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October 1817

Wicked Earls’ Club, London England

Bored. Bored. Bored.

Ansley Twistleton, the Earl of Scarborough, was bored. Out of his mind with ennui. Furthermore, he had absolutely no bloody idea whatsoever about how to remedy the situation. This discontentment. This restlessness. This new, entirely irksome, wholly vexing dissatisfaction. It made him edgy and irritable.

As was his habit, he analyzed his feelings logically and dispassionately. To a degree, he’d brought this state of malaise on himself. A man of rigid schedules and habits, nothing unexpected or exciting ever happened to him. That was precisely how he preferred his well-ordered, predictable life.

Until now.

Drumming his fingertips atop his thigh, he clamped his back teeth together, pondering the exasperating irregularity.

Why now? Why, after years of consistency, was he bored?

Probably, because his pursuits and interests were few.

He neither gambled nor frequented bordellos—God only knew how many men those creatures of the boudoir had serviced—nor did he racehorses. Assemblies, routs, balls, and the like were avoided like the plague or clap, as were picnics, the opera, musicals, and the theater.

Although… He’d been known to attend the latter by himself if the play consisted of something worth watching, and he made his way into his box before anyone had a chance to corner him into conversation. There was the inconvenience of having to wait until most of the other patrons had departed before he could make his escape. But on rare occasions, the performance had been entertaining enough to warrant the minor irritation.

To say he was socially awkward was as much an understatement as suggesting Caroline of Brunswick was out of favor with the portly Prince Regent, or the English had a slight partiality for tea.

Ansley’s physical fitness and athleticism could be contributed to hours spent riding, fencing, and biweekly bouts of training at No.13 Bond Street with Jackson himself. Generally, those activities required little more than an occasional one-syllable-word comment, a grunt, or a noncommittal noise in the back of his throat.

Men never felt the need to blather on just to hear their own voices. And of colossal more importance, no primping, simpering, salivating females were ever in attendance.

God help him, but like hounds on the fresh scent of blood, eligible young misses, their terrifying marriage-minded mamas, and their pernicious plotting papas had the habit of popping up at the most inopportune moments.

Much like disease-infested rats, cockroaches, or fleas.

One knew the loathsome pests lurked about in dark corners and crevices, but when one accidentally came upon one, the experience proved most alarming and unpleasant. Unlike those vermin which usually ended up dead, the giggling debutantes—God’s bones how he detested giggling—were almost certain to appear again.

And again. And again. God help him and any other unattached male possessing a title.

Fingering his glass with its remaining dram of superior cognac, he rested his head against the wingback chair’s plush crimson velvet. Legs crossed at the ankles, he stretched them before him and stared at the robust fire through half-closed eyelids.

Around him, the soft din of his fellow Wicked Earls’ Club members’ gaming, laughter, and conversations barely permeated his aura of jaded disinterest.

A wry smile kicked his lips up on one side. Wicked earls, indeed. His claims to wickedness were his cutting, sardonic tongue and wit. However, he couldn’t vouch for the other earls one way or the other. He didn’t know any of them well enough to form an opinion.

The trouble was, he decided, returning to the issue of his boredom with a slight downward slant of his mouth and a drink of the amber liquid, he eschewed most social gatherings. Consequently, he often found himself with nothing at all to do.

Until recently, that truth hadn’t bothered him. He’d even declined to seek memberships at White’s, Brooks, and Boodle’s. As select as those gentlemen clubs were, they still allowed far too many members for his comfort.

Other than the secret Wicked Earls’ Club and Bon Chance—another exclusive club and the only two places other than his country estate where he felt a degree of ease around other people—he avoided le beau monde.

Well, he didn’t willingly entertain and mingle with the haut ton.

Since coming into his title seven years ago at the tender age of one and twenty, due to the premature death of his uncle, he’d been obligated to venture out on occasion. Very rare occasions. Mostly when his mother or sister entreated him to put on a mien of civilization. And loving them as much as he did, he tried to oblige their wishes every now and again.

He suspected they were the only two people entirely aware of what an immense effort it took each time to don his public persona. For he couldn’t bear changes in his routines. Most particularly, unforeseen variations.

It rattled him in a way that was not only difficult to explain, but disconcerting and humiliating. Everything in his ordered life had a time. When he rose. Bathed. When he ate. What time he retired. When his hair was trimmed—every third Wednesday at half-past two. When he arrived at his clubs and, unsurprisingly, when he departed.

More than once, he’d wondered if he was even sane.

Surely such compulsions bordered on madness. A terrifying notion that had haunted him since his youth.