"I didn't want to give you the one last part of myself that I couldn't take back. And then you were gone... And I realized it was already yours. It had been since the beginning. Except that I hadn't told you. It drove me mad, the thought that you would never know. "

Wow I LOVED this story. First of all I loved this story because Derek and Sara were not from the ton and it was refreshing to have a story that didn't rely on calling in ones drawing room and having chaperones and so on. These two unlikely people were to never cross paths at all. Derek a gaming owner was being assaulted by two men when Sara, a novelist, happen to see the altercation. Sara was considered a spinster, so when she was in a bad neighborhood of London she had no sense of propriety when she decided to help Dereck out and pull her pistol out to help ward off the assailants.

A unclassic romance is built by these two and a unique turn of events brings these two together. An absolutely wonderful story of a Cockney poor young boy who grew up to be a successful and wealthy man to find love in a high spirited, loving, from the country, novelist.....