The Rake's Reward

the long version

Even a rake can lose his heart… Lady Cecily Randall was no green girl to be seduced by a handsome face. The eminently dutiful daughter of the Duke of Marlow, she’d been groomed to make a suitable match. So when the rather humorless Marquess of Edgewater proposed, she accepted. She tried not to think about love and happily-ever-after…and she certainly forced from her mind all thoughts of the handsome stranger she’d encountered on one of her forbidden solitary rides in the park. Alexander Darcy might be a viscount, but he was also a womanizing scoundrel…just the sort of man to upset the most practical of plans. It wasn’t easy being a rake—late nights, ruinous gambling and carousing, demanding paramours. But Alexander Darcy had managed to endure. Of late, however, even those simple pleasures had begun to pall. It was far more intriguing to investigate a lady conspirator. The Home Office was convinced Lady Cecily Randall was not all she seemed, and investigating her would be the most pleasant assignment Alex ever had. For even if he believed the wide-eyed beauty was innocent, he might just have to seduce her to prove it.