When Penelope Albright married Lord Norman, a much older, callous man, she believed she was doing the right thing for her impoverished family - and also ensured that she would never succumb to the sins of the flesh like her older sister Miranda did. Even though it turned out so well for Miranda, Penelope won't speak to her or see her. Now that her husband has died, Penelope is free - but to do what? He poisoned her self-image and only helped fuel her fear and dismay of pleasure.
A few passionate words made to a couple of ladies about the way the men of the ton treat their wives, leaving them to lavish attention on their mistresses, places Penelope in a position she never wanted: as spokeswoman for her peers, the gently bred wives of men who look elsewhere for pleasure.
A small group of powerful, wealthy men who pride themselves on their fast and loose ways are angry at how Penelope has stirred up their previously-complacent wives. Drawing straws on who should tackle the problem and silence the beautiful Lady Norman, Jeremy Vaughn, Duke of Kilgrath, picks the losing straw. He decides the only way to corrupt and possibly blackmail Penelope is to play a double game: pretend to be reformed and join her crusade, while secretly sending her inflaming letters and tapping into her repressed desires.
He's sure he can break her, but when Jeremy manages to reach past her natural scepticism and finds himself actually liking her - more than that, becoming friends with her, it becomes increasingly difficult to follow through with his original plan.
As he slowly draws Penelope out and encourages her to experience the very sinful things she's purportedly set against, their attraction, desire and friendship deepens to something stronger - can he still bring himself to expose her hypocrisy to the world, and does he even believe it any more?
Sometimes the problem with erotic romances is that they are often built on flimsy plot structures that serve merely to provide a pretext for lots and lots of good sex. When they get side-tracked on the plot, they become boring. When the plot isn't realistic enough, they become laughable. I was concerned, when I started this, that the latter would be true here. It worked in Taboo because the heroine worked in the world of pleasure games. It was a bit of a stretch in Everything Forbidden, the previous book in the series, because it was a gentlewoman crossing boundaries that you just never crossed. In Something Reckless, that line is completely discarded.
Eventually though, if you want to enjoy the story for its own sake and because it's the kind of book you're in the mood to read, you just have to let it go and go with the flow. I had to accept the story as presented and not stress about how improbable it could be. It's not the pleasure palaces and the naughty things people get up, sometimes practically in public, that is unlikely - that side of it is a given. But Penelope and Jeremy's story, especially the speed at which everything happens, can be a sticking point if you let it - and if you do, then there's no point reading the book.
It does set things back a bit though. Their chemistry wasn't as powerful as it could have been, and the subplot concerning the men and their mistresses - Jeremy tells a rather sad story about how he saw his father with his mistress and the two children they had together, and how happy his father was, playing with his daughter, while to his two legitimate sons he was perfunctory and distant - was dropped when I would have liked to see it play out a bit more. It served as too glaring a plot device, which made it all the more flimsy.
But it does have some solid electric moments, plenty of sexual tension and Penelope was likeable despite being a prude - especially at the end, when she really pulls herself together. It was harder to like Jeremy except when you got glimpses of what lay hidden behind his façade, because his motives are so monstrous - to ruin a woman's reputation and shame her, all so his friends can keep their mistresses while their wives shut up and do their duty. He comes across as a bit sleazy almost at times, and the description of him doesn't help much: he appears as a kind of Italian womaniser with long dark hair, tanned skin (seriously, very few men of his class would be tanned, especially all over) and beautiful green eyes. He was just too obvious.
He also didn't seem like much of a duke; dukes are very close to the royal family and have much more serious duties than the "lesser" nobility, including the need to marry and procreate. It would be unlikely that Jeremy would sowing his wild oats for such a long, unchecked time.
Ah dear, I've gone and done what I promised I wouldn't: focus on the plausibility of it all. Suffice it to say that dodgy plot points aside, for an erotic historical romance this is good fun and plenty spicy - nothing kinky - and ultimately satisfying in how it comes together at the end.