Duke of Sin, Elizabeth Hoyt
Grand Central, historical romance, May 2016
Connections: #10 in the Maiden Lane series
One of my very favorite things is when an author redeems a seemingly hopeless villain. Mary Jo Putney did it splendidly in The Rake, and Elizabeth Hoyt does it here with Duke of Sin.
For several books in the Maiden Lane series, Valentine Napier, the Duke of Montgomery, has been lurking and scheming in the background. Val's trade? He specializes in blackmail. Bridget Crumb is more than his housekeeper -- she is there to search the mansion on behalf of a lady that Val is blackmailing. For weeks now, while Val has been banished to the Continent, she's been taking apart every nook and cranny of the duke's private quarters, trying to find out where he's hidden the blackmail materials. The night she decides to try the ornate headboard of his bed, the man himself shocks her by revealing that he hasn't been on the Continent at all, and that he's been watching her search.
Unlike any other employer, Val is intrigued and delighted at the hidden depths of his duplicitous housekeeper. He longs to see the body beneath her dowdy uniform, and especially whatever she's hiding under the hideous mobcap she always wears. Bridget, for her part, is determined to discover Val's secrets without revealing her own. What ensues is a delightfully wicked dance.
In Sweetest Scoundrel, readers discovered that Val at least loved his half-sister, as he went to great lengths to save her from a gang rape instituted by their own father and his dissolute cronies called the Lords of Chaos. Basically, his entire career of blackmail has had the ulterior motive of bringing every last one of them down (though, of course, to him, blackmail is also great fun). Val is such an unrepentant rogue you can't help but like him, even as he says and does the most outrageous things. In Bridget, he finds a reason for living other than keeping score. Bridget, who is herself quite cynical about love and values propriety above it, learns that powerful passions and propriety can't mix for long -- at least not without love. Val and Bridget are the perfect foils for each other as they learn about love from the person they least expect.
There's a subplot in which Val blackmails the king, and the king's agent, the Duke of Kyle, is sent in as a fixer that is an obvious segue to the next book, Duke of Pleasure. The excerpt indicates that the Ghost of St. Giles will be back again, and though I confess I'm a little tired of this shifting persona, I am still intrigued at the twist presented.
Review © 2016 by Riley's Reviews