Kate Huntington historical romance author A HERO'S HOMECOMING preview at The Romance Club http://www.theromanceclub.com

MonaVie

Drink It ~ Feel It ~ Share It

A Hero's Homecoming
by Kate Huntington
Zebra Regency Romance ~ ISBN 0821776762 ~ U.S. $4.99; CAN $6.99

A Surprising Development

Captain Philip Lyonbridge went into the army to convince Isabella Grimsby he was no longer a wastrel, and he cannot wait to witness the melting admiration in her eyes now that he has returned a war hero. Yet Isabella seems oddly taken aback to see him again -- and one glimpse of her two-year-old "nephew" makes the reason clear. There can be no doubt that Jamie is Philip's son, and he resolves to make an honest woman of Isabella, ignoring his father's protestations that the flighty little baggage is an unsuitable match.

An Enduring Love

Raising her young son while Philip was missing in action changed Isabella from a frivilous debutante to a mature young woman. She will marry Philip for Jamie's sake, but as for letting him into her heart again . . . never. But her staunch resolve has met its match in the guise of Philip's slow, sensual courtship. And surrendering her heart may provide Isabella with the greatest triumph of all -- a love beyond compare.

Philip Lyonbridge's younger brother looked every inch the hero as he stood at parade rest before the fireplace of the private parlor of the inn. He was wearing his dress uniform, the one he had donned for his wedding to a young woman who should have been accepting the congratulations of all her friends at this moment, but instead would never be able to hold her head up in Society again because of Philip.

Adam never fidgeted. He never paced. Instead, his stance suggested that of a panther, ready to attack.

Philip had expected to be hundreds of miles away in Scotland by the time his brother found out what he had done, and by then Adam would have had to accept the runaway marriage as a fait accompli. He had not thought much on the matter beyond that, for he had been blinded by his desire for Isabella.

Isabella had begged him to save her from entering into a loveless marriage. Quite apart from Philip's lust for Isabella, he had been gratified to encounter one female who preferred him to his magnificent brother.

Philip might be the elder, but in the eyes of the world, Lord Revington's heir was merely a pale copy of the brave, the stalwart, the muscular and athletic Major Adam Lyonbridge. By the age of three, Adam had outstripped Philip in both size and girth. Thereafter, new acquaintances had routinely assumed that the bigger, stronger brother was the elder. In his heart of hearts, Philip had to admit that one of the attractions of going along with this elopement had been to embarrass his disgustingly superior brother.

Instead, though, here was Adam, looking like a hero about to chastise a recalcitrant recruit.

Philip was merely the contemptible cur who had disrupted the hero's wedding by ignominiously stealing his bride.

"Unless you bound her hand and foot, and bore her off against her will, she is no innocent. But you hardly need fear that I will retaliate against her. The vain, selfish little chit is beneath contempt after this day's work. I would not soil my hands on her."

"You will not speak of her in this way," Philip said, finding courage despite the deadly coldness in his brother's eye.

"I will speak of her in any way I choose, and you are hardly in any position to prevent me from doing so."

"Leave her out of this. I am at your disposal. Under the circumstances, I trust we can dispense with the convention of seconds."

"You could try," Philip said, but his heart wasn't in it. His brother was going to pound him to bloody pulp. And when Isabella emerged from the bedchamber to which Marian Randall, her half sister, had conducted her, she was going to know him for the paltry fellow he truly was. She had already watched Adam bloody Philip's nose after he caught up to them.

"Lord, what a figure I should cut," Adam said. He almost looked amused. "I outweigh you by at least three stone. It would be no contest."

"Even so," Philip said, gritting his teeth in defiance at his bigger, stronger brother. He could almost welcome the pain, for it would put an end to this wretched suspense. And, if Philip were very, very fortunate, perhaps he could pop a hit over Adam's guard and darken his daylights for him before Adam broke him in two.

"Do not flatter yourself. Like Isabella, you are beneath my contempt. I would not soil my hands on you, either."

Philip positively hated the feeling of relief that surged through his body. He actually felt his knees go a little weak.

"You are wrong," Philip said, striving for a cool tone. He even managed to give his brother a smile of sheer bravado. "Oh, not about me. I am every bit as despicable as you think. You are wrong about Isabella."

"It is a bit too late to defend your lady fair," Adam scoffed. "You are a coward, Philip. You sought this means of disgracing me because you aren't brave enough to fight me man to man. You aren't brave enough to fight anyone man to man."

"Father refused to buy me a commission," Philip snarled, "and you bloody well know it."

"It makes for a convenient excuse . . . coward," Adam snarled right back. "You have that legacy from our mother's brother quite apart from your allowance as heir. You could have purchased your own commission at any time these three years after our uncle stuck his spoon in the wall."

It was true. Absolutely true. Philip could have purchased a commission at any time and his father could have done nothing to prevent it, but he had been reluctant to go to war in his brother's shadow and invite the inevitable comparisons between them that were sure to be in his disfavor.

Instead, he squandered his allowance on horses and drink, and supported the character of a sophisticated fashionable fribble about town while he grew green with jealousy every time he read one of the newspaper accounts of Adam's bravery in action and watched his father's face glow with pride when acquaintances congratulated him on Adam's latest promotion on the field of battle.

"I think your cowardice makes you a prime match for the fair Isabella," Adam continued. "She could have broken our betrothal at any time by informing me that she wished to do so. All the girl had to say was no. I could not do so, for I was bound by our father's honor. No, Isabella did not merely wish to escape from the marriage. She wanted to humiliate me. And my own brother was her willing accomplice."

Philip wanted to protest, to tell Adam that he had been powerless to resist Isabella's blandishments when she had begged him to save her from this marriage, but he could not, for he knew there was no acceptable excuse for what he had done.

He should have encouraged Isabella to tell Adam the truth and cry off from the wedding if she did not wish to go through with it, even if it was the very night before the ceremony. It would have been a seven-day wonder, but she could have emerged with her reputation intact, more or less.

Isabella had pledged her undying love for Philip with an eloquence no man could have resisted. She had begged him to take her to Scotland and marry her. But what if she merely had been suffering from bridal nerves, and he had taken advantage of her momentary confusion to steal her away because he wanted to believe that his brother's lovely fiancée might in truth prefer him to Adam.

She was desperate and confused, but as her childhood friend and future brother-in-law, he should have encouraged her to withdraw from the betrothal with some degree of honor instead of taking her off with him before she could change her mind.

Or, more to the point, he should have encouraged her to marry the better man by extolling his brother's superior qualities. It was what any man of honor would have done.

Philip could not marry her now, much as he wanted to. She would grow to despise him if he did. All the world would despise him -- Isabella, his father, all the influential members of Parliament and the ornaments of society who had gathered at St. James's Church for Isabella's wedding to the glorious war hero only to find that the bride had been ignominiously stolen away.

"Take Isabella back to London with you," he said to Adam. "You and Miss Randall between you can make up some tale. Make me the villain of the piece. Say I took her against her will. Say . . . I care not what you say as long as you minimize the damage to her reputation."

"Oh, I see. You are running away from the consequences of your actions," Adam said.

"No. I am running toward them," Philip said. "It is inadequate I know, but tell Isabella I regret all this. Tell her . . . tell her I wish her well."

"See here! You are not going to put a period to your existence, are you? For if you are entertaining any such ridiculous notion -- "

"Spare me your expressions of brotherly concern," Philip said wryly. "We both know I haven't the courage to put a bullet through my brain."

"Where is he? What have you done with him?" Isabella Grimsby cried hysterically when she burst into the parlor to find Adam its sole occupant. Her clothing was disheveled. Her hair was hanging in damp wisps below her crushed bonnet.

Isabella ran to Adam and pounded his chest with her fists. He caught her elbows to hold her away from him.

"Hardly! He has run away," he said bitterly. "And, might I add, I am not surprised. It follows a familiar pattern."

"Here, now, Isabella," Marian said, entering the room at that moment and rushing forward to catch her shoulders when she would have flown at Adam's eyes with her nails. She looked daggers at Adam, who merely raised a sardonic eyebrow at her. "Calm yourself."

"Run away," Isabella repeated dully. She sat down abruptly on a chair. "No. He could not have done such a thing to me."

"Oh, good lord," Adam said, rolling his eyes at Marian, who was now fussing over her half sister. "If she is going off in a swoon like some silly drama queen, I will wait for you in the carriage."

She did not want to look at Marian. She did not want to look at him. They had ruined everything. And Philip -- his desertion had been the worst betrayal of all.

At that moment, Isabella's tender, hope-filled heart turned to stone and her limbs became steady.

She would have to face the disgrace alone. She might as well begin the way she meant to go on.

Captain Philip Lyonbridge had been surprised and disappointed to learn that Miss Isabella Grimsby-- still unmarried, for he had made inquiries almost before his ship touched shore in England -- was not in London with the rest of the world, celebrating the defeat of Napoleon at a succession of lavish entertainments.

He had somehow managed in the two years of hell since he had gone off to war to return to London a hero, and he found his triumphant homecoming decidedly flat without the worshipful welcome he had expected from the girl he so regretfully left behind.

Instead, he learned that Isabella was cooling her heels in Derbyshire, caring for her half sister Marian's child while Philip's brother, Adam, and his new wife, the aforementioned half sister, went on a peace-keeping assignment to Scotland with Adam's regiment.

Isabella? Missing the many fetes honoring the crowned heads of Europe in the wake of Napoleon's defeat in order to play nursemaid to another woman's child in the country? He could not imagine such a thing.

However, it was probably just as well. The first time he saw Isabella after their long separation, he did not want to be surrounded by a gaggle of silly chits making sheep's eyes at him in the middle of London. They had practically knocked him down in their zeal to be presented to the war hero whose name was on everyone's lips and who, thanks to Philip's father, had been the subject of a series of thrilling stories in the newspapers.

Philip's father, Lord Revington, had been busy puffing him off to Society's most eligible young ladies. Scores of them had met his carriage when he arrived in London to make his report to Whitehall. And they had been waiting -- with their mothers -- when he emerged from his meeting. Philip was the heir to a title and fortune, and therefore a valuable commodity on the marriage market. His recent celebrity as a war hero and spy who had infiltrated the French camp and provided his superiors with information that enabled them to win several crucial battles gave him an irresistible cachet, apparently.

It was no coincidence that many of these young ladies had fathers or grandfathers who were powerful members of Lord Liverpool's Government. Above all things, his father wanted a distinguished political career for Philip so he could follow in his own footsteps as a powerful and influential member of the House of Lords. The first step to that, of course, was to marry well.

Philip, attired in his dress uniform for his meeting at Whitehall, gave his gleeful father a repressive look as he bowed to the fair flower now being introduced to him. He forgot her name a moment after his father pronounced it.

Philip imagined her the way he did while he was at war, fighting for his life -- or risking his life to spy for his country. When there was nothing to eat, when he knew that his life could end in a moment if his imposture was discovered, she would come to him.

In his imagination, he would interrupt Isabella as she was picking flowers in a formal rose garden. She would be wearing a lacy white dress with a pretty straw hat trimmed in pink ribbons to protect her delicate face and glossy dark curls from the sun. Dainty white lace gloves would cover her slim, graceful hands. And she would look up, smile and hold her arms out wide.

Philip should not have let his brother intimidate him. He often wondered what would have happened if he had insisted upon marrying Isabella that fateful day instead of going blithely off to war to prove himself worthy of her.

Lord, what an idiot he had been! War was far from glorious, and he hardly deserved all the praise that was being piled on his head for his bravery.

He did what he had done to survive. He did it because if he hadn't, he might never see Isabella again. Now the war was over, and he was ready to resign his commission, marry Isabella and forget the whole wretched experience.

The Honorable Philip Lyonbridge, man about town, would hardly have the cachet of Captain Philip Lyonbridge, war hero. Resign his commission and his worth on the marriage market would plummet.

Philip's jaws hurt from smiling dutifully at all the little debutantes. Enough was enough.

"You cannot leave town as soon as you have arrived," Lord Revington snapped when Philip announced his intention of doing just that as the two of them were about to enter his lordship's carriage for the ride to Lord Revington's town house.

"I have reported my activities to Whitehall," Philip said. "As far as I am concerned, my duty here is over. I am for Derbyshire."

"Very well, boy," he said as he patted Philip on the shoulder. "I understand. You need a period of rustication in the country. We will go there at once."

It was unlike Lord Revington to revise his plans to accommodate anyone's wishes save his own.

No matter. Both his father's primary estate and his brother's small house, where Isabella was residing with his brother's step-son, were in Derbyshire, and that is where Philip most wished to be at the moment.

Poor Isabella. Stuck out in the country with a child for company. She must be bored silly.

"Miss Grimsby is not at home to visitors?" Philip repeated in disbelief to the housekeeper. "Are you certain? You did give her my card, did you not?"

"I am certain, sir. There is no mistake," the middle-aged woman said as she looked down at her hands.

Of the child, he had an impression merely of a thatch of dark hair and running legs. The boy was moving so fast he could not have gotten a clear look even if he had not been straining for a glimpse of Isabella beyond the gloom of the front door.

Suddenly she was there, and Philip found his throat so dry for a moment that he could not say a word. His eyes drank in the sight of her, even though she was frowning at him. The boy turned and buried his face in her skirt. She put her hand protectively on the back of his head.

The housekeeper, after giving Philip an anxious look, grasped the boy by the hand and quickly spirited him away. Philip took the opportunity to sidle through the door and block Isabella's retreat from the doorway.

"What are you doing here, Philip?" Isabella asked. She crossed her arms over her chest and looked annoyed.

"Are you not a little glad to see me, my dear?" he said with an ingratiating smile.

"Are there not enough silly chits vying for your favor in London that you must come to Derbyshire in search of more?" she asked. "My congratulations. The newspapers are full of your conquests, Captain Lyonbridge."

Ah. So that was it. She had read the nonsense being printed in the newspapers about him and was jealous of his supposed attentions to the young ladies who had been eager to welcome the gallant hero home.

"Come, Isabella, we can deal more comfortably together than this," he said softly.

She gave him a hard thump on the chest of his uniform and favored him with a look of injury when her hand was scraped on one of the medals pinned there.

Philip suffered a moment of embarrassment at his vanity in wearing all of his decorations to pay a simple call in the country, but he had wanted to impress her with his magnificence.

"I will thank you not to attempt to maul me in this undignified fashion," she said harshly.

"Maul you," he exclaimed. "Oh, do forgive me, Miss Grimsby. I had assumed you would be glad to see me."

"Had you?" she said with one uplifted eyebrow. "And why should you assume that? The last time I saw you, you were swearing eternal devotion. And then I learned you had run off to war to play at soldiering."

Her dark curls were confined in a severe chignon that made her look more mature than the girl he remembered, and her muslin gown in a green print, though attractive, was obviously not the work of a modiste of the first stare. Her figure, instead of being almost boyishly slim, was now more womanly.

But she was still beautiful, for all that. Her face was delicately flushed with color, and her dark eyes were bright with anger.

"How dare you saunter into this house as if you expect me to fall into your arms?" she demanded.

Philip sighed. He very much wanted her to forgive him, so he started to kneel at her feet in the hope that it would make her laugh.

He could see her lips twitch, and he was encouraged to believe that this silliness might produce the desired result.

It was the prerogative of the caller to take his leave and put an end to the visit, not the hostess. The Isabella of old would never have been guilty of such a breach of good manners.

"It is time for Jamie to take his nap, and he will not do so while there is a visitor in the house."

"Very well, Miss Grimsby," Philip said, deeply hurt, as he sketched her an ironic little bow. "I will take my leave of you. Do forgive the intrusion."

"Fare you well, Captain Lyonbridge," she said, but she could not quite meet his eyes. "It would be best if you did not come here again."

So much for the hero's triumphant return, he thought as he mounted his horse and set out for his father's estate nearby.

So much for his vanity in thinking Isabella Grimsby had remained unmarried for his sake.

Leaving her to the care of his brother and her bossy half sister that day on the London road was the hardest thing Philip had ever done.

The thought of Isabella waiting for him at home had been all that sustained him during those long days of fear and deprivation.

Now it seemed he had to forget the way she once melted in his arms, just as she, apparently, had forgotten that she once loved him.

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