Political intrigue could leave his heart the last one standing…alone.

Sweet Disorder

© 2014 Rose Lerner

Lively St. Lemeston, Book 1

Nick Dymond enjoyed the rough-and-tumble military life until a bullet to the leg sent him home to his emotionally distant, politically obsessed family. For months, he’s lived alone with his depression, blockaded in his lodgings.

But with his younger brother desperate to win the local election, Nick has a new set of marching orders: dust off the legendary family charm and maneuver the beautiful Phoebe Sparks into a politically advantageous marriage.

One marriage was enough for Phoebe. Under her town’s by-laws, though, she owns a vote that only a husband can cast. Much as she would love to simply ignore the unappetizing matrimonial candidate pushed at her by the handsome earl’s son, she can’t. Her teenage sister is pregnant, and Phoebe’s last-ditch defense against her sister’s ruin is her vote—and her hand.

Nick and Phoebe soon realize the only match their hearts will accept is the one society will not allow. But as election intrigue turns dark, they’ll have to cast the cruelest vote of all: loyalty…or love.

Warning: Contains elections, confections, and a number of erections.

Enjoy the following excerpt for Sweet Disorder:

Nick leaned on his walking stick, giving himself a few moments to catch his breath. Of course the widow lived at the top of two flights of very steep, very twisty stairs.

After six hours of jouncing about on bad roads the day before, followed by sleeping in an unfamiliar bed in damp weather, his leg had already been protesting. He’d waited until the sun came out this afternoon, and still his leg whined all the way from the Lost Bell, Tony’s inn headquarters: past the Market Cross and down the quaint streets, up the uneven garden path to the widow’s lodgings, past hedges and bushes strewn with drying clothes and past the open kitchen door, and into the house. Now, after the stairs, it shouted at him that it wanted to go home and sleep.

You and I both, leg. He rapped on the low attic door. There was no answer. After half a minute dragged by, he tried again. No answer. The wretched woman wasn’t home. The staircase yawned behind him like a drab, dirty descent into Hell.

Men had probably journeyed into Hell with more grace and less cursing, but eventually Nick found himself back out on the threshold. He closed the door and leaned against it. The maids at their washing in the kitchen couldn’t see him from this angle. He shut his eyes and silently recited Byron until the ache in his leg receded.

“Are you ill, sir?”

He started upright. The plumper of the two maids stood before him. The water from the washing had splashed all down her front, and it was chilly enough that the points of her nipples showed even through several layers of wet cloth. There was so much of her, breasts and hips and thighs and—

She cleared her throat loudly. “Sir?”

He hurriedly raised his eyes to her face. It was a lovely face, heart-shaped with great dark eyes, finely arched brows, and an annoyed rosebud mouth. The tips of her thick dark hair curled wetly.

“Yes, I must have eaten something that disagreed with me,” he said. “I’m Mr. Dymond, and I’m looking for Mrs. Sparks. Do you know if she’ll be in later?”

The maid’s eyes widened, and she tried to dry her hands on her skirts. “Maybe,” she hedged. “What did you want to speak to her about? Wait a moment, did you say Mr. Dymond? But I’ve met him, he’s—”

“I’m sorry, I should have said Mr. Nicholas Dymond. My brother is the candidate.”

Her eyes narrowed. “You know Mr. Sparks is dead, don’t you? He can’t vote.” Her Sussex accent wasn’t as strong as many of the folk he’d spoken to here, but a warm burr coated her words like a honey glaze.

It would behoove him to win her over for the sake of Mrs. Sparks’s vote, but he didn’t quite know how. Flirting with a voter’s wife was safe; she knew you didn’t mean it. A maid might think you were trying to bed her. His mother had impressed upon them all from a very early age the folly of womanizing during an election.

How would Lady Tassell handle this? A smile, flattery and a bribe, no doubt. She had small armies of servant spies across England, and they all thought her a paragon of kind generosity.

He smiled at the maid. Her hands twisted in her skirts. “I do know,” he said reassuringly. “But there’s nothing to stop her taking another, is there? If you could tell me of anyone she might be sweet on, I’d be very grateful. You must know all the news hereabouts.” He pulled a shilling out of his pocket and pressed it into one nervous hand.

Her fingers were cold and damp. Even with the sun finally out, it was a damnable day for washing.

The other maid, holding a linen shift trimmed with faded green bows and red rosettes, appeared at her elbow and plucked the shilling from her fingers. “That’s mine, I believe. And Mrs. Sparks isn’t sweet on anyone.”

“Sukey!” The maid flushed, then turned on him, eyes flashing. “I thought better of the Orange-and-Purples, I really did. I’m not getting married for your dratted election, so you can stop flirting with all the servants in the vicinity.”

Sukey winked at him. “Oh, don’t stop on my account.”

Nick stifled a groan. He wasn’t cut out for this. He couldn’t manage even the simplest bit of politic dealing. “Mrs. Sparks, I take it.”

Despite Nick’s dismay, he couldn’t help thinking this meant that was her shift in Sukey’s hands. Her petticoat and underthings were draped over the rhododendron behind her. Under her wet dress, right now, she must be wearing brown-and-white striped stockings, like the three pairs hanging from a nearby tree branch.

“Yes,” she said sharply, “and yes, those are my underthings you’re ogling. Sir.”

Nick straightened, collecting his wayward thoughts. “My humblest apologies, madam.”

She raised her eyebrows. “Really? The very humblest? Ne plus ultra?”

There was no purpose even in an ordered retreat; he had no reinforcements, no main army to rejoin. He had to stay and fix this. But first he needed to discover the lay of the land. “Did you like being married?” he asked bluntly.

“No,” she snapped, and then pressed her fist into her mouth as if she couldn’t believe she’d said it. “I mean—yes,” she amended after a moment. “Sometimes. I—it wasn’t Will’s fault. Lord, I’m a beast.”

This was interesting.

“Of course you’re not a beast, ma’am,” Sukey said. “Men are impossible to live with, that’s all.” She put a hand on her mistress’s shoulder.

As if that made her remember how cold she was, Mrs. Sparks shivered. “I’m impossible to live with too,” she said sadly. Then she shot him a glare. “Which is why I live alone.”

He sighed. “So do I. Although I’m sure it will be no time at all before my mother is trying to matchmake for me. She bullied me down here to talk to you, you know.”

He didn’t like how calculated his words were. But it worked. He could see it, when in her mind they became fellow pawns in his mother’s game. She smirked. “If this is an example of the delicacy of her stratagems, you have nothing to fear.”

“Unkind, but just.” Her lips twitched. He almost had her. “Listen—perhaps you don’t want to marry again, but do me a favor and at least come to the dinner my brother is throwing for the voters on Thursday? Meet a few potential husbands. I hear there’s to be dancing, and it will convince my mother that I’m at least making inroads into your spinsterhood.” Damn, that last bit sounded rather indecent.

She flushed, evidently agreeing.

“Why not, ma’am?” asked Sukey. “It would do you good to get out for an evening. I can’t remember the last time you wore something really pretty.”

It wasn’t meant as an insult, but Nick winced as the blush deepened into angry shame on Mrs. Sparks’s face. “I don’t own anything really pretty,” she said harshly. “I dyed my best gown black when we laid Will out.”

“There, you see?” Sukey said. “That means it was more than two years ago. Two whole years of drudgery and scribbling. It’s about time you—”

Mrs. Sparks began to vibrate like a teakettle. Nick found it inexplicably charming.

“It’s not a very formal affair,” he interrupted before she could boil over. “Pin an orange-and-purple rosette in your hair and you’ll be the height of fashion. Please say you’ll come. I’d like to know there will be at least one familiar face in the crowd.” His mother wanted him to dance. He had planned to ignore that, but now, if his leg would permit it, he found himself wanting to dance with Mrs. Sparks. Although if she stepped on his feet, he imagined she would do so very firmly.

Her face softened. He was close to success, so close. “I don’t have time,” she said, still sharply but with rather less conviction than before. “Drudgery and scribbling is time-consuming work, and unless you wish to do my washing and piece a quilt for the Gooding Day auction, the rest of my week is—”

“So if I help with your washing and make a donation to the auction, you’ll come to the party?”