Lady Alicia, is the self-confessed light of her father's life. But the much loved and beautiful daughter of Lord and Lady Pavier, of the noble House of Wingrave, is set to disoblige her family in marriage when she rejects the fabulously wealthy, Lord Biggins... the brilliant match the family craved. A dash to Gretna Green, finds Lady Alicia disinherited… and the newly married pair are forced to flee England to escape his lordship's wrath. Some years later, the couple's only child, Ella, is left an orphan and the four-year-old girl is now alone in the world. Although unwanted by the noble Wingrave family, the girl is nonetheless taken in… and Ella must learn to negotiate her way… with a family who will neither forgive nor forget: but indeed, seems determined to extend only enmity towards the child. While quietly employed in a teaching post at a Parish charity school, the twenty-one-year-old Ella is once again recalled to the family home, historic Deems Castle, only for Ella to discover she is to be cast as a reluctant bride in marriage the following morning, to a Frenchman unknown to her. To banish Ella from English shores, seems the family's coup de grace: the finishing stroke, against a girl innocent of any charge. This is a story of intrigue, love and loyalty… more especially when, at the time of the fear and turbulence of the French Revolution, the truest love can be over-shadowed by death.