AustLit

'"A shared secret from their past could destroy their future..."

'Northumbria, 1077. In the years following William the Conqueror's harrying of the North, Lady Alfreya of Tyrswick returns to her family home after seven years in exile. But instead of returning victorious as her dead father had promised, she returns defeated by Baron Sebastian de la Croix, the Norman who rules her lands.

'To save her gravely ill brother's life, Alfreya offers herself hostage to her enemy. As Alfreya gets to know her new husband, she finds he's not the monster she feared, and their marriage of convenience soon becomes a bond of passion. But Sebastian is a man with a secret–one that could destroy him.

'As a series of brutal murders haunt their nights, the man who betrayed Alfreya's father returns claiming to be her betrothed. He has learned Sebastian's secret and will use it to further his own ambition–using Sebastian's own family–which will destroy Sebastian and mark him a traitor, and plunge an unprepared England into war with the Scots...' (Publication summary)