Finding love and wanting to get married left Erica Wakefield in a situation that she had to find a way out of. She was already married, even if it was only suppose to last an hour it had somehow lasted nearly two years even though no one knew of it. Running into her husband at a dinner that she was attending with her father and the man she was hoping to marry she discovered his name, Rafael de la Torres and that he was nothing like what she thought he was. After they finally had a talk, she was shocked to learn that he had no intention of letting her out of the marriage, annulment was not and option and he refused to give her a divorce without a fight that would put her impulsive act of defiance front and center for her father to see.

This is an older book (a re-release of a 1976 book) so that or the fact that this is an early book for Janet Dailey, either may have something to do with the awkwardness that I felt with this one. The use of a thesaurus was obvious, and at times annoying (I don’t like the use of a $5 word if a smaller one works just as good and in some cases, better). This story is written from just the Erica’s point of view, which I guess is ok, that left some of Rafael’s thoughts and feelings as - well not a surprise, it was all pretty predictable - but surprising in his intensity. I did like Rafael, but not getting his side of the story was disappointing to me. ( )