I have always taken pride in my bad reputation. Polite society viewed me as depraved and utterly dissolute, for I was a disciple of passion. Pleasure was my hallmark, women my pastime. That is, before the incomparable Lady Charlotte Quinton disrupted my life--again.

Due to a scandal of her own making, she had been banished from home for five years. Apparently she decided that a life of boring respectability was the key to her happiness. We might have continued down our divergent paths if not for a vicious attack on our families.

Tracking a dangerous criminal occupied my time, but the tart-tongued spinster Lady Charlotte occupied my mind--and my desires. Certainly no other woman in London was immune to my charms. Yet the more Charlotte spurned me, the more I vowed to have her. After all, I can resist anything but temptation...

--The Memoirs of A Rake by Brand Villiers, fifth Earl of Faversham