Her Claim by Rebecca Grace Allen (Legally Bound #2)
Released: April 23, 2018
Erotic BDSM
Self Published
Reviewed by Mandi
Favorite Quote: “What a thing it must be,” he’d murmured. “To be under your fierce protection.”
“I look after the people I care about.”
“I know. It’s one of the things I admire most about you.”
Favorite Quote #2: “I really don’t like you.”
“Same here.”
Cassie grabbed him by the collar and closed her fist around his shirt.
“Good,” she said, and kissed him, hard.
I don’t read a ton of BDSM – over the years I’ve gotten a little tired of the BDSM club scene in romance books. However, I found Her Claim to be a really well done book (and it’s club free!). It has a very strong, powerful heroine who I absolutely fell for, and a sinfully sexy hero who learned that he could love again.
Cassie is half-cuban and works as a lawyer in a very cut-throat law firm where she passionately wants to make partner. The old, white men that are the current partners have yet to give her this chance, so she decides to bring in a big client to show them she can bring money into the firm, and kick ass. Cassie’s attitude at work has gotten her far, but her “take no prisoners” attitude in a relationship, has not resulted in many long-term boyfriends.
Her hard-shell exterior was great in the courtroom, but not so great in the bedroom. Which was why most of the relationships she’d had ended soon after they started.
“Well you’ve gotta get back out there,” Lilly said. “Men out there don’t have a tendency to like women like me.”
“What the hell does that mean?” Sam asked.
“It means I’m difficult. Abrasive. Too hard to deal with.” At least that was what her last few boyfriends had said during their breakup conversations. “Men say they want someone who is hardworking and intelligent, but that’s bullshit, because look at me, Ivy League and still single.”
Not that she was going to change who she was. If a guy was being a dick, she was going to say so. They couldn’t take her heat, then they could get the fuck out of her kitchen.
I love her.
Cassie also has some dark, secret desires that she would love to try out in the bedroom, with the right person, if he ever comes along. Let me make a quick note to say that there is consensual non-consent in this book (rape fantasy) along with breath-play and other power-play moves when they have sex. (Cassie likes Patrick to slap her and belittle her etc…). Please note that for any trigger/content warnings.
Patrick has known Cassie for some time now – they have a group of mutual friends, so they often see each other while getting a drink after work. Patrick runs a publishing company, handed down from his father. A job Patrick did not want, but after having his heartbroken by a young woman years ago, he left his passion on the floor, and decided to walk in his father’s foot steps. Patrick really doesn’t like his job, but he is wealthy and that helps. Patrick is….a player. He takes home a new woman every night, always very clear that there will be no strings and never a second night. He is suave, and cool, and extremely good looking…and good in bed.
Patrick and Cassie have a hate-hate relationship to start. She hates that Patrick is so blasé about taking women home. She hates that he can get under her skin when he tries his pick-up lines on her. There is much eye-rolling and heavy sighs between them…until one night there isn’t. One night the constant bickering turns into a sexual heat and to the surprise of both of them, they fall into bed.
“I’ve always loved your spitfire attitude.”
Patrick’s voice cut through the night. Cassie stopped and whirled around. He was standing at the doorway to the bar, his arms crossed like a bouncer or a Greek god.
“Have you now?” Cassie cocked her brow and placed a hand on her hip. “Well, you’d love me in bed then. I’m a spitfire there too.”
The words popped out before she could stop them, but she didn’t regret it. For once, she wanted that bastard to know the chance he’d passed up. Because she might never have been in love and had dated some serious losers, but damn it she knew how to make a man moan.
Patrick dropped his hands to his sides and quickly closed the distance between them.
“Prove it,” he said.
“Prove what?”
“That you’re a spitfire in bed. Unless all you can do with that mouth of yours is talk.”
As they have hot sex (hotttttt sex) Cassie starts to trust Patrick enough to tell her about her darker needs in the bedroom. And Patrick’s heart, which he closed up long ago, starts to have long-term feelings for her.
Everything is developed so well in this book. We see Cassie at work, we see her with her friends, her family. We learn her fears and what makes her feel vulnerable. And the same with Patrick – we see him with his mother and their strained relationship. At a job he doesn’t love. His evolution into becoming monogamous. And then when the two of them get together, their sex has depth. It changes them and allows them to grow together. This is definitely an erotic book, in terms of the number of sex scenes and their explicit nature. They add a lot to this book and didn’t feel excessive.
The only thing I found a little off or just silly, is how much Patrick’s heart was broken by his first real girlfriend all those years ago – and how it stops him in his tracks when he thinks of it. It’s used as a conflict point late in the book to briefly break them up and that felt — too predictable.
I really liked this one a lot. I’m definitely up for another book by Rebecca Grace Allen.
Grade: A-
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