Forbidden (Scandalous Sirens)

Elisa’s determined to have her son back at
any
cost, even if it means marry a vicious stoat of a man like Rufus Wardell, but her plans and her life are turned upside down by the sudden reappearance of Rufus’ grown and estranged son, Vaughn.

Lured by the contrast of Elisa’s sweet beauty with the wicked rumors of her wanton past, Vaughn embarks on a seduction as scorching as it is daring. What he finds is not at all what he sought: Elisa is an innocent, but with a sensuality so raw he cannot resist her...

...even though their passion is forbidden.

Praise for
Forbidden

I cannot say enough wonderful things about this story.

Danica Favorite-McDonald for
In the Library Reviews

This is a story that will linger on long after you turn the last page.

Kathi for
Fallen Angels Reviews

The wonderful end deserves cheers.

Denise Powers for
Sensual Romance

Readers will be swept up into this stunning historical story.

Amelia Richard for 
eCataRomance Reviews

Forbidden
is probably one of the better historical romances this reviewer has read in a long time.

Mirium for Love Romances

Pros: You root for the hero and heroine to get together.
 
Cons: none.

Pat for
About Romance Fiction

Secrets, lies, lust, hate and love. An exceptional story.

Cassandra for
Coffeetime Romance

I was swept away by this wonderful read and so will you!

Luisa for
Cupid's Library Reviews

Forbidden

by

Tracy Cooper-Posey & Julia Templeton

This is an original publication of Tracy Cooper-Posey & Julia Templeton

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales, is entirely coincidental. The publisher does not have any control over and does not assume any responsibility for third-party websites or their content.

Copyright © 2013 by Tracy Cooper-Posey

Text design by Tracy Cooper-Posey

Cover design by Dar Albert

Wicked Smart Designs

http://wickedsmartdesigns.com

All rights reserved

No part of this book may be reproduced, scanned, or distributed in any printed or electronic form without permission. Please do not participate in or encourage piracy of copyrighted materials in violation of the author’s rights. Purchase only authorized editions.

SECOND EDITION: September 2012

ISBN:
 

Cooper-Posey, Tracy

Templeton, Julia

Forbidden/Tracy Cooper-Posey—2nd Ed.

Forbidden/Julia Templeton—2nd Ed.

Romance—Fiction

Historical– Fiction

Serendipity

The Story of A Sexy Book and its Sequel

By Tracy Cooper-Posey

The project that became
Forbidden
fell into my lap, making it one of those delightful things that happen when you least expect it.

It began in 2001. I met Julia Templeton on the internet via a critique-finding service. I had decided to give the whole critiquing thing away — I’d had very little luck finding someone who suited me, but just hadn’t got around to withdrawing my name. Julia approached me and we decided to give the critiquing process a trial run. Julia’s strengths propped up my weaknesses and vice versa, so although the formal once-a-week thing quickly fell in a heap, we had continued to stay in contact and critique each other’s work whenever the need arose.

Julia, I’d discovered, also liked to attend Romantic Times conventions. I attend the annual Romantic Times reader conventions as often as I can afford them, which isn’t anywhere as often as I would prefer. However, I’ve managed to get to them for several years and Julia has also managed to be there the years I’ve gone. This is a good thing as Julia lives several thousand miles away from me and meeting someone in person helps iron out misperceptions of character, and puts a face to the name. Julia has never let me forget that I had assumed she was a brunette. I was shocked to find a tall, slender blonde waiting for me in the foyer of the Toronto Sheraton Centre the first time we met.

A couple of years after we met Julia said “we should co-write a book. You’re good at the sexy stuff and I can do the romance….”

As my one and only effort at co-writing up until then (with the man who I would end up marrying a year later) had been a disaster reaching point seven on the Richter scale, I shuddered and politely prevaricated as I didn’t want to offend Julia without appearing to have given it some thought. Julia is one of the most persistent people I’ve ever met, however, and got her way. Thankfully.

Forbidden
was tough work — there are few guides out there for hammering out the process of co-writing and none of them take into account the idiosyncracies of two writers have already written and published successfully on their own, and developed their own work routines. As the book is one of the better ones I’ve written, by deduction I must conclude that Julia’s efforts are what made the difference.

We published
Forbidden
in 2003 with Ellora’s Cave.
 
The first cover was very bad.
 
So bad, our editor went to bat with Ellora’s Cave management on our behalf and we were granted permission to have another cover commissioned.
 

In those days, covers for ebooks were still in their infancy as an industry and cover artists were just starting to use the infamous Poser software, which produced “people” that looked more like shiny vinyl props that a fetishist might take a fancy to, clunky joints and all.
 

Our second cover and the one that would become the permanent cover for
Forbidden
for the next nine years, was created using Poser.
 
Luckily, the artist who created it was particularly talented and the Poser people they conjured up were one of the better examples of what Poser can do.

Forbidden
was our first book published with Ellora’s Cave and we were both delighted when only a couple of months later we were asked by Ellora’s Cave when we would be supplying a sequel.
 
Sales, it seemed, looked promising.

We quickly bumped heads by pixel, and put together a proposal for the sequel,
Dangerous Beauty
, which was was subsequently written and published in April, 2004.
 

Alas, we were not so lucky with our Poser cover for
Dangerous Beauty
.
 
It was a bit more plastic and a bit more clunky.
 
But our readers didn’t seem to mind at all.
 

We were very pleased to discover we had readers by the time
Dangerous Beauty
was released.
 
The reviews for
Forbidden
were glowing, as well.
 
Both books, after their early sales surges, settled down to sell small but steady numbers.
 
Ellora’s Cave issued both books in print in 2008, and it was there we really seemed to hit it off with the historical romance fans who had been searching for a replacement source of romances ever since New York had all but stopped producing them nearly ten years before.
 

Julie and I took
Forbidden
and
Dangerous Beauty
out of circulation in 2011 and the paperback edition continued to sell at a steady little trickle until the day we pulled the plug.
 
Historical romance fans are the most loyal and the most dogged fans we’ve ever met.
 

Because of diminishing returns, we withdrew
Forbidden
and
Dangerous Beauty
from sale in 2011.
 
It was a strategic move – we already knew we wanted to re-issue both books as our own Authors’ Editions and taking back the copyright was merely the first step.
 
This re-issue allows us to re-edit the books and – thank heavens! – repackage them with better covers, reworked interiors and layouts, and tweak them to remove a lot of little niggles that have bothered us over the years.
 
It makes them better, smoother reads and gets rid of (we hope) most of the typos and grammar gremlins the first round of edits didn’t pick up.

It also allows us to set the price and distribution of the books, too – an option that wasn’t even a concept back in 2003.

Enjoy this second edition, our Authors’ Edition.
Tracy
&
Julia

Chapter One

1835, Fairleigh Hall, England

Vaughn Wardell, Viscount Rothmere, only heir of the Marquis of Fairleigh, stepped from the carriage and looked up at the three-story manor he hadn’t seen in nearly two decades. Fairleigh Hall hadn’t changed at all. The grounds were still immaculate, and the impressive manor rivaled any in England.

He hated the sight of it.

The years he’d spent at Fairleigh Hall had been the worst of his life. Now, at the age of tweny-four, he had returned to this hideous heap of stone to save his future.

His gut clenched as it had when he heard the outrageous news. The thought was a despairing one: Kirkaldy, his mother’s final gift, might be lost to him.

Little more than a glorified hunting lodge near Edinburgh, Kirkaldy had been his mother’s only untainted possession. The days there, far from Fairleigh Hall and his father, had been the best of Vaughn’s young life. At Kirkaldy, his mother had been carefree, even joyous. For that reason alone, Vaughn intended to plant himself like a weed here at Fairleigh Hall, a weed that refused to be pulled and discarded, until Kirkaldy’s ownership had been determined.

Taking a deep breath, he walked up the thirteen steps to his father’s home.

Vaughn had no trouble imagining the disapproval his father would convey upon his return. He’d learned years ago there was no pleasing Rufus Wardell. The only emotion Rufus had ever openly shown him had been when he’d announced Vaughn would be leaving for boarding school. A cruel smile had curled his father’s lips as he’d laid out the details of what would become twelve years of purgatory, hidden behind the walls of one of the best public schools in England. Though nearly a decade had passed since he had graduated, those memories still appeared in his dreams from time to time. They would wake him in the middle of the night, to cold sweat and a hurting heart, the bed sheets tangled around his legs.

The memory subsided as the door was opened. Joshua, his father’s trusted valet, stared at him. “Good lord! I mean, Lord Vaughn.” The valet’s expression softened. “You’ve come home?” There was a buried hope in his tone.