Beautiful eighteen-year-old Norina is dismayed when her widowed father Lord Sedgewyn quickly remarries to society beauty Violet – and even more so when she discovers her new stepmother's wicked plot to poison her and inherit a fortune held in trust for Norina. In fear for her life, she flees in disguise, securing a position as secretary to a temporarily blinded French Nobleman who whisks her away to Paris and then to his opulent South of France villa. Just as her rakish new employer's eyes begin to heal and are opened to Norina's innocent loveliness, the evil Violet's henchmen kidnap her. Facing certain death in a monastic cell, Norina realises that her employer, Le Marquis de Charlamont, will never know that she has given him her heart –