Love Remains

Reacquainted: Returning to stay with his sister in Somerset, Captain Frederick Wentworth is doing his best to forget his last visit to that county eight years previously, which resulted in a broken engagement, and a broken heart. When he and Anne Elliot meet by chance one morning, their ability to get properly reacquainted is curtailed when young Charles Musgrove falls from a tree. Frederick is hailed a hero, welcomed to Uppercross and immediately catches Louisa Musgrove's attention. This potential new romance ought to soothe his old hurt and allow him to properly move on, but can he forget the one woman he truly loved?

Anne had hoped to avoid all possibility of meeting with Frederick on his return, but fate has other plans. Being part of a social circle where he is a key feature does little but stir up the feelings she had thought were all but put aside. She knows he has not forgiven her, but is there a possibility they might be able to salvage at least a friendship from the connection they once shared?

Rediscovered: Surprisingly reacquainted after many years apart, Captain Frederick Wentworth and Anne Elliot have managed to salvage something resembling friendship out of their previous closeness, and Anne tries to content herself with that. She knows that Frederick does not return her feelings, and focuses instead on cultivating friendships and enjoying her lot in life. She is pleased to be of service in drawing Frederick's friend, James Benwick, out of the melancholy that has consumed him, little realising her offer of friendship might be taken as something more by the serious Benwick.

Frederick is certain his feelings for Anne Elliot are confined to the past, where they belong, but when she falls ill during their party's trip to Lyme, he is forced to realise the truth: he has loved her, and he loves her still. Once her recovery is ascertained, he realises he must do his best to resolve the anticipated connection between him and Louisa Musgrove, but his progress is halted when he notices Anne growing closer to James Benwick. Is he about to lose Anne a second time?

Reunited: Captain Frederick Wentworth has learnt to his cost that he loves Anne Elliot and always has: though it took the threat of losing her to illness and then to another suitor for him to realise the truth of his feelings. When he is invited, with his brother Edward, to spend Christmas in Somerset with his sister, he is delighted to find Anne will be spending the season with her own sister, in nearby Uppercross, rather than at Bath as he had assumed.

Anne is eager to learn whether the affection Frederick once had for her remains, as she has dared to hope it might. Free of the threat of other attachments, they might admit their true feelings and embark on a future together, if only the busy Christmas season and interfering friends and family will allow them to!