So she was doing something about it herself. She had not asked it aloud in anyone’s hearing, but no one would have had a satisfactory answer to give her even if she had.

If she did not take charge and do something, who would? There was no more society, no more place of belonging. There were no more rules, no more expectations. Was a bastard entitled to her father’s name? Life yawned ahead of her as a frightening unknown. She was now simply Miss Westcott, and she was not even sure about the name. Other people had that instead: parents, maids, nurses, governesses, chaperons, husbands, society at large-especially society at large with its myriad rules and expectations, most of them unwritten but nonetheless real on that account.īut she needed to assert herself now. She had not needed to take charge before the great catastrophe a few months before because she had been a lady-Lady Camille Westcott to be exact, eldest child of the Earl and Countess of Riverdale-and ladies did not have or need control over their own lives. And it is only the bond between them that will allow them to weather the rough storm that lies ahead.After several months of hiding away, wallowing in misery and denial, anger and shame, and any other negative emotion anyone cared to name, Camille Westcott finally took charge of her life on a sunny, blustery morning in July. But as Camille poses for Joel, their mutual contempt soon turns to desire. An art teacher at the orphanage that was once his home, Joel Cunningham has been hired to paint the portrait of the haughty new teacher. But even as she settles in, she must sit for a portrait commissioned by her grandmother and endure an artist who riles her every nerve. Looking to eschew the trappings of her old life, she leaves London to teach at the Bath orphanage where her newly discovered half-sister lived.

With her parents’ marriage declared bigamous, Camille Westcott is now illegitimate and without a title. Humphrey Wescott, Earl of Riverdale, has died, leaving behind a fortune and a scandalous secret that will forever alter the lives of his family-sending one daughter on a journey of self-discovery. A reversal of fortune befalls a young woman in this charming Westcott novel from the New York Times bestselling author of Someone to Wed.

Someone to hold by mary balogh