Through a hard turn of events, Reese Thackery has become an indentured servant. When the owner of her contract dies, the bank has rights to her fate. Conner Kingsley, the son of the bank's owner, comes to Tucker Mills to investigate and soon releases Reese from obligation and hires her to keep house for him. Reese is grateful for freedom but unsure of her other feelings for Conner. Yet, as her emotional hurts heal, and her faith blossoms, Reese allows...

"She remembered when Hemingway had planted a banyan tree at his house and told her its parasitic roots were like human desire. At the time she'd thought it romantic. She hadn't understood his warning." In Depression-era Key West, Mariella Bennet, the daughter of an American fisherman and a Cuban woman, knows hunger. Her struggle to support her family following her father's death leads her to a bar and bordello, where she bets on a risky boxing match...

Suffering an intense year of public and police scrutiny after being wrongly implicated in his fiance's murder, Boston lawyer Eli Landon takes sanctuary in a centuries-old family home and falls in love with resident housekeeper Abra Walsh, with whom he is entangled in an old, life-threatening mystery.

In their search for the new but missing Earl of Stoneford, Elise Finster and her British mistress Lady Anne Stone join a wagon train to follow his somewhat cold trail to Oregon. Will the ladies succeed in their quest or succumb to the malfeasance of the mysterious man dogging their heels? Scout Eb Bentley's initial disgust with these ill-prepared women eventually turns into admiration for one lady in particular. Can he protect her long enough to win...

She keeps house for Inspector Witherspoon . . . and keeps him on his toes. Everyone's awed by his Scotland Yard successes-but they don't know about his secret weapon. No matter how messy the murder or how dirty the deed, Mrs. Jeffries's polished detection skills are up to the task . . . proving that behind every great man there's a woman-and that a crimesolver's work is never done. Sir Edmund Leggett is flattered to be stalked by a young lady-who...

When Amelia Bedelia volunteers to fill in as director of a third-grade Thanksgiving play, she misunderstands everything from one girl's desire to play a big role to an opening night wish that she "break a leg," but all is well in the end.