The challenge: two weeks without your billionaire fortune! Greek magnate Stavros Xenakis must go undercover to win a bet–and escape his grandfather’s demands that he take a bride. Until encountering deliciously tempting housekeeper Calli proves that a wife is exactly what he needs! Calli’s baby being taken away robbed her of the ability to trust anyone. Now Stavros’s offer to marry her gives … Stavros’s offer to marry her gives her the chance to finally find her son. But Calli doesn’t expect their honeymoon to be so sinfully sensual–and for life as the temporary Mrs. Xenakis to be so exquisitely satisfying…
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Four alarm angst fest with your typical arrogant Greek hero (those poor maligned Greek men) and a heroine that takes no guff from anyone much less an arrogant 6’ 4” Greek tycoon. The h and H both have angsty backstories to deal with.
The hero has been challenged to live and work for two weeks like a regular Joe by one of his tycoon friends. Manual labor, a mere 200 euros and his own awesomeness are to keep him going for two weeks. He’s humiliated he’s a pool boy, but it doesn’t stop him from the typical inner monologuing about the heroine’s morals on the basis of nothing more than the fact she’s breathing.
“Who was she cooking for? It was ten o’clock in the morning and no one else was here, not even the man who kept her tucked away on the Aegean like a holiday cottage. A married man, presumably.”
Contrary to my many 1 and 2 star reviews, I love Harlequin HP’s, but what I don’t love is this kind of malarkey almost every HP author does with the Alpha heroes. The heroine even points out what a sexist pig he is for assuming the house doesn’t belong to her. It doesn’t; it belongs to the older man she’s living with but that’s a side issue. haha She’s all around housekeeper and nanny to his bratty daughter.
Two weeks of work and lusting is over and the hero swans back in to offer her a MOC so he can get his hands on his grandfather’s company. Angst alert H: The hero’s dad died when he was young and the H has struggled with his identity and guilt ever since. He doesn’t think he deserves luvvins.
The heroine agrees because she wants to get to New York badly. The H thinks it’s because she wants to sightsee, but it’s tied into her sad backstory. [ Five years ago she got pregnant at 17 from a wealthy tourist. Her father sold her son to the family, tried to gaslight her the baby was dead with no body, then beat her, then ostracized her on the small Greek island. Her mother was little better and turned her back on her daughter who was forced to sleep on the beach. (hide spoiler)]She doesn’t think she deserves luvvins either.
The H gets a little snarky with her about the MOC.
“I wondered why you were leaving him when you’re obviously very attached. Money does make the girl turn round, doesn’t it?”
Given the heroine’s experiences with her lowlife scum father, the hero’s nasty words are easily dealt with…
“She swiveled just her head, eyes wide with hurt and something else. Bitter astonishment.
“Are you pointing out that I haven’t risen very far from offering myself to Takis for ferry fare? I’m aware. But you married for money, too. If you find my behavior distasteful, it’s because you’re looking in a mirror.”
This may be the first time I’ve read where an HP heroine has pointed out the hypocrisy of a man marrying to gain a company. Yay. YAY! YAY!
The H and h connect in bed in spades, and eventually both angsty backstories are resolved. The heroine’s may be a little less so for some people (view spoiler)
Nice angst, sizzling sexual tension, and a teary as in sweet epilogue.
Only issues for me are the hero and heroine don’t seem to relate other than in bed, and, much more importantly, THERE IS NO COMEUPPANCE FOR HER PARENTS! Please do not create these horrifically horrible parents only to drop them. If you can’t boil them in oil, can you at least insert a scene where they try and grovel their way back into her now good and rich graces only to be shunned by the H and the villagers. A small stoning maybe?