MY PLEASURE

Author: Connie Brockway ISBN: 0743463234 10/2004 HISTORICAL Publisher: POCKET BOOKS
Time Period: Regency - 1805

By day, celebrated beauty Helena Nash works as a proper companion to one of London's most disagreeable ladies. By night she acts as an illicit messenger between two separated lovers. Masked and disguised, she falls into the path of a shadowy stalker. Fearing for her safety but unwilling to halt her nocturnal forays, Helena seeks out Ramsey Munro -- one of three men who pledged years earlier to serve her family in times of need. Handsome and elusive, the notorious Scotsman is London's most accomplished swordsman and represents everything Helena wants but can't have -- freedom, adventure, and passion. Now she demands that he teach her his formidable skills, a commission that may prove cool, collected Helena's undoing. For Ramsey has seen through her disguise...and soon vows to teach her both the way of the sword and the deliciously wicked pleasures of the flesh.

RRAH's THOUGHTS AND PONDERINGS:

So far, so good, for Connie Brockway's Rose Hunter's Trilogy. The second installment, MY PLEASURE, is indeed my pleasure to read. Normally a Brockway book is!

Lots of sexual tension, mystery, and a bit of humor lace this tale of unsurety and deception. The hero, Ramsey, is not exactly brooding but he does manage to pull at your heartstrings with his past and his insecurity. Helena, the heroine, is rather stoic and I must say most certainly keeps her promises to friends regardless of how the secret muddles her life. Together the couple becomes a pair I most heartily root for! Throw in a deranged stalker and an unscrupulous force from the past and you have yourself quite a story.

I have one small gripe with this one. It's not even a gripe, but more of a "Oh, come on, but I like this book despite this" type of thing. Helena Nash is very naive to think Ramsey Munro, who has pledged his service for life to her family and has been watching her for years, wouldn't recognize her in a half mask even with her hair stuffed under a cap! She may not have been aware of his scrutiny for so long, but she does find out, and yet still thinks he cannot tell who she is by her flimsy disguise. Even after some meetings in her proper clothes and some heated kisses. It reminds me of the stories where the women are pretending to be boys, but someone, normally the hero, sees through the charade.

This is a wonderful, sexy, and touching follow up to MY SEDUCTION. I truly can't wait for the end of the trilogy, MY SURRENDER. The heroine promises to be the most complex and interesting of the Nash sisters, and the hero just what she needs.

Shannon Johnson