Oh, yum. Meet Patrick, Alex’s twin from Potent Pleasures. If that’s not enough to send you into a reading fervour, well girls, you’re not alive… Patrick is panting after Sophie York, Alex’s wife’s best friend. Unfortunately she’s betrothed to marry Patrick’s mate, Braddon. Dear, bumbling Braddon, who’s busy lusting after someone else but promised to elope with Sophie. What a tangled web. In a convoluted turn, Braddon somehow persuades Patrick to climb into Sophie’s bedroom and – er – retrieve her for the elopement. Deliciously, everything goes wrong. Patrick climbs into Sophie’s room and right on into Sophie’s bed. Ooh. Trouble is, when they’re lying there naked and sated, Sophie’s father discovers them. Whoops. So noble Patrick and sweet Sophie, with nothing resolved and Braddon still lurching after someone incredibly unsuitable, marry in haste. Then the fun, the tragedy and the drama starts (get the tissues ready!). Like his twin Alex, Patrick is an idiot when it comes to understanding his heart and his wife. But you can’t help cheering him on when he reflects, after a beautiful time making love to Sophie:
Patrick’s eyes were heavy lidded. He was trying to figure out why having sex with his wife would make him feel almost as if he would cry. It must be something about the ritual of marriage, he finally decided. Knowing that you’re going to be with one woman the rest of your life, and never with another. There must be something about it that tipped sex from good to wonderful…