Heiress for Hire
Series: Duke's Heiress #1
Author: Madeline Hunter
Published April 28th 2020 by Zebra Books

Goodreads Synopsis
In this stunning series debut from New York Times bestselling author Madeline Hunter, a duke's mysterious bequest brings fortune—and passion—to three young women...

Minerva Hepplewhite has learned the hard way how to take care of herself. When an intruder breaks into her home, she doesn't swoon or simper. Instead, she wallops the rogue over the head and ties him up—only to realize he is Chase Radnor, the man who nearly got her convicted of her late husband's murder. Now, he's insisting that Minerva has inherited a fortune from his uncle, a wealthy Duke. Only one thing could surprise her more: her sudden attraction to this exasperating man...

Chase can't decide whether Minerva is a wronged woman or a femme fatale. Either way, he's intrigued. Since the scandal surrounding her husband's death, she has set up a discreet detective business to rival Chase's own. She may be the perfect person to help him uncover the truth about his uncle's demise. But as proximity gives way to mutual seduction, Chase realizes he craves a much deeper alliance...
Goodreads

Review
I received an Advance Reader Copy from the publisher via NetGalley. This in no way impacted on my view.

In Heiress for Hire, Minerva Hepplewhite has finally got her life back on track when she comes upon an intruder, who turns around and tells her that she is a beneficiary of the late Duke of Hollingburgh. The intruder is his nephew, Chase Radnor, who has been involved in working with the Home Office in the past, and on good terms with the Home Secretary, Robert Peel. His uncle's death was slightly suspicious - he fell from the roof of his country estate, a roof he had walked on year after year. Chase thinks there's something not quite right, and the fact that Minerva was once known by a different name, Margaret Finley, and suspected his her late husband's death, is raising his hackles. He tries to investigate her, and at the same time, she also is doing the same. She understands why she's being suspected, especially when she has no obvious ties to Hollingburgh, and the fact that he left basically nothing to his family, and a lot to his three beneficiaries, makes it a tricky situation. Creating her own agency, Hepplewhite's Office of Discreet Inquiries, to help her in her endeavours, she finds herself crossing paths again and again with Chase, and can't seem to control her feelings, but, luckily for her, he's feeling exactly the same.

I loved the mystery in this book. First we had the whole situation regarding Hollingburgh death, and why he had cut out the majority of the family from the will, and then we had Minerva's history, too. The more we delved into Minerva's background, the more my heart went out for her. She was abused, horrifically, in her marriage, and when she managed to leave him, and he later died, she was free, and wanted to forget everything about him, so changed her name. The only connections she had to her previous life were her two companions, Beth and her son Jeremy, who had worked for the family, and stayed with Minerva when she got away, and were her true family. Throughout the course of the book, we saw Minerva grow, and recover from the horrors of her past, both by herself, and with the help of Chase, Beth, and Jeremy, which was the best part of the story.

The romance between Chase and Minerva was definitely swoony. Both tried to fit their attraction, especially when there was suspicious between them about the death, but their chemistry was just too much to overcome. Their banter was witty and snarky, and it was obvious that their attraction was not just skin deep from the get go. They really cared about each other, and if they hadn't got together properly, I may have rioted! I can't wait to see how their story progresses, especially with the joint venture of their investigations, and hope that in the next books in the series, we see more from them. Madeline is definitely an author I'll read again!

April 11, 2020

Rating
4 Stars