Alliances and Confrontation — Gayle Messick

BOOKS I & II OF A WORLD OF EXPECTATIONS are combined into one. Fitzwilliam Darcy and Charles Bingley are joined by Lord Blake, Gerald Rawlings, and Stephen Kent at Netherfield Park where business is intermingled with romance and the men become opponents in a high stakes competition for money and control. With the help of an unnamed spy, a business rival is watching and preparing for the destruction of any alliance that emerges. Rivalry, alliances, romance, jealousy, and competition challenge the young men's friendships. Can men of differing backgrounds come adapt to the social and financial expectations of the emerging Industrial Revolution.