Anne de Bourgh's doctor prescribed laudanum to quiet her when she was a fussy baby. Anne now takes the opium-heavy tincture every day, growing up with few companions except her cousins, including Fitzwilliam Darcy. Throughout their childhoods, it was understood that Darcy and Anne would marry and combine their vast estates of Pemberley and Rosings. But Darcy does not love Anne or want her. After her father dies unexpectedly, Anne looks for a life without the medicine she has been told she must have. Fleeing to the London home of her cousin, Colonel John Fitzwilliam, Anne forges a new identity for herself, learning to navigate society and the complexities of love and passion. -- Adapted from jacket.