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From the Back Cover

An orphaned miss ould not settle for less

Otilia Kendall is an orphaned ht up by her uncle and aunt, the late Earl and Countess of Thornton Never having e isn’t in her future Tired of receiving deents, she has decided to —and handsoives her a dowry and carts her to London to marry her off She wants none of it but has no choice In close contact with theiain!

An arrogant lord who could not stay away from her

Edmund, the hot-blooded new Earl, is stunned by the poise of the very grown-up debutante he once met Weary of women interested only in his title, he shuns any idea of love It is getting hard to ignore the little ether with some other hard parts of his anato hi passion is about to burst And to the blazes with propriety

And the love struggling to unite them

CHAPTER ONE

Leicester, England, 1815

Miss Otilia Kendall was a woman destitute She had not always been so But for six months now, her situation had worsened considerably She was destitute of legitiical mother had been the late Countess of Thornton's sister who, after ed, had embarked on a secret liaison from which Otilia had become its product Dead at childbirth, the responsibility fell to her aunt, Lady Agatha Chadwick, nee Kendall, to raise her And it eased the sadness of her aunt’s childless e The poor dear who had been abehind a great deal of sorrow for Otilia and her aunt’s husband

Lord Earnest Chadwick received Otilia in his household with affable acceptance and beca less than a father to her Until he also passed sixalone in this world, depleted of a family and a means of subsistence The Thornton estate had endured bad crops in the last few years,her uncle die poor and indebted

She was also destitute because there would never be the prospect of a decent itimate, dowry-less miss? At twenty-six and practically on the shelf, she harboured no illusions on the matter

Which hy she had been answering advertiseovernesses or coht as well put her polished upbringing and education to good use

But no position had arisen so far

This fact accumulated a certain distress over the shape of her future

Otilia was not a wo the reason she now sat in theroom with a pile of silverware before her With a cloth in her hand, she cleaned the silver with scrupulous attention

The household had been reduced to a maid and a footman who amassed a heavy workload Miss Kendall helped as much as possible Part housekeeper, part bookkeeper, she did whatever other tasks needed attention It was the least she could do for her dearly missed uncle

His heir did not show for the funeral, or ever since for thatthe continent on business He could move to the confines of China as far as Otilia was concerned The secret hope that she ned to undertake the responsibilities accrued to his title glowed snuggly inside her

If she did not have to see the ain in her life, it would be too soon

But she refused to think about the new Earl There were countless chores that needed doing After the silverware, she would help thethem busy in the washrooers to update Late winter announced a busy time in the manor

Located in the region of Leicester, Thornton Manor prided itself on being one of the oldest in England, albeit with undeniable signs of decay as of late The hout the centuries by the wealthy Earls of Thornton Medieval re-standing power