~ Review ~
4.5 Stars
This book picked up right where the third in the Enthrall
trilogy ended!!
So if you don't want spoilers for the Enthrall trilogy then
read no farther.
I was so happy with Mia's choice at the end of the Enthrall
trilogy. I love Cam and Richard both,
but there was just something about Cam that I loved more. I almost felt cheated on the Enthrall series
because I didn't get to see what happened with Cam and Richard, Richard and Mia
and Cam and Mia. So when I heard there
was going to be more I was super excited!!!!
I loved how Mia finally got what she wanted. Cam was the man she wanted, but she also
loved Richard. Now that she has Cam will
she have the life she's always wanted?
Their relationship is going to have some bumps in the road. Will they be able to survive them?
Cameron has a lot to work through. He needs to let go of the
past, he needs to deal with his parents wanting him to take over the
business. Can he bring Mia into this
mess?
This book was amazing and another book I didn't want to put
down. I loved Cam throughout this book,
but he really pissed me off at the end.
This book ended on a huge cliffy and I need book two now so I can see
what happens.
~ Excerpt ~
CHAPTER 1
OBSESSION.
Only now did I understand its true torment.
I’d personally become acquainted with the misery of an
impossible conquest.
These endless laps in this ice-cold ocean failed to provide
my usual clarity, because all thoughts led back to her.
Mia Lauren.
She’d bypassed my defenses. I both loved and cursed her
existence for shaking the foundation of my BDSM empire that I rule with a firm
and steady hand. My ability to master every moment and everyone around me had
been compromised.
The ocean swelled and lifted me, carrying me out farther.
Powering on, slicing through with each breaststroke, my
Malibu beach house grew ever more distant. This current called for a certain
focus. A practiced discipline. A precise breath control.
Mia.
Back in my head, like a forbidden temptation.
Yet she remained innocent in all this. Having seduced her
into our world and delivered her to my best friend and business partner Richard
Booth, I truly believed I’d implemented my usual genius. I’d presented her as
the ultimate prize.
The plan had been simple enough: find a compatible
candidate, study the subject, methodically analyze her every behavior,
influence her motivations and manipulate them to dovetail my own, place her
under a psychological microscope until her every action could be predicted and
my desired outcome guaranteed.
Richard’s life had hung in the balance due to his reckless
daredevil stunts that included climbing skyscrapers in order to leap off them,
and when that no longer got his rocks off, diving into shark infested waters
for fun.
I had to ground the bastard.
Provide a distraction. The love of a woman.
Pure. Innocent. Malleable.
A stunning twenty-one-year-old—the perfect prescription.
I’d effortlessly drawn upon my critical ability to
comprehend the psyche of our subject, the sweet and innocent Mia Lauren, who
was presented as ideal. I’d chosen her from a slew of potentials and plucked
her out of the mundane. She held a timidity that was easily enhanced by her
ravishing beauty, and a femininity that left men swooning around her. A
flawless representation of the sacred feminine.
Her desire to please was a perfect trait for a submissive.
Harsh, perhaps, but the alternative for Richard was
unimaginable. He was going to fucking kill himself.
The objective to find the right applicant had
gone…swimmingly. Right up until the point I’d fallen for her. All I had to do
was train her. Break her. Prime her. Ready her.
Tame her.
But she’d trapped me instead.
My once ironclad will was tossed into disarray.
I’d broken the one true rule and fallen for the submissive I
was training for someone else.
Fucking unprofessional.
I was fourteen years older than her, yet her feistiness
threw me off guard. Her relentless strength, her presence, stirred a primal
desire to possess her.
I had to get a grip.
Pushing harder, I fought the rolling waves coming at me.
If I kept this pace up, my energy would fade several miles
out and, if caught in a riptide, I’d be screwed. When that realization hit me,
I began the swim back to shore.
“Master,” her tone breeched my defenses. “I am yours.” Her
words reached me like no other submissive before her.
And like the idiot I was, I’d insisted on delving deeper
into her mind, exploring this young woman from a troubled past to better
understand my own feelings, try to comprehend why her.
If I wasn’t going to destroy my closest friend Richard by
stealing her away, I’d have to put this behind me. And fast.
I hoped I’d survive her not becoming mine. A raw truth that
stabbed me with the consequences of my actions.
My escape plan to the other side of the world had been
sabotaged. My newly fueled jet had been scheduled for takeoff from Santa Monica
Airport a few hours ago. My destination, France.
My plane didn’t leave the runway. Paris had been derailed by
the remarkable circumstances of my reunion with Henry, my older brother. My
guilt and pain over what I once believed I’d put Henry through dissipated. His
perspective ironically clashed with mine. I’d believed I’d destroyed him back
in Afghanistan during a debriefing that had gone terribly wrong.
This morning, Henry had convinced me just how wrong I’d
been. After too many years between us ruined by misunderstandings and painful
mistruths, we’d spent precious time reuniting. This had been due to Mia’s
meddling in my personal affairs. Henry was back in my life again. My reclusive
older brother, whose war torn scars were the kind reflected in his eyes. The
consequences of Mia’s visit with Henry had ensured a family’s reconciliation
and old wounds healed. Yet another life Mia had saved and I’d scolded her for
it.
My arrogance once again served as a reminder I didn’t
deserve her.
I tried to think of anything but her…
My mind filled in the abyss of loss, projecting the vision
of a haunting beauty vacillating beneath the morning sun.
Blinking off droplets to see better, my feet found the sand
and I waded toward the beach.
Waves crashed around me as I wiped ocean from my eyes.
Mia ran toward me, splashing through the water.
My gaze swept the sand, searching for Richard and
questioning why he’d brought her here. To soothe? Taunt? He was like a brother
to me, but he was infuriating when it came to matters of the heart.
Mia came closer, standing waist deep in water, breathless.
Her blonde locks windswept, her face flushed, and her blue eyes full of hope.
Back at Enthrall, one of my dominatrixes had told me Mia
reminded her of a painting by William-Adolphe Bouguereau; an impossible beauty.
I’d prided myself on such a remarkable find and not once suspected I too would
become enraptured.
Had an argument with Richard sent her back to where it
began? This condo, her once safe refuge.
“Richard?” I broke my gaze from hers.
“He doesn’t want me anymore.”
Her words blurred the lines of possibilities.
Something about her failing as his submissive, something
about him sending her away. Something about them being over.
The truth spilled, emphasizing my inability to take Mia
where she’d needed to go. My attempt to tame her was unsuccessful. Her
feistiness became an unpredictable complication. I’d fallen short of my objective.
“I disagree,” I said. “You just require the appropriate
handling.” That made me grin.
She scrunched up her dress as though her drenched hem could
be undone.
Bewitching.
“You’re here?” she said. “Not France?”
That diamond bracelet was back on her wrist. The delicate
piece I’d placed there way back when I’d allowed myself the luxury of loving
that which I couldn’t have.
She raised her hand. “What’s engraved on it?”
Had Richard really let her go?
I failed to understand how anyone would ever willingly let
Mia go without a fight.
“The jeweler told Richard there’s writing on it. Only he
didn’t tell me what.”
An engraving naked to the human eye.
My thoughts bounced back to Richard’s latest text. Vague
words about what I deserved, that happiness was my right too, and I had to
trust him and follow through on his wishes.
Surely he’d realize his mistake and come back for her? My
focus settled on the horizon.
“Please tell me,” she said.
I feigned nonchalance. “It says ‘I will always love you.’”
A sob caught in her throat and she teetered forwards.
It was heart-wrenching to see her like this.
“Say it. Say the words.”
“I just did, Mia.”
“No, say it to me like you’re not reading it off my
bracelet.”
Bury these feelings. You have no right to her.
“Technically it’s my bracelet.” Another shrug. “As it’s on
your wrist.”
