Scarred billionaire Elias Hart wants one night with a blindfolded stranger…but ends up with his best friend’s all-grown-up little sister in book one of Jackie Ashenden’s Playing for Pleasure duet! My billions can buy me anything…but they can’t stop the women who beg for my touch from cringing at my scars. That’s why the blindfolds never come off… In the dark, I can be the golden athlete I … athlete I was–before the part of me that cared about others was burned away.
When I recognize the striking woman in my hotel suite, I know I should send her packing. But my best friend’s little sister has grown up in the most enticing way since I disappeared from her life ten years ago. And I don’t want Vesta going to some other “stranger” to lose her virginity. As long as she keeps the blindfold on, I can give her the pleasure she craves…
But the touch of Vesta’s skin, her plush lips and taut body drive me wild. And her fierce nature stirs unwelcome emotions. Vesta is marking my scorched soul as her own. But when the mask comes off, will she run from the beast whose heart she now holds in her hands?
Take control. Feel the rush. Explore your fantasies–Harlequin DARE publishes sexy romances featuring powerful alpha males and bold, fearless heroines exploring their deepest fantasies.
Read all the books in Jackie Ashenden’s Playing for Pleasure duet:
Book 1: In the Dark
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This book takes place all in one night. Vesta has been in love with her brother friend and partner, Elias, for years but she’s done saving her virginity for him. Through her best friend she lands a “job” where she can get rid of it. She is blindfolded and doesn’t realize it’s him until later that night. Lots of hotness and of course, he’s stupid and let’s her walk away but she doesn’t get far.
What an amazing story of two tragically broken souls who happen upon each other many years later in a beautiful setting with a blindfold & long evening full of sexy passionate moments ! A must read for all to see what happens once the blindfold is yanked free during this most beautiful HOT evening!! Once again Jackie outdoes herself with such critically flawed loving characters!
Although I usually complain about the brevity of Dare romances, this latest release by Jackie Ashenden was exceptional in many ways, and Ms. Ashenden’s novel, In the Dark, simply had it all, and it gets 5 stars from this reader.
Vesta, the heroine in this novel, is a 25-year-old virgin, a condition she wants to remedy. When her friend, Maggie, who works for Company of Strangers, an escort and whatever else the customer wants service, is double-booked, and prefers one client more than another, Vesta convinces her to allow her to replace Maggie for this one time, especially when she hears about the particular stranger’s talents and tips. She’s been in love with her brother’s best friend and business partner, Eli, since she was a young child, but he stopped communicating with her 9 years ago, for no reason she can fathom. Since Eli is the only man she’s ever been attracted to, this one and done gig will finally allow her to lose her virginity and hopefully put to rest her hopes of ever having a relationship with Eli.
Her Company of Strangers client has very specific requirements, the first and foremost being that she must be blindfolded for their date, she must not speak unless spoken to and she must never touch her client. When they finally meet, her client realizes that Vesta is not the escort he pre-selected for the evening, and that in her place is someone who doesn’t know the rules, hasn’t signed a contract or a non-disclosure agreement, and hasn’t set hard limits. She seems somewhat familiar to him, and Vesta too, senses that she’s met this man before–and they’re both correct, but even in the dark, these two characters are about to learn a lot about one another, far more than either of them realizes at the outset.
These two characters are so well-drawn and so angst-laden that you couldn’t help but feel their emotional pain. Both were under-appreciated or downright made to feel like failures by their parents. They both have plenty of emotional baggage, Vesta from being dyslexic, although her family refused to deal with it, treating her as dumb and unattractive. She didn’t want to attend college since reading and writing were so difficult for her–and she became a tattoo artist instead. Her family simply considers her a failure. Her client too was deeply and irrevocably damaged emotionally when he was about to make it in the NFL, but a severe knee injury ended his father’s dreams for him. We also soon learn that the reason for his no-touching rule is that he is badly scarred from rescuing his family when their home was on fire.
Once Vesta and her client agree to his terms, the sex in this novel is utterly incendiary. Because of Ms. Ashenden’s use of dual narration, she has let the reader into her characters innermost thoughts and feelings, their pain, their angst, their regrets, their deeply felt physical and emotional connection–so much so that I spent the latter half of this novel in tears.
If you’re looking for a romance novel you won’t be able to put down (I couldn’t), one that is both steamy, tense, deeply emotional, deeply moving, with characters you won’t soon forget, look no further–this is that novel. And, oh joy, there’s a sequel coming!