The Billionaire’s Wake Up Call Girl by Annika Martin (Carolyn Crane’s sexy, smexy alter ego) is the epitome of Wistful/Wanton! It is also hilarious and unbelievably entertaining. I stayed up all night reading it (putting it down was just not an option) and I was cackling only when I wasn’t fanning myself feverishly and only fanning when I wasn’t swooning!
Prickly, uptight, self loathing and more than a little surly, CEO Billionaire Theo Drummand is a brilliant scientist and develops live saving materials for first responders and medical facilities. Lizzie is a marketing/social media strategist contractor for his company. She needs the bonus she’ll earn by lasting 30 days on the job (red flag!!!!) and he needs a 4:30 am wake up call, only no professional call service will touch him with a ten foot pole no matter his status. He’s a jackalope. Rude and he’s ran them all off with his curt manner. What else is Lizzie to do but pose as his call service when her job and much needed bonus are on the line?
I narrow my eyes, imagining arrogant Mr. Drummond, so confident of his superiority to the rest of the human race. I grab it.
“Wake up, motherfucker,” I say. “It’s time to rise and shine, okay?”
Mia raises her hand like she wants the phone back, but it’s my turn. I spin around.
“It’s another day, full of promise and possibility, another opportunity for you to step over whatever people you step over on your way to wherever the hell you go at this weirdly stupid hour.”
Something soars in me. I continue—with gusto, “Time to start your day of being a complete and utter asshole, a man who thinks he’s all that and totally isn’t. And you need a wake-up call because you’re sooooo special. Because for whatever reason, you’re too much of an asshole to work an alarm clock like ninety-nine-point-nine-nine-ni
ne percent of people are able to do.” … A rumbly voice sounds out. “What?”
I freeze and pull the phone away from my ear. I see that it’s a live call. I see that it’s been one minute and three seconds of me insulting Mr. Drummond nonstop…
“Hello?” Mr. Drummond repeats. My thumb hits the hang-up button with lightning speed. I throw the thing onto the couch like it’s on fire. “Omigod.”
Oh yes, Lizzie! Oh your god indeed! As you can imagine things spiral out of control as Lizzie keeps up the charade and Theo falls for his wake up call girl. The storyline is cute and a little outrageous, but it all works and the novel on the whole is a must read.
That time I swooned…
He chuckles softly. I feel it from his lap. He traces my jawline back the other way, and a strange thrill stirs through me, wonderful and dangerous. This is nice, I think, and I suddenly want to say it. But I don’t. I can’t. He touches my right cheekbone.
“This is my favorite freckle of yours. My second favorite is the one on your right thigh.” He touches my right thigh. “Here.” His touch is a magic wand, awakening my thigh and nearby pussy. “I never think about that one.” “I always do. And there’s another one here at two o’clock from your belly button.” He sets a finger over the spot. My belly undulates under his touch, but it’s his gaze that gets me. “I like every place on you, Lizzie.”
My belly lurches. He’s not doing any kind of look, not playing any sort of game. It’s just him, open and frank. “I don’t want you to leave,” he says.
“Theo—”
“Please stay.”
“It’s impossible.”
“Unless we decide to make it possible.”
“Don’t. We talked about this. You said you wouldn’t get involved.”
“Maybe it’s time for you to change your mind,” he says.
“I can’t change my mind on an emotion.”
He gazes miserably out the window.
“Please respect that I need this to happen on my own steam. I need you to stop trying to change my mind on it.”
He sighs. I sit up and touch the inner edge of his right eyebrow. “This is one of my favorite places on you.”
He doesn’t want to play anymore. He just stares out the window, secret thoughts flowing behind stormy gray eyes.
“Your other one whorls perfectly, but this one refuses to whorl. It marches to its own drummer. It’s something you don’t see until you’re really up close. A secret eyebrow rebellion.”
He finally meets my gaze. “Do I need to quash it?”
“Maybe,” I say. He contracts his brows. “Still there. You can glower and furrow all you want.” I kiss it. “You’re not the boss of this eyebrow.”
He still looks sad. “You think you’re the boss of everything,” I add, sliding a finger over his lips, another favorite place.
*I’m a puddle. A puddle and I’m continuing this blog from puddle heaven*
That other time I pearl clutched- HARD…
I crawl over her and lean down, whisper in her other ear, “Lose the caller.”
She grins up at me. “Nothing,” she says. “That was nothing.”
I smile. Meet her defiant eyes. She kills me. I kiss her. I slide my palm up her stomach. She’s not a washboard-abs girl; she’s real. She eats cookies. Like a madman, I press my face into the sexy swell of her belly. I drag my lips up over it, squeezing her hips. She’s delicious. Even her imperfections are delicious. Actually, her imperfections make her more delicious. Still gripping her hips, I slide my face up her chest, aware that I’m giving her a little bit of sandpaper with the whiskers. From the way she wriggles, I can tell she likes it. I make whisker contact with the underside of her breast. Her skin is literally like silk. I slide my cheek along the curves, enjoying her, taking my lazy time to get to her nipple. I’ve never done this, just enjoyed a woman without any goal, except maybe her pleasure. When I come up for air, she’s watching me with unfocused eyes.
“What?” she says to the caller. “Ahhhh, okay.”
I’m up over her on my knees, enjoying her eyes on my cock. I give myself a few yanks, just because I can, cock swelling above her sprawled, naked body. I locate another condom in my pants pockets. I rip open the silver packet with my teeth.
“Gotta go,” she gusts. “Okay, okay,” she adds.
I pull out the condom and toss the wrapper onto her naked chest. Her eyes flare. I bite back a smile and slide the sheath over myself, nice and slow, letting her watch me handle myself, because she seems to like that. I give myself a few yanks. Her chest rises and falls. But enough about me. I lean down and palm her thighs, rough and casual, like I own them. Her eyes twinkle.
Reviving to say: Yessss Theo!
This novel is one of my fav’s of the year. Aside from a backstory that felt a little too outrageous and a little too swift resolution, Billionaire’s Wake Up Call Girl was a five star read for me. It took me through all the requisite romance feels. I will definitely read this and more by Annika again, how could I not, this was the epitome of adorable. One of the best “Billionaire/foes to lovers” out there.
Have you read it? What did you think?
*heart eyes*
I loved it! She was so snarky, great banter.
Zippy, it was so damn funny! I could not believe all the snorting and laughing out loud I was doing.
I liked it and would recommend it, but I did not love it the way I loved Martin’s MOST ELIGIBLE BILLIONAIRE. I thought all the ingredients were there for an A book (and I’m already predisposed to like anything Annika Martin/Carolyn Crane publishes), but there was one really negative stereotypical character that made the book more of a B+ for me: [POTENTIAL SPOILER, DON’T READ ANYMORE IF YOU DON’T WANT TO KNOW] The scheming administrative assistant who steals the heroine’s ideas and throws the heroine under the bus seemed to me to be outsized in her villainy against the conventions of the rom-com plot. Her eventual firing seemed too little, too late.
I haven’t read Most Eligible Bachelor yet, I have it on my shelf and was debating on when to start it. I’ll read it soon since you think so highly of it!
OMG, I agree, I wanted her fired sooner, but as thin as it was, I was fine with how she was eventually ousted. I was more eyebrow raising at why Lizzie needed so much money, it felt super fictiony. Especially how that particular issue was resolved. I didn’t buy Theo in that scene. lol
All that aside, I loved and am seriously excited that Most Eligible is just as sexy/funny. Thanks for the rec Deb!
MOST ELIGIBLE BILLIONAIRE (originally published as MOST ELIGIBLE BASTARD) is one of my absolute favorite reads of the year. It has some points in common with WAKE-UP-CALL GIRL, but I thought both the storyline and the hero’s contrition arc were stronger in ELIGIBLE. The humor, the snark, and the sexiness are all there too.
Yeah, I’m seeing a few thoughts about Theo not suffering long enough, but I guess I didn’t think he was so very, totally wrong. She needed the help he provided and he provided it in a way that allowed her to retain her control. I was glad she came to her senses sooner as opposed to later because we help the ones we love and even if we fumble along the way. As the reader we can see their true intentions (omniscient as we are, LOL). He loved her, didn’t want to lose her so he did something about it, something that pricked at her pride but he meant well, she read him the riot act and almost broke it off, but thought about it- saw that it was done in love and just what she needed. That felt realistic, even for fiction.
On the contrary, I tend to dislike heroines who punish and punish the hero and over the top groveling. Especially when the hero meant well and wasn’t a jackhole, for jackholings sake, LOL
I’m currently reading Kennedy Ryan’s Block Shot- but Eligible Billionaire is definitely next!