Compelling romance and swashbuckling thrills. Shadows aren’t always what they seem. The dramatic and gripping story of one man with two lives and the woman he craves, but cannot have…

It started with one exceptional man, Francis Granville.

He was a British aristocrat with an illustrious title and lineage that could be traced back for centuries. However, this was no bored, frivolous, idle peer or courtier. Behind the veneer of remote, ducal aloofness that most of late 18th century aristocratic society saw, Francis was both an extremely able as well as a down-to-earth and charming man. To those aware of his extensive business interests, he was astute, rich and powerful, with diverse enterprises and holdings around the expanding British Empire and further, to countries eager and open to trade. However, absolutely no one knew about his ‘little sideline’ - because he was also a ruthless, faceless and elusive criminal, known only as The Shadow, or L’Ombre.

He had a price on his head and was wanted on both sides of the English Channel for smuggling and pirating. Francis Granville was one man with two lives.

And then, one fateful day changed the course of his life. While he was in Normandy, in northern France, on one of his illegal trading expeditions, L’Ombre was approached for help by a Frenchwoman, desperate to save her family. The lengths she’d gone to in order to find him and plead her case made him wonder what it would be like to have someone care for him so much they’d risk losing everything they owned, including their freedom, even their life, just to save him from a dire fate.

Francis had always managed to wrap most people around his little finger, especially women; he’d also laughed at danger, thought himself untouchable and invincible, and relished the excitement his secret double life brought him. That was until his long-time enemy finally caught up with him, a malicious and clever adversary who’d been using the growing social unrest and inefficient government in France during the late 1780’s and the start of the Revolution to further his own nefarious ends. Francis’s arrogance and distraction were nearly his downfall, causing him to risk losing not only his life in terrible circumstances, but also the unconventional woman who meant everything to him.