When the Duke manages to secure a bride through a bit of trickery and an obscene amount of money, he is certain his problems are behind him. Except his purchased bride proves to be nothing like he expected. What is a man like the Duke to do with a bride who is gentle, loving and absolutely impossible to live without? To add insult to injury, Athena's brother-in-law and guardian, the Duke of Kielder, has asked Harry to assist Athena in finding the gentleman of her dreams.
Clair comes a dark and enthralling reimagining of the Hades and Persephone Greek myth. She remembered the words she had whispered to him in the back of the limo after La Rose. She answered, "Yes. Since she was a little girl, flowers have only shriveled at her touch. After moving to New Athens, she hoped to lead an unassuming life disguised as a mortal journalist. All of that changes when she sits down in a forbidden nightclub to play a hand of cards with a hypnotic and mysterious stranger.
Hades, God of the Dead, has built a gambling empire in the mortal world and his favorite bets are rumored to be impossible. But nothing has ever intrigued him as much as the goddess offering him a bargain he can't resist.
After her encounter with Hades, Persephone finds herself in a contract with the God of the Dead, and his terms are impossible: Persephone must create life in the Underworld or lose her freedom forever. The bet does more than expose Persephone's failure as a goddess, however.
As she struggles to sow the seeds of her freedom, love for the God of the Dead grows—a love that is both captivating and forbidden. She hasn't her sisters beauty nor their talent for conversing easily. Even her family's enviable connections may not be enough to prevent disaster.
But Daphne's misery turns to surprised delight when the first event of her Season brings an unexpected visitor to her door--James Tilburn, whose tender kindness stole her heart in her youth. When the handsome young gentleman expresses his desire to court her, Daphne is elated. Their feelings for each other quickly grow, and it appears that, much to Daphne's disbelief, her happily ever after is within reach.
Yet nothing is as it seems. The couple finds themselves caught in a tangled web of greed and deceit, leaving James and Daphne to determine whether they are willing to risk everything for true love. But from the moment I crossed the River Styx and fell under his dark spell But all that's ripped away when her mother ambushes her with an engagement to Zeus, the dangerous power behind their glittering city's dark facade.
With no options left, Persephone flees to the forbidden undercity and makes a devil's bargain with a man she once believed a myth It seemed, however, that he had no choice.
Hewitt will be bankrupted. Adam turned his gaze from the quickly disappearing carriage to the incomparable view from the first-floor windows of Falstone Castle. A forest, unsurpassed in its breathtaking beauty, stretched out before him. Just over the western rise sat a crystal-clear lake.
The lane leading away from Falstone Castle disappeared quickly among the trees, leaving behind the feeling of peaceful isolation. His family had lived in this precise location for more than twenty generations. He, himself, was the fifteenth Duke of Kielder, seventeenth Earl of Falstone. Less than a decade later, he was made Duke of Kielder. The Boyce line had gone unbroken since that time some years earlier.
Adam threw the door open and made his way directly to his desk. Jones remained at the door. George, who is next. Hewitt made little pretense of calculating the value of everything in sight. He had reason to worry, Adam silently acknowledged with a well-hidden smile. Adam had been known to pull his pistols without warning. Several times a day for the entire week he was here.
Jones cleared his throat. Hewitt from inheriting the title and lands. Adam ignored the moment of wit. Jones made some kind of whimpering noise. He was tempted to at that moment. What lady would want to tie herself to me? How long would it take, Jones, do you think, for her to change her mind? Within an hour of arriving, or is thirty minutes a better guess?
The movement was not lost on Adam. Adam had been born with a stub of flesh where his right ear ought to have been. A long line of sap-skulled surgeons had, in a vain attempt to locate the ear they were convinced was somehow just beneath the surface, spent most of his early years butchering him until he was left scarred from the place his ear—which was never located—ought to have been, out across his cheekbone, with smaller scars running up along his temple and out along his jaw.
Quite the opposite, in fact. Adam only ever saw her when he wandered down to take his seat in Lords—something he did only out of a sense of duty, not for the pleasure of the company. The ton he had discovered was not much different from Harrow, very little toleration for deformities. No one mentioned the scarring any longer. Adam had seen to that.
He was generally left alone, but he was never ignored. Not once had even the most ambitious of parents attempted to convince him to so much as dance with their daughters. The door overlooked the back gardens, a formal hedge garden which would be the envy of all England if Adam ever permitted tours. Tucked up as near to Scotland as one could get without actually leaving Britain, Falstone Castle was not precisely a destination for travelers.
Of course not, Your Grace! At the moment I am sorely tempted to do far more than clean them. He could hear Jones swallow from across the room. The thought of his not-distant-enough relative had Adam seething once more. He would not leave Falstone to that lack-brains. The idea was nauseating. Adam felt himself tense at the very thought. She, whoever this impoverished young lady with the horde of siblings was, would run—on foot, if necessary—all the way back to her run-down hovel of a home rather than tie herself to him.
One look at the tangled remains of his face and she would get that look of revulsion on her face, perhaps even faint. Others had.
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