Page 1 of Shining Knight
Prologue
Autumn 1811
Once upon atime, there was a girl.
Not only was she the youngest of five, she was the only girl at that. Eugenia Knight was already different from most ladies of her station. However, being raised by four brothers, without a mother, put her into an entirely different realm. If you counted their neighbor, Graham Tinsley, then she had five brothers. She lovingly referred to them asthe herd. Having nothing better to do with her, they allowed her to tag along on their adventures, and frankly, treated her like one of the boys.
Eugenia was a hoyden, a minx. But the thing was, she did not have a malicious bone in her body. She was a devilish good sport. She had been a part of Graham’s life since…forever. She had always been there when he played with the other Knight siblings, and even though she was by far the smallest, she always kept up. When Graham had left for the diplomatic service, after Oxford, Eugenia had still been a skinny stick with unkempt hair and always a smudge of dirt somewhere.
Graham had been gone for six years. Seeing her now across the ballroom, after returning from Vienna, he had to look twice. Gone was the skinny child, all arms and legs. Now she was beautiful, and the thought made him feel dirty, as if it was incestuous. Eugenia Knight was more like a sister to him than his own, who spent most of her time in Marseille with their mother. What was she now, sixteen? Seventeen? He could not remember. Had she changed so much? Or was the hoyden still wrapped up in this pretty picture?
“You remember Mr. Tinsley, Eugenia?” the Duke of Knighton asked.
“Of course I do, silly,” she replied.
The hoyden was definitely still there, Graham thought, trying to repress his laughter. But then she looked up at him and smiled and a warm, uncomfortable tingling rushed through his body—one he instantly recognized as attraction. He was going to hell.
“Would you care to dance, pet?”
She smiled up at him again with those big, blue eyes that she had finally grown into as she leaned forward and whispered, “I hope you’ve got steel in the toes of your boots.”
“Still ungraceful, Genie?”
She jabbed him with her elbow. “Only on the dance floor. Have you ever tried to dance in skirts? Yards and yards and layers and layers of fabric swirling in and out of your legs and under your slippers while you try to remember all the steps and keep rhythm?” She snorted. “If I remain upright, I feel I have succeeded.”
Graham could not help but be enchanted. Truly, after years away charming kings and queens, princes and every beauty on the continent, he felt jaded by the callousness of it all. Eugenia was a breath of fresh air. How refreshing it was to be with one so innocent who spoke her mind without artifice.
“Are you returned for good?” Eugenia was asking him. He turned his attention back to her face which was also not quite as it ought to be for a Society miss. It was sun bronzed, with a dusting of freckles beneath her eyes and across her nose.
“I am. Father’s health is failing and he asked me to return to help manage the estate.”
“Thank goodness,” she said in all seriousness, then realized how it must have sounded. The emotions flitted across her face like an open book. “I mean not good that your father’s health is failing, but if you are here, then it means I always have someone to dance with!”
He could feel the side of his mouth rise in a smile. “I will always save a dance for you, pet.”
She nodded as though there was never any doubt. They were separated by the movements of the dance, and he noticed that a couple of young lieutenants were eyeing her hungrily.
When they rejoined, she was smiling wistfully. Oh, dear. He would have to warn Rowley. For all of the duke’s managing ways, he tended not to pay enough attention to Eugenia as a female. He had engaged a governess for her, but Graham feared Eugenia was so comfortable with men that she would not see the sharks in the water.
“I cannot wait to go to London!” Her voice was filled with dreaminess.
“Knighton is taking you for the Season?” Everyone knew Rowley hated London.
“Emma is trying to convince him. He does not believe I will behave myself,” she added ruefully.
Graham did his best to keep his face straight, but he must not have succeeded.
“You don’t believe it either!” She looked crestfallen.
“I think you can do anything you put your mind to, Genie.”
“Thank you. I do not mean to misbehave, truly. It is just that there are so many rules for girls. It is quite unfair!”
Allowing her to run wild in Devonshire was going to haunt Rowley, Graham thought sympathetically. Yet the child was a force of nature and she might have been just as unbroken had her mother lived. A part of Graham hated to see her go to London, where the gardens were perfectly manicured and anything that grew beyond its boundary was immediately plucked. Eugenia was never going to be able to be herself and thrive under those strictures. She needed to be wild and free, growing with nature.
“I agree with you. There are certainly many restrictions on females and particularly for young, unmarried ones.”
“Well, I am very glad you are home.”
Graham was a bit afraid of what she meant by that, but he was very glad he was not Eugenia’s brother in truth. He suspected she would have an overabundance of suitors, if the gleam in those soldiers’ eyes was anything to go by. “Just be careful, minx. I should not wish anything to happen to you,” he warned as the dance drew to a close.
“Why, Graham, I think that is the nicest thing you have ever said to me!” She laughed musically, but as always, just a little too loudly.
Her smiling candor was like a bright light amongst the cynicism of Society, and he hoped no one would ever snuff it out. As their dance finished and he began the next with Lady Sybil, he watched one of the young lieutenants lead Eugenia from the ballroom. If the governess, and then Rowley, had not gone after her, Graham would have done. Responsibility for Lady Eugenia Knight was not something that could be achieved alone. He was a part of her herd, and he had a feeling it would take every one of them to save her from herself.
