PROLOGUE: The Hedge

The carriage should not have stopped.

Its polished wheels had been rolling smoothly through the park until a glimmer of white broke the rhythm of shadows and grass. The coachman pulled the horses up short, muttering under his breath. A gentleman stepped down, the faint crunch of gravel swallowed by the hush of late afternoon.

Something pale lay half-hidden in the hedge.

At first glance, it might have been linen caught in a branch, or a discarded wrap left by some careless promenader. But as he approached, the shape resolved into a woman lying still among the leaves.

Her clothing made no sense. The white coat that flared from her waist was much too clean, and beneath it, a narrow skirt of some charcoal-colored fabric clung above her knees instead of flowing to the ground as it should. Her bodice was some manner of gray and white striped fabric that fastened with small white buttons, the likes he’d never seen. Most astonishingly, her feet were bare, with gold-tipped toes.

He knelt. The woman’s skin was warm, her pulse steady, though her breath came shallowly. A breeze stirred the hedge, carrying a scent unlike any he knew, ozone and smoke, like the air after lightning.

“Madam?” he said quietly.

No answer. Only the faint rhythm of life beneath his fingertips.

For a long moment, he hesitated. To leave her here was unthinkable. To summon help might create questions without answers. He brushed an unruly curl of auburn hair from her cheek and felt an unexpected tug of curiosity. No, of responsibility. If she died here, society would call it a misadventure. He would know it was negligence.

He gathered her carefully into his arms. The fabric of her coat was impossibly smooth, cool, even in the warmth of her body. Something about her weight, her stillness, felt unreal, as though she had been placed here by accident.

Or, as Honoria would most likely say, by creative design.

As he turned back toward the waiting carriage, the sun caught the edge of the hedge and glinted faintly, as if a thread of light lingered there. Then it was gone.

He laid the woman across the seat, signaled the driver, and climbed in opposite her. For a moment, he simply watched the rise and fall of her breath steady against the rhythm of the wheels.

“Well,” he murmured under his breath, a trace of irony curling his voice, “you’ve chosen a peculiar place for a nap.”

The carriage rolled on, the sound of hooves fading into the evening. Behind them, the hedge stood perfectly still, the secrets held within its branches never to be known.

━━━━༻❁༺━━━━

CHAPTER ONE: The Genius and the Jackass

If the inscription Thornebridge College for Women of Exceptional Intellect, carved over the entrance of the massive four-story Art Deco building — located half a mile from Thornebridge Manor (home of the eccentric Thornebridge family and namesake of Thornebridge, Delaware), and one mile north of the main campus of Thornebridge University — could be easily overlooked, the modern signage declaring it the Thornebridge Department of Applied Sciences was impossible to miss.

While the exterior was undeniably imbued with the geometric elegance that characterized the era, the interior was frightfully modern. Even faintly Mad Scientist 2075, once one got past the long, sterile, industrial halls and stepped into the Temporal Physics Lab, home of the soon-to-be world-famous ChronoSpire.

Speaking of the ChronoSpire, it was difficult to locate the humans amidst the massive particle accelerator and the computers that controlled it. However, there were humans, and there had to be. Nothing happened in this room that wasn’t cross-checked with computer findings before being carefully documented and analyzed. Usually by one specific human: the petite redhead with her bottom in the air as she wiped a lower grid with a lint-free cloth.

Inspecting her handiwork, Dr. Madison Clarke had exactly three things on her mind: the paradox loop equation blinking on her monitor, the half-eaten protein bar stuck to her notes, and the fact that Gregory Harlan was, once again, taking credit for her work.

The lab was quiet, except for the low hum of the particle accelerator prototype and the occasional clack of black pumps against tile. If Maddie paced, it was only to ward off boredom. Awaiting test results from her latest input wasn’t the most invigorating activity. Checking the computer screen yet again, she pushed her glasses up the bridge of her nose, shoved a couple of stray locks of auburn hair back into her messy updo, and looked for the pen that should have been in its usual place—tucked neatly behind her right ear. Her lab coat flared slightly over her gray pinstripe button-down and charcoal pencil skirt as she moved. Both were practical, unglamorous, and chosen specifically to avoid Gregory’s never-ending comments about “dressing for attention” that he couldn’t keep to himself.

He’d made one earlier, of course, right before leaving for the faculty dinner without her.

“You’ll want to clean up before the symposium,” he’d said, gesturing vaguely at her face. “You’ve got that flushed look again. It’s distracting.”

She hadn’t responded.

Silence was more effective than sarcasm, at least where her fiancé was involved.

Dr. Gregory Harlan, astrophysicist, was thirty-five, tenured, and smug in the way only a man who’d never been challenged could be. He wore his authority like cologne: thick, cloying, and impossible to ignore. Maddie had once admired him. Now she tolerated him. Barely.

He’d proposed six months ago in the physics lounge, over lukewarm coffee and a PowerPoint slide titled Joint Publication Strategy. She’d said yes because it was easier than saying no. Easier than explaining that she didn’t want to be a footnote in someone else’s career.

Now, she was alone in the lab, debugging a simulation he’d presented as his own. The tapes from the lab’s CCTV, safely stored in a bank vault in town, said otherwise. Not only that, but the records in “Pete’s” computer logs would also support who’d logged in and done the work. Fortunately, the program was such that login identities couldn’t be changed. Another quirk in her favor, Gregory was too arrogant to consider that technology as low as CCTV and computer logins would give lie to his claims.

Well, Dr. Gregory Harlan would soon discover just how much of a jackass he really was.

He thought she was still the awkward prodigy he’d first met in his physics class ten years ago. The one who started college as a fifteen-year-old senior on an advanced trajectory and entered the M.S. program at sixteen as his first master’s advisee.

While the esteemed Dr. Harlan never crossed the line while he was her advisor, he’d used her admiration for him to seduce her to his bed three years later when she entered the doctoral program under another advisor. He’d been feathering his academic nest on her accomplishments ever since.

She’d discovered that when she’d done the one thing Greg never expected her to do: take time out of her busy schedule to finally watch the videos of his lectures at the various symposia and conferences over the past six years. The ones that got him all the accolades and grant money. The lectures where he supposedly shared credit with his brilliant fiancée. Right. She’d discovered he’d claimed her work as his own instead.

All of that was about to change. Once the video was posted for this final symposium, she would have everything she needed. The package she’d spent the last year compiling would find its way to the proper hands, and the unpleasant task of reclaiming her work and her life would begin. That Gregory would no longer be involved in that went without saying. Until then, she had a part to play.

Rising to her feet, Maddie walked over to the computer to check the latest results of the impossible equation she’d fed the system half an hour ago. She wasn’t expecting much. Common sense said her hypothesis would never work. It couldn’t. She knew that, but she had to try.

Even if that meant recording another failure for posterity. That was what science was all about. Abysmal failures and soaring successes. While she wished she could say she’d experienced both in equal numbers, she couldn’t. But, unlike the disappointments, those rare triumphs lasted. Especially in her field.

Speaking of quantum physics, the paradox loop was elegant. Too elegant. A recursive equation designed to test temporal consistency, it shouldn’t have worked…But it did.

Maddie stared at the screen, heart thudding.

She reached for the console.

The machine whined.

Lights flickered.

And the world went blank.

━━━━༻❁༺━━━━

CHAPTER TWO: The Incident Report

The hum of the ChronoSpire had long since stopped, but the air still crackled faintly with ozone when Gregory Harlan unlocked the lab door.

He hesitated at the threshold, every nerve on alert. The monitors idled in standby, throwing cold light across the workbenches. Maddie’s charcoal blazer still hung on the back of her chair. Her half-empty, lipstick-smeared coffee mug sat beside a notebook of scribbled notes and equations, her looping handwriting defying easy interpretation.

Maddie herself was nowhere to be seen.

“Madison?” he called, voice sharp against the stillness.

No answer. Not even the hum of the auxiliary fan she always left running.

He moved toward the console, scanning the digital logs. The system clock blinked 11:17, the last entry timestamped precisely six minutes earlier. The data trail ended mid-run with no sign-off and no shutdown. Just…nothing.

His stomach tightened.

Walking over to a computer, Gregory entered his login credentials. While security had access to the security cameras recording who entered and exited the lab, only he and Maddie had access to the recordings of their actual workspace. Fortunately, his fiancée had about as much interest in watching those tapes as she did in watching his latest porn stash. However, he felt different. How else was he supposed to know she was in the lab doing what she was supposed to do while he was away at conferences and symposia, unless he checked the video, as he was doing now?

The CCTV confirmed it: she’d been calibrating the ChronoSpire, poised and confident, then, in a wash of white light, she was gone. No sound. No movement towards the door. Just a flash and absence.

He replayed the video again. And again. He leaned closer each time, as if some overlooked frame might reveal a trick. Nothing. She vanished between one heartbeat and the next.

His first thought wasn’t of danger or even Maddie’s disappearance; it was of liability.

The head of ChronoDynamics Research didn’t misplace personnel mid-experiment. Not when half the funding came from private investors and the other half from defense grants. Maddie had been the department’s star attraction, the eccentric genius who made the impossible behave. His golden goose, though he’d never have said that aloud.

And now she’d disappeared on his watch.

Gregory’s jaw clenched. “Christ.”

He opened her desk drawers, rifling through papers, flash drives, and half-filled notebooks. Equations were everywhere—dense, obsessive, like spells written in numbers. Pure Maddie. One sheet caught his attention: something new, hand-scrawled in black ink. The symbols looked familiar, but something had shifted. She was working with entropy—the measure of disorder in a system—and trying to tame it. Not collapse, like in a dying star or a failing experiment. Stabilization. She was trying to hold something together.

He stared. She’d cracked it.

For a long moment, he forgot to breathe. The equations weren’t just theory anymore—they were proof. If Maddie had truly succeeded, if this was what he thought it was, then her “disappearance” might not be a loss.

It might be leverage.

He folded the sheet and slipped it into his pocket, the ozone tang of the lab still clinging to his cuffs.

He needed time to think.

###

By morning, the lab was sealed under official review. Two administrators, a risk officer, and the university’s in-house counsel crowded the glass conference room. The air smelled faintly of printer toner and panic.

Gregory sat at the head of the table, outwardly calm. His pressed shirt and tired eyes lent him a martyr’s credibility. A junior tech had found him there at dawn, still replaying the footage, claiming shock. It wasn’t far from the truth. He was shocked. Just not in the way they thought.

“Let’s begin,” said Dean Wallace. “Dr. Clarke’s… absence. Walk us through it.”

Gregory steepled his fingers. “She was running a final ChronoSpire simulation, standard protocol. She preferred to work alone.” A measured pause. “The data shows an energy surge and then an interruption. I found the lab empty at 11:17. No sign of intrusion.”

The university lawyer, Ms. Darnell, scribbled notes. “And CCTV?”

He nodded. “You’ll see. There’s… nothing to explain it.”

Wallace exchanged a look with the risk officer. “Dr. Harlan, we’re discussing a potential fatality.”

“Or a malfunction,” Gregory countered smoothly. “The ChronoSpire is experimental. A power anomaly could cause localized electromagnetic distortion. We won’t know until diagnostics finish.”

He neglected to mention that the logs showed no power failure, only perfect execution up to the instant Maddie vanished. Too implausible.

Too useful.

“What about family?” Darnell asked.

“My fiancé has no close relatives,” Gregory said. “Her parents are alive, but emotionally distant. She was put in a boarding school that nurtured her scientific gifts at an early age. I don’t believe they’ve spoken in ten years, so there is really no rush to contact anyone. Maddie lived alone, worked late, and kept to herself.”

Wallace sighed. “We’ll notify the authorities.”

Gregory’s voice sharpened. “That’s not advisable.”

All eyes turned toward him.

He leaned forward. “We’re handling classified equipment. If outside investigators step in, they’ll seize the ChronoSpire, freeze our grants, and bury the project in red tape. If this is kept internal, we can contain it.”

The lawyer frowned. “And if it isn’t?”

“Then she resigned,” he said simply. “Took a private contract in Europe. She was restless. Brilliant. Ambitious.”

The room went still. Wallace looked skeptical; Darnell, calculating.

“You’re suggesting a cover story,” she said finally.

“I’m suggesting damage control,” Gregory replied.

He knew exactly how it would play out. Maddie Clarke—brilliant, eccentric, unpredictable—had accepted a classified research post overseas. The university would issue a glowing release about her “extraordinary opportunity.” Donors would calm down. The department would survive. Grants would continue, and while they were tragically short of one gifted lecturer, it would be business as usual.

Seeing the silent nods around the table, he volunteered to draft the statement.

###

Three days later, the headline hit the faculty bulletin:

“Dr. Madison Clarke Accepts Confidential Post with European Research Consortium.”

There were quotes from the Dean. From Gregory. From nameless colleagues praising her genius. A new fellowship was offered in her honor. It was seamless. Airtight.

Gregory even managed a toast at the reception: “To Maddie, wherever your next equation takes you.”

Applause drowned the unease in his throat, but the truth had begun to itch.

Despite his best efforts to resume the tests, the ChronoSpire sat sealed, its activation key locked in dual custody. But Gregory couldn’t stop replaying that flicker on the CCTV. That shimmer where Maddie had been and was no more. He’d read her final notes a hundred times, chasing patterns he couldn’t replicate. Whatever she’d done, it worked. And he hadn’t the faintest idea how.

He told himself she’d glitched herself out of existence. Or staged it. But every night, he found his eyes drawn to the far corner of the lab, where the air still smelled faintly of static, as though reality hadn’t entirely sealed over her absence.

###

It was nearly two weeks later when the message appeared.

Gregory had been cataloguing files, forcing himself through the motions, when the console flickered. No message icon appeared. Instead, an unusual letter materialized at the corner of the screen.

It lacked an envelope in the modern sense; the paper was expertly folded to conceal the writing within instead. His address was penned in the familiar loopy cursive he’d always found vaguely childish. No return address was given.

The document was sealed with a blob of red wax, imprinted with a rather gnarly crow and an intertwined MC in an ornate script.

Gregory leaned closer. Since that letter wasn’t here five minutes ago, and no one had entered the lab but him in the last several hours, there was no way in heaven or hell that thing should be where it was. Not unless it had suddenly “poofed” into existence, kind of how Maddie had “poofed” out one lonely night.

His throat went dry.

The handwriting was unmistakable.

He read the first line and felt the blood drain from his face. He read more and understood he’d been outplayed. Wherever she was, Maddie Clarke had had the last word.

The room tilted. He gripped the desk edge as he read on. The page trembled in his hands. He dropped it as though he were burned.

He sat there for a long time, staring at the letter where it lay on the floor, his mind blank except for one realization blooming cold and unstoppable: If Maddie was truly gone—if she’d done the impossible—then everything he’d built was about to crumble.

Gregory swallowed hard.

He didn’t move.

By morning, the letter had vanished, and no one else ever saw it.

The hedge outside Hyde Park rustled once, faintly, as though amused.

━━━━༻❁༺━━━━

CHAPTER THREE: The Equation That Shouldn’t Work

Maddie woke to the sensation of motion, the rhythmic clatter of wheels, and the unmistakable scent of leather, lavender, and something smoky and expensive.

Her eyes fluttered open.

Burgundy velvet. Gilded trim. A ceiling far too ornate to be the lab’s acoustic tile…and across from her, lounging like a two-hundred-year-old portrait come to life, was a man in a navy tailcoat, light pantaloons, a fancy cravat, and the shiniest Hessians she’d ever seen. One that watched her much too closely.

Rising quickly, the world tilted, and Maddie pressed both hands into the seat.

“Where?” She blinked as though hoping the image would change. “What?”

“Ah, the enchantress awakens.” Thin lips curved into a wickedly amused smile. “I was beginning to worry you had expired mid-swoon.”

Not sure if that smile was delicious or devious, Maddie stared at him from behind her spectacles. “Who are you?”

“Sebastian Peregrine Alaric DeVere, Marquess of Ravensmere,” the half-bow was as mocking as it was genteel. “At your service.”

Blinking again, Maddie decided that devious was winning before defiantly declaring, “That’s not a real name.”

The man tilted his head. “And yet, here I am.”

She tried to sit straighter and realized, with horror, that her skirt had ridden up nearly to her thighs. Her bare skin gleamed in the afternoon light.

“I must say, madam, that your ankles are positively revolutionary,” Sebastien smirked. His eyes roamed over her from head to toe, lingering most appreciatively where they shouldn’t. “And the rest of your legs, well, I am not sure society is ready.”

Maddie yanked the fabric down below her knees, cheeks flaming. “Do you mind?”

“Not in the least.” One dark brow arched. “But I suspect you do.”

She pressed her hands to her temples. Oh, God, her hair was down. Not just down. Wild, dark auburn curls were tumbling over her shoulders like she’d been caught in a wind tunnel. If that wasn’t bad enough, her identification badge was no longer attached to her lab coat pocket, and heaven forbid, her shirt had lost a couple of buttons, exposing a hint of vivid purple lace.

“This is a dream.” Maddie peered through large red frames as though staring would make that man go away. “A very weird, very well-funded dream.”

One likely using some of those experimental drugs they were testing in the laboratory over in Anders Hall.

“My dear, if it is, I hope you will sleep a while longer.” He glanced down at well-kept nails before cutting his eyes in her direction. “You are far more interesting than my usual hallucinations.”

Snorting in disgust, Maddie looked out the carriage window at passing scenery. Gas lamps. Cobblestones. A man in a top hat riding a horse. No traffic lights. No phones. No noise but hooves and wheels and the occasional shout of a street vendor.

“Oh, God.” Maddie lamented under her breath. “I’m not in Kansas anymore.”

“Is that near Bath?” There went the bloody eyebrow again.

For a moment, she’d forgotten she wasn’t alone. Maddie huffed softly before she turned back to him, eyes wide.

“What year is it?”

“1817.” Maddie slumped back against the velvet seat in disbelief. “Unless you know something I do not.”

“It’s the other way around.” She reluctantly admitted. “I ran a simulation...a paradox loop that shouldn’t have worked.”

“And yet, here you are,” Sebastien said as though it was the most natural thing in the world for a startled young woman to materialize on the seat before him. “Legs and all.”

She glared at him. “Do you ever stop talking?”

“Only when I’m kissing someone.” Sebastien smiled invitingly. “Would you like to test the theory?”

She groaned. “You’re insufferable.”

“And you, madam, are a miracle.” Sebastien grinned as though he knew his next words would shake her to her core. “I found you unconscious in the middle of Hyde Park, lounging under a hedge, dressed like a French spy and muttering about quantum collapse. What was I to do?”

“Call an ambulance.”

“I don’t believe I know her.”

Maddie snorted and shook her head, silently admitting he was right. He didn’t know her, whether ambulances were even female in the first place.

The carriage turned. Ahead, rising like a dream or a threat, was a grand townhouse with ivy-covered columns and a brass knocker shaped like a lion’s head.

Maddie couldn’t stop her mouth from hanging open.

“Welcome to Ravensmere House, Mayfair.” Resisting the urge to tell her to close her mouth lest she catch flies, Sebastien merely shook his head in bemusement. “Try not to faint again. My mother’s nerves are delicate.”

About as delicate as Boudicca’s before a rampage.

“Your mother?”

“Whatever you might think,” Sebastian smiled. “Even the devil in fawn trousers has one.” Maddie had no doubt he meant that literally. “She’s the Dowager Marchioness of Ravensmere, and I suspect she is already redecorating your room.”

“I don’t have a room.”

“You do now.”

Knowing his mother’s love of all things scandalous and shocking, he’d sent a footman ahead to inform her that he’d found a most unusual stray unconscious in Hyde Park. While he doubted Lady Honoria had redecorated anything, he was equally confident a room had already been made ready for their guest.

The carriage rolled to a stop. Footmen appeared. The door opened.

Maddie didn’t move.

Sebastian offered his hand. “Shall we, enchantress?”

She took it—mostly to avoid falling—and stepped into a world that had no idea what to do with a woman like her.

━━━━༻❁༺━━━━

CHAPTER FOUR: The Dowager and the Witch

Ravensmere House rose from the corner of Berkeley Square, Portland stone and perfect symmetry, its tall windows watchful, its ironwork gates forbidding. The lion’s head knocker gleamed in the afternoon light, brass teeth bared in a silent snarl. This was not a house that welcomed visitors. It summoned them. And Maddie, barefoot and bewildered beneath her borrowed blanket, felt summoned indeed.

The door swung open onto a scene of genteel pandemonium. From the drawing room spilled the lilting hum of conversation, the rustle of silk, the delicate chime of teaspoons against porcelain. Maddie froze in the entrance hall— all marble, mirrors, and chandeliers—blinking at the sudden brightness, the scent of bergamot and beeswax polish, the sea of unfamiliar faces. She took a step back, and the blanket slipped from her shoulders, pooling at her feet in a soft heap.

A footman blinked at her bare ankles. Another dropped a tray.

“You’ve already broken two hearts and a teacup,” Sebastien quipped. “Impressive.”

Maddie caught sight of her reflection and groaned. Windblown curls, flushed cheeks, bare feet, and that same gray pinstripe blouse clinging where it shouldn’t. She looked like what she was: a woman dragged backward through time.

“Well, she’s not dead.” The cultured voice was crisp and to the point. “That is a relief.”

The fair-haired Dowager Marchioness of Ravensmere swept from the drawing room like a general surveying her troops. She wore violet silk, pearls, and an expression that suggested she’d already decided Maddie belonged to her.

“You are American, barefoot, and,” The Dowager leaned in, nostrils flaring slightly. “You smell of saltpeter. I adore you.”

“I—what?” Maddie blinked. “Thanks—I think.”

“Gunpowder. Fireworks. Or something more interesting.” Honoria smiled, slow and sharp, showing perfect white teeth. “I haven’t smelled that scent since I played Grantham’s second at that duel in Vienna while wearing a waistcoat and breeches, of course.”

A murmur rippled through the drawing room. Fans stilled mid-flutter. Someone gasped softly into their tea. Maddie could practically hear the collective tightening of stays.

“What?” Maddie glanced at Sebastien, who only smiled and shrugged, the picture of unrepentant elegance.

“You’ll need proper gowns,” Honoria continued, circling Maddie as if appraising a new racehorse. “And a maid. Perhaps an alibi.”

“She’s not a criminal, Mama,” Sebastien drawled.

“At least he doesn’t think she is,” Honoria said dryly. “But she’s clearly a woman not from this time, and with no understanding of how she arrived. Both deliciously impossible impossibilities.”

Maddie opened her mouth to explain — something about paradox loops and quantum collapse — but the nearby footman, still clutching his tray, took a nervous step backward.

“She speaks in strange tongues,” he murmured.

“It’s physics,” Maddie said. “I teach theoretical physics—”

“Witchcraft,” the footman insisted.

“There is no such thing,” Honoria said, her tone final. “And you must tell me more of this physics someday, my dear.”

The footman exhaled in relief.

Sebastien, lounging against the banister, watched her with eyes full of wicked amusement. “You’ll find Ravensmere quite tolerant of witches,” he said. “Especially clever ones.”

Maddie’s patience snapped. “Do you ever stop talking?”

Sebastien’s smile curved slowly and dangerously. “Only when there’s something far more interesting to do with my mouth.”

The silence that followed was absolute.

Fans froze mid-flutter. Someone dropped a spoon. The Viscount Hargrave choked on his brandy.

“Oh, do stop pretending you’re shocked.” Honoria didn’t even blink. “He’s been worse.”

“Indeed,” Sebastien murmured, straightening his cuff. “But never boring, Mama. Never that.”

Maddie’s cheeks burned. “You’re insufferable.”

“And you, enchantress,” he replied with mock courtesy, “are a most diverting punishment.”

The hum of conversation resumed in a flustered wave. The ladies exchanged glances. The men smirked. The on-dits were born — messy, immediate, and unstoppable.

Honoria clapped her hands once. “Well, since we’ve now scandalized everyone before brandy, I’d say the afternoon is a capital success.”

Maddie wasn’t sure whether to laugh or faint. She settled for glaring at Sebastien, who had the nerve to look pleased with himself.

“Come along, darling,” Honoria said, turning on her heel. “I’ll show you to your room.”

Maddie hesitated. “I—thank you. That’s very kind.”

“Kindness has nothing to do with it.” The Dowager ascended the staircase with the grace of a woman who’d never been denied anything. “I’m simply curious. You’ll be in the east wing. The room adjoining Sebastien’s.”

Maddie stopped midstep. “Adjoining?”

“Yes.” Honoria looked back, amused. “Is that a problem?”

“Well, it might be considered… improper.”

“Nonsense.” Honoria waved a hand. “What better way to get acquainted?”

Maddie blinked. “I’m not sure that’s—”

“You’re not sure of anything, my dear.” Honoria’s hand fluttered. “That’s half the charm.”

She reached the landing and gestured toward a pair of double doors. “Besides, if I were worried about propriety, I wouldn’t have allowed you through the front door without your shoes.”

Maddie followed, unsure whether she was being adopted, studied, or seduced by the wonderfully strange.

Honoria opened the doors to a room wallpapered in floral chinoiserie with ivory panels and decorative moldings, a marble fireplace, a sitting area, and an inviting curtained bed.

“You’ll be comfortable here.” A hint of a smile teased her lips. “And if you’re not, lie about it. It’s good for morale.”

Maddie stepped inside, dazed. “This is… beautiful.”

“Of course it is. I chose it.” Honoria turned to leave, then paused. “Call me Honoria. I dislike titles unless I’m using them to intimidate someone.”

She disappeared down the hall, leaving Maddie alone in a room that smelled faintly of lavender, ink, and promise.

From the floor below came the rising hum of whispered voices: Witch. American. No shoes. And did you hear what the Marquess said?

Maddie closed the door, pressing her back against it. The whispers died instantly, as though the entire house held its breath.

Somehow, she knew it wasn’t out of respect.

It was because Honoria had returned.

━━━━༻❁༺━━━━

CHAPTER FIVE: An Improper Introduction

For a long minute after Honoria swept out, Maddie simply stood there, staring at the closed door. The hush of Ravensmere felt alive — the slow tick of a mantel clock, the faint crackle of the fire, the hum of voices still drifting faintly up from the floor below. Somewhere, a piano chord rang out and dissolved into laughter.

Maddie exhaled and glanced at her reflection in the tall pier mirror: hair wild, blouse untucked, bare feet smudged with grass. She looked like an extra from a time-travel rom-com that had taken a hard left into Masterpiece Theatre.

A gentle knock came at the door. She turned. A young woman entered carrying an armful of folded silks, their sheen catching the firelight.

“Miss,” she said with a curtsy so brisk it might have been military. “I’m Tansy. Her ladyship says I’m yours now.”

Maddie blinked. “That’s… efficient.”

Tansy’s grin was quick and unapologetic. “She likes to settle people before they think to run.” She spread two gowns across the bed — one emerald and ivory, the other deep rose trimmed with silver thread — and stood back with a critical squint. “Said you’d need something that didn’t look like it came from the stews of Haymarket.”

Maddie looked down at her rumpled pinstriped blouse and pencil skirt. “Fair enough.”

“Caused a proper stir downstairs, you did,” Tansy continued, bustling to set a pitcher on the washstand. “Half the ladies think you’re a witch, the rest want to know who your modiste is. They’ve never seen a skirt stop above the ankles. Nearly fainted, poor souls.”

“I noticed,” Maddie muttered.

“Don’t fret. Her ladyship says scandal’s best served early.” Tansy grinned wider. “Like toast.”

Before Maddie could answer, another knock sounded from the adjoining door.

It opened without waiting.

Sebastien leaned casually against the frame, one shoulder braced, a bottle in one hand and two delicate glasses dangling from the other. His waistcoat was half-buttoned, his cravat loose, and the lamplight caught at the streaks of silver in his hair. He looked entirely too composed for a man whose household had just witnessed social Armageddon.

“Imported champagne,” he announced. “Or something that once aspired to be.”

Tansy’s eyes widened. “My lord, you’ve not even let the tongues cool!”

“Why would I?” he said smoothly, crossing the carpet. “Warm gossip breeds best in confinement.”

He set the glasses on the escritoire and began working the cork.

Maddie folded her arms. “You realize half of London now thinks I’m your mistress.”

“Only half?” He didn’t look up. “My reputation is slipping.”

“Sebastien,”

“Please,” he said with mock gravity. “After the afternoon you’ve had, you may call me anything you like. Most women do.”

Tansy snorted. “I’ll fetch the bathwater before he talks the paint off the walls.”

When she was gone, Maddie fixed him with her best professor-to-student glare. “You enjoy this far too much.”

“Of course. It’s the first time in years anyone’s given the ton something worth whispering about.”

The cork popped — a sharp echo that made Maddie flinch. He winced, instantly contrite. “Apologies. Force of habit. The French insist on it.”

“You mean drinking or misbehaving?”

“Both.” He smirked irreverently. “In equal measure.”

He poured the pale gold liquid delicately into crystal. “Here. A peace offering. And proof I’m not entirely without manners.”

She accepted the tiny glass, eyeing it. “This is a thimble.”

“In Ravensmere,” he said gravely, “we drink like birds and gossip like devils.”

The first sip surprised her — crisp, faintly sweet, with a tart finish that cut through the haze of disbelief clouding her thoughts.

Sebastien watched her over the rim of his glass. “Better?”

“A little.”

“Excellent. I’d hate for your first evening in 1817 to feel anticlimactic.”

She gave him a look. “You realize how insane that sentence sounds?”

He grinned. “Madness is a family tradition.”

Tansy returned. “Her ladyship says dinner is at seven,” she announced. “You’re expected to be interesting.”

“Is that a threat or a request?” Maddie asked.

“More of a challenge.” Tansy began laying out toiletries. “She’s invited the usual lords and ladies, a widow with opinions, and some poet who once tried to duel a critic.”

Sebastien looked delighted. “Oh, splendid. We’ll either dine or bleed.”

When Tansy left again, the silence between them felt warmer, closer, with the fire flickering off gilt moldings and the faint hiss of champagne bubbles between them.

“You shouldn’t keep barging into women’s rooms,” Maddie said at last.

“I never barge,” he replied mildly. “I make an entrance.”

“That’s not the same thing.”

“It is when one’s mother holds open the door.”

She laughed despite herself. “You are impossible.”

“True. But charmingly so, I hope?”

She shook her head. “You’re like every entitled man I’ve ever met except you somehow make me want to keep listening.”

He leaned in just enough that the air between them changed. “Then I’ll consider my day a success.”

Her pulse stuttered. Oh, no, you don’t.

“I should let you prepare for dinner,” he said lightly, as though unaware of the quiet havoc he’d just wrought. “Try not to look too spectacular, or I’ll never get a word in for all the staring.”

“You flatter yourself.”

“Constantly,” he said, bowing slightly at the door. “Practice makes perfect.”

When he was gone, the room felt suddenly too still. Maddie stared at the closed door, half-amused, half-unnerved.

Tansy’s voice drifted from the bathing chamber. “He’s harmless, that one. In that way that dangerous men sometimes are.”

Maddie exhaled and turned back to the gown on the bed. “Harmless,” she echoed softly. “I’ll try to remember that.”

But she didn’t believe it for a moment.

━━━━༻❁༺━━━━

CHAPTER SIX: Entropy and Soup

Maddie quickly decided that dinner at Ravensmere was not for the faint of heart. If donning the emerald silk round dress with the dangerously low off-the-shoulder neckline and the wide emerald and white striped Buffon ornament around the hem was pushing it, she ain’t seen nothing yet, as the old saying went. There were more forks than she had fingers, and the Dowager Marchioness had already introduced her to three people with titles that sounded like rare diseases one hoped never to catch.

She sat halfway down the table, wearing a borrowed diamond necklace and a pair of white slippers that pinched her toes. Her red-rimmed glasses clashed magnificently with her hair, and it took all her concentration not to knock over the dratted minuscule crystal. Hearing a delicate clearing of an aristocratic throat, she turned to her right.

“You are American, are you not?” Lady Danner leaned in, quizzing glass in hand. “How absolutely thrilling! I have never met one of you. Do you eat dinner standing up?”

“Only when the microwave’s broken.” Maddie quipped, not sure whether to just pull back or run from the starkly attractive middle-aged doyen of Mayfair’s literary soirees.

“Microwave?” One pale brow lifted inquisitively.

“It’s a very impatient oven.” Maddie smiled weakly at her knowing nod.

From farther down the table, a whisper slipped like a pin through silk. “Impatient oven?” a girl in lemon satin breathed to her mama. “Do they keep them in America?”

“Hush,” the mama murmured. “They keep everything in America, especially delusions.”

Before Lady Danner could ask more, the soup arrived—a clear, golden consommé served in porcelain that was so delicate that Maddie was afraid to breathe on it.

Sebastien, seated opposite and slightly down the table, let his fingers brush the air—an easy, almost idle gesture toward the far-right spoon. A faint nod. A conspirator’s signal no one else needed to notice.

Hearing a disapproving sniff from Viscount Hargrave, seated across from her, Maddie prepared to hear something snide. She wasn’t disappointed.

“You’ll find our cuisine decidedly more refined than what you’re used to in the colonies.” He stared at her as though she had no choice but to agree.

Maddie blinked. “It’s soup.”

“Ah, but it is Consommé à la Reine, au Vermicelli.” Whatever the heck that meant. “Refined and balanced. Orderly, unlike the chaos of American dining.”

Maddie stared at him. Then at the soup. Then back at him.

“Actually, this soup is anything but balanced and orderly.” Ignoring Hargrave’s look of disbelief that she would contradict him, she soldiered on. “It’s a perfect example of entropy.”

The table paused. A spoon clinked. Somewhere, a footman inhaled sharply.

“Entropy is the universe’s tendency to make a mess.” Maddie cheerfully switched into lecture mode. “You see, right now, the broth is hotter in the middle. But give it a minute, and the heat will spread out evenly. That’s entropy. Order becoming disorder. It’s kind of the universe’s favorite hobby.”

Viscount Hargrave sputtered before stuttering, “I—well, I hardly think—”

“Also, stir these delicate noodles too vigorously, and they will fall apart. That’s entropy, too. Delicious, inevitable chaos.”

A young lady in rose tittered behind her fan. Her mother applied a smile that did not reach her eyes. “How very…modern,” the woman murmured, which was ton-speak for provoking.

There was a beat of silence.

Then Honoria laughed—a delighted, unladylike sound that made the crystal tremble.

“I do adore her.”

As expected, everyone at the table nodded. If Viscount Hargrave was a little slower on the uptake, no one paid him any mind. They were more interested in watching Sebastien’s next move.

“To entropy.” He lifted his glass in Maddie’s direction. “And to soup.”

“And to impatient ovens,” added Lady Danner.

“‘Impatient suits Ravensmere tolerably well,” someone muttered, not quite under their breath.

Maddie blushed and smiled. She hadn’t meant to lecture. She hadn’t meant to cause a scene. But she also hadn’t meant to time-travel, and here she was. Somehow, she’d explained thermodynamics to a room full of aristocrats and hadn’t been thrown out.

She took another sip of soup. It was still just soup…but it tasted a bit like victory.

As for the rest of the meal, Sebastien’s subtle tips continued—a faint tap to indicate the fish knife, a lazy tilt of his wrist toward the correct fork for the oysters, a long blink of amusement when she nearly reached for the wrong bread. He never looked at her directly while doing it; he made it look like boredom, which made it possible.

“See how he guides her?” lemon-satin hissed again.

“Like a dancing master,” her mama replied. “Or a suitor with ideas above his station.”

“Above whose station?” someone else murmured, and three fans fluttered in agitated harmony.

Maddie made it through the first remove of consommé, turbot with lobster sauce, and vol-au-vent of oysters with various kinds of bread and butter without a mishap. The second remove, consisting of a haunch of venison with gravy and currant jelly, ragout of beef, and bowls of seasonal vegetables, was somewhat easier to navigate. As were the glasses of claret and madeira that accompanied the meal. By the time the third remove of oranges preserved in brandy, fruit tarts, custards, and small cakes arrived, Maddie felt like an old hand.

One who was still somewhat sober, thanks to those ridiculously small glasses and a fast metabolism.

“Miss Clarke,” Hargrave drawled, “your gown is… New World in its frankness.”

“Thank you,” Maddie said brightly.

He blinked, wrong-footed.

Lady Danner bit back a grin.

Several hours after the meal began, Maddie allowed Sebastien to escort her into the drawing room, her confidence bolstered by his whispered encouragement. Hearing that she had done magnificently when she’d felt totally lost, reassured her that she could navigate any event that occurred in a room filled with silk, candlelight, and perilous conversation.

Catching a glimpse of the elegant redhead confidently entering the room, attired in a vibrantly colored, daringly low-cut silk gown she could never wear with her fiancé on the arm of a dashing gentleman who made Geoffrey look like the dud he was, made her wonder briefly, “Who is this woman?” Smiling at the silent voice in her head responding, “You,” she crossed the room and perched on the edge of a striped settee near Honoria.

Thanking the footman, she accepted another joke of a glass filled with wine. Following the dowager’s lead, she lost count of the sips she’d taken. Before she knew it, she was slightly tipsy and enthusiastically explaining Newton’s law to a baroness.

“Okay, so, Newton’s first law. Objects in motion stay in motion unless acted upon by an outside force. Like this glass,” Maddie gestured with the empty crystal. “If I slide it across the table—”

The glass skidded, wobbled, and stopped just short of a lace doily.

“Is that why Lady Featherstone’s ghost keeps appearing in the east wing?” Lady Danner’s question sliced through Maddie’s next thought. “She was in motion, and no one stopped her?”

“I—what?”

“Lady Featherstone died in this house mid-waltz at the ball of the Season, my dear.” Honoria sounded delighted to repeat the tale. “It’s been four years since that fateful night, but some say she’s still trying to finish the turn.”

“Surely no one believes that?” Maddie gazed around the room. “Or in ghosts?”

“Featherstone is hardly a ghost.” Viscount Hargrave corrected. “She is a specter, or possibly a shade.”

“No, no, Hargrave, never a shade.” Lady Danner shook her head. “A revenant. She’s been seen twice in broad daylight.”

“Wait,” Maddie’s eyes grew wide. “There are categories?”

“Ah, yes,” Sebastian unfolded from where he leaned nonchalantly against the mantle. “Most definitely. Apparitions, phantasms, wraiths, shades, specters, revenants, and the occasional banshee. It’s practically a taxonomy.”

“That’s absurd.”

“So is time travel, dear,” Honoria quirked a brow in amusement. “And yet, here you are.”

A rustle of silks. “Time travel?” whispered lemon-satin.

“Witchcraft,” another replied with satisfaction.

“Fashion,” said Lady Danner dryly. “The deadliest of arts.”

Maddie blinked. The room was watching her again. Amused, intrigued, half-convinced she was either a genius or a ghost herself. However, unlike everyone else, Viscount Hargrave looked constipated instead.

Maddie picked up the tiny glass and held it aloft. “Newton’s second law: force equals mass times acceleration. Which means if I throw this at the Viscount—”

“Madam!” Alarmed, Viscount Hargrave rose to his feet.

“It’ll hit him harder if I throw it fast,” Maddie smirked. “But I won’t. Because I’m a lady.”

“A lady with excellent aim, I suspect.” Honoria was clearly delighted.

While she’d never say it, Maddie suspected the dowager found the viscount as much of a stuffed shirt as she did. He reminded her too much of Gregory.

“And possibly spectral tendencies.” Lady Danner chimed in.

“She’s not a ghost.” Sebastien snorted. “She’s entropy in striped slippers.”

“Barefoot earlier, I heard,” someone whispered.

“Utterly ruinous,” another sighed, sounding a little envious.

Maddie flushed, but she was laughing now—genuinely, freely, the kind of laugh that made her forget she didn’t belong here.

She set the glass down.

“Newton’s third law:” She might as well finish what she started. “For every action, there’s an equal and opposite reaction.”

Honoria fluttered her fan. “Which explains why the Viscount is now hiding behind a fern.”

“And why Lady Featherstone keeps knocking over vases.” Lady Danner added.

“And why you, Maddie Cl Aevearke,” Sebastien said softly. “Shall become the most talked-about woman in London before you are done.”

A final whisper, almost awed now rather than sour: “Talked-about… or talked to?”

“Both,” Lady Danner murmured, very pleased. “Do keep up.”

━━━━༻❁༺━━━━

CHAPTER SEVEN: Biscuits and Planets

By morning, the gossip had already done its rounds.

Tansy reported it cheerfully over breakfast while fastening Maddie’s gown. “Half of Mayfair says you’re a witch. The other half says you’re a miracle. Her ladyship says either way, you’re good for conversation.”

Maddie stared at her reflection in the mirror and wondered how it was possible to change so much in a few short weeks. Not necessarily in appearance, but in demeanor. She still had the same deep auburn hair, the same sprinkle of freckles across her nose, and the same near-sighted, smoky-green eyes behind huge red-framed spectacles. However, all resemblance to the old Maddie Clarke ended there.

While her muslin gown was white, embellished with a delicate floral pattern, her spencer was a gorgeous shade of deep China blue that made her eyes more turquoise than green. It was a color she’d never dare wear with Gregory that brought out the pink in her cheeks and set off her eyes beautifully. If that wasn’t enough, her half-boots, reticule, and gloves were the same vibrant shade. As for the massive straw bonnet on her head, that monstrosity was trimmed in China-blue ribbon and a striped ostrich feather.

Wrapping several biscuits from her breakfast tray in a handkerchief to feed the birds, she tucked the packet into her reticule. Taking one last look around to ensure she wasn’t forgetting anything, Maddie headed for the stairs and the exit to the garden.

Two housemaids paused mid-polish as she passed. One whispered, “That’s her—entropy at dinner.” The other giggled. Maddie smiled faintly. At least she was famous for something scientific.

Glancing towards the heated conservatory off the back of the townhouse, she wasn’t surprised to see Sebastien puttering about inside. The man was full of surprises. His love of exotic plants and talent for faithfully rendering each specimen in watercolor took her breath away.

She’d been impressed with the marquess’s small collection of exotic orchids, and with the familiar orange and blue Bird of Paradise so prominently displayed, when he’d first shown her about the room. He didn’t have to say they were a rare and highly prized part of his collection at this time. The care and reverence with which he handled each plant spoke volumes. If the exquisite blossoms weren’t enough of a testimony to his green thumb, his fruit trees were a fait accompli.

Not everyone could coax a pineapple plant to produce fruit as he had. Nor could they get citrus to yield. That his trees were rather heavily laden with the lemons, limes, mandarins, and oranges she would never take for granted again was unusual. Throw in the citron and pomegranate plants; she was in awe. No wonder Honoria took such pleasure in offering her guests slices of lemon and orange with the sherry and madeira or lime with brandy.

Shaking her head in disbelief at what she was seeing, Sebastien had promised to show her around the much larger conservatory at Ravensmere Hall when everyone retired to the country at the end of the Season. He’d reassured her that his orchid collection was far more extensive, as was his Orangerie. While she looked forward to that, there was still so much to see here.

She’d yet to make it through every room of the townhouse. Honoria kept her much too busy with soirees, lectures, and balls. It seemed everyone wanted to meet her adorable polydactyl Maine Coon kitten and have her perform for them. While she could be insulted or find it tiresome, Maddie enjoyed sharing her knowledge and mystifying the more arrogant members of the haut ton.

And, yes, she was well aware that the same “arrogant members” still whispered behind fans that she’d bewitched Ravensmere at dinner, that his mother encouraged the enchantment, and that Viscount Hargrave was nearly brained with a glass for questioning the laws of motion. Honoria, of course, had merely remarked, “Better his head than his opinions.”

While the on-dits throwing shade on her arrival from the future or alluding to witchcraft and mesmerism to account for her popularity could have upset her, she took it all in stride. The pettiness of people with more money than sense didn’t affect her. She was used to the negative commentary, and Honoria thrived on it.

It seemed the more the right kind of scandal attached to Ravensmere House, the more highly coveted were the invitations to her next ball, and Maddie was nothing if not the right kind of scandal.

Arriving at the rear garden, she contemplated the maze of formal beds, gravel paths, statuary, and roses enclosed in a brick fence with an iron grill gate. Glancing toward the mews, she was delighted to glimpse a groom exercising a beautiful bay. She had wandered outside with no real plan except to enjoy nature for a change. She’d spent too many years locked away in a laboratory. She knew that now. Heading for the roses, she followed the unexpected sound of voices instead.

Stumbling upon two boys in matching waistcoats arguing about whether Jupiter could beat Mars in a duel, she knew they were Sebastien’s sons. The youngest was thirteen, and the eldest was a year older. While she’d yet to meet them, both had arrived from Eton yesterday.

While an exception to the school’s formal breaks, a rare manuscript and a generous donation had ensured the boys got a “seasonal reprieve” every year. It seemed Honoria wanted her grandsons to get a taste of the Season before it was thrust upon them, and she wasn’t above bribery to get it. Hiding behind a rose bush, Maddie couldn’t stop her smile at the conversation she was overhearing.

“Mars is a god of war.” Henry declared with the gravitas of the firstborn. “Obviously, he would win.”

“But Jupiter is bigger,” Jamie stood his ground. “He could just sit on him.”

Maddie stepped from behind her bush.

“Are we talking about planets or mythology?”

Both boys turned and stared.

“Are you the witch?”

Maddie knew she wasn’t hearing stereo sound, so both boys must have spoken at once.

“I prefer ‘scientist,’” She sat cross-legged on their blanket without asking, her gown bunching inelegantly, and placed the biscuits between them. “But I’ll take it.”

Unwrapping the packet, Maddie wasn’t surprised that the boys smiled at the thought of unsanctioned treats. While she was sorry to disappoint them, those sweets had a more important purpose than filling their tummies.

“Okay, let’s build the solar system. This one,” She held up a large, round, cardamom biscuit and placed it on the blanket. “is Jupiter. The biggest planet. Lots of moons. Very dramatic.”

“That’s the best biscuit because it’s the biggest.” Henry’s confident nod was reminiscent of his father. “And it’s mine.”

“Not necessarily,” Maddie spoke to both assumptions as she picked up a smaller, crumbly, spiced biscuit with a brownish tint and placed it appropriately. “And Mars is this one—red, dusty, and kind of cranky.”

“What about Earth?” Jamie stared her down as though she was forgetting something obvious.

Maddie picked up a slightly squashed biscuit lightly iced with a sprinkle of lime zest throughout.

“Us.” She set the biscuit in place. “Small, stubborn, and full of surprises.”

Satisfied that her biscuits were in orbit, Maddie explained gravity using a sweet-smelling rose, inertia using a pebble, and black holes using a licorice lozenge she’d forgotten was in her bag. Staring at her layout, Maddie couldn’t help thinking about the digital diagrams she always made before plugging the latest equation into the ChronoSpire. While a part of her missed her laboratory, the ache wasn’t as sharp as it should have been.

“You’re very odd.” Henry declared with a cheeky smirk.

Maddie smirked back. “Thank you.”

“Papa says odd women are dangerous.” Jamie declared seriously.

“Only if you ignore them,” Maddie promised.

Both boys grinned. She grinned back. Somewhere in the distance, Sebastian watched from the terrace, arms crossed, expression unreadable. Maddie felt the subtle pull of unseen eyes in unseen places. She turned towards the terrace and smiled. Though his expression was guarded, Sebastien smiled back.

Later, the boys would tell Honoria that Maddie had explained the universe using snacks and made them laugh until they forgot to be polite.

And Honoria would smile like a woman who knew she’d found exactly what she was looking for.

━━━━༻❁༺━━━━

CHAPTER EIGHT: The Garden and the Decision Not to Go

Two days later, most of London had opinions.

According to The Morning Post, Lady Ravensmere’s dinner had been “spirited.” According to half of Mayfair, it had been scandalous. A woman who spoke of the universe’s “tendency to make a mess” over consommé à la Reine had given the ton precisely what it adored — something to talk about.

Maddie tried not to think about it as she turned in a slow circle, surveying the first ensemble to arrive from Madame Fouquet’s. Her silk promenade gown, gloves, and half-boots were a delightful shade of olive that enhanced the smoke in her eyes, while her coquelicot pelisse should clash abominably with her hair, but didn’t. Her bright red glasses, charmingly incongruous, were now tucked away in the writing table drawer in favor of the long-handled gold quizzing glass hanging on a delicate gold chain around her neck.

Somewhere beyond the window, she heard Honoria’s laughter. That unmistakable, low contralto ripple that made servants scatter and guests smile nervously. Maddie suspected the Dowager was already discussing her with whoever had called that morning to “inquire after her American prodigy.”

Satisfied with her appearance, Maddie started to leave to join Honoria in the garden when Tansy’s clearing her throat stopped her midstep. She’d hoped to escape unnoticed with a getaway that didn’t include the dratted straw bonnet resplendent in faux poppies and spangled ribbon. Apparently, she was wrong.

Her little maid was more than just the keeper of the wardrobe. She was the fashion enforcer who ensured her lady didn’t embarrass the family by ignoring social protocols. Slipping the bonnet on her head and tying the dark olive ribbon under her chin, Maddie nodded at Tansy’s approving smile before she skipped down the stairs fashionably late.

“Ah, my dear, you look delightful.” Honoria turned from the window at the soft swish of her skirts. “Sebastien has taken the boys for a ride through Hyde Park. I thought we’d take a turn through the garden before we promenade.”

“Won’t the papers follow?” Maddie asked dryly.

“My darling girl,” Honoria said, slipping her arm through Maddie’s as they stepped into the corridor, “at this point, they follow you.”

Maddie didn’t need to respond, only follow Honoria’s indigo pelisse out the back door. Falling into step beside the older woman, Maddie decided the morning was perfect with a hint of mist curling over the hedges, roses heavy with dew, and the relative quiet that made Ravensmere feel like a secret time had chosen to keep.

She walked slowly, hands tucked into the sleeves of her new pelisse, quizzing glass dangling. Honoria strolled beside her, regal even in boots, her bejeweled swordstick tapping lightly against the gravel. They passed the sundial. The lavender beds. The spot where Jamie had declared Mars the winner of the biscuit war.

“You have settled in.” Honoria glanced at her from beneath her lashes.

“I’ve stopped tripping over my skirts.” Maddie’s smile was rueful. “That feels like progress.”

“You laugh more, and you sleep longer.” That last bit likely came from Tansy. “You’ve stopped trying to find a way back.”

Maddie paused. A robin darted across their path. She hadn’t really thought about it, but Honoria was right. She had stopped scribbling equations and schematics on strips of scrap paper a while ago. She hadn’t even realized it.

“I thought I had to return.” Maddie shrugged. “That I was wasting time here. But now…”

She looked up. Ivy-covered walls. A sky that appeared too blue to be real. The house with the family that had begun to feel like home.

She hadn’t counted on any of that.

“You’re starting to think that maybe your life was wasted there.”

Maddie nodded.

Honoria smiled that slow, knowing smile that meant trouble. The one that showed teeth.

“I felt that way one time.” Honoria settled on a stone bench. “I grew up running wild in the Welsh countryside. My papa was the wealthiest man in three counties, maybe in the whole of Wales, but he was gentry, not aristocracy, and I was the prettiest girl.”

Maddie quirked a brow at the wistful note in Honoria’s voice.

“I fell in love with the handsomest boy in the whole of Wales.” Honoria’s smile said she’d thought he was. “And he fell in love with me.”

A quiet dread bloomed in Maddie’s chest, the kind that knew stories like this rarely ended well.

“But, alas, it was not to be.” Honoria laughed softly. “Sir Adam Cadwallader’s hellion of a daughter wasn’t worthy of an English Earl’s son… Forbidden to marry me on threat of disinheritance, my love married the woman chosen for him, and my papa sent his broken-hearted daughter to stay with relatives on the continent to get her smile back.”

“What happened next?”

“Nothing really.” Honoria’s smile was mischievous. “I learned the fine art of fencing, became a crack shot, stood in as second for my cousin at a duel wearing men’s clothing, and lost my innocence to a handsome Italian count with a fat wife and ten children.”

Something told Maddie that Honoria meant every word… Well, maybe not the fat wife and ten children… but then again, she was talking about Honoria.

“What happened when you returned home?”

“I had my first Season.” She laughed at the memory. “And discovered I was a walking scandal, much to my surprise.”

“You don’t sound very upset by it.”

“What do you want me to say?” Honoria laughed softly. “Very little of it was actually true, and anyone with a grain of wit knew it.”

“What did you do?”

“What do you think?” Honoria smiled softly. “I arrived at their balls in Papa’s finest carriage, wearing the latest silken robe à la française straight from Paris, and danced the night away. Before the Season ended, I was married to Sebastien’s father. Never married, my new husband was older, powerful, devoted, and wealthier by far than even my papa. When he passed not long after Sebastien’s twentieth birthday, he left me a wealthy woman and our son a force to be reckoned with.”

“Did you love him?”

“No,” Honoria answered honestly. “My heart already belonged to another, but I held Alaric de Vere in great affection, and he dealt kindly with his wild young wife… Before you ask, no, I never strayed. My husband and I were well-matched in our physical appetites… In truth, we were well-matched in every way. Had it been possible, I would have given him all of me.”

As things had stood, Maddie suspected what Honoria gave was more than enough.

“Did the pettiness stop when you wed?”

“Hardly.” Honoria smiled. “The malicious lies only stopped when the haut ton realized I didn’t give a fig what they thought of me. I had my adoring husband, my handsome boy, more wealth than I could spend, and my collection of oddities to keep me amused. Once the crème de la crème realized how little I cared, they started to care. I suddenly found myself not only the most coveted guest, but one of the premier hostesses of the Season, and that hasn’t changed in the thirty years since.”

“So, you’re telling me to keep my chin up.”

“I am telling you that you are perfect just the way you are.” Honoria rose to her feet. “If you don’t believe that, all I can say is trust me. My second husband was my beloved Earl of Somerset. We both lost our mates at about the same time, and we both came out of mourning within weeks of each other. No longer under the dictates of his parents, we married as we’d always wanted. We had ten good years together, and I’ve had no reason to remarry in the years since, though I could have several times over.”

Somehow, Maddie didn’t doubt that. Watching Honoria rise to her feet, she followed suit.

“So, my dear, how do you feel about a ball?”

They headed towards the back gate and South Audley Street.

“What do you mean?”

“Simply now that you have decided to stay,” Honoria stopped to look at her. “I shall have to give the ball of the Season.”

“A ball.” While she’d already attended several balls about Town, Maddie wasn’t sure she was up to Honoria’s ball. “What kind of ball?”

“Scientific romance with telescopes in the ballroom and star charts on the invitations.” Honoria was on a roll. “And the most scandalous waltzes inducing entropy.”

“You’re matchmaking.”

“I’m curating possibilities.”

“Sebastian is—”

“A man who has done his duty, buried his grief, and forgotten how to be surprised.” Honoria’s tone was more matter-of-fact than maternal. “Then you arrived with your big red glasses, quoting Newton, and rearranging his sons’ planets.”

Maddie flushed.

“Despite what some fools say, you are not a ghost, my dear.” Honoria looped her arm through Maddie’s. “You are a comet, and I intend to make sure you don’t burn out before you light up every ballroom in London.”

Honoria nodded to a passing viscount as they turned onto Mount Street. She pointed to a modiste’s window, casually noting the new style would be suitable for Maddie’s ball gown, just as she’d casually mentioned buying gowns in Paris before they were fashionable.

The viscount’s bow was a shade too deep, his smile a shade too knowing. Maddie realized then that everyone in Town already knew her name.

Glancing in Honoria’s direction, she was hit with the realization that the Dowager wasn’t merely accepted now, she was unapologetically followed.

━━━━༻❁༺━━━━

CHAPTER NINE: The Scientific Romance Ball

If Mayfair had a pulse, it beat at Ravensmere House that night, two weeks later. The carriages stretched two streets deep, every coach lantern mirrored in the wet cobblestones like twin constellations. A murmur rippled through the queue, “Lady Ravensmere has gone entirely mad this time.”

She had, and she was delighted about it.

The ballroom glowed in candlelight and curiosity. A massive brass telescope stood near the French doors that opened onto the terrace, its lens aimed toward the starlit garden. Star charts framed in gilt lined the walls beside mirrored panels. Clusters of candles floated in glass globes suspended from the ceiling like miniature planets, and the air shimmered with the scent of beeswax and champagne.

At the far end of the room, a sign in elegant copperplate announced:

The Scientific Romance: A Ball in Celebration of Celestial Order and Human Disorder.

Maddie wasn’t sure whether to laugh or hide.

Her gown, Honoria’s design, naturally was a deep twilight blue scattered with tiny silver spangles. It shimmered with every breath she took. Tansy had woven silver ribbons into her hair, leaving a few curls artfully rebellious against her neck. It was the most beautiful, terrifying thing she’d ever worn.

She’d tried to protest the neckline, of course.

Honoria had waved her fan. “My dear, if one intends to scandalize the ton, one must at least look celestial while doing it.”

So here she was, the comet in Honoria’s cosmos.

“Miss Clarke,” said Lady Danner, sweeping up beside her in mauve satin, “you’ve become quite the phenomenon. I believe there are wagers being placed as to whether you’ll reform Society, or destroy it.”

“Depends on the day,” Maddie murmured.

“Delicious,” Lady Danner said, eyes gleaming. “Do save me a waltz before the roof caves in.”

Across the room, Sebastien stood near the orchestra, resplendent in black and silver. His waistcoat shimmered faintly with embroidery shaped like constellations, subtle and wickedly elegant. The sapphire pin at his cravat caught the light each time he turned. He wasn’t watching her, not exactly. But the tilt of his head and the faint curve at his mouth said he was aware of her every movement.

Several ladies noticed, too.

“He looks at her as though she were an experiment he means to repeat,” murmured a baronet’s wife.

“Or a telescope he means to calibrate,” replied her friend, fanning herself briskly.

Maddie caught the whisper and bit back a laugh.

“Ah, my darling comet,” Honoria declared as she approached, trailing admirers like planets. “You are causing gravitational disturbances already.”

“Meaning I’m making people nervous?”

“Meaning you’re making them interested.” Honoria smiled like a cat with cream. “Now, smile at Lord Weatherby. He’s harmless but influential. Avoid Hargrave; he’s still nursing a bruised ego and possibly a fern.”

Maddie did as she was told. Smiled, curtsied, let the room orbit around her. She was getting better at it. The fine art of surviving admiration that wasn’t quite acceptance. The trick she’d learned was to seem as though one belonged, even when every whisper said otherwise.

“Miss Clarke,” drawled Viscount Hargrave, materializing at her elbow despite Honoria’s warning. “You look far less… colonial tonight.”

“Thank you,” she said sweetly. “You look far less constipated.”

Several gentlemen nearby choked on their drinks.

Hargrave blinked. “I beg your pardon?”

“Don’t,” she said brightly. “I never accept apologies I haven’t earned.”

Honoria’s fan fluttered. “Marvelous,” she murmured, not quite under her breath. “I must write that down.”

Sebastien appeared then, all lazy grace and dangerous amusement.

“Viscount,” he said, tone smooth as silk, “do you mind? I promised Miss Clarke the next dance.”

“I—well—” Hargrave floundered, trapped between retreat and rage.

“Excellent,” Sebastien said before the man could decide, offering Maddie his arm. “Entropy, my dear. The art of unsettling order.”

As the orchestra struck up a waltz, Maddie placed her gloved hand on his sleeve. “You’re enjoying this too much.”

“Unashamedly.” His smile was pure sin. “Besides, by now, everyone expects us to be at least mildly indecent.”

“And are we?”

“Not yet.”

Her breath caught. “Sebastien.”

“Careful, Maddie,” he said softly as they began to move. “You say my name like an equation you’re not ready to solve.”

The room blurred. Candles spun in mirrored walls. His hand at her waist felt steady, grounding, alive. For the length of the dance, she forgot the stares, the whispers, even the century she came from.

When the music ended, the applause felt distant, unreal.

Honoria intercepted them halfway across the floor. “Exquisite! Entirely improper. You’re officially the talk of London.”

“Already?” Maddie asked.

“My dear, you already were before dessert.”

Behind them, Lady Danner was gleefully explaining to a small cluster of guests that Miss Clarke’s gown represented the cosmos, her dance the forces of attraction, and her partner the gravitational constant.

Sebastien raised a brow. “Gravitational constant?”

“Apparently, I’m predictable,” Maddie said.

He leaned close enough that she could feel his breath. “Not to me.”

The orchestra began another waltz, and murmurs swelled again — admiration, envy, scandal. Someone whispered, “He’ll propose before the Season’s out.” Someone else sighed, “Or ruin her first.”

Maddie heard neither clearly. Her pulse drowned them out.

Later, as the evening waned and the candles guttered low, she slipped out to the terrace. The garden stretched dark and fragrant beneath a spill of stars. Somewhere in the distance, laughter rose from the ballroom; inside, the orchestra played a final waltz.

“You flee applause as though it might bite,” Sebastien said behind her.

“I just needed a little air.”

He joined her at the balustrade, gazing up at the night sky. “My mother says you’re a comet.”

“She would.”

“Do you believe her?”

Maddie smiled faintly. “Comets burn out.”

“Only if no one charts their course.”

The words hung there — too intimate, too dangerous — until Honoria’s voice floated from the doorway, amused and imperious as ever.

“Do stop seducing my protégée with astronomy, Sebastien. It’s terribly unoriginal.”

“On the contrary,” he murmured, eyes never leaving Maddie’s, “it’s timeless.”

Honoria rolled her eyes heavenward. “Entropy, indeed.”

Inside, the waltz ended to rapturous applause. Outside, the stars burned brighter.

And in the hush between worlds, Maddie realized she’d stopped wondering how to return home.

━━━━༻❁༺━━━━

CHAPTER TEN: The Morning After the Ball

Sunlight poured through Ravensmere’s east windows as though nothing improper had occurred the night before. Which was, of course, a lie.

Every breakfast table in Mayfair was rustling with newspapers and gossip, and nearly all of them carried the same headline:

THE MARCHIONESS AND HER MODERN MIRACLE: SCIENCE, SCANDAL, AND A WALTZ THAT STOPPED TIME.

Maddie groaned into her tea. “Do they have to make it sound like I built a Large Hadron Collider in the drawing room?”

Honoria smiled from behind her own paper, reading aloud with relish.

‘The mysterious Miss Clarke, protégée of the Dowager Marchioness of Ravensmere, dazzled last evening in a gown said to represent the heavens themselves. Her remarks on attraction, both celestial and social, left certain gentlemen visibly unsteady on their feet.’

“Good heavens,” Maddie muttered. “They make it sound like I flirted with gravity.”

“You did, darling,” Honoria said serenely, folding the paper. “And gravity flirted back. Everyone is talking about you, which means I win.”

“Win what?”

“The Season, naturally.” Honoria buttered her toast as though conquering London was as routine as breakfast. “The Danners and Weatherby’s may have their poets and philosophers, but I have the time-traveler who quoted Newton between courses and danced my son into visibility again.”

Maddie blinked. “Visibility?”

“My dear, half of London thought Sebastien buried with his orchids. The other half thought he’d taken vows of celibacy. Either way, you’ve revived him.” Honoria took a bite. “Do have some marmalade; it’s less tart than Lady Atherton.”

Maddie obediently reached for the toast rack, cheeks warm. “I didn’t do anything.”

“Precisely,” Honoria said. “You simply existed, and the world rearranged itself.”

Sebastien appeared a few minutes later, disheveled but maddeningly composed — open-necked shirt, cravat missing, a faint line at the corner of his mouth that suggested he’d spent most of the night laughing.

“Good morning, enchantress,” he greeted, taking the seat beside her.

“Don’t start.”

“Too late. You’re famous.” He added cream to his coffee. “Or infamous. Depends on which club you ask.”

Maddie sipped her tea. “And what does your club say?”

“That you’ve bewitched me,” he said lightly. “They’re not entirely wrong.”

“Try not to propose at breakfast, darling.” Honoria’s fan snapped open with a whuff. “It smacks of desperation.”

Sebastien looked faintly amused. “Noted.”

Maddie cleared her throat. “So. Entropy and gossip, both irreversible processes.”

“On the contrary,” Sebastien murmured. “Entropy can be reversed, under the right conditions.”

She gave him a look. “That’s not scientifically possible.”

“Nor are you.”

Honoria exhaled dramatically. “For heaven’s sake, must you two flirt in equations? It’s indecent.”

The footman entered with a fresh copy of The Morning Post and deposited it at Honoria’s elbow. She skimmed the next column, smirking.

“Oh, splendid, there’s already an ode. ‘A Lady’s Reflection Upon the Comet at Ravensmere.’ Terrible poetry, but enthusiastic. They’ve compared you to the aurora borealis and, inexplicably, a tea kettle.”

Maddie groaned. “Please tell me they didn’t print that.”

“They did,” Honoria said cheerfully. “Which means we must hold another event before the gossip cools. Perhaps a Scientific Salon. You can perform a small experiment and quote Shakespeare. It will drive them mad.”

Sebastien leaned back, crossing his arms. “Mother, you’re going to run her ragged.”

“Nonsense,” Honoria said. “Miss Clarke is invigorated by chaos. It’s her native habitat.”

“I’d prefer oxygen,” Maddie muttered.

Sebastien chuckled, and something in the sound — quiet, unguarded — made her glance at him. For the first time, she saw fatigue behind the laughter. The kind of tired that doesn’t come from too little sleep but from carrying too much for too long.

He caught her looking. “Don’t pity me, Maddie.”

“I wasn’t.”

“Yes, you were.” His voice softened. “But thank you.”

Honoria set down her cup with a decisive clink. “If you two are quite finished radiating longing across my breakfast table, I’ll be in the conservatory arranging the next scandal.”

When she swept out, the silence she left behind was intimate and awkwardly vast.

Maddie folded her napkin, aware of the way Sebastien’s gaze followed the movement. “Your mother thinks I’m her newest project.”

“She thinks you’re a mirror,” he said quietly. “You reflect what people forget about themselves.”

“That sounds like a polite way of saying I cause trouble.”

“That too.”

Their eyes met across the table. For a moment, the teasing vanished. What replaced it was something sharp, real, and far more dangerous than flirtation.

Then Sebastien smiled, a retreat, and a mask. “You should come riding with us tomorrow. The boys will adore it, and you could use fresh air.”

“Fresh air or supervision?”

“Both.”

He rose, kissed her hand, lightly, formally, infuriatingly proper, and left her staring after him.

Honoria returned moments later, swordstick in hand, face radiant. “Well, that was successful.”

“What was?” Maddie asked faintly.

“I just sent invitations for the Salon,” Honoria said, perfectly smug. “And I made certain to note that Miss Clarke will demonstrate celestial attraction. It should be quite the crowd.”

“Celestial attraction?” Maddie repeated.

Honoria smiled sweetly. “You’ve already proven the terrestrial kind, my dear.”

━━━━༻❁༺━━━━

CHAPTER ELEVEN: The Scientific Salon

By Tuesday afternoon, Ravensmere House had become a laboratory of spectacle.

Honoria had declared that science must be witnessed, and society had responded with morbid curiosity. Every wit, dowager, and dilettante within a mile of Berkeley Square descended upon the townhouse to see what the “American enchantress” would do next.

The drawing room gleamed under the blaze of new chandeliers, each festooned with strings of glass beads that caught the candlelight and scattered it like sparks. Along the walls, footmen had set up instruments borrowed from the Royal Society — telescopes, prisms, even a brass orrery ticking softly beside the punch bowl.

The assembled guests looked equally mechanical: jeweled heads turning in perfect synchrony as Maddie entered the room.

“Ah, our comet!” cried Lady Danner. “We feared you might burn out before luncheon.”

“Not yet,” Maddie said sweetly. “But keep fanning the flames. I might.”

A ripple of laughter ran through the room, delighted, scandalized, divided down invisible lines of loyalty. Honoria’s allies laughed first; her rivals tittered a beat too late.

The nasties had arrived in force.

Lady Beaulieu, her diamonds nearly as sharp as her tongue, whispered behind a painted fan, “She teaches men now, I hear. Quite openly. No wonder the marquess finds her diverting.”

“Indeed,” murmured Lady Westcott. “I suppose some men mistake novelty for intellect. Poor things.”

Their fans fluttered like wasp wings.

Across the room, Sebastien leaned against the marble mantel, watching the exchange. He didn’t move, but the glint in his eye promised that he’d heard every word.

Honoria swept in with all the grace of a general arriving on the field. “Darlings! Do stop whispering and pay attention. Miss Clarke has graciously agreed to educate us.”

The nasties froze.

Maddie felt her pulse trip, but she managed a steady smile. “Thank you, Lady Ravensmere. Today, we’ll explore attraction, celestial and otherwise.”

The room hummed. Chairs creaked. Someone dropped a lorgnette.

She walked toward a small display table, the white silk of her gown whispering around her ankles. Two glass spheres rested on it, balanced delicately on metal stands.

“When I was a child,” she began, “I thought gravity was the universe’s way of reminding us to stay humble.”

“Quite so,” murmured a colonel near the back.

“But then,” Maddie continued, “I realized gravity is attraction. Everything pulls on everything else, whether it intends to or not. The stronger the mass, the stronger the pull. The only question is how close we’re willing to get before something gives way.”

A quiet, nervous laugh rippled through the crowd.

Sebastien’s voice drifted from the back: “Some experiments, my dear, are worth the collapse.”

Maddie looked up. “Then you’d best stand clear, my lord. I’m highly unstable.”

The laughter that followed was genuine this time, even from the nasties, though their smiles were thin.

After the demonstration, a simple illusion of magnetic attraction that looked far more mystical than it was, conversation resumed in glittering clusters.

Maddie found herself surrounded by a half-circle of guests, all smiles and insinuations.

“Such a fascinating concept,” drawled Lady Beaulieu. “Of course, you must find it challenging to… translate your knowledge for ordinary minds.”

“Sometimes,” Maddie admitted. “But I find metaphors help.” She smiled sweetly. “For instance, certain systems resist comprehension until you stop assuming they revolve around you.”

A faint gasp, then laughter from the sympathetic crowd.

Lady Beaulieu’s lips thinned. “I see the Americans are well-versed in irony.”

Honoria’s fan snapped open like a duelist’s blade. “My dear Beaulieu, she’s fluent in five languages, including mathematics. How many can you count to ten in?”

“Touché,” murmured Lady Danner, delighted.

As the crowd drifted toward the refreshment table, Sebastien joined Maddie. “You handled them beautifully,” he murmured. “I might actually be a little afraid of you.”

“Good,” she said. “Fear keeps entropy in check.”

“Does it?” He laughed softly. “Because I feel increasingly disordered around you.”

She turned toward him. The air between them felt charged again, not quite flirtation, not quite danger, but something in between that made her skin tingle.

From the corner of her eye, Maddie saw two young ladies of quality watching, whispering furiously. One fanned herself while the other mouthed, ‘She’s going to marry him.’

Maddie stepped back, flustered. “I think I’ve scandalized enough for one afternoon.”

“Impossible,” Sebastien said, offering his arm. “But allow me to shield you from further study. Mother’s hounds can scent blood.”

Honoria intercepted them halfway across the room, radiant. “A triumph! Half the ton believes you’re a witch, the other half a genius. Which means, of course, you’re both.”

“Isn’t that dangerous?” Maddie asked.

“Darling,” Honoria said with a wicked grin, “in Mayfair, it’s the safest thing you can be.”

━━━━༻❁༺━━━━

CHAPTER TWELVE: The Ghost in the Greenhouse

The house was quiet. Too quiet.

Maddie tugged her chintz dressing gown over her white cotton nightdress and padded down the stairs in stocking feet, one hand trailing the banister. The lamps had been dimmed hours ago, and the hush of Ravensmere at night felt sacred—like something ancient, never meant to be disturbed. She told herself she was just restless.

The looming end-of-Season ball had her nerves fraying at the edges. If that weren’t enough, Honoria’s comet metaphor was still rattling around in her head like an annoying techno beat she couldn’t shake, and watching Sebastien with his sons stirred something she couldn’t yet name. If that wasn’t the perfect recipe for insomnia, she didn’t know what was.

But her feet didn’t take her to the library or the drawing room, as she’d intended.

They took her to the conservatory.

The scent of citrus and damp earth greeted her like an old friend. Moonlight filtered through the glass panes, casting silver shadows across the tiled floor. The air was warm, humid, and strangely alive—as if the plants themselves were waiting for something yet unseen.

She stepped inside.

And froze.

There, near the far end of the conservatory, stood a figure. Pale. Still. Watching.

Maddie’s breath caught. The figure didn’t move. Didn’t speak. Just stood there, half-shrouded in mist and moonlight. A woman, maybe. Or a trick of the glass. Or something older and unnamed that she didn’t want to know.

She blinked.

The figure was gone.

Her heart thudded against her ribs. She wasn’t frightened, exactly. But she wasn’t fine, either. She turned to leave and nearly collided with solid rock.

Sebastien caught her by the shoulders, steadying her. His hands were warm, grounding. Maddie’s breath came fast, but not from fear — not exactly.

“I didn’t mean to startle you,” he said softly.

Maddie glanced back toward the misted glass, half-expecting the figure to reappear.

“I saw someone,” she said. “A woman, I think. Just standing there.”

Sebastien followed her gaze, then shrugged lightly. “Ravensmere has always had its ghosts.”

She looked at him, uncertain.

He added, “Lady Featherstone is simply the most theatrical.”

That earned a breath of laughter, not quite relief, but close. “You say that like it’s normal.”

“It is,” he said. “Here.”

They stood in silence, the moonlight casting pale shadows across the tiled floor. Maddie felt the weight of the house around them — the history, the hush, the way everything seemed to hold its breath.

“I think I’m nervous,” she said finally.

“About the ghost?”

“About the ball.”

“Ah.” Sebastien’s mouth quirked. “That ghost.”

“She’s planning something,” Maddie said. “Honoria. Something outrageous. More telescopes in the ballroom. Star charts on the invitations. Entropy waltzes.”

“She’s matchmaking.”

“She says she’s curating possibilities.”

“She always says that.”

Maddie hesitated. “Do you mind?”

Sebastien looked at her. “Do you?”

“I don’t know,” she admitted. “I don’t know what I’m doing here. I don’t know what she wants. I don’t know what you want.”

He was quiet for a moment. “I want my sons to laugh again. I want my mother to stop worrying about her only son. I want to stop feeling like I’ll never have what my father had.”

If Sebastien suspected Honoria hadn’t given Alaric de Vere her whole heart, he also knew what she had given was more than he’d asked. His parents were happy together. His father was deeply mourned by them both. If his mother had eventually moved on, she’d earned that right. She’d been a good wife to a good man.

Maddie swallowed. “And me?”

“I want to know what you’ll do next,” he said. “Who else quotes Newton at dinner parties, wears ghastly red glasses, and explains entropy like it’s your dearest friend.”

She flushed. “That doesn’t answer the question.”

“No,” he said. “But it’s the truth.”

They stood close now. Not touching, but close enough to feel the shift in the air.

“She called me a comet,” Maddie said.

“She’s right.”

“I don’t want to burn out.”

“You won’t,” Sebastien said. “Not here.”

He didn’t have to say he wouldn’t let her. He reached out to brush a curl from her cheek instead. The touch was light, reverent. Maddie didn’t move.

“I couldn’t sleep,” he said. “I kept thinking about you. About the way you looked at the boys. Like they aren’t an afterthought.”

If Maddie wondered where that came from, she didn’t ask. She didn’t want to know. Not if it came from their mother.

“They aren’t.”

“I know.”

Maddie studied him. “Did you love her?”

“We got along.” Sebastien shrugged. “Kitty was kind. I was dutiful.” He didn’t look away. “We didn’t fight. We didn’t fall. We did what was expected.”

They existed.

“And the boys?”

“She let the nursery raise them,” he said. “I couldn’t.”

The moment stretched.

But neither of them moved.

Not yet.

Sebastien stepped back, just enough to let the air settle.

“Come on,” he said. “I’ll walk you back.”

Maddie nodded silently as Sebastien tucked her arm through his.

###

He paused at her door, his hand resting lightly on the frame. Maddie turned the handle, then looked back at him.

“Do you want to come in?” He hesitated, not out of doubt, but out of care. “Yes,” he said, quiet and deliberate. “If you want me to.”

She nodded once. He stepped past her, and the door clicked shut behind them.

The room was dim, lit only by the dying embers in the grate. Maddie moved toward the hearth, the warmth brushing her ankles. Sebastien stood near the writing desk, fingers grazing the edge as if it anchored him.

He shrugged off the banyan. It slid to the floor with a whisper of silk and theatrical intent, or it would have, if the nightshirt beneath hadn’t ruined the effect.

Maddie turned. Stared. “You look like Scrooge.”

Sebastien glanced down, unbothered. “I was aiming for ‘romantic scholar.’”

“You missed.”

“It’s comfortable,” he said, stepping closer. “And historically accurate.”

“What?” She raised an eyebrow. “Don’t tell me those old stories are true?”

The ones about copulating fully dressed under the covers.

Sebastien smiled, slow and warm. “Hey, having your arse covered isn’t so bad when the fire burns out.”

She stepped closer, fingers brushing the linen at his sleeve. “Maybe we’ll see one day.”

The silence between them held—steady, breathing, alive. Maddie could hear the faint crackle of the fire and the quiet tick of the clock in the hall. She felt him exhale more than she heard it, a small sound that somehow changed the air between them.

Sebastien’s hand found hers, fingers tracing the edge of her palm like he was mapping constellations he meant to remember. She laughed softly, a little breath of sound that broke the hush without shattering it.

“What?” he asked.

“You’re very deliberate,” she said. “Like you’re trying not to frighten a skittish animal.”

“Should I be?” His voice was quiet, teasing.

“Possibly,” she said. “Depending on your intentions.”

He smiled at that—slow, amused, just this side of rueful. “I’m still working those out.”

“Good,” she murmured. “I’m better when there’s a hypothesis involved.”

He chuckled, and the sound settled somewhere deep in her chest. The heat between them wasn’t sudden. It was slow, inevitable, like something remembered rather than discovered. She felt the brush of his lips against her temple, a whisper that could have been a word or a sigh.

Outside, a gust of wind stirred the ivy against the glass. The candle nearest to them flickered and went out. Neither of them moved to relight it.

Sebastien drew back just enough to look at her. The light from the hearth gilded his features—tousled hair, the faint shadow of a smile, the steady calm that made him seem both of his time and somehow beyond it.

“Do you ever think,” he said softly, “that perhaps we were meant to miss our proper centuries, just so we’d find each other in this one?”

If this were a rom-com, Maddie knew this was where she’d catch herself in a near swoon. “That sounds dangerously romantic.”

He tilted his head. “Then I’ve phrased it correctly.”

She smiled, then reached up and pulled him closer. The kiss wasn’t cautious. It was the kind that closed the whole remaining distance, that carried warmth and laughter and a strange, fragile peace.

###

When they finally parted, the fire had burned down to a faint orange glow. She rested her head against his shoulder, feeling his heartbeat under her palm.

“Sebastien?”

“Yes?”

“If Honoria asks tomorrow, we were discussing astronomy.”

“Obviously,” he said gravely. “Entirely scientific.”

She gave a sleepy laugh. “Entropy,” she murmured, already half-drifting.

“Only if it means we decay together,” he whispered.

And with that, the last of the candles guttered out. The house was quiet again, too quiet, but this time, it felt less like loneliness and more like belonging.

###

The first thing Maddie noticed was the quiet. The second was the weight of Sebastien’s arm across her waist, heavy and sure, his breath stirring a loose curl at her temple.

She didn’t open her eyes at once. The room smelled faintly of woodsmoke and citrus polish, and somewhere downstairs a clock chimed eight. The world felt soft-edged — the kind of morning that didn’t ask questions yet.

Sebastien shifted behind her, not quite waking, but close. His nose brushed her hairline. “You’re awake,” he murmured, voice roughened by sleep.

“Mostly,” she said. “You snore.”

“That,” he said, eyes still closed, “is a malicious rumor.”

“Empirically tested,” she countered. “Repeated trials.”

He smiled against her shoulder. “And yet you didn’t flee.”

“I was pinned,” she said, laughing quietly.

He opened one eye at that.

“I would apologize,” he murmured, “if it were not the most pleasant confinement I have ever endured.”

Maddie rolled onto her back, the sheet rustling between them. She wasn’t surprised when Sebastien kissed her neck and covered her body with his. Wrapping her legs lightly over his hips, she closed her eyes as he made lazy love to her in a way that felt both lighthearted and deeply sensual at the same time. Opening her eyes, she was captivated by the adoration in his eyes.

“You do realize,” she said, “that this is wildly improper.”

“I’m sure Honoria would call it an experiment in applied entropy.”

Maddie groaned. “You’ve been listening to me too much.”

“Impossible,” he stopped moving and propped himself on his elbows. The morning light painted him in gold and shadows, tousled hair, faint stubble, a scholar gone rakish by accident.

“Sebastien…” she began, uncertain what followed. The question wasn’t about regret — there wasn’t any — but about what came next in a world that insisted on explanations.

He brushed a thumb along her jaw, slow and deliberate. “You don’t have to define us yet,” he said. “We’ll confound the era together.”

“That might be the most romantic thing anyone’s ever said to me,” she whispered.

“Then I’m improving.”

Maddie didn’t resist when he rolled on his back and pulled her gently over to straddle him, offering the autonomy Gregory denied. The look in Sebastien’s eyes silently told her that he would follow wherever she led. Smiling softly, she felt his hands on her waist, guiding her in ways she’d never moved before. His hands fell away as she found a rhythm that had them both breathless in shared delight…

They rose eventually, dressing in the easy silence of people who had crossed a line and found the world still intact. Maddie’s hair refused to behave; Sebastien’s cravat came out crooked. She laughed as she retied it, standing on tiptoe to smooth the fold.

“There,” she said. “Acceptably scandalous.”

“Your standards are improving too,” he said dryly.

When they descended to breakfast, the household was mercifully quiet. Only Honoria’s note awaited them on the sideboard: Gone to the Covent Garden Market for flowers. Don’t let the world collapse in my absence. H.

Maddie reached for the teapot, caught Sebastien watching her, and felt a slow smile tug at her lips.

“It’s already shifted,” she said.

He didn’t ask how. He only reached for her hand, the morning light spilling through the windows like a benediction.

━━━━༻❁༺━━━━

CHAPTER THIRTEEN: The Final Flourish Ball

When the night of Honoria’s Final Flourish Ball arrived, the last glittering event before the ton scattered to their country estates, Maddie allowed Tansy to part her curls and draw them into a high tuft on the top of her head. She had no idea what Honoria was up to, but that was tradition. The Dowager Marchioness always ended the Season with a bang, and this year’s farewell fête promised to be no exception.

From the beaded constellations on her gown to the borrowed diamond hairpins dotting her updo like stars on a black velvet night, her lover’s mother was up to something.

Speaking of Sebastien, there had been no repeat performance of their delicious encounter, nor had she expected one. Between entertaining the boys as their visit wound down and preparations for the ball, there wasn’t time for anything more than tender touches and stolen kisses.

Glancing at her reflection, Maddie wondered why she wasn’t more upset that Sebastien hadn’t knocked on her door for a booty call. She wasn’t surprised when, “Because he respects you,” echoed through her head. He had, however, knocked once or twice to share an amusing anecdote about one of his sons and a sip or two of champagne. Nothing more and nothing less. Just a quiet moment spent together at the end of an exhausting day. If she hadn’t noted it already, that alone would have highlighted the differences between Sebastien and Greg.

She couldn’t call him her fiancé anymore. Not even in her head. Not because she wasn’t going back. Because the truth was welcome in paradise, and being out from under his thumb had allowed her to “see the light” and reach some startling conclusions over the past few weeks. For one, Dr. Gregory Harlan was no longer her fiancé in any time.

She’d removed that stingy little diamond from her finger two weeks into her unplanned vacation. It didn’t feel right anymore. Even without the whole college professors don’t make a lot of money spiel. Tell that to someone who didn’t know better. They were both well-paid for their contributions to science and the university. Besides, not making a lot didn’t stop him from driving an expensive luxury coupe or buying a condo in an exclusive part of town.

If that wasn’t enough, making love with Sebastien wasn’t necessary for her to know Greg was a selfish lover. She’d known it for years. She just hadn’t admitted it. He’d convinced her that what she lacked in experience she made up for in intellect. Right. What she’d lacked in experience had made it easy for her to believe that if he was satisfied, she was.

Both in and out of bed.

What she hadn’t known was how it felt to be treated like something to be treasured. Not like property to mold and shape. Once she’d recognized the difference, there was no going back. Literally. Even if she’d wanted to.

Rising to her feet, Maddie raised her arms to allow Tansy to lower her gown over her head. Standing perfectly still, she watched the little maid pull the delicate fabric in place. One thing she was eternally grateful for was that she no longer had to fight to wear her bra and panties. In truth, far from being scandalized by the newfangled foundations from the future, Honoria had summoned her personal staymaker, sworn him to secrecy with a generous bribe, and ordered an untold number of “bosom anchors” in white and soft pastels within a week of her arrival. While she drew the line at “underdrawers,” much too “of the lower orders,” Honoria did allow her seamstress to make several pairs of “bikinis” for her pet.

“My Lady,” Tansy’s impatient voice finally penetrated her thoughts. “Lady Honoria shall be most unhappy if her guest of honor is more than just fashionably late.”

Nodding, Maddie grabbed her silver spangled fan and preened one last time in front of the mirror. Her short-sleeved, iridescent blue-green Drake’s neck silk gown, slashed with beaded white silk French ribbon from the low-cut bodice to the end of the petticoat, was finished in a wide border of beaded constellations. Her clocked stockings were embroidered in silver, her long gloves gleaming white, and her dancing slippers were the same vibrant shade as her gown. If she dripped in more borrowed diamonds than a d-list Hollywood starlet, she had her hostess to thank for that. Clashing red glasses aside, she was stunning.

Primed for her grand entrance, Maddie didn’t know what she was walking into, but she was ready to be seen.

“Tansy,” Maddie smiled softly. “You have outdone yourself.”

The little maid beamed as she showed her lady to the door and gave her a gentle push to set reluctant feet in motion. If she just happened to peep over the banister to watch her descent and reception, who could blame her? Certainly not Mrs. Lamb, the housekeeper, for she was likely doing the same.

If the guests had already declared that Mayfair had never seen anything like it, they were in for yet another surprise. Honoria’s Final Flourish Ball had outdone even her most notorious soirées. Forget a ballroom with constellations stitched into the drapes, telescopes stationed beside the punch bowls, and a string quartet playing something that sounded suspiciously like a waltz named “Entropy in E Minor.”

It was the magnificent redhead descending the grand staircase in a ball gown that shimmered like the tail of a great comet with diamonds twinkling like shooting stars that took their breath away.

Across the other side of the ballroom, Sebastien turned at the collective gasp, champagne flute in hand, to behold a vision that was as far from the bedraggled creature he’d lifted from beneath a hedge as the east was from the west. Moving through the pathway opening in front of him, he made his way to Maddie’s side.

If his expression was that of a man who’d just realized he was in love with the impossible creature who’d once explained chaos with soup, no one realized it but his mother. Watching her son, debonair in black tails with a Drake’s neck embroidered waistcoat, she smiled when Sebastien openly tucked Maddie’s arm through his, declaring his serious intent to the whole room, if only subconsciously.

“You look radiant.” He watched her take a flute of champagne from a passing footman.

“I’m terrified,” Maddie admitted. “I haven’t a clue what your Mama is up to…”

“But we both know it is something.” Sebastian’s gravelly laugh bordered on wicked. “I could not agree more.” He took a sip of champagne. “My dear, all I can say is relax and let Honoria have her way. It’s not as though either of us could stop her. As you’ve said yourself, an object in motion stays in motion.”

That wasn’t correct in the real world, not without an external force anyway. However, in the case of Honoria, perhaps it was. The Dowager Marchioness of Ravensmere was hardly subject to Newtonian limits in any universe.

As Sebastien set their empty glasses aside and swept Maddie into a waltz, she failed to notice anything but the man holding her so confidently in his arms. She was too busy laughing, spinning, and forgetting that she’d ever wanted to leave.

Smiling at how adoringly Maddie gazed into her dance partner’s eyes, Lady Danner sidled up to Honoria.

“Maddie looks like a beautiful comet.”

Honoria laughed. “Unpredictable and occasionally destructive?”

“Exactly.”

“Perfect.”

Lady Danner smiled happily as she fluttered her lace fan and surveyed the room. As always, Honoria’s farewell ball was progressing without a hitch, unless you counted the usual peccadillos beyond anyone’s control. Across the room, an inebriated duke spilled punch on a star chart, Lady Featherstone’s ghost flitted near the conservatory, and their hostess was already on her third romantic intervention of the night…

###

Satisfied that her work was almost done, Honoria sipped her wine slowly, watching the room swirl with lace and laughter. Her Final Flourish Ball had unfolded exactly as planned—one last scandalous, sparkling triumph before the Season’s end. She had overseen her court as all queens must. Lord Hampton was well on his way to offering for Lady Cecilia’s grandniece, even if he didn’t know it, while Sebastien and Maddie were exactly where they were meant to be. In each other’s arms. Dandridge’s widow looked less lost and more animated, chatting with Lord Trevelyan at the refreshment table. As for the rest of the riffraff that had yet to depart for their carriages, most were availing themselves of Cook’s masterful cold collation and Sebastien’s spiked citrus punch. Far be it from her to deny them tumbling into bed tipsy with full stomachs.

Alas, the ball of the Season was winding down, as all things must.

Soon, her guests would depart, and then—

“Lady Ravensmere.”

She turned. And there he was. Lord Jasper Bellamy. Unbidden, without an invite. Older. Grayer. But still standing like a man who knew how to hold a stage.

“You haven’t changed,” he said.

“You’re lying,” she replied.

“Only about the parts that matter.”

She smiled, slowly, dangerously, clearly delighted.

“Are you here to cause a scandal?”

“I’m here to finish what we started.”

Honoria arched a brow as if to ask, “Are you now?”

Lord Jasper offered his arm. “Shall we?”

Honoria glanced toward the ballroom where Maddie was laughing in Sebastien’s arms, the constellations stitched in her gown catching the candlelight.

“The stars have aligned,” she said softly. “I’ve done my part.”

Then, with a final sip of wine and a nod to Lady Danner, she turned toward the study and the passage no one else remembered.

Sebastien glanced toward the far end of the ballroom. Not a sign of his mother. He laughed softly. Of course not. She always vanished before the last waltz, like Cinderella in reverse, leaving behind a trail of satisfied guests and just enough mystery to keep them talking. It was her signature move, especially at her Final Flourish.

Looking down at Maddie as the final note ended, Sebastien was surprised that the evening had wound down, and most of their guests had already departed. He hadn’t noted the passing of the hours. Now that he had, he was pleased to see the few remaining stragglers making their way toward the door, confident that Fortune had smiled upon them. Surely, were that not so, they would not have been invited to what was undeniably the ball of the Year.

Content that the servants had everything in hand, Sebastien walked Maddie to the terrace.

“You have changed everything.” He tucked a stray curl behind her ear. “You do know that?”

“I didn’t mean to.” Maddie fluttered her fan nervously.

“Perhaps not,” Sebastien smiled and pulled her against his side. “But the best discoveries are made by accident.”

Maddie looked up at the stars, amazed at how much clearer they appeared at this time. Smiling softly, she decided they were distant, yet somehow closer than they’d ever been.

“Do you think love obeys Newton’s laws?” she asked.

“No,” Sebastien spoke with quiet confidence. “Love, like my mother, is the rare exception.”

Then he kissed her gently, reverently, like a man who understood order but chose chaos instead.

━━━━༻❁༺━━━━

CHAPTER FOURTEEN: Unfinished Business

Pushing the lever secreted behind a copy of Radcliffe’s The Mysteries of Udolpho, Honoria watched the panel slowly swing open. Alaric’s grandfather had wanted a means to get from his study to his chamber that bypassed the main staircase and his family after a hard day’s work. So, he’d had a secret staircase installed when the townhouse was built. While her husband had known about the escape, he’d rarely used it. Unlike the first Sebastien, who loathed his wife, he’d adored his.

Sliding another panel open, Honoria stepped into her bedchamber. It was fortunate as well that, while he’d had adjoining bedchambers built into the townhouse for the benefit of future generations, the first Sebastien had chosen to make the large chamber over the library his own. If he hadn’t, the secret staircase would open into her son’s bed chamber instead. Clicking the panel back in place, Honoria turned to face her guest.

“What is this nonsense about finishing what we started?” Her crooked smile mimicked the wicked cant of her brow. “From what I remember, we already have…quite satisfactorily.”

“I was not speaking of our last encounter.”

The one where she’d turned up in his small apartment off Drury Lane wearing a great coat and little else. He still remembered how exquisite she looked spread across his bed, satiated, breasts heaving, as he’d pulled away. He’d then told her this was the last time they could be together like this. Young and spirited, she’d known her Papa had found out about them and offered him money. She’d known as well that Jasper hadn’t taken a pence. He had, however, taken her father’s words to heart and known she was meant for more than he had to offer.

“I speak of the unfinished business between us instead.”

“Oh,” Honoria turned to face him. “Have you come to tell me that your ship has come in?”

“Far more than one.” Lord Jasper nodded. “And while I can offer you nothing higher than a baronetcy, I can offer Foxleigh Court and residence in the townhouse I have recently purchased from Lord Ashcombe…”

“Ashcombe and his wife had to leave the country rather unexpectedly, I have heard.” She snorted rudely. “As I recall, it seems he is responsible for a certain popular diplomat’s unwed daughter spraining her ankle unexpectedly.”

“You recall properly.” Lord Jasper agreed. “Leading to my purchase of a most desirable property at a most agreeable price.”

“Is that all you can say?” Honoria sat on her settee. “That you offer nothing I do not already have?”

“Honoria, what do you wish me to say?” Lord Jasper laughed softly. “That I never stopped loving a wild Welsh hellion who could shoot straighter than any man I’ve ever met and made love like tomorrow would never come?”

“Perhaps,” Honoria smirked. “She certainly loved you.”

“Or she thought she did.” Jasper laughed softly.

“Oh, she did.” Honoria corrected. “As much as a wild Welsh hellion could love anyone.”

“Then, no, Honoria, I never stopped loving the hellion,” Jasper confessed. “Or the woman she would become.”

“That is all I wished to hear.”

Smiling, Honoria stepped into his waiting arms.

###

“What is this?” Jasper dropped her chemise and stared at the bits of lace covering Honoria’s chest.

“My son’s wife-to-be calls it a brassiere, or a bra for short.” Honoria huffed. “It is foolish to call such a marvel after a child’s waistcoat.” She smirked. “I call it my bosom anchor instead.”

“I see,” Jasper motioned to the other bits of fabric covering her cheeks. “And what of this?” He picked at the lace covering one hip. “Since when do you wear underdrawers?”

Not that that inviting wisp of lace looked like any underdrawers that he had ever seen.

“Tonight is the first night,” Honoria admitted. “I was curious to discover how wearing such a vulgar garment felt.”

Jasper shook his head. This wasn’t the first time she’d done something scandalous out of intellectual inquisitiveness. He huffed at the memory of an aristocratic young hoyden surrendering her virtue to an actor old enough to know better against the wall of his private dressing room in Drury Lane a lifetime ago. He suspected she’d done so more out of a desire to know what it felt like to lie with a prominent actor than she’d truly wished to have amorous congress with Jasper Bellamy one warm summer night. If those feelings had changed over time…

“And how does it feel?” Jasper shook his head.

“Different,” Honoria admitted. “But not masculine in the least.”

He couldn’t agree more. “

“Maddie says they’re called bikinis, not underdrawers, though I can hardly fathom why.” Tired of being the single all-but-naked person in the room, Honoria untied Jasper’s cravat. “Even knowing such garments are unseemly, the dear girl refuses to prance about commando as she calls it.”

“Your Maddie is a strange creature.”

“My Maddie is from the future,” Honoria confessed. “Don’t ask me how, but Sebastien found her in a swoon under a hedge in Hyde Park.”

“You believe that?” Jasper allowed her to pull his shirt over his head.

“Most certainly.” Honoria huffed. “You have only to talk to her to know that is true.” She dared him to contradict her. “She tells of horseless carriages, machines that speak without breath, and ovens that burn with impatience.”

“Then I shall endeavor to converse with that lovely young woman tomorrow,” One brow cocked as feminine fingers undid the buttons of his breeches without a ‘by your leave.’ “Tonight, I have more important considerations on my mind.”

Honoria squealed like the hoyden she’d once been when she was abruptly swung into Jasper’s arms and carried to her bed.

━━━━༻❁༺━━━━

CHAPTER FIFTEEN: Truths Laid Bare Like Crumbs on Linen

The candlelight was low, the sheets tangled, and Maddie’s laughter still echoed in Sebastien’s chest. They hadn’t meant to fall asleep, but after hours of dancing, kissing, and discovering how well they still fit together, sleep had come like a sigh.

Now, barefoot and rumpled, they tiptoed down the back stairs, Maddie clutching the back of Sebastien’s banyan.

“I still don’t understand why you hide the good stuff in the library,” She whispered.

“Because my mother believes the library is sacred,” Sebastien replied. “She’d never think to look behind the treatises on agricultural reform.”

Giggling at the absurdity of his observation, Maddie decided that that was likely true. Honoria eschewed anything that figuratively reeked of cow dung and compost.

Watching Sebastien fetch the bottle hidden behind an impressive stack of treatises, Maddie briefly wondered if he’d read all of them before deciding he likely had. From what she’d overheard at the ball, he’d written a few as well.

“Come along, my dear,” He grabbed a couple of glasses from a shelf in passing. “We have yet to raid the remains from the ball.”

Laughing softly, Maddie wondered what Sebastien would say if she asked him for a doggy bag. Following him into the kitchen, she watched him stack meat pasties, tarts, and macarons on a plate before piling their stash on a tray. As they crept back up the stairs, muffling giggles and balancing their predawn feast, Maddie paused.

Honoria’s door was ajar.

Inside, the Dowager Marchioness lounged in a silk wrap, her hair tousled, her smile wicked. A distinguished, silver-haired gentleman she’d never met stood behind her in a burgundy banyan likely belonging to one of her late husbands and nothing else, swirling cognac like a man with the right to be there.

Honoria raised an eyebrow at her son. “Sebastien,” she drawled, “I trust you found the Malmsey.”

Stunned, Sebastien lifted his tray.

Honoria laughed.

Jasper lifted his glass in salute. “To young love,” he said. “And older mischief.”

Sebastien didn’t blink. “To both,” he replied, tugging Maddie gently down the hall.

The last thing he wanted to think about was his mother and that man doing whatever it was they’d just done.

###

Sebastien set the tray down on the low table, nudging aside a stack of books Maddie suspected he’d meant to read and hadn’t. She plucked a meat pie and curled up beside him on the settee, her gown rumpled, her hair falling loose. Having a comfortable sitting area in the bedroom where one could read or visit with guests was a luxury she’d quickly become used to.

“Well,” she said between bites, “your mother certainly knows how to exit a ball.”

Sebastien poured the Madeira, his smile crooked. “She’s been slipping away like that since I was twelve.” But never with a lover until now. “I used to think she was a spy.”

Now he knew she did it to create a stir.

“She might be,” Maddie mused. “But I doubt it. More like a woman in love.”

Or lust. As much as he didn’t want to contemplate the thought, he had no doubts about what occurred the moment that door shut behind them.

“Mother looked positively smug,” Sebastien added. “Like a cat who’d licked the cream, before demanding champagne.”

Maddie giggled. “She raised an eyebrow and said, ‘I trust you’ve found the Malmsey.’ Like she’d planned the whole thing.”

“She probably did,” Sebastien said. “She’s always had a flair for timing.” Maddie had to agree. “And exits.”

They clinked glasses.

“To scandalous mothers,” Maddie said.

“To early morning meat pies and stolen wine,” Sebastien replied.

“To finding someone who really sees you,” Maddie whispered.

Sebastien leaned in, brushing her cheek with his thumb. “And stays.”

###

Sunlight spilled across the breakfast table, gilding the silver and catching the glint of sherry in Jasper’s glass. Maddie stirred her coffee, grateful they finally knew his name, while Sebastien buttered a scone with the precision of a man avoiding eye contact with his mother.

Honoria, wrapped in silk and scandalous serenity, reached for the marmalade.

“I suppose you’ve heard the story,” she said, voice casual, “about the Italian count. Handsome, tragic, married to a woman with ten children and that devastating fondness for gelato.”

Sebastien flinched. “Mama, please.”

Maddie leaned in. “I’ve heard whispers.”

“Well,” Honoria said, spreading marmalade with theatrical flair, “it’s nonsense. I lost my innocence in a dressing room at Drury Lane. To a rising star with a voice like velvet and a reputation for ruining innocents.”

Jasper coughed into his drink.

Sebastien dropped his knife. “You mean—”

“I mean,” Honoria said, eyes twinkling, “that I was seventeen, curious, and entirely unwilling to wait for a man with gout and little else to recommend him.”

Maddie blinked. “That’s…unexpected.”

“Is it?” Honoria smiled. “You’re here, aren’t you? In love with a man who found you under a hedge and kissed you until you finally accepted he meant it.”

“To hedges.” Jasper raised his glass. “And dressing rooms.”

Sebastien groaned.

Maddie laughed until she cried.

Honoria just looked pleased she’d finally set the record straight.

###

A half-hour later, everyone sat in quiet contemplation, sipping their final cup of coffee or tea. Glancing around the table, Honoria swirled tepid hot chocolate in her cup, eyes half-lidded, voice deceptively light.

“Papa said I was meant for greatness.” She quietly shared. “That I could not waste myself on a man with velvet vowels and a rented flat off Drury Lane.”

She glanced in Jasper’s direction.

Sebastien blinked. “Wait—you meant that—he was your first?”

If Jasper was uncomfortable beneath his censoring glare, he didn’t show it.

“Lord Jasper Bellamy.” Honoria didn’t flinch. “One of the finest Shakespearean actors to tread the boards.” Her face took on a wistful expression before she fixed her son with an unapologetic stare. “Before the perfect love. Before the title. Before I learned the Ravensmere smile,” The one that showed her teeth and dared anyone to slander her to her face. “There was Jasper Bellamy.”

Maddie set down her cup, suddenly aware of the quiet ache beneath Honoria’s usual bravado, and a faint memory of a playbill framed on the wall in the library at Thornebridge. According to that treasured bit of nostalgia, Jasper Bellamy played opposite Sarah Siddons in Macbeth. While she wasn’t sure of the date, she thought it was in the 1790s.

“And now?” she asked softly.

“Now I know that the perfect love is often the one they tell you to forget.” Honoria’s smile curved, slow and dangerous. “And the one I never forgot.”

Jasper raised his glass. “To remembrance without apology.”

Sebastien tipped his glass toward Jasper, the last of the sherry catching the light. Maddie watched Honoria swirl her tepid chocolate, her smile unreadable, her past no longer myth but memory. The table had gone quiet, the laughter spent, the truths laid bare like crumbs on linen. Maddie reached for Sebastien’s hand beneath the table, and he didn’t let go.

Somewhere between the marmalade and the mischief, each had found a love that lingered—one that threaded through memory like a scent, a song, or a promise never quite forgotten through time.

━━━━༻❁༺━━━━

CHAPTER SIXTEEN: The Letter

Two weeks later, Maddie lifted the letter that had taken her all day to write. While her earlier versions had been bitchier with a bitter, hurt bite, that tone didn’t feel right. After all, she was getting the better end of the stick. What did she have to be bitchy, bitter, or hurt about? Not a thing. She was grateful she’d made her great escape. Rereading the letter, she decided she’d struck just the right balance between honesty and pain.

Gregory,

He was no longer her “Dear.” In truth, he never had been.

I write to you from somewhere in time. The when isn’t important. Just know that I am safe, happy, and loved.

She refused to risk him disrupting her future, as he had her past, so exactly where in time would remain unknown.

First, you will find your ring enclosed. As I am never coming back, it is only fair that I return it. Perhaps the little redhead you took to that last symposium would like it. The one you knew I wasn’t attending, so you felt confident taking a guest. Since we look so much alike, right down to body type, I suspect the ring will likely fit.

He didn’t need to know that the de Vere family jewels were outrageous enough to make a Kardashian sing.

Second, I am enclosing the equation that brought me here. It shouldn’t work, but it does. However, it isn’t anything to trifle with. The results can be somewhat unpredictable. I wouldn’t play around with what I don’t understand if I were you. Goodness knows what you might destabilize.

Just knowing that would ensure Greg would burn the paper on which the equation was written.

Third, you should know I finally understand that your love was always contingent on what I could do for you. That I know you’ve built your career on stealing my work over the last six years. That far from sharing the glory with your fiancée, taking solo credit is how you’ve won your grants and received your accolades.

Not only do I know that, but I have a file thoroughly documenting your actions with everything I need to prove your intellectual and scientific theft. However, I wouldn’t worry too much about the consequences of your actions. If I never decide to come back, you’re in the clear. If I do, well, you figure it out. I would say “scientific scandal of the year” is putting it mildly.

In closing, I wish you all the best in your future endeavors. Oh, I would also issue one warning. Your newest lover, the little redhead who looks enough like me that it’s creepy, well, her driver’s license is forged. Far from being twenty-one, she’s barely eighteen. If I don’t miss my guess, you were banging her at the tender age of seventeen. That might present a problem somewhere down the road.

Sincerely glad to be free,

Dr. Madison Clarke

Smiling softly, Maddie folded the letter as she’d been taught and sealed it with the signet Sebastien had made just for this occasion. The one with the inquisitive raven above her initials in an elegant script. Glancing at the red sealing wax, she was pleased to see the impression was as perfect as it could get. While she would love to use the official de Vere seal, she wouldn’t dream of giving Gregory any clues to her whereabouts. Rising to her feet, she slipped into her evening primrose pelisse and straw bonnet and headed for the stairs. Honoria, Jasper, and Sebastien were all waiting for her in the drawing room.

Without them, she would never have written such a letter, bearing so many painful truths. It was thanks to Honoria’s, “I would have given anything for a letter, even a cruel one, back in the day,” and Jasper’s supportive, “It is not for him, but for you,” that gave her the courage to find the words. When Sebastien pulled her hair back from her face and whispered, “Write it, then you’ll see,” as she’d stared forlornly at the blank page, she’d finally dipped a quill in ink and let her feelings flow.

“It’s done.” Maddie held the letter up. “Sign, sealed, waiting to be delivered.”

Honoria smiled, Jasper nodded, and Sebastien lifted his cup of tea in a silent salute as the sound of the carriage pulling up to the curb signaled that the next step of the journey was about to begin.

###

The carriage waited at the curb, its lanterns flickering against the early dusk. Honoria stepped in first, her sarsenet pelisse gathered neatly at the waist, eyes sharp beneath her feathered bonnet. Jasper followed, offering his hand to steady her, though she didn’t need it. Sebastien held the door for Maddie, his gaze quiet, unreadable, but warm.

They didn’t speak much on the ride. Honoria watched the passing streets as if their order might have changed. Jasper adjusted his gloves with the practiced grace of a man who’d once commanded attention from the footlights. He didn’t speak as the carriage rolled toward Hyde Park, but his silence wasn’t empty. It was studied, like a well-timed pause before the final act. Sebastien’s hand found Maddie’s again, and this time she held it with intent.

Hyde Park was nearly empty, the hedge just visible beyond the wrought iron gate wild, improbable, and humming with the same quiet energy Maddie remembered. It hadn’t changed. Not in shape, not in scent. The air around it felt charged, like the moment before lightning struck.

She stepped down from the carriage; the envelope tucked into her glove. The others stood quietly behind her, close enough to witness, far enough to let her lead. Maddie approached the hedge slowly, her boots crunching over gravel. She knelt beside the roots, found the hollow where she’d once stumbled through time, and pressed the letter inside.

Nothing happened.

She waited, breath held, heart steady.

Then — a flicker. A shimmer. The envelope pulsed once, as if recognizing her touch, and vanished. Not torn, not burned. Just gone.

Behind her, Honoria gasped softly. Jasper murmured, “Well, I’ll be damned.” Sebastien stepped forward, his voice low. “It knew you.”

Maddie rose, brushing soil from her gloves. “It knew I wasn’t coming back.”

They didn’t ask what she’d written. They didn’t need to. The hedge had accepted it. That was enough.

As they turned back toward the carriage, the wind shifted, carrying the pungent scent of ozone. Maddie didn’t look back.

Something told her the hedge worked like a transporter from a certain television show — one breaking the traveler into atoms, then reassembling them with uncanny precision. She didn’t doubt the letter had already arrived, propped on her lab bench as though she’d placed it there herself. That was enough.

She had done all she needed to do.

━━━━༻❁༺━━━━

EPILOGUE: Curtain Call

The Season was winding down, though London still shimmered with its last bursts of gaiety. Invitations fluttered like butterflies, and gossip clung to the corners of drawing rooms like perfume. But at Bellamy Place, the mood was quieter, not solemn but settled.

Honoria stood in the morning room, her hand resting on the windowsill, watching the light shift across the garden. Lord Jasper Bellamy had just returned from Foxleigh Court with news that made her smile.

“Rather than retiring to Ravensmere Manor at the end of the Season,” he said, “we should all go to Foxleigh for Christmas weddings. It’s absurdly picturesque. And the folly is finally repaired.”

She raised an eyebrow. “You mean the one you nearly burned down trying to install gas lighting?”

He grinned. “Artistic vision, darling. Not arson.”

In the drawing room, Maddie and Sebastien were reviewing the latest botanical sketches from the conservatory at Ravensmere and trying their best to ignore the pheromones swirling in the air.

Glancing at her puce gown, Maddie was grateful Honoria insisted on being fashion forward. Allowing her future mother-in-law and her modiste control over her wardrobe, she now wore silken gowns and pelisses in the most outrageous colors and patterns. Ones that clashed with her glasses and her auburn hair. Contrary to her expectations, their insanity was quickly imitated. Laughing softly at the realization she was being groomed to one day step into Honoria’s hallowed footsteps, she decided she couldn’t imagine a greater honor than that.

Sebastien, ever the romantic at heart, had begun cataloging his newest rose varieties by emotional resonance rather than genus, insisting that some blooms deserved names like Equilibrium and Second Chances. Maddie, ever the physicist, teased him gently, but she’d started keeping a notebook of her own, filled with equations that read more like poetry than calibration.

Later that afternoon, Jasper led them through the garden at Bellamy Place, pausing beside a newly developed rose with petals like burgundy velvet tipped in gold.

“Sebastien and I call this one Curtain Call,” he said. “Velvet drama with a golden finish since every performance deserves a proper ending.”

Honoria rolled her eyes, but her smile betrayed her fondness. Maddie leaned in, inhaling the scent — rich, nostalgic, with hints of clove and black tea.

It smelled of one’s fondest memories.

Now, as the sun dipped low and the city prepared for its final balls, the four of them were gathered in the garden to wind down the Season. Jasper poured wine. Sebastien adjusted the lanterns. Honoria handed Maddie a folded invitation embossed, elegant, rosewater scented, and entirely unnecessary.

“We’re going to Foxleigh,” she said. “For Christmas. For the weddings. For everything.”

Thanks to Honoria’s effortless acquisition of a special license, the ceremonies would be held at her new home, quiet, candlelit, and entirely theirs. A mother and son, each marrying the love of their life, under the same roof, under the same snow-dusted sky.

Maddie took the card, pressed it to her heart, and nodded.

She and Sebastian agreed. Honoria’s plans were perfect. They couldn’t ask for anything more. Not knowing that the hedge had taken the past, and the future was theirs for the making.

~ THE END ~

Tough Guy's Tomato: Chapter 5

GG Wylde

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