Lost in Pleasure

‘I beg your pardon?’

Richard eyed the strange female cowering against his folio edition of the Encyclopédie with a mixture of amusement and surprise. She was very tall for a woman; those hazel eyes of hers did not have to look too far up to meet his. Fiery red hair, most unfashionably cut, hinted at an equally fiery temperament, and there was intelligence there too, in that unusual countenance. She looked exotic, though he couldn’t quite say in what way. Foreign perhaps?

He stepped closer, the better to appraise her. Smooth skin. A well-defined face, a strong face, for a woman. She held his gaze with something akin to defiance. He liked that. Richard smiled. The strange female smiled back. It transformed her face. She was quite lovely in an unconventional way.

Her skin looked soft, her complexion remarkably clear and smooth. Arched brows, finer than was the fashion. She wore a light, citrusy scent, not a perfume he recognised. Intriguing, like the woman herself. Under the incongruous shirt and jacket she wore, he could see the rise and fall of her breasts. Richard raised an enquiring brow. ‘Delightful surprise as this is, may I ask what you’re doing in my library?’

‘Your library? Who are you?’

Her voice was low, pleasantly husky, her accent most unfamiliar. Richard gave a little bow. ‘Richard, Earl of Kilcreggan. Third earl, if you wish to be precise.’

‘You’re the man in the portrait!’

‘Yes.’

‘So that’s your chair,’ Errin said, pointing at the wingback sitting innocently by the fire.

‘Yes.’

‘Right.’ Errin’s mouth was dry. She felt...she felt...she felt exhilarated. The way she did sitting at the top of the Cyclone roller coaster at Coney Island, waiting for the free fall with a mixture of terror and anticipation. It wasn’t possible, what she was thinking. It couldn’t be. But she wanted it to be. She really wanted it to be. ‘This isn’t a film set, is it?’ she asked, more because it was the logical thing to think than because she believed it.

‘Film?’ The Earl of Kilcreggan looked satisfyingly perplexed.

‘Or maybe you’re staging a play?’

‘You think I’m an actor?’

‘Are you?’

‘No.’

‘Right.’ His smile was really quite infectious. His mouth kind of quirked up at one side, tugging an answering response from her. Errin felt as if she might melt. She’d never felt that way before. Not even... ‘I must be dreaming. I must be. You can’t be real.’

‘I’m very real,’ Richard said, taking her hands and placing them on his chest. ‘See?’ He had no idea what was going on, but he was quite happy to let it continue. The boredom that had been weighing upon him had vanished. He’d been about to venture out, to try out his new numerical gambling system at Boodle’s, but had seen a flash of light coming from the direction of the library and had come to investigate. He’d been craving unpredictability. Well, now he had it, by Jove.

Errin could feel the silk and thread of his embroidered waistcoat. A silver button pressed into her palm. Underneath, he appeared to be solid muscle. Absolutely not a dream. ‘Totally real,’ she said. She was having trouble breathing.

Richard laughed. ‘Thank you, I think.’ He took her hands in his. ‘May I ask what you are doing here? My servants made no mention of a caller. How did you gain entry to my house? Who are you, and why, now I come to look at you,’ he asked, surveying her attire with an amused look, ‘are you dressed as a man?’

She should make something up, because he’d never believe the truth—if it was the truth. Surely it couldn’t be? But if not, how else...?

She should make something up before he had her arrested, but her mind was a complete blank. And anyway, she somehow knew that the Earl of Kilcreggan was a man who would not take kindly to being lied to. ‘Errin. My name is Errin McGill. And I’m not dressed as a man. These are women’s clothes. At least they will be.’

‘Will be? You’re not making much sense.’

‘No. And you know what?’ Errin replied, casting caution to the winds. ‘I’m about to make even less. You want to know how I got here? Well, the truth is, I was sitting in that wingback chair, in a shop, and I sort of fell asleep and when I woke up I was here.’

Richard eyed her sceptically. ‘My chair was in a shop? How can it be in two places at once?’

‘You don’t believe me. I don’t blame you, but it’s true. Where is here, by the way?’

‘London, of course.’

‘At least that hasn’t changed.’ Errin eyed the chair, noticing for the first time its pristine condition and spotless upholstery. ‘This will seem a mad question, but what year is it?’

‘Eighteen sixteen.’

One thing to think it. Another, quite another, to have it confirmed. ‘Bloody hell.’

She swore like a man, though she didn’t sound a bit like one. In fact everything about her was absurdly feminine, despite her clothes and her hair and her language. ‘You seem perturbed by that fact.’

‘Perturbed!’ Errin giggled nervously. ‘That’s one way of putting it. So would you be if you were in my position.’

‘And what position, pray, would that be?’ Richard asked, trying not to be distracted by the many positions in which he could too easily imagine this exotic creature.

‘When I went to sleep it was the year two thousand and thirteen.’

Richard’s jaw dropped. ‘You’re saying that you have travelled here, via my chair, from the future?’

The astonished look on his face made her want to giggle again. Errin tried valiantly to suppress it, but it escaped all the same. ‘I’m sorry. I know it’s not really funny—not for you, anyway, but it is for me. Kind of. In a mad way. I mean if it’s true—and I really think it must be because there’s no other logical explanation—I’m just totally blown away by the whole thing. Aren’t you?’

‘If you mean, do I find the concept of time travel intriguing, then yes I am, as you so quaintly put it, blown away.’

‘So you believe me?’

He tried to think dispassionately. He tried to assemble the facts and look at the logic of the situation. He tried, very hard, to assess what she had said in a cold, scientific way, but for once Richard’s heart refused to allow his mind sway. ‘I believe you.’ He shook his head in wonder. ‘I shouldn’t but I find I actually do believe you.’

‘How extraordinary.’

‘Extraordinary,’ Richard agreed, looking down into her captivating face and her gold-flecked eyes. If he were the victim of some adventuress, then he was a willing dupe. Errin McGill met his gaze with an uncertain smile and a connection sparked between them, so visceral as to be almost physical, as if they were both anchored by the same rope. ‘Absolutely extraordinary,’ Richard said, pressing a kiss to her hand. Laughter bubbled up from deep inside him. ‘Welcome, Miss McGill,’ he said with a flourishing bow, ‘to the nineteenth century.’

Chapter Two

‘Wow.’

Richard raised an eyebrow. ‘Wow?’

‘I mean, how terribly exciting,’ Errin said, trying and failing dismally to drop an answering curtsy. It was trickier than it looked. ‘I’m in actual Regency London. It’s awesome. I have to see it. Can we go out? Can we go for a walk or—have you got a carriage?’