Book 3 in the series. Like the other 2 books, i'd really give it a 3.5. Unlike the other 2 books, I found I was less than enthralled with the hero. He was overbearing and controlling. However, it was still a decent read and entertaining. ( )

As they say, "third times a charm" and that couldn't be more true than in this case. Although I enjoyed both of Kresley Cole's preceding highlander romances this was by far the best.

In this story the seemingly irredeemable Ethan MacCarrick, meets his match in the daughter of the family he once ruined for revenge. Madeleine van Rowen is one of the best romance heroines I've read in some time. She was spunky, innocent, smart and funny; and a whole lot more fun to read than many heroines I've encountered. Despite having really not liked Ethan's character in the previous novels of this trilogy, he was remarkably likeable in this story. I'm still troubled by the fact that all three brothers' were rather unrepentant killers in their professions but in this book it wasn't quite as stressed as it had been in the past books. The chemistry between the leads was very good and for reasons even I don't get, I felt very much more emotionally invested here than in the other stories. Maybe because they didn't spend as much time disliking each other as they did learning how to love one another.

Of course, there was the "big secret" between them, not so much the MacCarrick's family's curse which was really barely touched upon this time around, but more so how Ethan's past actions so severely affected Maddy's childhood. I do think that although this story would hold up very well if read alone, the first two books give us much more of a feeling for Ethan and allow us to fully appreciate how much he changes for the love of his life.

All in all I'd highly recommend this trilogy as a whole to any lover of highlander romances and those lovers of romances in general! ( )

really impressed wth author; one of my favorites; very strong female characters without being sooo argumentative, which can get very boring; very alpha tortured male. excellent read ( )