Rane Aria

To avoid an unwanted marriage Rafe Ramsey travels to Cairo in search of a lost granddaughter of an old family friend and finds himself with more trouble then an unwanted marriage. Ayisha has lived by her wits and disguised as a boy on the streets of Cairo for many years, until one day a unknown Englishman starts asking questions that starts to raise more then questions but secrets she long to forget. As she has to chose between her old life and a new life with Rafe....... I liken this book to a pot of soup on simmer, as it takes awhile for everything to warm up but in the end it taste all the better, and that how it was with this book. It took sometime for things to warm up but between that there was lot to keep you reading. To Catch a Bride had a lot of action and adventure as you the reader try to figure out whom Ayisha truly is. Ayisha is the type of heroine I love, love, love. She doesn’t act immature, she’s strong and she’ll fight beside you and protect you when your down. She knew when to be tough, and when to be kind and she had a lot of brains and she used them. She was upfront about who she was but like Rafe, we were left in the dark to whom she truly was as the puzzle pieces start to fall in order about her background. Rafe had a Knight in Shining Armor complex, when he saw and found out about how Ayisha was living he made it his duty to fix everything right. Even going so far as to force the issue, but at the same time not seeing beyond duty and what trouble he was stirring up. Although he meant well, when it came to Ayisha he became a idiot, know as a smooth charmer, he would say the very wrong thing making you wanna smack him over the head for being a dolt! With Rafe he felt the need to save Ayisha from hardship, was also the need he felt as a unwanted second spare child to his father whom was an earl. Rafe needed to help someone, but it was he who needed the lessons in love. While the romance between Rafe and Ayisha was on very “slow” burn, there wasn’t a time there wasn’t an attraction between them, but for a short book I wanted a little more speed up in the real romance that doesn’t take place until toward the end. The romance takes a backseat to the adventure side as Rafe and Ayisha fight off thugs on the streets of Cairo then help one save the ship their own from pirates. With the Rafe acting like a dolt, the slow burn on the romance, there was also the sudden filler toward the end that could have been left out that I felt brought this book down. There was a few side stories and characters that really shined and moved the story along nicely.Overall: a very sweet historical that reads quickly with more on the adventure side then romance, with two loveable leads as they find their sweet HEA