Spotlight & Giveaway: When the Viscount Wanted Me by Lydia Lloyd

Today it is my pleasure to Welcome author Lydia Lloyd to HJ!

Hi Lydia and welcome to HJ! We’re so excited to chat with you about your new release, When the Viscount Wanted Me!

To start off, can you please tell us a little bit about this book?:

Hugh Aldershot, the Viscount of Tremberley, aka Trem, is sitting in his gentleman’s club one night and overhears the Earl of Hartley drunkenly crying over a vixen who has broken his heart. Ever the gossip, Trem keeps listening in to figure out the identity of the lady in question—and gets the shock of his life. The young earl is talking about Henrietta Breminster, his best friend’s little sister, and is claiming that he bedded her but now she wants nothing to do with him! Determined to punish the earl for his lies, Trem takes him to Breminster House (once he has passed out cold…) to face a reckoning. Instead, he finds that his best friend is not home and Henrietta herself is there alone.

After his arrival, Trem discovers from Henrietta that the earl is not lying about their tryst and that the blackguard is trying to pressure Henrietta into marrying him to save her reputation—and that she is very much not interested. Trem promises to help her disentangle herself from Hartley, but he can’t unsee the truth: Henrietta is not the innocent debutante he has always assumed her to be. Henrietta has always had a wicked crush on Trem and can’t believe that he now knows about her embarrassing indiscretion. Soon, their new proximity as they solve the Hartley Problem has Trem and Henrietta experiencing (and acting on) forbidden desires—but can they find their HEA amidst the chaos?
 

Please share your favorite lines or quote(s) from this book:

After her coachman inadvertently shoots him:

He kissed her again, his tongue only just edging her lower lip. His body was hot and needy under hers and she could feel, from herself, the same desperate desire.
“Your arm—” she began, “I don’t want to hurt—”
“I could fuck you with a bullet in both,” he responded, his fingers gripped underneath her jaw, his grasp just short of drawing pain.

Henrietta dresses as Artemis earlier in the book for a costume party and then she discovers a mosaic of the goddess on his estate:

“Is this a grotto?” She rushed up to the cave and pressed her palms to its walls. It faced out of the woods and, through a strategically placed break in the trees, was visible from a pretty meadow that was one of the most striking spots in the place. In the meadow, between the grotto and the woods, you could feel surrounded by a pretty wilderness, like you were in a kind of natural fairyland. But Trem had always loved the grotto itself. A mural had been inlaid there, crafted of tiles that were now crumbling, but which still showed a bust of a woman.
“It’s Artemis,” Henrietta said, running her hands over the tiles. “Who built this?”
“My great-grandfather—” Trem explained “—when a craze for grottos swept the aristocracy—at least according to Mr. Foxcroft. No aristocrat’s estate was complete without one.”
“It’s beautiful.” But he noticed her glancing at her feet. She kneeled down and picked up something—and when he saw it, he couldn’t swallow a feeling of embarrassment.
Henrietta held in her hand a little wooden horse, clearly carved by a child’s hand.
“You played here when you were a boy.”
“It was my favorite spot in the woods,” he said, rationalizing that there was no point in hiding this history from her, even though speaking about it made him feel unusually shy…“I used to sit here and imagine that, one day, I’d marry a beautiful lady and she would come and live here with me.”
Henrietta laughed. “No, you didn’t. I bet you sat here and played battle with your horses and toy soldiers and gave no thought to ladies.”
“I did a fair bit of battling, it’s true,” he said, sliding his hands around to her arse, causing her to emit a little shriek of delight. “But I also used to look at this picture of Artemis and imagine marrying a lady just like that.”

What inspired this book?

As a historical romance writer, I am, as you might expect, a big historical romance reader. The genre is known for having virginal heroines and, when heroines do have more sexual experience, they tend to either a) be widows, b) be outside of high society, or c) have been “ruined” and shamed for their supposed sexual misdeeds. I really wanted to write a heroine who is living and learning in real time—and write a hero who understands and loves her for it.

How did you ‘get to know’ your main characters? Did they ever surprise you?

This book was really fun to write because I already knew the characters well from book 1. Henrietta is the sister of John, my hero in book 1, and Trem is John’s best friend—they both feature prominently in that book and so I already had a really good sense of their characters. I went into writing knowing that they had a lot in common, both in terms of shared history and their personalities. Henrietta and Trem share their loyalty, their sweetness, and their inclination to see the humor in a situation—they can also both be impulsive and do what they want without thinking about the consequences.
In book 1, John and Catherine really grapple with resisting their desires; they hold off on their relationship for most of the book, only giving in here and there to their love for each other, because they feel a real duty to those around them to resist their attraction to and deep feelings for one another. In that book, I had to figure out how to get Catherine and John to let their guard down with each other and find a way to each other despite all the internal and external barriers to their relationship. Not only is a scandal keeping them apart, but they themselves can’t quite allow themselves to be together. With Henrietta and Trem, I went in the opposite direction. I really wanted to write a couple who is all gas, no brakes; the question for them, then, wasn’t how can they come together despite their differences, but can they make this relationship work and find equilibrium given that they share some of the same impulsive tendencies? Can they both change and grow so that they can have stability and peace as well as heat and passion? This challenge—to convince the reader that they could really work long term—made Trem and Henrietta super fun to write.

What was your favorite scene to write?

My favorite scene is Trem and Henrietta’s initial confrontation about Hartley. At first, Trem confronts Henrietta about her relationship with Hartley and implies that she has been irresponsible and reckless, but she turns the tables on him and asks him to account for his own scandalous behavior. He wants to know why she slept with Hartley, but she reverses the question and makes him answer the same question for his many scandalous affairs—he is a rake after all, so who is he to judge her? She is rejecting his judgment in this scene and calling him a hypocrite for his reaction to her decision to pursue desire. Her reversal also shows how they are similar and it is the beginning of their discovering what a great fit they are as a couple, because Trem pretty quickly realizes that she is right and backs down. They really understand each other!

“Forgive me, Henrietta,” he said, his voice deadly in its coiled control. “You are informing me that you lost your virtue to that little wastrel?”
She felt that her cheeks might burn off her face—her embarrassment was so immense. And, yet, even in this moment of stillness, even with his solemn use of the word “virtue,” she could still see a hint of that same old kindness in his eyes. The same look that had made her understand all those years ago that she could trust him about the Christmas baskets.
She gave a quick nod.
He closed his eyes, as if trying to master himself. Then, just as quickly, opened them.
“And why, in the name of God, would you have done that?”
She stepped back, instinctively. It was as if he had struck her. The question, so contemptuous, was so unlike him. So unfamiliar from anything she had ever known him to be. Anger, seething, broke through her. It wasn’t just her anger at Trem, but at Justin, too, for the way he had hounded her to marry him, not taking her refusal for an answer.
“Why?” she echoed, her indignation nearly hysterical, her voice past shrill. “Why did you begin an affair with Lady Lexington two weeks after her husband died? Why did you slide into the bed of Lady Fairfax, right after she married Lord Fairfax, who everyone knew was far too old to carry out his husbandly duties? Why did you keep Lydia Sheerling as your mistress, right after she was ruined by Lord Simmons? Why did you parade around with Mr. Sweetish and his lover Mr. Porter, all while carrying on an open entanglement with Mrs. Sweetish herself? Why, Trem? Why?”
With each question, she took a step towards him, until she was right in front of him. She was gasping for breath, as if the words had been ripped out of her. She had watched him embroil himself in complicated situations for the past four years while her brother, Montaigne, and Leith had merely laughed and shaken their heads. Nothing Trem likes more than a complication, Montaigne had said once, and it was true. And yet he dared to question her choices.
He stood silent before her. She could still see the anger burning in his eyes, but she now saw a little embarrassment, too. And she realized what she needed was a response from him.
“Why?” she repeated. “Why did you do it?”
“Henrietta.” His voice was almost a plea. Then, he scoffed, crossing his arms and leaning away from her. Somehow, he managed to be both defiant and ashamed at once.
“Answer the question,” she pressed. “Why did you do it?”
“Henrietta,” he repeated, “I—”
“Answer it,” she hissed.
“Because I wanted to,” he snapped. “Because I bloody wanted to, all right? Is that what you want me to say?”

What was the most difficult scene to write?

As is often the case for me, the scenes that I find most difficult to write are often my favorites! The scene that was actually most difficult to write is the one that I just quoted above as my favorite. I had to really work to get the scene to do what I wanted.

Would you say this book showcases your writing style or is it a departure for you?

This book definitely showcases my writing style! I love a bold historical romance that is a bit of a departure in the genre and this book definitely (at least in my mind!) lives up to that aspiration. Henrietta and Trem’s story has a beginning that is rare in historical romance and I hope readers enjoy this twist as much as I enjoyed writing it.

What do you want people to take away from reading this book?

I want readers to have fun! That is always my goal. This book is more light-hearted than the first in the series and I have intended it to be very rollicking and sexy. I really hope readers experience it that way.

What are you currently working on? What other releases do you have planned?

I just finished drafting book 3 in the Rake Chronicles—out in May—and so I will be working on revisions for that soon. I’ve also started to think about book 4, which would be the last in the series. I can’t believe I am actually talking about writing the last book in this series!

Thanks for blogging at HJ!

Giveaway: Winner will receive one ebook copy of WHEN THE VISCOUNT WANTED ME plus one additional Tule ebook title of the winner’s choice!

To enter Giveaway: Please complete the Rafflecopter form and Post a comment to this Q: What qualities do you like to see most in your heroines? Are the qualities of the heroine or the hero more important to you when you read a romance or are they equally important? When you are reading romance, do you find heroes or heroines more difficult to like/connect with?

 
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Excerpt from When the Viscount Wanted Me:

Chapter One
London, England

Late April 1819

Lord Hugh Aldershot, Viscount of Tremberley, wasn’t lonely. It wasn’t loneliness that drove him from his residence and into a gentlemen’s club that, before tonight, he had hardly remembered belonging to. It certainly wasn’t loneliness that led him to indulge in not one or two but four tumblers of Scotch—itself not a rarity, after all. And it definitely wasn’t loneliness that caused him to stare out the broad window of the club with an expression that might look, to a mistaken passerby, quite melancholy.

After all, he couldn’t be lonely. He had his best friends, the Rank Rakes, his set since Eton, whom he saw more days than not. He had invitations to all the best balls and soirées happening this very evening, at the height of the London season, a privilege that many would, no exaggeration, kill for. Not to mention, he could have chosen to pass time with one of the demimondaines currently renowned for their beauty. Or take a tumble with a comely lady—of any class. Yes, the latter amusements were more the respective purviews of the Marquess of Leith and the Earl of Montaigne, two of his best friends, who had very particular penchants for the type of women that they liked to bed. He himself didn’t need to pursue a new courtesan every fortnight or find a fetching chambermaid around every corner, but he certainly could have and had done. No, most of all, he couldn’t be lonely, because he could always do what he liked most for pleasure and a warm bed. Find a ravishing woman in interesting circumstances—his friends would say complicated—and embark on a two-month affair that left him, at its end, sated in a way that he could not quite capture in words.

And yet he found himself staring out the window of what he supposed was his club after all and feeling for the first time in his life, at the age of two and thirty, a bit….at sea.

He knew what the problem was, of course. He just didn’t like to admit it. He was happy for John. And he adored Catherine. The Duke and Duchess of Edington seemed to have unlocked the secret to matrimonial bliss. He teased them about their joy. He told them they should sell viewings of their connubial happiness to society mamas with wayward, titled sons who shunned marriage. The young saplings would have breakfast with John and Catherine and be convinced that they had better marry. Their felicity could make a fellow feel a bit de trop, that was all. But it wasn’t their fault. They did everything they could to not make him and Leith and Montaigne feel that way.

Still, he couldn’t deny that things were different now than they had been. And it wasn’t the same sort of change for Monty and Leith because they still had each other. They were all best mates, but he and John had always been a bit closer and Montaigne and Leith had their own special bond. But now John had a whole new life—a bigger life. It wasn’t that Trem was jealous or wanted more…attention from his best friend. It just meant that, on nights like this one, when he didn’t particularly feel like entering into a complicated liaison or going to a ball or even seeing Montaigne and Leith, he wasn’t sure what to do with himself.

Lost in these reflections, Trem did not at first pay heed to the strange sounds coming from the other end of the club sitting room. Finally, however, the noise had grown loud enough that he was forced to look in their direction. They were coming from the back corner, an area partially obscured by a row of armchairs. At first, he did not recognize the unfamiliar sounds. And then he realized what they were.

They were the sounds of a grown man. Sobbing. Fairly blubbering, actually.

Smirking, he leaned in and tuned his ears to the noise.

“…she doesn’t…love…me,” the man said, his aristocrat tones slurred by drink.

“Come now,” said another, much more sober-sounding man, who Trem recognized as the Baron of Drent, a nice fellow at least a half decade younger than himself whom he remembered from school. “Why don’t you take a rest? Just close your eyes.”

“Can’t… Must reach her… You don’t understand, Drent…” the other man continued. “She is the most…beautiful woman…I have ever seen.”

Trem stifled a laugh, wondering what dangerous woman of the demimonde had reduced this young lordling—whoever he was—to such a state of idiocy.

“I’m sure you’ll prevail eventually, mate,” said the other man, irritation lacing his voice. “She’ll come round.”

“No….” the other answered, his voice sounding quite young. “I’ve sent her…so many letters… Doesn’t respond… Doesn’t want to see me… If the duke knew, he’d kill me.”

Trem’s pulse spiked. Dear God, were they talking about a gentlewoman? A lady of the ton? What duchess had tarried with this young lackwit?

Drent laughed. “If her brother knew, he’d make her marry you.”

Holy hell, they were talking about a gentlewoman. And not a duchess, but a duke’s sister. Who was it? He leaned in to hear more. It could be only a small number of women but no likely candidate sprang to his mind. If he had known his club would always have this much fresh society intelligence—which he had to admit he had always liked more than he should—he might have begun frequenting it earlier than tonight.

He had to know the identity of the drunken, jilted man. Trem peered over the armchair that blocked his view of the men and saw that the speaker was the Earl of Hartley. He looked very deep in his cups, indeed.

“Can’t,” Hartley groaned. “Want her to want to marry me. Want her to choose me.”

Trem snorted. The Earl of Hartley had been known for some years now as one of the best catches for young debutantes, despite the rumors that still swirled, after his inheritance of the title, that he wasn’t his father’s son. He imagined several disappointed ladies would take pleasure in the young lord’s pain at present.

Despite his princely looks and good title, Trem had always found Hartley a bit juvenile. And it wasn’t that he had particularly high standards. Montaigne, after all, was one of his best friends.

In short, Trem wasn’t surprised that he would be whinging about a woman, given that he had a rather whinging personality.

It was surprising, however, that that woman would be a lady.

Trem leaned in so as not to miss anything else.

What woman of the ton had Hartley compromised?

“Best woman I’ve ever had… So sweet…” Hartley continued to slur, seeming only half aware of Drent. “Best face…best arse…”

Trem stifled another laugh at this bathetic description.

“Hart,” Drent said, no longer trying to hide his irritation. “Sleep it off.”

“You have to find her,” Hartley said, now sounding more agitated than foggy. “Take this note to her. Make her see me. Grosvenor Square. Breminster House.”

Trem’s blood ran cold. The smile snapped off his face. Because only one duke’s sister lived at Breminster House. And he knew her very well.

She was the younger sister of his best friend.

It couldn’t be.

No, it must be someone else.

“Henrietta…Henrietta…” Hartley began moaning, as if he were trying to speak to the lady in question himself, as if she were there in the room with them.

Henrietta.

Henrietta Breminster, his best friend’s younger sister, practically his younger sister, had thrown the ton into a frenzy from the moment she had debuted. He remembered her when she was an innocent country girl who had never seen London. But it felt like an age since she had been that girl, much longer than three or four years.

Because in that time, she had become the jewel of London society. He could hardly believe it at times, how she had changed. At almost two-and-twenty, she was one of the most beautiful and sought-after young women between Park Lane and Regent Street.

Her ascent made sense, of course. He knew that. Really, he shouldn’t have been surprised. She was the sister of a duke and she had a notoriously enormous dowry. And John and Catherine had themselves gone from potential pariahs for their union to the center of the ton after their marriage. They hadn’t sought it out, but high society had gone wild for their story. After their wedding, their popularity had soared. Now, there was no family more fashionable than the Breminsters. Their prominence was only enhanced by their own indifference to it.

Well, Henrietta wasn’t quite indifferent to it.

He knew she cared. At least a bit.

What girl of her age and station wouldn’t?

In the past, Trem had always laughed when he saw little Henrietta making high society bend to her will.

He knew from John that quite a few gentlemen had already asked for her hand.

But she hadn’t wanted any of them.

It had pleased him, that knowledge, unaccountably. It was true that, if she married, it would be another change. She certainly wouldn’t be little Henrietta anymore if she became some aristocrat’s new wife.

Of course, she was still changed, whether she was single or married. He had seen her last week at the Countess of Whitmore’s ball and even he, who knew her so well, had been taken aback by her mature beauty. Her light brown hair, which seemed to shift a shade each time he saw her, flittering lighter and darker, playing tricks with her pale skin, had been done up in an elaborate coiffure. Her slim, elegant figure had attracted every eye. Her delicate features, doll-like in their prettiness, created an intoxicating contrast to her knowing, fun-seeking gaze.

Not that she had any sort of effect on him personally.

Any man would notice such obvious charms.

“Go to sleep, mate,” Drent said again, and his voice broke Trem’s reverie and brought him back to the present moment.

“Henrietta…” Hartley responded, his voice sounding fainter but no less like a whine.

Trem sighed.

In this situation, only one action lay available to him.

Whatever the Earl of Hartley thought had happened between him and Henrietta Breminster, it needed to be resolved now. He couldn’t leave when this fool was blubbering madness in the premier gentlemen’s club in England and risking the reputation of his best friend’s younger sister with every word he spoke. Who else might overhear these falsehoods?

“I advise you to stopper your mouth at once, Hartley.”

Trem had crossed the room to the two men.

Only one set of eyes met his own, however. The Earl of Hartley had passed out cold and now snored softly in his armchair. His face appeared a pasty, alcohol-blanched mask. Grabbing him by the throat, which had seemed so tempting a few seconds ago, was now pointless. Still, he itched with the desire to throttle the man. How dare he claim to have touched Henrietta? He shouldn’t even be allowed to think of her.

Drent gaped up at him. Trem knew he and his friends cut quite a figure among the young lords of London. Still, it didn’t make his mood less brutal.

“How can you let him carry on in this way?” he snapped at Drent. “Anyone might hear him.”

“I…am sorry, Trem, really,” the younger man said, his complexion turning pallid with fear. “When I arrived here, he was in this state.”

“It’s Tremberley to you.” He knew his quarrel wasn’t with Drent yet he needed to vent his anger somehow.

“I told him to have a care,” Drent spluttered. “But I can’t help it. He’s mad with love for her.”

“All the more reason why he should not impugn her honor with these falsehoods.”

“They’re not falsehoods. If Edington knew, he’d give his sister a choice between marriage to Hartley or the convent.”

Tremberley sized up Drent. He had known Drent a long while and had never taken him for a liar. Still he couldn’t believe that Henrietta would do something so foolish as to lose her virtue to a bit of aristocratic tinsel like Hartley. Unless she loved him. Which, to hear Hartley tell it, didn’t seem at all the case.

He knew what he had to do.

Trem kicked Hartley on the shin, hard, but he merely grunted in his sleep.

Good, he thought.

It was better this way.

“Grab his other arm, Drent,” he said, hoisting Hartley up on one side. “We’re going to Breminster House. Now.”

Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.
 
 

Book Info:

Her reputation is at risk. He vows to help…but soon finds resisting her the greatest challenge of all.

When Lord Hugh Aldershot, the Viscount of Tremberley, overhears the drunken Earl of Hartley claiming to have bedded Lady Henrietta Breminster, his best friend’s little sister, he is livid. He drags the passed-out earl to Breminster House to face punishment for his blathering, only to find himself face-to-face with Lady Henrietta in a sexy night dress and little else.

When Lady Henrietta Breminster sees the Viscount of Tremberley dragging the unconscious Earl of Hartley to her doorstep, she panics. Not only was she indiscreet with the earl, but she has long nursed a flaming tendre for her brother’s best friend. Now she must ask Tremberley to help her keep her biggest mistake from the gossips of the ton.

Drawn closer by their efforts to subdue the jealous earl, Trem and Henrietta soon discover their own forbidden attraction. But even as Henrietta discovers true passion with Trem, she knows she could never marry for anything less than love.

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Meet the Author:

Lydia Lloyd writes high-heat historical romance set during the Regency period. She enjoys creating love stories between roguish heroes and complex heroines that are driven by authentic conflict and steamy encounters. Lydia holds a PhD in nineteenth-century British literature and, when she isn’t writing historical romance, works as a teacher and scholar.
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