When the loathsome Lord Bascomb tries to force her into marriage, Elizabeth Woolcot, against her will, must applea to her influential guardian. Nicholas Warring, known as the Wicked Early, is a darkly handsom charasmatic figure--with the power to save her but a past that could put her reputation dangerously at risk. A ruthless womanizer, he has also been convicted of murder--and barely escaped hanging. Elizabth can't help her attraction to the man who haunts her dreams--nor he his hunger for her. But she knows it can never be. For Nicholas is a married man. Then a heinous crime shatters their lives--and Nick is the natural suspect. Elizabeth wants to believe in his innocence more than life and love itself--but can she trust a man who has killed before?