Chapter 1

London, July 1812

The damned limp ruins my appearance.

Eighteen-year-old Samantha Douglas watched herself in the cheval glass as she limped across the bedchamber. With short Spanish-shoulder sleeves and square-cut neckline, her blue silk gown matched her eyes. Her aunt's maid had dressed her ebony hair in an upswept fashion and then adorned the coiffure with diamond florets that glittered like stars in the midnight sky.

Samantha stared at herself in the cheval glass and decided that she had never looked so pretty. No one would ever guess from her appearance that she hadn't led a pampered life as a member of the Quality. She felt like a princess…until she walked.

Why was I the one run over by the carriage? Samantha wondered. Why couldn't it have been--?

Samantha banished that uncharitable thought. She could never wish what happened to her on anyone else.

Turning away from the mirror, Samantha tried to calm her nerves by focusing on her bedchamber. The four-poster bed was enormous, seeming larger than her old bedchamber at the cottage, a room she'd shared with her two sisters. Everything in the bedchamber--textiles, carpet, wall hangings---had been created in pinks, gold, and cream.

A lady's chamber, Samantha thought. She'd only been in residence at the Duke of Inverary's for two weeks and was still unused to the opulence. She could hardly believe that her aunt and her parents had lived almost their entire lives with this luxury.

"Are you ready to meet society?"

Samantha turned at the sound of her younger sister's voice. "I'm not going to the ball," she told her.

"Are you ill?" Victoria asked, hurrying across the chamber.

"My limp prevents me from walking gracefully, never mind dancing," Samantha said, her expression glum.

Hopping Giles... Hopping Giles... Hopping Giles.

Samantha recalled the jeering name reserved for cripples and hurled at her since the carriage accident. Like an old friend, heartache for being different swept through her. The little girl who limped was always chosen last for games with other children; there was no reason to think the young woman who limped would be anything other than a wallflower.

"No gentleman will ask a pathetic cripple to dance," Samantha said, unable to control the catch of emotion in her voice.

"A slight limp doesn't make you a cripple," Victoria argued. "Besides, we have more to worry about than your limp. If anyone discovers we're frauds, we'll never find husbands."

"We are not frauds," called Angelica, the oldest Douglas sister, walking into the bedchamber. “Father was the Earl of Melrose, and since his passing, I am the Countess of Melrose."

"Father lost the Douglas fortune," Victoria reminded her.

"He didn't lose it," Angelica corrected her. "Charles Emerson swindled him out of it."

“We have nothing to recommend us but our wits and the Duke of Inverary's generosity," Samantha said. "We are pretending to be wealthy."

"Everyone pretends to have more than they do," Angelica said, waving her hand in a gesture of dismissal.

"Aunt Roxie said you're going to marry the marquess and become a duchess when the duke dies," Victoria said, and then sighed. "I wonder whom Samantha and I will marry."

"Are we ready to take our place among the Quality?" Angelica asked, changing the subject.

"I'm not going tonight," Samantha told her.

"Get Aunt Roxie," Angelica ordered Victoria. Then she turned to Samantha, saying, '~Why don't you want to go? You look beautiful. Think how much fun our first ball will be."

Samantha leveled a skeptical look on her. "All my life I've listened to children calling me Hopping Giles," she said, unable to keep the raw pain out of her voice. '~I couldn't bear for society to whisper behind their hands about me. What gentleman will ask a cripple to dance?"

"Sister, do not let a simple limitation ruin your life," Angelica said.

"That's so easy for you to say," Samantha replied. "No one ever had a cruel word for you. You're beautiful, talented, and intelligent. The Marquess of Argyll adores you."

“You have gifts, too," Angelica said, touching her sister's shoulder. "Besides being exceptionally lovely, you are the kindest and most charitable lady I know."

"Gentlemen do not value kindness and charity," Samantha told her. "Gentlemen prefer beauty and talent and intelligence." When her sister arched a brow at her, Samantha gave her a grudging smile and amended herself, saying, "Perhaps gentlemen do not value intelligence in a woman."

The door crashed open, gaining their attention. Auburn-haired and voluptuous, Aunt Roxie marched into the bedchamber. "What is the problem?" she demanded.

"I told you," Victoria blurted out. "Samantha isn't going to the ball. She--"

Aunt Roxie glared at her youngest niece, and Victoria clamped her lips shut. "Don't sit down," she cried, turning her attention on Samantha.

Samantha bolted to attention. "Why can't I sit?"

"Your gown will wrinkle."

Samantha's expression became mulish. "I am not attending the ball."

"What has changed your mind?" Aunt Roxie asked, her tone soothing.

"Charles Emerson ran me over with his carriage," Samantha said. "Should I and my deformed leg now attend a ball at his house?"

"That unfortunate accident happened long ago," Aunt Roxie replied. "He never intended to hurt you."

"Accident or no, Emerson will pay for what he has done to the Douglases," Angelica spoke up.

"Darling, you must put aside this ridiculous notion of being inferior," Aunt Roxie said, ignoring her oldest niece. "You are not merely a limp. Others will accept you when you accept yourself. Don't you want to meet a suitable gentleman and marry?"

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