It was Margarite's dark haired beauty that made her jealous stepmother banish her from the Austrian court, to the exotic climes of Mexico.

And it was her curvaceousness that captured the eye of the maniacal bandit, El Cuchillo, who vowed he would have his fill of Margarite before he was done.

But it was Margarite's bold beauty that brought the handsome, enigmatic Patrick O'Malley to her rescue. A captain in the Union Army, he was secretly working for the United States in Mexico. Even as he fought the very people she supported, Margarite found love in Patrick's embrace as, again and again, he took her to the peaks of passion -- and beyond.

Her all-consuming love would take her through the terrifying days of Mexico's fight for independence, into the court of the mad Carlota and her husband Maximilian, and back to her Austrian home where Margarite literally battles for her life -- and the love of the man she can never forget...