Chapter One

The Grantham Townhouse, London, 1814

Lydia Grantham stood at the foot of the staircase, watching the scuffed leather trunk bump unceremoniously down the steps, trailing behind Mrs. Grafton like a wounded soldier. The house was silent, stripped of the clatter of shoes, the hiss of steam kettles, the murmured gossip of maids. Just silence, deep and settling like dust on furniture long untouched.

“You’ll understand, Miss,” Mrs. Grafton said stiffly, adjusting the strap of her worn carpet bag. “It isn’t personal. But with your father gone, and no income…”

“No need to explain,” Lydia replied evenly, her chin tilted at the perfect angle of polite dismissal. Her voice was steady, if a little cold. “Go on then, Mrs. Grafton. I wish you well.”

There was a pause. Then a nod and the door closed behind the woman with a soft click, final and absolute.

Lydia didn’t move. Not immediately. She stared at the door, at the fading threads of sun stretching across the tiled hall, at the silence that had now taken on the weight of a presence.

So that was that, she thought to herself.

She turned and walked with quiet, deliberate steps through the wide hall, the soft echo of her slippers following her to her father’s study. She pushed open the heavy oak door and was met with the familiar scent of old paper, pipe smoke, and lemon oil, now tinged with the unmistakable musk of abandonment.

The curtains were half-drawn, and the light slanted golden across the desk where ledgers lay undisturbed. Lydia had not entered this room often while her father was alive. It had always been his sanctuary, the one place he would not suffer interruption. But now it was hers, like everything else he had left behind.

All the mess, the debts, and the scandal. Even the beautiful old townhouse with no one left to clean it.

Lydia exhaled slowly and crossed the room, her fingers brushing the spines of books and paper stacks, the carved edge of the desk, the silver penknife still resting beside the blotter. She sat down stiffly in the leather chair, which creaked under her weight, and reached for the nearest ledger.

It took time to decipher his neat, slanted script. The columns of sums. Debts owed, debts paid. And then the names. Names upon names. Some she recognized from hushed conversations over breakfast, from invitations to parties they had never accepted. Others were strangers. Men of means, she supposed. Business associates. Aristocrats. Gentlemen who had no intention of paying what they owed to a merchant, even one who’d once been a king of commerce.

Her father’s empire had been built on silk and risk. His fall had come on the point of a letter opener, the one that had slit his own throat.

Lydia closed her eyes for a moment, and then she looked back down at the page.

A name stood out, circled twice in thick graphite, almost angry in its finality. Montclair, Nicholas. Duke of Hawthorne.

Her brows lifted slightly. A duke? Her father had dealings with a duke?

The sum beside his name was not small. In fact, it was enough to keep the house running for another few months. Enough to hold off the butcher. Enough to bring the servants back.

The Hawthorne name stirred something in her memory. Gossip, a mention in the Gazette. Something about debt, a crumbling estate, the absence of heirs. A proud title with a bankrupt legacy, but a duke nonetheless.

She sat back in the chair, eyes scanning the ceiling as if she might find some divine guidance in the flaking plaster.

If she were a different kind of woman, she might have wept. Might have folded under the weight of disgrace and misfortune, as society expected. As they wanted.

But Lydia Grantham had not inherited her father’s recklessness, only his iron will and inconvenient pride.

A sharp wind rattled the windowpanes behind her. She glanced toward the tall window and caught a flicker of movement, her reflection, half-shadowed and blurred by the smudged glass.

She looked tired. Her dark curls, too wild to be fashionable, were pinned back in a style that had begun the day tidy and had since given up. Her hazel eyes, large and sharp, had always been her best feature, or so her father had told her, back when he still praised things. She wore a simple walking dress of slate grey, mended at the hem, and gloves without buttons.

But there was something about her bearing, even now, straight spine, tilted chin, lips pressed in determined resolve, that said, No, I will not go quietly.

She turned back to the ledger. There it was in her father’s handwriting, plain and clear. The duke owed her money, which meant he owed her something.

Her gaze lingered on the name again. Montclair. Hawthorne. He was said to be reclusive. Remote. The kind of man who did not attend balls or issue invitations or pose for portraits. A man with a crumbling estate and too much pride.

“How very familiar,” she muttered to herself.

Just then, there was a brisk knock on the front door, three sharp raps in quick succession.

Lydia didn’t rise immediately. She waited, listening to the echo, knowing no one would answer it but her. That was her life now: no footmen, no housekeeper, no cheerful bustle. Only silence and her own determination.

She opened the door to find her fondest friend, Emma Carlisle, bundled in a plum-coloured pelisse, her cheeks flushed from the walk, curls escaping her bonnet in charming rebellion. A wind-blown wisp clung to her jaw as she looked Lydia up and down.

“I passed Mrs. Grafton on the street,” Emma said without preamble, stepping inside. “She was dragging her trunk and muttering about genteel poverty. I assume that means you’ve officially been abandoned?”

Lydia stepped aside to let her in. “She had the courtesy to wait until the tea ran out.”

Emma made a noise somewhere between a laugh and a sigh. “Charming. Shall I help you burn the drapes for warmth, or have we not reached that stage of desperation yet?”

“Give it a fortnight.”

They walked toward the study together, Emma removing her gloves with quick, efficient tugs.

“You look tired,” Emma said as she sat on the edge of the worn settee, her gaze sweeping Lydia’s face with affectionate concern. “And stubborn. Which is always a worrying combination.”

“I’ve been going through my father’s ledgers.” Lydia gestured to the stack of books on the desk. “There may still be money owed—debts left unpaid. I mean to collect them.”

Emma raised a brow. “From who? Ghosts? Dead men can’t pay what they owe.”

“Not all of them are dead,” Lydia said, sliding a particular page across the desk. “This one, for instance. Nicholas Montclair. The Duke of Hawthorne.”

Emma’s eyebrows shot up. “The Duke of Hawthorne? The brooding recluse who hasn’t shown his face at a single ball in three seasons? That Duke of Hawthorne?”

“The very one,” Lydia replied. “He owes my father quite a respectable sum. Enough to keep the house for now.”

Emma gave a low whistle, then flopped back against the settee with dramatic flair. “Well. I suppose if one is going to demand payment from a debtor, it might as well be a dangerously handsome aristocrat with a tragic past and a collapsing estate.”

“You left out emotionally stunted and prideful,” Lydia murmured.

Emma grinned. “I assumed that was implied. Dukes are rarely cheerful.”

Lydia leaned against the edge of the desk, arms folded, eyes fixed on the reflection in the window again, but softer now, as if she were considering her future as a chessboard rather than a cliff edge.

“No one will lend to me, Emma. Not a woman alone. And I cannot access most of what remains from my father’s holdings without a male signature. I need control. And for that, I need a husband.”

Emma sat up straighter. “Wait. Are you suggesting…?”

“I’m considering,” Lydia said carefully, “that if this duke owes me money—and is, by all accounts, also in financial ruin—then perhaps we might come to a mutually beneficial arrangement.”

“You mean to marry him?” Emma’s voice pitched upward.

Lydia gave a delicate shrug. “Why not?”

Emma stared at her. “Lydia. You are proposing to use a business debt as leverage to secure a duke as your husband. A man you’ve never met. A man with titles and expectations and a crumbling estate full of bitter old retainers who will take one look at your merchant’s blood and faint into their porridge.”

Lydia arched a brow. “I don’t need his heart. Or his approval. Just his name.”

Emma gaped. “And you expect him to say yes?”

“If he’s as ruined as the ledgers suggest, and I offer a substantial dowry in exchange for his name and signature, why wouldn’t he?”

“Because,” Emma said slowly, “you’re you.”

Lydia blinked. “What does that mean?”

“You’re brilliant, obviously, and stubborn beyond reason,” Emma said, throwing her hands up, “but you’re also proud. You can’t stomach insincerity. You hate being dismissed. And you are not going to enjoy being married to a man who looks at you like a balance sheet.”

“Then it’s fortunate I don’t care whether he looks at me at all,” Lydia said coolly. “Love is for girls with options. I have leverage. That’s all I need.”

Emma was quiet for a long beat.

“You deserve more than this,” she said softly.

Lydia’s gaze dropped to the floor, and for a fleeting moment, her mouth trembled before she set it straight again.

“I deserve a roof over my head. And control over my own future. If that comes with a title, well—so be it.”

Emma studied her with wide, dark eyes. “You’re serious.”

“As a banker’s final notice.”

Another gust of wind rattled the windowpane. Outside, the first hints of autumn gold fluttered from the trees along Bedford Square.

Emma rose from the settee and walked to her friend, placing a warm hand on Lydia’s arm. “If you do this, I’ll stand by you. Even when it all turns to scandal and ashes.”

Lydia smiled faintly. “I expect nothing less.”

“And when the duke throws a book at your head and refuses to marry you?”

“I shall duck, flatter his crumbling pride, and remind him his creditors won’t accept brooding as payment.”

Emma shook her head in disbelief. “You’re either the bravest woman I know or the most dangerously clever.”

“Why not both?” Lydia murmured, already turning back to the desk, already reaching for a fresh sheet of parchment.

Chapter Two

Montclair Townhouse, London, March 1814

The study in the Montclair townhouse smelled faintly of damp stone and dying pride.

Nicholas Montclair, the eighth Duke of Hawthorne, sat behind an antique rosewood desk that was worth more than what remained in his bank account. A pale beam of morning light angled through the high windows, highlighting a map of his crumbling estate, annotated with far too much red ink.

He pinched the bridge of his nose.

“Tell me again,” he said slowly, “how it is possible that I own five thousand acres and not a single shilling of working capital?”

Across from him, his friend, Lord Sebastian Greaves, lounging like a housecat in the worn leather armchair, gave a low whistle.

“Ah, yes. The eternal mystery of the landed nobility: rich in name, poor in pocket. Like a gilded teacup full of dust.”

Nicholas shot him a look. “Your metaphors are getting worse, Bash.”

“And your finances are getting worse,” Sebastian countered cheerfully. “At least one of us is improving.”

Nicholas didn’t laugh. He turned another page in the ledger. The numbers didn’t change. If anything, they looked more hopeless by candlelight than they had yesterday by sunlight.

“Let’s see,” Sebastian continued, crossing one well-booted ankle over his knee, “your tenants haven’t paid in two quarters, your sheep farm is flooded, your land agent has disappeared—probably drunk in a ditch—and your roof at Hawthorne House is threatening to collapse, should a pigeon land upon it too heavily.”

Nicholas’s jaw ticked. “Charming summary. Did you come here to offer solutions, or simply to narrate my ruin like a Greek chorus in a cravat?”

Sebastian grinned. “Both. But if I’m to watch you descend into penury, I insist on doing it with style.”

Nicholas stood abruptly, pacing to the hearth. The fire had gone out hours ago, but he hadn’t bothered to have it relit. Coal was expensive. Everything was expensive when you had nothing but titles and a family crest.

He ran a hand through his dark hair, scowling. “My father gutted everything. Every investment failed. Every creditor was lied to or delayed or outright ignored. By the time I inherited, there was barely anything left to salvage.”

“You’ve done what you could,” Sebastian said, softer now. “You’ve cut costs. Sold the hunting box. Closed three wings of Hawthorne House.”

“And now we’re down to selling the draperies,” Nicholas muttered.

“Well, they are terribly out of fashion.”

Nicholas shot him a dry look, but some of the tension in his shoulders eased. That was Sebastian’s role: friend, buffer, occasional devil’s advocate, and the only person alive who didn’t treat him like a title with teeth.

Sebastian picked up a crystal decanter from the side table and poured himself a small glass of brandy. “There’s still the dowry route, you know.”

Nicholas turned sharply. “Don’t.”

“Oh, come now. A few clever waltzes at Almack’s, and some unfortunate debutante could find herself wearing your name by summer.”

Nicholas stared at him. “I’d sooner marry a turnip.”

Sebastian raised his glass. “Turnips are famously low-maintenance. But they don’t come with dowries.”

“I’m not going to trap some simpering girl with stars in her eyes and a purse on her hip,” Nicholas said coldly. “That’s not who I am.”

Sebastian arched a brow. “Isn’t it? Or are you just too bloody proud to do what needs doing?”

Nicholas’s silence was answer enough.

He hated it, the entire sordid reality. The title, once so mighty, now felt like a noose. His pride was a weight strapped to his back, dragging him down as surely as the debts. And still, he couldn’t bring himself to beg. Not even for survival.

He crossed back to the desk, arms folded tightly across his chest.

“I’ve written to half the tenants,” he muttered. “Most won’t reply. The others can’t pay. The land is failing. No one wants to invest in an estate on the brink of collapse. The old families sniff at me like I’m a cracked porcelain vase.”

Sebastian tilted his head. “Cracked, maybe. But you’ve still got your jawline. You could do worse.”

Nicholas didn’t rise to the bait. “If you’re so full of ideas, why don’t you marry for money?”

“I would,” Sebastian said easily, “but I rather enjoy being scandalous and unattached. It’s part of my charm.”

“You’re a rake.”

“I’m a successful rake. There’s a difference.”

Nicholas shook his head and sat back down. The chair groaned under his weight. Great, just another piece of furniture clinging to grandeur by a thread.

Just then, his sister, Lady Charlotte Montclair, entered with her usual soft step and calm composure, a sealed letter held delicately between gloved fingers. She looked like their mother had once insisted a proper lady should: serene, well-coiffed, and impossible to read unless you knew where to look.

“I hope I’m not interrupting?” she asked, eyeing Sebastian with only mild disapproval, as was her custom.

“Always a pleasure, Lady Charlotte,” Sebastian said with a lazy smile, rising and bowing with a theatrical flourish.

Charlotte ignored him. “This just arrived. It’s addressed to you.”

Nicholas took the envelope and turned it over in his hands. The seal was plain. The handwriting was precise. And the name inscribed across the front in slanted black ink sent a cold ripple down his spine.

Mr. John Grantham.

Sebastian stepped closer, peering over Nicholas’s shoulder. “Oh dear. I thought he was dead.”

“He is dead,” Nicholas said flatly, breaking the seal.

“Then either he’s developed an unwholesome talent for ghostly correspondence,” Sebastian murmured, “or someone’s playing games.”

Nicholas unfolded the letter and read silently.

Charlotte moved to the window, drawing back the heavy curtain with a sigh. “Who’s writing to us now, asking for money we don’t have?”

Nicholas didn’t answer as he scanned the page again.

Sebastian poured himself another splash of brandy and sat down. “Go on, then. What does our dearly departed merchant want?”

Nicholas read aloud, his voice clipped:

“To His Grace, the Duke of Hawthorne,

In regard to a debt owed to the late John Grantham, your presence is requested at a private meeting to discuss a matter of mutual benefit.

Discretion is requested.”

There was no signature. No name.

Sebastian blinked. “Well. That’s ominous.”

Charlotte crossed her arms. “You’re not seriously considering answering that, are you?”

“I’m not considering anything at all,” Nicholas muttered, tossing the letter onto the desk. “It’s unsigned. Vague. Ridiculous.”

“But addressed to you,” Charlotte pointed out.

“By a corpse.”

Sebastian leaned back, smirking. “Perhaps it’s his daughter writing on his behalf. Miss Grantham. She may have chosen her father’s name for added weight.”

Nicholas snorted. “Then she’s either very bold or very foolish.”

“Both make for interesting women,” Sebastian offered.

Nicholas shot him a glare. “Don’t you have someone else’s wife to scandalize?”

“Tempting,” Sebastian said, “but watching you froth at the mouth over a mysterious letter is far more entertaining.”

Charlotte approached the desk and picked up the page, studying the handwriting. “This isn’t nonsense, Nicholas. Someone went to the trouble of composing it and sending it to your London residence. That implies knowledge. Intent.”

“It implies desperation,” Nicholas said, rising from his chair. “Which I am in no mood to indulge.”

“Then don’t indulge. But don’t ignore it entirely, either,” Charlotte said softly. “Desperate people can be dangerous.”

He didn’t answer right away. He turned his back to them, facing the hearth, shoulders drawn tight.

They all knew what desperation looked like.

He saw it in the unpaid bills piling up on his desk. In the peeling wallpaper of Hawthorne House. In the tremble of Charlotte’s fingers when she stitched her own gloves because there was no money for new ones.

He was tired of being cornered. Tired of pretending.

“No,” he said at last. “I won’t reply. I won’t be summoned like a debtor to some back-room negotiation. If Miss Grantham, or whatever poor soul is writing on behalf of a dead man, thinks they can shake coin from this carcass of a dukedom, they’ll be sorely disappointed.”

Sebastian gave a theatrical sigh. “So that’s a no, then.”

Nicholas didn’t answer. He walked to the sideboard, poured himself a glass of brandy, and downed it in one unceremonious swallow.

Charlotte watched him quietly, then turned and left without another word.

Sebastian rose and stretched. “Very well, then. I’ll leave you to your brooding and brandy. But I do hope, for entertainment’s sake, that she shows up on your doorstep anyway.”

Nicholas muttered something inaudible.

“Pardon?”

“I said, if she does, I hope she brings a ghost and a solicitor. At least then the theatrics would feel earned.”

Sebastian chuckled as he strolled toward the door. “You should be careful, Hawthorne. Ignoring intriguing women who write mysterious letters? That’s how novels begin.”

Nicholas rolled his eyes. “This isn’t a novel.”

“Isn’t it?” Sebastian opened the door. “Could’ve fooled me.”

The door clicked shut behind him.

Nicholas stood alone, the fireless hearth yawning at his back, and the letter on his desk like a match waiting to be struck.

***

That evening, the chandelier dripped light like diamonds onto the polished floors of Lady Harrow’s townhouse, where the ton gathered like moths in silk and satin. The air was thick with perfume, gossip, and the slow bleed of violins from the drawing room orchestra.

Nicholas stood near the refreshment table and wondered how many more evenings he could endure pretending he wasn’t broke.

“Try not to look like you’re plotting a duel,” Sebastian said, swirling his champagne with a smirk. “You’re here to mingle. Court. Charm.”

“I’m here because you insisted,” Nicholas muttered.

“Yes, and I stand by it. A crumbling estate is no excuse for bad manners or boring waistcoats. Speaking of which, navy again? You really are mourning your finances.”

Nicholas ignored him, scanning the room with the detached precision of a man inspecting horses he had no intention of buying.

Every eligible lady in London seemed to be there tonight, fluttering fans, whispering behind gloves, and sneaking glances at him like he was a particularly sullen prize at auction.

Sebastian nudged him with his elbow. “Let’s play a game. I’ll name candidates. You object unreasonably. Ready?”

“No.”

“Too late. There’s Lady Poppy Willingham. Just turned eighteen. Rich as sin. Skin like milk.”

Nicholas followed his gaze.

Lady Poppy stood near the refreshment table, surrounded by a half-moon of admirers and fluttering like a well-bred bird. Her gown was a confection of pale pink tulle and pearls, her cheeks flushed to an artificial bloom that matched the ribbons in her coiffed blond curls. She was the very image of youthful innocence, posed and perfect, as if she’d been assembled by committee for maximum matrimonial value.

She turned slightly, and Nicholas noted her expression: a soft, empty smile that didn’t quite reach her eyes, like she’d been taught to emote on cue but never meant it.

“Come on,” Sebastian pressed. “She’s pretty.”

“She’s an airhead,” Nicholas snapped. “The one time we spoke, all she could talk about was her Pomeranian named Horace.”

“Hmm, alright,” Sebastian said. “Well, how about Miss Eugenia Mott? Tall, quiet, good teeth.”

Nicholas scanned the room, spotting her near the pianoforte, seated primly with her hands folded just so atop her lap.

Miss Mott was, indeed, tall—statuesque, really—with pale blonde hair arranged in a mathematically precise chignon. Her gown was an impeccable shade of lilac, modest to the point of mourning, and she wore it with the stiff elegance of someone who had been trained from birth not to exhale too loudly. Her chin was slightly elevated, her posture faultless, her smile fixed in a tight little crescent as though she were permanently prepared to sit for a portrait.

“Have you ever heard her laugh?” Nicholas challenged. “It sounds like a goat being strangled.”

Sebastian laughed into his glass. “You’re impossible. Ah—there! Lady Beatrice Langford. The Marquess of Sedgewick’s niece. Comes with a dowry that could re-roof Hawthorne House twice.”

“She once tried to feed me strawberries with her fingers. In public.”

Sebastian waggled his brows. “How scandalous.”

Nicholas shot him a withering look. “She was twelve.”

“Ah. Less so.”

They moved through the crowd slowly, nodding to acquaintances, avoiding the more ambitious mamas. The walls shimmered with candlelight reflecting off gilt-framed portraits of dead ancestors. A string quartet played a lilting waltz that no one seemed interested in dancing to yet.

Nicholas felt as out of place as a wolf at a tea party.

“Fine,” Sebastian said. “Let’s get serious. You need a dowry. A respectable bride. Someone with money, no opinions, and a fondness for drafty estates. Which means, sadly, most of the women in this room.”

“I’m not interested.”

“You’re not allowed the luxury of disinterest. Dukes don’t starve quietly in corners.”

Nicholas exhaled, long and slow. “There has to be another way.”

“You’ve tried every other way. Farming, leasing, selling off the good horses. What’s left? The family silver? The greenhouse?” Sebastian narrowed his eyes. “Or are you still thinking about that letter?”

Nicholas didn’t answer.

Sebastian snorted. “You are.”

“I said I wasn’t replying.”

“Not replying doesn’t mean not thinking. You’ve worn that same grim expression since this morning. It’s halfway between offended and constipated.”

Nicholas’s jaw twitched. “I’m simply trying to survive this evening.”

“And that is Lady Florence Edgecomb,” Sebastian said dramatically, gesturing with his glass, “who would very much like to help you survive. She’s been glancing over her shoulder at you for the last quarter hour. Just turned twenty-two. Father owns shipping interests. Likes Greek poetry and—”

“—believes a wife’s most important role is to ‘support her husband’s opinions by having none of her own.’” Nicholas took a sip of wine. “She told me that over a fish course last Season.”

Sebastian blinked. “Well, in that case, it seems Lady Florence would be perfect for you.”

Nicholas threw him a withering look, but said nothing.

They paused near a velvet chaise where an older dowager was loudly arguing with a clergyman about the decline of bonnet craftsmanship. A nearby footman nearly tripped over a sleeping pug.

“I’m doomed,” Nicholas said quietly.

“No,” Sebastian said with a sigh, “you’re proud. Which is worse.”

The music changed to something livelier, hinting that dancing would soon begin. Already, couples were being nudged toward the floor.

“I suppose you could always marry for love,” Sebastian added with a smirk. “How romantic. Starving in each other’s arms while the roof caves in.”

Nicholas didn’t smile.

Marriage. Dowries. Ballrooms full of blank stares and brittle laughs. None of it appealed. Not even in theory.

He wasn’t built for love stories. Not anymore. If ever.

And yet, his mind, traitorously, wandered back to the letter. The unsigned one. The letter from a dead man. Despite his best efforts to ignore it, he could not help but feel intrigued by it. Had the dead man’s daughter written it? What did she want with him?

“You alright?” Sebastian asked, pulling him from his thoughts.

Nicholas straightened his cuffs. “I’m going to need another drink.”

Sebastian clapped him on the shoulder. “So says every man about to fall in love.”

Nicholas narrowed his eyes. “I don’t believe in love.”

“You don’t have to,” Sebastian said breezily. “Love believes in you.”

Nicholas gave him a look so deadpan it could have soured cream.

The dance floor glittered with hopeful smiles, whispered ambitions, and carefully plotted futures.

He felt none of it. Only the heavy thrum of obligation and the cold certainty that every woman in the room saw only his title and perhaps the remnants of his jawline.

What he needed wasn’t a wife.

It was an escape.

And that, unfortunately, was growing harder to find.