Widow of an earl, popular society novelist — Marina Wyatt works hard to keep her life organized and her secrets to herself. Though if a new young lover every Season keeps her in the public eye and helps sell her books, all the better.
What might not be better, however, is Marina’s growing involvement with Jasper Hedges, noted classicist and art authority: a man of controversial opinions, unpopular ideals, and a closely-guarded past of his own.
Still, two experienced adult people know how to be careful, don’t they?
Where’s the harm in a few hot midnight meetings? How hot is too hot? How close can two scarred, ardent souls get to each other without hurting the innocent — or pitching over the edge of impropriety?
For a couple as proud and contentious as Mary and Kit, a hint of scorn or a whiff of condescension was quite sufficient – for the bonds of trust and honor to dissolve at the slightest provocation.
They came by their intransigence honestly; as the children of feuding Derbyshire landowners, Mary Penley and Kit Stansell had been raised to be enemies. Too willful to be bound by their families’ prejudices, they became secret friends instead – and then much more than friends. When they eloped, they thought they’d left all rancor and rivalry behind them.
But a proper Mayfair marriage wasn’t so easy for the reform-minded daughter of a brewer and the wildly undisciplined son of a marquess – if Kit really was the marquess’s son anyway.
Now, nine years, a legal separation, and a war later – Kit and Mary are thrust together again, as passionate, as stubborn and single-minded, and as ready to hurl themselves (or perhaps the glassware) at each other as ever. Until a vicious political intrigue threatens everything they hold dear…
