Cristabel Swann accepts a job in a boarding house only to discover that the other female tenants seem unusually popular with men.... Well-bred orphan Cristabel Swann tolerates her thankless teaching job—until her uncle dies unexpectedly. Arriving in London to claim her inheritance, Cristabel encounters something else entirely—a loutish naval captain who won all of the old man's property in an evening's gambling, leaving his niece nothing but debt! To his credit, Captain Chase recognizes her desperation and offers her a position as landlady of a "boarding house" in Kensington. Cristabel is happy with her new situation and with the female tenants of the house. They are exceedingly well dressed for working-class girls and have many admirers. Cristabel soon has a beau of her own—the dashing Lord Winstoke, who seems just a tad familiar, both in appearance and in attitude. Of course, Cristabel maintains propriety in every situation. But she cannot understand why the men she meets are so forward. Could it be the company she keeps?
Author
Barbara Metzger is the author of over three dozen books and a dozen novellas. She has also been an editor, a proof-reader, a greeting card verse-writer, and an artist. When not painting, writing romances or reading them, she volunteers at the local library, gardens and goes beach-combing and yard-saling. Her novels, mostly set in Regency-era England, have won numerous awards, including the Romance Writers of America RITA, the National Reader's Choice Award, and the Madcap award for humor in romance writing. In addition, Barbara has won two Career Achievement Awards from Romantic Times Magazine. Source: http://www.barbarametzger.com/about\_b...
