She's been watching him for days, Guy Devoran, the handsome and charismatic nephew of a powerful duke, is Sarah Callaway's only hope for finding her missing cousin. But first she must get close enough to uncover the dark secret that he's hiding...

Honor demands that Guy help Sarah rescue her cousin from whatever fate has befallen her. Yet he will never let slip his shameful secret-or drop his guard with this red-haired beauty who will stop at nothing in her pursuit of the truth.

From the elegant ballrooms of London to the perilous smugglers' dens of Devon, their desperate quest leads Guy and Sarah ever deeper into danger. But when forbidden passion demands more restraint than they can muster, past sins must be confronted-until destiny refuses to be denied.

I was expecting big things from this novel, but those hopes deflated after Chapter 4. The plot never really got off the ground, but in this case, that was only a minor annoyance. There are bigger fish to fry with this one.

The analogies and incessant references to flowers-Orchids in particular-grated on my nerves from the very start. And, for as much as the author kept pushing the floral correlations, it seemed as though the flowers would play a part in the turn of events that were to come, but no. I was forced to read about stamens and endless list of scientific names for different varieties of Orchids for no known reason. It was excruciating to say the least and drew attention away from what had the possibility to be a somewhat decent story.

Then we get to the sickening phrases scattered throughout the book to explain the sparks that were supposed to have been flying between the main characters:

"...the air sparkled in her lungs like champagne."

Does that mean that she was drowning? If I was forced to read this dribble, it was comforting to know that I wasn't the only one being tortured. Unfortunately, she didn't choke on that champagne that mysteriously found its way into her lungs and the story continued.

"She felt suddenly light-headed, as if he had mesmerized her, as if loose strands of her hair sang faraway songs of enchantment."

Huh? You've got to be kidding me! What kind of a descriptive sentence is that? At first, I was frightened by an image of Medusa with her snakes singing a merry little song. Hell, even Fabio's hair doesn't sing as it flails in the wind in the I Can't Believe It's Not Butter commercials. And what does singing hair have to do with feeling light-headed anyway? Well, if my hair started singing, I guess maybe that would be grounds for me to feel a bit light-headed too.

Maybe I had better go get a haircut........

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Publisher: Berkley Trade (November 7, 2006)
ISBN: 0425211975
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