Nicola Cornick: Unmasked

is an international bestselling author and a

RITA ®Award finalist, and her novels have received acclaim the world over

“A rising star of the Regency arena.”

—Publishers Weekly

“Nicola Cornick’s historical romances bring the sensual and elegant world of the Regency to vivid life.”

—Anna Campbell, author of Untouched

“Ms. Cornick has a brilliant talent for bringing her characters to life, and embracing the reader into her stories.”

—RomanceJunkies

“A powerful story, rich, witty and sensual—a divinely delicious treat.”

—Marilyn Rondeau, Reviewers International Organization, on Deceived

“Cornick masterfully blends misconceptions, vengeance, powerful emotions and the realization of great love into a touching story.”

—Romantic Times BOOKreviews, 4½ stars, on Deceived

“Cornick expertly spices her latest Regency historical with danger, while the sizzle she cooks up between her sinfully sexy hero and delightfully resourceful heroine is simply spectacular.”

—John Charles, Booklist, on Lord of Scandal

Dear Reader,

From the Scarlet Pimpernel to Zorro, Robin Hood to William Wallace, the real-life legends and fictional stories of those who fight for freedom and justice have always inspired me. In Unmasked I have written an outlaw story of my own! Over the wild heather-clad hills and dales of Yorkshire ride a band of highwaywomen, taking from the rich to give to the poor, protecting the weak and setting right the injustices of society in true Robin Hood style. But the Glory Girls who ride in Unmasked are no ordinary outlaws. These are women who defy convention because they cannot bear to sit at home, confined by the traditional role of the Regency wife or widow, who see injustice and feel a burning need to take action.

Nick Falconer, the hero of Unmasked, is a man of honor, sworn to uphold the law, and when he is sent to bring the Glory Girls down he is determined to do his duty. But in Mari Osborne, the woman he suspects to be Glory, he finds someone very different from the criminal he is expecting, someone whose principles equal his own…. I loved writing my story of those dashing Regency outlaws the Glory Girls, and I hope you enjoy it, too!

Love from

This book is dedicated to Yorkshire,

county of my birth, for all the wild and

wonderful places that inspired me.

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

AUTHOR NOTE

London—April 1805

Daffodil—Deceit

“THE THINGS I DO for England.” Major Nick Falconer stood back and squinted at his reflection in the pier glass in the hall of the Marquis of Kinloss’s London mansion. The Marquis was out of Town, which Nick thought was probably all to the good. His great-uncle was notoriously high in the instep and might have cut up extremely rough had he seen his heir’s outrageous appearance.

Nick turned to the young man who was leaning against one of the marble pillars and watching him with amusement in his blue eyes.

“What do I look like, Anstruther?”

“You look quite shocking, sir,” Dexter Anstruther said politely. “The ribbon is a nice touch, as is the perfume and the patch.”

Nick laughed. “And the jacket? Quite dandified, I think.”

“Much worse than a dandy,” Anstruther said, a smile twitching his lips. “I beg your pardon, sir, but you look like a molly with extremely dubious sexual tastes. A rum cove, as my father would have said.”

“I do my poor best,” Nick said. He picked up his hat, a jaunty wide-brimmed affair with a flirtatious orange feather.

“This place you’re going to,” Anstruther said, “this club…”

“The Hen and Vulture,” Nick supplied.

“Yes.” Anstruther looked vaguely uncomfortable. “Is it really the case that one cannot be sure whether…I mean, there are men there, and women…”

“And the men may be dressed as women and the women as men,” Nick finished. He grinned. “So I understand. Far too shocking for youngsters like yourself to visit, Anstruther.”

“Men dressed as women,” Anstruther muttered, rubbing a hand across his forehead. “How could that possibly be attractive?”

“I believe the appeal of such a place lies in the ambiguity,” Nick said. “Apparently some of the most beautiful courtesans in London also attend and the skill is in telling them apart from the men in women’s clothes.”

“Good God,” Anstruther said faintly. “It’s so…unBritish.”

“Just count yourself lucky that you don’t have to come with me,” Nick said comfortingly. He looked at his companion, sober in his black evening dress. Dexter Anstruther had been assigned to assist him in his current mission by no lesser personage than the Home Secretary himself. The boy had only graduated from Oxford the previous year but he was clever, diplomatic and hardworking, and Nick’s current venture, to rein in the wilder excesses of his cousin the Earl of Rashleigh, required assistance from someone with absolute discretion. Dexter Anstruther fitted the bill perfectly.

“How would you dress if you were visiting the Hen and Vulture, Anstruther?” Nick inquired.

“Just as I am—as a repressed English gentleman,” Anstruther said ruefully, looking at Nick’s somewhat colorful outfit, “rather than the sort of mincing dandy I see before me—with the greatest of respect, sir.” He straightened, thrusting his hands into his pockets. “What if Lord Kinloss should hear of this, sir? He’ll have a fit. The heir to a Marquisate in a house of ill repute!”

“I’ll probably recognize plenty of other peers in there,” Nick said, “so no one will be able to point the finger.”

Anstruther shook his head in disbelief. “It is difficult to believe, seeing you like that, sir, that you have a certain reputation for ruthlessness.”

Nick was adjusting his outrageously lacy collar. “Thank you, Anstruther. Unfortunately I also have the bad luck to be Rashleigh’s cousin.”

“And the best shot in England and one of Gentleman Jackson’s finest,” Anstruther said, with an air of hero worship.

Nick smiled. “More to the point, Anstruther, Lord Hawkesbury knows I’ll be discreet because no matter how much I hate my cousin, this is a family matter.” He tilted his head to one side and patted the patch on his cheek. “Too much, do you think?”

“You look like a whorehouse madam, sir.”

“Just the style I was attempting,” Nick said.

“Lord Hawkesbury said that this was a delicate business,” Anstruther said, shifting from one foot to the other, as though he was not quite comfortable to be in the same room as a man in such dubious attire. “A matter that could cause repercussions through the top ranks of society, he said.”

“Yes,” Nick said. “It is damnably delicate. You know that my foolish cousin Rashleigh has borrowed heavily from the sprigs of the nobility, Anstruther. He has targeted those youths with generous allowances and lax guardians. And now that his activities are exposed there are peers lining up from Aberdeen to Anglesey threatening to see him in hell. Lord Hawkesbury wants Rashleigh warned off tonight and the money repaid before one of them kills him.”