Julie Anne Long (31 page)

About the Author

JULIE ANNE LONG
originally set out to be a rock star when she grew up, and she has the guitars and the questionable wardrobe stuffed in the back of her closet to prove it. But writing was her first love. When playing to indifferent crowds at midnight in dank clubs finally lost its, ahem,
charm
, Julie realized she could incorporate all the best things about being in a band—drama, passion and men with unruly hair—into novels, while also indulging her love of history and research. So she made the move from guitar to keyboard (the computer variety) and embarked on a considerably more civilized, if not much more peaceful, career as a novelist.

Julie lives in the San Francisco Bay Area with two big fat orange cats, brothers and rivals. (Little known fact: they issue you a cat the moment you become a romance novelist.) Visit her website at
www.julieannelong.com
, or write to her at Julie@
julieannelong.com
.

More Julie Anne Long!

Please turn this page for a preview of

TO LOVE A THIEF

available in mass market April 2005.

Chapter One

I
f Lily were pressed to descibe what she did every day on the streets of London, she would have called it an art. It required a delicate touch and exquisite timing, faultless vision and near-flawless judgment. Yes: an art, that’s what it was.

A profoundly dangerous, entirely illegal, unfortunately necessary art.

Lily was goodat it.

But she’d discovered recently that she . . . well, she actually
enjoyed
it.

She supposed she should feel more ashamed at this realization. Though it wasn’t as if shame had abandoned her completely; even now, Lily could sense its weak, distant little voice
ahem
-ing away in a vain attempt to distract her from her objective. But it was the firm, cold voice of pragmatism Lily listened to as she scanned the men on Bond Street for likely quarry. Pragmatism, not shame, kept her and her younger sister fed and a roof, such as it was, over their heads.

She eyed the flow of men on the street expertly. Like a magpie, her gaze darted and swooped toward things that glittered about their persons, coins between fingers, gold buttons on coats, watch fobs. The cut and color and fabric of their coats and trousers, the polish of their boots, their facial expressions and the way they held themselves, their walking sticks, their companions—the choices men made about these things helped her make her own choices about them.

Her eyes were suddenly arrested by a flash of color. A young man, taller by several inches than most of the crowd, had lifted his hat to push his hand agitatedly through his hair. His hair wanted cutting—it was a bit longer than fashionable gentlemen typically wore theirs—and it was this fact that had enabled a breeze to lift it up into the sun. The sunlight had found the deep red hidden in the glossy black strands, and his hair briefly glowed like a fire burned almost all the way down to ashes.

The man clamped his hat back down on to this head a moment later, but it was too late; his hair had drawn Lily’s attention, and she studied him a little more closely.

His shoulders were very broad atop a long, lean body, and he radiated a sort of restless, distracted energy; she saw it in the shifting of his feet in their fine boots and the gestures of his hands as he spoke to his companion, a man only a little shorter than he. His chestnut-colored wool coat was beautifully cut; it skimmed his contours as though he had been sewn into it. An expensive coat, clearly, courtesy of an expensive tailor.

Suddenly the young man thrust his hands into his trouser pockets and the expensive coat bunched out behind him, the pocket of it gaping invitingly. Lily’s sharp eyes picked out the gleam of gold in that pocket. A watch, most likely. She considered what that gleam might mean to her and her sister.
Dinner for days. A new blanket for our bed. A bottle of gin for McBride.

The man’s companion was just as beautifully dressed, and he had the pale, open face of someone who has known much of comfort and little of worry or care. He was listening, with an expression of exaggerated patience, while his friend appeared to expound passionately about something. They were utterly absorbed in their conversation.

Perfect
, Lily thought with satisfaction. The pair of them will be oblivious.

She had found her quarry.

“Don’t go, Gideon, it’s as simple as that. You know very well your uncle isn’t
actually
dying. And you simply cannot afford to leave the ton again now that Jarvis seems to be making a run for Constance. Have you seen the—”

“Hullo, Cole! Oh, and hullo there, Kilmartin.”

Gideon Cole and his friend Lawrence Mowbry, Lord Kilmartin, paused in their heated conversation to bow and smile politely as the marquis of such-and-such strolled by—Gideon had met him only recently at some soiree or other and had forgotten his name.

“Notice how I was a sort of afterthought?” Kilmartin’s mouth lifted ruefully. “It’s ‘Hullo, Cole!’ with great enthusiasm, and then, ‘Oh, hullo Kilmartin.’ And I
introduced
the two of you.”

“Sorry, Laurie.” But Gideon sounded more amused than apologetic. It was indefinable, really: a charm that was just shy of roguish, a face that was pleasing at first look and riveting on the second. Gideon, much like the sun, often eclipsed lesser lights simply by virtue of being. His friends eventually became accustomed to this. Some of them even eventually ceased minding. Laurie was of this variety, fortunately.

But being popular was often exhausting and distracting, Gideon thought; people forever
hullo
-ing you when you were trying to have an important conversation or read a paper in peace at White’s. Given a choice, he thought irritably, he would much rather be rich than be popular. Being rich often seemed to negate any need to be popular.

And furthermore, if he were rich—and it was his own bloody fault he wasn’t yet rich—he would very likely not be in his current, absurd predicament.

“As I was saying,” Kilmartin continued, “you know very well your uncle merely wants you to dance attendance upon him again. And you cannot afford to leave the ton now that Jarvis is making a run for Lady Constance Clary. Jarvis
already
has a title and a fortune.”

“Thank you, Laurie,” Gideon said through gritted teeth. “I am painfully aware that Jarvis
already
has a title and a fortune. But what if this time Uncle Edward genuinely
is
dying? I
am
fond of the man.”

No one knew for certain the precise nature of the Lord Lindsey’s condition, only that it seemed to require him to be bedridden and waited on hand and foot at all hours of the day and night. It had also created handsome dowries for each of the parish doctor’s five daughters. Uncle Edward, in fact, was the most jovial sick person Gideon had ever seen. And because Gideon stood to inherit the baronetcy, all the money, and his extraordinary estate, Aster Park, Edward sent for him every time he felt a twinge.

Gideon had received another of the notes this morning. “Come at once,” it said. “Uncle Edward very ill.”

Uncle Edward was forever feeling twinges.

“Allow me to paint a picture for you, Gideon.” Kilmartin was growing exasperated. “Let’s just say that your uncle Edward
isn’t
actuallydying this time. But once again you rush away from London to Aster Park, and Constance at last makes up her fickle mind to marry Jarvis instead of you because he showered attention upon her at Lady Gilchrist’s ball and you did not.”

“That possible outcome is the
point
of this discussion, Laurie. You’re supposed to be helping me decide what to do.” Gideon was growing testy.

Kilmartin sighed heavily. “Look at it this way, old man. Even if Constance is taken off the marriage mart, you would still have your pick of young ladies.”

This sentiment brought a smile to Gideon’s face. And Gideon’s smile, the slow, sultry curve of it, could crack the heart of any female between the ages of twelve and eighty.

“Yes,” he acknowledged, without a trace of conceit. For it was true, and he hadn’t the strength for false modesty today. “But I want Constance.”

Kilmartin sighed. “Bloody hell, Gideon. You and your Master Plan. You could wed any number of wealthy females with the blessings of their mamas and papas, and you choose the most difficult of them all.”

“Oh, come now, Laurie. How long have you known me? You should know by now that, no matter what, I
always
choose the most difficult of them all.” Actually, it sometimes seemed the difficulty had chosen
Gideon,
but regardless, he’d grown to welcome challenge the way a racehorse welcomes room to run. He grinned to make his friend grin back. Kilmartin gave a short laugh and shook his head.

Gideon knew Kilmartin humored him. He was a good friend, Laurie was, but he was heir to a viscount; he would follow in the well-trodden path of centuries of his ancestors. Wealth and property and a triumphant marriage were merely stops along the way for him. But Gideon had come from nothing, and as a boy he had lost nearly everything. He’d decided long ago he would have all he wanted if it killed him: property, wealth, status, and a spectacular marriage. Whatever order they happened to occur in. And he rather hoped to do it all before the age of thirty.

This, in short, was his Master Plan.

Oh, he was so close, so tantalizingly close. And it was evidence of his stock in the tonthat it was not considered a miracle that Gideon Cole, former soldier and current near-penniless barrister (though this bit was more or less a secret), was very nearly engaged to Lady Constance Clary. Glowing, golden, Constance, the uncontested jewel of the season. And Gideon had accomplished this the way he had accomplished everything else in his life: through a steady application of hard work and charm, propelled by his consuming ambition. And a goodly amount of secret regret and guilt.

And he supposed his looks didn’t hurt matters, either.

Constance was astounding, really. She set fashions and ended them; she effortlessly won card games and archery contests and most other competitions simply because she wanted to very badly. She associated only with the finest people, dressed only in the finest clothing and rode only in the finest carriages. Constance, quite simply, would brook no rival. She in fact trounced potential rivals with the sheer vigor of her personality.

Gideon fully intended to marry Constance. He
needed
to marry Constance and her lovely large fortune. She represented the very pinnacle of his Master Plan.

Gideon was fond enough of her. And Constance seemed fond of him, as well. Even her father, Marquis Shawcross, was fond of him; he was convinced Gideon Cole would enjoy a bright political future, and was only too happy to assist Gideon along the way. Such were the fruits of Gideon’s hard work and charm to date.

But Gideon sometimes suspected that in place of a heart Constance possessed a sort of scale, and on that scale his looks and charm and popularity were evenly offset by his lack of title and fortune. He could hardly blame her, really; Constance was a beauty, but his own motives for wooing her were not precisely rooted in passion.

“Laurie, I have very nearly enough saved to purchase a townhouse on Grosvenor Square. Perhaps that will help to sway her.”

“Well, you’d best come up with
something
to sway her. Have you seen the betting books at White’s?”

Gideon felt a little prickle of foreboding. “Tell me.”

“There are now wagers—not insignificant sums—on the possibility that Lord Jarvis will be engaged to Constance Clary before the end of the season.”

Bloody hell
. “All the wagers used to be about me.”

Kilmartin nodded sympathetically. “Used to be.”

Gideon lifted his hat again and pushed his fingers agitatedly through his hair, and then clamped it back down over his head.

“Just do it, Gideon. Propose,” Kilmartin urged.

“I can’t, Laurie.” Gideon’s voice was taut with frustration. “Not until I’m certain her answer will be yes.”

In truth, Gideon had too much pride to risk a sweetly regretful rejection. Not to mention having to withstand the aftermath of such a rejection. The ton would offer soft condolences to him, and then savor the news like candied fruit behind his back. It was simply the way of their world.
He’s just a barrister,
they would mutter half in sympathy, half in relish.
Why on earth would she say yes?

Kilmartin sighed again. “Well, isn’t Constance off to visit her cousins in the country soon? Perhaps you can persuade your uncle to die
then
. And by the time she returns for the Braxton Ball, she will find you a baron and the master of Aster Park.”

In spite of himself, Gideon laughed. “Uncle Edward would never be so obliging. He would—”

Gideon could not have told anyone what made him spin around at just that moment. Perhaps it was the same instinct that had enabled him to dodge musket balls at Waterloo and come home with limbs and senses intact.

But spin he did.

And that’s how he saw the girl just as she was dipping her slim white hand into his coat pocket.

Gideon seized her wrist. Frozen in shock, breathing hard, they glared at each other.

The impressions came at him swiftly. Her wrist, thin as a child’s, her skin shockingly silky, her pulse speeding with terror beneath his thumb. A high pale forehead, luminous in the afternoon sun, a pink mouth nearly the shape of a heart, a pair of extraordinary aquamarine eyes ablaze with panic and outrage. And freckles, a collection of tiny asymmetrical splashes of gold, across her nose. Almost unconsciously, he began to count them. One, two, three, four—

“Oof!”

Gideon dropped to his knees, gagging for breath. While he had been counting her freckles, her knee had come up between his legs with brutal accuracy.

And she was gone, absorbed into the crowd as though she had never been anything more than a shadow.