The Trouble with Thornfield

When Vivienne Mercer arrives at Thornfield Estate, she expects paperwork, dust, and a quick sale. Instead she finds a dying clause in her great-aunt Eleanor's will: she cannot inherit the crumbling Pacific cliffside manor unless she shares it for one year with Julian Thorne, the cold, infuriatingly handsome historian Eleanor handpicked to finish her work. The house itself seems to have opinions, doors latch on their own, a woman's perfume drifts through locked rooms, and Eleanor's letters keep finding Vivienne at moments she least expects. As Vivienne and Julian dig into Eleanor's past, they uncover a scandalous 1940s affair, a bitter enemy in the form of Cal Drummond, and a haunting that may not be a haunting at all. But when Marisol Chenn, a sharp-eyed writer sniffing out the estate's secrets, arrives uninvited, and Drummond begins quietly acquiring the surrounding land, Vivienne realizes the inheritance was never really about the house. It was about protecting Eleanor's final, unfinished truth. With the year's deadline pressing closer, Vivienne must decide whether to trust the brooding man the will forced into her life, surrender Thornfield to the shadows swallowing it from outside, or believe the great-aunt whose spirit may be the only one still fighting for her.