Drug addicts Harvey, Lord Darlingside, and his supermodel wife, Mara, died by drowning in the Trevi Fountain while on a heroin binge. In a previous rare moment of sobriety, Harvey created a trust for their three children with a peculiar stipulation designed to ensure none would go his way: each must demonstrate maturity by making a substantial non-monetary contribution to others.
A Fortune To Win is the story of the Darlingside heirs' journey to love and their legacies.
Will Alice break through her emotional shell to find love?
Can supermodel Sophie survive repeated attacks from someone who seems bent upon her death?
Alcoholic Peter is accused of murder...can he get his head out of the bottle long enough to beat the charge and maintain his freedom?
PLUS A SPECIAL HISTORICAL PREQUEL!
Here's a snippet to pique your interest...from Peter's Story:
Prologue
LORD DARLINGSIDE AND WIFE MARA FOUND DEAD
DRUG OVERDOSE SUSPECTED
[ROME] The jetsetting couple known as
‘Marvey,’ Harvey Fortune, Lord Darlingside and his supermodel
wife Mara Tove, were found at three a.m. today (local time) drowned
in the historic Trevi Fountain. An autopsy is planned, which many
fear will confirm the initial assumption that the couple’s known
heroin addiction caused their deaths. Reportedly, used syringes were
found on the fountain’s marble balustrade… They leave three adult
children: Peter, age 26, the new Earl Darlingside; daughter Alice,
23, a teacher; Sophia, 19, a model.
…one week later…
CONTENTS OF ‘MARVEY’ WILL REVEALED
[LONDON] …Though the Fortune family
solicitor, Rabbie White of White, Cheshire and Queen (Lincolns Inn
Fields) remains closemouthed, an unidentified source close to the
family states that the Fortune fortune, encompassing a manor house in
Kent, a mansion in Hampstead, and invested monies totaling some 50
million pounds, will be divided between ‘Marvey’s’ children.
However, the ‘Marvey’ trust requires the heirs make a substantial
non-monetary contribution to society. Whether each child’s acts are
sufficient to inherit is a decision left solely to White’s
discretion. Apparently Lord and Lady Darlingside wanted to ensure
that their progeny did not follow the same dangerous path they trod…
...eighteen months
later...
Chapter One
One cool, bright summer morning, Peter
Fortune, Earl Darlingside, awakened in a big, four-poster bed covered
with a fluffy white duvet with a woman beside him. She was dead.
Until that moment, he’d been doing
quite well, thank you very much, considering that he’d spent the
night before drinking Remy Martin Black Pearl with a number of
equally dissolute young noblemen and getting drunk as, well, drunk as
lords. He should have had a throbbing head, unclear eyesight and a
belly that pitched like bloody hell, but he felt great. And, given
that he’d won rather than lost betting on billiards was another
point in favor of the day.
Which was, he remembered blearily,
Monday, perhaps? Or maybe Tuesday. Did it matter?
The window was open to the Hampstead
sunshine and also admitted birdsong. Every once in a while he heard
the sound of a distant siren, reminding him of...of…?
Oh yes, the dead girl.
Melanie.
He supposed he ought to call 9-9-9 and
get an ambulance, though judging by her total lack of movement and
warmth, the authorities would get to her too late. Far too late.
He rolled to the side, reaching for the
bedside table where his mobile reposed. Something jabbed his arse,
and he threw back the sheet to find a used syringe. A needlestick
from an addict’s rig. Oh, shite, I’m fucked. He grabbed the
thing and flung it across the room, then called for help.
*****
She’d been called Foxy Roxy for as
long as she could remember, but she hadn’t embraced the nickname
until her fifteenth birthday. That day she’d visited a charity shop
with friends. One had spotted an old fox stole on a mannequin and
bought it for Roxanne Fox as a gift. She’d worn that fox pelt
around her neck on cool days until it had fallen apart, then bought
another and then another. Only from the charity shops, though—she
wouldn’t be directly responsible for the death of an innocent
animal. Later she’d found a source for high-quality fakes, which
fit her vegan habits far better.
This morning, she was nibbling a
gluten-free currant scone slathered with soya cream cheese whilst
enjoying her second flat white of the day (made with soya of course),
reading a fairly interesting case file about a fellow who had been
recorded by the many CCTVs roundabout London. Unfortunately for the
client, he’d been taped with his zip open whilst fondling an
impressive erection. Even less fortunately, the Crown was not
amenable to letting the incident go by even though he claimed he’d
been “pissed legless.”
Roxanne’s secretary stuck her head
into the open doorway, her eyes round. “That prat Darlingside has
gotten himself arrested again.”
“Oh, happy day.” Roxy wiped her
mouth with a hanky. “What is it this time? Dead drunk? Car crash?”
“No, it’s more serious. Unless
someone’s having a go at us.”
“Not chundering onto some poor
copper’s shoes?” That had been a memorable case.
“No, murder.”
Roxy sat up straighter. She’d been
White, Cheshire and Queen’s criminal defense specialist for four
years, having left the Crown Prosecution Service to pursue more
lucrative options. At WCQ, she’d had the opportunity to sample a
more varied menu of cases than she’d expected. Along with the
anticipated tax avoidance schemes and family squabbles regarding
bequests—which occasionally devolved into wine-throwing and
fistfights—a prominent client occasionally committed the odd sexual
peccadillo, like the fellow diddling his dong in Notting Hill.
And then there was Peter Fortune, the
Earl of Darlingside, who seemed intent upon imitating his parents’
strikingly self-destructive ways.
Bless him—he’d brought her a case
she could really sink her teeth into. “Where’s he being held?”
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