His Convenient Countess

Colorado, 1889. Lady Cordelia Ashworth has two trunks, a title that's worth nothing west of the Mississippi, and a scandal she crossed an ocean to escape. Cyrus Locke has a railroad, a smelter, and a daughter who hasn't spoken in eleven months. He needs a wife with a name respectable enough for the statehood vote. Cordelia needs a name that isn't hers. The marriage is a transaction. He gets a countess. She gets his protection. Nell gets a stranger in the house — and, slowly, a voice. But the man who ruined Cordelia in London has followed her to the frontier, and Cyrus, without asking, pays him to go away. He meant it as protection. She sees it as the same thing she ran from. At the statehood ball, with the whole territory watching, Cordelia decides exactly what she's willing to say out loud.