She was the one person in the world who seeped warmth beyond his cold, fortified walls. Until he betrayed her.

Jericho Easton, famed throughout England for his brutal victories inside the ring, has spent most of his life alone, untouched, and blood-stained. He’s not certain why he fights. To find the man who murdered his father? Or unleash the ever-burning fury inside his chest? Regardless, he never expected to confront the blackguard from his nightmares so soon. Or that the man’s innocent daughter would smile at him as no one ever had.

Iris Gregory has secrets and griefs of her own. But she tucks them away behind an eager smile and a laughing zest for life. When mysterious and unreachable Jericho Easton comes to her family’s rescue on the farm, some of the loneliness ebbs away into trust, hard-earned friendship—and maybe something more. Why are all her letters suddenly filled with him? Was she ever truly alive before his kiss?

Then the unthinkable happens. Jericho grapples with a sense of duty and justice toward his dead father, and Iris is left reeling in the wake of so many lies. As the consequences of Jericho’s decision unfurl, Iris is thrown into a vortex of pain, destitution, and utter hopelessness. Jericho might be the only one who can rescue her. But can she let him—or ever again give him passage into her heart—when he’s the very one who shattered it?

Enjoy other Gothic-Style Regencies from Hannah Linder:
Beneath His Silence
When Tomorrow Came
Garden of the Midnights
The Girl from the Hidden Forest
Never Forgotten
The Red Cottage