Wedding Night Reunion in Greece by Annie West

She’s his runaway bride…

He’s come to claim his wedding night!

Emma Piper’s just promised to love, honour and cherish Greek tycoon Christo Karides…but then she overhears him admitting he married her purely for convenience. Bolting to her family’s beautiful Corfu villa, Emma doesn’t expect Christo to follow—especially, with seduction in mind! Their intense attraction promises an explosive reunion. Will a night in her husband’s bed show Emma there’s more to their marriage than just convenience…?

https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/33259027-the-duchess-deal

Title: Wedding Night Reunion in Greece
Author: Annie West
Series: Mills & Boon Modern
Pages: 192
Genre(s): Contemporary, Mills & Boon Modern, Europe
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Oh I do so love a Mills & Boon Modern tale just as the weather’s starting to get warmer. THey’re full of lovely, warm locations (you won’t be surprised to hear it’s Greece in this particular story), hunky billionaires and the women who capture said billionaire hearts.

There’s not much prevarication with this tale - we get stuck right into the storyline and Emma overhearing the conversation that breaks her heart and leads to her fleeing her wedding day. It really starts as it means to go on as you can’t help but keep the pages moving to get to the next bit of the story.

Christo is everything you want a hero to be - especially a Greek billionaire hero. He’s grumpy, self-assured, cocky, arrogant and so damn sure that his way is the best and only way. Oh, yes - he’s due for a good comeuppance and downfall due to love. I honestly didn’t much care for him for the first wee while in the book.

Emma was also a delight. She was sweet, innocent and gullible - which disappeared pretty darn fast once she heard Christo’s unfeeling conversation about her. I was cheering for her as she took control of her life and left her ‘husband’ in the lurch. And when he tracked her down and told her she should apologise to him - I cheered some more as she told him where he could go!

And then we got a nice bit of back and forth as they danced around their attraction and distrust of each other. It was fun and I do like a couple who hide their attraction behind bickering - especially since timid Emma gave as good as she got.

Where it kind of fell down for me was when the pair started to reconcile. Christo still seemed to manipulate Emma by criticising her ‘running away’ instead of confronting him after hearing the conversation. The argument and make-up that led to more - it just felt a little wrong to me.

After that, the book went a little flat for a few chapters, before picking up near the end. I was expecting a big misunderstanding so was pleased that the author went a different way to get to the big declaration scene - which was sweet and a perfect conclusion to Emma and Christo’s story.

My complaints about the story - other than the slightly flat section - included the ridiculous overuse of the word ‘till’. Seriously?! Sloppy, informal writing in a book makes my blood boil. Sad but true.

I wasn’t sold on the little girl in the story. I question her age vs the way she talked/behaved - and she really felt more like a plot device than a full-bodied character. She could have been removed from the story and not a jot of difference would have been made.

And while I liked the writing style - and it really kept my interest - I did feel that there was a bit of thesaurus work going on at times. Every now and then a word jarred and felt forced - in direct contrast to the rest of the book, or even the rest of the paragraph.

The setting of Greece made me long for warmer months and made me long for crystal blue seas, skies and golden, sandy beaches. And this was the ideal romance for a beach read - or for wishing you were reading on the beach. It was a cute, sweet and fast read and gets you right in the mood for summer. 3 stars.