With her reputation in tatters and a baby to look after, Catherine Balley is given a single chance at redemption: marry the man she once betrayed, a man who has every reason to hate her. * * * * * Seduced, ruined, and abandoned, Cate spends her days looking after her illegitimate baby, Luke, and trying not to think about the past she lost and the future she will now never have. When David Demery, the man she was once engaged to, offers to honour his promise and marry her, Cate cannot refuse: it is the only chance she will ever have to repair her reputation and protect Luke's future. But just because Demery is willing to marry her doesn't mean he's willing to love her: she broke his heart once, and he is determined not to let her do it again. Even if this time Cate's own heart is at risk of breaking too.

Sophia has sacrificed everything for her younger sister, Lucy. She has removed them from the only home they ever knew, taken on the care of Lucy's illegitimate son, George, and even assumed the role of a widow and mother in order to erase all hint of scandal from the boy's birth. But rumor continues to follow them like the darkest of clouds, and Sophia must adapt to her new existence as a false widow with no prospects beyond the doors of her small cottage. Lord Haughton - "Finn" to those close to him - will stop at nothing to prevent the slightest whiff of disgrace from tainting his family's name. When he learns of his younger brother's latest indiscretion-one that leaves a bastard child in his wake-Haughton rushes across the country to offer the boy's mother a comfortable living in exchange for her silence about the child's true parentage. But he arrives only to have his generous offer thrown back in his face by Sophia Brixton, a sharp-tongued and sharper-witted woman who proceeds to toss him out of her house. But just because he is banished from her home does not mean he is so easily banished from her life.