Delilah Swanpoole, countess of Derring, learns the hard way that her husband, “Dear Dull Derring”, is a lot more interesting - and perfidious - dead than alive. It’s a devil of an inheritance, but in the grand ruins of the one building Derring left her are the seeds of her liberation. And she vows never again to place herself at the mercy of a man. But battle-hardened Captain Tristan Hardy is nothing if not merciless. 

Ewan Cameron has no intention of falling in love with the delectable, bookish Lily Farthingale. He is the estranged grandson of the duke of Lotheil and has come to London because of a deathbed promise to his father. He has no intention of staying beyond his three-month obligation. Nothing can tempt him to remain, not even Lily, the beautiful bluestocking determined not only to restore relations between him and his grandfather, but to turn Ewan into a proper gentleman. 

Lady Marie O’Shea lives life by her own rules...but her days of running free end when her brother, Lord Fergus O’Shea, returns from England, intent on marrying his sisters off to keep them from being the scourge of the county. And when Marie lands herself in a scandalous amount of trouble, she ends up as the first sister doomed to whatever marriage of convenience her brother can arrange. Bad boy Christian Darrow is having too much fun to be tied down, and as the younger son of an earl, he isn’t expected to amount to much.

Reverend Augustus Shackleford's mission in life (aside from ensuring the collection box was suitably full every Sunday) was to secure advantageous marriages for each of his eight daughters. A tall order, given the fact that in the Reverend's opinion they didn't possess a single ladylike bone in the eight bodies they had between them. Quite where he would find a wealthy titled gentleman bottle headed enough to take any of them on remained a mystery and indeed was likely to test even his legendary resourcefulness.

Lady Myrtle McQuoid has always felt a little forgotten, and this season is no exception. When her boisterous family vacates their London townhouse for the country, Myrtle finds she’s been left behind. But she just needs to stay warm, keep her belly full, and distract herself until her relatives realize their mistake and turn back to collect her. Surely that won’t take long.