Its release day! A Folly of Youth is now available!

Its release day for A Folly of Youth! You can get it at Amazon (read for free if you are a KU subscriber!) but before you go–hope you enjoy this excerpt! A little drabble from the substory, wherein Saye does his darnedest to make Lilly love him!

Saye stood in the Upper Rooms with Darcy—who was ill-humoured, having been made to watch some young bucks make love to Lady Cassandra all night long—observing the exquisite Miss Goddard as she stood with her cousin Mrs Drummond-Burrell. Saye detested Mrs Drummond-Burrell, and nearly everyone related to her, but her society would be borne for the sake of his future wife.

“Like a delectable flummery, is she not?” Saye nearly licked his lips in anticipation of what he would say to Miss Goddard while they danced.

“A flummery?” Darcy gave him a look. “I do not imagine most ladies wish to hear such a backwards compliment as that.”

“Hear me, Darcy,” said Saye. “All ladies are flummery whether they want to know it or not. Best had after a proper dinner, and yet too much will give you indigestion. But enough of that! No time for me to teach you now. I must be off to my lady.”

So saying, he pushed his cousin to the side so that he could pass him. The Upper Rooms tonight were filled, and all about him were sweating, heaving masses of people—but Saye would not sweat, nor would he heave. He moved with aplomb, cool and calm, ever the master of his fate.

She understood his approach, glancing over her shoulder several times as he made his way through the crowd to her. He permitted himself a half-smirk, anticipating her delight, her eagerness to please him. Mrs Drummond-Burrell, pasty puss that she was, gave him a sour look, but likely that was because she could not have him herself.

He arrived at her and bowed, accepting her curtsey in reply. For a moment, he said nothing, standing beside her and allowing his eyes to wander over the crowd. Many observed him with Miss Goddard, no doubt wondering what he was about, while others pretended not to look. Ah, but the anticipation was delightful!

“Did you want something?” Miss Goddard asked him.

Impatient girl! “I suppose you could say I do.”

“What is it?” She smiled prettily.

Saye laughed. “We are here at the assembly rooms, so I suppose we must dance.”

Miss Goddard reached up, toying with the curl that brushed her shoulder. “Forgive me, but I am not dancing tonight.”

“I will dance with you if you require a partner,” said Mrs Drummond-Burrell.

He ignored her. As if he would dance with a matron! Saye leant towards Miss Goddard. “Hard to get, hm? You would not be the first to try it to earn my attention.”

“I am not trying to do anything.” Raising her fan, she smiled behind it. “I do not dance with rakes, and Bath seems to have nothing but.”

“You wound me,” he said. “I am hardly a rake.”

“Forgive me, sir, but if half the gossip I hear of you is correct, you are most decidedly a rake.”

He gave a theatrical gasp. “The ton is full of liars.”

“Would someone who is not a rake carry a list of wife candidates on his person? Ladies who had been rated like horseflesh at Tattersall’s?” She gave him an eminently alluring frown over her fan.

“What do you know about my list?”

“Ah! So you do not deny it?”

“I have no wish to deny it.”

“All of Bath is in a state of agitation wondering who is on the list,” said Mrs Drummond-Burrell. “As well as how you have ranked them.”

“Only the bonniest of the bon ton,” he informed Miss Goddard. “England’s finest roses, in full bloom.”

Miss Goddard crossed her arms, fan included, in front of her chest and levelled a serious look at him. Her eyes were the blue of aquamarines, and her neck, so creamy and pale!—delicious flummery indeed. For a moment, he imagined kissing it but recollected himself—she will surely slap you for that!—and stopped. Not that he minded being slapped, but not so early on in their acquaintance.

“I hear you began with twenty and now have nine.”

“I began with thirty and am down to four,” he said. Then he considered a moment. He had replaced the engaged Miss Dillard with Lady Susannah Fairchild, who had kept him waiting for nearly half an hour when he called on her. Would this be his life? Eternally pacing the vestibules of London, waiting for her to arrive? “Make that three. But pray do not distress yourself that you are not among them.”

“I am not?” she asked with mock astonishment. “My lord! I am ruined with dismay.”

He chuckled. “I did not know you when I made my list, which I begin to fear makes the entire exercise a farce. Indeed, I think I shall add you to the list straightaway when I am home.”

“I pray you would not.”

He stared at her a moment. Was not that her object in this conversation? To earn her spot? “I assure you, you are twenties all across.”

“I have no idea what you mean, but I am certain I do not want to know. In any case, I have no intention of marrying. Your list is safe from me!” She smiled again as she said it and dashed if she did not appear in earnest.

“Not marry?” He gave her a horrified frown. “Do not you wish for the respectability of a married lady? How will you live?”

“From my fortune,” she said. “I have above thirty thousand, you know.”

Damn! He had not known it was so much. He had been told it was twenty.

“One can survive on that, I suppose.” He shrugged. “What about children?”

She lowered her voice. “I must confess, I do not prefer them.”

“They are a rather sloppy, unappealing bunch, I will own. However, most necessary unless a man intends to live forever.”

“Necessary for you,” she said. “You have the earldom to consider. I have only to leave money here and there when I die, and I shall be fondly remembered for it by my appreciative nieces and nephews.”

“You are an odd woman.”

“I am as yet too young to be a proper eccentric,” she told him. “But the years and encroaching spinsterhood shall do me well, I think.”

This made him laugh. What a notion! Someone as lovely as Miss Goddard could never be an eccentric. This was a farce; he was certain of it. She wished to increase his ardour by spouting these silly little notions at him.

“You.” He shook his finger at her. “What ideas have come! But I shall not hear you—you are a handsome girl and must wish, above all things, to find yourself a good match.”

“No, I most surely do not.”

“You do.”

She shook her head firmly, making her curls shake. “I do not, and in any case, I can most heartily inform you that I do not wish to partake in some rake’s reform.”

Mrs Drummond-Burrell had left them and beckoned to her from a short distance away. Miss Goddard turned as if to move towards her.

He narrowed his eyes, regarding her for a moment. “Are you trying to make me fall in love with you?”

She laughed and replied coolly, “Not even a little bit.” And with that, she left him.