Reese's Bride, January 2010
Bride Trilogy #2
by Kat Martin
MIRA
Featuring: Reese Dewar; Elizabeth Clemmens
400 pages ISBN: 0778327442 EAN: 9780778327448 Mass Market Paperback
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"Eloquently depicts the ramifications bad decisions can have on everyone involved."
Reviewed by Suan Wilson
Posted December 15, 2009
Romance Historical
Fear surrounds Lady Elizabeth Aldridge as she grapples with
a way to escape her late husband's relatives. They are
prepared to go to any lengths to inherit, including killing
her son. As weakness and lethargy envelope Elizabeth, it
makes her objections to her brother-in-law Mason
ineffectual. She knows he is poisoning her. Her only hope
comes with the arrival of her former love at a neighboring
estate. Wounded in the war, Major Reese Dewar returns to his estate
to begin a new career as a gentleman farmer. He thinks he's
prepared to meet the woman who betrayed him and broke his
heart. Before he left, Elizabeth accepted his marriage
proposal. Then he heard she married a wealthy earl. His
passionate love for her changes to consuming hatred. When
she shows up with her son seeking sanctuary, Reese can't
turn away the obviously ill Elizabeth. Elizabeth convinces him of her plight, and Reese promises
to help her. He will guard his heart for he does not trust
Elizabeth, until there are attempts on her life. His
solution to her problems will cause both of them pain, and
if the secrets Elizabeth keeps are exposed, it will
devastate their fragile truce. REESE'S BRIDE, the second in the trilogy about the devilish
Dewar brothers, captivates readers with characters who leap
to life. Ms. Martin shows the ramifications of Elizabeth
and Reese's bad decisions and the effects it has on
everyone involved. Her talented storytelling makes the tale
of murder and lost love a keeper.
SUMMARY
Years before, love-struck Reese departed his home at
Briarwood with a promise from raven-haired Elizabeth
Clemmens: that she would make a life with him upon his
return. But mere months later, she married the Earl of
Alderidge, attaining wealth and status Reese could never
match. Memories of that betrayal make his homecoming far
more bitter than sweet. Elizabeth knows when she appears on Reese's doorstep dressed
in widow's garb that she is twisting the knife. But fear for
her young son's safety has overcome guilt and shame: she
begs Reese for protection against the forces that would see
the boy Earl dead to posses his fortune. The former overs
forge an uneasy alliance, but Elizabeth still harbors some
deep secrets -- and Reese know that protecting her mean
placing himself in danger... of losing his heart all over
again.
ExcerptExcerpt #1 Reese's Bride, by Kat Martin
TEASER: Their eyes locked, hers troubled, filled with some
emotion he could not read. His own gaze held the
bitterness and anger he made no effort to hide. He loathed
her for what she had done, hated her with every ounce of
his being.
CHAPTER ONE England September, 1855
The crisp black taffeta skirt of her mourning gown
rustled as the woman walked out of the dress shop a few
doors in front of him. Reese Dewar froze where he stood, the silver-headed
cane in his hand forgotten, along with the ache in his
leg. Rage took its place, dense and heavy, hot and
seething. Sooner or later, he had known he would see her. He
had told himself it wouldn’t matter, that seeing her again
wouldn’t affect him. She meant nothing to him, not
anymore, not for nearly eight years. But as she stepped off the wooden walkway, a ray of
autumn sunlight gleamed against the jet black curls on her
shoulders and anger boiled up inside him, fury unlike he
had known in years. He watched her continue toward her sleek black four-
horse carriage, the crossed-saber Aldridge crest glinting
in gold on the side. She paused for a moment as one of the
footmen hurried to open the door and he realized she wasn't
alone. A small, dark-haired boy, nearly hidden in the
voluminous folds of her skirt, hurried along beside her.
She urged him up the iron steps and the child disappeared
inside the elegant coach. Instead of climbing the stairs herself, the woman
turned and looked at him over her shoulder, her gray eyes
finding him with unerring accuracy, as if she could feel
his cold stare stabbing into the back of her neck. She
gasped when she realized who it was, though she must have
known, in a village as small as Swansdowne, one day their
paths would cross. Surely she had heard the gossip, heard of his return
to Briarwood, the estate he had inherited from his maternal
grandfather. The estate he had meant to share with her. Their eyes locked, hers troubled, filled with some
emotion he could not read. His own gaze held the
bitterness and anger he made no effort to hide. He loathed
her for what she had done, hated her with every ounce of
his being. It shocked him. He had thought those feelings long past. For most of
the last eight years, he had been away from England, a
major in the British cavalry. He had fought in foreign
wars, commanded men, sent some of them to their deaths. He
had been wounded and nearly died himself. He was home now, his injured leg making him no longer
fit to serve. That and the vow he had made to his dying
father. One day he would come back to Briarwood, he had
been forced to concede. He would make the estate his home
as he had once intended. Reese would rather have stayed in the army. He
didn't belong in the country. He wasn't sure where he
belonged anymore and he loathed his feelings of uncertainty
nearly as much as he loathed Elizabeth. She swallowed, seemed to sway a little on her feet as
she turned away, climbed the steps and settled herself
inside the carriage. She hadn’t changed. With her raven
hair, fine pale features, and petite, voluptuous figure,
Elizabeth Clemens Holloway, Countess of Aldridge, was as
beautiful at six-and-twenty as she had been at eighteen. As she had been when she had declared her love and
accepted his proposal of marriage. His gaze followed the coach as it rolled off toward
Aldridge Park, the palatial estate that had belonged to her
late husband, Edmund Holloway, Earl of Aldridge. Aldridge
had died last year at the age of thirty three, leaving his
wife a widow, leaving her with his son. Reese spat into the dirt at his feet. Just the
thought of Aldridge in Elizabeth's bed made him sick to his
stomach. Five years his senior, Edmund was already an earl
when he had competed with Reese for Elizabeth's
affections. She had been amused by his attentions, a
handsome sophisticated aristocrat, but she had been in love
with Reese. Or so she had said. The carriage disappeared round a bend in the road and
Reese's racing pulse began to slow. He was amazed at the
enmity he still felt toward her. He was a man who had
taught himself control and that control rarely abandoned
him. He would not allow it to happen again. Leaning heavily on his cane, the ache in his leg
beginning to reach through the fury that had momentarily
consumed him, he made his way to his own conveyance and
slowly climbed aboard. Aldridge's widow and her son had no
place in his life. Elizabeth was dead to him and had been
for nearly eight years. As dead as her husband, the man she had betrayed
Reese to marry. And he would never forgive her.
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