Everand Logo

Welcome to Everand!

  • Discover millions of ebooks, audiobooks, and so much more with a free trial

    Only $11.99/month after trial. Cancel anytime.

    The Purloined Heart
    The Purloined Heart
    The Purloined Heart
    Ebook289 pages5 hours

    The Purloined Heart

    By Maggie MacKeever

    4/5

    ()

    Read preview

    About this ebook

    Widowed Maddie Tate and handsome Angel Jarrow. In the ordinary course of events, their paths might never cross. But then comes the Burlington House bal masque, when Maddie witnesses something she should not, and flees straight into Angel s arms. And he discovers that he does not want to let her go. Mysterious masqueraders, misbehaving monarchs, and political perfidy in Regency England. 2nd of Tyburn trilogy. Regency Romantic Suspense by Maggie MacKeever; originally published by Vintage Ink Press
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherBelgrave House
    Release dateJul 15, 2013
    ISBN9781610847964
    The Purloined Heart

    Read more from Maggie Mac Keever

    Related to The Purloined Heart

    Titles in the series (2)

    View More
    View More

    Related ebooks

    Historical Fiction For You

    View More
    View More

    Related podcast episodes

    Related articles

    • Article

      Where The Walls Have Ears

      May 22, 2020

      Where The Walls Have Ears
      8 min read

    • Article

      The Coming Out

      May 11, 2020

      The Coming Out
      6 min read

    • Article

      Love will WIN

      Sep 6, 2023

      Love will WIN
      9 min read

    • Article

      A Nest Of VIPERS

      Jan 25, 2023

      A Nest Of VIPERS
      9 min read

    • Article

      Beau Brummell

      Nov 6, 2020

      Beau Brummell
      5 min read

    • Article

      Elsi, The Strange Maid

      Aug 29, 2018

      Elsi, The Strange Maid
      17 min read

    • Article

      Men Behaving Badly

      Jul 6, 2018

      Men Behaving Badly
      5 min read

    • Article

      THE MISCHIEF & THE MAJESTY

      Jun 19, 2019

      THE MISCHIEF & THE MAJESTY
      6 min read

    • Article

      Regency Romance

      Jun 12, 2022

      With the success of the TV show Bridgerton, it was inevitable that copycat Regency romances would follow. For those who find them insipid and silly, this won’t be the greatest news, but I adored the Georgette Heyer books (she was the queen of the Reg

      1 min read

    • Article

      Echoes

      Jul 13, 2022

      Echoes
      9 min read

    • Article

      Marking 21 Busy Years In ‘The Firm’ The Countess Of Wessex Reflects On Royal Titles, Family Fun And Giving Her Children A ‘Normal’ Life

      Jun 15, 2020

      She has been a member of the royal family for 21 years this month, but the Countess of Wessex says her children Lady Louise Windsor, 16, and Viscount Severn, 12, are “highly unlikely” to ever use their HRH titles. “We try to bring them up with the un

      2 min read

    • Article

      Frost FAIR

      Jan 18, 2023

      Frost FAIR
      11 min read

    • Article

      The Only Rule

      Jul 13, 2020

      There is only one rule in polite English society, but it is iron clad. Of course, polite English society is a fiction. For one thing, its members are rarely polite. Politeness is for the middle classes rather than those who live off ancestral acres o

      5 min read

    • Article

      Magnets: Carried through time, lovers seek their purpose.

      Feb 6, 2014

      Moon Colony B, 2213 Former Ponzi-schemer Mary Pillar digs through a trashcan. It smells like rotten eggs and milk. She is elderly and homeless, living in an alley between two eco-efficient skyscrapers. Dust particles dance around her. She has lost ev

      11 min read

    • Article

      ‘My Life With Princess Diana’

      Sep 11, 2023

      ‘My Life With Princess Diana’
      3 min read

    • Article

      Stranger Than Fiction

      Apr 12, 2024

      Stranger Than Fiction
      5 min read

    • Article

      Mrs Simpson Learns A Lesson

      Jul 29, 2021

      Mrs Simpson Learns A Lesson
      4 min read

    • Article

      The Bold And The Beautiful

      Oct 12, 2018

      The Bold And The Beautiful
      7 min read

    • Article

      ABATH For All SEASONS

      Jul 4, 2019

      ABATH For All SEASONS
      7 min read

    • Article

      Up and AWAY

      Jan 26, 2022

      Up and AWAY
      3 min read

    • Article

      Venetian Find

      Mar 6, 2024

      Love from Venice: A Golden Summer on the Grand Canal By Gill Johnson Hodder & Stoughton, £25 Every now and again, a dream-like book slips on to the shelves, having battled its way past a politburo of marketing executives with their spreadsheets. Such

      3 min read

    • Article

      The Governess

      Dec 27, 2020

      The Governess
      10 min read

    • Article

      The Governess

      Dec 30, 2020

      The Governess
      10 min read

    • Article

      Liar, Liar

      Apr 4, 2021

      Liar, Liar
      7 min read

    Related categories

    Reviews for The Purloined Heart

    4/5

    1 rating0 reviews

    What did you think?

    Tap to rate

    Review must be at least 10 words

      Book preview

      The Purloined Heart - Maggie MacKeever

      Heart

      Maggie MacKeever

      Chapter One

      And, after all, what is a lie?

      ‘Tis but the truth in masquerade. 

      —George Gordon, Lord Byron

      I don’t think, said Viscount Ashcroft, this is a good idea.

       So you’ve told me several times, retorted the young woman strolling by his side. Perhaps you think I have gone deaf?

      If that don’t beat all, Tony muttered, much struck by this ingratitude; had he not put aside his own plans, against his better judgment, to escort her to this masquerade ball being held by members of Watier’s Club to celebrate the long-awaited peace between Great Britain and France, only to discover the surroundings most unsuitable for a respectable female due to the presence of demi-reps? Tony might not be in the habit of hobnobbing with the muslin company but he recognized the breed and if that wasn’t Harriette Wilson standing over there he’d eat his hat, not that he was wearing a hat, being dressed as a medieval monk in a dreary full-length hooded robe, a cross hanging from his neck and a cord around his waist, when he’d wanted to come as Sinbad the Sailor, sporting a hooped earring and a cutlass and tall leather boots, a parrot perched on his shoulder demanding pieces of eight—

      He paused, having lost his train of thought. At any rate, if he had to be here at least his companion might have left the matter of her costume up to him, in which case she wouldn’t have been one of several nigh-identical Dianas, and so he informed her.

      "But I don’t want to draw attention, she protested. And the costume was at hand. You’re cross because you were persuaded to come as a monk, and Caro Lamb mistook you for Lord Byron, and made a cake of herself. Try for a little patience, Tony. We needn’t stay much longer now."

      How do you define ‘not much longer’? inquired the viscount, who had already endured several country dances and a gavotte. Ten more minutes? Two more hours? Tell you what, I’m going in to supper. You do as you please. He plunged into the noisy throng, which was immense and colorful as well, everyone having been required to come in costume except the club members, who wore blue dominoes. The doors to the supper rooms had been flung open to accommodate two thousand gay, glittering, and half-tipsy guests.

      Maddie sighed. She had grown fond of Tony since they joined in a conspiracy to mislead his mama and her papa by pretending an inclination toward matrimony neither of them felt; and regretted having made him cross.

      She wasn’t hungry. Maddie snatched a glass of iced champagne from a passing servant’s tray — her sixth of the evening, Tony could have pointed out — and made her way in the opposite direction, savoring this rare opportunity to speak to whomever she chose, say whatever she pleased, without being scolded for it afterward. Maddie didn’t care for being scolded, or receiving disappointed glances, or any of the various unpleasantnesses that now made up her days.

      A corpulent Elizabethan courtier bumped into her. Maddie caught his arm before he could pitch forward on his nose. Thank’ee, he said, as he righted himself. Demned if you ain’t a sweet piece. That is— He winked a bloodshot eye. Could a man but feast upon your beauty, he’d have no need for mortal food.

      Beauty, was it? Maddie pointed him at the supper rooms and gave him a push. You need spectacles, sir.

      Damn me. Spectacles, the courtier muttered, as he staggered away. Aware that she was being foolish, Maddie peeked in a pier glass.

      Alas, no transformation had taken place. Even costumed in a chiton that clung to her body, girded at breast and waist and leaving one arm bare; even wearing a blonde wig dressed in a classical manner and sandals laced up around her calves, a bow slung over her shoulder and a quiver filled with golden arrows and no gloves whatsoever because Tony had forbade them, she looked what she was: an ordinary female of seven-and-twenty years, with a plumpish figure, a roundish face made no more exotic by the half mask she wore.

      She moved away from the glass. Odd encounters were to be expected, Maddie told herself, when a female wandered off alone. She strolled through the grand silk-lined rooms, lavish with elegant furnishings and crammed with costumed figures, listening to snippets of conversation as she passed her fellow guests. Byron! sniffed a Marie Antoinette in hoop skirts and panniers, ruffles and lace; All that brooding and posturing and pouring vinegar over his potatoes. Someone should give the man a good shake. Two Roman senators were placing odds on whether the Prince Regent’s efforts to exclude the Princess of Wales from the festivities were destined for success. Several dashing officers of the 19th Light Dragoons were defaming a female of their acquaintance whose affair with the local apothecary had resulted in a not-so-secret abortion, which her husband hadn’t yet found out.

      One officer eyed Maddie, thereby proving that even the most unremarkable female was worthy of attention when she went out in public wearing less than her chemise. Maddie averted her gaze and asked a footman for directions to the ladies’ withdrawing room.

      The chamber was light and airy, with papered walls, a central fireplace, and crimson-upholstered furniture. A matron dressed in flowing Greek draperies perched on one of the sofas while a harried-looking maidservant pinned up her torn hem. He kept a mistress from the moment of his marriage, confided the matron to her young companion, an Austrian peasant girl; as any fool might have foreseen. The shepherdess expressed greater interest in the recent elopement of a certain earl. Leaving the ladies to their gossip, Maddie placed her empty champagne glass on a table and went out into the hall. From the public rooms drifted distant laughter, and music, and conversation. She hoped Tony was enjoying his meal.

      If the viscount had the right of it, barques of frailty numbered among the guests. Had the Greek matron been a courtesan? The peasant girl? Maddie doubted she would recognize a high flyer if one leapt up and bit her on the nose.

      A slender hand plucked at her quiver. Maddie paused. The hand belonged to a youthful Henry VIII wearing black satin knee-breeches, fur-trimmed metallic brocade coat, purple tunic, full face mask and a velvet hat. ‘Many arrows, loosèd several ways, fly to one mark’, quoted His Majesty, sounding less like a monarch than a pubescent boy.

      Maddie knew her Shakespeare, Henry V, to be precise. She did not know why Henry should quote Shakespeare at her. Still, this was a gala, where people were imbibing more than they should, herself among them, and so she joined in the spirit of the thing. ‘As many ways meet in one town; as many fresh streams meet in one salt sea—’

        ‘So many a thousand actions, once afoot, end in one purpose’. Henry draped an arm around her shoulder. He stood mere inches taller than she.

      His Majesty stank of stale perfume. You mustn’t let me keep you from your royal duties, sire.

      ‘Every subject’s duty is the king’s. But every subject’s soul is his own’. Henry detached himself and moved on along the hall.

      Maddie adjusted her quiver, which His Majesty had knocked askew. She suspected young Henry had been drinking something stronger than champagne.

      Why had he been lurking outside the ladies’ withdrawing room?

      She knew she shouldn’t follow. Probably she wouldn’t have followed, save for those six glasses of champagne. But Maddie was having an adventure, she reminded herself; and though she had reservations about the business, she’d not soon be granted another opportunity to behave as badly as she wanted with no one to say her nay.

      The distant sounds of revelry faded altogether as she trailed the furtive monarch into the more private recesses of the house; along a hallway lacking footmen, which was passing strange when one considered the plentitude of footmen elsewhere, including the ballroom, where they stood every few feet against the wall, fluttering large fans.

      The dim corridor stretched before her. Several candles had flickered out. Maddie slipped back into the shadows each time His Majesty glanced behind him, half-expecting someone to seize her by the scruff of the neck and demand she explain her presence in this part of the house.

      Henry reached the hallway’s end, halted in front of a closed door. Maddie ducked down beside an elegant commode.

      A silent moment passed. She peered around the commode’s curved side. Henry knocked once, again, and entered the room.

      The door clicked shut behind him. Maddie crept across the carpet, her pulse pounding in her throat.

      She bent to peer through the keyhole. Her bow and quiver slid sideways, pulling her off balance. Steadying herself with one hand on the doorknob and the other on the jamb, she peered into the room.

      Henry stood in the middle of the chamber, arms folded across his chest. Looming over him was an Egyptian pharaoh clad in sandals, a kilt that hung from waist to knee, and a golden bird mask. A blue and yellow striped headcloth was secured around his forehead by a golden asp with head reared back to strike. In one hand he held a scepter resembling a small shepherd’s crook.

      The men were arguing. Maddie couldn’t make out their words. Something to do with being slave to an unamiable woman, and political necessity. Henry presented the pharaoh with his back and started toward the door. The pharaoh raised his scepter and brought it down on Henry’s skull.

      Maddie’s fingers tightened on the knob. The door swung open and she stumbled into the room. Henry lay crumpled on the floor in an expanding pool of bright red blood.

      Chapter Two

      His own enjoyment, or his own ease, was in every particular, his ruling principle. 

      —Jane Austen

      Angelo Basile Jarrow — known to the world as ‘Angel’, or alternately, ‘that devil’, the latter sentiment often expressed by his estranged wife — strolled through the supper rooms, where excellent wines flowed in abundance while rare delicacies, both in and out of season, were being served. The members of Watier’s Club mingled with the guests, pausing behind this chair and that. The club’s perennial president, George Brummell, sat teasing a lady wearing a wax mask, declaring he would not leave her side until he saw her face.

      Angel might have made an educated guess as to who hid behind that wax. It was in his nature to recognize the elegant turn of an ankle, the sweet slope of a shoulder, the flirtatious tilt of a head. He paused to speak with one of his friends, an event that would in the ordinary unmasked way of things have attracted no little feminine attention, the pair of them being the town’s most notorious flirts. Where Lord Saxe was dark and diabolic and devilish handsome, Angel was temptation incarnate, with the face and form of an Adonis (his wife said, Narcissus), sun-kissed skin and gleaming fair hair. Even his hazel eyes were flecked with gold. The more moonstruck among his admirers claimed the day became a little brighter when Angel appeared, as if he drew the light to him and reflected it back again.

      Lord Saxe wore a domino of rich blue Gros de Naples. Angel, who was lazy, spoiled, and indolent, and not inclined toward effort, had permitted his valet to dress him as one of Charles II’s merry cavaliers in brocade and velvet and lace, square-toed high-heeled shoes and a broad-brimmed hat with luxurious ostrich plumes. He carried a walking stick adorned with bright ribbons, a snuffbox and an embroidered handkerchief; sported a smallsword of Toledo steel at his hip, and a nice diamond bob in one ear. His hair had been powdered a delicate pale blue.

      Lord Saxe had had a trying time of it recently, during what he called the Allied Invasion, which followed the cessation of the long hostilities with the French. He was still having a trying time, even after the departure of various foreign princes and potentates. We are to celebrate the centenary of the House of Hanover in grand style, he informed Mr. Jarrow. With temples, taverns, pagodas and bridges in the royal parks, and a mock naval battle on the Serpentine.

      And drinking booths, added Angel. There must be drinking booths, Kane.

      The baron scowled. Are you never serious?

      "The day will come, I know it will — I am eight-and-thirty and have one foot already halfway in the grave — when my entertainments are restricted to giving long and boring speeches in the House. Angel rearranged his priceless lace. There will be time enough to be serious then."

      Time, the devourer of all things, murmured Lord Saxe.

      I shall skulk about the old manse in my nightshirt, Angel added. Stealing kisses from housemaids.

      The baron’s lips twitched. Angel was pleased. Rumor claimed Kane had suffered a recent romantic disappointment. Difficult to credit, but there it was. A man chased one too many times after Aphrodite’s golden apples, tripped, and tumbled head over heels.

      Such were the risks one took when embarking upon any game of chance. Angel enjoyed games of chance. Such was his luck that he almost always won.

      He saw a gypsy girl approaching. She possessed a well-turned pair of ankles, as he recalled. Leaving the ankles and their owner to the baron, Angel departed the supper rooms. Tonight’s event, for all that highborn ladies were fraternizing with courtesans in an unprecedented manner, was turning out to be a dull affair.

      At least Isabella wasn’t present. Angel’s wife made it her practice to avoid being caught under the same roof. He ventured deeper into the house, currently owned by Lord George Cavendish. Pope had visited this old pile, and Swift; Handel dwelt here three years as an honored guest. Mere weeks past, the Allied Sovereigns had been feted in tents and temporary rooms erected in the gardens, at a cost of £10,000.

      In those same gardens, the marbles brought by Lord Elgin from Athens were decaying in a coal shed. As Angel was pondering the problem posed the gardens’ owner by rubbish tossed over the walls, a female dressed as the goddess Diana raced around a corner and smacked into him.

      His first impression was that the lady made a pleasant armful; his second that he didn’t think he knew her, though in that costume it was difficult to tell. Young, but not too young, he decided; she hadn’t the feel of an untried miss. Her skin (a fair amount of it exposed by her costume) was pale and smooth. He sniffed. She smelled of—

      Peppermint?

      The lady had been running. Her bosom heaved as she gasped for breath, hissed, Let me go!

      Angel appreciated a heaving bosom. He pulled Diana through a nearby doorway. She ceased struggling to survey the huge chamber, which contained a fireplace and a bay and walls lined with book-filled shelves.

      Meantime, Angel surveyed her. He was a connoisseur of females, after all. This particular female wasn’t overly tall, or overly short, and — especially in the bosom area — generously formed. Her mask hid the upper portion of her face so well he was unable to determine whether her eyebrows arched or marched or stuttered, if her nose was a girlish button or a frigate’s bold prow. Her earlobes were delicate, he noted; her neck elegant; her jaw and chin line firm. Impossible to tell the color of her hair under that atrocious wig, but her eyes were a honey brown, her mouth neither sensually suggestive nor prettily pouting but almost prim.

      Ah. Did he glimpse a quiver? Indicative of some strong emotion? Perhaps, even, fear?

      She should have been afraid, in light of his reputation. Angel let her go. Where are we? she asked, rubbing her wrist.

      Ordinary? He had thought the lady ordinary? There was nothing in the least bit ordinary about the glorious golden voice that curled his jaded toes. We have strayed a considerable distance from the festivities. Across the room is the west door, which will take you back to the grand staircase.

      Came a sound from the hallway, as if distant doors opened and closed. Kiss me! Diana demanded, and flung her arms around his neck.

      Angel had long since passed the stage of kissing every female who asked him. Females, ladylike and not, were forever putting themselves in his path, and if once he had done his best to oblige them all, he was more discerning in these his later years. Still, he found it difficult to resist that voice. Not to mention the warm body fitted so snugly against his. Angel let his walking stick fall to the floor and slid his arm around her waist.

      He had no sooner touched his lips to hers than the hallway door crashed open. Angel raised his head. An Egyptian pharaoh stood on the threshold.

      The pharaoh stepped into the room. I am searching for Diana. It would seem that I have had some success.

      Angel felt her body stiffen. Find yourself another. This Diana is with me. He dropped one hand to the hilt of his smallsword.

      The golden mask turned toward him. Time stretched out interminably before the pharaoh spoke again. I have interrupted. My apologies. The door closed behind him. Diana let out her breath.

      Angel loosened her grip on his sleeve. I shan’t plague you with questions. A lady has the right to change her mind. You mustn’t clutch me quite so hard. My valet will fall into hysterics if you tear this lace. Much better! No, no, you must not leave me. The pharaoh may return. Now where were we? Ah, yes. ‘Queen and huntress, chaste and fair. Thou that mak’st a day of night. . .’ He raised her fingers to his lips.

      She snatched her hand away. You, sir, have had too much to drink.

      He smiled at her. Have I? It seemed the perfect amount.

      The young woman blinked. Angel’s smile often had that effect, drawing as it did attention to the most kissable — and undoubtedly most kissed — mouth in London. "Are you flirting with me, sir?"

       I believe I must be. Do you mind?

       I daresay I wouldn’t. But you might. I’m not the sort of female—

      Nonsense. In Angel’s considerable experience, under the proper circumstances, every female was. You are attending a masquerade. None of us are ourselves tonight. And I owe you a proper kiss. No, don’t argue! I have a reputation to uphold.

      She opened her mouth as if to protest. Angel swooped, launching a sensual assault with lips and tongue.

      He was expert at kissing. With so much practice, how could he not have been? He drew back to salute the corner of Diana’s mouth, brushed his lips across hers, once and then again; teased and tormented and tantalized with nips and nibbles and caresses, earlobe to breast, throat to chin, until she vibrated like a plucked harp string.

      The masks were deuced awkward. Angel reached to untie hers. No, she murmured, and drew his mouth back to hers.

      Very well, the mask could stay. Her armament, however, was damnably in the way.

      Angel divested Diana of her quiver. She tossed aside his plumed hat, grasped his shoulders, rose up on her tip-toes and kissed him as if nothing else mattered in the world.

      Moments passed — how many, Angel could not be certain; he had been distracted by a hot sharp stab of desire. He became aware of his surroundings only when Diana placed her hands against her hands against his chest and shoved.

      Reluctantly, he released her. ‘Lay thy bow of pearl apart, and thy crystal-shining quiver. . .’

      She backed away from him. Do you recall what happened to Acteon, sir?

      Acteon? Who the devil was Acteon? Something to do with stags, thought Angel, but could not remember what. As he was wrestling with his memory, Diana snatched up her bow and quiver and slipped out the west door.

      Angel retrieved his various belongings from the floor where he had dropped them, readjusted his wig and mask.

      What an extraordinary female.

      He was almost tempted to try and find out her name.

      Chapter Three

      And yet a little tumult, now and then,

      is an agreeable quickener of sensation;

      such as a revolution, a battle, or an adventure of any lively description. 

      —Lord Byron

      Maddie glanced at her reflection. The dark circles beneath her eyes matched the grey stripes in her gown, result of a sleepless night spent trying to convince herself that her imagination had run riot as result of overindulgence in spontaneity and sparkling wine. Gingerly, due to the headache throbbing at the base of her skull, she opened the door into the hall.

      It was Maddie’s custom of

      Enjoying the preview?
      Page 1 of 1