The Perfect Gentleman (Valiant Love) (A Regency Romance Book) Read online

  THE PERFECT GENTLEMAN

  VALIANT LOVE

  a regency romance book

  deborah wilson

  Copyright and About the Author

  Copyright © 2018 by Deborah Wilson

  All Rights reserved.

  In no way is it legal to reproduce, duplicate, or transmit any part of this book in any form or by any electronic means without written permission from the author. Recording of this book is strictly prohibited. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

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  Table of Contents

  Copyright and About the Author

  Join Deborah's Reader Club

  The Perfect Gentleman

  BOOK LIST ORDER

  the perfect gentleman

  0 1

  July 1816

  London, England

  Lady Brinley Soulden stood by the door and listened to the conversation taking place in the ladies’ boudoir, but the sound of the sweet soprano flowing from the salon was what truly held her attention.

  The lady singing had one of those voices that transported the mind to another place entirely, allowing one to forget their worries and simply breathe.

  Brinley had always wished she had a voice that one might compare to an angel or siren. Music had the power to captivate, influence, and liberate its listeners.

  She closed her eyes but jumped at the sound of her sister Arabella’s shrieking.

  “But, Mama, do not lie!” Arabella cried in a high-pitched tone. “I was terrible, and everyone knows it. Did you hear them? They didn’t clap for me nearly as loudly as they had for Lady Grisham. They loved her. They only tolerated me! It was a horrible idea to come.” Tears poured down her face, which remained lovely as ever. Her skin didn’t redden but paled. Her liquid blue eyes glittered like sapphires. Arabella had a visage that had the ability to make misery quite becoming.

  Brinley knew, since she’d seen her nineteen-year-old sister practice it in the mirror.

  Arabella sat with her hands at her bosom and her lips slightly parted, showing off a row of straight white teeth. She’d put Rembrandt’s Weeping Woman to shame.

  Their mother, Lady Tellock, composed her expression as she gazed down at her daughter. “Arabella, it was not that at all. You were lovely. Everyone thought so.” Tabitha Soulden was quite handsome as well. She and Arabella both had golden locks, blue eyes, translucent skin, and slim figures that made any gown lovelier.

  Arabella turned to Brinley. “Did you think me lovely, Brin?”

  Brinley opened her mouth—ready to tell her sister that she’d honestly thought the song sweet—but her words were cut off before she could utter them.

  “Arabella,” the countess said. “You’ve an exquisite voice. I would not say so if it were not true.”

  Arabella’s gaze remained on Brinley… to their mother’s scorn.

  “Brinley,” the countess said. “Don’t just stand there doing nothing. Go get your father. We are ready to leave.”

  Brinley’s eyes widened. “Perhaps, if I may be permitted to say? I’ve already missed so much of the music. I’m sure one of Lady Wycliff’s servants can see me home.”

  Lady Tellock huffed. “How like you to only think of yourself. Look at your sister.” She pointed at Arabella for emphasis. “How could you possibly enjoy a single moment when Arabella is clearly distraught? No. To remain is out of the question. We will all leave together. Now don’t dally. Don’t stop for cakes along the way either. Just get your father.”

  “Oh, Mama,” Arabella began. “Do you think anyone will wish to marry me after this evening?”

  Lady Tellock sat down by her daughter’s side and began to comfort the girl. Brinley’s presence was immediately forgotten.

  Brinley wanted to argue, but there was no point in telling her mother that she wished to stay, no point in reminding either of them that it had been Brinley’s idea to come to her friend Everly, Lady Wycliff’s musical, or the reason why they’d allowed it.

  She’d turned four and twenty and had asked her father to bring them to the musical.

  In between performances from an Italian opera singer, Everly had allowed a few of the guests to show their own talents.

  Arabella had volunteered as a way to catch the eyes of a certain earl.

  The song had gone well if Brinley were to give her own opinion, but Arabella was convinced that she’d embarrassed herself since her applause had not been grander than anyone else’s.

  They’d spent the entire first part of the second act in the boudoir. Lady Tellock, in a commanding tone, had told Brinley to come along. Acquiescing, Brinley had followed.

  As she passed the salon, she told herself that the night had not been a complete failure. She’d enjoyed dinner and the conversation at the table. She’d also enjoyed the first half and those talented few from the crowd who had sung before Arabella.

  She’d be thankful for that, at least.

  The notes of the pianoforte faded as Brinley continued down the hall.

  Fewer lamps burned as she turned the corner, casting the rest of the hall into shadows.

  Brinley recalled her father leaving the salon before the first act finished. He was not one who enjoyed sitting back and allowing himself to be entertained. Lord Tellock was a spry man who engaged in sports and other activities that kept him busy.

  He also had the tendency to be impulsive. Those were the moments that Brinley dreaded the most.

  She heard voices at the end of the hall and recognized one as belonging to her father.

  Moving toward the room she knew to be Everly’s study, Brinley had just pressed her hand to the door when something her father said gave her pause.

  “I think it a fair trade,” her father said. “My daughter for your horse. You take them both or you leave as you came.”

  Brinley’s heart raced, and her fingers trembled so badly she was forced to pull them from the door or give away her position.

  His daughter for a horse? Was that how much she was worth to him in the end?

  Somehow, Brinley knew the earl wasn’t talking about Arabella.

  But there was hope.

  “My lord,” the other man said. “With all due respect, I have no intention of marrying. Not today. Not ever.” From his voice, she knew him to be younger than her father, but there was a bitterness in his tone.

  “I’ve already given my conditions,” Tellock said. “You lost the horse in a fair game. If you loved it that much, you should have been more cautious with your bets.”

  Tellock enjoyed cards and was very good at them. He’d gathered a tidy sum over the years.

  Brinley closed her eyes and prayed her father was speaking ab
out Arabella. And who knew, maybe the other man was the young earl her sister liked.

  This was only Arabella’s second season. Her mother had purposefully stopped her from courting during the first and instead used that time to gain the attention of as many young and unattached gentlemen as she could.

  This year, Arabella hoped to marry, and she had her heart set on one man.

  Perhaps her father was working to get Arabella exactly what she wanted.

  Brinley was not ready to accept anything else.

  “Please,” the younger man said. “I… was not myself that night. I recently lost my father. I’ve been having a hard time adjusting.”

  Brinley’s heart went out to the man. Part of her wanted to burst into the room and demand her father give him the horse, but she knew such a thing would never be granted just because she said it.

  “I knew your father,” Tellock said. “His Grace was a great man.”

  His Grace. The formal address meant they spoke of a duke.

  The gentleman Arabella wanted was an earl and his father had been an earl as well.

  Brinley’s stomach sank to her toes.

  “My father was an honorable man,” the other man said. “I have done him a disservice by gambling away the horse he gave me. I will not serve him another by marrying someone because of a bet.”

  Brinley waited with bated breath for her father’s reply.

  Her father grunted. “Very well. In honor of Richard, you’ll not have to marry my daughter, but you will do me a service.”

  “What would you have me do?” the young lord said eagerly.

  “You’re an attractive man. I hear what the women say about you, Lord Lore. Your charms are as legendary as your name suggests. If it were to appear that you’d taken some interest in my daughter, she’d likely have more of a chance of marrying someone else.”

  They were speaking of her, Brinley decided. Arabella was Venus. She possessed a lure that few men could refuse.

  Brinley, on the other hand, was lacking in nearly every way.

  Or rather, she had too much of everything.

  Too much hair.

  Too much color.

  Too much body.

  Her body was unflattering. There was no polite way to put it. Her breasts, hips, and thighs were twice the size Arabella’s, and her skin remained a dusky color no matter how much she avoided the sun.

  Sunspots covered most of her face. Her brown eyes were nondescript, and her dark unruly hair never obeyed her brush.

  She touched her linen cap to make sure it was still in place and that not a curl had escaped.

  Brinley was not a woman who stood out from the crowd. She was forgettable unless she purposefully stepped out to be seen—which she rarely did.

  But Lore, or rather Lord Laurel Curbain, was not a man anyone forgot.

  Every woman in London knew who he was.

  They’d been introduced last year at a party given by the Duke of Reddington.

  Laurel was the third son of the Duke of Ayers. Ayers had passed away just over a year ago, and Lore’s eldest brother now held the seat.

  Brinley didn’t have to close her eyes to imagine Lore. He was a striking man. She often saw him on horseback, seated like a mighty knight with enough muscle to take on any enemy and strength to protect his lady from all harm.

  It was what all the ladies said of him.

  Not even Brinley could deny that the man had been blessed with fair looks.

  Lore had warm honey-coated hair and the palest blue eyes that usually held a hint of good humor.

  He was one of, if not the most, desired gentlemen in London, even more so than his brother the duke, since unlike the new Duke of Ayers, Lore had a social grace everyone admired.

  If her father was hoping to get Lore to marry her, or even pretend to be interested, then he was a fool.

  And worst of all, the situation proved what Brinley had already known.

  She was hopeless.

  Her father knew it, and that hurt more than she could bear.

  Tears burned her eyes, but she refused to let them fall.

  This was what she got for listening in on conversations. She should have stopped their little tête-à-tête before it could get this far.

  “She just turned four and twenty today,” her father said, confirming Brinley’s identity. “You could start this very evening.”

  She decided she would wait for Lore’s refusal before she entered the room.

  “The Season is almost over,” Lore said. “What would be the point?”

  “You start now,” her father said. “When my daughter is married—”

  “No,” Lore cut him off. “That could be years from now, even if I flirted with her every day.”

  The knife in Brinley’s chest nearly made her double over.

  “Then we’ll put a deadline on it,” her father said. “A year.”

  “A month,” Lore countered.

  Brinley pushed the door open and stumbled into the room.

  Both Lore and her father turned to her.

  The earl’s eyes flashed, likely wondering what, if anything, Brinley had heard. Lore simply stared at her. He was gorgeous. The Curbains, both the men and women, possessed a prominent noble nose that could not be ignored, but somehow, Lore’s features dominated the protruding structure and made it his own.

  There was anger in his gaze, an expression she couldn’t recall ever seeing on his face.

  It made the moment even more humiliating.

  She was glad she’d had years to practice hiding her emotions. She turned to her father. “Lady Tellock is ready to leave.”

  Tellock turned to Lore. “Lore Laurel, I’m sure you recall meeting my daughter, Lady Brinley.”

  Lore’s eyes widened. He hadn’t even remembered her.

  Brinley curtsied but kept her chin lifted and her gaze direct. “My lord.”

  He bowed.

  Brinley straightened, no longer able to meet anyone’s eyes.

  If she cried now, it would be not be as attractive as when Arabella did.

  “We will meet you in the carriage,” Brinley said. Then she bowed again and departed.

  How dare her father make such a bargain!

  She would rather never marry than to have it come from such a distasteful ruse.

  Her heart shook. Her lips trembled with grief.

  She silently prayed the floor would swallow her and make her disappear forever.

  Yet how often had she asked for that very thing? Her dreams never came true.

  If there was any hope, the next time she saw Lord Lore, he would once again be unable to recall her.

  ∫ ∫ ∫

  0 2

  Two Months Later

  Lord Laurel ‘Lore’ Curbain slowed as he gained his first clear view of Ayers Castle in a year. The stone towers and high gray walls had a mountainous appearance that seemed just as cruel and vast as its history.

  It sat on a hill, seeming to reach for the blue heavens and look down on those below. It had been designed for war, not comfort, and thus had protected its inhabitants during one bloody battle after another.

  His father had loved it here.

  Richard Curbain, the tenth Duke of Ayers, had held a fondness for history that Lore had inherited. Through stories, Lore’s father Richard had chronicled his world and passed his vast record onto his sons and daughter.

  Lore had not returned here since his father’s funeral over a year ago.

  The sound of the carriage slowing behind him caught his attention. Two more, carrying servants and trunks with enough clothes for a lengthy house party, came up behind the first.

  Valiant, his sister, stuck her head out the window and studied the castle with a marveling expression before she turned and smiled at Lore. “It’s beautiful, is it not?”

  He nodded. Ayers Castle was impressive and picturesque with the woodland behind it and the ravine in the front that separated it from the town.

  The wind rip
pled Lore’s hair, bringing with it the distinct and crisp scent of the swaying high grass. The blades danced in rows over the hills and valleys. Clouds swept through the sky.

  The scene before him was stunning.

  If Lore had been riding Jupiter, he’d have taken off for the castle and left the carriages behind. Maybe he’d have invited his sister to mount her own horse and race him to the wall, becoming one with his surroundings. With Jupiter, Lore no longer felt like a lord. He became but a man with his beast, ready to see the world. Past and future faded until there was only the present.

  He could almost feel the pounding of heavy hooves underneath him and the cool air that would rustle his clothes.

  But the horse beneath him was not Jupiter. While Gasper had been able to carry Lore from London ten days north, Lore did not feel comfortable taking the horse off the path and into wild terrain at such a high pace. He didn’t know the horse well enough yet.

  Disappointment at Lore’s past failings hit him.

  “Are you concerned with passing Mr. Landon on the street?” Valiant suddenly appeared at his side, riding her own mount. She’d clearly been busy during his musing.

  She had the Curbain pale hair, blue eyes, and prominent nose, but her other features were so delicate that the nose did not detract from her beauty.

  Valiant had likely seen the sadness in his eyes and mistaken it for something else. Mr. Landon was reason enough for him to have remained in London. Mr. Landon was local gentry, wealthy, and had once been a member of the church.

  As the third son, Lore had been called to join the church and had done so without protest. For two years, he’d gladly led God’s flock, but scandal had forced him to leave.

  From his place on the high road, he could see the church’s white steeple. He was not at all looking forward to seeing anyone he’d known all those years ago.

  “Don’t worry,” Valiant said. “It was years ago. Mr. Landon has likely forgotten all about it.”

  Three years was not enough time for anyone to have forgotten, though in that amount of time Lore had changed, becoming the rake everyone had believed him to be.