Beautiful Isabella Hope was married ten years ago at eighteen to Marcus, the spoiled and spiteful young Duke of Stourbridge. When her beloved father died shortly afterwards, Isabella inherited his wealth, which Marcus took control of.
Marcus turns out to be a cruel husband and a serial adulterer, continually flaunting his mistresses. He holds it against Isabella that she hasn’t given him the heir he needs, and when he dies in mysterious circumstances, his title and estate pass to the cousin he bullied when they were children.
Captain Richard Carstairs, Marcus’s long-estranged cousin, is a rough diamond of a man who’s been off soldiering since he was a boy. Eventually, Richard receives news of his inheritance and returns from the peninsula to claim his title and property. He discovers he has a sitting tenant at his country estate – the previous duke’s enticing widow. A widow who might be guarding a terrifying secret.
