Clara & Jack · Book 1
Historical Romance
A Lady in Pawn
Revised edition of “Love by Contract”
He holds the contract. She holds her ground.
No court would ever uphold this contract. It only has to hold her.
Victorian London. On a summer afternoon at the gates of Hyde Park, nineteen-year-old Clara Ashworth collides with a stranger. A stain on her sleeve, a stolen kiss, a name: Jack. The next morning a runaway carriage comes out of the fog, and her parents are gone.
What is left is debt, a ship lost at sea, and Miriam, her six-year-old sister. Clara sews, gives lessons, waters down the soup. Until Miriam falls ill with a fever.
Her father’s creditor, Bartholomew Crumley, lays a contract before her. The debt is wiped clean. The collateral is Clara herself. She reads every line—and signs. For Miriam.
The holder of the contract is Jack Crumley. The man from the park gates. Gambler, drinker, heir, a man who takes whatever is on the table. He calls himself her master. She brings him water from the dog’s bowl.
Then the Season begins, and London starts bidding—on the ship’s papers, and on the girl attached to them. With every ball the bids climb. And old Crumley simply opens his pocket watch and says nothing.
What is a woman worth when she will not be bought? And what will it cost a man who has never left anything on the table?
A lady in pawn · Enemies to lovers · Slow burn · Ballrooms, counting houses and a moonlit conservatory · A sister she would do anything for · Guaranteed happy ending
Heartfelt, dry-witted and without explicit scenes: a slow burn that lives on glances, hands and a basket of bread.