Chapter 1

CHAPTER

a

1

C harlotte Cronenworth stopped walking and gazed at the house at the end of the lane. It was called Fog Bay and was a typical country cottage, two stories high, with large windows, painted shutters, and a turret on one side. Ivy grew up the front and roses were blooming everywhere.

The place was rustic and very isolated, but it looked cozy and comfortable, the sort of spot where a lost princess might hide in a fairytale. The strangest wave of longing swept over her, as if she wished it was hers, as if she could move in and stay forever.

Behind the building, there was a patchy lawn, the green grass sloping to a line of sandy dunes. A strip of blue ocean was visible beyond them. She could smell a salty tang in the air.

She peered over at the girl who was with her, Polly, and said, "I see smoke rising from the chimney. That's a good sign."

Polly pointed to the turret. "The windows are open too, so someone must be at home."

"Let's knock, shall we? We've come all this way. We might as well get it over with."

Charlotte voiced the comment confidently, as if she was in charge and in control, but in reality, she was weary, exhausted, and a bit afraid. Polly was even more frightened, but then, she was only twelve. Charlotte was twenty-three, so she had to think and act like an adult, even though—at that moment—she felt foolish and na?ve.

"Can we wait another minute?" Polly said. "I'm not quite ready."

"If you want the truth, I'm not ready either."

They studied the cottage, the untended yard, the ocean in the distance. There was a meadow off to the left, a single horse grazing, but there were no people anywhere. The lone sounds were the lapping of the waves out past the dunes and a slight sea breeze rustling the trees in the nearby woods. The seclusion and silence were unsettling.

They'd traveled for two days to reach their destination. Once they announced themselves and stated their purpose, what would happen?

For the prior four years, Charlotte had been a teacher at Mrs. Pemberton's Academy for Girls. She'd enjoyed her job, but she'd become complacent. She knew that life was a gamble and a woman who supported herself was never safe. Just as she'd quit worrying that calamity might strike, it had struck with a vengeance.

The previous week, with no notice, the school had suddenly closed. Apparently, Mrs. Pemberton had been awful at handling her money. She'd run out of it, and hadn't paid her bills for such an extended period, that the bank had seized her property and it had been sold. She'd been too embarrassed to tell anyone what had transpired so, when the new owner had arrived to take over, it had been a complete shock.

The staff had had three days to notify parents, send students away, then head off to their own families. Unfortunately for Charlotte, she'd had no relatives to whom she was willing to return. She was floating free and irked to suppose she'd have to find another situation for herself.

Polly was in the same dire boat as Charlotte. All of her classmates had had homes to go to, kin to welcome them, but there had been no information as to what should be done with her . Mrs. Pemberton had been no help. After the foreclosure, she'd suffered a nervous collapse and had been whisked off to a health sanitorium.

Polly had been a charity case, who'd boarded year 'round. She'd been enrolled at the school at age five, but her history and antecedents were a mystery. No details had ever been shared with the staff. She'd never had any visitors. No one had ever written to her or had gifts delivered.

With her slender physique, black hair, and intense blue eyes, she was extraordinarily pretty, and with her being on the cusp of womanhood, it was clear she'd be a great beauty when she was older. She could be kind and considerate, but she exuded a superior attitude, as if she'd been born certain that she was more important than everyone else.

Due to her haughty comportment, rumors had abounded: that she was the King's bastard daughter, that she was the secret love-child of a foreign prince, that her father was a high-ranking bishop in the Church.

Charlotte didn't mind Polly's conceited traits. She had plenty of vanity herself, and if Polly had a prominent sire, it meant they had very much in common. Charlotte had been born into a prominent family too, but her lofty spot had imploded and she'd tumbled very far down Society's ladder.

As the school had been shut down, she and Polly had been the only ones with nowhere to go. She had Polly's file tucked in her satchel, but it wasn't very useful. It contained a single piece of paper with a contact address: Fog Bay, located outside the village of Baywick on the south coast.

There were no names jotted on the paper, so there was no way to discern who resided at Fog Bay, no way to know if it would be Polly's kin. If the occupants had never heard of Polly, what would she do?

Polly was hoping to encounter cordial relatives who would let her stay with them. Charlotte had been hoping, if Polly was indeed home, that they might need a governess for her. Yet Charlotte was quickly having doubts about that notion.

She believed, as had been regularly bandied, that Polly was the natural daughter of a notorious personage, but now that she'd glimpsed Fog Bay, she couldn't imagine that the inhabitants had an elevated position in the world. She'd been expecting a grand estate with an ostentatious manor house. She'd been expecting opulent salons, gold wainscotting, liveried servants. Instead, it was just this rather decrepit beach cottage.

Since Charlotte's life had been one disaster after the next, and she'd never been lucky, it had been deranged to presume there would be a viable conclusion at Fog Bay. But what other option had there been? Would she return to London and beg her stepmother, Georgina, for shelter? No. She'd jump off a cliff first.

Would she forgive her sister, Theodora, whom she called Theo, for betrothing herself to their stepbrother, Arthur? Arthur was Georgina's son, a drunkard and bungler who'd wrecked what remained of their paltry existence, and Charlotte refused to watch Theo walk down the aisle with him.

When she'd accepted her job with Mrs. Pemberton, it had been for the sole purpose of escaping Georgina and Arthur, and she'd sworn to Theo that she wouldn't come back until they were wrenched away to a foul purgatory. There was no possibility of that happening though, but she wouldn't pretend all was fine. She wouldn't wear blinders and ignore how they'd been wronged by Georgina and Arthur.

Polly was braver than Charlotte. She took a deep breath, straightened her shoulders, and said, "I'm ready. Shall we keep on?"

"Yes, and don't fret. It will be all right."

"Of course it will be," Polly agreed, but it was wishful thinking and the optimistic remark very likely untrue.

They marched over and knocked, but they received no response. Charlotte pressed her ear to the wood, but there was no movement inside. After three more tries, a footman finally answered. He gaped at them as if they were fairies who'd snuck out of the forest, but she figured there weren't many visitors to the remote haven.

She and Polly had traveled to Baywick on the public coach, then they'd obtained directions to Fog Bay. They'd trekked for over an hour before a farmer had given them a ride on his cart to the Fog Bay lane. The property was tucked between two headlands and not visible from the road. Who would ever stop by? Even someone who was lost wouldn't stumble on it by accident.

"May I help you?" he asked.

"I am Miss Charlotte Cronenworth," Charlotte said, "and I'm a teacher at Mrs. Pemberton's Academy." Her mention of the Academy simply produced a blank stare.

"Were we expecting you?"

"No, definitely not." She gestured to Polly. "This is Polly and she's been one of my pupils. Recently, the school was closed due to financial difficulties, and the students were abruptly sent home. There was no time to apprise Polly's kin of the dilemma and her file lists Fog Bay as her family's residence. We need to speak with her relatives to inquire as to their preference with regard to her situation."

Charlotte hadn't been entirely candid. There was no concrete proof that Polly was from Fog Bay, but at the moment, it would be too complicated to delve into that problem.

He continued to stare, then he said, "Are you assuming she belongs with us?"

"I'm not sure. It's just that Fog Bay was in her file." She paused, waiting for him to comment. When he didn't, she added, "She's twelve and she has nowhere to go."

"So you brought her here ?"

She was beginning to wonder if he was a tad slow mentally. Her temper flared, but she tamped it down. "I realize this is a strange predicament, but may I talk to the person in charge? Is there anyone who might be available?"

"Hold on. I'll check for you."

To her stunned aggravation, he shut the door in her face. They froze, then Polly said, "Well, that was awful. Where do you suppose he went? And will he ever return?"

"I wouldn't try to guess. I had no idea what might occur when we arrived, but I could never have imagined such shabby treatment by a servant."

"If we can't tarry, what will we do?"

They'd been debating the same question ever since they'd departed from the Academy. Charlotte had some coins in her reticule, enough to spend another night or two at a coaching inn, enough to purchase fares on the public coach to London. But that route led in only one direction: to the Cronenworth town house, where Georgina lorded herself over everyone like a wicked witch.

Charlotte had worked so hard to flee from Georgina. After all her struggles and tribulations, would she wind up where she'd started?

The notion was too nauseating to contemplate, so she shoved it away and said, "We shouldn't borrow trouble. We'll hear his reply, then we'll decide what our next step is to be."

Several minutes passed, then he peeked out at them. "You can come in if you like, but currently, there's no one who can deal with this issue. It will be a lengthy delay."

"That's fine. We're in no hurry."

He ushered them into a small, dark foyer, and there were two chairs by the window. He motioned for them to sit down, and as they complied, he said, "I'll be back as soon as I have news, so please be patient."

He vanished in the shadows, without so much as offering to take their cloaks or bonnets. They were lugging packed satchels, their palms blistered from carting around the heavy weight, and he hadn't offered to carry them in either. They set the bags at their feet and sighed with relief.

Polly pointed to the nearby front parlor. "I can't believe he didn't escort us in there. We would have been much more comfortable. I recognize that we're rumpled from our journey, but he can't have deemed us to be low company."

Rather snidely, Charlotte said, "Maybe it's his first job and he hasn't been fully trained to his duties. He hasn't learned how to be polite."

They snickered somewhat maliciously, then they hunkered down. It was the middle of the afternoon and quite a distance to the coaching inn at Baywick. With it being July, the summer days were long, but she wouldn't like to be walking to the village as the sun was dropping in the west. Nor would she like to leave without Polly's circumstances being resolved.

It would be sufficiently embarrassing to slink back to live with Georgina by herself, but it would be doubly difficult with Polly in tow. Georgina wasn't hospitable, and she wouldn't be keen to provide shelter to an unknown girl, but Charlotte was growing afraid that she might have to assume custody of Polly.

In light of the paltry conditions at Fog Bay, she couldn't abandon Polly in the isolated spot. Even if there were people to claim her, Charlotte would be loathe to relinquish her to them. If that problem arose, Charlotte wouldn't be surprised. She'd never achieved a feasible conclusion for herself. Why would she have thought she could arrange a good ending for someone else?

The house was dim and quiet, and in the parlor, she could see a clock on the mantle. A half-hour passed, then an hour. The footman hadn't returned. No courtesy had been extended, no refreshments furnished, and Charlotte was starving.

The past week had been exhausting, and gradually, she dozed off and began to dream. She was tiny and playing in the garden behind the manor at Peachtree Haven, which had been her childhood home. Her mother was with her and they were sitting together in the grass. Her mother had run away when Charlotte was five, and she had scant memories of her, so the image was a precious gift.

Her mother looked young and pretty, but very unhappy. " Why are you always so sad?" Charlotte was asking her, but before her mother could respond, she was jolted awake by the footman shaking her shoulder to rouse her.

"Come with me," he murmured.

Her pulse was racing, her balance unsteady, as she desperately tried to hold onto the dream, so she'd never forget it, but it had vanished. She swiped a hand across her eyes, then rose awkwardly. He still hadn't offered to take her cloak and bonnet, so she removed them and put them on the chair. Polly had dozed off too and was sleeping soundly.

Charlotte nodded to her and said, "May she remain here?"

"That would be for the best." He whipped away and started off and she thought he said, "The Earl doesn't like children, so he wouldn't like her."

She hurried after him, asking, "What was that?"

He glanced back. "The Earl has agreed to speak with you, but he wouldn't like to fuss with her."

"I'm meeting with an earl?"

"Yes. Lord Dartmouth? This is one of his properties. Isn't it the Earl whom you're seeking?"

Charlotte sucked in a sharp breath, both because she hadn't expected to encounter such a toplofty person in the small, rural location, but also because of the name Dartmouth. Polly's surname was Dartmouth, which was an indication that she'd been born at a Dartmouth estate, but that her father had never been identified.

Charlotte swiftly realized that she'd waded into a very murky bog.

"What is the Earl's given name?" she hastened to inquire.

The footman scowled. "Why would you need to know that?"

"I'm just curious." She added a white lie. "I was thinking I might be acquainted with him."

"Winston Wainwright."

"No, it doesn't ring a bell."

They wound through the halls to the rear of the house. As they reached an open door, he leaned in and whispered, "Lord Dartmouth is enjoying a very private holiday. He's an important man, who isn't eager to have a visitor, so you're lucky he granted you an audience. Don't annoy him."

"I wouldn't dare."

"I'll wait for you out here." He peeked into the room and said, "I've brought her, my lord."

There was a resigned sigh, then a male replied, "Show her in."

The footman motioned for Charlotte to enter and she braced herself and marched by him. She was no shrinking violet and she couldn't abide pompous men. From her father, Harold, to her stepbrother, Arthur, they'd all treated her abominably. In general, they were idiots and fools, yet the world was structured so they were in charge and invented the rules.

It would be galling to have to bow down to an exasperating dolt, but she was determined to have Polly settled. If the Wainwright family was willing to claim her, Charlotte had to be glad about it.

She walked into a cozy den. There was a fireplace, a warm fire burning in it. Bookshelves lined one wall, with books stacked to the ceiling. Windows lined the far wall, and out them, the garden stretched to the ocean.

The Earl was seated at the desk, the windows behind him, and with the bright afternoon sun shining in, it was difficult to see him. He gestured for her to approach and she trudged over and sank onto the chair across from him. It was hard and straight-backed, with no cushion, and she felt like a lowly housemaid who was about to be reprimanded for an infraction.

Her vision adjusted, and as she got her first clear glimpse of him, she could barely keep from tsking with aggravation. He was thirty or so—and too handsome for words: black hair, striking blue eyes, a perfect face attached to a perfect body.

He exuded such a potent masculine aura that she was being pummeled by it and handsome men had always irked her. They thought their attractive features imbued them with extra power and authority, but in reality, it simply made them obnoxiously vain.

He had wide shoulders, strong arms, and a broad chest that narrowed to a slender waist, and she supposed he was quite tall. She was only five-foot-four herself, so if he stood, he'd tower over her and, no doubt, become unbearable.

Once she was able to shuck off her initial irritation, it occurred to her that she was absolutely conferring with the right person. She steeled her expression, so he wouldn't notice her shock.

He had to be Polly's father; he looked exactly like her. Same hair, same eyes. He'd cocked his head and was studying her meticulously, and Polly did the very same thing when she was dithering over a mathematical problem.

Was he aware that he had a daughter? If he wasn't, Charlotte couldn't be the one to apprise him. The old phrase, kill the messenger, definitely applied. He had a very high position in the kingdom and, evidently, someone was hiding Polly's connection to him. Who might it have been?

Probably not him. He was glaring at her as if she were a gnat he'd like to swat away. If he had an inkling of Polly's existence, he didn't provide the slightest hint, but Polly needed his help, so Charlotte had to tread cautiously. She couldn't utter a stupid remark and get them kicked out before the conversation had even begun.

He didn't bother with niceties. "Miss Cronenworth, is it? My servant tells me you're dying to speak with me."

"Not dying to speak. Hoping to speak would be more accurate."

He snorted with disgust. "Fine. You're hoping to speak with me. What is this about? And please be brief."

Charlotte explained about being a teacher at Mrs. Pemberton's, about the school closing, about Polly being a charity case there. He was obviously bored to tears, so she hurried to add, "Mrs. Pemberton suffered a nervous collapse and fled, and without her on the premises to guide us, we possessed no information about Polly's kin. Her file states that correspondence should be sent to Fog Bay, but that's it. I escorted her to be sure she arrived safely and to request aid on her behalf."

He snorted again. "You traveled all this way, due to your having a location jotted on a piece of paper? It seems a tad deranged to me. Are you prone to peculiar conduct?"

The comment was insulting and snooty and precisely what she might have expected from him. She swallowed down a rude retort.

"We wrote to ask for instructions," she said, "but the incident transpired so rapidly that there wasn't time to dawdle and wait for a response. She's twelve. Should I have abandoned her on the school's stoop to fend for herself?"

"As I'm not acquainted with the girl—or you, for that matter—I have no idea what you should have done, but it's bizarre to me that you assume I would like to hear about your troubles."

"Why is that? Are you annoyed that I've approached your grand self? Your footman confided that you're enjoying a private holiday, so you can't be that busy."

It was a horrid taunt, but apparently, they were destined to trade barbs. She should have been more polite, but she was feeling weary and beaten down, so she wasn't at her best. She never groveled to anyone either.

"You have a very smart mouth," he said.

"So I've been told. When I was young, my stepmother despaired for my future."

"Your admission is not surprising to me." He waved to the door. "You can go."

She spat out a stunned breath. "We haven't resolved a single issue. You can't dismiss me."

"Yes, I can. I don't know you; the child you're carting around is a stranger to me, and you're correct: I'm on holiday. I don't wish to be pestered by you."

"You're being deliberately obnoxious."

"It's my normal condition. Goodbye."

Charlotte stared him down and his smug attitude made her remember how much she loathed powerful men. They ruled the world, and women let them be in charge, but she'd never understood why women were so amenable to having them run things. For the most part, society was a wreck. Her own life was particularly fraught with drama and difficulties and she was in no mood to put up with an arrogant cretin.

"Polly's surname is Dartmouth," she said, "and rumor has it that she is an important man's bastard daughter, but we were never certain. Now, I've staggered into this rather decrepit country cottage and find out you are Lord Dartmouth. Is that a coincidence? I think not."

She imbued her tone with his same sort of haughty disdain, and she glowered at him, her every pore telling him she wasn't impressed and didn't like him.

He couldn't fail to miss her allegation, and for an instant, his eyes widened with astonishment, but it was quickly masked. "Are you hinting that she might be mine? I doubt that very much. I am a confirmed bachelor and I know how many children I've sired. That would be none."

"Well, she's someone's. Who might it be? Your father? A brother? A cousin? Whoever sent her to my school wanted her identity to remain a buried secret. Correspondence was addressed to this place. Who might have opened any letter from the Academy?"

"Usually, the house is shuttered, but I have a caretaker to watch over it."

"Perhaps we could question him about the situation."

"Or perhaps we won't."

Charlotte bristled. "What is wrong with you? I traveled here with honorable intentions, needing to chat with you about this dilemma, and you're being terribly uncooperative. It wouldn't kill you to mind your manners and help me."

"Help you with what? What is it you'd like me to do? Should I give you money? Should I offer you shelter? For how long? Forever? Should I make promises I would never keep? You have wandered in to plague me with no warning at all. Is there some reason I must be cordial?"

Charlotte nearly launched into a tirade about overbearing aristocrats, about him being a hostile bully, but before she could begin, she was overcome by anguish. She was all alone and struggling to survive on her own. When she was five, her mother had run away with a scoundrel, and ever since that riveting incident, she'd been on a downward trajectory.

One day, she'd been a happy little girl with a pretty, doting mother, and the next, she hadn't had a mother. The reckless woman had deserted them, and even though Charlotte and her sister had prayed she'd return, she never had. It was the type of catastrophe that left a definite mark.

Her father, Harold, had been wealthy—the owner of the shipping company, HH Imports—and her mother's disappearance had been a very public scandal. She'd been branded the most notorious hussy of her generation, and he'd ordered them to never talk about her, to never ask about her. He'd insisted she was dead to them, and a short interval later, he'd abruptly announced that she was dead, that she'd died in Paris. But he'd never provided any information as to why she'd been there, how she'd perished, what had happened.

He'd always been stern and gruff, but her brazen betrayal had rendered him even more cantankerous. He'd looked at Charlotte and her sister and had seen their mother's face, and he'd scrutinized them as if wondering whether they'd grow up to be just like her.

He'd remarried immediately to their widowed cousin, Georgina, and she'd had a son, Arthur, from her first marriage. With no notice, he'd moved them in, then he'd abandoned Charlotte and Theo to Georgina's corrupt machinations. Georgina was a shrew whom Charlotte couldn't abide. Arthur was amiable enough, but he was a lazy bumbler who would ultimately bankrupt them.

Harold had passed away when she was fourteen, and even though he'd been scrupulously organized and efficient, Georgina had claimed there was no Will, no bequests, no dowries arranged. Initially, Charlotte had been young and gullible, and she'd believed that odd story, but after she'd matured, she'd doubted every comment Georgina had ever uttered.

It had meant their home was riddled with quarrels and distrust. The final straw had arrived when Georgina had pushed Theo to engage herself to Arthur. Charlotte was a fighter, but Theo was her exact opposite. She never rocked a boat or caused a scene. She wanted everyone to be friends, so she'd agreed to the betrothal rather than fuss about it.

The preposterous decision had enraged Charlotte to such a degree that she'd disgraced them—and herself—by applying for the teaching post at Mrs. Pemberton's, then departing to work there. She'd sworn she'd never reside with them again, but with Lord Dartmouth refusing to offer even a tiny bit of assistance, she was out of options, and the reality of her predicament was too much to bear.

She was twenty-three years old. Her mother had been fetching and kind, her father affluent and prominent. Why was she having to struggle so hard just to get by? Why was the world so unfair? She'd always been a good person, a smart person, an honest and ethical person. Why was there no reward for decent behavior?

She was about to burst into tears, but she would never let Lord Dartmouth realize that she was dismayed. He was such a pompous prig that he'd be delighted to discover how completely he'd distressed her.

"Thank you for seeing me," she tightly fumed. "I won't say it was a pleasure because it wasn't."

"I'm not patient or cordial. Nor am I keen to involve myself in the difficulties of others."

"We don't have anywhere to go," she blurted out.

"I'm sorry, but that's not my problem to solve."

"Polly could be your daughter, niece, or cousin, yet you're kicking us out. Doesn't that bother you? We'll have to walk to Baywick, with the sun setting and no guarantee there's still a room at the coaching inn."

"Is that your brash way of asking me to pay for your lodging?"

She scoffed. "I can pay for our lodging."

Despite her remark, he reached in a drawer, pulled out a cloth pouch, and dropped some coins on the desk for her to grab. She was in such a pathetic state that she nearly snatched them up, but she had some pride remaining. Not much, but some.

"Now that I've met you," she said, "I'd camp in a ditch before I'd accept your help. If you were the last man on Earth, I wouldn't leave Polly with you."

She stood and stomped out. Behind her, he snickered with amusement, as if she was funny, as if he regularly insulted women and found it to be humorous.

She wondered if he was truly a bachelor. She hadn't noticed a wedding ring, but if he was wed, she pitied his poor wife. There was probably a valid reason why he was on holiday alone. What sane female would spend time with him if she didn't have to?

She stepped into the hall and the footman was there, most likely having listened to the entire, humiliating exchange. She stormed by him and out to the foyer. Polly was awake and anxiously watching for her. Charlotte's expression must have appeared thunderous, for Polly said, "I guess we shouldn't have come."

"No, we shouldn't have come."

Polly sighed. "I can't decide if I'm glad or sad."

"You should be very glad. You wouldn't want to be trapped here. Let's go. If we hurry, we might make it for supper at the coaching inn."

"I'm starving."

"So am I."

The footman whipped the door open, as Charlotte retrieved her cloak and bonnet from the chair, but she didn't delay to put them on. She was that eager to flee. They picked up their satchels, the blisters on her palm howling in pain, then they marched out.

She didn't glance back and neither did Polly. There was nothing to see anyway, so why look?