Shadow of the Bastille

Evan Somerset is on a quest to find a unique vase with a thunderbolt painted on it. He sees it in a small French restaurant in London. Brienne LeClerc, the owner, isn't interested in selling the family heirloom-the only thing, besides Brienne, that her grandmother brought from France while escaping the French Revolution. No matter how much of a charming scoundrel Evan is, she won't budge. That decision leads to disaster. In the wake of the destruction of everything she has worked on, Evan learns an astounding truth. Brienne is the daughter of a French duke, Marc-Michel Levesque, who died on the guillotine. If she still had the vase, she could prove that and regain the family's estates in France. Not telling him that she does, Brienne sets off to learn the truth. She realizes how much she needs Evan by her side and in her arms as her family's past comes back to haunt her. She can only hope that it is not too late to be honest with him about the vase . . . and about how much she has come to love him.

When Dominic St. Clair, a French privateer, captures an American ship, he has the American officers transferred to his ship, offering them the respect of one officer for another. He even asks if they need to bring anything from their ship with them. The American captain says no, but then Dominic discovers Abigail Fitzgerald, the captain's daughter, has been left behind on the ship he now is overseeing. Abigail barely knows her father, for she has lived ashore with her aunt her whole life. She looked forward to getting to know him on this voyage. She cannot believe that he would leave her behind with the enemy. But he did. So begins the battle between Abigail and Dominic, but they must become allies when they barely survive the ship being blown up by her father's men. They reach the shore of England, where both are considered enemies. There they find both unexpected allies and an unexpected love. Even so, betrayal stalks them as lies long told draw them into a web of treachery and bring Dominic a heritage he never imagined would be his, for he is the heir of a duke killed during the Terror. Not that he will be able to claim his legacy unless he can escape their enemies and save Abigail for a horrible fate. Their two hearts must be as powerful as thunder and dare to grasp love in the midst of hatred.

Was her mother really a spy? Michelle D'Orage refuses to believe that when a Russian diplomat named Alexei Vatutin comes to the Swiss boarding school where she teaches. Her mother fled France and the Terror when Michelle was only a baby, and Michelle never thought about where the money came for them to survive. Nor did her mother tell her about their past or the ring with the lightning bolt on it that she claims was her wedding ring. Now Alexei insists she come with Alexei to Vienna, where a meeting of leaders in the wake of Napoleon's banishment to Elba is going to redraw Europe in the hopes of lasting peace. Alexei doesn't hide that he is a spy and believes that Michelle has inherited her mother's gift for subterfuge. The glittering, dangerous world of diplomacy and espionage is almost as terrifying for Michelle as her overwhelming craving for the handsome Russian. But, as she longs to give her heart and herself to him, Alexei has not told her all his secrets, and his greatest one could tear them apart forever as Napoleon makes one last desperate attempt to regain his empire.