Once Miss Amaryllis Duvane had been the reigning beauty of the London season, about to marry the man of her dreams and live and love happily ever after.

Then her father died. Suddenly Amaryllis was penniless and alone, forced to survive on the charity of relatives who made her little more than a servant to their husband-hunting daughters.

Now the lord that Amaryllis had once loved - the magnificently handsome Marquess of Merechester - had come to court one of these daughters. And the only thing Amaryllis feared more than his discovering the sad state to which she had descended, was her finding out that she still wanted him so much . . .