Fans of Eloisa James & Julia Quinn discussion

Hero and Heroine's first meeting :)



Heroine thought of the beautiful mural in Lady Browning’s home, and wondered if this man were the artist, not the famous muralist and knew, instinctively, that she was right.
She stepped into the room, not bothering to hide her entrance. “Good evening,” she said, and he froze, one hand poised to draw. He stood that way for several seconds before he slowly lowered his hand to his side. He was completely still, unnaturally so, as if he didn’t even dare take a breath. His loose white shirt was untucked, his sleeves rolled up revealing a strong, sinuous upper arm.
“Please don’t stop your work. I’m just fetching my book.” He continued to stare at the wall in front of him unmoving and she wondered if his face were disfigured in some way. “I won’t tell. I promise.”
Then he turned to her, as if curiosity overcame him, and stared in such an oddly intense way, Heroine felt uncomfortable. He was rather amazingly, disturbingly handsome. His hair was a deep chocolate brown, thick and unruly and far too long for convention. His eyes were some light color; she couldn’t quite tell in the lamplight. And his mouth was ... Heroine had to look away. She shouldn’t be thinking about his mouth or the color of his eyes or anything else about him. As Monsieur Desmarais’s assistant, he was little more than a servant.
“I don’t care who paints the mural just as long as it gets done,” she said with measured casualness. “Did you do Lady Browning’s rose garden?”
He nodded slowly.
Heroine grinned, proud of her perception. “Oh, marvelous,” she said, clapping her hands together. “Please do continue to work. Don’t mind me and I won’t mind you. I’m afraid I find it difficult to sleep and often end up here. Quite improper, I know.” She grinned again and he simply stared at her. He couldn’t be daft. Certainly a man with such artistic talent had to be highly intelligent. Finally, he turned back to the wall, gripping the charcoal so tightly, she could see the tendons in his arms.

Hero could not believe his misfortune. No one, in all these years, had ever discovered Monsieur Desmarais’s secret. Once, Monsieur had been the finest muralist in all of Britain, but rheumatism had made holding a pencil or paintbrush for more than a few minutes excruciatingly painful. It had been an insidious thing, taking away his ability a little at a time. By the time Monsieur could no longer do anything but supervise, Hero had discovered his own talent, which was easily perfected with such a wonderful mentor.
Hero loved Monsieur Desmarais like a father and would die before the older man was shamed. He didn’t know if he could trust this girl, but it looked as if he was being forced to. If only she would go away. If only she would stop that incessant chatter.
“I think it should be rather nice to have company,” she said, sounding rather wistful.
He would not be good company for anyone, particularly not a girl who was apparently lonely and given to wandering about her house at night.
“I don’t sleep,” she said. He tensed again, as he always did when a stranger spoke to him. But he found himself relaxing a bit when he realized she did not expect him to respond and didn’t seem to care one bit whether he did or not. “Well, I do sleep, just not at night. And not in my b... my room,” she said, as if simply saying the word “bed” were naughty. Which it was, and he almost smiled.
Hero had discovered there were two kinds of women: those who thought him a eunuch simply because he didn’t speak, and those who thought him good sport. When he was younger, he rather liked the latter. But this one was perhaps simply young and naïve. No good girl would spend time alone with a strange man in the middle of the night unless she was looking for a bit of naughtiness or was so innocent those naughty thoughts hadn’t entered her head.
He began working as she prattled on about her sleeping habits. He stared at the wall and frowned. Most of the detail would come later when he was painting, but now he was creating the scene, the perspective. He was used to doing pretty landscapes, fanciful castles in clouds, or mountain scenes. This mural, however, was different, and far more personal. No one could know, of course, what painting this lake was doing to him. It was like a knife to his soul, every slash of his charcoal tearing further into his damaged heart.
It was perhaps not entirely shocking that this girl would have seen the lake, that place he remembered with an odd mix of happiness and horror. Mansfield Hall was not far from where he’d grown up near a lake very much like the one the girl described. Enough time had passed that he very much doubted anyone would recognize him. He’d rarely been brought out into society even as a child, for fear he would humiliate himself. And, of course, his father. While his brother would bow and say all the proper things a boy should say to adults, Hero never could. He would stand there, his eyes wide open, frozen as if a lump of ice around his throat prevented him from speaking. Such a scene had played out more than once, followed by a thrashing, before his father had given up on him entirely. The last time, the worst by far, didn’t bear thinking about at all.
His father had been deeply ashamed of his second son, but Hero had still been surprised when his father had committed him to an asylum for the mentally deficient one month after his brother’s death. And there, he’d been forgotten. They probably still thought him there, that sad place where the aristocracy placed their unwanted offspring, the deficient ones that were an embarrassment.
He’d been so lost in thought, he hadn’t heard the girl come up next to him. She traced a line he’d drawn with one finger. “The rock,” she said, a smile on her lips. She oughtn’t to be so close to him. She smelled sweet and looked sweeter. Her wavy red-gold-brown hair falling down her back, her green eyes sweeping along the line he’d drawn. He hadn’t seen what she looked like that afternoon, and she’d been in the shadows this evening. Now that she stood bathed in the soft light of his lamp, he realized she was beyond exquisite. “It looks exactly as I pictured it.” She gave him a curious look, a small tilt of her head before returning to the couch and her book.
“It’s special to me, that lake,” she said, her voice echoing in the emptiness of the vast room.
He wished he could tell her to stop talking, to leave him alone. But he knew from painful experience that once someone who thought him mute discovered he could talk, their reaction was humiliatingly jubilant, as if they had somehow “cured” him. Other times people felt angry and betrayed, and he supposed that was how his father had felt. For he could easily talk to his mother, even to his tutor, but in front of his father, he froze. He never spoke to someone who knew he could not speak, and he rarely got a chance to speak to anyone else. He liked his silent world of paint and charcoal and beauty—a world this girl was disrupting.
“My sister and I discovered the lake,” she said. “It’s surrounded by a huge hedge and shrouded with mystery. We found it at Warbeck Abbey. Have you ever been?”
Hero ignored her, ignored the fear that sliced through him at the mention of that terrible place.
“No one ever speaks of the lake and why there’s a large hedge surrounding it.” He willed himself to keep working, even as nightmarish images filled his head. “Of course, we were children and told in no uncertain terms that we should stay away from the hedge, that there were monsters on the other side. We couldn’t resist,” she said, laughing. “We walked around it until we discovered the smallest hole in the hedge. How brave we were, for we actually thought there might be a monster. Christine went first. She was my twin, but she was always far braver than I. We were exactly alike in every other way.” She paused and Hero thought she was finished.
“On the other side of that huge hedgerow was the lake. It was beautiful and yet somehow so forlorn, as if it hated being surrounded so. I never did find out why that lake was hidden.”
Hero heard her sigh and the sound of her picking up her book. My God, how long was she going to stay here? All night? He glanced back at her and gave her a pointed look, fighting the urge to tell her to leave him alone.
“I’m bothering you,” she said, sounding completely unrepentant. “To be honest, I find it quite refreshing to talk to someone who doesn’t interrupt. It’s almost as if I’m holding you captive to my conversation.”
Hero fought a smile, turning back to the wall before she could see. He decided, then and there, that she could talk all night if she wished. No woman had ever told him she liked his silence.

Sounds really familiar but I can't place it.

I read this not to long ago.

I know this one :)

I have no idea. But I am intrigued!

Oh, I remember this one. So sweet how they help each other face their respective demons.

I know I read it and it's pretty new. But I can't recall the name or author.

2011 I think. I loved the book, it was different from most other HRs out there.

I liked this one. Her new book is nearing the top of the TBR list, another unusual story, I think.

Hmmm, I have to push them up then.

I actually didn't enjoy it as much as I expected.

Shh I'm reading! wrote: "I actually didn't enjoy it as much as I expected."

If I'm honest, I liked this book right up to a certain point. Then the bottom fell out & it became a 3-star book. When I saw this puzzler I remembered all the good parts, so at least that was in the author's favor :)

Jane Goodger - When a Duke Says I Do

Phoenix77 wrote: "Shh I'm reading! wrote: "I actually didn't enjoy it as much as I expected."

If I'm honest, I liked this book right up to a certain point. Then the bottom fell out & it became a 3-star book. When..."

I agree. I thought it was great until about the halfway point.

I loved it. I thought it had tons of Dickensian twists on the path to true love, so the middle made sense to me.

Oh, these puzzlers always lengthen my TBR pile...

I like the sound of it!!! I'll add it to my list!