A KISS GONE WYLDE

  CHASITY BOWLIN

  Copyright © 2023 by Chasity Bowlin

  All rights reserved.

  No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

  ALSO BY CHASITY BOWLIN

  PARANORMAL HISTORICAL ROMANCE:

  THE VICTORIAN GOTHIC COLLECTION

  House of Shadows

  Veil of Shadows

  Passage of Shadows

  DARK REGENCY

  The Haunting of a Duke

  The Redemption of a Rogue

  The Enticement of an Earl

  A Love So Dark

  A Passion So Strong

  A Heart So Wicked

  An Affair So Destined

  REGENCY ROMANCE:

  STANDALONE

  The Beast of Bath

  Worth the Wait

  Pretty In Pink (Preorder)

  THE LOST LORDS SERIES:

  The Lost Lord of Castle Black

  The Vanishing of Lord Vale

  The Missing Marquess of Althorn

  The Resurrection of Lady Ramsleigh

  The Mystery of Miss Mason

  The Awakening of Lord Ambrose

  A Midnight Clear: A Lost Lords Holiday Novella

  Hyacinth: A Regency Romance Novella

  The Pirate’s Bluestocking (Pirates of Britannia)

  THE HELLION CLUB SERIES:

  A Rogue to Remember

  Barefoot In Hyde Park

  What Happens In Piccadilly

  When An Earl Loves A Governess

  The Duke’s Magnificent Obsession

  The Governess Diaries

  All I Want For Christmas Is You: A Regency Historical Romance Novella

  Making Spirits Bright: A Regency Historical Romance Novella

  The Boys of Summer

  THE DUNNE FAMILY SERIES

  The Last Offer

  The First Proposal

  The Other Wife

  The Late Husband

  The Plain Bride

  The Perfect Groom

  The Scandalous Elopement

  The Inconvenient Compromise

  THE COLLECTIONS

  Christmas in Cumbria

  THE WYLDE WALLFLOWERS…

  One Wylde Night

  A Kiss Gone Wylde

  Too Wylde To Tame (Available for Preorder)

  On The Wylde Side (coming soon)

  THE LYON”S DEN

  Fall of the Lyon

  Tamed By The Lyon

  Lady Luck and The Lyon

  CONTENTS

  Prologue

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  About the Author

  Also by Chasity Bowlin

  PROLOGUE

  Benedicta Wylde was lying in her bed, staring at the ceiling and thinking of nothing. Not as in she had no thoughts at all, but as in nothing ever happened in her life. Nothing. There was no excitement, no adventure, no flirtation.

  It wasn’t that she was unhappy. She had a comfortable home, the company of her sister and often her cousins. Her parents did not harangue her in regards to her unwed state. Though surely they were of the same mind as everyone else. The Wylde Wallflowers, as they had been dubbed, were in that state even beyond spinsterhood. They were not simply unwed, but unweddable.

  Even now, in the luxury and comfort of her aunt’s London home, with the season looming before them, she had no great hope of her lot improving. Charity and Felicity were the beauties with their curvaceous figures and blonde locks. Cordelia, her younger sister, was lovely as well, in a quieter way perhaps than their cousins. But as for Benny, she knew what she was. Thin with hardly any bosom to speak of, the figure of a preadolescent boy and plain brown hair that refused to be either curly or straight. It just hung about her face in some mutinous combination of the two and refused all attempts to dress it properly.

  She was smart, she was witty—when she wasn’t with strangers—but alas, every one was a stranger because no one cared to converse with a group of Wallflowers. The gentlemen in attendance at parties thought them all lonely and desperate. The other ladies in attendance at parties thought their inability to land husbands was something contagious perhaps and would not risk their own daughters’ futures by encouraging acquaintances with them. In short, they were pariahs in their current city just as they had been pariahs in Bath. Changing locations had done nothing to change their lives.

  So perhaps something more than a change of location was required? Perhaps it was time for a change in behavior, as well?

  In the neighboring bed, her younger sister snored less than delicately. Then again, Cordelia did nothing delicately. Smaller in stature and more slight of figure than any of them, Cordelia always charged ahead like a bull.

  Sighing heavily, Benny rolled onto her side. The curtains were drawn and she could see nothing outside. Of course, there was little to see that interested her at all. She was not a fan of London. To say the least, it was certainly not what she had expected.

  They’d all had ideas about what the city might be like. For starters, social and romantic success had been envisioned by one and all. Felicity had succeeded on that front, but not without some difficulty. The rest of them would hardly be so lucky. Lightning, after all, rarely struck twice. At her age, she couldn’t even hear thunder from her position on the dusty shelf reserved for spinsters.

  “Benny, what’s the matter?”

  “Did I wake you?” Benny asked, sitting up in bed. She shrugged into her wrapper. “I’m sorry, Delia. I am a bit restless tonight. I’ll go downstairs to the library to read so that I don’t disturb you.”

  “I can keep you company,” Delia offered. “I’ll warm some milk and perhaps scavenge some teacakes from the kitchen.”

  Benny smiled. “No. You sleep. You will be unbearable tomorrow if you do not.”

  Cordelia laughed. “You are correct, of course. I cannot even abide myself when I haven’t had enough rest.”

  Benny walked toward the door to their shared chamber. “Rest, sister. I will come back to bed in a while… once I have quieted my mind.”

  “Are you troubled, Benny? I know you were closer to Felicity than to any of us. You must be lonely without her here.”

  “How could I be lonely with you and Charity to keep me company? I’m just out of sorts. I’ll be all right in the morning.” And she would be. Or she’d at least pretend to be. It would be selfish to let her melancholy ruin things for everyone else. “I’ll read for a bit and then come back to bed. Sleep well.”

  Once in the corridor, the door closed softly behind her, Benny leaned back against the wall and let out a deep breath. Out here in the corridor, there was a window that opened onto the street and a bit of light came in. Just enough, she thought, that she could make it downstairs without needing a candle. Creeping along, one hand clinging tightly to the bannister and the other holding up the long skirts of her wrapper and nightgown, she reached the bottom without falling.

  Whispered voices coming from the dining room halted her. Rather than be discovered and have to explain herself to yet another person, she ducked into the drawing room and pressed her back flat to the wall so that no one would see her. The maids, for they were close enough now to identify their voices, stepped into the corridor in a flurry of whispers and giggles.

  “Vauxhall!” One exclaimed, too loudly to be considered a whisper.

  “Shhh! Nancy, you must be quiet. If her ladyship hears that I snuck out to the pleasure gardens I will be sacked for sure!”

  Suddenly the book in the library she’d been considering seemed infinitely less appealing than the drama playing out right there in the entryway of her aunt’s home. Peering around the staircase, she watched with rapt attention.

  “Was it magical, Jenny?” The younger maid, Nancy, asked.

  “Oh, it was,” the one called Jenny replied. With a giddiness about her that Benny envied, the young woman did a quick dance step or two, twirling over the marble floor. “Some of the most handsome men I have ever seen. And the ladies were dressed so scandalously… There were lights and jugglers and fire eaters. More colors and sounds in one place than I’ve ever heard. Music was everywhere. People danced on the floor that had been installed just for that purpose, but…” she paused for dramatic effect, “they danced along the paths, as well!”

  Nancy gasped. “Oh, Jenny, you didn’t! Please tell me you did not go down the dark walk!”

  Jenny giggled. “Oh, but I did. And it was glorious. He’s so handsome, Nancy. A lord and everything. He made me an offer..”

  “An offer” Nancy squawked.

  “Shush!” Jenny hissed. “And yes he offered so soon. I thought it would take much longer.”

  “
Cor! I never heard of it happening so fast. Will you accept?”

  “Why else do you think I went to the pleasure gardens? A woman alone goes there for only one reason… to signify that she is available for… flirtation. I’ve no wish to be a maid in someone else’s house, Nance. And I knew that I was pretty enough to catch someone’s eye to spare myself that fate.”

  “You are so brave,” Nancy said, her voice a reverent whisper. “I’d give anything to be like you.”

  “You can!” Jenny insisted. “All you have to do is take yourself off to Vauxhall when they are having one of their midnight dances.”

  “When is that?”

  Jenny laughed. “The first Saturday of every month… Now help me return this gown to the laundry before anyone realizes I borrowed it.”

  Benny stepped back into the shadows as quickly and silently as possible. The two maids rushed past her, heading for the stairs that led down into the kitchen and laundry. The light from Nancy’s lamp revealed a dress of very familiar peach silk gracing Jenny’s far more voluptuous form. It piqued her temper instantly.

  Benny didn’t care that the dress Jenny had borrowed was one of her own. She didn’t care in the least. She was a little perturbed that the dress looked so much better on the maid than it did on her. Jenny’s much more abundant bosom was all but spilling out of the top of it when she had to add padding to her stays just to make the fabric lay properly. That was certainly lowering. But given what she’d learned, she was inclined to be forgiving. After all, had it not been for Jenny, she would not have been inspired to do something so out of character, so exciting and, at once, so terrifying.

  She’d been bemoaning the fact that nothing ever happened to her. Perhaps it was because she never put herself in a place where something could happen? And the first Saturday of the next month was not so far away. There were plans to be made, Benny thought. Vauxhall awaited.

  1

  It was not at all what she’d expected. Nancy had tried to warn her, Benny thought. Jenny had gone on and on about how beautiful Vauxhall had been. And it was beautiful. So were tigers. They’d still eat you if you were foolish enough to go into one’s cage.

  Well, she had certainly been foolish. She’d ignored every dire warning and tearful plea from the ladies maid that she and Cordelia shared and she had adamantly refused to listen. Now, in the midst of Vauxhall’s Pleasure Gardens, well after midnight, she could safely assume that the offer Jenny had received had not been an offer of marriage. Rather it had been for an entirely different sort of arrangement. Being there alone, she’d had more masculine attention in one night than she’d ever had in the entirety of her life. But none of it was the sort of attention she’d wanted.

  “This is most assuredly not the sort of adventure I had been looking for,” Benny murmured to herself as she tried rather desperately to find the exit. She’d ducked around a darkened corner to escape a particularly zealous suitor. When he’d shown no signs of giving up the search, she’d gone deeper and deeper into the unlit paths that surrounded the central entertainment area. Based on the noises she kept hearing, the paths might have been unlit but they were clearly not unoccupied. All she wanted was to escape. She wanted to find her way back to the main area and make her exit. That was proving far more difficult than she could have imagined.

  Part of the problem was that the mask she wore kept slipping, obscuring her vision. But if she were to take the mask off she would be ruined entirely because someone would recognize her. No, she was not popular or well known, but the truth of the matter was that the Ton was really very small. Everyone knew everyone and everyone knew her aunt. By extension, she, her sister and her cousins were all easily identifiable even if not especially noteworthy.

  Leave the mask on and stay perpetually lost or take the mask off and be utterly ruined? Decisions, decisions!

  As being lost, at least for the short term only affected her but her ruin could have negative ramifications for both Charity and Cordelia, there was really only one choice. She would continue to stumble around in the dark while trying desperately to extricate herself from a terrible muddle entirely of her own making.

  In the distance, fireworks boomed, a shower of sparks lighting the night sky for a few seconds. She stumbled forward and when the last of the light had faded, halted once more. Another remarkable display and she progressed further along the path. It would be dawn at that rate by the time she found her way.

  Dancing and lights and music, Jenny had said. There had been no mention of how scantily clad the performers would be or that men and women would be engaged in such liberties with one another—some in full view. It was beyond scandalous. And for a young woman such as herself, one who had always attended to every propriety, it was beyond shocking.

  A lull in the fireworks had left her stranded for the time being. Waiting for the next flash, she shivered. It wasn’t cold. The night was, in fact, unseasonably warm. The shiver was something else entirely. Fear. It came upon her suddenly, the sensation of being… hunted. Stalked. Watched.

  Benny drew in a deep breath and held it, not daring to even exhale as she listened for the slightest sound. Snap. A branch on one of the many hedges or bushes that lined the paths had broken. Cocking her head, she strained to decipher the exact direction from whence it came.

  Hands grabbed at her roughly, tearing at the silk of her gown. She let out a sharp scream. “Unhand me, you scoundrel!” As insults went it was not very effective. She didn’t know any curses to make it appropriately offensive. Twisting side to side, Benny struggled to get away until he simply seized her, hauling her up against him with a bruising grip. They were so close that his breath fanned over the bare skin of her neck as he exhaled raggedly from his exertions.

  The man let out a harsh chuckle, his breath reeking of spirits “Oh, I like them with a bit of spirit! Scoundrel is it?”

  He spoke like a gentleman, but that was perhaps his only claim to the title. He smelled of sweat and liquor, his breath foul. But his smell was even more so. Strong spirits, old sweat, and general filth. His hands groped at her, pinching and cruel while a group of men laughed in the distance. They knew what he was about. They had to have heard her scream. And they were not helping, which could only mean that they were with him.

  “Let go of me!”

  “Oh, no, pretty. We are just getting started… why would you be on the Dark Walk if you didn’t wish for a tryst?”

  “I didn’t come here on purpose! I was lost. Unhand me!” She attempted to stomp his toes, but with her slippers and his boots it was a pointless waste of energy. Then he simply lifted her off the ground. Out of desperation, she jabbed backwards with her elbow, catching the man in the softest part of his midsection. With a startled, “oof”, his arms fell away and she dropped to the ground once more.

  Benny turned to run but his hand snagged her wrist, yanking viciously to spin her back into his wretched embrace. As she whirled around, she brought her other hand up, fingers curved like talons and raked her fingernails over the fleshy skin of his cheek. She could smell the blood and knew she had marked him. He let go of her, his hand flying up to cup his wounded cheek.

  “Bitch!”

  Not wanting to waste what little advantage she had gained, Benny took off in the fastest sprint she could muster. In full darkness and with no notion of where she was going, she simply ran as fast as she could. Ripping the mask from her face, she tossed it to the ground. It did nothing to improve her vision but at least she didn’t feel as if she were fighting a blindfold.

  As she ran, she could hear footfalls and trampling brush behind her. The man who had grabbed her, and his lads, were in pursuit. In pursuit and gaining.

  Her side was beginning to ache. Her feet hurt from running in slippers that had never been intended for such a thing, the hard and sharp gravel tearing at the thin leather and delicate satin. And then a pair of strong hands grasped her, pulling her not backwards but sideways. Sideways into the thick bushes that flanked the path. They tore at the fabric of her gown. She could feel them scratching her face and arms. She would have screamed again, but a hand slid over her mouth as she was pulled back into the shadowy space between two large hedges. Against her ear, her abductor whispered, “Hush. They cannot see a thing out here and if you remain quiet, they may well pass us by.”