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  Viv pinched her lips together. “I have never strayed.”

  “Neither have I.”

  She laughed in his face. “No matter what means you have in mind for proving your abstinence this evening, you could never prove that.”

  Miles leaned closer until she could feel his warm breath. “You’re going to kiss me,” he said, his words a delicious, rumbling promise.

  “Hardly.”

  “You are. And you’re going to use that delectable pink tongue of yours and taste me.”

  Viv shivered. She looked for any means of escaping his seductive ease, but her feet wouldn’t move. Her knees had turned to porridge.

  “And when you taste nary a drop of whiskey nor a hint of cigar smoke, you’ll have to believe that I’ve kept my word.”

  “Tonight, perhaps.”

  “Is that an invitation, my dear? Because I could come back again and again.” He placed the gentlest kiss on the apple of her left cheek. “And again.” Then the other. “Until you believe me.”

  Viv closed her eyes. His voice, the rich scent of him, conspired like an opiate to muddy her thinking. She breathed past a hot ache that radiated out from her belly. Only the wall held her upright.

  “Vivie,” he whispered against her mouth. “Kiss me.”

  Pocket Books

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  www.SimonandSchuster.com

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events or locales or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

  Copyright © 2011 by Carrie Lofty

  All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce this book or portions thereof in any form whatsoever. For information address Pocket Books Subsidiary Rights Department, 1230 Avenue of the Americas, New York, NY 10020

  First Pocket Books paperback edition October 2011

  POCKET and colophon are registered trademarks of Simon & Schuster, Inc.

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  Designed by Jacquelynne Hudson

  Cover illustration by Jon Paul Ferrara

  Manufactured in the United States of America

  10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

  ISBN 978-1-4516-1638-5

  ISBN 978-1-4516-1640-8 (ebook)

  To Keven

  For all the reasons I can’t mention.

  Contents

  Acknowledgments

  Prologue

  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

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  Epilogue

  Author’s Note

  Acknowledgments

  Thank you to Patti Ann Colt and Kelly Schaub for early reads, and to the members of Chicago North who critiqued a very rough draft. In particular, the comments provided by Blythe Gifford, Courtney Milan, and Nancy J. Parra set me on the right course.

  I am deeply beholden to Cathleen DeLong, who offered continual support, incredible friendship, and keen insights on various incarnations. I’d quote a bunch of lyrics to show my appreciation, but you already know them by heart. #truths

  As always, I am grateful for the encouragement of good friends who keep me relatively sound of mind. Many, many thanks to Ann Aguirre, Zoë Archer, the Broken Writers, Jenn Ritzema, and my family: Keven, Juliette, Ilsa, and Dennis and Kathy Stone.

  Two additional individuals, Kevan Lyon and Lauren McKenna, have earned my undying gratitude for taking such a tremendous chance on this story. The support I received from both of you, as well as from the incredible team at Pocket, has resulted in the most creatively satisfying experience of my life. With utmost respect, I thank you.

  Prologue

  New York City

  November, 1880

  Vivienne stared at the portrait of her loud, arrogant, bombastic father and stifled the grief that had yet to ease. Captured by deft strokes of color, Sir William Christie’s patented scowl glared down from above the library’s austere marble fireplace. Even three weeks on from his rain-drenched funeral, the truth of his passing had yet to sink in. But there she waited in his brownstone mansion for the reading of the will.

  She waited to breathe again.

  Her gloved hands wouldn’t stop their restless dance across a pleated ruffle at her waist. Had she repaid her debts to him when she’d been nothing but a dead Frenchwoman’s brat? Had she masked her resentment when he’d held back his approval, expecting her to rise above the circumstances of her birth?

  Harsh, her father. Always harsh. But never had there been a man more true to his word. He had claimed her as his daughter. The details of the bequest, however, had been kept in the strictest secrecy. Anything less than a substantial share of the estate would mean a return to England—to her husband. The rabble and grime of her childhood in the Paris slums held more appeal.

  At least then she’d been cherished.

  Viv pressed unsteady palms between her breasts and breathed once, and again, until her fears quieted. She needed to keep her best face in place. Instead of more fretting, she reinforced her courage with memories of those first few monstrous months after her betrothal. Wealthy Sir William’s knighthood, bestowed by Her Majesty for his contributions to British rail facilities, had only permitted Viv entrée. The remainder of the steep social climb had been hers to undertake. On the cusp of marrying into the aristocracy, she had succeeded in becoming a vital, respected member of London society.

  The greatest challenge of her life—a challenge met and conquered.

  Whatever the will held in store for her, Viv would persevere. She believed that of herself, as had her demanding father.

  The door behind her opened. She turned to find the butler ushering a tall, stoic man into the library.

  “Alex,” she breathed.

  Only upon seeing her older half brother did Viv realize she’d been counting the minutes until her siblings’ arrivals. Their laughter and unflinching devotion had laid a bedrock of strength atop memories of her mother’s love. Alex’s embrace was strong and sure. When sleep had eluded Viv as a child, he had been the one to read aloud the mythological stories she loved—no matter that he examined life with the analytical detachment of a gifted scientist.

  He drew back and gave her shoulders a squeeze, as if making certain she would remain standing when he let go. The library hardly seemed so gloomy with his steady support. “How are you holding up, Viv?”

  “Well
enough.” She shrugged slightly, studying him. Five months had only just started to ease the grief of his wife Mamie’s death. Weariness still tugged his lips downward and deepened the creases fanning toward his temples. “And you?”

  “I’ve been better.” He offered a tremulous smile. “But I’ve been worse, too.”

  Like a verdant breeze in spring, Gareth and Gwyneth arrived next—together, of course, and as stylish and noisy as always. Chatter from Gwen. Snickered replies from Gareth. And laughter enough from both to prompt a full grin from even Alex.

  Aside from those final days of their father’s demise and burial, Viv hadn’t seen the twins since August, when Gwen had debuted as Gilda in Rigoletto. Her younger half-sister’s star was on the rise in the world of opera, with Gareth there to manage her career.

  Holding themselves with the matched confidence of youth, wealth, and expectation, they harbored no outward doubts as to their share of the Christie estate. Neither did Alex. After all, her siblings were not bastards. Viv was, with her misbegotten origins hidden by an adoption’s paper-thin veneer of respectability.

  If their father had needed to disclose her true origins to his attorneys . . .

  Gwen and the boys knew. But Viv’s place in Society would be lost forever if anyone else learned the truth.

  “It had to be the library,” Gareth said, shaking Alex’s hand before the men pulled one another into a quick embrace. “I always hated this polite dungeon.”

  After receiving Gareth’s affectionate kiss on the cheek, Viv embraced her sister. Gwen, all sunshine and champagne bubbles, always held on a little longer and a little tighter than anyone else, so Viv closed her eyes. Comfort eased deep into her bones. “Good to see you, my dear,” she whispered.

  “And you, Viv. I don’t know how I’d manage all of this bother without you and Jonesy to see me through,” she said, using her twin’s childhood nickname.

  “Don’t worry. All will be well.”

  Gareth dropped onto the nearest settee. “Are we still gathering in Newport?”

  “Packed and ready,” Viv said. The Christies’ palatial summer home, dubbed Calton after Sir William’s birthplace, would be less hospitable at that time of year. But they’d anticipated the need to escape Manhattan Island and regroup in private, no matter the will’s contents. They would protect one another as they always had, banding together beneath their father’s long shadow. “Alex, is Edmund well enough to travel?”

  Dressed in an elegant yet practical woolen suit, Alex appeared every inch the celebrated astronomer. But he was also the exhausted father of an infant son born prematurely. “I do hope so. His nurse is keeping him comfortable, but the croup has yet to leave him be.”

  Forever the first to offer comfort, Gwen followed Alex to another settee and held his hand. “Here’s hoping this won’t take long,” she said.

  “Little likelihood of that,” Alex replied. “You know how Father was. Such an opportunity for grandstanding won’t go unnoticed, even from beyond the grave.”

  Viv resisted the urge to flick her gaze back to the portrait, as if Alex’s skepticism might deepen that scowl rendered in oils. Their father’s severity had been just as fixed while he lived. To his last breath, his mind failing and his body succumbing to pneumonia, he’d required only a frown to reduce her to the child she’d been, plucked from a grim Parisian prison and whisked to a pristine new life. She’d long ago forgiven his sternness because of the gifts his kindness had bestowed, her family being the foremost.

  Alain Delavoir, the estate’s hawk-faced executor, arrived without fanfare. He settled into the leather wingback behind a massive mahogany desk, his bony frame dwarfed by furniture crafted to suit Sir William Christie’s robust Scots build.

  “Everyone, please have a seat,” he said.

  Momentarily beset by her fears, Viv swayed. Somber oxblood walls tightened. Dust and a trace of mold leeched out of countless books on sober, orderly shelves. But that smell only stiffened her resolve. This was her father’s domain. And she would rise to his expectations—surpassing them, if possible.

  As she settled onto the dark room’s third settee, she thought of her little brownstone some three miles north. The chrysanthemums were in bloom, while spring would rejuvenate her beloved lilacs. Her home. A place of refuge she’d purchased with hoarded resources. Granted, that refuge had rotting shutters and a leak in the cellar, with walls in need of paint and a roof that let in bats. But it was hers and she loved it. She hoped for money enough to maintain it properly. Nothing was more important than keeping the property that represented her independence.

  “The good news is that the estate will not be subject to probate,” Delavoir said, his accent a discordant hybrid of Paris and Westchester County. “The entirety of the Christie fortune has been duly allocated, or else stored in trust. My duty today is to outline the nature of these arrangements.”

  Alex’s expression was dubious. “Father never said anything about trusts.”

  “Nor did he intend to,” Delavoir replied. “He’d hoped discretion would minimize speculation and protect share prices.”

  “While keeping us in the dark,” Gareth said with a grimace. “No surprises thus far.”

  “Jonesy, he probably had his reasons.” Not only the most empathetic, Gwen was, inevitably, the most stalwart defender of their father’s actions. Thus she and her twin maintained staunchly opposing natures. “No use second-guessing them now.”

  “Of course he had reasons.” Grinning, Gareth ticked them off his fingers. “Reexamining our reprehensible life choices, admitting he was right all along, and thanking him for the lesson learned.”

  Viv laughed behind her gloved hand. Even Alex smiled. Much of the tension dissipated, lifted by shared mirth. Yes, they would persevere. She believed that with all her heart.

  A tall man barged past the sputtering butler and strode into the library. Cigar smoke swirled around him like a sickly fog.

  Viv’s stomach twisted. Dear God, he came.

  Miles Warren Durham, 9th Viscount Bancroft. The man she’d married to please her father. The man she’d fled to save her dignity.

  Ribs straining, she felt her heart trying to escape the confines of her body. The moment he would look her in the eye dangled between them like the blade of a guillotine. It would be lurking there in his languid gaze—the confrontation they’d delayed for over a year.

  Without acknowledging anyone, Miles strode to the sideboard and opened a decanter with sloppy haste. As if by some dark magic, he didn’t spill a drop of liquor on the plush Turkish carpet.

  The sight of him stripped Viv of the hope that time might blunt her response. He remained just as imposing, in possession of height, brawn, and negligent grace. Coffee-colored hair curled just at the edge of his collar. And his face. She’d always been a fool for his face, especially freshly shaven as he was just then. All symmetrical and strong, his chin, nose, forehead had been crafted from the very best of his aristocratic forebears.

  Seeing him again left her lightheaded, just as recalling the Saunders’ gala still lit a fire in her chest. Miles had conjured such rough pleasure on their last night together. A swift heaviness settled in her breasts and between her legs, which she tried to ease by sitting straighter, by clamping her knees so tightly that bone ground against bone. Memories made her blood bubble and roll, tingling under skin that had yet to forget his touch.

  But the following week, after discovering the real reason behind that passionate seduction, she’d departed for New York.

  Unable to look at her siblings, Viv feared what she would see on their faces. Confusion, maybe, or disapproval. Outright pity. She had weathered such censure in London by adopting a placid, tolerant demeanor, but that falsity never felt right when facing her family. She’d hoped Miles wouldn’t bother to come—too intent on debauchery to make the tedious transatlantic crossing—just as she prayed he wouldn’t choose that moment to lay bare their private war.

  “Don’t let me
interrupt.” He collapsed beside Viv and draped an arm around her shoulders. Cigar ash flicked onto one of her cream-colored kid gloves. Yet he remained perfectly at ease and perfectly groomed. A blue-and-white silk ascot hugged his throat as he swallowed scotch. His highborn English accent slurred around sloppy consonants, but his actions spoke of clear-headed antagonism. “Let’s have done with this.”

  Miles’s warm breath slid along her nape. Viv hated herself for shivering, for aching, for indulging him with even an ounce of her attention. He’d always been so unpredictable. Temptingly reckless. But she could only apologize for his behavior so many times. The esteem he’d squandered with each fresh disappointment tempered her desire. How could she give herself into the keeping of a man she did not respect? A man who disdained his title and squandered the wealth her family had worked so hard to attain?

  Never again. She found strength in those words. Never again. The mantra throbbed in her mind as she shrugged from under Miles’s hold, one as casual as it was meant to intimidate.

  Delavoir adjusted his monocle and cleared his throat. His blatant impatience drew Viv back to the gravity of what he would reveal. The will. Her future. A chance to be free of the dangerous man at her side.

  Retrieving a document from his patent folio case, Delavoir said, “The majority of Sir William’s liquid assets have been endowed to Crittenford, the academy for immigrant children he founded some years ago. As for the remainder of Christie Holdings Limited, the railroads, and the newspapers, he relinquished his own shares back to their respective companies.”

  Viv’s fingertips turned to ice. Puzzlement slid toward sick understanding. Even Miles perked up at the news. “Of all the bloody cheek,” he said, grinning. “He’s entitled it all away.”

  Gwen had gone white. Her chin trembled. “But . . . he wouldn’t!”

  “He has,” Delavoir said firmly.

  Miles snickered before returning to the sideboard. “Then I believe I shall refill my Hennessey before we’re all turned out.”