Sophia James: A Secret Consequence For The Viscount

An unexpected Christmas gift...

Like all of London society, Lady Eleanor believed Viscount Bromley dead. Now, after six years, he has returned a changed man. Brooding Nicholas Bartlett has no memory of their one night of incredible passion—so how can she tell him he fathered a child?

As Nicholas starts to regain his lost memories, he realizes the true reason he feels so drawn to beautiful Eleanor and her young daughter. And with the danger from his past threatening to rear its head, it’s up to Nicholas to protect his newly discovered family!

Hidden amongst the masked revellers of an underground Regency gentlemen’s club, where decadence, daring and debauchery abound, the four owners of Vitium et Virtusare about to meet their match!

Welcome to…

The Society of Wicked Gentlemen

Read

A Convenient Bride for the Soldier

by Christine Merrill

An Innocent Maid for the Duke

by Ann Lethbridge

A Pregnant Courtesan for the Rake

by Diane Gaston

A Secret Consequence for the Viscount

by Sophia James

All available now!

Author Note

I wrote the prologue for this book on a plane between Los Angeles and Melbourne after the Romance Writers of America® 2016 conference, and by the time I arrived home in Auckland I both understood and loved Nicholas Bartlett, the lost Viscount Bromley and one of the owners of the club Vitium et Virtus.

It was my absolute pleasure and privilege to work with Christine Merrill, Ann Lethbridge and Diane Gaston on The Society of Wicked Gentlemen series.

I hope you enjoy this last story, A Secret Consequence for the Viscount, as much as I enjoyed writing it.

A Secret Consequence for the Viscount

Sophia James

www.millsandboon.co.uk

SOPHIA JAMESlives in Chelsea Bay, on Auckland, New Zealand’s North Shore, with her husband who is an artist. She has a degree in English and History from Auckland University and believes her love of writing was formed by reading Georgette Heyer in the holidays at her grandmother’s house. Sophia enjoys getting feedback at www.Facebook.com/sophiajamesauthor.

Books by Sophia James

Mills & Boon Historical Romance

Knight of Grace

Lady with the Devil’s Scar

Gift-Wrapped Governesses

‘Christmas at Blackhaven Castle’

Ruined by the Reckless Viscount

The Society of Wicked Gentlemen

A Secret Consequence for the Viscount

The Penniless Lords

Marriage Made in Money

Marriage Made in Shame

Marriage Made in Rebellion

Marriage Made in Hope

Men of Danger

Mistletoe Magic

Mistress at Midnight

Scars of Betrayal

The Wellingham Brothers

High Seas to High Society

One Unashamed Night

One Illicit Night

The Dissolute Duke

Visit the Author Profile page

at millsandboon.co.ukfor more titles.

This book is dedicated to Linda Fildew, my wonderful and irreplaceable editor, who has been with me right from the start.

Thanks for knowing when to give me a push to try new things.

Contents

Cover

Back Cover Text

Introduction

Author Note

Title Page

About the Author

Dedication

Prologue

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Chapter Thirteen

Chapter Fourteen

Chapter Fifteen

Chapter Sixteen

Chapter Seventeen

Epilogue

Extract

Copyright

Prologue

James River, Virginia—1818

He was bone-weary and cold and had been for a long time now.

He could feel it in his hands and heart and in the fury wrapped around each intake of breath, fear raw against the sound of the river.

Once he knew he had been different. Such knowledge sent a shaft of pain through him that was worse than anything else imaginable, an elusive certainty drifting on the edge of misunderstanding.

He swore as he lowered his body into the water, closing his eyes against the sting of cold. With the hand that still had feeling in it he grabbed at the rushes and steadied movement. He was here somewhere, the man who had slashed at him with a blade. He could feel his presence, close now, a shadow catching at space between darkness, barely visible. He held no weapon except for his wits, no way of protecting himself save for the years of desperation honed in distance. He couldn’t remember ever feeling safe.

The voice came unexpectedly and close.

‘Nicholas Bartlett? Are you there?’

The sound had him turning his head. For more or for less he knew not which. The name was familiar, its syllables distinct as they ran together into something that made a terrible and utter sense.

He wanted to stop the sudden onslaught of memories, each thread reforming itself into more, building a picture, words that pulled at the spinning void of his life and anchored him back into truth. A truth that lay above comprehension and disbelief.

More words came from the mouth of his stalker, moving before him, as he raised steel under a dull small moon.

‘Vitium et Virtus.’

A prayer or a prophesy? A forecast of all that was to come or the harbinger of that which had been?

‘No.’ His own voice was suddenly certain as he shot out of the water to meet his fate, fury fuelling him. He hardly felt the slice of the knife against the soft bones of his face. He was fearless in his quest for life and as the curve of his assailant’s neck came into his hands he understood a primal power that did away with doubt and gave him back hope. He felt the small breakage of bone and saw surprise in the dark bulging eyeballs under moonlight. The hot breath on the raised skin of his own forearm slowed and cooled as resistance changed into flaccidity. Life lost into death with barely a noise save the splash of a corpse as it was taken by the wide flowing James to sink under the blackness, a moment’s disturbance and then calm, the small ridges slipping into the former patterns of the river.

He sat down on the bank in the wet grass and placed his head between his knees, both temples aching with the movement.

Vitium et Virtus.

Nicholas Bartlett.

He knew the words, knew this life, knew the name imbued into each and every part of him.

Nicholas Henry Stewart Bartlett.

Viscount Bromley.

A crest with a dragon on the dexter side and a horse on the sinister. Both in argent.

An estate in Essex.

Oliver. Frederick. Jacob.

The club of secrets.

Vitium et Virtus.

‘Hell.’ It all came tumbling back without any barriers. Flashes of honour, shame, disorder and excess after so very many years of nothing.

Tears welled, mixed with blood as the loss of who he now was melded against the sorrow of everything forgotten.

The young and dissolute London Lord with the world at his feet and a thousand hours of leisure and ease before him had been replaced by this person he had become, a life formed by years of endurance and hardship.

‘Nicholas Bartlett.’

He turned the name on his tongue and said it quietly into the night so he might hear it truly. The tinge of the Americas stretched long over the vowels in a cadence at odds with his English roots, though when he repeated it again he heard only the sorrow.

He searched back to the last memories held of that time, but could just think of being at Bromworth Manor in Essex with his uncle. Arguing yet again. After that there was nothing. He could not remember returning to London or getting on a ship to the Americas. He recalled pain somewhere and the vague sense of water. Perhaps he had been picked up by a boat, a stranger without memory and shanghaied aboard?