Satisfyingly angsty and filled with sensuality and pulse-pounding action, The Wayward Duke was so good it’s made me want to check out the other volumes in Katrina Kendrick’s Private Arrangements series.

Caroline, Duchess of Hastings, has a bum marriage but can paint like nobody’s business. She and Julian, the Duke of Hastings, have forged completely separate lives from one another after distance and time estranged them. Caroline has been happy with a solitary life spent painting while Julian attends to his interests in other countries; he’s a codebreaker for the crown and his work is dangerous. Julian is so often absent that Caroline has turned the ducal chamber in their home into her art studio. To her, his visits are pure torture and a reminder of what was and could have been.

Once, they had a close and passionate connection that sparked from a near lifelong friendship, but they were forced to marry after being caught in a compromising position. They were happy for a while, but the death of their mutual best friend, Grace, has changed everything. Julian has become so remote since then that Caroline is convinced that Julian loved Grace, not her, believing that was why he fled and left her all alone to face Grace’s funeral – and the stillbirth of their son. They have been living apart for eight years, but Caroline demands change. If Julian is to stay with her while his apartments are being renovated, he must act the part of a loving husband during his one month stay in their house and put an end to the social humiliation she has suffered.

Julian, of course, is dealing with another case. A master cryptographer, he’s been called in to figure out some threatening letters that baffle authorities. He can’t break the code – but Caroline can. Soon they’re getting shot at, nearly blown up, having carriage sex and working undercover together. But can all of this danger lead to a recovered marriage? Or will one of them end up alone and cold in their grave?

The Wayward Duke is Kendrick’s best novel so far. While clichés tripped up her previous book, the strong amount of angst in the plot of this one works in her favour. I did have to ding it because there were a number of repetitive plot points – Caroline nearly dies multiple times for Julian, to the point where her near-deaths start looking like carelessness. Some readers aren’t going to enjoy the deep, dark reason for Caroline and Julian’s estrangement. But he does try to make amends, and when she pushes him away it makes a lot of sense. Neither of them comes off as immature or childish, even when grappling with a near decade of guilt. They’re two wounded people realistically reacting to their pain and trying to fight temptation, and I greatly enjoyed their journey. I actually wanted them to spend more time talking about the stillbirth and mutually grieving the lost child – she rejects him so hard that it lingers over the book. I know it’s nine years in the past for them, but still. Yet the romance is hot, the characters likable and interesting, the sex scenes intense, and the spy plot successfully twisty.

The book seamlessly weaves in the flashbacks to nine years earlier to explain how the estrangement between Caroline and Julian happened, and we see other characters from the series, though I easily picked this book up without having read the other instalments.

Overall The Wayward Duke worked well for me, and could be a fine introduction to Kendrick’s work. It avoids some of her earlier pitfalls, making for a well-wrought and engrossing romance.