The Highwayman's Lady (BookStrand Publishing Romance) Read online

  The Highwayman’s Lady

  Captain Jack Jordan, newly returned to England from the Peninsular War, is only having fun with friends when he poses as a highwayman to waylay a lady’s carriage. Now she faces banishment from society amid false allegations the rogue ruined her. The same honor Jack displayed on the battlefield dictates he restore her reputation, even if it means wedding the rebellious vixen—ideally without revealing his role in her downfall.

  Felicity Griffin wonders if dashing Captain Jordan is the gentleman thief to whom she surrendered her betrothal ring. How else to explain his sudden interest? But since the outraged earl engaged to her since infancy has jilted her, she hopes to escape another marriage of convenience. Wanting some fun of her own, she sets out to tease and trap Jack into admitting his guilt. As they entangle each other in a battle of wits and deceit, and ultimately seduction, she also traps his heart even as he steals her own.

  Genre: Historical, Regency

  Length: 87,870 words

  THE HIGHWAYMAN’S LADY

  Karen Lingefelt

  ROMANCE

  www.BookStrand.com

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  A SIREN-BOOKSTRAND TITLE

  IMPRINT: Romance

  THE HIGHWAYMAN’S LADY

  Copyright © 2015 by Karen Lingefelt

  E-book ISBN: 978-1-63258-969-9

  First E-book Publication: February 2015

  Cover design by Harris Channing

  All art and logo copyright © 2015 by Siren Publishing, Inc.

  ALL RIGHTS RESERVED: This literary work may not be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, including electronic or photographic reproduction, in whole or in part, without express written permission.

  All characters and events in this book are fictitious. Any resemblance to actual persons living or dead is strictly coincidental.

  PUBLISHER

  www.BookStrand.com

  DEDICATION

  For Alexander, with all my love always.

  Table of Contents

  Title Page

  Copyright Page

  Dedication

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  About the Author

  THE HIGHWAYMAN’S LADY

  KAREN LINGEFELT

  Copyright © 2015

  Chapter One

  Sussex, England, June 1814

  Once she realized their carriage had stopped, Felicity Griffin’s first thought was they’d arrived at their destination. Why would she think anything else? Of course, she couldn’t know for certain since dusk had fallen and she didn’t see anything recognizable out the window, even with the exterior carriage lamps that only served to make the carriage visible to anyone other than its passengers and driver.

  Only why were they still sitting here?

  No light spilled from any manor windows. No one opened a front door with blazing candelabrum in hand to welcome her and Aunt Cordelia and Cousin Lydia to Howland Hall.

  However, someone did open the carriage door itself, but with no candelabrum in hand. A deep voice smoothly said, “I’m sorry to interrupt your journey, ladies, but I must ask you to stand and deliver.”

  Lydia immediately screamed, as if she’d been waiting all day for the chance to do so.

  “Merciful heavens!” Aunt Cordelia somehow managed to gasp out each and every syllable. “We’re being robbed!”

  Felicity’s biggest fear at this moment—next to loss of hearing—wasn’t that they were being robbed, but that she might be more slow-witted than her aunt and cousin, because she was still trying to figure out what was going on. It didn’t help she’d been dozing until the steady lull of the rumbling carriage had abruptly ceased, but her aunt and cousin, seated across from her, should have been snoozing, too. She wouldn’t have been able to nap otherwise, because they chattered constantly when they were awake.

  They were certainly awake now. Awake…alert…and thoroughly alarmed as the man behind the voice finally showed himself in the carriage doorway, prompting another shriek from Lydia.

  Felicity could only stare in bewilderment, perhaps because she was still half asleep. He held the door open not like a highwayman, but like a footman who’d forgotten his candelabrum. And his liveried coat. Otherwise, he looked like a highwayman who’d forgotten his pistol. And maybe even his own mask.

  Not that he wasn’t masked, because he was. But this mask looked like something he’d borrowed—or rather, since he was a highwayman, stole—from a reveler at the Venice Carnival. It was white, a startling contrast to the surrounding darkness. The lower portion of it flared outward while still concealing his entire face. He also wore a battered old tricorne hat over a very old wig. With astonishing pleasantness he said, “On second thought, none of you ladies really need to stand, since I don’t believe any of you would do it for long before fleeing into the bushes like frightened rabbits. You need only deliver.”

  Judging from his refined speech and that elegant mask, Felicity thought he might easily be mistaken for a gentleman, if not for his decidedly ungentlemanly intentions. Yet how did he know there were only ladies in this carriage, unless their coachman had informed him thus? And speaking—or rather, thinking—of which, she asked, “May I inquire what you’ve done with our coachman and groom?”

  “I ordered the coachman to tie up the groom, and then I tied up the coachman. They’re sitting right here next to the rear wheel where I can keep an eye on them. Now, about that delivery. Shall we start with your reticules?”

  “Sir—” Felicity started to say.

  “Don’t call him that!” Cordelia cried, as if the honorific would more likely antagonize him than legitimize his very illegitimate profession.

  “Very well, what shall I call him?”

  “You should not call him anything.”

  “You can call me ‘highwayman,’” he said helpfully.

  “Highwayman,” Felicity said. “We have no mo
re than a few coins among the three of us.”

  “My dear lady—”

  “She is not your dear lady!” Cordelia chided him.

  “Then what shall I call her?”

  “You should not call her anything, especially when you haven’t even been properly introduced!”

  “Bless me, I didn’t know we were in a London ballroom,” the highwayman said. “As I was about to say, if I let pass every carriage that came my way just because the occupants had only a few coins, then there wouldn’t be much point in my doing this, for every bit helps. But if you don’t want to give up your pin money, then perhaps you might give me your jewelry?”

  Bewildered, Felicity knit her brow. “Is that a demand or a request?”

  “It’s a demand couched as a request. Remove your gloves, please.”

  “But I don’t have a ring,” Lydia said glumly. “I shan’t have one until I’m married, or at the very least betrothed.”

  “You sound very disappointed,” the highwayman remarked. “Is it because you’re not married or even betrothed, or because you have nothing to give me?”

  “Lydia, don’t answer him,” Aunt Cordelia snapped, as she peeled off her gloves. “And as for you, you—you—”

  “Highwayman,” he reminded her.

  “I shan’t dignify you by calling you anything! But if you want my wedding band, you’ll have to cut off my finger, for I haven’t been able to remove it in twenty years.”

  As she held up her plump hand to prove her case, the highwayman shook his head. “Dash it all, but I forgot to bring my knife. Where is your husband?”

  Cordelia snatched her hand back. “That, sir—I mean, you—you—oh, blast it—that’s none of your concern!”

  “I only ask because I wonder why he’d let you travel alone, thus leaving you vulnerable to scoundrels like me.”

  “I’m a widow—not that that’s any of your concern, either!”

  “I’m sorry.” He grabbed the brim of his tricorne, as if to remove it and offer a respectful bow, but then he abruptly dropped his hand and turned his head toward Felicity. “What about you, my dear? Oh, I beg your pardon, I forgot I’m not supposed to call you anything.”

  Who was this rogue? Felicity’s head swam with eddies of bewilderment and fascination. What kind of expression did he wear behind that rigid façade? For a masked highwayman, he was frightfully charming. Was he just as handsome?

  “Your betrothal ring, Felicity,” said Cordelia. “It should come right off.”

  “You’re betrothed?” he asked Felicity. “I don’t suppose your betrothed has the same excuse as her husband? After all, if your betrothed is deceased, then you’re not exactly betrothed anymore. What sort of man is he that he’d let you travel after dark without his protection?”

  Felicity didn’t know what vexed her more—the fact that he had a very good point, or that... “What sort of man are you that you must prey upon innocent travelers this way?”

  “Innocent lady travelers,” Cordelia clarified.

  “Innocent, frightened lady travelers,” Lydia amended.

  “And I’ll have you know we’re not without the protection of my betrothed,” Felicity added.

  “Don’t tell me he’s hiding under your seat,” said the highwayman. “Blast your coachman. He assured me there were only ladies within, unless he doesn’t consider your betrothed to be much of a man. I must say I don’t.”

  Felicity tended to agree, but she wasn’t about to tell him that—certainly not with Aunt Cordelia and Cousin Lydia in earshot. They would have been more scandalized to learn her true feelings about Lord Renton than they were frightened of this highwayman. She was already seething at her fiancé because he’d insisted on traveling by himself, in a bigger, newer, much nicer carriage than this creaking old tumbrel. Which reminded her... “It just so happens my betrothed is traveling to the same destination we are. He should be here any moment.”

  “Then you’d best make haste and surrender your ring. If I may be so bold, perhaps you might consider this a test of his love?”

  “Love!” Cordelia nearly choked on the word.

  “Love,” Lydia dreamily whispered.

  “Love?” Felicity couldn’t have sounded more mystified than if the highwayman had said, “If I may be so bold, perhaps you might consider this a test of his goose?”

  “Love,” he repeated, as if reading her muddled thoughts. “If he truly loves you, then surely he’d rather you sacrifice his easily replaceable ring than your most decidedly irreplaceable life? For I should warn you that I do have a pistol—”

  Lydia promptly let out another shriek, as if she’d been perched on the edge of her seat—which she was, by the way—just waiting for him to say that. Cordelia simply turned ashen, or maybe that was just the reflection from the moonlight streaming through the window on the opposite side of the carriage.

  “—and I hope I shan’t have to draw it, if only to keep this one from screaming again,” he added with a nod to Lydia.

  Felicity had to admit the highwayman had another good point—well, two more good points, if she included the threat of another piercing scream from Lydia. But it would certainly be interesting to see how Lord Renton would react when he found out what happened tonight. Perhaps he’d give her a new betrothal ring. One that he’d present to her himself, since his mother, who was now deceased, had given her the one she wore now.

  “Or think of it another way,” the highwayman continued. “This could be a test of your love. Perhaps you love him so much, you can’t bear to give up the ring he bestowed upon you, and you’d rather die for him?”

  Why did he keep saying that word love? But Felicity already knew the answer to his question, even if she didn’t know how to respond to her own. “You wouldn’t dare shoot me.”

  “Felicity! You just dared him!” scolded Cordelia, who only moments ago had practically dared him to cut off her finger.

  “I just said he wouldn’t dare—”

  “And in so doing, you dared him!”

  “Fine. Since I’m not about to die for Lord Renton, especially since I doubt he would risk his life for me, I will surrender my ring to the highwayman.” With that, Felicity finally discarded her gloves, and held out her hand to the highwayman.

  He leaned forward for a better look, then cocked his head. “Blast these poorly placed eyeholes. I can hardly see a thing.”

  “Try removing your mask.” Sarcasm dripped from her voice.

  “Oh, is that why you’re holding out your hand as if you’re waiting for me to kiss it?”

  Horrified at that realization, Felicity snatched her hand back.

  “Mind you, I’d be happy to oblige, if removing this mask wouldn’t defeat my whole purpose,” he said ruefully. “Hold your hand up like this.” He demonstrated by holding his gloved hand straight up, the palm facing him.

  Felicity mimicked his gesture.

  He tilted his head the other way, as if he still had trouble seeing. “Do I glimpse a ruby?”

  “’Tis only a garnet. Do you still want it?”

  “Of course. What sort of highwayman would I be otherwise? I’m already in danger of being pronounced inept by my fellow highwaymen and expelled from the highwaymen’s guild, simply because I’m letting you keep the coin in your reticule.”

  Without even taking so much as one last look at the garnet ring, Felicity pulled it off her finger and dropped into the highwayman’s gloved, outstretched palm, fighting to suppress a smile, if only for the sake of her terrified cousin and outraged aunt.

  “Thank you,” he said, as graciously as if they were seated at a dinner table and she’d just passed him the salt cellar.

  “Just out of curiosity,” Felicity said, as if they were still dining, “is this by any chance the first time you’ve ever held up a carriage?”

  He stiffened and straightened up. “What makes you ask that?”

  “There’s no need to bridle so. I suppose there has to be a first time for every
thing, and I’d wager this is your first time holding up a carriage.”

  “Oh, and just what would you wager? I already have your betrothal ring, now what could you possibly have of greater value than that? Perhaps you do have more coin in your reticule than you’d like me to believe?”

  “Felicity, do not engage him in conversation,” Cordelia said sharply. To the highwayman, she snapped, “If you’re quite finished committing your atrocities, then could we please continue our journey? It’s very late and we don’t even know how much farther it is to Howland Hall.”

  “Oh, that’s not far at all. ’Tis only a mile or so from here.”

  “What about our men?” Felicity asked. “Aren’t you going to free them? Or do they have to stay tied up because you forgot your knife?”

  “No, because I tied your coachman’s bonds in a simple bow that he could probably undo himself if he sets his mind to it. He can use his own knife to free the groom.” Without further ado, the highwayman closed the carriage door.

  Indignation gripped Felicity. How dare he leave without...without...well, without further ado?

  Only what sort of ado? She should have been grateful he’d left without hurting them or the coachman, or taking the horses and carriage and leaving them stranded on a dark roadside. Or even killing them, like the brigand who’d waylaid her cousin Gerard’s carriage near Thorndale Abbey in neighboring Hampshire last year, but that, she’d recently learned, was because poor Gerard had been targeted for murder by a madwoman now in Newgate Prison. This was something completely different. What ado had the highwayman left without that prompted her to spring from her seat and throw open the door?

  Besides, she welcomed the opportunity to stretch her legs and breathe some fresh air after being cooped up in that gloomy carriage for so long.