June 1890: in search of independence, beautiful Chloe Blake takes a position at Fairfield House as companion to bed-ridden Jessica Matthews. With her boundless energy and enthusiasm, she will change the lives of the entire Matthews family: Jessica's resentful spinster daughter, Bertha, Bertha's deceptively dutiful brother, Oliver, and his secret French mistress, Adele, and kind-hearted black sheep Uncle Jerome. But Chloe's main priority in taking the job is to save enough money to fulfil an ambition of her own: to travel to the west coast of America to seek out her long-lost father.