It seemed to Willa as if she’d entered a theater after missing the first two acts of a melodrama.

Before her stood the brave heroine, amidst a circle of uncaring aristocrats. This would be the scene in which the hapless, seduced maid denounces the evil squire for taking her virginity and getting her with child.

That speech was typically capped by the squire’s rejection, leading in Act Five to the heroine’s tragic plunge from a high tower, cliff, or church steeple.

But in this scene the evil squire was Alaric, and he was holding out his hand. He needed her. Her heart was pounding in her chest, even though there was no logical reason she should be so thrilled by the expression in his eyes.

“Lady Knowe, Your Grace,” she said, dropping a curtsy. Then she came a few steps closer and murmured, “Lord Alaric.” He promptly reached down, caught up her hand, and held it to his lips.

Willa felt herself turning pink. The duke was looking at them, his eyes speculative, but unsurprised. Lady Knowe outright winked at her.

“I cannot and will not marry you, Miss Larkin,” Alaric stated. “I did not seduce you, or even spend time with you. I do not know you, and you are clearly disturbed.”

Marriage? Willa’s guess at melodrama seemed correct; the state of affairs was not as simple as an enthusiastic pilgrimage to Lord Wilde’s birthplace.

Alaric would never act in a shabby way toward a woman. For a fleeting moment, Willa thought about how much her opinion of him had changed since they’d met. He was no longer Lord Wilde, the famous explorer.

He was Alaric. Alaric of the honorable eyes and hungry kisses.

“Even as you say that, I just love you more,” Prudence breathed, moving a step toward Alaric. Her voice dropped. “Think of me as your spaniel.”

Goodness.

Hadn’t Miss Larkin noticed the object of her devotion was pressing kiss after kiss on another woman’s fingers?

It seemed not. Willa withdrew her hand; it was awkward to stand there and be theatrically kissed when the designated audience was paying no attention.

“The more you beat me, the more I will fawn on you,” Miss Larkin said in a panting voice.

Ugh.

Willa instinctively moved closer to Alaric, her arm brushing his. She caught Miss Larkin’s eye and gave her a direct stare that she hoped would clarify that there was to be no “beating” in Willa’s presence.

Nor fawning either, to be frank.

“Lord Alaric, won’t you introduce me?” she asked.

“Please forgive me,” Alaric said. “Willa, my love, this is Miss Prudence Larkin, whom I knew exceedingly briefly when she was a young girl in Africa and her father, a missionary, showed me hospitality. We have just learned that she traveled to London some time ago, and is the author of that wretched play.”

All signs of fawning love fell from the playwright’s face. “My play is not wretched!” she snapped. “It has been widely proclaimed as brilliant!”

Alaric’s adjective had certainly been less than tactful, though most people would agree that he had reason to be annoyed. “I must congratulate you on your extraordinary success, Miss Larkin,” Willa said. “I have not been lucky enough to see the production myself, but it is certainly popular.”

Miss Larkin glanced at her. “Yes, well, the tickets have been sold ahead for months. I suppose I could find you a ticket or two if you happen to be in London.”

That was so extraordinarily rude that Willa bit back a smile and Lady Knowe actually guffawed.

Ignoring them, the playwright took a step toward Alaric, her hands clasped before her. “Spurn me, strike me, neglect me, lose me,” she said in a low, broken voice. “Only give me leave, unworthy as I am, to follow you.”

Oh, for goodness’ sake.

“That sounds awfully familiar,” Lady Knowe muttered.

“Because the speech was written by Shakespeare,” Willa pointed out. “It first appeared in A Midsummer Night’s Dream, as did most of her lines since I entered the room.”

“What worser place can I beg in your life than to be used as you use your dog?” Miss Larkin cried, her voice rising feverishly. She swayed and Willa had a horrible sense that she was about to fall to her knees. “I am sick when I—”

“I am betrothed to Miss Wilhelmina Everett Ffynche,” Alaric said, cutting her off.

Willa let out an involuntary gasp. Lady Knowe broke into another bellow of laughter, and even the duke smiled.

“Miss Larkin, this is not a stage, nor are you in a Shakespeare play,” Alaric continued. “I’m afraid I must ask you to leave.”

The lady’s eyes grew round. She slapped her hands to her cheeks, falling back a step.

Overacting, Willa thought unsympathetically. What could you expect from someone who adopted Shakespeare’s wilder lines for her own? If Willa remembered correctly, this particular character, Helena, was drugged with a love potion when she said those foolish things.

Shakespeare was a good example of why Willa disliked fiction. Helena ran around on stage abasing herself. There was enough of that in real life.

“I expect this is a shock,” she said.

A large tear rolled down Miss Larkin’s cheek. “Verily, it breaks me. I think I will die again.”

She was a terrible actress. Perhaps she was a brilliant playwright, but Willa was beginning to have suspicions about that too. The cannibal stew pot had sounded dubious, and it could be that Wilde in Love was utter rubbish.

Perhaps even plagiarized rubbish.

“Dying is not allowed in Lindow Castle,” Lady Knowe said. She wasn’t laughing anymore; instead she looked sympathetic.

Alaric’s aunt was eccentric, brusque, and funny, but Willa was also starting to think that she was one of the kindest people she’d ever met.

“You proposed marriage to this woman before you knew that I still lived,” Miss Larkin gulped. “You will change your mind because you loved me first, and I know you still love me. I saw how many times you glanced at me across the table in Africa. I’ve read every one of your books!”

“What does that have to do with anything?” Lady Knowe asked.

Alaric had the feeling that he was caught in a nightmare. Willa was the only stable fulcrum of his world.

“Alaric left clues for me in his books,” Prudence cried. Eerily, that sweet smile broke over her face again. “As I read his lines over and over, I came to see that he spoke to me through the pages.”

“Why would I be speaking to you if I believed you dead?” Alaric asked.

“Love is eternal,” Prudence explained. “You were talking to my soul, little knowing that I had survived the tempest.”

“Alaric and I are betrothed,” Willa said, putting a hint of outrage in her voice. “It is presumptuous, not to mention inaccurate, to suggest that my fiancé might fall out of love with me and marry you. Lord Alaric is mine,” she concluded, nudging him with her elbow.

“And she is mine,” Alaric said, taking her cue. “Miss Ffynche is mine.”

Prudence’s large eyes moved from one to the other. “My heart is a wasteland,” she rasped, as tears began to flow down her cheeks.

“Oh, for goodness’ sake,” Lady Knowe said, moving forward. She towered over Prudence like a pine tree. “Come along, my dear.”

“Where are you taking her?” the duke asked.

“We can’t simply throw her out of the castle,” his sister said.

“We could send her to the village and drop her at the parsonage,” the duke suggested. “Perhaps the vicar can remind her of the prevailing moral principles governing relations between men and women. Those followed by Puritans and all people of good taste.”

Prudence broke into louder sobs.

“Prism will find her a bedchamber, and she can remain here while she decides what to do next,” Lady Knowe said.

Alaric was about to disagree—there was something about Prudence Larkin that he truly disliked—but it struck him that as long as Prudence was in the castle …

He and Willa would have to pretend to be engaged.

“I don’t mind,” he said.

“Two days,” His Grace said, meeting Alaric’s eyes. His father had a way of smiling without moving his face. He was smiling now, even as he regarded Alaric with perfect sobriety. “Miss Larkin may remain here for two days, during which time you must decide what to do with her.”

“Keep me!” Prudence wailed. “Keep me because I am yours!”

Lady Knowe pushed a handkerchief into her hand. “If you haven’t anything sensible to say, keep silent,” she told her, not unkindly.

“I l-l-love—”

“As do I,” Willa said, cutting her off. “I love Alaric, and he is mine, Miss Larkin. I will not give him to anyone. You must come to terms with that fact.”

For the first time Prudence seemed to be struck dumb. She stared at Willa as if she were a burning bush.

Willa gazed calmly back.

To Alaric, Willa was a study in clear lines: patrician nose, high cheekbones, a Cupid’s bow of a mouth. In contrast, Prudence had a round cheek, soft jaw, her blurred features underscored by the tears dripping from her cheeks and creating dark splashes on her gray dress.

“Why her?” Prudence whispered. “Why her, why not me?”

“I don’t even know you,” Alaric said, allowing astonishment to leak into his tone. “You were a tiresome fourteen-year-old when I first met you, Prudence, and you will have to accept that there was, and is, absolutely nothing between us.”

Prudence started weeping again.

“She is bedazzled,” Willa observed.

“I had nothing to do with that bedazzling,” Alaric said. “Her father was living in a house that wasn’t much bigger than a hut; it was hot as blazes; we couldn’t bathe in the river thanks to crocodiles. There was nothing dazzling about me.”

“However it happened, it has,” Lady Knowe said, and led Prudence away, the young woman’s shoulders shaking with sobs.

Alaric did not feel a shred of guilt. Prudence had written the idiotic play that was endangering his chance to marry Willa. She was at least partly responsible for the hordes of women who were stripping his flowerbeds and stealing his bricks.

“There seems to be a great deal of drama surrounding Miss Larkin,” Willa said, as the door closed behind Lady Knowe. “She certainly knows her Shakespeare.”

“Will you pretend to be my betrothed for a few more days, just until we work out what to do with Miss Larkin?” Alaric asked.

The duke bowed before Willa could respond. “If you’ll forgive me, I should inform Her Grace that we will be entertaining another guest.”

“Prudence Larkin can scarcely join us at the table, given her delusions,” Alaric said.

“In fact, I believe she ought to do just that,” His Grace said. “Rumors are far more pernicious than discovering the lachrymose daughter of a missionary at the table. What’s more, given enough contact with you, she might well drop her infatuation.”

Alaric grinned at his father. “Questioning my desirableness, are you?”

“Miss Larkin’s command of logic is debatable,” his father said dryly, “but propinquity will inevitably have an effect.”

When he’d gone, Alaric stepped forward and wrapped his arms around Willa.

“I will pretend to be engaged to you,” Willa said, not pushing him away. “But that doesn’t mean that I agree to marry you. Once Miss Larkin leaves, or comes to her senses, we are no longer betrothed.”

Alaric nodded. He’d accept that for the time being.

It was a step better than friends, because betrothed people could kiss. Did kiss. “We should practice intimacy so as to be convincing,” he suggested.

Willa pushed him away, her mouth curving up. “I think we shall have no problem with that.”