Portraits, Passion, and Other Pastimes

In this funny, sweet, and steamy second-chance romance, a hard-headed marquess and his mother’s companion fall in love despite every reason they have not to.

A clever companion without a home.

Professional companion Matilda Bellvue is tired of living other people’s lives. A surprise inheritance allows her to retire to a home of her own, after completing one final job--serving as companion to the Marquess of Waneborough’s mother. Her task is simple: help the grieving marchioness and, above all else, do not fall in love with her employer, a man who feels more like home than any building ever could.

A grumpy marquess without money.

Raph Bromley, new Marquess of Waneborough, inherits a crumbling estate, an ocean of debt, and no easy way to save his family from penury. Thank goodness for heiresses. Raph will simply marry for money. Except his mother’s new companion, a clever but poor beauty, makes him wish he didn't have to.

A forbidden love they can’t resist.

Raph and Matilda's attraction quickly sizzles into something more. But she has no money, he must marry rich, and falling in love offers only heartache.

Portraits, Passion, and Other Pastimes is book 1 in Charlie Lane's new Regency romance series The Art of Love. Raph and Matilda endure matchmaking mamas, inconvenient inheritances, steamy lake encounters, and an electrifying battle of wills to find true love in the most unlikely of places--each other.