The bickering couple are forced to join forces to either uncover (or bury) the mystery of a little homeless boy who looks an awful lot like the brother-in-law, and naturally, Charlotte's 'totes honorable' dead husband Phillip gets pulled into the turmoil. So, he sets forth to uncover some dastardly secrets, while she begs him to keep whatever dastardly secrets her family totally doesn't have (because Charlotte's deep in denial) a secret. When Nathaniel gets dragged into a legal matter pertaining to Charlotte's stuffy brother-in-law, he realizes that he's about to stumble into a house of cards that could destroy Charlotte's precious reputation. However, despite Nathaniel's slight obsession with his 'mystery woman,' he's still drawn to Charlotte. He has no idea that Charlotte is the woman he spent a night of passion with AT AN ORGY a month ago, and even though Charlotte knows, she's keeping her lips sealed. Of course, this all changes when Nathaniel nearly seduces Charlotte after she shows up at his bachelor's lodgings to gain his help with one of her campaigns. I can't give you much reason for their distaste for each other aside from the fact that they both frequently refer to their fascinating past of turning every conversation into an argument. Women's rights reformer Charlotte Mardenford and courtroom advocate Nathaniel Knightridge have never gotten along very well. I use the word 'horrible' to mean awful, immoral and irresponsible x 1 billion. And by 'horrible,' I don't mean ill-advised.

Perhaps it was the way the main characters made a horrible decision at the very end of the story in order to guarantee their own happiness.

Maybe it was the deus ex machina that practically thrust me into insulin shock. So what made me hack off 1.5 stars at the very end of my journey through Lady of Sin? It's hard to narrow it down. The prose was good, the dialogue was some of the best I've read in an HR in quite some time, and the characters were both flawed and sympathetic. This book was going so well until I reached the end. I'm feeling generous today, so I'll round up my actual 3.5 rating in the star rating.

Lady of Sin by Madeline Hunter