‘You are possibly the loveliest woman I ever beheld and any man can dream of until he drives himself nigh mad with longing.’

      There was something very serious in his steady look that made Persephone’s heart thump heavily and then race on.

      ‘Did you do that when you were held and tortured, Alex?’ she asked painfully, somehow unable to halt the question on her lips.

      ‘Not then,’ he said, with a shake of his head that spoke of honesty and regret. ‘Don’t forget you were a very cross little schoolgirl when I left for the army, Persephone. I dreamt of someone very like you are now—a someone who could reach inside my tortured heart and join her clean, bright soul to my bitter one. I was getting ready to dream of you and only you every night from the moment I finally did lay eyes on you as a grown-up goddess. I’ve got so into the way of it now that I don’t think even your displeasure will stop me.’

      ‘Maybe I don’t want to stop you,’ she murmured, and suddenly found it impossible to meet his gaze full-on without a host of huge possibilities humming between them like warm lightning.

      About the Author

      ELIZABETH BEACON lives in the beautiful English West Country, and is finally putting her insatiable curiosity about the past to good use. Over the years Elizabeth has worked in her family’s horticultural business, become a mature student, qualified as an English teacher, worked as a secretary and, briefly, tried to be a civil servant. She is now happily ensconced behind her computer, when not trying to exhaust her bouncy rescue dog with as many walks as the Inexhaustible Lurcher can finagle. Elizabeth can’t bring herself to call researching the wonderfully diverse, scandalous Regency period and creating charismatic heroes and feisty heroines work, and she is waiting for someone to find out how much fun she is having and tell her to stop it.

       Previous novels by the same author:

      AN INNOCENT COURTESAN

      HOUSEMAID HEIRESS A LESS THAN PERFECT LADY CAPTAIN LANGTHORNE’S PROPOSAL REBELLIOUS RAKE, INNOCENT GOVERNESS THE RAKE OF HOLLOWHURST CASTLE ONE FINAL SEASON (part of Courtship & Candlelight) A MOST UNLADYLIKE ADVENTURE GOVERNESS UNDER THE MISTLETOE (part of Candlelit Christmas Kisses) THE DUCHESS HUNT

      THE SCARRED EARL

      features characters you will have met in THE DUCHESS HUNT

       Did you know that some of these novels are also available as eBooks? Visit www.millsandboon.co.uk

       AUTHOR NOTE

      I fell for the scarred and reclusive Earl of Calvercombe the moment he walked into THE DUCHESS HUNT, the first book in my Seaborne trilogy, one dark night. He seemed an ideal hero for a spirited Seaborne lady, and I hope you enjoy Alex and Persephone’s story whether you read the first book in the series or not.

      Rich Seaborne’s story is coming soon, and I hope his family forgive him for all the trouble he’s caused them!

      The Scarred Earl

      Elizabeth Beacon

      

       www.millsandboon.co.uk

      I would like to dedicate this book to my lovely editors past and present: Maddie West, Lucy Gilmour and Megan Haslam—without their hard work, humour and patience all my books would be very much poorer.

       Chapter One

      ‘Your turn next then,’ the Dowager Duchess of Dettingham told her eldest granddaughter with a smug nod at the posy of late China rosebuds the bride had thrown into Persephone Seaborne’s hands before driving off with her besotted bridegroom.

      Suddenly Persephone wouldn’t have been surprised to look down and find it made up of thistles and stinging nettles instead of cosseted late blooms, and almost dropped the lovely thing in the dust. Jessica’s purposefully accurate throw showed what a schemer her best friend had become since she had fallen in love with Jack Seaborne, Duke of Dettingham, and she wondered at herself for catching it more by reflex than desire to be the next one to marry as tradition demanded. Wondering who her grandmother expected her to marry this time, she coolly returned the Dowager’s gimlet-eyed stare and silently fumed about matchmakers of all ages and abilities.

      ‘Please don’t plague the girl about such things on my daughter’s special day, your Grace,’ Lady Pendle, mother of the bride, intervened. Her youngest daughter had just married Persephone’s cousin Jack, Duke of Dettingham, yet she found time to rescue Persephone from her domineering relative, and she was truly grateful.

      ‘Anyway, I think Miss Brittles and Sir John will walk up the aisle long before I do. I see all the classic signs of mutual enchantment,’ Persephone mused aloud.

      She marvelled that a couple so very different from Jessica and Jack could wear the same smitten look whenever they set eyes on each other as the happy couple had been modelling for weeks. Sir John and his lady love seemed to manage to find their mark remarkably often among the large group of aristocrats and friends invited to the wedding of the year, let alone the Season, as well. Realising too late she’d placed them in the Duchess’s sights by doing her thinking out loud, she sincerely wished she’d held her tongue in the terrible old lady’s presence.

      ‘Hah, that pair are far too old to go about smelling of April and May in such a ridiculous fashion,’ the Dowager snapped with a fierce frown in their direction.

      Miss Brittles took an involuntary step backwards and Sir John Coulter glowered back with compounded interest. Sensing more interesting prey than her stubborn granddaughter, the Dowager forgot her reluctant companions, so Persephone and Lady Pendle cravenly slipped into the crowd of guests milling about the famous gardens and made good their escape.

      ‘Sir John seems very well equipped to fight his own battles,’ Lady Pendle muttered sheepishly.

      ‘And I’m sure Miss Brittles thinks him even more wonderful than usual for defending her from the dragon Duchess,’ Persephone replied.

      ‘So it’s probably not really chicken-hearted of us to leave her Grace having fun in her own peculiar manner,’ Lady Pendle agreed as she led Persephone to where her second-youngest daughter was standing with her doting husband, holding their baby son in her arms and taking in the finer nuances of a happy family occasion with her usual good-humoured intelligence.

      ‘Never mind, Persephone dear, her Grace can’t endure the countryside for more than a day or so and must be pining for the noise and stink of the city by now. Although making her grandchildren squirm is one of her favourite occupations, you do all seem to share a stubborn habit of going your own way. I can’t imagine anything more exasperating for the poor, dear Duchess than being saddled with such deeply ungrateful descendants as this latest generation of Seabornes, can you, my love?’ Rowena, Lady Tremayne, observed wickedly as she passed his son and heir to Sir Linstock instead of his hovering nurse, who seemed constantly surprised the child’s parents were unwilling to leave him to her until he was old enough to be seen and not heard. If that day ever came in the lively Tremayne household, which Persephone doubted.

      The dashing Baronet took his child from his lady with a rueful smile and a shrug that admitted the wild reputation he’d once worked so hard to earn was ruined, first by his uniquely fascinating wife and now the robust little son upon whom he clearly doted. There was a look of quiet contentment in his dark eyes Persephone had never thought she would see and Sir Linstock gently rocked his son as if he’d been practising to become a loving father for years. He had