Murgatroyd (Troy) Sacheverell, fifth Earl of Ravenhurst, is doing his best to put the nightmarish months of his capture and subsequent torture behind him. He's spoken to no one of his captivity and the fact that he was treated as a slave by two women who beat him and even branded him. He escaped and it's time to put that part of his life to rest.

And then he sees the younger of the two women who had treated him as a dog posing in polite society. Lillian -- hence the lily brand -- is even making the moves to marry his cousin, something that he cannot allow to happen.

Lillian finally has escaped from her stepmother and her evil household, where men were kept chained as animals and forced to be subservient. She's remaking her life as a respectable woman with her aunt and uncle, who know nothing of what was happening at her former home. Then the world stops when one of the men who was abused at her stepmother's household appears. Horror of horrors, he's the cousin of the man who's been courting her.

Troy immediately tells his cousin that he cannot marry that "hussy" -- but keeps the details of his knowledge of Lillian to himself. That would require telling his cousin, Alex, about his own humiliation, and he cannot bring himself to even think of it, much less speak. When Alex refuses to stop the courtship, Troy goes to Lillian. In the face of her stoic countenance, he kisses her and rips her bodice, attempting to make her feel some of the humiliation that he felt.

In a terrible turnaround, Troy marries Lillian to protect his cousin. Both are proud and refuse to reveal their feelings -- Lillian will not attempt to make him see that she was a victim of her stepmother, too.

Whew! This is certainly an interesting book. It begins with scenes that you'd expect to find in pure erotica-type books, with the stepmother eating food off of her slaves' bodies, walking them on leashes, etc. Yet, after the stepmother is removed from the scene, it becomes more of a "normal" historical romance as Lillian and Troy try to find the way to their private thoughts and hearts through a huge misunderstanding. Of course, this is a much more dramatic "misunderstanding" than in most of the romances I've read. It takes a pretty good dose of love and lust to get past what Troy went through at (supposedly) Lillian's hands.

Ms. Schwab handles this challenge very well and in a believable manner. Troy hangs on to his very justified anger (fury would be a better description) for a very appropriate length of time. I highly recommend this book that pushes the edges of the historical romance genre.