Knight was still awake at the crack of dawn to snatch the newspaper from his butler’s hands the moment it arrived.
“But, m’lord, I’ve not even ironed it yet,” the servant called after him as Knight headed to his library.
Standing at his desk, he started at the back because gossip was usually nearer the end than the beginning, and he knew someone in attendance at a ball was always willing to blather the latest rumors making the rounds to reporters on the hunt for scandalous happenings at aristocratic affairs. It was one of the reasons some lords found themselves at the altar—their compromising transgressions discovered and announced in print the following morning. But scanning the headings, he found no reference at all to the identity of Anonymous. Nothing to suggest the author had been revealed at the Bremsford ball.
Surely, he’d been convincing enough. Lady Finsbury had even asked him to sign her damned book.
He turned to the next to last page, which would have been the second page he’d encountered if he’d gone in the proper order, and there it was:I Am Anonymous.
Only it wasn’t describing the shock and uproar his announcement had caused. As he quickly scoured the length of the column, he didn’t find any mention of himself, because it wasn’t a piece written by an enterprising gossipmongering reporter. It was a letter. Penned by the scandalous author herself.
Dear gentle reader,
I am Anonymous, the author ofMy Secret Desires.
I spent a large portion of my life hidden away, and so it was I preferred anonymity toacclaim. But the need for some to uncover my identity is distracting, taking attention away from the story’s purpose, which is to entertain and perhaps in a small way to reassure those who have known the intoxicating power of love that they are not alone if unable to resist the temptations it offers. Passion is a fundamental necessity of our existence, for without it, how would we endure the daily trials and tribulations we face?
A second story is in the works with a much happier ending. I hope you will join me on that journey.
Yours most sincerely,
Miss Regina Leyland
Bracing his arms on the desk, he slammed his eyes shut and bowed his head. Why had she done it? Why had she not accepted the protection he’d offered? They certainly weren’t going to arresthimfor indecency. If he was no longer welcomed among the aristocracy, what did he care? Besides, he deserved paying that price. If not for him, she’d have never written the story.
“I am my mother’s daughter after all,” a soft voice murmured, and yet it carried the weight of conviction straight to his soul.
Jerking up his head, he drank in the sight of her, still in the gown she’d worn to the ball. Her hair was no longer tightly bound but looked in danger of spilling from its pins. She couldn’t have gone to sleep. Instead, she must have written the letter after returning from the ball and afterward journeyed through London to deliver it to the newspapers of consequence.
Although he hadn’t slept, either, and could well imagine what a sight he made. During the wee hours, he’d discarded his coat, waistcoat, and neckcloth. Buttons were undone, sleeves rolled up. Perhaps he was delirious from lack of sleep, and she was a figment of his imagination. If he moved from where he was rooted, took her in his arms, she might disappear like a wisp of smoke. He looked down at the newsprint, back up at her. “Why did you do it?”
With her brow slightly pleated, she strolled forward and flattened her palms on his desk. “Because I’m weary of all the secrets and the strangling hold they have over me. The constant worry of discovery. All my life, I wanted to be accepted for who I was. Last night, I thought at long last that was happening... with Bremsford. But walking through his residence, seeing the evidence of my father with his other family, I began to doubt that even he had ever truly accepted me. He would have been appalled by the book. You claimed to have written it. I realized I’ve never had to pretend with you or prove my worth. With you, I was always free to be me, without fear of judgment or having to consider my words.”
The weight of all she’d shared, in particular the last bit, should have made him feel like he’d been standing beneath a bricklayer’s scaffold and a ton of bricks had fallen upon him. Instead, he took his first deep breath in what must have been weeks—no, months. No, years. Perhaps ever. Because he experienced the samewhen he was with her. He wasn’t a son who couldn’t meet his father’s expectations. He wasn’t, as he’d discovered only a few years earlier, a bastard who had no right to become duke. With her, he’d never been a title to be acquired or the possessor of so many coins that at least one if not two future generations would have no financial worries.
“As I said upon first entering, I am my mother’s daughter. I’ll be your mistress if you’ll have me.”
Unflinchingly she held his gaze, daring him to accept this aspect of her as well and to not find fault with it. Without the benefit of marriage, she would continue to lie with him. She would bring other bastard children—his bastard children—into the world and protect them as best she could.
“I’m not asking that you provide for me. Actually, I’m going to provide for myself. I spoke with my publisher in the dead of night—he wasn’t too happy about being roused from his bed, but he deserved to know who I was and what I’d done regarding the letter I’d delivered to several newspapers—and he’s agreed to begin printing more books today, with my name on them.” As it should have been from the beginning. “He’s very interested in volume two, assures me he’ll fight the courts on any indecency charges if it comes to that. He reckons I can earn a fairly decent income, nothing like Dickens, of course, but I can live modestly.”
“What of Chidding?”
“Funny thing, that. I understand he’s on the verge of having a modest income as well, thanks to some investment advice you gave him.”
“I wanted to ensure you gained a husband who wanted you for more than coin.”
“He did ask for my hand last night but giving it wouldn’t have been fair to either of us. He is deserving of a woman who loves him. And I am madly in love with someone else.”
He was barely aware of getting to her, wasn’t quite certain if he’d leapt over the desk or gone around it, but suddenly between his hands he was cradling her beautiful face with its slightly red and swollen eyes from lack of sleep. “I don’t want you for my mistress. I want you as my wife. I want to be there every time you put our daughter to bed.”
Her deep brown eyes flared. Her brow furrowed as she studied him, and he knew she was striving to determine if he merely accepted her daughter as he might his own or—
“You know the truth of her, then,” she whispered. “That there was no Spanish matador, no Italian sculptor, no Parisian artist, no German clockmaker. There’s only ever been you.”
He wanted to crush her to him and take her luscious mouth and show her that there had only ever been her, but more needed to be said. “It’s easy to lie about the month in which she was born. It’s not so easy to ask me to look into her eyes and not see my own.”
“Hence you’ve known from the beginning, but you didn’t let on.”
