Winning Lord West
Authors: Anna Campbell
Tags: #historical romance, #regency romance, #novella, #rake, #reunion romance, #regency historical romance, #anna campbell, #dashing widow
Published by Anna Campbell
Copyright 2016 Anna Campbell
Cover Design: ©
Hang Le
ISBN:
978-0-9975307-0-4
All rights reserved. No part of this book may
be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means,
including information storage and retrieval systems - except in the
case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles or reviews -
without permission in writing from the author, Anna Campbell. This
book is a work of fiction. The characters, events, and places
portrayed in this book are products of the author’s imagination and
are either fictitious or are used fictitiously. Any similarity to
real persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental and not
intended by the author.
Smashwords Edition
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hard work of this author.
Thanks to my
friend Annie West for allowing me to borrow her name for my
hero!
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Excerpt: The Seduction of Lord
Stone
Richmond Park outside London, May 1820
Helena, Countess of Crewe, arrived at Lord
West’s picnic, determined to talk to her brother Silas. Since
yesterday when she’d caught Silas on the point of seducing Caro
Beaumont—in a greenhouse in full sight of anyone who cared to look,
no less—he’d done an excellent job of evading her.
Well, his evasion ended right now.
With a purposeful step, Helena approached her
brother as he rode in on his dapple-gray mare. She could already
tell something was afoot. He looked brittle and alert, like a man
on the eve of battle. She’d seen him like this when his botanical
experiments verged on a major breakthrough.
While a groom led the gray away, Silas’s
hazel eyes sharpened on Caroline’s flashy curricle rolling across
the grass toward the extravagant festivities. West had taken great
trouble to create his riverside idyll, with cushions and divans in
open tents, fine wines and exotic delicacies to tempt jaded
appetites, and boats for pleasure trips. There was even a string
quartet scratching away at the latest tunes.
“You can’t run away from me forever, brother
dear.”
Silas cast Helena a sheepish look. “Save the
scolding. You couldn’t say anything that I haven’t already said to
myself.” He sighed and ran his hand through his untidy tawny hair.
“I don’t know what got into me.”
To her regret, Helena knew the answer to
that. Overwhelming desire.
When she’d burst into the greenhouse, the
lust in the air had woken long forgotten memories. From their first
meeting, she’d been wildly infatuated with her late husband, Lord
Crewe. Desire, however frustrated, had outlasted love by a long
measure. Until her pride had sickened at sharing his attentions
with any other woman who took his eye, and she barred him from her
bed.
Catching Caroline and Silas in a torrid
embrace had provided an unwelcome reminder that Helena hadn’t
always despised her profligate swine of a husband. “Caro means to
have West. I’ll tell you that much.”
Her friend wanted a lover and had set her
sights on Lord West, Silas’s boon companion and Helena’s first
sweetheart. Helena had tried to warn Caro that the dissipated West
was a dangerous choice. But the lovely brunette had the bit between
her teeth, and there was no stopping her headlong gallop.
Until yesterday in the greenhouse, when it
seemed Silas might make a late run.
“You two are being dashed unsociable,” West
said softly, prowling up on his long, powerful legs. His green eyes
were watchful. “Save the family reunion for your own time. I’ve got
a dozen footmen standing idle, ready to answer every whim. If you
persist in loitering over here, you’ll hurt their feelings.”
Despite having long ago recognized West’s
many faults, Helena couldn’t suppress a frisson of awareness. She
reminded herself she didn’t like overly handsome men—Crewe had
looked like a Greek god until debauchery took its inevitable
toll.
Vernon Grange, Baron West, was another
handsome man, if in a very different style. He was the classic
English aristocrat, tall and elegant, and with features so crisp
and perfect, they could be carved from marble. Glossy black hair
under a stylish beaver hat. A commanding aquiline nose. An air of
effortless authority that always made her bridle like a half-broken
filly.
“West,” Silas said, and Helena searched in
vain for any hostility in his greeting. With Caro’s preference
turning to West, lately Silas had been grumpy with his childhood
chum. “You’ve been devilish fortunate with the sunshine.”
That thin, expressive mouth curled in wry
humor. “I have contacts in high places.”
West bowed over Helena’s hand and sent her a
glinting smile from beneath his heavy eyelids. It was a rake’s
trick, designed to make a lady’s heart beat faster.
“Down below more likely,” Helena muttered,
struggling to hide how her pulses jumped at his touch. Knowing it
was a trick didn’t seem to offer her immunity from its effects.
What the devil was wrong with her? She hadn’t
felt an ounce of attraction for Vernon Grange since she was a
sixteen-year-old ninnyhammer. Perhaps she should blame her
unsettled reaction on seeing Caro and Silas so intimately connected
on that bench.
“Put away your barbs, my prickly lady. It’s
too nice a day for sniping.”
Coolly she withdrew her hand. “I’d imagined
more guests, my lord.”
The gathering comprised West, Helena, Silas,
Caroline, a couple of West’s rakish friends, and Fenella
Deerham.
“The numbers are sufficient to my
entertainment.” Under the winged dark brows that added a satanic
touch to his good looks, West’s regard was searching. “Yours, too,
I hope. You didn’t ride?”
“No.” Given the failure of her plan to quiz
Silas on the drive to Richmond, she was sorry she hadn’t come on
horseback. It was so long since she’d had a good run, and this wide
field beside the Thames offered scope beyond anything in Hyde
Park.
“I have a spare horse.”
Silas shuffled sideways to keep a better eye
on his beloved. Caro glanced their way, stiffened, and headed
swiftly in the opposite direction.
“Helena?” West said when she didn’t respond.
“I brought you a horse to ride.”
She stopped watching her brother and met
West’s amused eyes. He was a man society fawned over—handsome,
rich, from an old family. People were more inclined to hang on his
every word than drift off in his presence. But he’d always worn his
consequence lightly. A lesser person might find her erratic
attention an insult to his vanity. Vernon Grange merely thought it
funny. She’d always liked his lack of conceit, thorny as relations
had become since she’d abandoned her girlish
tendre.
“I can’t ride astride. Even in Richmond that
would cause talk.” She fought to rise above the antagonism he
always stirred. Crewe and West had been bosom bows at Oxford. She’d
never forgiven West for introducing her to the man she’d so
disastrously married. “But thank you for offering.”
“You used to ride astride when you were a
cheeky schoolgirl in plaits and a muddy pinafore.”
“I used to do many things.” A chill entered
her voice. “But wisdom has a grim habit of following after reckless
decisions.”
His amusement faded. “Not always.”
“No, not always.” The ghost of her late
husband hovered. Charming, deceitful, self-centered. And
destructive—to himself most of all.
“I’ve missed seeing you on a horse, Hel,”
Silas said absently, still watching Caro, who had joined Fenella on
the far side of the field.
West made an effort to lighten the tone. “I
arranged this picnic purely for the pleasure of seeing you flying
across the grass on the back of a galloping horse.”
Oh, dear, that wasn’t what she wanted to
hear. She’d imagined he’d put this party together to further his
pursuit of Caro. Helena didn’t want West
noticing
her. For
years, he’d been content to treat her as a distant acquaintance.
“Really?”
“Yes, really. It’s been a fancy of mine since
I saw you restricted to a trot in Hyde Park. The experience was
most uncongenial for an observer. You looked like someone was
strangling you. Slowly.”
She frowned, resenting that West made her the
focus of his attention. And that his conclusions were so accurate.
“Town isn’t the place to ride neck or nothing. I’ll soon be back at
Cranham.”
West signaled to a groom. “Such a pity.”
“That I’m leaving London?”
“No, that you don’t want a good gallop, when
I went to such trouble to bring you a suitable mount—and a suitable
saddle.”
The groom led a pretty chestnut mare toward
them. Helena immediately noted the gleaming sidesaddle. Her hand
curled at her side as if it already held a crop. Despite her
misgivings about the man offering the favor, she itched to throw
herself onto the lovely horse. The groom passed the reins to West,
bowed and left.
West’s smile was mocking. “If you deny me,
I’ll think that you don’t like me.”
She ran a gentle hand down the Arab’s jaw and
bit back a sigh of longing. The mare truly was a darling. “I
don’t.”
That wasn’t completely true. Her feelings for
West had always been more complex than mere antipathy. When they
were children, he’d been her hero. Shreds of that fondness
lingered, although she’d long ago recognized that he was cut from
the same cloth as her depraved husband.