Wounds of the heart are the hardest to heal. Solicitor’s clerk George Johnson has a secret goal when he moves into a London boarding house in the winter of 1920: to find out if his fellow lodger, Matthew Connaught, was the wartime traitor who cost George’s adored older brother Hugh his life. Yet the more he gets to know his quarry, the more George loses sight of his mission -- and his heart. Blessed with boyish good looks and charm in abundance, ad man Matthew is irrepressibly cheerful despite having lost an arm in the Great War -- and soon makes plain his attraction to George. As George’s feelings for Matthew grow, so does his desperation to know the truth about what happened that day in Ypres. Even if bringing all their secrets to light means he’ll lose the man he’s come to love.

To Love a Traitor

“Oh, I’m sure there’s some ordinance exempting brothers from all that sort of thing. But when isit due? By the look of you, we should be sending for the midwife without delay—and then getting ready to saddle the poor infant with one of those dreadful Christmas names, like Noel or Emmanuel. And by the by, I am extremely cross that you’ve kept this such a secret from me!” He didn’t, of course, look in the least cross—in fact he was as flushed with pleasure as if it were the birth of his own child he were anticipating, and not his sister’s.


“I just couldn’t resist surprising you, I’m afraid,” Agnes admitted with a dimpled smile that made her appear barely old enough to be married, although Matthew had told George she was only three years younger than he. “And anyway, I’m not as far along as all that.” She shot her husband a fond glance. “The doctor is certain it’s twins, and they aren’t due until March. Now, manners—aren’t you going to introduce us to your friend?”


Chapter 37