What a charmer this is! Celeste, the gardener’s daughter, has wanted only one thing from the time she was little: to marry the second son of one of England’s wealthiest families, Ellery Throckmorton. Fresh from Paris and all grown up, with a new, sophisticated French va-voom, Celeste discovers Ellery is betrothed to a seemingly shallow lady. Surely it won’t take much for her to steal his affections away? After all, he’s not married. Yet.
In marches older brother Garrick, who definitely disapproves of her plans. In a Sabrina-like tale, Garrick deliberately sets out to woo her affections away from Ellery, and so ‘deal’ with her. Secretly involved in a huge spy network for England, Garrick is embattled on all sides, what with Ellery falling in love with Celeste, the spy network going berserk with traitors and murderers, a crazy house party with lords and ladies all over the place to celebrate Ellery’s betrothal, Ellery’s fiancée discovering a backbone and a determination to keep her man no matter what, children going missing, and – dash it all – an unexplainable and amazing attraction to the woman he plans to rocket straight back to Paris once he’s successfully prised her away from her brother.
The poor man almost breaks under the pressure. And Celeste, hitherto always blindly in love with Ellery, discovers there’s more to the older, darker, intense, formerly boring but now surprisingly passionate Throckmorton than she ever imagined. Think a British Humphrey Bogart, or (if you like), Harrison Ford, and you have Throckmorton. Think Audrey Hepburn and you have Celeste. The scene where Garrick storms around and yells at his mother that I had my hand up her skirt, Mother. All the way. – is priceless. His mother, having given up all hope a woman will shake her beloved, too serious son up, starts dreaming he’s found the right woman at last. And Ellery – dear, drunken, good-for-nothing, second son Ellery, proves he has The Right Stuff after all. Gorgeous fun.