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He was here. He was back.

The light caught on his pupil, smattering the green with flecks of gold. The look he gave her was pleading, soft.

Her eyes blurred with tears as he fell to one knee before her. He took her free hand and held it in his own. With his other hand he reached for the ring, holding it between his thumb and forefinger.

“Henry,” she breathed. Her hand shook inside the warmth of his palm. “What are you doing?”

He looked up at her, one side of his mouth rising into a smile; his dimple was thrown into egregious, adorable relief.

God, that dimple.

“Caroline,” he said, holding up the ring. “I’m asking you to marry me. Again. Marry me, please. Please, Caroline, say yes.”

She plucked the ring from his fingers. “How did you find this? I haven’t—no one knows—”

“Your brother knows,” Henry replied. “Funny, both of you
claim to have outwitted each other with your hiding spots. But you know all about William’s sock drawer. And William knows exactly which pair of boots you use to ferret away your secrets.”

Caroline blinked. “You—and William—my brother helped you find the ring? Knowing what you meant to do with it?”

Henry dipped his head, a nod.

“But William hates you.” Henry reached up, swiped a tear from her cheek with the pad of this thumb. “He tried to kill you in a duel, remember?”

“I remember, Caroline. Of course I remember. But we’ve since made amends. I had to bribe him, of course. He doesn’t want to let you go.”

Caroline drew back. “Bribe him? But—”

“I’ll explain everything, Caroline. Just know that William gave me his blessing.”

She started to cry in earnest then. Henry took her face in his hand, wiping away the tears as they rolled off her bottom lashes.

“I love you, Caroline,” he said. His voice was low, earnest. “I promise there will be no more leaving. Marry me again. I want to marry you in front of everyone this time. Your family and mine. Our friends. Even people we don’t like, let’s invite them. I want everyone to know that I am yours, and you are mine. Trust me. Marry me.”

Caroline swallowed. “But your work—and Paris—you said yourself that it was not possible to be together—”

“I hate to boast, darling, but I’m retired now”—Henry held up a finger at her gasp—“with the intent of becoming the fattest, most boring gentleman farmer England has ever had the misfortune of knowing. I intend to buy a pile and a bit of land, and while I haven’t a clue what to do with either of those things, I
do
know I would like to share them with you.”

Caroline looked down at him, her chest rising and falling as she struggled to breathe through the tightness in her throat. She swore she’d never let him close again; she swore she’d never open herself to another. How badly he’d hurt her the first time, the second; the pain of his absence was fresh in her mind, considering she’d been drowning in it just moments before.

She’d be a fool to trust him.

Except—

Except he’d proven himself to be everything she’d ever
wanted. Everything she dreamed of. He wasn’t the selfish liar she believed him to be. No—he was honest and generous and fun and good God his hands and loyal and, above all else, he was in love with her.

They’d both been lonely.

They did not have to be lonely anymore.

Caroline didn’t know she was nodding until she saw Henry’s eyes spark. “Yes,” she whispered.

His smile was delirious now, and she was falling to her knees on the carpet, and Henry was digging his hands into her hair and pulling her to him and telling her he loved her, he loved her, God, he loved her.

The kiss was hard and wild and a bit slobbery, considering all the tears. When at last Henry pulled away, he held up the ring.

“May I?”

Caroline’s hand trembled as he slid the ribbon onto the fourth finger of her left hand. As it had been twelve years before, the ring was a bit loose; it felt smooth against her skin, and she toyed at it with her thumb.

“Before the wedding I’ll have something real made up for you,” Henry said. “Perhaps an emerald, or a sapphire! Yes, a sapphire, I—”

Caroline pressed her fingers to his lips. “I don’t want another ring. I want you, Henry,” she paused, looked into his eyes. “I love you.”

As she said the words, a great weight rolled off her chest, a weight that had smothered her joy. Now that joy flooded her being, bubbling inside her like laughter.

Henry grinned. “Heavens, woman, I’ve only been waiting a decade to hear you say that! I was beginning to believe you never would.”

“Let’s not wait anymore,” Caroline replied, smiling against his lips as he kissed her, and kept kissing her, until at last she surrendered.

Historical Note

The French Blue vanished from historical record following its theft in Paris from the Royal Warehouse in autumn 1792. It reappeared some two decades later in 1812 London, in association with French émigré and jeweler John Françillon; in his papers, Françillon described an enormous, and enormously unique, blue diamond that was at the time in the possession of another jeweler (you may recognize his name from the pages of this book!): Daniel Eliason.

There are a variety of scenarios that point to the French Blue’s whereabouts between 1792 and 1812; according to Richard Kurin’s excellent
Hope Diamond: The Legendary History of a Cursed Gem
, it’s possible Caroline, Princess of Wales, inherited the stone from her father, the Duke of Brunswick. If this had indeed been the case, Kurin posits the duke—under duress while at war with Napoleon—had the stone recut sometime around 1805, before sending it to his daughter in London for safekeeping.

While it’s impossible to know, exactly, how the French Blue crossed the Channel, I’d like to think this the most likely scenario; a scenario I explored in my previous book,
The Millionaire Rogue.

Henry Beaton Lake, the hero of this book, tracks down the jewel so that he might make a strategic trade with the French—a trade that would save British lives. While the diamond was many things—mysterious, beautiful, even dangerous—it was not, as far as my research tells me, used as diplomatic bait during England’s war with Napoleon.

Of course, as a fan of James Bond (Daniel Craig slays me, every time!), I couldn’t resist inserting a spy into the murky history that surrounds the French Blue in the early nineteenth century. The opportunity to incorporate the French Blue into the political and military action of 1812—the battle of Salamanca, Wellington’s march on Madrid—was far too tempting to resist.

It is true King Louis XVIII and his brother, the Comte d’Artois, lived in exile in London following the Revolution. They would return to France in 1814 during the Bourbon Restoration. That they frequented White’s—and had a penchant for nubile women—is, as far as my research tells me, purely fiction.

For more on the Hope Diamond, check out Richard Kurin’s
Hope Diamond: The Legendary History of a Cursed Gem
and Marian Fowler’s
Hope: Adventures of a Diamond
, both of which proved indispensable to my research for this trilogy.

Turn the page for a preview of the first book in the Hope Diamond Trilogy

The Gentleman Jewel Thief

Now available from Berkley
Sensation!

City of London, Fleet Street

Spring 1812

T
he evening’s winnings in his pocket and a small, if indiscreet, smile on his lips, Lord William Townshend, tenth Earl of Harclay, strode into the bank. At once a gaggle of bespectacled Hope & Co. employees gathered at his elbow. One peeled back his coat while complimenting Harclay’s cologne, even though he wasn’t wearing any (“a vigorous choice, my lord, most vigorous!”); another took his hat and gloves and bowed, not once but three times, and appeared about to burst into sobs of gratitude.

Biting back a sigh, Harclay continued up the familiar wide staircase, polished with such enthusiasm as to make it impossible to climb without the aid of the sturdy balustrade. He admired the zeal of Mr. Hope’s bankers, he really did. But to be greeted as if Harclay were Julius Caesar, triumphantly marching on Rome—it was a bit much, considering he came not to conquer Pompey, but to deposit a thousand or two.

And Mr. Hope—ah, he was an altogether different breed.
It was why Harclay had, upon his accession to the title some eight years before, chosen to transfer his not inconsiderable wealth to the then-unknown Hope & Co. For Mr. Hope possessed qualities Harclay was hard-pressed to find in his English set: Hope was foreign and exotic and infinitely odd, but more than that, he was possessed of a sort of magnetic brilliance that was at once off-putting and entirely hilarious. That Hope had, through wise investment, nearly doubled Harclay’s fortune—well, the earl considered that quite secondary.

The doors to Hope’s office were flung open to welcome him, and he strode into the cavernous room—more a museum, really, with a Japanese samurai suit of armor squatting in one corner and a passel of Persian rugs rolled up in another. Above Mr. Hope’s enormous desk hung a monumental Botticelli, which, despite Harclay’s admiration, was a bit indecent for a place of business, considering it depicted a breast-bearing goddess.

And then there was Mr. Hope: tall, broad, imposing in that strange way of his. He stood and, though Harclay waved him off, proffered a short but lyrical bow. Behind them the doors swung shut and Harclay let out a small sigh of relief.

“My dear Lord Harclay,” Mr. Hope said. “To have braved such hellish weather to seek my company—why, after a brandy or two I’d blush! Speaking of . . . ?”

Hope raised an eyebrow to a stout pine sideboard crowded with crystal decanters winking seductively in the dull morning light.

“Good man, it’s not yet noon.”

Mr. Hope blinked. “Nonsense. In the north it’s common knowledge a nip in the day keeps the doctor at bay. Please, do sit.”

As Hope busied himself at the sideboard, Harclay folded his tall frame into a rather wide but rickety antique chair. It groaned ominously beneath his weight.

“I say, is this chair sound? I would hate to damage the”—he cleared his throat—“
lovely
piece.”

Hope waved away his words, setting a heavy blue crystal snifter before him.

“Ah.” Hope smiled, landing in his own chair, snifter pressed to his nose. “I daresay it will withstand its current burden, all
things considered. It once belonged to Henry VIII—did you know he weighed over twenty stone at his death?”

“I did not,” Harclay said, shifting his weight so that it rested not on the chair but on his own legs. “However did you manage to discover such a treasure?”

“That profligate prince regent of yours,” Hope said. “Idiot fellow’s so deep in debt he’d sell his own bollocks for a fair price. Whatever is left of them, anyway.”

“Fair point,” Harclay replied.

“No matter.” Mr. Hope took a long, satisfied pull of brandy. “Assuming you have not come to discuss the prince’s rather epic stupidity—in which case I am
most
happy to oblige you—how might I be of assistance this morning, Lord Harclay? A withdrawal, perhaps?”

Harclay shook his head. “Not this time. A deposit, actually, and a rather large one.”

He placed his snifter on the desk. Reaching into his jacket pocket, he produced a stack of banknotes, each signed by its respective debtor and stamped with the credentials of various banks and agents.

Harclay watched in amusement as Hope struggled to smother his surprise. The banker coughed, pounding on his chest, and finally managed to wheeze a reply.

“Good God, my lord, did you ransack the royal treasury? Bankrupt the local gentry?” He lowered his voice to a whisper. “Not a duel, surely? Winner takes all? I hear blood wages are quite the thing.”

Harclay laughed. For a brief moment he thought of his Manton dueling pistols, gleaming, gorgeous things that were his constant companions during a rather raucous youth. Alas, they had remained in their velvet-lined box for some time now, but Mr. Hope’s toes would positively curl if he knew how often those guns had been Harclay’s saving grace.

“No, no,” Harclay said. “I’m afraid it’s just a bit of luck I’ve come across at White’s, games of chance and all that.”

Mr. Hope scooped up the stack of notes and rifled through them. Harclay could tell the banker was biting his tongue to keep from exclaiming at the number of zeros on each note.

Hope clucked his tongue. “Tsk-tsk. Those gentlemen friends of yours should know better than to gamble with
the
Lord Harclay. Hell, even I’ve been warned about you. Something of a legend you’ve become; they say your luck never runs out. That your stakes are impossibly high.”

Harclay, legs aching, leaned as far back as Henry Tudor’s priceless chair would allow without splintering into a dozen pieces. “My companions at last night’s table were”—here that secret smile returned to his lips—“in a rather generous mood.”

“Well”—Mr. Hope held up the stack of notes with a smile—“all the better for you, my lord, though your accounts are already robust, yes,
most
robust. Many gentlemen of—ah, your particular age and station have quite the opposite problem, I’m afraid.”