Lady Emmaline Fitzhugh, a hopeless romantic, is tired of sitting with the wallflowers, waiting for her betrothed to come to his senses and marry her. When Emmaline reads one too many reports of his scandalous liaisons in the gossip rags, she takes matters into her own hands.

Christopher Ansley, Earl of Waxham, has constructed a perfect image for the ton - the ladies love him and his company is desired by all. Only two people know the truth about Waxham's secret. Unfortunately, one of them is Miss Sophie Winters. Sophie Winters has known Christopher since she was in leading strings. As children, they delighted in tormenting each other. Now at one-and-twenty, she still has a tendency to find herself in scrapes, and her marital prospects are slim.

To distance herself from a personal scandal, Abigail Stone flees America to visit her uncle, the Duke of Somerset. She finds herself helplessly intrigued by the hard, too proper Geoffrey. With his strict appreciation for decorum and order, he's nothing like the man she's always dreamed of.

Miss Juliet Marshville is spitting mad. With one guardian missing, and the other singularly uninterested in her fate, she is at the mercy of her wastrel brother who loses her beloved childhood home to a man known as Sin. Determined to reclaim control of Rosecliff Cottage and her own fate, Juliet arranges a meeting with the notorious rogue and demands the return of her property.

Lady Patrina Tidemore gave up on the ridiculous notion of true love after having her heart shattered and her trust destroyed by a black-hearted cad. Used as a pawn in a game of revenge against her brother, Patrina returns to London from a failed elopement with a tattered reputation and little hope for a respectable match. The only peace she finds is in her solitude on the cold winter days at Hyde Park.

Responsible, practical Miss Hermione Rogers, has been crafting stories as the notorious Mr. Michael Michaelmas and selling them for a meager wage to support her siblings. The only real way to ensure her family's ruinous debts are paid, however, is to marry. Tall, thin, and plain, she has no expectation of success. In London for her first Season she seizes the chance to write the tale of a brooding duke. In her research, she finds Sebastian Fitzhugh, the Fifth Duke of Mallen.

Lady Beatrice Dennington has become the most courted lady of the ton—not bad for a duke’s sister. Only problem being is that the courting has never ended with an offer of marriage. Every single gentleman who has courted her has found his true love, and it hasn’t been Beatrice.

There have been two constants in Miss Anwen Kearsley’s life: One, she has always loved Phineas Lesar, the marquess of Landon, her brother’s best friend. And two, like all her cursed relatives, she is fated to die young. Before she turns up her heels, Anwen plans to have a courtship from Phineas any way she can. She thinks it will be enough.