The backdrop: Meet the Bedwyns --- six brothers and sisters --- men and women of passion and privilege, daring and sensibility... Enter their dazzling world of high society and breathtaking seduction... where each will seek love, fight temptation, and court scandal... and where Wulfric's story finally comes to life. Eldest son, head of the Bedwyn family, he is cool, arrogant, mysterious, and...
Slightly Danagerous
All of London is abuzz over the imminent arrival of Wulfric Bedwyn, the cold-as-ice Duke of Bewcastle, at the most glittering social event of the season. But on this dazzling afternoon, only one woman could capture his attention---and she was the only female in the room who wasn't even trying. Christine Derrick is intrigued by the handsome duke... all the more so when he invites her to become his mistress. What red-blooded woman wouldn't enjoy a tumble in the bedsheets with a consummate lover---with no questions asked. An independent beauty, Christine confounds Wulfric at every turn. Yet even as he vows to seduce her, something strange and wonderful is happening. Now for a man who thought he'd never lose his heart, nothing less than love will do...
Rating: ***** (Outstanding)
Detailed Review:
Wulfric Bedwyn, the Duke of Bewcastle, is as different from Christine Derrick, a 29-year old school teacher and a widow, as chalk and cheese. He's the wealthiest, loftiest, and haughtiest peer who has ice water flowing in his veins, while she's the humblest and most cheerful person to be found who does not mind laughing at herself.
Cut to Schofield Park in Gloucestershire:
A betrothal party which Wulfric accepts out of sheer boredom and Christine is made to accept to even out the numbers. A secret wager is proposed; the winner will be the young lady who can engage the Duke of Bewcastle for an hour. Someone bids of Christine. So she draws the attention of the duke. Only she needn't have tried. The duke already has his eyes (and his "hateful" quizzing glass) on the very improper Mrs. Derrick. She's someone who should be tolerated and avoided at all costs. However, what caught them unaware was the sexual attraction towards each other.
Wulfric propositions Christine to be his mistress. The proposal is rebuffed. Apologies are made and accepted. However, a passionate coupling during a ball makes them realise that their feelings may be deeper than they thought.
When Wulfric proposes a marriage, Christine rejects him again. Who would say yes to the following words? "I find myself unable to stop thinking about you. I have asked myself why I offered to make you my mistress rather than my wife and can find no satisfactory answer. There is no law to state that my position demands I marry a virgin or a lady who has not been previously married. There is no law that states that I must marry my social equal. And if your childless state after a marriage of several years denotes an inability to conceive, then that is no prohibitive impediment either. I have three younger brothers to succeed me, and one of them already has a son of his own."
And how could the proud Duke of Bewcastle forget these humiliating words of rejection? "Can you? A husband with a warm personality and human kindness and a sense of humor? Someone who loves people and children and frolicking and absurdity? Someone who is not obsessed with himself and his own consequence? Someone who is not ice to the very core? Someone with a heart? Someone to be a companion and friend and lover?"
Cut to London:
Wulfric and Christine cannot stop thinking about each other. They meet again in a wedding and Wulfric stars courting Christine in a dignified and ducal way, of course. He is her reluctant knight in shining armor, rescuing her from a persistent suitor and when she's dripping wet and cold after falling accidentally in the Serpentine while retrieving a lady's glove. Wulfric asks Christine to reconsider his proposal and see him as the man he is by accepting an invitation to Lindsey Hall, where his family is gathering and he's inviting her family just for her sake.
Cut to Lindsey Hall:
Wulfric and Christine fall in love. Beautiful dialogues, splendid settings, and soulful love. Added to the picture are amusing ancedotes by Duke's family members, exposure of the real "culprit" behind Christine's unfortunate past, and glance at Wulfric - the man behind the duke.
The book is splendid. It reminded me of "Pride and Prejudice." The verbal clashes, the inner battle, and the passion....Oh yes! The passion behind every deed and action. It's what a love story is about - raising above the petty perceptions based on outer appearance and recognizing, accepting, and loving the real selves. There are only two love scenes in the book, but they are enough. They give warmth to the story and move the story forward, rather than just making the book into a "soft porn," which historical romances are occasionally blamed to be.
- The plot: Fantastic. Not even a single word is out of place.
- Male and female leads: Wholesome. You will fall in love with Wulfric and Christine.
- Supporting characters: Sufficient. They do not hinder the story or deviate the focus from the main characters.
- Hotness quotient: Attention is paid to emotions, not lurid details behind the act.
The best scene of the book: Very hard to decide. In the end, I've written below one of my favorite, hilarious scenes. For the rest, please read the book:
"I am not attracted to you!" she cried.
"Are you not?" He raised one supercilious eyebrow and then his quizzing glass. "You have sexual relations, then, with every dancing partner who invites you to accompany him to a secluded spot?"
Fury blossomed in her. And it focused upon one object.
"That," she said, striding toward him, "is the outside of enough!"
She snatched the quizzing glass out of his nerveless hand, yanked the black ribbon off over his head, and sent the glass flying with one furious flick of her wrist.
They both watched it twirl upward in an impressively high arc, reach its zenith between two trees, and then begin its downward arc---which was never completed. The ribbon caught on a high twig and held there. The glass swung back and forth like a pendulum a mile off the ground---or so it seemed to Christine.
She was the first to speak.
"And this time," she said, "I am not going up for it."
"I am relieved to hear it, ma'am," he said, his voice sounding as frosty as she had ever heard it. "I would hate to have to carry you all the way to the house in another ruined dress."
She turned her head to glare at him.
"I am not attracted to you," she said. "And I am not promiscuous."
"I did not believe you were," he assured her. "That, in fact, was my very point."
"I daresay," she said, looking ruefully up at the quizzing glass, which was now swaying gently in the breeze, "you will raise an eyebrow when we return and an army of gardeners will rush out here to rescue it. You will not be able to raise your quizzing glass, will you? Though I daresay you have an endless supply of them."
"Eight," he said curtly. "I have eight of them---or will have when that particular one is back in my keeping." And he strode away from her.
For a moment Christine thought that she was being abandoned for her sins. But then she realized that he was headed for the old oak tree in puruit of his quizzing glass. He went up the tree as he had come down the slope from the wilderness walk---with ease and elegance. Her heart was in her mouth by the time he was high enough to reach for his glass, but it was too far from the trunk, and he had to sit on a branch and edge his way out toward it.
"Oh, do be careful!" Christine cried, and set both hands over her mouth.
"I always am." He unhooked the ribbon, dropped it and the glass for her to catch, and sat there looking at her. "Always. Except, it would seem, where you are concerned. If I were careful, I would stay here, just where I am, until you had returned safely to Gloucestershire. If I had been careful, I would have avoided you at Schofield Park as I would avoid the plague. Earlier this year I would have shut myself up inside Bedwyn House after Miss Magnus's wedding until I was sure you were at least fifty miles on your journey home. After one aborted plan to marry when I was twenty-four, I gave up all idea of marriage. I have not looked for a bride since then. If I had, she most certainly would not have been you. I would have been very careful to choose altogether more wisely. Indeed, you are the very antithesis of the woman I would have chosen."
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