Excerpt of How to Engage an Earl by Kathryn Caskie

My God, could it be?

Laird slid from the massive tester bed and blinked his
bleary eyes, unable to believe what he was seeing.

But there she was.

His ethereal angel, here, standing in the moonlight in his
bedchamber.

She spun around, turning from the brightness of the window
to stare into darkness. Her form became a dark silhouette
framed by quicksilver.

“Who is there?” Her voice was weak, her stance tremulous.
She leaned forward out of the well of light behind her so
that her gaze might better pierce the darkness.

She couldn’t see him but she knew he was there.

After all, she had come to him.

Why, he didn’t know. Didn’t damn well care.

His mind floundered in the swirl of brandy his emptiness
had bid him to consume. Walking was nearly beyond him, and
he barely managed to remain on his feet as he slowly made
his way toward her.

She sensed his presence as he drew closer, and nervously
slid a foot backward as if to escape him. “Please, who is
there?”
There was loud creak as her heel slammed into the skirting
board beneath the window. A thump, as her back met a pane
of rippled glass. She could retreat no farther.

“It’s only me,” he told her. “No need to run.”

Laird came into the light and stood directly before her.

She did not look up at him at first, but peered, furtively
down at her slippers. Her chest rose and fell rapidly. Her
quick, shallow breaths fell softly against the wedge of his
bared chest, where his shirt had come opened as he had
unsuccessfully attempted to sleep off the potent effects of
the spirits. “Do not worry,” he said to her. He smoothed a
hand down the length of her arm.

A small gasp broke through her lips and finally, she lifted
her chin. As she turned her eyes to peer at him, a whisper
of moonlight to caress her face. “I...I...I can’t—”

Laird eased his fingers over her cheek, then cupped her
chin in his hand and angled her mouth upward toward
his. “Yes, you can. You possessed the boldness to come into
my bedchamber.”

“No. You don’t understand. I can’t—” she protested thinly.

He covered her mouth with his own then, and muted any
feeble protest. Her lips were soft and warm, and, after a
moment, he felt them moving against his.

Laird groaned and slipped his right arm around her slim
waist, and drew her closer so that he could feel her body
against him.

She responded with a firm hand against his bared chest,
pushing against him at first, but then he felt her fingers
ride up his skin and catch the half-tied neckcloth she
found there. Her grip tightened around it and she pulled
hard. It took him a half tick of the minute hand to realize
she was trying to hold herself upright.

Confused, Laird drew back a hand’s width. Her frightened
eyes met his gaze for a scant moment before her knees
buckled beneath her.

Her free hand scrabbled at her stays beneath her bodice. “I-
I can’t breathe,” she managed, before her grip upon his
neckcloth loosened and her eyes closed as she collapsed in
his arms.