The Mad Mistress — Sorcha MacMurrough

A Desperate Gamble … on Love!

Wealthy heiress Vanessa Hawkesworth is offered as the stake in a card game by her half-brother Gerald in order to cover his gambling debts.

Clifford Stone, their nearest neighbor, only agrees to play for her hand in marriage in order to free her from Gerald's excesses. Clifford is fascinated by the lovely if unworldly young bluestocking.

As his attraction grows, so too does his certainty that his new-found love is in increasing danger from malevolent forces who will stop at nothing, not even murder, to seize her newly-acquired fortune.

Vanessa must learn to trust a complete stranger with her heart, and her entire life. Stunned at her new fiance's accusations against Gerald, she is sure she is going mad, torn between loyalty to her family and the wildfire passion that flares every time Clifford touches her.

As new a series of crimes in the district threatens her new-found love and happiness, Vanessa must gamble all herself in order to protect her beloved Clifford, and bring the men responsible to justice before it's too late.