Blurb:
Miss Alice Bursnell is determined to wreak
revenge on Nathaniel Eastwood, Viscount Abingdon, for the seduction, ruin, and
death of her beloved twin sister. But how to expose a seducer without falling
prey herself? As she gets closer to Nathaniel, she finds she is in serious
danger of following in her sister’s much-too-tempted footsteps. The man is
nothing like the heartless rake she expected...and his kisses are truly divine.
Could she be wrong about him?
When a
mysterious and gorgeous woman confronts Nathaniel at a fancy ball, he suspects
she has murder on her mind—his own. But the more he tries to determine who the
deceptively innocent beauty is—and what she’s up to—the deeper he falls under
her alluring spell. Nathaniel fears he’s in imminent danger of losing his
life...or worse, his heart.
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First Chapter:
Prologue
1816, Northumberland, England
In their small village just outside of
Berwick-upon-Tweed, Adelaide had always been known as the prettier of the
Bursnell twins, while Alice was regarded as the smarter—or razor-tongued, as
the more uncharitable of her set were wont to say. Which was ridiculous, Alice
often thought indignantly but never said out loud, because both sisters were
smart.
They were also identical. Same short,
slender frame. Same eyes so dark they might as well be black, and same inky
hair that framed a startlingly pale face. But—when Alice was honest with
herself, which she nearly always was—Adelaide’s sweet nature added an extra
twinkle to her eyes and a pleasing curve to her lips that threw the balance in
her favor.
Everyone loved Adelaide. Alice, most of
all.
So, when Adelaide told Alice that she was
in a “spot of trouble,” Alice had wrapped her arms around her sister, held her
tight, and murmured, “Oh, Adelaide. It will all be fine.”
And Alice had believed it. As the daughter
of Lord Bursnell, Viscount Westsea, the sweet and lovely Adelaide had a sizable
fortune. Most men would thank the stars of heaven for the good fortune of being
trapped into marriage with such a charming lady. Surely, the man responsible
for the “trouble” would stand up for her.
But no man had appeared to claim the lady,
and no amount of threats or entreaties could make the lady name the man.
“You will bring ruin and shame on the
family,” Lady Westsea had argued. “Think of poor Alice. Who will marry her now?
She’s twenty!”
That had elicited a low growl from Alice.
Adelaide was also twenty, after all, but no one ever feared that she would remain unmarried. Which was
why the whole matter was so disconcerting. One expected Alice to get into
mischief of one sort or another. But Adelaide? It was utterly unthinkable.
“You will never be allowed in society
again,” Westsea had bellowed.
Adelaide had merely pressed her lips
tightly, shaken her head, and clung to the locket around her neck. The locket
was identical to the one Alice wore—a two inch oval of solid silver, engraved
with the letter A and adorned with a single diamond, their birthstone. Each
contained a picture of the other sister. This was their idea of a joke, of
course. When they explained why it was so funny to wear a picture of someone
who looked exactly like oneself but was most certainly not oneself, all they
got was bemused looks.
When Adelaide began increasing, Westsea
shipped his daughter to Our Lady of Good Tidings in France, with instructions
to give the baby to an orphanage and for Adelaide to join the nunnery. The
Bursnell family were members of the Church of England, but when one was ruined,
it hardly mattered if one was Catholic.
Neither Adelaide nor the babe had survived
the birth.
Lord and Lady Westsea had hidden the
breakables—Alice, as the more tempestuous twin, never shied away from a
scene—and informed Alice of Adelaide’s demise as gently as they could.
Indeed, Alice would have obliged them in
creating a scene, as she had a year earlier when her late fiancé had not
returned from Waterloo, if only she could summon the requisite amount of
passion. But she’d felt…nothing.
She’d wordlessly gotten to her feet,
climbed the stairs to her bedroom, and shut the door.
When the door opened one month later, Alice
was changed. Into what, she hardly knew, but she was certainly no longer
herself. An irrevocable line had been drawn, separating the before from the
after.
Before, she was a pair. She had always been
a pair, for even longer than she had truly been a person at all. Before, she
was a Bursnell Twin. She was Alice, of Alice-and-Adelaide. She had never been
Just Alice.
After, she was Just Alice.
Just Alice was an empty shell.
It was Newton’s Third Law of Motion: For
every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction. Who was she, if not a reaction
to Adelaide? She was nothing.
While Alice of Alice-and-Adelaide was high-spirited
and energetic and could often be found dragging her sister into one scrape or
another, Just Alice spent her time sitting quietly, her eyes tracing words that
her mind never bothered to comprehend. Sometimes she remembered to turn the
page, other times the book remained suspended, unmoving, for hours on end.
Then one day, Adelaide’s effects arrived
from across the Channel. Three plain dresses, a handful of letters from Alice,
and her silver locket. The dresses were given to a maid, the letters burned,
and the locket given to Alice.
Alice trailed her fingertip over the cool
metal, tracing the curlicue on the letter A. For just a moment, she pretended
that she wasn’t Alice. She was Adelaide, abandoned to a nunnery, alone except
for the nuns and other fallen ladies. How scared she must have been, facing the
end of her confinement without her mother or her sister! How often had she
opened the locket, seeking solace in the beloved face within?
Alice instinctively flicked the locket
open.
And stared.
She stared harder.
Red gold hair. Piercing blue eyes. A cleft
in a strong chin.
It was not her face.
Queasiness shot through her stomach. It was
the first thing she had felt in two months. It wasn’t pleasant, by any means,
but it was something.
She pried the miniature from its casing. It
was a simple oil, but surprisingly detailed and lifelike for something so
small. The materials were high quality. She turned it over. The initials NE
were scratched into the wood. She turned it around again.
Who could it be, but Adelaide’s lover?
Alice became aware of a curious sensation
traveling through her limbs, filling all the spaces that had been a dark void
since her sister’s passing. It felt like poison, but Alice cared naught. At
least she felt.
She knew he had money.
She knew his initials.
She knew his face.
It wasn’t much, but it was enough.
She would find the villain.
And she would destroy him.
Author Bio:
Elizabeth Bright is a writer, attorney, and mother. After spending ten years in New Orleans (yes, she survived Hurricane Katrina), she relocated to Washington, D.C. to be closer to family. When she’s not writing, arguing, or mothering, she can be found hiking in the Shenandoah or rock climbing at Great Falls.
Social Media Links
Website: http://www.elizabethbrightauthor.com
Twitter: https://twitter.com/A_Bright_Lizzie
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