To Rescue a Rogue by Jo Beverley

settle to enjoy the play, but it was a sad disappointment. The Lady’s Choice had sounded so promising, involving as it did a clandestine betrothal, but it reminded her of her complaint to Dare about novels designed to teach. This was a play written to teach a lesson, in this case that a lady should surrender her choice of husband to her father. Mara hoped it would be enlivened later by rebellion, but didn’t have much hope.
    At the intermission, they ignored the dancers who came onstage and left the box to promenade in the elegant gallery. Mara took the arm of Captain Scilly this time, sharing her favors.
    â€œNot a bad piece, eh?” he said. “Free of barnacles.”
    Mara stared at him. “Barnacles, Captain?”
    â€œIn sound shape, Lady Mara. Seaworthy. With a well-scraped bottom.”
    Mara desperately fought laughter. “I don’t suppose it will leak, Captain Scilly. Do you attend the theater often?”
    â€œNow and then, now and then, Lady Mara, being stuck ashore with no hope of action.”
    â€œBut you’d not want war, Captain?”
    â€œNever,” he declared, but wasn’t the slightest bit convincing.
    â€œPerhaps a noble mission, such as the Barbary campaign?”
    As she’d intended, that set him off on a description of his role in that enterprise, which had forced the release of the Christians enslaved by Barbary pirates. But he reduced the exciting mission to topsails and tacking.
    Mara made the appropriate comments, but her eyes wandered. In Lincoln she would be surrounded by friends and relatives at a moment like this, but here she hardly knew anyone. Her gaze paused on the back of a man’s head that looked familiar.
    Dare?
    Her heart sped. It was. He was talking to two elegant couples. Rogues?
    Paying just enough attention to heavy seas, batteries, and going to leeward, she gently steered a course toward Dare, trying to guess which Rogues the men might be.
    The slender blond looked very clever. Sir Stephen Ball? Nicholas Delaney? Or the scholarly Lucien, Marquess of Arden? No, he was a prime athlete.
    The dark, gentle one. Francis, she thought. Francis, Lord Middlethorpe—she was sure of it by process of elimination.
    When she was within feet of her target, Captain Scilly was hailed and Mara was turned to join a Captain Macken and his wife. Naval conversation ensued. Mara ground her teeth behind her smile. She couldn’t just walk away, but she sent silent pleas to Dare to rescue her.
    And he did!
    â€œLady Mara, I hope you are enjoying the play.”
    She turned, a brilliant smile no effort at all. “In parts,” she said, adding, “The barnacle-free bits.”
    His brows rose in a query, but he also looked down at her breasts and was still and silent for a moment.
    Then he introduced his companions.
    She’d been right about Francis, and the blond man was Sir Stephen Ball MP. Rogues. At last! But Dare’s reaction to her gown was the greater thrill.
    The naval party was as delighted as she was. A duke’s son, a viscount, and an influential politician!
    Amid general conversation, Mara studied the Rogue wives. Lady Ball was a true beauty, with lush dark curls and brilliant eyes. Mara remembered that she had been a toast during her first marriage.
    Lady Middlethorpe wasn’t a beauty in the same way, but her looks were remarkable. Creamy skin, heavy-lidded eyes, and startling deep red hair created an impression Mara could only think of as sultry.
    Certainly the naval gentlemen were agog and Captain Scilly probably couldn’t have reefed a topsail right then to save his life.
    Lady Ball turned to Mara and said, “Serena and I plan a quest on Saturday. We have word of a fabulous emporium of Oriental silks on the borders of respectable London and mean to find it.”
    â€œWith escort,” Lord Middlethorpe said firmly.
    â€œOf course, dearest,” Lady Middlethorpe said. “You know I have no