SWEETEST SCOUNDREL
Maiden Lane, 9
Elizabeth Hoyt
Grand Central Publishing Mass Market
November 24, 2015
SHE'S TAKING CHARGE
Prim, proper, and thrifty, Eve Dinwoody is all business when it comes to protecting her brother's investment. But when she agrees to control the purse strings of London's premier pleasure garden, Harte's Folly, she finds herself butting heads with an infuriating scoundrel who can't be controlled.
HE'S RUNNING THE SHOW
Bawdy and bold, Asa Makepeace doesn't have time for a penny-pinching prude like Eve. As the garden's larger-than-life owner, he's already dealing with self-centered sopranos and temperamental tenors. He's not about to let an aristocratic woman boss him around . . . no matter how enticing she is.
BUT LOVE CONQUERS ALL
In spite of her lack of theatrical experience-and her fiery clashes with Asa-Eve is determined to turn Harte's Folly into a smashing success. But the harder she tries to manage the stubborn rake, the harder it is to ignore his seductive charm and raw magnetism. There's no denying the smoldering fire between them-and trying to put it out would be the greatest folly of all . . .
Prim, proper, and thrifty, Eve Dinwoody is all business when it comes to protecting her brother's investment. But when she agrees to control the purse strings of London's premier pleasure garden, Harte's Folly, she finds herself butting heads with an infuriating scoundrel who can't be controlled.
HE'S RUNNING THE SHOW
Bawdy and bold, Asa Makepeace doesn't have time for a penny-pinching prude like Eve. As the garden's larger-than-life owner, he's already dealing with self-centered sopranos and temperamental tenors. He's not about to let an aristocratic woman boss him around . . . no matter how enticing she is.
BUT LOVE CONQUERS ALL
In spite of her lack of theatrical experience-and her fiery clashes with Asa-Eve is determined to turn Harte's Folly into a smashing success. But the harder she tries to manage the stubborn rake, the harder it is to ignore his seductive charm and raw magnetism. There's no denying the smoldering fire between them-and trying to put it out would be the greatest folly of all . . .
Excerpt from Sweetest Scoundrel:
“What do you see when you look at me?”
What did she see
when she looked at him?
Eve inhaled, trying and failing to tear her gaze
from his.
Mr. Harte sprawled across her dainty settee like a Viking
marauder in a pillaged Christian church. His broad shoulders took up more than
half the width, his arms lazily draped over the back. His scarlet coat was spread
open, contrasting with the sedate gray-
blue of the cushions almost shockingly. One long leg was thrust straight
before him, the other cocked open and resting on a booted heel. The pose made
the apex of his thighs very . . . obvious . . . and even as she kept her eyes
locked on his she could feel heat rising in her cheeks.
What did she see?
She saw violence and anger, kept under a control
that was tenuous at best.
She saw power and a strength that could hurt her—kill her—if he so chose. She saw the innate brutality that was, in
larger or smaller part, in all men.
She
saw her most terrible fears.
But—and this was the truly unprecedented part—she saw more in him. She saw temptation—her temptation—alluring
and frightening at the same time, his virility so strong it was nearly a
visible miasma in the space between them.
She wanted him. Wanted that brash gaze,
those long, muscled thighs, that mocking, insulting mouth, and the shoulders
that went on forever, big and brawny and so
very, very male.
This was
madness—she knew that intellectually. She’d never wanted a man before—was in
fact afraid of almost all men, let
alone one so obviously, blatantly sexual.
She took
a breath, hoping that he couldn’t read all this from her gaze—and knowing it
was a lost cause already.
His
heavy-lidded green eyes were far, far too perceptive.
“I see .
. .” She paused to lick suddenly dry lips. “I see that your hairline is nearly
a perfect arc across the expanse of your forehead. That your eyebrows tilt ever
so slightly up at the ends and that the right has a scar through it. I see that
when you are solemn, the outer edges of your lips reach just to the midpoint of
your eyes, but when you smile, they go beyond the corners. I see that your chin
and jaw are almost in classical proportion and that a small white scar forms a
comma on your chin just to the right of center.” She finally glanced away from
him, breathing heavily, certain that she’d not thrown him off the track with
her artist’s eye’s impressions. She inhaled again and ended, “I see every line
of your face, every line’s intersection and how they relate. That is what I see
when I look at you.”
“And is
that all you see? Lines?” His voice was deep and amused.
She
chanced a peek.
He still
watched her, his gaze utterly unperturbed by her observations about his
countenance.
No, she’d
not fooled him at all.
She
licked her lips again, buying time. “I see,” she said carefully, cautiously, “a
very self-possessed man.”
“Self-possessed,”
he drawled. “I’m not sure
what that means, frankly. It
sounds, just a bit, like a coward’s answer.”
Her gaze
flew to his, outraged.
But
before she could take him down a peg, he chuckled softly. “Tell me, Miss
Dinwoody, would you like to know what I see when I look at you?”
She
shouldn’t. She really, really shouldn’t.
“Yes,”
she blurted, and then winced because she knew well enough what men
thought when
they looked at her: ordinary, if they
were charitable. Plain if they were not.
She
braced herself for mockery, but when she glanced again at him, his gaze was hot
and hard. Certainly not gentle. Certainly not kind. But he wasn’t dismissing
her, either.
He looked
at her as if they were equals. As if he really saw her, a woman to his man.
“I see,”
he said, his deep voice musing, “a woman afraid, but fighting her fears. A
woman who carries herself like a queen. A woman who could rule us all, I suspect.”
She gazed
at him, her breath caught in her throat, afraid to exhale and break the spell.
A corner
of that wicked mouth tilted up. “And I see a woman who has a deep curiosity.
Who wants to feel but is worried—of herself? Of others?” He shook his head.
“I’m not sure.” He leaned forward slowly, destroying his pose, and she had to
fight herself not to scoot her chair away from him. “But I think she has a fire
banked within her. Maybe it’s only embers now, glowing in the dark, but if
tinder were to be put to those embers . . .” He grinned slowly. Dangerously. “Oh,
what a conflagration that would be.”
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About the author:
Elizabeth Hoyt is the New York Times bestselling author of over seventeen lush historical romances including the Maiden Lane series. Publishers Weekly has called her writing "mesmerizing." She also pens deliciously fun contemporary romances under the name Julia Harper. Elizabeth lives in Minneapolis, Minnesota, with three untrained dogs, a garden in constant need of weeding, and the long-suffering Mr. Hoyt.
The winters in Minnesota have been known to be long and cold and Elizabeth is always thrilled to receive reader mail. You can write to her at: P.O. Box 19495, Minneapolis, MN 55419 or email her at: Elizabeth@ElizabethHoyt.com.
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