A Lady Awakened by Cecilia Grant

I won an ARC of this on Goodreads - thank you so much!  I enjoyed it so much!

My favorite romances are of the Regency period and this is that time period.  But that is where all similarities to others end.  Mrs. Russell (I just can't bring myself to call her Martha LOL) is a new widow who comes to realize she will loose her home and her dowry if she doesn't produce a male heir.  The kicker to this is that the late Mr. Russell's brother is a total jerk-face who has taken advantage of women in their home when he lived there as a young man.  Enter Mr. Theo Mirkwood...the rogue who has been sent to the country as a punishment by his father.  Mrs. Russell employs Mr. Mirkwood as her "stud" for a month so she can conceive a child and claim the inheritance.  

Mrs. Russell believes she can't take any pleasure from their daily (later it becomes nightly) encounters.  Theo eventually changes her mind.  Martha is so set on her plan to thwart her late husband's claim that she even turns down Theo's confession of love and request for them to be together

I'll be honest, I was in tears at the end when Martha realizes she wants to be with Theo and has figured out a way for them to be together and the brother-in-law to not get the inheritance.  When she gets to him and he's gone...my heart broke.  All I'm going to say is, they get their happily ever after, but you're left wondering how on earth they'll get there.  It was a great journey.