Barbara Cartland Boeken

The Marquis of Melford was actually relieved to be alone on his yacht. Carnival in Venice was every bit as gay and abandoned as the Marquis had remembered, but after a few days the revelling had begun to bore him. Even the seductive charms of his dark-eyed mistress had worn a bit thin. Now the Marquis sat at the writing desk in his luxurious cabin, happy to be heading back to England, delighted his demanding mistress had decided to remain in Venice. Women were such a nuisance aboard ship, always.... The constant faint thumping noise behind him had finally succeeded in disturbing the Marquis' thoughts. It seemed to be coming from the large painted wardrobe that stood against one wall of the cabin. Opening the cupboard doors, the Marquis lost both his composure and his well-earned solitude. There, huddled in a corner, was the most beautiful young woman the Marquis had ever seen--a fragile, blue-eyed, golden-haired stowaway. Caterina runs away from a loveless and frightening marriage and takes refuge on a Marquis' yacht en route to England. When the yacht is blown off course and encounters Barbary pirates, it is only then that she and the Marquis realise they have fallen in love.

Black magic? Dorina Stanfield, the Vicar's young and lovely daughter could not belive that she was hearing Jarvis Yarde's murderous incantations against the one man who stood between himself and the ancient Earldom of Yardcombe. Yet it was true...and only Dorina could combat the gathering forces of evil that menaced the handsome raffish Earl who had captured her shy and secret heart...

Since the loss of her parents, the beautiful young Filipa Seymour runs the family’s ancient Manor House alone with very little money and only her beloved dogs and horses and ageing housekeeper, Mrs. Smeaton, for company. So she looks forward with excitement to every visit from her brother, Sir Mark Seymour, except that invariably he is looking for yet another heirloom in the house to sell in order to finance his extravagent Society lifestyle in London. So when Mark suggests a crazy plan for Filipa secretly to take the place of the glamorous ‘Pretty Horse-Breaker’ with whom he is due to ride at the Marquis of Kilne’s prestigious horse race meeting, she reluctantly agrees. Introduced to the Marquis and the other house guests as ‘Fifi’, Filipa is intimidated yet strangely enthralled by his dismissive attitude. But, even as she realises that she is falling in love with him, the Marquis seems oblivious to her and convinced that she is just another gold digger – until she foils a dastardly plot to poison his beloved stallion, saving its life and probably that of its rider as well and in the process opening the Marquis’s eyes to love.