by: Alix Nichols
Series: The Montevor Royals Saga
Genre: Contemporary Romance
Release Date: May 31, 2026
For sixteen years, they’ve hated each other...
and craved each other.
Widowed and betrayed, Eva Castellane will do anything to protect her daughter’s inheritance.
Standing in her way?
Alex Castellane—her late husband’s steely, magnetic half brother.
The man poised to take it all.
Her worst enemy.
Her forbidden temptation.
Stuck together in the family castle, their legal fight spirals into war…
until a common threat forces a reluctant alliance.
Desire blurs the lines.
Chemistry sizzles.
Rules get broken.
But as the verdict nears, one slip could unravel Eva’s explosive secret…
A Duchess with a Secret stands alone within the Montevor Royals Saga. It is a spicy contemporary enemies-to-lovers romance with forced proximity, family secrets, and a hard-won HEA.
Eva, 35, is the elegant dowager duchess of Rohinn. She is poised, graceful, and always perfectly composed on the outside. Years of training will do that to a person.
But beneath the perfect manners and beautiful gowns is a woman who has spent far too long enduring instead of choosing. She’s a fiercely protective mother to her fourteen-year-old daughter, and her greatest hope is to give her child the secure, happy future she deserves.
What Eva wants most is freedom — the freedom to make her own decisions, to love on her own terms, and to never again feel like she has to shrink herself to keep the peace.
Her biggest fear? That the secrets she’s carrying and the forces beyond her control will take that future away from her darling girl.
Then there’s Alex, 39, brilliant, logical, and a little bit gruff. A mathematics professor who prefers equations and reason to messy emotions, he never expected to be pulled into the world of titles, estates, and family drama. He’s the kind of man who keeps his walls high and his heart carefully guarded.
What he desires, deep down, is something he’s not sure he’s allowed to want: real connection, a sense of belonging, and the chance to protect the people who matter to him.
His fear? Losing control.
When circumstances throw these two together at Fort Vauclairt, sparks fly… and not always the romantic kind. Eva and Alex have every reason to keep their distance, but the more time they spend in each other’s company, the harder it becomes to ignore the pull between them.
She challenges everything he thought he knew about himself. He sees the strength and vulnerability she’s worked so hard to hide.
I adored writing their journey! All of it: the distrust, the arguing, the reluctant respect, and the slow, beautiful way they start to choose each other despite everything working against them.
If you want a little taste of the delicious tension between Eva and Alex, here’s a short video teaser I put together: https://www.youtube.com/shorts/2sYrzwI2hwQ
If you love a strong, layered heroine finding her voice and a hero who’s a little grumpy but deeply honorable (with plenty of chemistry and heart), I think Eva and Alex will feel like old friends by the end of the book.
Alex
The air outside the basement at Mount Evor Secret Service feels colder than it did inside. It isn’t exactly chilly; just crisp enough to bite, which I welcome wholeheartedly. It clears my head.
“I’m going to walk to the hotel,” Eva says. “I need air.”
“I was about to say the same.”
She shoots me a look. “Please don’t. I don’t want to start thinking we have things in common.”
“What about the duchy?” I taunt.
“Of all the things we don’t have in common,” she quips, “the duchy is the one we don’t have in common the most.”
I smile despite myself. The pretty shell has some humor.
“May I walk beside you?” I ask.
“If you must,” she says after a beat. “But don’t think I’m warming to you.”
“Understood.”
We fall into step, heading toward the hotel located in the city’s historic center. She keeps her arms folded tight across her chest like a shield.
“I want you to know I will fight you with everything I’ve got. Dirty. No-holds-barred,” she warns. “My lawyer, Pauline, is very good at her job.”
I glance over. “So, this is your idea of small talk?”
“If you’d prefer silence…”
“No, this is delightful.”
We keep walking. Pombrio glows in the late-September dusk. The limestone facades catch the last golden rays and appear to be lit from within. Lined with old trees starting to turn, cobbled streets stretch ahead, winding gently. Cafés hum with end-of-day energy, clinking glasses, and low laughter. A faint whiff of woodsmoke rides the breeze.
I’d enjoy this stroll more if Eva weren’t so close. Her presence is magnetic and annoying in equal measures. Her perfume doesn’t help. It has none of the sugary sweetness most ladies favor. Instead, it’s seductive in a sharp, provocative way that’s so much her.
The air outside the basement at Mount Evor Secret Service feels colder than it did inside. It isn’t exactly chilly; just crisp enough to bite, which I welcome wholeheartedly. It clears my head.
“I’m going to walk to the hotel,” Eva says. “I need air.”
“I was about to say the same.”
She shoots me a look. “Please don’t. I don’t want to start thinking we have things in common.”
“What about the duchy?” I taunt.
“Of all the things we don’t have in common,” she quips, “the duchy is the one we don’t have in common the most.”
I smile despite myself. The pretty shell has some humor.
“May I walk beside you?” I ask.
“If you must,” she says after a beat. “But don’t think I’m warming to you.”
“Understood.”
We fall into step, heading toward the hotel located in the city’s historic center. She keeps her arms folded tight across her chest like a shield.
“I want you to know I will fight you with everything I’ve got. Dirty. No-holds-barred,” she warns. “My lawyer, Pauline, is very good at her job.”
I glance over. “So, this is your idea of small talk?”
“If you’d prefer silence…”
“No, this is delightful.”
We keep walking. Pombrio glows in the late-September dusk. The limestone facades catch the last golden rays and appear to be lit from within. Lined with old trees starting to turn, cobbled streets stretch ahead, winding gently. Cafés hum with end-of-day energy, clinking glasses, and low laughter. A faint whiff of woodsmoke rides the breeze.
I’d enjoy this stroll more if Eva weren’t so close. Her presence is magnetic and annoying in equal measures. Her perfume doesn’t help. It has none of the sugary sweetness most ladies favor. Instead, it’s seductive in a sharp, provocative way that’s so much her.
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At the age of six, she released her first book. It featured highly creative spelling on a dozen pages stitched together and bound in velvet paper.
Decades later, she lives in France and still writes. Her spelling has improved (somewhat), she has become a Kindle Scout winner, Chanticleer First Place winner, USA Today bestseller, Book Riot's Top 100 Must-Read International Romance author, and Amazon All-Star for being one of the 100 most-read authors in Kindle Unlimited.
Places to find Alix Nichols:
You can follow A Duchess with a Secret Book Tour here.
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