LITMIR.BIZ

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      To my very special Dad, Eric Haworth Faulkner, 6/2/1923–6/12/2012. A true and everlasting hero!

      The dedication of this book says it all for me. I lost my Dad in December, a man who was and always will be a true hero to me, in every sense of the word. He was always very proud of my writing, but I am even prouder to have enjoyed the absolute privilege of being his daughter.

      I hope you will all continue to enjoy reading my books as much as I enjoy writing them!

       Chapter One

       Late April, 1817—the London home of Lady Cicely Hawthorne

      ‘I, for one, am disappointed that you do not seem to be any further along with finding a bride for Hawthorne, Cicely,’ Edith St Just, Dowager Duchess of Royston, gave her friend a reproving frown.

      ‘Perhaps we were all being a trifle ambitious, at the start of the Season, in deciding to acquire suitable wives for our three grandsons?’ Lady Jocelyn Ambrose put in softly.

      The three ladies talking now had been aged only eighteen when they had shared a coming-out Season fifty years ago and had become fast friends, a state of affairs that had seen them all through marriage and their children’s marriages. They now had their sights firmly set on the nuptials of their errant grandchildren.

      ‘Nonsense,’ the dowager duchess dismissed that claim firmly. ‘You had no trouble whatsoever in seeing Chambourne settled—’

      ‘But not to the bride I had chosen for him,’ Lady Jocelyn pointed out fairly.

      ‘Nevertheless, he is to marry,’ the dowager duchess dismissed airily. ‘And if we do not see to the marriage of our respective grandsons, then who will? My own daughter-in-law is of absolutely no help whatsoever in that enterprise, since she retired to the country following my son Robert’s demise three years ago. And Royston certainly shows no inclination himself to give up his habit of acquiring a mistress for several weeks before swiftly growing bored with her and moving on to the next.’ She gave loud sniff.

      Miss Eleanor Rosewood—Ellie—stepniece and companion to the dowager duchess, glanced across from where she sat quietly by the window with the two companions of Lady Cicely and Lady Jocelyn, knowing that sniff only too well: it conveyed the dowager duchess’s disapproval on every occasion.

      But Ellie could not help but feel a certain amount of sympathy towards Lady Cicely’s dilemma; Lord Adam Hawthorne was known by all, including the numerous servants employed on his many estates, for being both cold and haughty, as well as totally unapproachable.

      So much so that it must be far from easy for Lady Cicely to even broach the subject of her grandson remarrying, despite his first marriage having only produced a daughter and no heir, let alone finding a woman who was agreeable to becoming the second wife of such an icily sarcastic gentleman.

      Oh, it would have its compensations, no doubt; his lordship was a wealthy gentleman—very wealthy indeed—and more handsome than any single gentleman had a right to be, with glossy black hair and eyes of deep impenetrable grey set in a hard and arrogantly aristocratic face, his shoulders and chest muscled, waist tapered, legs long and strong.

      Unfortunately, his character was also icy enough to chill the blood in any woman’s veins, hence the reason he was known amongst the ton as simply Thorne!

      Hawthorne’s cold nature aside, Ellie was far more interested in the dowager duchess’s efforts to find a bride for her own grandson, Justin St Just, Duke of Royston…

      ‘Adam is proving most unhelpful, I am afraid.’ Lady Cicely sighed. ‘He has refused each and every one of my invitations for him to dine here with me one evening.’

      The dowager duchess raised iron-grey brows.

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