Page 59 of Regency in Color

One Night Only

Elise Marion

Thalia Ramsey has resigned herself to a quiet life running a respectable book shop in London’s West End. Nothing exciting ever happens in her world…until Stephen Dryden, His Grace the Duke of Westerfield, begins patronizing her establishment. Her girlish infatuation is completely ridiculous, and nothing will ever come of it. Yet, a heart’s hope is not so easily broken, especially when a chance encounter during a Vauxhall Gardens masquerade brings Thalia face-to-face with the duke.

A night of passionate romance is more than she could have hoped for, but once the night is over, will there be a chance for more?

Chapter One

London, 1817

Thalia squinted through the dust mites floating on the brightly-lit air, raising up on tiptoe to reach the shelf nearly a foot over her head. The step-stool adding a few inches to her height wobbled, making her heart lurch into her throat. She tightened one hand around the heavy book waiting to be shelved, and the other on the edge of a shelf, regaining her precarious balance.

Where was her assistant when she needed him? Joseph Hyde stood an impressive five feet and ten inches, and could reach every shelf without trouble. Thalia could shelve and procure books with her stool, but only with a great deal of effort for the top shelves—something she wasn’t forced to do when Joseph was about. With a decidedly un-ladylike grunt, she heaved the book onto the shelf, one leg kicking out like a ballerina as she gave it a little shove, wedging it between two others.

Thalia’s grin of satisfaction lasted until she tried to step down, her foot catching in the hem of her skirts. Arms wheeling, Thalia went backward with a startled yelp, her back hitting the shelves opposite before she slumped in a graceless heap on the floor.

“Bloody hell,” she muttered, swiping a dark, loose coil of hair out of her eyes.

“Tsk, tsk, Miss Ramsey,” chided a deep, masculine voice from the top of the aisle.

Humiliation heated Thalia’s face as she glanced up to discover the last person she would have wanted to catch her in such a position. His Grace Stephen Dryden, Duke of Westerfield, stood before her, an amused grin curving the corners of his sumptuous mouth. Thalia’s ribs constricted around her lungs, robbing her of breath at the sight of one of her most dedicated customers. As well, he was the one man who made her heart flutter madly in her chest and her stomach turn wild somersaults.

The duke was immaculately dressed, a bottle-green coat and stark white cravat accentuating the burnished bronze hue of his skin—which he had inherited from an Indian mother. His hair was as black as pitch, gleaming in the sunlight filtering through the large front windows. At first glance his eyes appeared just as black, but when one stood close enough, shades of amber and cognac could be found within the prisms of soft brown eyes fringed by heavy, sooty lashes. Not that Thalia had been close to the man very often. There had only been the one time—as she’d opened a particular book to display the lovely frontispiece—only for His Grace to lean in to study it. The light had touched his eyes in the exact right spot to display the variegated hues, and the circulating spring air coming through the open door had sent the scents of sandalwood and bergamot up her nostrils.

There was no spring breeze today, and her door was closed against the humidity of a summer afternoon. Adding insult to injury, she was heaped on the floor like a rag doll, her skirts hiked up to bare her calves. One of her slippers had fallen off and her fichu was knocked askew, displaying far more skin than was appropriate.

“Your Grace!” Thalia exclaimed, pushing down her skirts and righting her fichu—both of which seemed of more importance than her foul language or her position on the floor. “I beg your pardon, I … took a little tumble, but …”

Her stammering trailed off as Westerfield approached, crouching along the way to retrieve her slipper. “Think nothing of it, Miss Ramsey. Are you hurt?”

Thalia’s tongue refused to move, her mouth gaping like that of a fish out of water as she stared at the duke, experiencing the heady fragrance of him—both woodsy and citrusy at once. “N-No,” she managed. “Only my pride has been injured.”

The duke chuckled, gently retrieving her foot and replacing her slipper. Thalia’s skin came alive with gooseflesh and shivers, and a dozen other sensations she could not name. All too soon, his hand was gone, leaving her bereft.

“Well, thank goodness no one was here to witness it,” he murmured.

“Except you,” she pointed out as he offered her a hand up.

“Except for me,” he agreed. “And I swear upon my honor that I will never breathe a word to anyone.”

As if anyone who ran in the same lofty circles as a duke would care about a nobody bookshop owner who had fallen off a stool. Yet, there was no teasing in Westerfield’s voice or on his face—only an earnestness she found as charming as his smiles.

Clearing her throat, Thalia smoothed both hands over her skirts and then adjusted her spectacles. “I had not expected to see you today,” she remarked, while resuming her place behind the polished oak counter.

Instead of moving on to peruse the shelves, the duke followed, casually leaning against the edge of the counter. “Really? Why is that?”

Thalia busied herself tidying her surroundings—even though the remaining books to be shelved were already efficiently sorted and stacked. She needed to do something with her hands to keep from making a cake of herself. “The Vauxhall masquerade is tonight. I would have thought you’d be too busy preparing for it to visit today.”

“It is Saturday, is it not?” he said, shrugging one shoulder. “Besides, there is very little for a man to do in preparation for a masquerade. At least, in comparison to the efforts of a lady.”

“Especially when said man is a duke with a valet at his disposal,” Thalia said.

Westerfield laughed, and the sound warmed Thalia’s belly. “Miss Ramsey, are you teasing me?”

Her throat clenched as she realized she might have gone too far, even given their cordial and amiable acquaintance. The man visited her shop every Saturday and was always friendly. But he was still a duke, which placed him so far above her in the social hierarchy that he might as well live in the clouds.

“I beg your pardon, Your Grace,” she mumbled, lowering her eyes.