A special excerpt of Máire Claremont's The Dark Lady is available on Heroes and Heartbreakers for members. To read the full story, please log in or register at right.
The Victorian era was full of majestic beauty and scandalous secrets—a time when corsets were the least of a woman’s restrictions, and men could kill or be killed in the name of honor...
Lord Ian Blake has returned from India a broken man. Years ago, he pledged to Lady Eva Carin—his childhood companion and first love—that he would bring her husband back alive. His failure haunts him. But even his jaded soul can’t anticipate the shocking sight of beautiful, independent Eva confined in a madhouse...
Locked in an asylum, forgotten by society, Eva is adrift in both body and mind. For Ian to break her free, they must cross a powerful enemy—and prove her sanity to England’s unforgiving aristocracy. But the biggest danger of all may come when the secrets of Eva’s tragic past are finally unlocked...
Get a sneak peek of Máire Claremont's The Dark Lady (available February 5, 2013!) with this special excerpt from Chapters 2-3!
Chapter 2
The room tilted in never-ending ups and downs. So much brown. Brown above. Brown below. Brown on her skin. Brown ceilings, walls, and floors. Brown clothes. She knew that once even her hair had been brown. No. Not brown. Black. Her hair had been black.
It might be still.
She hadn’t seen it in over a year.
Eva swallowed, her mouth certainly drier than the vast deserts Hamilton had described in his letters so long ago. She’d gotten used to the awful taste. The bitter taste. But the taste meant that forgetfulness would soon offer itself up to her, wiping her mind clean of a little body, lifeless in the mud.
The bed itched and gnawed at her. It always did. Little enemies running about. Even when she slipped away from the present, she couldn’t quite rid herself of the disgusting tickle of a thousand little legs running up and down her skin.
She knew this room so well. Even without a jot of light, for there were no windows or bars. Why would one need bars with endless walls?
In the silence, Eva could hear Mary breathing. It wasn’t the peaceful breath of dreaming. Mary breathed in starts. Gasps. Many of the girls did, herself included.
