Cherry's Jubilee

Charlotte Caulfield has spent her entire life feeling all alone, despite being surrounded by the members of a theatre troupe. On the night she first steps onto the stage, she experiences both mind numbing terror and hope - but her dreams of pursuing a career in music are quickly dashed. Thrown out into an alley simply for singing a song, she is hurt and frightened. Driven from her hiding place in her terror, she falls at the feet of a man who will change her life. Lord Clayton Corsair had never again expected to see the angel who captured his soul when she sang the one song as an understudy. He'd attended the theater as a favor to his godparents but was so distracted, afterwards he couldn't have told anyone what the play had been about. The moment the petite singer had lifted her eyes to his and he'd seen the terror and need in them, he'd been unable to think of anything else. He only returns to the theater to retrieve a forgotten fan - but when a scream shatters the silence of the night and a hysterical woman flees from a nearby wagon, he has no choice but to offer his help. And it isn't until he carries her to a circle of light that he realizes not only that she's hurt, but who she is. Shocked to discover that this is the angel herself, he promises to take her to safety, but by the time he returns with a carriage, she has disappeared. His life has already begun to shift, then it flips again when she reappears the next day. Clayton soon discovers that she may sing like an angel, but she fights and curses like a wild animal. Will he truly be able to change her life, or is his godfather correct in saying that women are offered few choices in their world? Can a titled man understand the reality for a woman born to a lower class? Can she accept that he has no use for titles, or the silly expectations of the society he has been born into? Charlotte will need to learn to trust, and to stop making assumptions about his intentions, but it's hard when he treats her like a little girl in some ways, yet maintains a proper and polite distance in others. Despite their instant mutual attraction, Charlotte and Clayton are determined to keep their baser needs from each other. Will that make them miss the opportunity to find what they've both been searching for? With the help of Eleanor Summers and her students, Charlotte learns that life does offer choices - as long as she is willing to open her heart and take a chance.