were ready to celebrate, and more importantly, many were of a mind to marry.

The mothers of unwed daughters throughout the land should have been in alt.

Instead they were in a panic.

Their daughters were refusing to cooperate. Refusing to be wed!

Who had ever heard of such a notion? Not marry? Why not just declare oneself a savage and be done with the matter.

Well, such foolishness wasn't to be borne. Especially not by Malvina Witherspoon, Countess of Tottley, the mother of Lady Lucinda. She hadn't spent a fortune sending her darling daughter to Miss Emery's exclusive school only to have her arrive home and announce that she would never take a husband.

Never. Ever.

"It is all this wretched Darby creature's doing," Malvina declared one morning to a circle of equally desperate mothers. "And it is time we put a stop to this nonsense once and for all."

Heads nodded enthusiastically, since they knew the countess had good reason to want to see this state of anarchy put to an end.

If the rumors were true, and most likely they were given the ungodly hour Lady Tottley's summons had arrived, Lady Lucinda had refused,
yes, refused
, the young and handsome Lord Barwick, heir to the Hemswell dukedom.

There wasn't a moment to lose. It could very well be one of their daughters refusing such an eligible
parti
. And so it was that the good mothers of London had gathered together to formulate a plan of attack. The author of the
Miss Darby
chronicles, known only as M. Briggs, was probably hated with more ferocity and incurred more wrath by the occupants of Lady Tottley's morning salon than Boney at the height of his despotic reign.

The murmurs of complaint and gossip were interrupted by a discreet knock at the door. Crumpton, Lady Tottley's infamously stodgy butler, poked his long nose through the crack in the door. "Ma'am, there is a
gentleman
here who claims to have been invited."

His tone spoke volumes. That he no more believed the man in question was a gentleman, nor that this interloper had been invited.

So it was a rare treat for all those in the room to see Crumpton's mouth fall open in dismay when her ladyship responded with an enthusiastic wave of her hand.

"Send him in at once, Crumpton."

"But, my lady," the butler protested, "this… this… person isn't accepted. I have it on good authority that he's considered—"

"Don't be such a ninnyhammer, Crumpton," the countess said. "These are desperate times and we can no longer cling to social boundaries if we are to see the world righted."

Fans fluttered and more than one slanted glance asked the same question.