Title: The Billionaire Banker
Author:  Georgia Le Carre
Publisher/Year:  Georgia Le Carre 10/23/13
Length:  276 Pages
Series: The Billionaire Banker #1

Overview

Beyond the seductive power of immense wealth lies… Dark Secrets

When Lana Bloom learns the devastating news that her mother is dying, she is faced with a terrible dilemma. The one thing that can save her is the one thing she does not have.

For young and Innocent Lana, The unthinkable is her only choice.

When she walks through the door of that exclusive restaurant she has no idea of the seismic shift her life is about to take, for the highest bidder will not be the rich man she has accompanied.

Fate drops her at the feet of the deeply mysterious and dazzlingly gorgeous American banker, Blake Law Barrington. Throbbing with raw masculinity and arrogance, this is a man who owns all that he pursues.

And now he wants her.

Lana cannot deny she is both intrigued and intoxicated by the world Blake inhabits and the smouldering passion he stirs in her body, but she is also fearful for this man is addictive and right now she is very vulnerable. She knows she should focus only on the arrangement, but how can she?

When he has opened a door that cannot be closed…

My Thoughts

I’m a sucker for a story about a successful man who comes to the rescue of a damsel in distress, and finds himself in a situation that he didn’t expect and that has implications for the future.

This story starts off with Blake having dinner before a party one night when he sees a woman enter the restaurant that takes all of his attention.  She’s stunning but clearly looks out of place and this woman is Lana Bloom.  She’s at dinner with Ruper Lothian who isn’t the classiest of men, kind of perverse based on what folks say, and Blake comes to her rescue.  Mind you, Lana knows what she’s getting into when she goes out with Rupert, because she needs a large amount of money and she’s hoping that he’ll give it to her in exchange for her sexual favors.  Blake offers double the amount of money, without knowing how much and well, things spin out from there.

What we have here is a nice story of a naive girl of 19, and a well established man of 29 – he teaches her what it is to be wanted, cared for and to be quite sexual, yet he’s learning from her as well.  what’s nice in this story is that we seen an even trade off of ‘banter’ – she calls him out on his high brow life of society, and he’s willing to debate the ‘low life’ qualities of those who are poor.  It’s really nice though to see that he does have emotions given that he learns that she works hard based on her up bringing from her mother, and then learns that she’s ‘sold’ herself to care for her mother who has stage four cancer.

The journey that we take is a really nice one.  We have a man who clearly likes to control the woman that he’s with,.but it’s erotic without being BDSM in nature.  We also see that he’s fighting what he’s known, even though he’s clear about what his intentions are with her and that he’s promised to someone else.  He does however take what he wants of her and her body – and what we get is some pretty great scening and great imagination from our author.  It’s well written and not seedy – always adding to the high wealth and society ambiance that’s being cultivated.  Lana is given her freedom as long as she’s on call and available when he wants her-  so her life is only upturned in the sense that she has a posh apartment, nice clothes and doesn’t have to work for a few months.

All good things come to an end though right?  You have to expect that the women that he’s supposed to marry is going to find out about Lana and all hell will break loose.  We also know that at some point something in the contract that Blake made Lana sign will come to bite her in the butt – so it’s just a matter of time until we see that.

I can’t wait to see where things go, given that we had quite the cliff hanger of somoene ending up in the hospital, and someone fleeing the country – and someone showing their evil and vindictive side.  With all this anxiety, at least we know that there’s heated chemistry among some, and I can only hope that the heat and passion will continue into book 2.