The pitch for this one is “What if Cinderella was actually running a con?” Upon reading, this is a little disingenuous. This book starts after Cinderella has successfully completed her con. Prince Charming is in love with her, they’re engaged to be married, and Cinderella is installed in the royal palace ready to begin Phase 2.
Cinderella Ash, known publicly as Lady Aislinn, has further schemes. As far as her stepmother is concerned, Ash is working towards securing advantageous marriages towards her stepsisters (something of a challenge, given how they are widely reviled for being cruel and abusive ever since Ash was “rescued” from her situation by the Prince). But Ash is playing her own game. Her dead mother was secretly from a nearby, conquered kingdom, and Ash is working in secret to liberate, or at least improve, the lives of her people.
Living in the palace as a hostage ever since the conquest is the son of the king and queen of the conquered kingdom. The Hostage Prince is handsome, and has the reputation of being a lazy, sloppy wastrel, though in their encounters with each other Ash gets the sense that he is much more than meets the eye.
He’s also the best friend of Prince Charming, the two of them having grown up together.
You can see where this is going.
I won’t call this a book with a love triangle, per se. Ash is never even remotely interested in Prince Charming; she is using him, but that does make any kind of an affair with the Hostage Prince a non-starter. But there’s a lot of drama and tension that is love triangle-esque.
It’s a fun story, and a tense one. I generally didn’t know where this was going to go until I went there. It kept me guessing on whether or not it would be a happy ending right up to the very end. Easy four stars.