Somewhere on the London-Eton road, April 1799

“Standish? Can you hear me, lad? Open your eyes!”

Ignoring the stranger’s harsh-voiced urging, William Hastings kept his eyes resolutely shut.

Opening them would only encourage the pain hovering on the edge of his consciousness to explode into full-blown agony, and his head already felt split in two. Besides, why would he obey someone who couldn’t even get his title correct? He was Viscount Rydell, the heir. Father was the Marquess of Standish.

“Standish?” the man repeated, accompanying his words with a gentle shake.

“Do not t...touch him!” interrupted a tear-choked feminine voice. “And stop calling him that.”

“Forgive me, my lady, but the fact is...”

“The fact is, sir, you are n...needed elsewhere. I will remain with Lord Rydell.”

“All right, all right,” the man said gruffly, his boots crunching loudly on the ground as he strode away.

“William?” the woman again, nearer this time. “Come on now, darling, wake up. Please, please, wake up.”

Slowly, carefully, his head was shifted onto a soft lap and his thick hair smoothed back from his forehead, yet the supremely comforting and familiar gesture from his childhood felt wrong, too. His mother was rounder than he remembered and smelled of rosewater rather than lemon.

Uneasily, he inched an eyelid open and discovered huge, glistening brown eyes staring anxiously back at him. No, not his mother, but her oldest and dearest friend Jane Forsyth, Countess of Westleigh.

“Aunt Jane?” he mumbled, thoroughly disorientated. “What is going on?”

“Oh, thank heavens,” she said, tears beginning to spill down her cheeks. “Hush now and rest, sweetheart, there was ah...an…accident. But you are going to be just fine.”

William froze as every instinct he possessed cried foul at the blatant lie. Grown men of fourteen weren’t cosseted like they were still in leading strings when everything was just fine.

Bracing his hands on the rocky, muddied ground, he attempted to sit up. He immediately regretted the action when his head swam and stomach threatened to unleash its contents. Firmly pressing a fist to his lips and swallowing hard, he slowly lifted his head and pinned her with a gaze. “I don’t believe you.”

“William...”

“Tell me the truth,” he said, trying to sound firm and manly instead of terrified. “What happened?”

Soft-hearted Aunt Jane crumpled immediately. “The innkeeper held us up for a half hour after you left. By the time we got here...I only saw them fleeing.”

Them?

Abruptly, images pounded through his mind. Two demi-masked, black-caped highwaymen appearing out of the trees, firing pistols in the air and frightening the horses. Mama screaming, Father grabbing her hand as the carriage jerked and shook, and luggage flew in all directions. Wheels crunching and snapping as they plunged over a small bank and into a freshly tilled field. The door wrenching open. Cruel hands ignoring his parents’ pleas, dragging him out and away from them. Shouting. Far too much shouting, and more screaming. Cold silver eyes glittering with malice, a Frenchman who reveled in chaos and terror. Mocking laughter and an Englishman’s whisper of...vengeance? Something hard slamming into the side of his head. Utter blackness.

“Aunt Jane,” he whispered, his stomach churning violently again. “Where are Father and Mama?”

Torment aged her elegant blonde prettiness before his eyes, and she began to sob as she rocked back and forth.

Horrified, William tried to scramble to his feet, but his gangly limbs were even more uncoordinated than usual, and embarrassingly he fell backward onto his behind like a toddler who hadn’t yet learned to walk properly. Wincing at the burning scrape of broken rocks, he eventually hauled himself up and staggered away from Lady Westleigh. Several feet away, tall, imposing Uncle Andrew stood next to a covered cart and issued orders to grave-faced men. Further along, his longtime friends Gregory and Stephen were determinedly preventing their precocious little cousin Samantha from leaving the family carriage to explore, but he continued past them all.

Across the road a flash of black caught his eye, and a chill raced down his spine at the sight of half a carriage wheel turning in the crisp spring breeze. Teeth chattering, he lurched down the bank, skidding and sliding in the freshly churned mud.

What greeted him at the bottom would remain imprinted in his memory forever.

A haggard-faced, dark-haired man, cradling a limp auburn-haired woman against his massive chest. And blood. So much blood the air was heavy with the metallic scent as it soaked their clothing, draining and pooling on the rough, lumpy ground beside them.

“Father!” he screamed, falling to his knees. “Mama!”

As if caught in treacle, Richard Hastings, Marquess of Standish, lifted his head and dark blue eyes stared vacantly into the distance.

“My Sophia,” he said hoarsely, a single tear inching its way down his usually emotionless face. “Gone.”

“No! She’s just swooned, that’s all. Mama,” William pleaded, taking her pale, delicate hands and chafing them frantically, “Wake up! A doctor will surely be here any minute and everything will be all right. Just hold on!”

Lord Standish shook his head, but the movement made him cough and a dark stream of blood trickled from the side of his mouth onto his formerly snow-white cravat.

“Too late, son, and it’s my...fault. Didn’t... protect her. Should have. Man’s duty...to protect women. Thought I knew it all...how to defeat evil. But I failed. Especially your mother. I failed her...completely.”

“How can you say that?” William choked out through the giant boulder now resting in this throat. “You loved Mama, I know you did!”

“Yes. And look...what happened. I couldn’t think in the crisis. Couldn’t act. She tried to save me. Threw herself... in front of a goddamned bullet. Your mother is dead... because I was the worst of fools. So much less than I should have been.”

“Father, no...”

“Be quiet...and listen, boy. Swear to me...” Lord Standish paused, and a heavy, gurgling sigh escaped his mouth. More blood flowed, and his skin took on a frightening gray tinge.

“What do you want? I’ll do anything! Please!”

“Swear you won’t... make the same mistakes as me. Emotion makes you…vulnerable. Enemies use it against you. Duty, always. Nothing more. No matter what...” He trailed off, his head lolling sideways as his breaths became shorter and shallower.

Too soon, they stopped altogether.

Shuddering, nearly numb with grief and so cold he didn’t think he’d ever be warm again, William leaned forward and gently closed his father’s sightless eyes. Then he sat back, bowed his head and crossed himself.

“I swear.”