At Your Pleasure (2 page)

Designed by Jill Putorti

ISBN 978-1-4516-0695-9
ISBN 978-1-4516-0701-7 (ebook)

For Steph,
for innumerable reasons—“friendship” being too pallid and commonplace a word to begin to describe them.

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Contents

Author’s Note

Prologue

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

Chapter 16

Chapter 17

Chapter 18

Chapter 19

Chapter 20

Chapter 21

Chapter 22

Chapter 23

Author Bio

Author’s Note

W
hen Queen Anne died, in 1714, the English crown passed to her second cousin, George of Hanover, who had been born and raised in what is now Germany. (Anne’s half brother, James Stuart, was not eligible to inherit the throne because of his Catholic faith.) The accession of George I was marked by a dramatic shift in political power. The long-reigning Tory party saw many of its greatest leaders arrested and forced from office, and in the general elections that followed, the Whigs assumed almost complete control of the government.

Believing that their faith, powers, and privileges were threatened by the new king and his allies, many English Tories decided to take up the Jacobite cause and champion James Stuart’s claim to the throne. Across England, 1715 was a year marked by treasonous rumors, riots, and repressions . . . and, ultimately, war.

Prologue

ENGLAND, 1709

F
aster.

Adrian had abandoned the lathered horse a mile behind. He ran now, his feet no sooner striking the ground than lifting again, all his instincts and memories combining to aid him, directing him sure-footedly and safely over the darkened field where he had played as a boy and later loved her as a man.

Faster
.

The lights of Hodderby, which had flickered in the distance for long minutes, grew brighter. He could see now the draperies thrown back, the windows blazing like torches. Behind them moved darkened shapes, perhaps looking out, one of them Nora: she was watching for him. She was strong. She would hold out. He would not be too late.

Faster.

He stumbled and the pain speared up his side, so that all at once, he grew aware of his breath sawing razor-like
in his throat—the burning in his chest—the ache in his shoulder that had not yet healed; the throb in his ribs where his father had struck him. On the ship they had chained him to keep him in place, claiming that they did it with love; they were saving his life from ruin, they said. His brother had clapped him on his wounded shoulder and laughed at his expression—and then, when Adrian had hawked spit across that smirking mouth, had cursed and kicked him like a mongrel dog.

“You will thank me for that one day,” his brother had said by way of farewell. Wiping his jaw, he had added, “I will have your apology then.”

There would be no apology.

Faster
.

Out of the dimness of twilight emerged a group of people in festive finery, men and women stumbling into each other, their wine-drunk laughter light in the cool autumn air. The girls wore bracelets of flowers braided round their wrists and brows; the flowers were orange blossoms, bridal flowers, purloined from a wedding.

Not hers,
he told himself.
Not yet
.
She will not bend for them
.
She will wait for me
.

The group, seeing him, called out greetings. He had no breath for a reply. He was flying now, flying toward the manse.
Faster,
he thought.
Faster
.

1

ENGLAND, 1715

N
ora was sitting at her dressing table, her maidservant Grizel braiding her hair for bed, when she heard hoofbeats on the road without. For a moment her heart swelled with relief:
David,
she thought. Her brother had finally returned, and she could surrender his cares to his own keeping. Thank God for it: they had worn her to the bone.

The next second, the maid crossed to open the window. Peering down, she gasped. “King’s riders, my lady,” she said over her shoulder.

Nora felt the blood drain from her head.

King’s riders, approaching by night with no message sent ahead to announce them: the only conclusion was that they meant to take the household by surprise. Their mission was not a friendly one.

Somebody had betrayed her.

“My gown,” she said as she rose. “Lace me quickly. And leave the window open.”

As she impatiently submitted to Grizel’s nimble hands, she heard the household stirring back to life. Dogs barked in the inner courtyard. Tack jingled and a horse whinnied. Low voices rose on the cool night breeze, impossible to discern. She caught three distinct timbres, and then a fourth. Her chest tightened. “How large is the party?” she asked. “Could you tell?”

“I saw . . . eight, nine mounts?”

“So many?” Nora cast her mind back to the letter she had received last week. Since the riots at Oxford, the government had recalled the old act, passed before the Civil War, that allowed the king’s agents to search any house suspected to harbor traitors. But to come this far into the Lancashire wilderness, with so very many men . . .

Evidently they felt certain they would not leave this place empty-handed.

She took a deep breath.
No cause to fear,
she told herself. As Grizel’s hands fell away, she squared her shoulders. In the standing mirror in the corner, she saw herself: small, dark, half-lost in the shadows of the room.

It would not do. She lifted her head, trying for a prouder look. These visitors would behave as her manner instructed them. Best that they see a grand lady, deserving of respect.

“What can they want now?” Grizel whispered.

Turning, Nora found her maid twisting a lace cap in her hands. Her anxious gaze begged for reassurance.

Not for the first time, Nora felt a stab of anger. Her brother’s mad schemes had endangered every soul in his care. At a time when heavy rains and failing crops should
have riveted his attention to his estates, he conspired instead in French palaces, and exposed every throat in this house to the axe.

The thought was disloyal. She forced it away. David had no choice, after all. When her majesty had died and the German had come from Hanover to take the throne, their father’s enemies had been waiting. They had whispered lies into the new king’s ear. In the end, Father had been impeached, stripped of his title, and driven from England.

Neither Father nor David could be expected to tolerate such insult. As her brother often said, only dogs and cowards licked the boot that kicked them. And if the Colvilles did submit . . . who was to say that next, these lands would not be taken from them, too? The crown had already seized their more far-flung holdings, but Nora’s late husband had labored to ensure that Hodderby and its environs were spared.

Now that her husband was dead, the Whigs no longer had cause to treat the Colvilles kindly. Before David could tend to these estates, he first must ensure that they remained his to protect.