Reputation is a fragile thing to put in a rake’s hands.

Lady Amelia Westfield has one goal: to fall in love with and marry a duke. But after a ruinous encounter with Lord Nicholas Drake—notorious, ruthless, and infuriatingly handsome—she is forced into a dangerous bargain. In exchange for his silence, she must help him steer his brother, the future Duke of Lancaster, away from a fortune-hunter and toward Amelia herself.

It should be a simple transaction. Amelia gets the duke she’s always wanted. Nicholas protects his family. But the more Nicholas pushes Amelia toward his brother, the more he comes to covet her for himself.

She won’t settle for less than love. And Nicholas Drake—a man for whom love has always been denied—may be the one person incapable of giving it to her.

Amelia froze in the darkness. This was not what she had expected when she had opened the near-invisible door in the side of the extravagant drawing room, hunting for an escape.

Warm hands came to her waist. “Well, dove, what do we have here?” a voice purred.

Behind her, through the door, Amelia heard the unmistakably drunken footfalls of the man who had been pursuing her. Her attempts to find an earl had proven disastrous.

Well, that wasn’t quite right—she had found an earl. She just wished she hadn’t.

“Be quiet,” she hissed at the strange man. Better the devil she didn’t know than the one she did.

That was the saying, wasn’t it?

In case he didn’t get the message, she took his hands from her waist and stepped away, keeping as much distance between them as she could. This was a particularly small hallway, and there was very little space between them.

Once Lord Davenport discovered she wasn’t in the room, he would hopefully leave. His level of inebriation presumably meant he wouldn’t see the door.

After all, he hadn’t managed to see where her back ended and her backside began.

If she’d had a better presence of mind, she would have stabbed him with her hairpin. Better still, set fire to the ridiculous sleeves of his tailcoat.

The stranger sharing her space leaned closer until she could smell the wine on his breath, and she wondered if she had made a terrible mistake in trapping herself with him. Almost certainly. His hand found her shoulder, then her neck, his fingers light and exploratory.

She searched for a hairpin that wouldn’t entirely dismantle her lovely curls.

“Would you like some help?” he murmured.

“From you?”

“Unless you are hiding someone else in this deplorably small space.”

She had no good answer to that. “Stop touching me.”

Breath curled around her ear as he leaned in. “It sounds as though the gentleman outside is looking for you.”

“Hence why I’m in here,” she hissed.

“I could get rid of him for you.”

“Not without revealing you are in here with me!” And if that happened, she would be essentially ruined. Her first Season, and she would be forced into marriage with whatever sort of gentleman concealed himself in servants’ corridors.

She had little hope he would be a duke.

“Ah,” the stranger whispered, and she felt him shift. “So you are a young lady of delicate reputation.”

“Who else did you think I would be?”

“Such young ladies do not often force themselves into dark spaces with strange men.”

“I would not have done so if I had known you were here,” she retorted under her breath.

“Lady Amelia,” Lord Davenport called, a little unsteady, his voice now close enough that she could hear him clearly. At the thought of how he had attempted to grope her behind a curtain, she shuddered.

“Lady Amelia, is it?” the stranger whispered. She felt his interest like a spark catching alight. “Could you be the illustrious Lady Amelia Westfield?”

Terrified Lord Davenport would catch them, she leaned up and pressed the palm against the man’s lips, muffling him. A puff of air against her hand betrayed his surprise, but to her horror, she felt his mouth curve into a slow smile under her palm. She pressed harder, willing him to remain silent.

“Where have you gone?” Lord Davenport’s voice dipped petulantly.

“Excuse me?” This voice was cold and authoritative, and Amelia froze in new fear. If Hugh found her here, she could kiss goodbye to her London Season and any hope she still had of finding her duke and falling in love, and—well, all of it.

The stranger seemed to sense her sudden distress; his smile dropped, and he tensed, as though waiting for a fight.

“Oh, ah—” Lord Davenport stumbled over his words. Amelia gritted her teeth. Not only was he a drunken idiot, but he was an incomprehensible drunken idiot. “Your Grace.”

The stranger’s head tilted. Amelia willed him to stay quiet, pressing against him a little more, holding her wrist so that her palm remained firm against his mouth. She would not let him ruin this for her.

“Did I hear you calling Amelia’s name?” Hugh demanded.

“N-No,” Lord Davenport slurred unconvincingly. “I was just—I fancied a sit down, you see.”

“Then perhaps you might return to the ball and sit down on one of the chairs there.”

Amelia closed her eyes. Good heavens, Hugh was angry.

“Yes, Your Grace.” A few stumbling footsteps later, and there was blessed silence again.

Amelia exhaled slowly. Her fingers felt too warm. All her extremities, actually, felt too hot, and it felt as though her limbs were filled with fizzing, unnatural energy that had nowhere to go. Her heart pounded.

Goodness, that had been close. For all she wanted to choose her own destiny, she had not wanted said destiny to be through a series of reactionary choices merely to preserve her own skin.

A few moments later, during which Amelia did nothing but listen for the sound of footsteps or proof that Hugh had indeed left, the stranger wrapped his hand around her wrist. With a gasp, she retracted her hand from his mouth; she had been so intent on listening for Hugh, she had forgotten what a compromising position they had been in.

“I think,” he drawled, “I may now be trusted to control myself.”

She snatched her hand back and cradled it against her chest, stumbling back. She had been pressing him against the wall, and he had been letting her.

She was mad. There could be no other alternative.

“Was that, by chance, your brother?” he asked, and although she could see nothing of his face, she could sense his sharp attention. “What do you suppose he might think if he found you in here with me?”

“Why, are you going to tell him?” Alarm made her voice near shrill. “You can’t!”

“Why not?”

“Because…” She had no good reason. He was right—well-bred women did not, typically, hide in darkened servants’ corridors with strange men. “Because that would be cruel when nothing untoward has happened.”

“Mm.” His hand came to her waist again, the warm weight of it spreading through her. Lord Davenport had attempted to touch her in such a way, but that had felt very, very different. This felt charged, somehow, as though lightning sparked beneath his palm. Her hand burned where his lips had pressed against it. “And what,” he murmured, “if I wanted something untoward to happen?”

She gasped, shoving back from him and stumbling out of the door. The drawing room was mercifully empty.

When she turned, she saw the shadow of a man unfold from the servants’ corridor, teeth gleaming as he smiled. “I see that would be unwelcome.”

“Who are you?” she demanded breathlessly, her heart thudding for reasons she could not fully articulate. Even now, he lingered in the darkness, allowing her to see only a line of him at a time—the curve of his mouth, one high cheekbone, the angled tilt of his jaw. From what she could see, he had an elegant face, but she saw it only in parts. “What gentleman would expect such things from a lady?”

“Tut tut, dove,” he said, clicking his tongue, that smile turning wicked. She saw enough of his expression to know that. “Who said I was a gentleman?”