My Lady Destiny

the long version

Her dying mother christened her Destiny, and the lovely, lonely orphan grows up a drudge in a poor parsonage. Until she is fifteen, she has no idea that she is the daughter of Lord Claud, the Earl of Destermere. Then, from his deathbed in Switzerland, her long lost father decreed her his sole heir-to the largest fortune in Queen Anne's empire. Loyal Stephen Godwin, the Earl's secretary, traces her to Bath and carries her away to Richmond where she is caught up in the social whirl. But Lady Mahla Destermere, her beautiful and unscrupulous stepmother, resents her coming. The widow Countess plans to marry Destiny to her own half-brother, the depraved, sadistic Baron Humbert Faramund, who tries to gain control of Destiny's fortune. Suddenly Destiny found herself in a world of magnificent opulence - a world of intrigue and passion beyond her innocent experience - a world in which she would learn to brave the lusts of a dissolute Russian prince or lose her title, her wealth, and Stephen - the one man she loved! As Destiny rises from kitchen drudge to social beauty, will her fate be love or misery?