Julia Quinn - To Catch an Heiress

For Mama Chiks, Sister Song, Freener, and Nosk from Bools

And also for Paul, even though it's a miracle

I got this book finished at all since he kept stealing my computer to play DOOM.

con-tu-ber-nal (noun). One who occu­pies the same tent; a tent-fellow, comrade.

The thought of Percy Prewitt as my contubernal causes me to break out in hives.

- From the personal dictionary of

Caroline Trent

Hampshire, England

July 3,1814

Caroline Trent hadn't meant to shoot Percival Prewitt, but she had, and now he was dead. Or at least she thought he was dead. There was certainly enough blood. It was dripping from the walls, it was splattered on the floor, and the bed­clothes were stained quite beyond redemption. Car oline didn't know very much about medicine, but she was fairly certain a body couldn't lose that much blood and still live.

She was in big trouble now.

"Damn," she muttered. Although she was a gen­tlewoman, she hadn't always been raised in particularly gentle circumstances, and her language occasionally left a bit to be desired.

"You stupid man," she said to the body on the floor. "Why did you have to lunge at me like that? Why couldn't you have left well enough alone? I told your father I wasn't going to marry you. I told him I wouldn't marry you if you were the last idiot in Britain."

She nearly stamped her foot in frustration. Why was it her words never came out quite the way she intended them to? "What I meant to say was that you are an idiot," she said to Percy, who, not sur­prisingly, didn't respond, "and that I wouldn't marry you if you were the last man in Britain, and- Oh, blast. What am I doing talking to you, anyway? You're quite dead."

Caroline groaned. What the devil was she sup­posed to do now? Percy's father was due to return in just two short hours, and it didn't require an Ox­ford degree to deduce that Oliver Prewitt would not be pleased to find his son dead on the floor.

"Bother your father," she ground out. "This is all his fault, anyway. If he hadn't been so obsessed with catching you an heiress..."

Oliver Prewitt was Caroline's guardian, or at least he would be for the next six weeks, until she reached her twenty-first birthday. She had been counting down the days until August 14,1814, ever

since August 14,1813, when she had turned twenty. Just forty-two days to go. Forty-two days and she would finally have control of her life and her for­tune. She didn't even want to think about how much of her inheritance the Prewitts had already run through.

She tossed her gun onto the bed, planted her hands on her hips, and stared down at Percy.

And then... his eyes opened.

"Aaaaaaack!" Caroline let out a loud scream, jumped a foot, and grabbed her gun.

"You b-" Percy started.

"Don't say it," she warned. "I still have a gun."

"You wouldn't use it," he gasped, coughing and clutching at his bloody shoulder.

"I beg your pardon, but the evidence seems to indicate otherwise."

Percy's thin lips clamped into a straight line. He swore viciously, and then lifted his furious gaze to Caroline. "I told my father I didn't want to marry you," he hissed. "God! Can you imagine? Having to live with you for the rest of my life? I should go bloody insane. If you didn't kill me first, that is."

"If you didn't want to marry me you shouldn't have tried to force yourself upon me!'

He shrugged, then howled when the movement sparked pain in his shoulder. He looked quite fu­rious as he said, "You've quite a bit of money, but do you know, I don't think you're worth it."

"Kindly tell that to your father," Caroline snapped.

"He said he'd disinherit me if I didn't marry you."

"And you couldn't stand up to him for once in your pathetic life?"

Percy growled at being called pathetic, but in his weakened condition he couldn't do much about the insult. "I could go to America," he muttered. "Surely savages have to be a better option than you."

Caroline ignored him. She and Percy had been at odds since she had come to live with the Prewitts a year and a half earlier. Percy was quite under his father's thumb, and the only time he showed any spirit was when Oliver quit the house. Unfortu­nately, his spirit was usually mean and small and, in Caroline's opinion, rather dull.

"I suppose I'm going to have to save you now," she grumbled. "You're certainly not worth the gallows."

"You're too kind."

Caroline shook a pillow out of its case, wadded up the cloth-the highest quality linen, she noted, probably purchased with her money-and pressed it against Percy's wound. "We have to stop the bleeding," she said.

"It appears to have slowed down," Percy admit­ted.

"Did the bullet go straight through?" "I don't know. Hurts like the devil, but I don't know if it's supposed to hurt more if it goes through or gets stuck in the muscle."

"I imagine they're both quite painful," Caroline said, lifting the wadded pillowcase and examining the wound. She turned him gently and looked at his back. "I think it went through. You've a hole in the back of your shoulder as well."

"Trust you to injure me twice."

"You lured me into your room under the pretense of needing a cup of tea for a head cold," she snapped, "and then you tried to rape me! What did you expect?"

"Why the hell did you bring a gun?"

"I always carry a gun," she replied. "I have since ... well, never you mind."

"I wouldn't have gone through with it," he mut­tered.

"How was I to know that?"

"Well, you know I've never liked you."

Caroline pressed her makeshift bandage against Percy's bloody shoulder with perhaps a touch more force than was necessary. "What I know," she spat out, "is that you and your father have always quite liked my inheritance."

"I think I dislike you more than I like your in­heritance," Percy grumbled. "You're too bossy by half, you're not even pretty, and you've the ser­pent's own tongue."

Caroline clamped her mouth into a grim line. If she had a sharp way of speaking, it wasn't her fault. She'd learned quickly that her wits were her only defense against the parade of horrible guardians she'd been forced to endure since her father's pass­ing when she was ten. First there had been George Liggett, her father's first cousin. He hadn't been such a bad sort, but he certainly didn't know what to do with a small girl. So he'd smiled at her once- just once, mind you- told her he was happy to meet her, and then tossed her into a country home with a nurse and governess. And then he proceeded to ignore her.

But George had died, and her guardianship had passed on to his first cousin, who was no relation of hers or her father's. Niles Wickham was a mean old miser who'd seen a ward as a good substitute for a serving girl, and he'd immediately given her a list of chores longer than her arm. Caroline had cooked, cleaned, ironed, polished, scrubbed, and swept. The only thing she hadn't done was sleep.

Niles, however, had choked on a chicken bone, turned quite purple, and died. The courts were at a bit of a loss as to what to do with Caroline, who at fifteen seemed too well-bred and wealthy to toss into an orphanage, so they passed her guardianship on to Archibald Prewitt, Niles's second cousin. Archibald had been a lewd man who'd found Caroline entirely too attractive for her comfort, and it was then that she began her habit of keeping a weapon on her person at all times. Archibald had had a weak heart, however, and so Caroline had only had to live with him for six months before she attended his funeral and was packed off to live with his younger brother Albert.