Classic Regency Romance

Eighteen-year-old orphan Harriet Thomson has resided with a distant cousin’s aristocratic household since the age of five, first as companion to Prudence, the youngest daughter of house, later as carer of Pru’s ailing father. When he dies, she has to make her own way in the world and finds work as companion to the elderly Countess Arden, who resides in the Dower House on the Hertfordshire estate of the dashingly handsome Duke of Fairbridge.

Twenty-five-year-old Lady Vanessa Templeton’s life is ruled by her aunt and uncle, who took over title, house, and estate following her father’s death. With no intention of escaping to marriage, she avoids society as much as possible. Following a rare visit to London to see an elderly aunt, she encounters an illiterate, ex-seaman who looks suitable for the footman’s position her aunt has been trying to fill, so she takes him home.

Twenty-five-year-old Lady Millicent Smythe has come a long way since her elder brother, as her then-guardian, tried to marry her off. It was a deal he’d made when she was but 17 with his friend Sir Montague Morton MP, in return for funds. Her escape all those years ago was not a little to do with Lord Charles Lombard, a chivalrous 20-year-old army officer who found her stranded on the road and carried her to safety.

meet Nathaniel Sandiford, DUKE OF SHERBORNE. As a scholar at Eton College, he brings a sense of entitlement and a supercilious confidence to all he does, not least his swordsmanship. But then he attends a fencing class at Angelo’s School of Arms and get soundly thrashed by a 12 year old lad called Jack. He vows to improve his skills with a view to a re-match one day, which he intends to win. What he doesn’t know is that Jack is really Jacinta, daughter of a tutor at Angelo’s, where she assists by sparring with the younger boys.