The Serpent Prince by Elizabeth Hoyt

WHEN THE DEVIL MEETS AN ANGEL

Country bred Lucy Craddock-Hayes is content with her quiet life. Until the day she trips over an unconscious man – a naked unconscious man – and loses her innocence forever.

HE CAN TAKE HER TO HEAVEN

Viscount Simon Iddesleigh was nearly beaten to death by his enemies. Now he’s hell-bent on vengeance. But as Lucy nurses him back to health, her honesty startles his jaded sensibilities – even as it ignites a desire that threatens to consume them both.

OR TO HELL

Charmed by Simon’s sly wit, urbane manners, and even his red-heeled shoes, Lucy falls hard and fast for him. Yet as his honor keeps him from ravishing her, his revenge sends his attackers to her door. As Simon wages war on his foes, Lucy wages her own war for his soul using the only weapon she has – her love…

I am sure it is very wrong of me, in oh so many ways to say this, but…

If you haven’t already, put this down on your TO BE BOUGHT AS SOON AS POSSIBLE list.

This is a flat out amazing read. The Serpent Prince is a darkly beautiful, morally questionable and erotically charged must be read novel. Simon and Lucy have a love that seems so hauntingly raw, you won’t know if you are envious or if you want to kiss it and make it better.

A few people will have a very hard time reading this maybe even more than a few. It is as violent as it is passionate, with two characters I did not want to leave. I am on a complete book high right now and the only complaint I would say I had was it ended.

Well there were a few other minor things but I will tell you about that later. But trust me. You want this book.

The ever delightful Elizabeth Hoyt has given us another excerpt to share with you! This follows the first excerpt, you can find here.

E * X * C * E * R *P *T

“I’ll not have him in my house,” Captain Craddock-Hayes pronounced, arms crossed over his barrel chest, feet braced as if on a rolling deck. His bewigged head was held high, sea-blue eyes pinned on a distant horizon.

He stood in the entrance hall to Craddock-Hayes house. Usually the hall was quite large enough for their needs. Right now, though, the hall seemed to have shrunk in proportion to the amount of people it held, Lucy thought ruefully, and the captain was right in the center of it.

“Yes, Papa.” She dodged around him and waved the men carrying her stranger further in. “Upstairs in my brother’s bedroom, I think. Don’t you agree, Mrs. Brodie?”

“Of course, miss.” The Craddock-Hayes housekeeper nodded. The frill of her mobcap, framing red cheeks, bobbed in time with the movement. “The bed’s already made and I can have the fire started in a tick.”

“Good.” Lucy smiled in approval. “Thank you, Mrs. Brodie.”

The housekeeper hurried up the stairs, her ample bottom swaying with each step.

“Don’t even know who the blighter is,” her father continued. “Might be some tramp or murderer. Hedge said he was stabbed in the back. I ask you, what sort of a chap gets himself stabbed? Eh? Eh?”

“I don’t know, I’m sure,” Lucy answered automatically. “Would you mind moving to the side so the men can carry him past?”

Papa shuffled obediently nearer the wall.

The laborers panted as they wrestled the wounded stranger inside. He lay so terribly still, his face pale as death. Lucy bit her lip and tried not to let her anxiety show. She didn’t know him, didn’t even know the color of this man’s eyes, he was a stranger to her, and yet it was vitally important that he live. He’d been placed on a door to make it easier, but it was obvious that his weight and height still made the maneuver difficult. One of the men swore.

“Won’t have such language in my house.” The captain glared at the offender.

The man flushed and mumbled an apology.

Papa nodded. “What kind of a father would I be if I allowed any sort of gypsy or layabout into my home? With an unmarried gel in residence? Eh? A damned rotten one, that’s what.”

“Yes, Papa.” Lucy held her breath as the men negotiated the stairs.

“That’s why the blighter must be taken somewhere else–Fremont’s house, he’s the doctor. Or the poorhouse. Maybe the vicarage–Penweeble can have a chance to show some Christian kindness. Ha.”

“You’re quite right, but he’s already here,” Lucy said soothingly. “It would be a shame to have to move him again.”

One of the men on the stairs gave her a wild-eyed look.

Lucy smiled back reassuringly.

“Probably won’t live long in any case.” Papa scowled. “No point ruining good sheets.”

“I’ll make sure the sheets survive.” Lucy started up the stairs.

“And what about my supper?” her father grumbled behind her. “Eh? Is anyone seeing to that while they rush about making room for scoundrels?”

Lucy leaned over the rail. “We’ll have supper on the table just as soon as I can see him settled.”

Papa grunted. “Fine thing when the master of the house waits on the comfort of ruffians.”

“You’re being most understanding.” Lucy smiled at her father.

“Humph.”

She turned to go up the stairs.

“Poppet?”

Lucy stuck her head back over the rail.

Her father was frowning up at her, bushy white eyebrows drawn together over the bridge of his bulbous red nose. “Be careful with that fellow.”

“Yes, Papa.”

“Humph,” her father muttered again behind her.

But Lucy hurried up the stairs and into the blue bedroom. The men had already transferred the stranger to the bed. They tramped back out of the room as Lucy entered, leaving a trail of mud.

“You shouldn’t be in here, Miss Lucy,” Brodie gasped and pulled the sheet over the man’s chest. “Not with him like this.”

“I saw him in far less just an hour ago, Mrs. Brodie, I assure you. At least now he’s bandaged.”

Brodie snorted. “Not the important parts.”

“Well, maybe not,” Lucy conceded. “But I hardly think he poses any risk, the condition he’s in.”

“Aye, poor gentleman.” Brodie patted the sheet covering the man’s chest. “He’s that lucky you found him when you did. He’d’ve been frozen by morn for sure, left out there on the road. Who could’ve done such a wicked thing?”

“I don’t know.”

“Nobody from Maiden Hill, I’m thinking.” The housekeeper shook her head. “Must be riff-raff down from London.”

Lucy didn’t point out that riff-raff could be found even in Maiden Hill. “Doctor Fremont said he’d be around again in the morning to check his bandages.”

“Aye.” Mrs. Brodie looked doubtfully at the patient, as if assessing his odds of living to the next day.

Lucy took a deep breath. “Until then I suppose we can only make him comfortable. We’ll leave the door ajar in case he wakes.”

“I’d best be seeing to the captain’s supper. You know how he gets if it’s late. As soon as it’s on the table I’ll send Betsy up to watch him.”

Lucy nodded. They only had the one maid, Betsy, but between the three women, they should be able to nurse the stranger. “You go. I’ll be down in a minute.”

“Very well, Miss.” Brodie gave her an old-fashioned look. “But don’t be too long. Your father will be wanting to talk to you.”

Lucy wrinkled her nose and nodded. Brodie smiled in sympathy and left.

Lucy looked down at the stranger in her brother, David’s, bed and wondered again, who was he? He was so motionless that she had to concentrate to see the slight rise and fall of his chest. The bandages about his head only emphasized his infirmity and highlighted the bruising on his brow. He looked so terribly alone. Was anyone worried about him, perhaps anxiously awaiting his return?

One of his arms lay outside the covers. She touched it.

His hand flashed up and struck at her wrist, capturing and holding it. Lucy was so startled she only had time for a frightened squeak. Then she was staring into the palest eyes she’d ever seen. They were the color of ice.

“I’m going to kill you,” he spoke distinctly.

For a moment, she thought the grim words were for her and her heart seemed to stop in her breast.

His gaze shifted past her. “Ethan?” The man frowned as if puzzled and then he shut his weird eyes. In a minute more, the grip on her wrist grew slack and his arm fell back to the bed.

Lucy drew a breath. From the ache in her chest, it was the first since the man had seized her. She stepped back from the bed and rubbed her tender wrist. The man’s hand had been brutal, she’d have bruises in the morning.

Whom had he spoken to?

Lucy shuddered. Whomever it was, she did not envy them. The man’s voice held not a trace of indecision. In his own mind there was no doubt but that he would kill his enemy. She glanced again at the bed. The stranger was breathing slowly and deeply now. He looked like he was slumbering peacefully. If not for the pain in her wrist, she might have thought the whole incident a dream.

“Lucy!” The bellow from down below could only be her father.

Gathering her skirts, she left the room and ran down the stairs.

Papa was already seated at the head of the dinner table, a cloth tucked in at his neck. “Don’t like a late supper. Puts my digestion off. Can’t sleep half the night because of the gurgling. Is it too much to ask for a dinner on time in my own home? Is it? Eh?”

“No, of course not.” Lucy sat in her chair at the right of her father. “I’m sorry.”

Brodie brought in a steaming roast beef crowded with potatoes, leeks and turnips.

“Ha. That’s what a man likes to see on his dinner table.” Papa positively beamed as he picked up his knife and fork in preparation for carving. “A good English beef. Smells most delicious.”

“Thank you, sir.” The housekeeper winked at Lucy as she turned back to the kitchen.

Lucy smiled back. Thank goodness for Brodie.

“Now then, have a bite of that.” Papa handed her a plate heaped with food. “Mrs. Brodie knows how to make a fine roast beef.”

“Thank you.”

“Tastiest in the county. Need a bit of sustenance after gallivantin’ all over the place this afternoon. Eh?”

“How have your memoirs gone today?” Lucy sipped her wine, trying not to think of the man laying upstairs.

“Excellent. Excellent.” Papa sawed enthusiastically at the roast beef. “Put down a scandalous tale from thirty years ago. About Captain Feather–he’s an Admiral now, damn him–and three native island women. D’you know these native gels don’t wear any– Ahurmph!” He suddenly coughed and looked at her in what seemed like embarrassment.

“Yes?” Lucy popped a forkful of potato into her mouth.

“Never mind. Never mind.” Papa finished filling his plate and pulled it to where his belly met the table. “Let’s just say it’ll light a fire under the old boy after all this time. Ha!”

“How delightful.” Lucy smiled. If Papa ever did finish his memoirs and published them, there would be a score of apoplectic fits in His Majesty’s navy.

“Quite. Quite.” Papa swallowed and took a sip of wine. “Now then. I don’t want you worrying over this scoundrel you’ve brought home.”

Lucy’s gaze dropped to the fork she held. It trembled slightly and she hoped her parent wouldn’t notice the movement. “No, Papa.”

“You’ve done a good deed, Samaritan, and all that. Just as your mother used to teach you from the Bible. She’d approve. But remember”–he forked up a turnip–“I’ve seen head wounds before. Some live. Some don’t. And there’s not a blessed thing you can do about it either way.”

She felt her heart sink in her chest. “You don’t think he’ll live?”

“Don’t know,” Papa barked impatiently. “That’s what I’m saying. He might. He might not.”

“I see.” Lucy poked at a turnip and tried not to let the tears start.

Her father slammed the flat of his hand down on the table. “This is just what I’m warning you about. Don’t get attached to the tramp.”

A corner of Lucy’s mouth twitched up. “But you can’t keep me from feeling,” she said gently. “I’ll do it no matter if I want to or not.”

Papa frowned ferociously. “Don’t want you to be sad if he pops off in the night.”

“I’ll do my very best not to be sad, Papa,” Lucy promised. But she knew it was too late for that. If the man died tonight, she would weep on the morrow, promises or no.

“Humph.” Her father returned to his plate. “Good enough for now. If he survives though, mark my words.” He looked up and pinned her with his azure eyes. “He even thinks about hurting one hair on your head and out he goes on his arse.”