Scoundrel in My Dreams Read online

  Praise for New York Times bestselling author

  CELESTE BRADLEY

  and her novels

  ROGUE IN MY ARMS

  “Bradley doesn’t disappoint with the second in her Runaway Brides trilogy, which is certain to have readers laughing and crying. Her characters leap off the page, especially little three-year-old Melody, the precocious ‘heroine,’ and her three fathers. There’s passion, adventure, nonstop action, and secrets that make the pages fly by.”

  —RT Book Reviews

  “When it comes to crafting fairy tale–like, wonderfully escapist historicals, Bradley is unrivaled, and the second addition to her Runaway Brides trilogy cleverly blends madcap adventure and sexy romance.”

  —Booklist

  DEVIL IN MY BED

  “From its unconventional prologue to its superb conclusion, every page of the first in Bradley’s Runaway Brides series is perfection and joy. Tinged with humor that never overshadows the poignancy and peopled with remarkable characters (especially the precocious Melody) who will steal your heart, this one’s a keeper.”

  —Romantic Times BOOKreviews

  “Part romantic comedy, part romantic suspense, and wholly entertaining, Devil in My Bed is a delight!”

  —Romance Reviews Today

  “Laughter, tears, drama, suspense, and a heartily deserved happily-ever-after.”

  —All About Romance

  DUKE MOST WANTED

  “Passionate and utterly memorable. Witty dialogue and fantastic imagery round out a novel that is a must-have for any Celeste Bradley fan.”

  —Romance Junkies

  “A marvelous, delightful, emotional conclusion to Bradley’s trilogy. Readers have been eagerly waiting to see what happens next, and they’ve also been anticipating a nonstop, beautifully crafted story, which Bradley delivers in spades.”

  —Romantic Times BOOKreviews

  THE DUKE NEXT DOOR

  “This spectacular, fast-paced, sexy romance will have you in laughter and tears. With delightful characters seeking love and a title, [this] heartfelt romance will make readers sigh with pleasure.”

  —Romantic Times BOOKreviews

  “Not only fun and sexy but relentlessly pulls at the heartstrings. Ms. Bradley has set the bar quite high with this one!”

  —Romance Readers Connection

  DESPERATELY SEEKING A DUKE

  “A humorous romp of marriage mayhem that’s a love-and-laughter treat, tinged with heated sensuality and tenderness. [A] winning combination.”

  —Romantic Times BOOKreviews

  St. Martin’s Paperbacks Titles

  By Celeste Bradley

  THE RUNAWAY BRIDES

  Devil in My Bed

  Rogue in My Arms

  THE HEIRESS BRIDES

  Desperately Seeking a Duke

  The Duke Next Door

  The Duke Most Wanted

  THE ROYAL FOUR

  To Wed a Scandalous Spy

  Surrender to a Wicked Spy

  One Night with a Spy

  Seducing the Spy

  THE LIAR’S CLUB

  The Pretender

  The Impostor

  The Spy

  The Charmer

  The Rogue

  Scoundrel in My Dreams

  Celeste Bradley

  St. Martin’s Paperbacks

  Table of Contents

  Title

  Copyright

  Dedication

  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

  Chapter Twenty-eight

  Chapter Twenty-nine

  Chapter Thirty

  Chapter Thirty-one

  Chapter Thirty-two

  Epilogue

  NOTE: If you purchased this book without a cover you should be aware that this book is stolen property. It was reported as “unsold and destroyed” to the publisher, and neither the author nor the publisher has received any payment for this “stripped book.”

  This is a work of fiction. All of the characters, organizations, and events portrayed in this novel are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.

  SCOUNDREL IN MY DREAMS

  Copyright © 2010 by Celeste Bradley.

  All rights reserved.

  For information address St. Martin’s Press, 175 Fifth Avenue, New York, NY 10010.

  ISBN: 978-0-312-94310-3

  Printed in the United States of America

  St. Martin’s Paperbacks edition / October 2010

  St. Martin’s Paperbacks are published by St. Martin’s Press, 175 Fifth Avenue, New York, NY 10010.

  10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

  This book is dedicated to people who adopt unwanted kittens and puppies from shelters across the U.S. All my animals are rescues and I love them even more for it. Think first before you buy.

  I must acknowledge the help of three great brainstorming partners! Darbi Gill, Robyn Holiday, and Joanne Markis. I couldn’t have written this trilogy without you.

  I must again mention the inspiration of little Frankie Jean Baca-Lucero, soul-sister to Lady Melody. Thanks, everyone!

  Prologue

  The mony stopped coming from the mother. I can’t keep her no more. The father can take her now. Don’t know his name. He’s a memmber of Brown’s.

  Once upon a time a child was left on the doorstep of a stuffy London gentlemen’s club with a note pinned to her coat. Since the question on the minds of most of the members of Brown’s was ‘Where did I leave my teeth?’ only three were young enough to be sowing oats of any kind, wild or otherwise. Aidan de Quincy, Sir Colin Lambert, and Lord John Redgrave.

  Aidan and Colin were quick to pin this foundling on their absent friend Jack. It is always easier to blame someone who isn’t there, isn’t it? Yet as Aidan grew to love that tiny cherubic hellion, he began to wonder . . . could little Melody be his?

  Forced to face his past and seek out the lovely widow Madeleine Chandler, Aidan brought her back to Brown’s to get to know her discarded child and to become his bride. The problem was that Madeleine had a secret, a past that made lying to Aidan seem like the best chance of escape.

  Chaos and mayhem ensued, of course, when their pasts collided and the truth was revealed. By the time peace reigned once more, Sir Colin Lambert was beginning to have doubts of his own.

  Therefore, Colin set off to Brighton with little Melody to find Chantal, the lovely actress who had held his heart captive for years. However, Chantal had fled. Colin hired her seamstress, the saucy Prudence Filby, in order to find Chantal before she married another.

  Travel and misadventure ensued, bandits and giants went to war, and little Melody adored every moment. Colin, however, began to fear finding the woman of his dreams now that he had feelings for flame-haired, hot-tempered Pru. Torn, he knew that for Melody’s sake he must find Melody’s mother and wed her at once, even though his heart belonged to Pru. Fortunately, Chant
al was as deceitful as she was beautiful and her claim to Melody was false.

  This happy discovery led to one inescapable conclusion.

  By the process of elimination, Melody must be the child of Lord John Redgrave, heir to the Marquis of Strickland.

  When Jack arrived home from tending to his uncle’s sugar plantations in the West Indies, he was going to have quite a surprise waiting for him.

  For the only woman he’d ever loved had long since married another man.

  Twenty years later . . .

  “Button?”

  With a noise between a chuckle and a sigh, Button ceased his narrative and looked down at the dark head resting upon his shoulder. “Yes, Melody?”

  Melody sat up straight, which made her taller than he, even seated on the sofa. She wrinkled her nose apologetically. It made her look far younger than her three-and-twenty years. “I know I’m interrupting again, but that’s simply not how it was. Mama never married someone else.”

  Then, as if the merest mention of marriage was more than Melody could stand, she shot a single panicked glance at the exquisite Lementeur wedding gown hanging only a few feet away. The sight of that shimmering confection of lace and beaded silk only made her bury her face in Button’s shoulder again.

  “Never mind. I’m sorry.” Her words were muffled by panic and Button’s superfine wool surcoat. “Please continue.”

  Button tipped her chin up with one finger to gaze into dark-lashed eyes like summer sky. “Mellie, if I finish this story, will you promise to put on the wedding gown that I painstakingly designed myself and then charged your poor father an obscene amount for?”

  Melody shrank back. “If I get dressed, I’ll have to . . . to . . .”

  Button raised an implacable brow. “If you can’t say it, you certainly won’t be able to do it.”

  Melody tried to take a deep breath, then another, but she rushed the process and lost her breath altogether. Her eyes widened as she paled and she shot him a gaze of pure panic. Button plunked his palm on the top of her head and matter-of-factly pushed her head down between her knees as if he did that sort of thing often. Considering all the brides who clamored to wear an actual Lementeur on their momentous day, he probably had.

  Melody’s breathing eased back to the sort of rhythm she’d never had any trouble with until this day. She sat up and pressed both palms to her flaming cheeks. “I don’t know what’s wrong with me.”

  “I don’t, either,” Button said patiently, although not quite as patiently as the first time he’d said it several hours before. “You love him to tiny little bits. He adores you. You are clearly meant for each other.”

  She shut her eyes tight and shook her head swiftly. “ ‘Meant for each other’? What does that mean? Meant to live together forever, making each other uniquely miserable, like half the couples in Society? Meant to know precisely how to hurt each other the most?”

  Button frowned. “He has never hurt you!” Then, “Has he?”

  “No.” Melody sniffled. “But he could. He could, he could—” Her face began to crumple. “He could leave.”

  Button put his palms on either cheek to stop the disintegration. “No crying. It will melt your face.”

  Melody stared up at him for a long moment, her cheeks a bit smushed and her brow crinkled. “Button,” she said finally, through lips pooched out from the gentle pressure, “you’re a bit mad, aren’t you?”

  He smiled and released her with a quick kiss to her forehead. “Mad like a fox. If you cry, it will take hours for the redness to fade.”

  Then he tucked her beneath his arm once more. “Here is how matters will proceed. You will listen to the best and last story of the complicated courtship of your parents—”

  “I know you said it was the basis for Uncle Colin’s book, The Queen in the Tower, but I don’t believe a word of it is true.” She gazed up at him seriously. “There are no such things as elves.”

  Button ignored her and continued. “You will listen to this story and you will find yourself entirely reassured that your own rather event-filled courtship was nothing out of the ordinary for your family. You will gladly get dressed in that marvelous frivolity of a wedding gown and you will make it look exquisite and it will return the favor. You will walk down that aisle without the slightest hint of reluctance and you will marry that young man and make him—and yourself!—eternally happy!” He glared at her fondly. “Is that understood, little Milady?”

  She gazed back at him sadly. “I suppose you ought to get started.” She sniffled and snuggled closer. “I think this might take a while.”

  He squeezed reassuringly as he began again. “Once upon a time there was a man who thought he’d lost everything. . . .”

  It all began in a castle far away. . . . Oh, very well, it was only a country manor in Surrey. A young woman tugged her cap down over her hair and smoothed her dressing gown with nervous hands as she tiptoed down the dark hallway in the guest wing.

  Without a candle—and why would she need a candle when she’d lived in this house every moment of her entire life?—the only light came from the moon, streaming through the window at the end of the hall. The chambermaid had forgotten to pull the draperies closed at sunset, an understandable lapse with the house so full of guests to tend to. The house party had raged for days and the staff was worn quite thin.

  For this particular young lady, however, only one guest mattered. Lord John Redgrave, heir to the Marquis of Strickland, handsome, dashing, and still so pitiably distraught over the battleground death of his cousin, Blakely.

  She stopped outside the door assigned to Lord John and took a deep breath. “Jack,” she whispered, just to practice her speech one last time. “I know that you’re sailing away tomorrow to tend to your uncle’s plantations, but . . . I love you.”

  Ridiculous. She sounded childish and pathetic even to her own ears. Yet how else was she to let him know her feelings before he went so far away she might never see him again?

  Her trembling hand touched the chill iron of the door latch and with the merest of clicks, she was in Jack’s room.

  The moonlight came, too, pouring in through the wide bedchamber window like blue and silver magic. Sprawled in the pool of light, tangled in the snowy bed linens, Jack lay sleeping in the middle of the wide bed.

  Naked.

  Her mouth went dry and her heart began to hammer a warning.

  Jack lay on his back. As she moved closer—and she couldn’t seem to help moving closer—she could make out every dip and plane of his broad muscled chest. One arm was flung wide, as if reaching for her. The other lay lax across his rippled abdomen, his hand resting just above his navel.

  The linens covered much of what lay below that, except for one muscular thigh and knee, so she let her gaze travel back up his long, muscular body to his face. She’d always loved the angled planes of his sensitive face, even before he went to war, but now the desolation he’d witnessed had refined the easy sanguine features of old into a honed, more rugged version of her Jack.

  His jaw and the planes of his cheekbones were sharper and more defined. His mouth with its sensual lower lip had not given a single smile since he had arrived. Tragedy had worn his brow and given him slight creases on either side of his beautiful mouth. The war had taken the lighthearted boy and brought back to her a dark and troubled man.

  She loved him all the more for it. It had been easy to adore him before. Everyone did. Now, however, he was left to himself. The young man who was so happy to be entertaining and delightful was gone.

  At present, he scarcely spoke at all and when he did, his words were terse and startling, as if he no longer had the patience for the banal and trivial conversation of Society. His gaze was distant instead of laughing, his dark brown eyes now smoldering with something battle born and much too momentous for the tender constitutions of the other guests. They shunned him as if avoiding an improperly tamed animal. To her, however, his darkness drew her like a moth to a black
flame.

  He had not cut his hair in far too long, but she loved how it fell straight and midnight dark nearly to his shoulders. It made him seem untamed and a little dangerous, as if he cared nothing for the standards of Society. Her hands twitched to brush it back from his brow as he slept, to let the glossy strands of it run through her fingers. His jaw showed dark stubble, even in the moonlight. It would feel rough to her touch, like sandpaper on the steel angle of his jaw.

  She licked her lips and moved closer to the bed. She’d studied his face for so long she could draw him in the dark. She had longed to see more.

  Now was her chance.

  His body was long and tall, flung across the mattress at an angle. Broad, powerful shoulders narrowed down to his hips, giving his torso a catlike leanness she’d not noticed in his clothes. His chest was broad and sculpted. She could clearly see the dips and bumps of more muscle cording his upper arms and strapping across his ribs, rippling over his abdomen. A patch of dark hair covered his chest from one flat nipple to the other, then narrowed to a dark trail over his taut belly down past his navel. Her eyes followed it in fascination. Her fingers itched to explore as well.

  The corner of the sheet concealed his groin. She let out a faint sigh, half in disappointment, half in reprieve.

  One thigh was hidden beneath the covers, but the other leg bent outward, muscled and long, ending in a large shapely foot. The bed was huge, one of the largest in the house, yet he filled it by himself.

  He was so different. He no longer seemed aware of the handsome exterior he used to wear as confidently as a fine coat. Now his awareness was turned inward, consumed by loss and tragedy, a witness to death and destruction on a scale she could not even imagine in her sheltered, decorous world.

  She saw scars, new and angry, darkly ominous on skin gone silvery in the moonlight. A starburst pattern on one shoulder. When had he taken a bullet? Why had she heard nothing of it? A diagonal slash across his opposite ribs—a bayonet had struck dangerously close to his heart. Another such slash on one muscular thigh, as if he’d been mounted while the other man was on foot.