a good book, though I felt that it could have developed in many ways where instead it just went in a straight line plot wise. The fathers character could have been developed more to where you either really ended up hating him or where he redeemed himself, but left the way that it was you just ended up not caring about him. With the sisters as well they had a very small part and while you know that it's not their story it would be nice to know how they ended up. A nice read though with a pleasant ending. PLOT SUMMARY: Marguerite - hitherto referred to M b/c Marguerite is too fucking long - is a nurse that only tends to dying patients. Lo and behold one of her patients doesn't die but instead recovers UNTIL a seer comes to visit and foretells the patient's death by week's end. Angry with the seer for upsetting her patient, she follows the seer out, grabbing her by the arm to slow her retreat; the physical contact causes the seer to blurt out that M too will die soon, sometime after Christmas which is shortly. M dismisses this until the patient does die at which point she ventures into St. Giles to confront the seer. The seer elaborates that she will meet her sisters, passionately marry some handsome man and then promptly die. Armed with this additional information, M exits the bldg to find a small man racing past, in pursuit by a larger, handsomer man: the story's hero Ash Courtland (who's name is luckily short enough to require no abbreviation.) Ash beats the shit out of the little man, and M breaks up the fight only to learn that little man just beat the shit out of a women (which is why he was under violent pursuit.) Ash threatens her than kisses her then gropes her boobies (a little rapey right?) Maybe because of this (?), M decides if she's going to die, she should take a lover. So she goes to the house of some viscount where she had previously been employed as a nurse and hit on by the viscount himself to become a mistress; she says she will become his mistress if he'll take her to Spain for the next 3-months. He agrees and they plan to leave the following week. Meanwhile a letter arrives from M's father (whom she's never met and whose only interaction with previously was to take her mother away several weekends a year for trysts and pay for boarding school once her mom passed away). He's requested she come to meet her other two sisters, with the intention of marrying each of them to titled men so that the father - who is essentially a low-class Cit - can move up in the world. As it would happen, the father is the business partner of Ash, so the intent to give his fortunes away to his daughters' husbands in exchange for entrance to the Ton is denying Ash what Ash believes to be his inheritance. So Ash decides to kidnap and forcibly marry one of the daughters, which by chance ends up being M after she arrives at her father's, only to learn his intentions (and not wanting to marry to avoid her death sentence.) So M is gagged, thrown in a carriage, and hoofed off to Scotland, only discovering at their first stop that her kidnapper is the grouper from St. Giles. Blah blah blah, smoldering passions, mixed messages, thwarted escape attempts, ultimately culminating in sex the night before reaching Scotland where Ash realizes she's a virgin and not an experienced kept women, as he presumed (having learned of her plans to go to Spain with her protector). Ash leaves bed early the next am and returns with a priest; they're wed in their room. Blissful honeymoon ensues. But returning to London, Ash becomes douchey and effectively ignores her. Given his lack of attention, she's willing to leave with her father when he realizes he's been duped, in hopes of annulling the marriage. Ash comes to fetch her, realizing he loves her. She also realizes that she loves him and does want to die, and therefore leaves early the next am to see the seer for additional details on her death in hopes of avoiding it. The details are: rain, thunder, screaming horses, carriage too fast, mud. A mishap after immediately leaving the seer's - where M is almost trampled by horses - leads M to believe that she's thwarted her doom. Ash - so distraught by M's near death - sends M away to the country where he believes she'll be safer. They fight, their love seemingly dies, she leaves, he stays... only to race after her by lone horse several hours later. Meanwhile a thunderstorm has worked up and the carriage driver mistakes Ash for a highwayman; in trying to flee him, the carriage crashes and M "dies." I was so annoyed with the book at this point I was almost like: "yes!" But than angel-M is moved by Ash's sobs over her lifeless body and returns. THE END. In the epilogue, the next Christmas that she wasn't supposed to live past, her gift to him is: she's pregnant. Gag.
Do You like book Wicked Nights With A Lover (2010)?
a quick read; interesting plot, wished it was flushed out a bit more, seemed rushed...
—Caitlin
All three girls grow up to find love.
—kay
started out well; crashed at the end.
—yurishapiro
