Elise arrives at Jonas's crumbling estate with one waterlogged trunk and a forged letter of introduction, because respectable women with ruined reputations can't afford scruples. The duke hasn't let another person touch him in three years, but his new 'housekeeper' simply begins stripping his bed linens and bullying him into broth, ignoring every snarled command to leave. She's sunshine in soggy muslin; he's a scarred recluse who hasn't bothered with trousers in weeks. This cannot possibly end well.
Now she's helping him bathe, her fingers lingering on the twisted skin of his shoulder, and neither of them is breathing properly. Jonas tells himself he's only keeping her because she's too stubborn to fire. Elise tells herself she's only staying because she has nowhere else to go. They're both liars, and the county assembly is three weeks away, and the man who tried to make her his mistress will be there, smiling. Jonas doesn't know why she flinches at carriage wheels. She doesn't know why he watches her mouth when she reads aloud. Someone is going to break first, and when they do, it will be spectacular.