Wallflower Series - Book 1
Author: Lisa Kleypas
Annabelle Peyton getting desperate. Her father's death has left her family in dire straits. What little money they have goes mainly toward putting her younger brother to school and keeping her looking as fashionable as possible on their meager budget in hopes that she will catch a wealthy husband. Even though she is beautiful and gently bred, she has reached the age of 25 and this will be her last season, her last chance to save her family before she's forced to do something ruinnous, like accepting the protection of one of the many "gentlemen" who have begun to circle like vultures. She knows there is no coming back from that and so she'll do whatever she has to do to catch a husband, even if it means going along with two outrageous Americans and a mousy red-head who stutters in a scheme crazy enough to work. They're tired of being wallflowers and all in need of husbands for various reasons, so why not pool their resources and join forces to get them each a husband one at a time. After all, what man could stand against the combined cunning and determination of four marriage minded women? If only that dreadful cit, Simon Hunt would stop asking her to dance and making inappropriate propositions that remind her all too well of that one time, years ago, when he kissed her in a darkened amphitheater. Yes, he's got obscene amounts of money, but he's not of her class and she knows he's not the marrying kind. The Wallflowers have set their sights on a rich viscount who seems very sweet and kind. They've got their strategy all mapped out and they'll have that gentleman caught in a compromising position before before he knows what hit him.
Simon Hunt was born the son of a butcher, but you couldn't tell it by his fine clothes, bulging bank account and thriving businesses. He's got more money and connections than some aristocrats can boast and he's gotten there through ambition, hard work, and determination. What Simon Hunt wants, he gets. He's been fascinated with Annabelle Peyton from the first moment he saw her. He's never been able to forget the time he went to an amphitheater with Annabelle and her brother. The lights went down for a few minutes and there, in the dark, he gave in to the urge to kiss her. He expected to be pushed away and slapped, but instead she gave in and kissed him back. He's spent the last two years since that kiss trying to get her alone. He knows her family's financial situation and when she finally gives up on marriage she'll need a protector. Simon plans to be that man, no matter how many other gentlemen he's got to take down to do it. When rumors first surface that she's already taken a protector, an unsavory man who apparently gives her just enough to get by on, Simon is sure it's all a lie, but during a house party in the country, there seems to be an odd sort of tension between Annabelle and the man purported to be her protector. Could it be true? When Annabelle is poisoned by an adder bite, Simon diagnoses and treats her before the doctor even gets there. He realizes after the ordeal that he might just love her and that he wants her to be his in every way, but can he convince her to marry a man who's not of her class? Especially when a rich viscount seems ready to offer for her at any moment?
I really like Simon, though in the beginning it irked me that he used not being a gentleman as a rationalization for taking advantage of her bad situation to make a mistress out of her, but looking down on the aristocrats for doing the same thing. He has been fantasizing about this girl for 2 years and he never thought to offer her marriage? Really? Annabelle wasn't much better in her resistance to Simon. She let her prejudice of the lower classes color her judgment when it came to Simon. If she'd have accepted his offers to dance she might have gotten to know him. I mean, the guy is mega rich, and interested in her. If she'd gotten over herself she could have eventually talked him around to thinking marriage. She never even thought to give it a chance. The whole attitude the guys in this book had with regards to Annabelle's situation was disgusting. They're all like "Why marry the poor girl when I can wait until she's desperate enough to become my whore? " I know, different times and all that, but it's still sick as far as I'm concerned. I really liked the rest of the Wallflowers and am looking forward to their books.
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