Forbidden Fire

Deception flames into passion when a lady's maid secretly takes her mistress's place in an arranged marriage On a frigid March day in Yorkshire in 1895, ten-year-old Marissa Ayers encounters the raven-haired, blue-eyed stranger for the first time. When next they meet, she has escaped the dust of the coal mines and is now a lady's maid at a fine estate, determined to escape her hardscrabble life. She instantly recognizes him, but has no inkling that their lives are about to come together in the most intimate way—until her mistress begs her to take her place in a marriage of convenience. Haunted by the memory of his lost love, Ian Tremayne is honor-bound by the promise he made to an old friend. His marriage to Katherine Mary Ahearn will be a union in name only. Yet something about the proud, green-eyed Englishwoman seems familiar . . . and intrigues him. He takes her home to America, where the willful beauty slowly begins to thaw his guarded heart....