The Proud Wife (Mills & Boon Modern) [Paperback]

Kate Walker's The Proud Wife, was a most amazing romance. I believe it will be at the top of my "Favorite Kate Walker" romances. A very intense romance about a short lived marriage due to communication problems, the loss of a baby and putting up walls. Now two years later Pietro D'Inzeo demanded his wife Marina return to Sicily to end their marriage and file for divorce until Marina walked into the room.

Two years earlier the beautiful woman who took his breath away, fueled his passion walked out on him. No one walked out on Pietro D'Inzeo. Now he was determined to end his marriage or so he believed until she entered his lawyer's office. She was still stunning and she moved things in him like no other woman ever had. He couldn't forget the passion they once shared. He was more than willing to give her a fair settlement until he found out she absolutely didn't want anything from him. She just wanted to forget the past, the pain and move forward. The meeting was so emotional for both of them that neither barely held on by a thread.

Emotions running high Marina thought, again Pietro was in control. Two years ago she thought she had everything; a husband she loved, a baby they created together, a beautiful home and then it was all gone. She lost her baby shortly after their marriage, Pietro retreated and she couldn't take it anymore. She left without a word and no explanation. However, secretly she hoped he would come after her but he didn't, so the writing was on the wall. But I wondered, why then didn't she file for divorce? She believed the only reason he had married her was for the baby and the heir she would provide him. Her only thought was she needed to move forward. However, when she told him she didn't want a thing from him, he couldn't believe it.

Kate Walker set up an emotional reunion and it was obvious they were both confused by the feelings stirred up at seeing each other again. Just seeing him, remembering how she felt when she first met him, remembering loosing the baby, hiding out in her room and not communicating to her husband her feelings about loosing the baby almost killed her. For Pietro, just seeing her stirred feelings. For the past two years he had hidden and hadn't faced up to loosing her. When she walked into the room, immediately he knew in the back of his mind that he wasn't ready to let her go. There were bitter words exchanged. He asked to speak to her alone and then made the mistake of kissing her. At that time, that's when I truly believed he would spring into action with some sort of a plan to keep her in Italy and I wasn't wrong. He used the press as an excuse not to take her back to her hotel and said he couldn't afford a scandal. So they drove off with only Pietro knowing their destination. However, instead of taking her to the home they lived in as a married couple, he cruelly took her to the cottage where they stayed on their honeymoon. Could he hurt Marina anymore I thought? How could he just shutdown and not remember how much he felt when he married her and she was pregnant because she had cast a spell on him.

The core of their love story for me was they needed to deal with the past before they could have a future. Would this happen at the cottage that was so special to them.? Would these two stubborn people let down their guard? In someways, yes they did but only in a physical way. Again they made love and it still was incredible how they could make each other feel. It was explosive! Yet the issues of their failed marriage needed to be addressed but what were those issues? First of all, they got married only knowing each other for a short time and because of the baby. Then having a live in mother-in-law who wanted her son to marry a Sicilian girl and who lost her heir. And the lack of communication after they lost their baby. Pietro using work as an excuse and Marina staying behind closed doors and refusing to talk about it. What a mess! However, they needed to deal with it. Pietro and Marina needed to resolve their hurts and either move forward together or alone. Quite a lot to forgive and forget but not impossible.

Talk about complicated. Marina was heartsick when she realized the mistake they had just made in the bedroom because it only complicated their issues. They had let their emotions get the better of them and had finished what had happened back in the attorney's office, they hadn't made love, they had sex. She felt herself a fool to believe he wanted more and so her plan was to walk away just walk away as she had in the past. I believed Pietro wanted more; he just didn't know how to tell her. However, he was determined not to let her walk away. He told her she was not "going to shut or lock any doors again!" And that little statement was the key to why their marriage hadn't worked Marina realized. So she stayed to sort things out. However, it didn't work out as each of them thought. They continued to argue about their reasons for their failed marriage . In the end it was Pietro who walked away taking Marina's broken heart along with him.

Would this proud Sicilian wise up and realize this beautiful woman loved and adored him? Would the walls come down and could they forget the past? Yes to all, especially when Pietro realized that when Marina walked into his lawyers office, "his life had been on hold until she walked back into it". The Proud Wife along with it's roller coaster ending was magnificent! It was a beautifully crafted and extremely emotional along with a few secrets revealed as only Kate Walker can pen.

Think of everything you love about a Mills and Boon and you will find it in The Proud Wife. Kate Walker skilfully creates the sexual tension, mental anguish and tangled emotion that makes a novel sizzle.
Aside from the convincing backdrops and accomplished narrative, Pietro and Marina emerge as free standing, fully developed characters with all the flaws, confusion and complexities of real human beings. The reader is dragged into their world to share their torment and it is impossible to put the book down until their trials are resolved.
It is no surprise that Kate is one of the more successful authors of this genre. She understands people and the barriers that can keep us from achieving personal fulfilment. Because she knows exactly what makes her characters tick they come alive on the page and the reader is personally involved with their happiness and craves the resolution as deeply as they do.
Marina is a fully rounded woman, no swooning, no soppy weaknesses; she emerges as a strong, modern, convincing woman who stands on her own two feet. Pietro is troubled, with some skeletons in his cupboard but he is essentially a good, fair minded man (aside from being stupendously good looking) and as such, is the type of man we can all fall in love with.
When you open The Proud Wife you will become involved in Marina and Pietro's journey and can expect vivid scenery, sizzling sex scenes and heart wrenching dark moments but you can be safe in the knowledge that it will all come right it the end.
The Proud Wife is a romance that sparkles.