Oh. My. Gosh.

Yesterday I was skimming the discussion boards at Digs, and found a thread for people who are trying to track down books that they read years ago but whose titles they can't remember. And I found what looks like pretty much the Best Book Ever.

This is the poster's description, by the way--not mine. Ditto for the typos and formatting:

(italicized comments added by me in the manner Eric D. Snider and his angry letters. My compliments to Eric D. Snider. Call me!)

In the beginning of the book the heroine is at a party where her cousin is getting engaged. (The cousin's fiancés is really a spy along with her brother) In the first chapter, the cousin finds his fiancés looking through some paper and he realize what she was doing so he beats her. Her brother(whom everyone thinks is her cousin and lover) kills him and they leave. (wait, so they're having this huge engagement party even though everyone thinks the bride-to-be is sleeping with her own cousin? Eww . . . )

The heroine met the brother outside and he made a past at her. (because he isn't too busy fleeing the scene of a murder or anything) Then the heroine's father dies and she has to live with the uncle (who is a bad guy). Apparently the heroine father was helping the government un cover something and when she goes into the office that was her father (well, there's your book title: The Office that Was My Father) she finds a envelope on the back a cabinet. She also finds the brother there and he takes the envelope and her in the carriage escaping the uncle’s guards (Yay, a carriage ride! I love a carriage.). When they are a good distance away they argue and he starts seducing her (which is how it always happens, you know. Then they start up with the heat and flame metaphors, if this is the kind of book I think it is.). Then she makes him stop and when the uncles and his guard come she gives the wrong direction where the brother escaped.

I don't really remember what happen after that some how the uncle get drunk and want to rape the heroine but her slave stops him but he rapes her. (So . . . her uncle does rape her, then? Some help that slave was.) Then the uncle sends the heroine to England (yay, England!) and the brother goes after her. While there she stays with some other family member and their son falls for her and teaches her how to sword fight. Then when she try to escape he tries to kill her but the brother comes and saves her.(b/c ahe escape her families house b/f he had a change to get there). (Um, if you were going to kill someone, why would you bother to, I dunno, teach them how to use a sword???)

She goes back with him to America. Also his sister (the cousins fiancée) has a secondary romance with I think another spy(she is barren by the way). (Oh, good. I was wondering.) After they go back to the South, (aaaah, they're Southern. This is all making so much more sense.) the brother want to uncover the uncle and he does but the heroine end up going also with his sister behind his back. She end up shaken b/c I think some how she fought with the uncle, and then you find out she is pregnant (by the uncle? Eww.). At the end both couple and a double wedding, where 2 American presidents (don't remember which ones though I think one was Adams) participate in the wedding. (Wow, I bet Adams was just thrilled to be there. Southern white-trash shotgun weddings were totally his thing.) So if you know what novel this is or even have an idea please let me knowThank U

I have never in my life been so happy to confess that no, I do not believe I am familiar with that book. I would be willing to guess, though, that it was in paperback, with a cover illustration containing a woman with hoopskirts and unbound hair swooning with parted lips while a dark brooking breeches-clad man clasps her to him. And maybe Tara is off in the distance. And maybe the book is covered in my vomit.