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again.
    The mask stared back.
    “Are you ill? Have you some sort of sensitivity to light upon your skin?” she prompted.
    “Sensitivity to light,” he uttered and then gave a short laugh of derision. He lifted his head. “I am deformed.” That the confession hurt his pride did not escape her. “It was an accident. Long ago.”
    She nodded stupidly.
    “I realize my appearance is far from ideal to an attractive young lady in search of a husband. On the other hand, I can provide a lifestyle of wealth and comfort…” He trailed off as though pained by his own speech and then shifted his weight. “Well, Miss Ellis? What say you? This is between us now. Whatever your decision, your father may keep what little funds he hasn’t managed to squander without fear of retribution from me.”
    “And if I say no? What will you do? Is there another girl you might ask?” She shouldn’t care really, but her basic curiosity could not be quelled.
    He flinched, a tiny movement, but on him it seemed as obvious as if he’d been struck by a blow.
    “No. It has to be you.” He sucked in a sharp breath and straightened like a soldier. “To speak plainly, there is no other option left to me. As to what will I do should you say no, I will continue to live alone. In short, I need you. Your help, that is. Should you grant it, Miss Ellis, you shall want for nothing.”
    The man in the black mask seemed to stand alone, apart from everything. Miranda knew loneliness when she saw it. Her mind drifted over another memory, one hard repressed. One of herself standing in the very same corner of the vestry, watching as Martin cut their engagement and walked away. And it had hurt. God, it had hurt. So much so that the idea of doing it to another made her queasy.
    Lord Archer had shown his weakness, given her a chance to cut their agreement. He’d given her power over him. The man was clearly intelligent enough to have done so with purpose. A chance at equality was unexpected.
    Still, none of that might have mattered. Foolish was the woman who gave away her freedom out of sympathy. No, it was not sympathy or the hope of power that prompted a decision; she felt something when in the presence of this strange man, a tingling thrill that played over her belly, the sense of rapid forward motion though her body stood still. It was a feeling long dormant, one gleaned from taking a sword in hand, swaggering through dark alleys when all proper girls were in their beds. It was adventure. Lord Archer, with his black countenance and rich voice, offered a sense of adventure, a dare. She could do nothing short of picking up that gauntlet, or regret it for the rest of her days. Perhaps, then, she could help them both. The idea of helping rather than destroying filled her with a certain lightness of heart.
    Miranda collected the blasted train that threatened to trip her and straightened. “We have kept my father and sisters waiting long enough, Lord Archer.” She paused at the door to wait for him. “Shall we go?”

Chapter Three
     

     
    I t had been a brief ceremony, without sentiment. A few words spoken, and Miranda Rose Ellis had disappeared. She glanced down at her wedding ring, a glowing round moonstone held aloft by a thin gold band. Now, as Lady Miranda Archer, she rode in an elegant town coach opposite her new husband. A cantankerous grumble of thunder sounded overhead and, with it, a flash of blue light. Lord Archer’s black mask gleamed for an instant, the high curves of its cheekbones and the rounded eye sockets highlighted in the dim. Miranda’s heart missed a beat.
    Silver streaks of rain slid down the window, obscuring the view as they crossed a small gully. She leaned closer only to have the window fog over from the warmth of her breath. She wiped it away, heedless of marring her kid gloves, and was rewarded with the sight of her new home as they turned up the long drive.
    Rising up four stories, it broke from the gentle crest of land like