Trust in Summer Madness by Carole Mortimer (HP 669)

Reviewed by Janet85 on July 31st, 2008, 7:55pm

by Carole Mortimer

Format: Print Books

Series: Harlequin Presents

Back Cover:

This man should have been her husband

Jarrett King had walked out on Sian three years before, breaking their engagement and leaving her devastated. Now he was back, expecting her to come to him.

He had a wife. He was dating Sian's sister. He claimed to be in love with Sian. What sort of man was he?

And what sort of woman was she, she wondered, that a week before her marriage to another man she could still feel such a passion for Jarrett?

Spoiler Warning: All my reviews contain spoilers to some degree  

Favourite Scene:

Jarrett stood up, at once seeming predatory, and Sian took a wary step backwards. His mouth twisted derisively. ‘I never needed to use force on you, Sian,’ he drawled mockingly.
‘You would now,’ she snapped.
‘If I were interested,’ he watched with satisfaction as she paled, ‘and I am,’ he added softly. ‘I telephoned you earlier tonight, as soon as I got to town, but you weren’t at home,’ he told her huskily, suddenly very near, the heat of his body, the seduction of his aftershave, reaching out to her.
Sian refused to look at him. ‘Why on earth would you telephone me?’ she asked jerkily.
Suddenly he was more than just close, he was dangerously so, the lean length of his body curving into the back of her as his arms came about her waist and pulled her into him. ‘Guess,’ he murmured throatily against her earlobe.  

My Review:

The H/h were engaged three years ago until the heroine caught the hero kissing his ex-lover (or current lover? she thought so) at his stag party.  It was an off-in-private, cosy little corner, his shirt is unbuttoned halfway to his waist kind of kiss.  Naturally she jumped to conclusions.  Unnaturally, the hero refused to explain himself and wanted the heroine to trust him implicity.  He left the country with the ex-lover and was actually surprised three years later to learn everyone in town had no faith in his fidelity either, everyone assumed he'd ditched her for the ex.  Hero was a dummy not to explain. 

Hero was hypocritical to go off for three years, always planning to eventually come back to her and claim her as his bride once she "matured enough to trust him".  (slap to the hero)  While all those years, he had multiple lovers himself, pretending they were all her, and then he came home and demanded to know whether she'd let her NEW fiance make love to her, he was jealous and possessive and hypocritical. 

Nice little moment of intimacy, the first time Jarrett sees Sian again, he clasps her wrist as she walks by, stopping her and telling her they need to talk.  He warns her he isn't going to stand by and let her marry another man.  When Jarrett sees her new fiance kissing her, he reacts with a glacial jealousy (which was nice) and goes off and kisses her sister (not so nice, but he did warn the heroine he'd seduce/date her sister until she came back to him).  It's sweet that he goes ahead and starts building the house they'd dreamed of building three years ago (for their future family) while he still has yet to win her away from her fiance. 

No fidelity during the three year separation, which I didn't like because the issue that drove them apart was her suspecting he couldn't do without variety: he kissed another woman at his stag party years ago.  It would have been more meaningful for him to have not slept with other women, he told her that for the entire three years he always intended to come back for her, but got kept busy with business.  (not busy enough to keep him from a social life apparently)   Carole Mortimer is one of my "safe authors" who I could always count on for a fidelity read, so I was disappointed here, I thought I could expect fidelity, especially when I thoroughly skimmed and read a passage where the hero was telling the heroine there'd been "no one else" (which he later said he meant "no one but women that I used and pretended were you"... ICK!).     

My Rating: 2.5/5 stars, I'm totally punishing it for the hypocrisy in the hero insisting on her fidelity to their love while having other lovers and thinking he can walk back into her life and take it over whenever he wanted.  Fidelity on the hero's part would have made it an unhypocritical and faithful love.