Ashton Laytham was a happy little boy until, at the age of seven, he lost his parents. Sent to Fayerweather to be brought up by his uncle and his uncle’s wife, he was perceived to be an unhappy, unlovable child. Shunned by family and servants and permitted no friends to visit, he grows to adulthood alone and aloof, with only an occasional illicit rendezvous to lighten his days. When his uncle dies, leaving the estate virtually bankrupt, it’s left to Ashton to make good on his uncle’s gaming debts and save Fayerweather. But how? The family talisman, worth thousands of pounds, has been stolen and the suspects vanished in the night, leaving Ashton to face the loss of the home he’s come to love. Geo Stephenson, who works in His Majesty’s civil service, has ghosts of his own. The product of a marriage of convenience, Geo has known all his life his father never loved his mother, and he vows that will never happen to him. Marked by a physical scar earned in battle, none of his previous lovers could bear looking at it without shuddering; his mental scars are due to the many friends lost in useless battles. Geo arrives with a fistful of Sir Eustace Laytham’s IOUs and a solution: Ashton accommodating him in bed, thereby paying off the debt. Attracted to Geo in spite of himself and desperate for any human kindness, Ashton agrees ... never expecting to lose his heart to a man who has sworn he’ll never give his. Can these two men find a measure of happiness together?

Bless Us With Content

He turned my hand over, his eyebrow rising as he noted the calloused flesh of my palm, and then he brought it to his mouth in a carnal caress.


I tried to keep my breathing even as his tongue traced the line that deeply scored my palm, my lifeline a wandering traveller had once told me. I shivered again, and felt his smile against my palm. He drew his hand away slowly, his fingertips lingering enticingly on the backs of my fingers.


I rose, closing my fingers over the dampness of my palm. He was allowing me to put some distance between us, but it took all my resolve to make that move.


“I look forward to our first encounter—”


“Please,” I interrupted, sure he was about to call me “Awful.” I’d no more permit him to call me that than I would John Scarlett.


His gaze hardened, and I had to moisten my lips. Did he think I was about to plead to be released from our bargain?


“I’ll do what you desire of me, but please don’t call me ‘Awful.’”


Chapter 33