A Slight Miscalculation

A Slight
Miscalculation

By Deb Marlowe

This book is a work of fiction. Names,
characters, places and incidents are either products of the
author’s imagination or are used fictiously. Any resemblance to
actual events or locales or persons, living or dead, is entirely
coincidental.

A Slight Miscalculation

Copyright © 2014 by Deb Marlowe

Cover design by Lily Smith

All rights reserved, including the right to
reproduce this book or portions thereof in any form whatsover.

Smashwords edition

This ebook is licensed for your personal
enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to
other people. If you would like to share this book with another
person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient.
Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

Find Deb Marlowe on the web!

www.DebMarlowe.com

www.facebook.com/pages/Deb-Marlowe/70397149702?ref=hl

https://twitter.com/DebMarlowe

The Half Moon House
Series:

The Love List

An Unexpected Encounter

A Slight Miscalculation

and

coming soon: The Leading Lady

Table of Contents

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

About the
Author

The Half Moon House
Series

Chapter One

London
1814

William Hampton, Viscount Worthe, glared at
the nervous footman blocking the doorway. “Say. That. Again,” he
ordered.

The footman swallowed, his eyes darting from
Worthe’s frown to his clenched fists. “The young miss is not at
home, sir.” He bit his lip and leaned forward, his manner
confiding. “I don’t mean in the sense of not receiving visitors,
sir. She’s not here at all.”

The paper that had blighted his life
crackled in his pocket as Worthe stiffened. “I believe I asked for
J. M. Tillney.” He spoke slowly and clearly this time.

“Yes, sir.” Now the
footman looked at him as if
he
were the one with attics to let. “But as I said,
she’s not here. She’s rarely home, lately.”

“Do you mean to say that
J. M. Tillney is a
girl
?”

The footman began to look alarmed.

“Wait.” Worthe pulled the letter from his
pocket. “Lord Tillney franked this. This is his home, is it
not?”

“Yes, sir.”

“And is there no one else in the house who
might have signed a letter with that signature? Not the baron
himself, but his heir? A ward?” He fought to keep the sudden
desperation from his tone. “A nephew?”

The footman drew himself straight. “I may be
new to my post, sir, but I know the family. The young miss is the
master’s only child, and the only one with those initials.” He
glanced behind him, then motioned Worthe back, stepped outside and
closed the door behind him. “I’m risking my place saying so, sir,
but if that letter is indeed from Miss Jane, then I beg you will
not mention it to anyone else. Her mother will have kittens, should
she hear she’s written a gentleman she’s no acquaintance with. It’s
not seemly.”

Worthe frowned. “She did not write me
directly. She sent the letter via the Astronomical Gazette. They
passed it on to me.”

“Begging your pardon, but Lady Tillney won’t
hold with that, either. She don’t approve of Miss Jane’s scholarly
interests, any more than she likes her spending so much time at
Half Moon House. Says she’s ruining her chances at a husband.”

A husband? Worthe’s humiliation doubled. All
of his plans had been put in jeopardy by a debutante?

A call sounded from inside. “That’s Wheats.
I must get back to my post.”

“Hold, please. Half Moon House, you said? Is
it an astronomy society?” That would make sense.

Already closing the door, footman merely
shook his head.

“But that’s where I’ll find her?” At the
man’s quick nod, Worthe thrust out a hand to keep the door from
closing. “Where is it located?”

“Craven Street. Just ask—everyone in London
knows the place.”

Worthe turned on his heel, his mind
spinning. An amateur enthusiast. Surely that explained it. But did
it? He stopped at the end of the walk and glanced down at the
damned note that had plagued him.

Many congratulations on your discovery of
the new asteroid. How thrilling for you. I read over your
mathematics and ideas on the variations in Uranus’s orbit with
interest. There is a slight miscalculation on the second page,
however. I thought you would like to know.

He’d scoffed when it had first arrived. But
uncertainty had haunted him. He’d checked all of his calculations
again. It had taken him two days to find the mistake.

Worthe had been furious.
Humiliated. Despondent. How had he missed it? How had everyone
else, at the
Gazette
and beyond? Truthfully, it didn’t destroy his plans, he just
had to make adjustments. But the correction smarted. The casual
ease with which his mistake had been pointed out set his teeth on
edge. He’d become obsessed with meeting the man who’d sent the
letter. He wasn’t sure if he wished to thank him or pop his cork
for him, but he most definitely wanted to meet him.

He’d left off his exhaustive work on his
telescope, gathered his papers and come straight to London,
purposefully not informing his mother of his arrival, so as to
avoid the inevitable dragging forth of every unmarried chit of her
acquaintance. And now he found that it was one of them he searched
for.

He crumpled the letter and threw it aside,
stomping onto the pavement, vowing to put the incident behind
him.

But a few minutes later he was back,
retrieving the damned thing, smoothing it out and tucking it away
again.

Half Moon House, indeed.

The footman had been correct, the first
hackney driver knew the place, although he gave Worthe an odd look
when asked. Worthe climbed down when they arrived, paid the jarvey,
and stood, contemplating the place.

The townhouse looked ordinary enough, but
the door was distinctive. The fan above had been carved with a half
moon and a scattering of stars, all set with glass. A very pretty
effect at night, he’d wager, when the light shone through. But he
could not recognize the pattern of the stars.

He snorted. A very amateur society, after
all.

His knock was answered
immediately—by a girl wrapped in a sheet, one corner thrown over
her shoulder. She beamed at him while he stared at the ivy in her
hair and the waxed grapes tucked in the crook of her arm. Granted,
he was largely out of touch with the
ton
and their interests, but this?
He could not explain it.

“Welcome, Mr. Middleton, sir! I am a nymph
of the vine, handmaiden to Dionysus. Won’t you come in?”

She opened the door wider. Frowning, he
opened his mouth and stepped in—just as a call rang out.

“I’m Diana, Goddess of the Hunt!”

Suddenly, Dionysus’s handmaiden screamed.
She jumped back as an arrow shot past her—and straight into
Worthe’s shoulder.

The impact knocked him back, he stumbled . .
. and fell back, landing hard and grunting as his head struck the
stone walkway. His last thought, as the light faded, was that he
didn’t recognize the pattern of stars dancing overhead, either.

“Oh, please, sir. Do wake up!”

The stars were still there when he opened
his eyes again.

Wait. Not stars. Sunbursts of gold in a pair
of wide, green eyes. He blinked, still befuddled, but immensely
relieved to find a recognizable pattern at last. Andromeda—the
princess constellation—laid out clearly in the form of faint
freckles across the bridge of a finely crafted nose.

“Is that real?” His tongue felt thick, but
he reached up to brush a soft cheek. He checked. His thumb remained
clean and the freckles were still in place.

“Oh, Molly.” The owner of the freckles drew
back, worry etched across her pretty face. “You’ve addled his
wits.”

“No.” Worthe struggled to sit up. “I’m
fine.”

“I’m ever so sorry, sir!” Another young
woman enveloped in white wrung her hands at his side, her bow
discarded nearby. “I meant to hit the door!” She looked to
Andromeda. “I’m so glad you made me blunt the end!”

“As am I. The poor man will likely have a
bruise, you shot with such force. But never mind. Let’s get him
up.”

The world tilted again as Worthe sat up.
Mist rushed in to blur his vision. Groaning, he felt gingerly along
the back of his skull.

“Oh, that’s quite a lump!” Andromeda
exclaimed. “Peggy, will you run for ice?”

The nymph hurried away, leaving her grapes.
Frowning, Worthe counted five young ladies surrounding him—all
draped in white linen—except for his Andromeda. He squinted to see
that she wore sprigged muslin in a light green that showcased those
spectacular eyes and contrasted nicely with soft, chestnut
curls.

“Can you stand?” she asked.

He nodded. A mistake, as nausea tried to
wash over him, but he found it easy to ignore as she pressed close
to help. The princess Andromeda possessed ample curves to go along
with her sun-burst eyes and intriguing freckles.

She held him steady as they made their way
inside, never faltering as they passed through a wide entry and
headed for a parlor on the right. “It makes sense, Andromeda,” he
said through the fog. “You must have been both beautiful and strong
to survive being chained and left for that monster.”

“Oh, I’m afraid you
are
rattled, sir. I’m so
sorry about all of this, Mr. Middleton. You’ve mistaken me. My name
is Jane.”

Alarm bells worsened the
din in his head. Worthe abruptly stopped.
Jane?

“Mr. Middleton? Oh, sir. Mr. Middleton?”

“Yes?”

Worthe turned. Too suddenly. He groaned. He
hadn’t made that answer. Another chap stood in the open doorway
behind them, dressed like quality, foot tapping impatiently. “I’m
here to see Hestia,” he announced.

Andromeda looked between them. “You’re
Middleton?” she asked the other man. “Then who—?” She eased Worthe
down on a long, low sofa. “Never mind, now.”

Dionysus’s handmaid returned with ice
wrapped in a cloth and Andromeda . . . No, not Andromeda. “You said
your name was Jane?” he rasped.

She nodded and pressed the ice to his aching
head.

Worthe waited for anger to push back in, but
it was no match for the disappointment churning up from his gut.
His Andromeda must be Jane Tillney.

“Sit a moment, please?” she asked. She
turned to the other man. “I’m sorry, sir. Hestia Wright has been
called away, and Callie Grant with her. I’m helping out as I can.
Won’t you come in? She told us of your play, though, before she
left, and that you are looking for girls to travel with your
company.”

“Aye. Six girls to act as a sort of Greek
chorus,” Middleton answered, his head bobbing enthusiastically.
“Just a line or two each, nothing difficult. Bit parts only, they
will deliver commentary on the action from the heavens above. But
they’ll be counted full members of the company.”