The Study of Seduction (Volume 2) (The Sinful Suitors, Band 2) - Softcover

Buch 2 von 5: The Sinful Suitors

Jeffries, Sabrina

 
9781476786070: The Study of Seduction (Volume 2) (The Sinful Suitors, Band 2)
Softcover
ISBN 10: 1476786070 ISBN 13: 9781476786070
Verlag: Pocket Books, 2016

Inhaltsangabe

A marriage of convenience ignites into a passionate love affair in the hotly anticipated second novel in New York Times and USA TODAY bestselling author Sabrina Jeffries’s addictive Sinful Suitors series!

When Edwin Barlow, the Earl of Blakeborough, agrees to help his best friend’s impetuous ward, Lady Clarissa Lindsey, in her time of need, he knows he’s in for trouble. He’s been hunting for someone to wed, and she’ll just get in the way. Although captivated by the witty, free-spirited beauty, he fears she’d be all wrong as a wife...if she would even take such a gruff cynic for her husband. Yet he wants nothing more than to have her for his own.

Clarissa has no intention of marrying anyone—not Edwin, whom she’s sure would be an overbearing husband, and certainly not the powerful French diplomat stalking her. But when matters escalate with the diplomat, she chooses Edwin’s gallant offer of a marriage between friends in hopes that it will deter her stalker. She expects nothing more than an amiable union, but their increasingly tempestuous kisses prove more than she bargained for. When her stalker’s vow to expose the lovers’ deepest secrets threatens to destroy their blossoming attraction, will their tenuous bond withstand public ruin, or will Edwin lose all that’s important to him to protect his bride?

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Über die Autorin bzw. den Autor

Sabrina Jeffries is the New York Times and USA TODAY bestselling author of several Regency-set historical romance series, including the Royal Brotherhood, the School for Heiresses, the Hellions of Halstead Hall, the Duke’s Men, and the Sinful Suitors. When she’s not writing in a coffee-fueled haze, she’s traveling with her husband, caring for her adult autistic son, or indulging in one of her passions: jigsaw puzzles, chocolate, music, and costume parties. With more than nine million books in print in twenty languages, the North Carolina author never regrets tossing aside a budding career in academics for the sheer joy of writing fun fiction and hopes that one day a book of hers will end up saving the world. She always dreams big.

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The Study of Seduction

One

London

April 1830

“You have lost your bloody mind.”

When every member in the reading room of St. George’s Club turned to look at Edwin Barlow, Earl of Blakeborough, he realized how loudly he’d spoken.

The place was more crowded than usual, now that everyone was back in London and night was falling. Gentlemen wanted a few drinks before they plunged into the maelstrom that was the Season.

With a quelling glance that sent the curious onlookers scrambling to mind their own business, Edwin returned his attention to Warren Corry, the Marquess of Knightford. “This plan of yours can’t possibly work.”

“Of course it can.”

Warren was Edwin’s closest friend. Really, his only friend, aside from his sister’s new husband, Jeremy Keane. Edwin didn’t make friends easily, probably because he didn’t suffer fools easily. And society was full of fools.

That was precisely why Edwin, Keane, and Warren had started this club—so they could separate the fools from the fine men. So they could protect the women in their lives from fortune hunters, gamblers, rakehells, and every other variety of scoundrel in London.

In a matter of months, the club had swollen from three to thirty members, all good men eager to share information about which of their peers couldn’t be trusted with women. Until now, Edwin hadn’t realized that so many gentlemen’s female relations needed protecting from sly and not-so-sly attempts on their virtue . . . and fortunes.

Warren was clearly taking that mission very seriously. Perhaps too seriously.

“Clarissa will never agree,” Edwin said.

“She has no choice.”

Edwin narrowed his gaze on Warren. “You actually believe you can convince your sharp-tongued cousin to let me squire her about town during the Season?”

“Only until I return. And why not?” Warren said, though he took a long swig of brandy as if to fortify himself for the fight. “It isn’t as if she hates you.”

“No, indeed,” Edwin said sarcastically. “She only challenges my every remark, ignores my advice, and tweaks my nose incessantly. The last time I saw her, she called me the Blakeborough Bear and said I belonged in the Tower of London menagerie, where ordinary people could be spared my growls.”

Warren burst into laughter. When Edwin lifted an eyebrow at him, Warren’s laugh petered out into a cough. “Sorry, old boy. But you have to admit that’s amusing.”

“Not nearly as amusing as it will be to watch you try to talk her into this,” Edwin drawled as he settled back in his chair.

Rather than giving Warren pause, that made the blasted idiot ask, “Does that mean you’ll do it?”

“The point is moot. She’s not going to agree.”

“Don’t be too sure. You mustn’t take her pokes at you as anything more than her usual mischief-making. You let her exaggerations get under your skin, which only tempts her to plague you more. You should just ignore her when she starts her nonsense.”

Ignore Clarissa? Impossible. He’d spent the past few years trying unsuccessfully to unwrap the mystery that was Lady Clarissa Lindsey. Her barbed wit fired his temper, her provocative smile inflamed him, and her shadowed eyes haunted his sleep. He could no more ignore her than he could ignore a rainbowed sunset . . . or a savage storm.

For three months now, she’d been isolated at Warren’s hunting lodge, Hatton Hall, and Edwin had felt every second of her absence. That was why the idea of spending time with her sent his blood pumping.

Not with anticipation. Certainly not. Couldn’t be.

“What do you say, old boy?” Warren held Edwin’s gaze. “I need you. She needs you.”

Edwin ignored the leap in his pulse. Clarissa didn’t need anyone, least of all him. Thanks to the fortune left to her by her late father, the Earl of Margrave, she didn’t have to marry for love or anything else. Apparently, the woman had some fool notion she was better off without a husband, given that she’d reportedly refused dozens of marriage proposals since her debut years ago.

But it wasn’t her fortune that had men falling all over themselves trying to catch her eye. It was her quick wit and effervescent personality, her ability to draw a man in and put him off at the same time. It was her astonishing beauty. She was the fair-haired, green-eyed, porcelain-skinned darling of society, and she almost certainly knew it.

Which was why he rather enjoyed the prospect of watching Warren attempt to convince her she should go about town with a gruff curmudgeon like himself. “Assuming that she and I both agree to this insanity—how long would I have her on my hands?”

“It shouldn’t be more than a month. However long it takes me to deal with her brother in Portugal. I can’t leave Niall stranded on the Continent with all the unrest there right now.”

“I suppose she’s already heard why you’re going.”

“Actually, no. She doesn’t even know about his letter yet, which was waiting for me when we arrived from Shropshire for the Season. I wanted to be sure you would agree to keep an eye on her before I told her. But once she learns that this involves Niall, she’ll want me to take this trip, and she’ll realize I won’t do that unless I’m sure she’s safe.”

“From this Durand fellow.” After all, there was a reason for this charade Warren was proposing.

Warren’s jaw hardened. “Count Geraud Durand, yes.”

Settling back into his chair, Edwin drummed his fingers on his thigh. “If I’m to do this, you’d better tell me everything you know about this Frenchman.”

“Haven’t you met him?”

Edwin lifted an eyebrow.

“Oh, right. Not your circle of influence. But surely you’ve heard of him.”

“He’s the French ambassador’s lackey.”

“If he were a lackey, he wouldn’t be a problem. He’s the man’s first secretary. And because the ambassador had to return to France right after Christmas, Durand is now running the embassy as the charge d’affaires. The position gives him a great deal of power.”

“Then what the devil does he want with Clarissa?”

“A wife. He asked her to marry him in Bath some months ago.”

That stunned Edwin. Warren had initially described Durand as an admirer who’d been plaguing her.

Not that Edwin was surprised at anyone’s desiring Clarissa to distraction. Most men did. But men in the field of diplomacy generally preferred wives who were . . . well . . . not inclined to speak their minds and flirt outrageously.

“She turned him down,” Warren went on. “That’s why we had to return to London. Unfortunately, he followed us here. He seemed to have made it his mission to gain her, no matter what. He was at every public event we attended. Twice, he tried to accost her on the street.”

“Accost her? Were those your words or Clarissa’s? Because even you said she’s prone to exaggeration.”

“This was no exaggeration.” His lips thinned into a grim line. “The bastard...

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Verlag
Pocket Books
Erscheinungsdatum
2016
Sprache
Englisch
ISBN 10 
1476786070
ISBN 13 
9781476786070
Einband
Taschenbuch
Anzahl der Seiten
384
Kontakt zum Hersteller
Nicht verfügbar
Verantwortliche Person
Nicht verfügbar

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