Chapter One

September 1813 -- the Tyne Valley, Northumberland

Diana Clare fought the overwhelming temptation to swear violent oaths, inappropriate oaths, oaths of the type that no one would even consider a spinster such as she knew.

One tiny scream of frustration and the merest hint of an oath passed her lips. Jester the piebald mare turned her head and gave her disgusted look. Diana shifted uneasily in her seat on the gig. Jester was correct. She had given into her anger, and had broken one of her cardinal rules – a lady never allows passionate emotion to overcome her sensibilities.

She drew a breath, counted to ten and concentrated hard on a serene outlook. But the gig remained held fast in thick oozing mud and the tug of pain behind her eyes threatened to explode into a full blown headache. Adding insult to injury, Jester began to munch another clump of sweet meadow grass, daintily choosing the last few remaining daisies. Diana tucked a stray lock of midnight black hair behind her ear and peered over the side of the gig. It was her fault that the gig had become stuck. No one else’s. She accepted that, but accepting and wishing to admit it to the general populace were two entirely separate matters.

Diana knew she ought not to have been reading and driving at the same time, but she had needed something to erase the full horror of visiting Lady Bolt’s At Home as the congregated gaggle of gossips blithely tore another woman’s reputation to shreds.

 That the third and final volume of Pride and Prejudice had been waiting for her at the circulating library she took as providence, a way to restore her temper. Normally she scorned novels as frivolous and refused to open them, but Mrs Sarsfield had insisted she read the first page, and Diana discovered that she had to read on and on. She had not bought the book but done things the proper way – waiting her turn for each volume. And finally it was here, on the seat beside her in the gig. As she often joked to her brother Simon, Jester knew every step of the way home.

 And what possible harm could come to her in the country?

Slack reigns and the temptations of late summer meadow grass proved too great for the mare and Jester had pulled the gig into the mud pool just as Diana reached another scene between Miss Elizabeth Bennet and Mr Darcy.

Diana straightened her straw bonnet, measured the distance from the gig to solid ground.

 She could do this -- easily, with dignity and in a ladylike manner. One long leap. She pushed off from the gig and hoped.

 Her half-kid boot caught in the oozing mud, several feet short of dry land. Diana gave a small cry as her bonnet tilted first one way and then the other before sliding off into the mud, taking her cap with it. Gingerly, Diana picked the bonnet up by one ribbon and stuffed the dripping cap inside. Mud dripped from it, splattering her dress.

 ‘Beauty in distress,’ a low voice drawled behind her, cultivated with more than a hint of arrogance. A masculine voice. A stranger’s voice.

Her throat constricted and every particle of her froze. Her situation had become a thousand times worse.

‘Distress fails to describe my predicament.’ Diana refused to turn. Spoken to in the correct manner, the stranger would depart. Nothing untoward would happen to her as long as she behaved like a true lady. She had to believe that, or otherwise what was the point of the last few years? ‘My gig has become stuck, and I solving a problem with calmness and fortitude. There is a difference.’

Diana concentrated on finding the next halfway decent place for her foot, rather than glancing over her shoulder at the owner of the voice. If she ignored him, there was a chance that he would depart and everything would be fine. Her ordeal would end. It was her actions that mattered. Her balance altered slightly and she was forced to make a windmill motion with her arms in order to stay upright.

‘As I said -- definite distress.’

‘Nothing of the sort. I am finding my way out. It is simply proving trickier than I first imagined.’ She put her foot down hard and heard the squelch as the brown liquid spewed up. Her feet slipped. An involuntarily shriek emerged from her throat. She flailed her arms about, trying desperately to regain her balance, before the mud sucked her down and destroyed all her dignity and decorum.

Her fingers encountered a solid object and grabbed on with all her might. She rebalanced and looked, hoping for a branch. But instead her hands clung to the sleeve of a white travelling cloak. It was a choice between two evils – the indignity of falling into the thick black mud and the impropriety of clinging to an unknown man’s arm. Impropriety won.

‘It would be a shame to stain your dress, I believe.’

Without waiting for a reply, his hands moved to her waist, and lifted her up. Her breast and thigh touched his broad chest. Her senses reeled, then righted. She refused to give way to panic. She kept her body rigidly still and willed him to release her but the arms stayed strong about her.

‘You may let me go.’ Her voice resounded, high and shrill, in her ears as she glanced up into deep grey eyes. A strange sensation stirred, deep within her, curling around her insides with insidious slowness. She swallowed hard and beat it back.  ‘Please.’

‘After I have had my reward.’

‘Reward?’ Her tongue seemed to be three times thicker than normal. The day was rapidly becoming a nightmare. Surely this man, this gentleman, had to understand that she was a proper lady. She was not going to be punished. Again. ‘Why do you insist upon a reward?’

‘For rescuing you. Surely my gallant action warrants the merest trifle.’

He lowered his lips and his mouth skimmed hers, a brief touch but one that sent a blaze of fire coursing through out her body. Panic engulfed her. She turned her head and beat her fists against his chest.

 ‘Put me down this instant!’

‘If that is what you truly desire.’

Diana gulped and struggled to hang on to some sense of dignity. It was the only thing that could save her. A truly worthy and refined woman was never in danger. Ever. ‘It is.’

‘Never let it be said that I do not accommodate a pretty wench’s wishes.’

Her rescuer withdrew his arms and she was unceremoniously deposited on a green knoll.  Her skirt flew up and revealed her legs up to her calves. Diana hurriedly pushed it back down and hoped that the man had been gentlemanly enough not to look. Silently she promised never to read novels again, never to utter oaths, if only she would be delivered from this nightmare. It was all her fault. She had broken her rules of ladylike behaviour and this was what happened to women who behaved inappropriately.

Diana forced her breath in and out of her lungs and regained some small measure of control. She could not show that she was discomforted. Exhibiting emotion only made situations like this one worse.

‘I did not mean quite so quickly.’

‘But I did as you requested. Beauty, thy name is perverse.’

‘You have rescued me. Now you may depart.’

His black boots remained still. She glanced up at her rescuer, praying that he was a stranger, someone she might never encounter again. Broad shoulders filled out the finely cut white coat with fifteen capes and two rows of pockets. Tapered down to buckskins and the pair of black Hessian boots. He sported a white neck cloth with black spots, immaculately tied. Diana’s gloom deepened. It was the sort only sported by a member of the Four Hand Club, the premiere carriage driving club in the country.

She studied his dark features again and recognised the distinctive scar that ran from his forehead to his cheek.

Her insides twisted. That little place inside her that she normally kept locked and barred cracked opened.  The man was Brett Farnham. Had to be. She pressed her hands into her eyes. Slammed the place shut and willed the terror to go.

‘Is something troubling you, Beauty?’ The warmth in his voice lapped at her senses. ‘Your face has creased. Forgive me if I have offended, I merely sought to assist you.’

‘Nothing, nothing at all.’ Diana forced her face to relax and her lips to smile. Politeness needed to her shield. A lady was always polite. ‘Why should anything trouble me? Today has been without blemish or stain.’

‘Aside from becoming stuck in a pool of mud.’ A smile crossed his features.

‘Aside from that.’

Diana resisted the temptation to bury her face in her hands.  She had allowed herself to be carried and kissed by one of the most renowned rakes in the country, a man who had founded the notorious Jehu driving club at Cambridge University and who had set the fashion for speaking cant, tying neck cloth, a close confidant of both Brummell and Byron. Her late fiancé had revered him, and in the end that reverence had been responsible for his destruction.

All the years she had spent here, trying to forget that London had ever happened. Then Brett Farnham appeared and everything came crashing back as if were yesterday. But whatever happened, she had to remember that it was her actions which decided her fate. If she held fast to her rules, she would be safe. If she had learnt one thing in London, it was that. ‘Please, I beg you – go and forget about my predicament.’

 He continued to stand there, looking down at her from a great height. ‘I am no fool. You disliked being rescued.’

‘Normally a gentleman waits to be asked.’

‘A gentleman acts when he sees a lady in distress. He attempts to prevent greater harm.’ His gaze roamed over her body. And Diana was fervently glad that she was wearing her dark brown gown with its high neck. ‘It would have been a shame if your dress had become mud-splattered.’

Diana forced her eyes from his face. Struggled to breathe as her throat constricted again. It was nothing more than polite words, the sort that rolled off his tongue a dozen times a day.  She was a fool to worry. This encounter would not happen again. London remained in her past. All was safe here. Her place in society was secure as long as she maintained her poise.

‘Thank you,’ she mumbled. Polite. Calm. She had to banish any hint of emotion and behave as if they had encountered each other at a tea party or some other social function. It was the only way.

‘Remain here and I will free your gig.’ A dimple showed in his cheek. ‘You may thank me properly...later.’