From Publishers Weekly
The wealthy and seemingly heartless Ian Blackheath is also Pendragon, the defender of American colonists and the scourge of Tories. He has sworn never to marry after seeing his mother fatally used by his father as a son-producing machine. In 1772, When Ian's estranged sister dies, leaving him her bratty eight-year-old daughter, Lucy ("I don't like other girls. They don't do what I tell them to"), Ian plans to ship the child off to boarding school. He brings her to British dressmaker Emily d'Autrecourt for some clothing, and she steals a wooden doll. But this doll contains a secret message for the Crown, for whom Emily is spying in exchange for a fresh start in the colonies. To get the doll back, Emily becomes Lucy's governess, and she and Ian find themselves strongly attracted to each other. Cates ( Crown of Flame ) compensates for a long set-up--which includes Emily's loss of her husband and young daughter--with endearing characters. Smart-mouthed Lucy is a refreshing contrast to the angelic children often found in romance novels, and Ian and Emily are realistically vulnerable. But an unbelievable ending mars this otherwise original story.
Copyright 1994 Reed Business Information, Inc.
Book Description
He looked like the devil's own angel...incorrigible, outrageous, and promising paradise with one bold kiss.... By day Ian Blackheath was the most sensual, immoral rogue in colonial Virginia. By night he was secretly Pendragon, the ruthless leader of the patriot cause. He certainly had no time for a ward. The lovely Emily Rose d'Autrecourt knew only the rogue Blackheath, and was outraged at his insensitivity toward Lucy, the curly-headed orphan who had been dumped at his mansion's door. But Emily was seized with fear when little Lucy stole a doll from her millinery shop that contained evidence of her dark and secret role as a British spy.
Accepting Ian's offer to become Lucy's governess was dangerous, yet it was the only way she could recover the doll without arousing suspicion. She never dreamed how perilous her new position would be until she discovered the dizzying pleasure of being in Ian's arms, stripping away his image of an arrogant, selfish rakehell and recklessly revealing her own desperate needs. Suddenly, in a land racing toward revolution, this man and woman with so much to lose would willingly risk all they had for love....
