The supposedly reliable butler is repeatedly unable to bar her uncle from the premises. Catherine is left to face her uncle alone several times without Crispin putting an actual plan into place to protect her in case he is away from home. However, the love story stops progressing and the plot stagnates in the middle of the story. The couple starts to form a friendship based on Crispin’s kindness and it seems that the rest of the story will involve a series of entertaining misadventures as they fall in love. ***the rest of the review contains spoilers*** The story starts promisingly (but improbably, since as a peer Crispin could probably have arranged another solution) with a kiss and a forced marriage between Crispin and Catherine, orchestrated by her abusive uncle. In fact, it was torture through the second half. I have read many other books in the Jonquil and Kielder series and I expected to like this one based on other reviews but I really did not. You can visit her at Others in the series are infinitely better Eden is an award-winning author of short stories and was a Whitney Award Finalist for her novel Seeking Persephone (2008). Fascinated by the Regency era in English history, Eden became a regular in the Regency section of the reference department at her local library, painstakingly researching this extraordinary chapter in history. Eden read her first Jane Austen novel in elementary school and has been an Austen addict ever since. But their hopes are dashed when forces conspire to split asunder what fate has granted, and as a battle of wits escalates into a life-threatening confrontation, will it be possible for Crispin and Catherine to Live happily ever after? Their unfolding relationship reveals encouraging surprises for both of them, and privately, each of them wonders if theirs may become a true marriage of the heart.

Trapped between an unwanted marriage and a hasty annulment, which would leave his reputation tainted and Catherine’s utterly ruined, Crispin begins guiding his wife’s transformation from a socially petrified country girl to a lady of society. The dismayed young lord has no choice but to marry Miss Catherine Thorndale, who lacks both money and refinement and assumes all men are as vicious as her guardian uncle.

But he couldn’t be more mistaken - the maid is not only a lady of birth, she’s the niece of a very large, exceptionally angry gentleman, who claims Crispin has compromised his niece beyond redemption. When Crispin, Lord Cavratt, thoroughly and scandalously kisses a serving woman in the garden of a country inn, he assumes the encounter will be of no consequence.

The kiss of a stranger sarah eden