Lord Vere is handsome, strapping, and sweet. The only problem? He is an idiot. Or is he a secret agent of the Crown, solving crimes and bringing evildoers to justice, all the while playing the part of the dimwit to facilitate his investigative work?

Elissande Edgerton is desperate to break free of her uncle's malevolent control, so desperate she is willing to marry any man, even an idiot like Lord Vere, who believes that diamonds grow in oysters and can't sit down to a meal without spilling sauces all over himself.

Their dramatic wedding night, however, quite changes Elissande's mind. She begins to suspect that Vere is not who he appears to be. Can she make this interesting and complicated man drop his mask—and bare his heart—before dark secrets of the past tear them apart and destroy their marriage?

By turns laugh-out-loud funny and deeply poignant, packed with both danger and simmering sexual tension, this RITA award winner for Best Historical Romance of 2011 is a treat not to be missed.