Paris, September 1824 Lord Nicholas Asquith needs his wife. Too bad he broke her heart ten years ago. Can he resist a second chance at the love he lost? When Mariana catches the eye of the man at the center of an assassination plot, Nick puts aside their painful past and enlists her to obtain information by any means necessary, even if it means seducing the enemy agent. Even if the thought makes … agent.
Even if the thought makes his blood boil.
Only by keeping his distance from Mariana these last ten years was he able to pretend indifference to her. With every moment spent with her, he feels his tightly held control slipping . . .
Can she trust the spy who broke her heart?
Mariana spent the last decade forgetting Nick. Now she has the chance to best him at his own game, an opportunity she can’t resist, even as her view of him begins to shift. Increasingly, she wants nothing more than to seduce her own husband . . .
It’s only a matter of time before mad passion ignites, a passion never convincingly extinguished. A passion that insists on surrendering to the yearning of the flesh and, quite possibly, of the heart.
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—3.5 Stars—
This book was a fun, charming, intriguing, and entertaining historical romance read!
This book is set in 1824 and is about Nick and Mariana, an estranged husband and wife that rarely keep in contact after their split over a decade ago. However, when Mariana receives a letter stating that her husband is missing and presumed dead she fleas to Paris to help find him or bring home his body.
Mariana is relieved when she learns that Nick is actually alive. It turns out that Nick is a spy and when his mission got dicey he had to go into hiding. Nick has been trying to get his job back on track, but he’s been missing something, and Mariana might just be the key to pulling off his mission and derailing a huge assassination plot.
Nick teaches Mariana the art of seduction as it becomes her assignment to get close to the guy Nick thinks is pulling the strings of the assassination. As Nick and Mariana work closely together, it is obvious that these two still have that chemistry and spark. The longer these two are together the passion continues to heat up and it isn’t long before they both forget why they ever separated in the first place.
I really liked the beautiful Paris setting. Paris has been on my travel bucket list for years, so I love reading books that take place there. The author did a lovely job describing the details the made the scene settings very easy to picture.
For the most part I enjoyed the characters. I honestly liked Mariana more than Nick. I really wanted to like Nick and by the end of the book he had won me over a bit more than at the start of the book. However, I still found him selfish and irresponsible for abandoning his wife and children, so he could play spy. If I had been Mariana I’m not so sure I could or even want to just drop everything to go looking for my loser ex in Paris to see if he’s alive or not. Then having found out that he is fine and now he wants me to stay and help him even further. I don’t think I could ever forgive and forget so easily. Plus, I felt for such a strong character that Mariana was I don’t think she would have either. I think she would have been more reserved and guarded with Nick and less trusting than she actually was with him.
I really enjoyed the mystery, suspense, adventure, and intrigue of the background storyline assassination plot. It definitely upped the ante on the historical romance and added a dramatic flair that kept me guessing trying to solve the case.
I like that this book does focus on second chances and new beginnings. I strongly believe in those, but I think people need to earn them or at least try to show that they are making an effort to make that change.
I found the pace of the book to be mostly steady with a few slower passages at times. This book is listed at 267 pages and for the most part it is a quick read. However, I felt some of the scenes dragged out a bit and could have easily been whittled down or cut.
Unfortunately, I was shocked to find quite a few spelling errors throughout the book – one even in the blurb. I know errors happen, but it is somewhat distracting from such an entertaining story.
All in all, there were just a few hang-ups for me, but overall, I enjoyed reading this book and would recommend this book to anyone interested in a fun, charming, intriguing, entertaining, historical romance with an added mystery and suspense bonus!
**Disclaimer: I received a complimentary copy of this book and have voluntarily provided an honest, and unbiased review in accordance with FTC regulations.**
Good, not great
This book was hard to get into. The plot switched from present time to prior experiences.
For such a short story, it had so much detail involved for so little action. I stopped reading halfway through the story as I became bored. I read another book. Then returned to finish the rest of the story. Too much detail in things that have a small part of the story do not interest me. Over all it was entertaining, the concept was original.
I normally sail through a book. This one took a while to catch my interest. Characters were well developed but it seemed to drag on in parts.
Not a page turner. Ok best. Still can’t bring myself to finish.