{"product_id":"the-sinner-isbn-9780553585926","title":"The Sinner","description":"Filled with seduction, suspense, and passionate love, Madeline Hunter’s bestselling novels have captivated readers everywhere. Now she introduces fans to one of her most thrilling heroes yet—“the Sinner”—in an irresistible tale of a sensual bargain so dangerously provocative, it could tempt the devil himself . . . \u003cbr\u003e  \u003cbr\u003e \u003cb\u003eTHE SINNER\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e  \u003cbr\u003e Wearing nothing but a man’s nightshirt, Fleur Monley wakes to find herself in the bed of England’s most charming and reckless libertine. But it was a stray gunshot, not passion, that put her at the mercy of a man as infamously handsome as he is famously talented in the arts of love. Believing herself immune to any seduction, Fleur thinks herself perfectly safe to proffer an arrangement no ordinary woman would dare make: half her fortune for the freedom she would gain by being his wife—in name only. Desperately in need of funds, Dante Duclaire could do worse than the “white marriage” proposed by this idealistic beauty too naïve to know the danger she is in. But the rashest thing he’s ever done is to tell himself he’ll be able to resist the invitation to sin that this sensuous innocent would arouse at every turn—or that he’ll be able to protect her from \u003ci\u003eboth\u003c\/i\u003e the ruthless enemies that seek her ruin . . . and his own dangerous desire.\"Packed with sensuality and foreboding undertones, this book boasts rich historical details and characters possessing unusual depth and vitality.\"—\u003ci\u003ePublishers Weekly\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cb\u003eMadeline Hunter\u003c\/b\u003e is a \u003ci\u003eNew York Times\u003c\/i\u003e bestselling author of historical romances who lives in Pennsylvania with her husband and two sons. In a parallel existence to the one she enjoys as a novelist, she has a Ph.D. in art history and teaches at an East Coast university.\u003ci\u003eChapter One\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eUtter ruin provokes soul-searching in even the least reflective of men.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eDante Duclairc was contemplating that unwelcome discovery when he heard the horse outside. He opened the cottage door to find one very annoyed physician standing in the moonlight at the threshold.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eMorgan Wheeler peered severely over the top edge of his spectacles. \"This had better be very serious, Duclairc. Your brother's land steward pulled me out of bed.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"It is very serious, and I am sorry that your sleep was interrupted.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"No one said you had come down to Laclere Park. Why haven't you called on me?\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"Only the steward knows I am here, so you must swear to keep this visit a secret. I should have sent for a surgeon, but you are the only medical man in the region I could trust to be discreet.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eMorgan sighed heavily and stepped into the humble abode. \"Why did you send for me?\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"There is a woman upstairs who needs your attention.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eMorgan set down his bag and removed his frock coat. \"She is alone here?\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"Except for me.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"Why does this woman require me?\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"The lady has been shot.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eMorgan had been rolling up a sleeve. He stopped, arm outstretched and fingers engaged. \"You have a lady visitor who has been shot?\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"Grazed, actually.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"Where was she shot? Excuse me, grazed?\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"In this cottage. Accidentally. We were playing a little game and--\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"I meant, where is the wound?\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"In the rear nether region of her trunk.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"Excuse me? Are you saying that you shot your lover in the buttock?\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"Yes. Come upstairs and--\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"One moment, my good friend. My dull life has feasted off the excitement of yours for years, but this is too much. You have secretly brought a woman, a lady, to a rustic cottage on your brother the viscount's estate, where you engaged in some orgiastic rite that resulted in her being shot in the buttock. Do I have the essential facts correct?\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"Her arm is hurt and she hit her head too.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"Not like you, Duclairc, getting rough like that. You surprise and disappoint me.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"I assure you that this was an accident. A little game gone awry.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"How? What? My imagination fails me. I try to picture it but . . . If I am going to debase myself by doing a surgeon's work, the price of my skill and silence is an explanation.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"As it happens, that is precisely what I can afford. Please come up now. The steward had some laudanum and we dosed her up so she is still out, and it would be best if you did this quickly.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"Details, Duclairc. I shall expect details.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eAs Dante led Wheeler up the stairs, he considered that details were exactly what his friend would never get. No one would. The woman awaiting Wheeler's attention had come to this cottage through bizarre circumstances. Dante knew in his gut that speaking of them to anyone would only cause him untimely trouble.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eWhat had she been doing out there, dressed like a man and brandishing a pistol, on a night when the countryside was alive with a mob burning farming machines and a posse on the chase? Dante had taken his own gun to the highest hill of Laclere Park, in a nostalgic effort to protect the estate on his last night in England. When he had been surprised by a trespasser he had returned fire, only to discover to his horror that he had not shot a radical but a woman.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eAs it happened, not just any woman.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eDante paused outside the bedchamber. \"If you ever reveal what has occurred here, or that she was with me, she will be ruined.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"Discretion is a physician's second name. I never failed you in the past, did I?\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eWheeler became all business as soon as they passed into the chamber. He walked to the bed, took the patient's pulse, and felt her cheek. Ever so gently, he turned her head toward him.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eHe froze.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"Oh, my God.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"Exactly.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"Oh--my--God.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"Now you know why discretion is essential.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"It is Fleur Monley, Duclairc. Fleur Monley.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"So it is.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eWheeler collected his wits. Shaking his head, he proceeded to examine his patient. \"Fleur Monley. Even I, who have seen women of highest repute faint at your smile, am thoroughly impressed. No one ever got Miss Monley to the altar let alone into bed, let alone playing games that get women shot in the buttocks. The closest was when your brother Laclere almost got engaged to her. . . .\" The implications of that had Wheeler wide-eyed again. \"He will probably kill you if he finds out.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"Another reason for discretion.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"Of course, of course. I promised silence and am bound by it, but it will be hell to honor my word. I will burst.\" He stripped away the bedclothes to reveal Fleur demurely dressed in one of Dante's nightshirts. \"Charming, Duclairc, but why did you bother? She is drugged, I am a physician, and you are her lover.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eHe had bothered because he could hardly present her in those farm-boy rags, and because it did not seem dignified to leave her naked despite her unconsciousness and the ribald story he was feeding Wheeler. No matter what a man's reasons for stripping off her clothes, even a scoundrel did not leave the Fleur Monleys of the world naked for someone to see.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eMorgan touched her bare leg. \"She is damp. Did you bathe her?\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"She felt warm, and I thought that I should.\" It was one more bold-faced lie. Upon removing the rags he had discovered a very dirty body and had washed off the worst of it.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"Of course. Next time, do not give laudanum if the patient has a head wound.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"It wasn't much, and we dosed her some time ago when she began to moan as she came to. I am concerned that it may wear off, so you should get busy.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eMorgan was not to be rushed. He touched all around her scalp. \"It does not seem too serious. Fell, did she? Went out? She will have a bad lump. She will have to rest quietly for a few days.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"Surely she can be moved.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"Best not. You will have to make some excuse if anyone is expecting her return. She should stay here at least two or three days, in bed. Resting. It will give this arm time to repair too. Bad sprain. I can only guess how that happened. Some exotic position for coitus that country boys like me never get to learn, no doubt. Hindu?\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eWheeler's grin invited explication. Dante ignored him. Fleur Monley was going to create problems. He could not keep her here for several days, because he had no intention of being here himself. In approximately ten hours he planned to meet a fishing boat on the coast that would spirit him over to France.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"Help me to turn her so I can see about this gunshot. Gently now.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eTogether they turned Fleur on her stomach. Morgan pulled up the nightshirt. Dante turned to leave.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"No you don't. She was only nicked but you were right, it needs to be sewn. Get over here and hold her. The laudanum made her sleep but she is not unconscious. If she wakens while I am at it, I want someone backing me up.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eDante truly did not want to stay. In his thirty-two years he had seen more women nude than he could count. He had long ago learned to release or suppress his sexual reactions at will, much like a canal lock controls water. Still, seeing Fleur like this was making him uncomfortable.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eShe was injured and needed care and he lied about being lovers only to protect her from the posse out there looking for blood. Having her in this bed, naked from the waist down and her face pressed in his pillow, appeared a desecration of sorts. All the same, he was annoyingly aware that stripping her and washing her and seeing her body had raised the lock's water level more than he would like.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThat surprised him, because he had grown fairly jaded about such things. Furthermore, her reputation and condition made sexual reactions either ridiculous or despicable.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThen again, her very presence here indicated that the world may have gotten that business about her unblemished virtue very wrong. The woman Fleur Monley was supposed to be would never run through the countryside in boy's clothes on a night when the radical rabble were out committing crimes.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eWhat the hell had she been doing out there? For that matter, where the hell had she come from? The last he heard, she was visiting France.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eHe sat beside her on the bed and carefully placed his palms on her back. Behind him Morgan prepared the needle, sloshed something over Fleur's bottom, and went to work.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eShe gritted her teeth and held in the tears. She wanted to scream. If she did, however, these men would know that she was awake. That would be too humiliating to bear, and possibly very dangerous.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eWhere was she? The bed seemed clean but she could smell earth and damp and she doubted that she had made it to Laclere Park. That man who shot her must have given her up. She was probably in a farmer's cottage, being tended before they carted her off to gaol.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eBetter that than Gregory, she supposed. Unless he learned about it and bribed them to get her back. In that case she would be right where she started.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThe man holding her had not spoken much. She wished that he faced away. She would not have to swallow the pain so much if he were not looking at her. He was definitely doing that. She could feel his attention on her, despite his brief responses to the other's comments about horses and boxers.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eA hand moved from her back to her head. She barely caught the cry of surprise that jumped to her throat. Fingertips gently brushed her hair back from the pillow and lightly stroked her head. She held her breath, cheek crushed against the down, and prayed that he had not seen her jaw clench or heard her shocked intake of breath.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThat caressing hand should repel her. It implied dangerous interest and she was horribly defenseless. Instead, she found the light touch comforting and sympathetic and not at all insinuating. Who was this man who bothered to reassure an unconscious woman?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"I don't remember her being so thin,\" the voice near her rump mused. A painful skewer by the needle accompanied the comment. She tasted blood as she bit down. \"I can see her ribs plainly. Normally people gain weight on the Continent, not lose it. I have to say that even so she has a nice, um, how did you so elegantly put it, rear nether region.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eHe spoke as if he knew her! If so, the night's risks had probably achieved nothing but more danger.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"Just sew,\" the man beside her muttered. \"Aren't leeches supposed to be above noticing such things? Rather like artists?\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"I am a physician, a man of culture and learning, not a leech. If you think artists grow immune either, you are doubly a fool. All the same, I accept your correction. Although, coming from you . . .\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"I do not like my lady friends discussed by other men, that is all.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eHer ears were half-smothered in the pillow, but that voice sounded familiar. Why would he be claiming she was his lady friend? A dreadful possibility opened. Could this be the man she had heard speaking with Gregory last night?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"Considering how quickly you tire of your mistresses, I have always thought your reticence in talking about them a little priggish and ungenerous,\" the physician said. \"Although it has never been the ladies who interested me but the strategies for winning and loving them. You could save yourself a lot of curious questions by writing a treatise as I suggested years ago.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"Maybe I will do that. I will have plenty of time in France, and it may pay my keep for a few years.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThe rhythm of the needle stopped. \"France? My good man, you are not! Has it come to that?\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"Afraid so.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"How bad?\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"Very bad. They are on my trail.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"Surely your brother--\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"I have been to that well far too often, and I will not go again. Once settled in France I will write and explain to him.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"Now I am distraught. You have ruined my humor completely.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"Well, finish up here, come downstairs, and I will tell you all, but it is such an old and tired story that I am sure you have heard it often before.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eEfficient hands bound a bandage to her hip. More gentle ones slid the nightshirt down and carefully tucked bedclothes up around her shoulders.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThey left. She exhaled the strain of keeping her composure and stillness. Her rump hurt badly now, even worse than when she had first woken in shock to that sewing needle. Still, the pain both existed and didn't, like something floating in part of her mind while the other parts daydreamed and slept. She did not know how long she drifted around the edges of consciousness.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eShe wondered if only the physician had recognized her or whether the other man had as well. He spoke in the cultured manner that said he moved in the sort of circles where she could have met him at some point over the years.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eShe clung to the hope that he was not anyone who had anything to do with Gregory, and certainly not the man who had spent last night bargaining for her like she was some four-hoofed animal.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eA door below closed on mumbled farewells. Boot steps sounded on the stairs. Someone entered the chamber. She closed her eyes but she felt the warmth of the candle near her face.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"He is gone. Let us see if we can make you more comfortable now, Miss Monley.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eShe heard his voice plainly this time. Jolting up on her good arm, she twisted in shock.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eAnd looked right into the resplendent brown eyes of the most charming wastrel in England.\u003cbr\u003e\u003ci\u003e\u003cbr\u003eChapter Two\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThe women of English society could bicker and argue with the best of them, but on one point they had always been in total agreement.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eDante Duclairc was a beautiful man.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThat was the word they used. Beautiful. His luminous eyes, thick, lustrous brown hair, perfect face, and devilish smile had mesmerized any female he chose to conquer since he turned seventeen. Fleur knew three ladies who had committed adultery only once in their lives. With him.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThe years had added some hardness to his countenance, but they had not dulled the heart-skipping effect that his attention provoked.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eEven in her, and he wasn't even trying.New York Times bestselling author of Provocative in Pearls","brand":"Bantam","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":46302185259237,"sku":"NP9780553585926","price":8.99,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1842\/7735\/files\/9780553585926.jpg?v=1767741527","url":"https:\/\/k12savings.com\/products\/the-sinner-isbn-9780553585926","provider":"K12savings","version":"1.0","type":"link"}