Under a New Year's Enchantment

Under a New Year's Enchantment
Barbara Monajem

Hampshire, 1816Garrick, Lord Westerly, has forbidden the hanging of mistletoe, yet the holiday house party at his country estate sizzles with sensual desire. And though Theodora Southern decided long ago never to marry, she has been enjoying the erotic fantasies that haunt her each night—fantasies featuring her handsome, brooding host…Since returning from the war, Garrick has been in no mood to celebrate. But suddenly the nightmares that plague him are making way for much more pleasant dreams—dreams in which his childhood friend Theodora is very much a grown woman. The question is, has he fallen in love—or fallen under a wicked spell?

Hampshire, 1816

Garrick, Lord Westerly, has forbidden the hanging of mistletoe, yet the holiday house party at his country estate sizzles with sensual desire. And though Theodora Southern decided long ago never to marry, she has been enjoying the erotic fantasies that haunt her each night—fantasies featuring her handsome, brooding host….

Since returning from the war, Garrick has been in no mood to celebrate. But suddenly the nightmares that plague him are making way for much more pleasant dreams—dreams in which his childhood friend Theodora is very much a grown woman. The question is, has he fallen in love—or fallen under a wicked spell?

A Festive duet from Barbara Monajem

Wicked Christmas Wishes

Under a New Year’s

Enchantment

Barbara Monajem

www.millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk)

AUTHOR NOTE

When I was a child, our whole family stayed up late on New Year’s Eve, and at the stroke of midnight, we all went onto the front porch and banged pots and pans. While staying up late was in itself a real treat, getting to make a huge racket in the middle of the night was fabulous. I never questioned why. It was fun and therefore good.

It turns out we were driving away evil spirits, whether or not we knew it or believed in such things. I learned this while researching English Christmas customs, and since I enjoyed this event so much as a child, I put it in both stories of my current duet. In Under a Christmas Spell, the evil spirits are driven out of the house on New Year’s Eve, just as in my childhood. In Under a New Year’s Enchantment, the pots and pans (and a volley of gunfire) are part of the custom of wassailing the apple trees on Twelfth Night—giving thanks for the current crop and driving the evil spirits away so the trees will produce well again in the coming year. The tradition of wassailing the apple trees is still alive and well in parts of England today.

Dedication

Many thanks to Kathy Payne for discussing Roman hoards and ruins in Britain with me, and for directing me to websites where I spent a great deal of time puttering happily. What better friend than one who gives one cause to putter?

Contents

Under a New Year's Enchantment (#u31daa9a1-0341-5e4c-84fc-cb3432768dec)

Hampshire, January 1816

Thank God there’s no mistletoe. Theodora Southern swerved to avoid one of the rowdy guests at the New Year’s Eve celebration at Westerly House. She had had enough of the worst Christmas house party ever.

She glanced behind her, but Maynard Buxton, the bane of her existence, was doing his best to coax one of the serving maids into a corner for a kiss without the benefit of mistletoe. Garrick, Lord Westerly, whom she had known since childhood but seen rarely during the war years, had forbidden mistletoe this Christmas, except in the servants’ quarters. At first, Theodora had been dismayed—she’d hoped for a kiss from Garrick. But on the other hand, it meant less of having to be on one’s guard.

Or it should do, but something was most peculiar about this party. There was always some illicit behaviour at house parties, and this one was a fortnight long, making a few affaires unavoidable. But this year Westerly House seemed to sizzle with sensual desire.

Thank heavens the first wassail ritual, in which the villagers made a lot of noise and clamour to rid the great house of evil spirits, was over. The guests, high and low alike, mingled in the great hall. Ladling the wassail—hot, spiced ale—into the cups of the thirsty throng was Theodora’s responsibility, but when her friend Lucille had offered her some respite, Theodora had taken advantage of the opportunity to escape.

She hastened upstairs and down the passageway to her bedchamber. Judging by the grunts and moans from one of the rooms, some guests had already left the great hall and were once again indulging their baser instincts. “One would think this was a bawdy house,” she muttered. She was unwed and therefore a virgin, so she couldn’t risk indulging herself with an affaire. Usually, she didn’t even wish she could. She had a completely satisfying secret life—daydreams in which a handsome lover pleasured her in multiple ways. She had long ago decided she didn’t need a real flesh-and-blood man.

But something about Westerly House this Christmas made her feel as if she did.

Not Maynard Buxton, though.

At the moment, Theodora had better things to think about than lust. She grabbed a cloak from a hook in her bedchamber, slipped downstairs and through a corner of the great hall, and hurried down a deserted corridor. In the gun room, she found and lit a lantern. She pulled the hood of the cloak over her hair and set out through a side door into the cold night.

She crossed the meadow toward the abbey ruins, thankful for the chilly wind, which meant no one would venture outdoors. Ever since she’d learned that Garrick had discovered the remains of a Roman villa under the ruins, she’d been dying to take a look. A proper look, not a glance as one of a gaggle of young ladies whose only interest was in batting their eyelashes at his lordship. She’d thought about asking Garrick for a brief tour, but he’d been in a withdrawn, unfriendly mood since her arrival a week earlier. He’d spent much of his time alone in the ruins and hadn’t even tried to hide his annoyance when Lady Westerly had shepherded the ladies up to gawk at him. Very well, then! Since he had returned from the war a complete curmudgeon, Theodora would visit the ruins by herself.

She made her way through the overgrown sanctuary and across a strip of flagstones to the site of the old refectory. A pit the size of a small bedchamber, but only a few feet deep, yawned near the tumbledown stone walls. A makeshift canopy covered it to keep out the rain. She jumped into the pit and made her way carefully around the picks, shovels and trowels, past the brazier and a couple of chairs to where several pillars had been unearthed.

She squatted, aiming the beam of the lantern. She knew what the pillars were. She’d seen a drawing in one of Papa’s books. They were the remains of a hypocaust, which—

“What the devil are you doing here?” said a voice of pure rage.

Theodora started violently, dropping the lantern. It hit the ground with a clatter. The glass broke and the candle went out, plunging her into darkness. She uttered a mew of distress.

“It serves you right.” It was Lord Westerly speaking, she realized. “I don’t intend to wed you or any of the others, as I trust I’ve made plain by now.”

She stood, disbelieving, staring into the blackness. He thought she’d come out here to trap him!

“Even if I did, this sort of ploy wouldn’t work,” he said. “I won’t be forced into marriage.”

Mortification washed through her. As if she would! Much as she liked Garrick, she wasn’t one of those ninnies his aunts had invited in the hope that he would fall in love with them. She had come, as she did every year, to help out as a sort of secondary hostess. She’d known Garrick Westerly for years. She’d followed him about when she’d been ten years old to his fourteen. She’d been desperately in love with him at fifteen. She’d prayed for him when he was away at war, and she’d looked forward to seeing him again.

He wasn’t the same man. He had returned hard, bitter and frequently rude.

“Let this be a lesson to you, before you ruin all your chances,” Lord Westerly drawled. “Gentlemen use some rather unpleasant words to describe the sort of woman who chases a man. I assure you, nobody wants one of those as his wife.”

Shaking with anger now, Theodora made her way slowly away from his voice and toward the edge of the pit. It was all she could do not to shriek at him. I already did that, remember? I wouldn’t chase you now if you were the last man alive. Theodora’s half boot encountered a trowel. She muffled a curse and bent to pick it up. And I’ll certainly never use you as a daydream lover again.

She hurled the trowel in the direction from which his voice had come. It met something with a clang—fortunately not Garrick’s head, which wasn’t made of metal, although evidently he had returned from the war about as intelligent as a lump of lead.

“You disgust me,” she said. She picked up her skirts and stormed away without another word.

* * *

Garrick Westerly stared into the night. Dora? Damnation, what had he just done?

Her footsteps died away. The chilly breeze flapped the canopy overhead, and in the distance a fox yowled. He should go after her and explain. He set out in pursuit, but as he exited the far side of the ruins, the sound of voices stopped him short.

“Miss Southern?” asked a female in sharp, disapproving tones. “Whatever are you doing outdoors at this time of night?”

“It’s just as I told you, Mother.” That was the vain, redheaded Miss Concord, the most persistent of the female guests at this disaster of a house party. So far she had stalked him in the corridors day and night and even hidden in his bed in the hope of trapping him into marriage. He’d managed to get rid of her each time, but it had been a close-run thing. “She followed Lord Westerly out here. She tried to steal him from me.”

“Don’t be ridiculous,” Theodora said. “I’m not the slightest bit interested in Lord Westerly.”

That stung. Theodora wasn’t one of the too-young ladies assembled to tempt Garrick into marriage, but he’d known her forever. He liked her, and she’d had a tendre for him long ago. The one woman Garrick cared about in the entire household, and look what he’d done. He couldn’t have blundered worse if he’d planned it in meticulous detail, copied it in triplicate and passed it to the most inept of his commanding officers for approval.

“Then why are you out here?” Mrs. Concord demanded.

“To see the remains of the Roman villa,” Theodora said.