LETTERS TAKE THE LADY

Anna Valleria

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GENRE: Historical Romance

Antigone Sprague, the spirited daughter of a gentleman scholar, has no patience for arrogant lords. So when she meets the reserved and bitingly clever Lord Michael Northram, she’s immediately put off by his condescending manner. She has no idea that he is utterly captivated.

Tongue-tied and overwhelmed by a passion he doesn’t understand, Michael can only confess his feelings in secret poems never meant to see the light of day. But when Antigone begins receiving those very poems from a charming and ambitious suitor, she believes she’s found the man who understands her soul. Believing he has lost her forever, a heartbroken Michael accepts a diplomatic mission to America, unaware that the woman he loves has actually fallen for his words.

Years later, his return to England ignites a shocking reunion and an undeniable spark. But their second chance is built on a foundation of lies. When the truth of the letters emerges, it exposes a scheme of shocking deception, and her spurned suitor reveals a desperate and dangerous side, threatening her very freedom. To win her trust, Michael must finally bridge the gap between the poet on the page and the man by her side, proving he is the hero she’s always deserved.

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Antigone was sitting next to the bed fully dressed as her ripped chemise lay crumpled at her feet. While he was not embarrassed of his nakedness, he felt cold and alone, and he pulled the bedclothes up to his chest. Something was wrong. She had her mask of civility on, and he didn’t like it.

“I awoke this morning to send a note to my father. In spite of everything, he ought to know I was safe. I looked for something to write with, and I found this.”

She threw several papers on the bed. Even though he did not have his spectacles, he knew exactly what they said. More poems, in the same hand. He looked up at her helplessly.

“Why?” Her mask began to crack and pure emotion seeped through. “Why do you have these? What game have you been playing?”

“I—” He felt like the worst liar. He had meant to tell her, to reveal Trevathan’s deception, but he had put it off because it would have meant revealing why he wrote the letters. But wasn’t five years long enough to hide?

“You and Sir Ambrose had some scheme to entrap me? To make me—” She seemed as though she couldn’t continue or find the word she meant to say.

“No, I never—”

“Don’t. Lie.” Her words were harsher and colder than he had ever heard from her lips before and they sent a chill down his spine.

“Antigone. Annie.” He began to get up, but the tone of her voice stopped him cold.

“Only my friends call me Annie, and clearly you are not, nor have you ever been my friend. You told me what you thought of me the very first time you met me, what a silly dreamer, surely, we could entrap her with airy poetry about goodness and light! What a weak-willed ninny, such an easy target! How stupid I was, when I should have believed what you thought of me at the beginning.”

“No.” His voice finally carried over hers. Something in his soul had to tell her it was not Trevathan who wrote the poems. That it was him. “I wrote them.”

She looked at him so helplessly, it almost broke his heart again. “Why?”

He looked her in the eye. This was the moment. To confess everything. To lay his soul bare. “Because I loved you.”

His words seemed to shake her, and she hung her head for a moment. As she looked up, she wouldn’t look at him, wouldn’t catch his eye, and she shook her head.

“No, Lord Michael, this is not love. Lies are not love. Love is truth. Lying to someone is the very opposite of love.”

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Anna Valleria writes historical romance that is sweet with steam. Her stories have been praised for their rich, realistic tone and aching romanticism, reminiscent of classic romance novels. She crafts deeply layered characters, like the honorable heroes and resilient heroines in her Victorian Historical Rogues Fall First series, that will remind you why you fell in love with romance in the first place. Anna was also a runner-up in Dragonblade Publishing’s 2024 “Write Track” Writing Contest, soon to be seen in the Tales of Timeless Love Vol. 4.

A lifelong lover of coffee and writing in cafes, she finds inspiration in the historic city that she lives in.

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