The Duke’s Hammer by C.H. Admirand

The Duke’s Guard: The men in black who have sworn an oath to protect the Duke of Wyndmere and his family from enemies that would stop at nothing to discredit and destroy him!
Garahan has no time for love, but his heart has other ideas…
James Garahan, one of the duke’s private guard, has had his head turned many times by a comely face in his thirty years. Not once has a lass touched his heart…until the night he walks into a tavern in the bowels of London and sees a battered angel in need of rescuing.

Melinda Waring is alone and homeless. She struggles to find work, but employers see her pronounced limp, from a childhood injury, as a weakness. With no other choice, she accepts an offer to work in a tavern in exchange for room and board. The conditions are deplorable, and the constant jeers from patrons, intolerable, but she has no choice but to stay.
The next time Garahan sees her, she has bruises on her wrists and cheek. When she is cornered in the back room of the tavern, he whisks her to safety. For the first time in his life, Garahan listens to his heart, and willingly hands it over to the brown-eyed lass with work-worn hands.