Blog tour ~ excerpt: The Viscount’s Daring Miss by Lotte R James

Genre ~ Historical Regency Fiction

Release date ~ April 25, 2023

Page count ~ 278

I am delighted to share an excerpt today ~ thanks to Rachel’s Random Resources for organizing.

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Excerpt:

In this scene, Lawrence, Viscount Hayes, is told by the man he was originally meant to race, who he will actually be racing…

‘Well, that’s the thing, isn’t it Hayes? It may have cost me racing for my own honour and estate, but nothing more than that.’

‘I… What?’

Now, Lawrence was not typically the type of man one could throw off guard.

When you trusted no one, or at least, trusted them to only do their worst, you were rarely surprised when they obliged.

And neither was he a man to be made speechless.

That simply wasn’t the way of a proper gentleman.

Yet, here he was, caught off guard and speechless.

Rothwakes stared at him, torturing him with that childish grin and impish glint in his eyes, for a moment longer, before something softened, and hardened all at once.

‘Someone else will be racing in my stead, of course.’

‘Unacceptable. The terms—’

‘Of our agreement clearly state which horses shall race,’ Rothwakes cut in, silencing Lawrence.

He clenched his jaw, and forced himself to remember that shouting, and pummelling already injured lords, was not the way to go. Tamping down the anger brewing inside like a hot summer storm, he forced himself to listen. If only so as not to let his anger run away with him.

‘Not which riders.’

‘It was implied,’ Lawrence pointed out, patting himself on the back for remaining civilised.

‘But not spelled out in our contract. And given the circumstances, you can be damn sure I will exploit this loophole rather than simply lay down and let you take my family’s heritage from me, along with all I have built.’

Measuring his breathing, Lawrence bit back a thousand cuts against the Rothwakes name, and forced the baron’s words to permeate his brain.

Fact was, the man was right. They hadn’t put who must ride in the contract, and that was Lawrence’s own fault. But in the end, it didn’t matter who he raced. He would win.

Too much was at stake for him not to.

‘And who is it, may I ask, that I shall be competing against, then?’

If possible, the smile on the little baron’s face returned, ten-fold more self-satisfied.

While the glint in his eye turned to anticipated amusement.

Something inside Lawrence told him he was not going to like the answer to his own question.

He waited with bated breath, but feigned boredom as only a lord could perfect, while Rothwakes rang the bell, and instructed the attending footman to show Bobby in.

Lawrence expected a surprise, perhaps a world-renowned rider—not that he could remember one by the name of Bobby—or an old adversary, but what he didn’t expect, not in a million years, was what Bobby turned out to be.

A groom.

Book blurb:

ivalry leads to passion in 1830s England 

May the best viscount or miss…

…Win!

When her best friend and employer is injured, groom Roberta “Bobby” Kinsley feels compelled to help him. She agrees to step into the saddle and compete in an endurance horse race to help secure his ancestral home. Yet the minute that Bobby comes face-to-face with her opponent—arrogant yet infuriatingly charismatic Lawrence, Viscount Hayes—it’s clear that it won’t just be the competition that has her heart racing!   

From Harlequin   Your romantic escape to the past.

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