Lady Star Read online

  LADY STAR

  by Claudy Conn

  Copyright Page

  http://www.claudyconn.com

  Copyright © 2014 by Claudy Conn at Smashwords

  Edited by: Kathryn Riehl

  Cover Artist: Kendra Egert

  All rights reserved

  Published in the United States of America

  January 2014

  Names, characters, and events depicted in this book are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, places, organizations, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental and beyond the intent of the author.

  No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the author.

  Excerpt from Mandy

  Copyright © 2014 by Claudy Conn

  Excerpt from Netherby Halls

  Copyright © 2013 by Claudy Conn

  Contents

  Copyright

  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

  Epilogue

  Excerpt – Mandy

  Excerpt – Netherby Halls

  About Claudy

  Sometimes the heart sees what is invisible to the eye.

  H. Jackson Brown, Jr.

  Chapter One

  ON THE SEACOAST road to Rye, in the midst of a summer’s hazy day, stood Sir Edward Danton. His uncovered head of silver tinged ginger colored hair blew around his lean and handsome face. His lightweight, neatly tailored and soberly fitted blue coat was in some disarray with one sleeve torn and a lapel badly smeared with grime.

  His attention was on the rise and fall of the breakers and his uncovered hands were clasped tightly at his back.

  Behind him, in a deep and narrow ditch, one could see the sad semblance of his hired coach. One of the two horses that had pulled it into its present predicament stood grazing and hobbled not far off. The driver had ridden the other coach horse into town to seek help.

  If this situation was not enough to trouble a man of Sir Edward’s stamp, the ordeal he had just been through certainly was. His life had just been thrown into chaos.

  The morning had started in a thrillingly delicious manner. He had abducted the lady of his choice and was set on marrying her willy-nilly. He had truly believed that she loved him and wanted to be swept off her feet.

  How could he have been such a fool? She didn’t want him. She didn’t want to be swept off her feet by him. This had not been driven home until it was too late.

  His day had come dramatically to a halt with his coach in a ditch and his lady love in the arms of another.

  He was bruised of heart, mind and body. He was, for the first time in his adult life, left confused, dazed and insecure.

  He had lost her to nothing less than a duke—Lord Wildfire himself. There was some solace in that, but the loss of Lady Babs was deeply felt all the same. He had been enchanted with Lady Babs. He found her delightful of mind and character. He also found her desirable and thought she actually wanted him, but was playing a game.

  His pride had taken a throttling and his heart had taken a beating. He had now to take a long hard look at himself and what he saw, he found he no longer liked. It came home to him that he knew she wasn’t really enamored with him. He hadn’t cared. What sort of man had he become? Was he so spoiled that he only looked to his own needs?

  Somewhere along the way, he had lost the man he had been and had become a stranger to himself. It was no wonder Lady Babs had rejected him so roundly.

  To be sure, he felt ill used. Had Lady Babs not teased him—led him a playful dance while she flirted outrageously with him?

  Indeed, he had been smitten, but the question remained—had he been truly in love. How could he have been in love and not seen that she loved another? How could he have been in love and not really taken her needs into consideration?

  Had he decided to abduct her because in his heart he knew that was the only way he could make her his own? Yes, the answer was a slap in the face—yes!

  What had he been thinking? He hadn’t been thinking—that was the trouble. He believed, or thought he believed that given her impetuous nature, she would enjoy being swept off her feet and fall instantly in love with him. What a complete fool he had been.

  Before she left with the duke she had told him that he was not in love with her.

  Was she correct? Time, only time would tell. What was that thing philosophers always went on about? Ah yes, time washes love’s wounds clean. He sighed and stared at the sea.

  The breakers crashed, flinging pebbles on the sand and he paced a bit with some of his frenzy returning to haunt him. What had he done? He closed his eyes as he thought of how he had even threatened blackmail. He had suspected at that point that she was no longer simply teasing him, dallying with him. He had realized hadn’t he, that she did not, definitely did not want him and yet…he abducted her all the same. Why? Did he think to change her mind with such cavalier behavior?

  What he needed was to take a good hard look at the man he was becoming and repair the damage before it was too late.

  First, he had to get away. He would travel on to Rye, send for his things then perhaps visit friends in Cornwall. It was a long trip and a goodly time away from the ton’s gossip and frivolous society—that was what he needed.

  Another environment for the summer.

  He turned at the sound of horses and the grinding of wheels signifying a carriage at his back and observed that the driver of his coach had returned with a smithy’s wagon and several husky men.

  Ah, help had arrived.

  He would send the driver back to Brighton to collect his valet, groom, and his own horses. That’s right. That was the ticket and then he would be off and away. He would forget Lady Babs, his humiliation and the fact that he was no longer the man he thought he was. He would put this horrible business behind him and become the man he should be.

  * * *

  Star Berkley’s hair was the color and texture of cornsilk. She wore it in a style peculiar to herself and one that was not at all fashionable.

  It was cropped in short layered waves, first presented to the haute ton by Lady Caroline. This style had been adopted by a few daring ladies of the ton, but most of the gentlemen still preferred a woman to wear her hair long.

  Star’s brother had encouraged her to continue to keep it cropped and she found that because it suited her to do so, she would not give a fig for what the gentlemen of the haute ton thought.

  Star’s face was piquant and heart shaped, giving her a naughty pixie-like countenance. Her nose was small and pert, her lips, full and rosy. However, as she turned from the mirror in her brother’s room, she sighed heavily. She did not count herself a beauty, or notice the fact that she turned male heads wherever she went. She thought, in fact, that she might never meet her true love and told her brother, “I don’t know, Vern. Perhaps I was not
meant to fall in love and marry.”

  He laughed and looked her over. “Well, Star, perhaps I was wrong. Perhaps you should grow your hair and wind it all around your head in curls. Indeed, you would be stunning with such a hairdo.”

  She plopped on the bed beside him. “I am afraid that you see me out of brotherly eyes…I am far from stunning.” She peeped at him naughtily, “Why…I look like you.”

  Her dark slightly almond shaped eyes, framed with dark thick lashes, laughed into the same dark eyes. He chuckled heartily, but that chuckle gave way to a fit of coughing.

  Her spontaneous smile and infectious laughter vanished as she bent toward him on the bed and touched his shoulder. “Oh dear, Vern…you should be better by now.”

  Her brother’s coughing subsided and he took a long gulp of air, looked her over with deep affection and said, “Star…and you shouldn’t be here looking after me. You should be in London…at routs and balls and…”

  “Hush,” she admonished. “You take on too much to yourself. Why…that is neither here nor there. What do I care for such frivolities?”

  “You can’t fool me, Star, besides it is what I promised Papa I would do for you.” He pulled a face. “I have made a mess of it.”

  “Vern, you are only two years older than I. Papa was unable to pull us out of the mess he not you created. I loved him so dearly, but he shouldn’t have made you promise to do take on his burden. Matters were dire long before you inherited.”

  He frowned and turned away from her to stare out the window. Star was worried. She got up and took the sponge out of the bowl of warm water touched with rose water she had brought up and began wiping his head and neck with its soothing application.

  Suddenly he took hold of her hand and said, “Star.”

  “Yes, Vern, what is it, darling…do not get so worked up,” she cooed in an effort to calm him down. Faith! He suddenly looked frantic.

  She wished Doctor Hayes would arrive. Vern should be much better by now, but he wasn’t. She had sent Jeffries who she couldn’t really spare from the stables to fetch the doctor to the Grange more than an hour ago.

  “Star…” her brother cried out again. “Damn, but it is hot…so hot in here.”

  “Hush, Vern…just lay still.” She sponged his face again.

  All at once, he startled her by sitting straight up in his bed. He grabbed her wrists. His eyes were black pools boring into hers. Star was surprised by the intensity of his grip.

  He said, his voice sounding frenzied, “Star, it has just come to me—now when I realized how much we look alike. Damnation! Why didn’t I think of it sooner?”

  “Vern…what are you talking about?” Star frowned with concern and wondered if the fever had made him delirious.

  He moved his hold from her wrists and clutched her hands, “Star, sis…it will be a simple thing. You are shorter, yes, but perhaps that won’t be noticed,” he squeezed her fingers and she objected.

  “Ouch, stop, Vern.”

  “Oh, sorry, sis, but you must listen to me,” His voice was hoarse and he swallowed hard. “There isn’t time. I am out of time…out of time.”

  “You aren’t making any sense, Vern. What are you talking about?” Something however, had gripped at her heart. Instinctively she knew something awful was coming. Her spine felt a horrible tingle shoot through it. She had known something was off with Vern and had been over the last month.

  She had been unwilling and was unwilling still, to acknowledge what she knew in her soul to be a fact. Her brother had been associating with the wrong people. She was sure of it. She withdrew her fingers from his hands and stroked his damp cheek, “Just hush, the doctor will be here soon.”

  “Listen to me Star, my life depends on it. You see, I already accepted payment…don’t have it to return. You are my only hope.” His dark eyes pleaded before he ran a hand through his mass of cornsilk hair. “I promised father, I would look out for you, repair the estate…but nothing we did…the breeding fees only helped a little…and I was desperate. Star…”

  “Stop it. None of it is your fault and father should not have put such a burden on you.”

  “It is my fault. I lowered myself—misused my position and now my life is in jeopardy as well.”

  “What are you saying? I simply don’t understand,” she scanned his face as she tried to make sense of it. She knew of course, they were in debt. She knew they were in danger of losing everything. Was that what he was referring to, or was it something else? In fact, as of late, his comings and goings before he fell ill, had her worried. She had supposed he had fallen in with a heady group of men…perhaps gamblers like her father.

  “Star, I am in trouble. If you don’t do this for me, they will put a hole in me. This is more than an issue of money. They will think I betrayed them. Star, I would never ask this of you, but I don’t have a choice. I have to get the information to them.”

  She went very still as she looked at him. He was her elder by two years. He was her dear, most treasured brother, but he was more a child at twenty-two than she was at twenty. Their father had been dead for just under a year. Their ancestral estate was in ruins not because of Vern but because of her father’s extravagances and his gaming habits.

  Vern was nothing like their father and yet, she had wondered what he had been up to the last month. Lately cash had come in somehow and he had managed to get a few things around the place repaired. She had not questioned it, but she had wondered how he was managing. He had been so much more like himself as of late, laughing and jesting—hopeful, and that had made her happy.

  She had turned a blind eye, especially when he spoke of giving her a London Season. This was as much her fault as his…whatever ‘this’ might be.

  Still, how surprised and shocked she was when she heard just what had brought in the cash, for it wasn’t gambling or smuggling as she had feared—not at all.

  She wished when he finished his confession that it had been, but it wasn’t…and now, he was right—his life might be in jeopardy because he had fallen in with the wrong crew.

  Things were much worse than she feared.

  Chapter Two

  SIR EDWARD LOOKED up at the darkening sky and hoped it wouldn’t rain. It had the look of rain. He felt the first drop of it hit his face and with a growl of exasperation he hunched his shoulders into his summer weight riding coat and damned the loss of his top hat.

  Cursing out loud helped, but did not do enough to assuage his frazzled nerves and so he added again, quite a bit louder than before, “Zounds! May I be damned beyond redemption if ever I allow a woman to make a victim of me again!”

  The cob horse he had managed to buy from the driver of his leased coach, nodded his head most vigorously, though whether in agreement or a desire to be fed, he couldn’t tell, until the big horse snorted, which led him to believe his horse did indeed fully agree. “Indeed, ‘ole boy…had your share of heartache, have you?” He sighed. “’Tis a good thing you are gelded and no longer interested in a filly that might break your spirit.” However, the idea of resorting to such a drastic measure made him frown and shake off these words.

  “Egad,” he continued to talk to his horse. “Will I ever forget the events of this day?”

  The light drizzle took on a bit more force and he sighed heavily as he stared at the fingerpost just ahead. It indicated that at least he was not lost. “Aha, Rye…we are nearly there, ‘ole boy. You shall have your grain, hay, water and a straw bed, and I…with any good luck shall have a good sight better than that.”

  Once again, as though in agreement, his horse snorted. “Indeed,” Sir Edward said comradely. “Water for you and some of France’s best for me. Tomorrow…well, tomorrow will come and be what it will be. Tonight old steed, I shall take a pretty tavern wench on my knee and get the Lady Babs out of my head.” He sighed heavily. “You know, when this day started I thought myself a top sawyer, a devilish hero whisking off his true love. I was wrong. She was right. She could not h
ave been my true love, for she was always his…never mine.” He pulled himself erect and announced, “There is nothing for it! Tonight, I shall get very drunk! What say you?”

  And on cue, his horse snorted.

  The town of Rye came into view and with it Sir Edward recalled all the gossip that surrounded this ‘hilltop town’ overlooking the sea.

  It did not actually boast any fabulous heights, though a good part of it overlooked the Marshes—Romney Marsh itself.

  Romney, he thought with a grimace. There wasn’t a man alive that didn’t know what went on in Romney Marsh.

  Overlooking the Harbor, the Customs House starkly reposed. It was well appointed and quite official in appearance. Sir Edward wondered as he glanced at its darkened interior and his horse clip-clopped by, how much smuggling still went on in Rye.

  Smuggling, he knew had always been the town’s mainstay. He had always heard that a man was sure during hard times to turn to a bit of smuggling to see him through. Aye, he understood that philosophy for you couldn’t talk about right and wrong to a man who needed to feed his family.

  Edward sighed. He was fairly certain that the business of smuggling was still quite robust and that English money made its way to France more often than not, war or no.

  His horse brought him past a large engraved stone which depicted the information that the town dated back to medieval times. Sir Edward grinned as he told his steed, “Aye then, I’d wager the ‘gentlemen’ have been doing business here just as long. What say you?”

  His horse blew out air, apparently totally in agreement.

  Sir Edward was also aware of all the stories associated with Rye about its numerous ghosts. The village had more than its share of veiled tales of spirits and their like.

  These tales had grown over the years and were held as undeniable facts, a friend had once told him. Well, well, that may be, but all he wanted was a room, a bottle and his dinner. If a ghost dared to bother him this evening, he would make the creature regret it.