Title: The Gilded Cuff
Author:  Lauren Smith
Publisher/Year:  Grand Central Publishing 2/10/15
Length:  352 Pages
Series: Surrender #1

Overview

Every passion has its price . . .
Journalist Sophie Ryder has been following Emery Lockwood’s story since she was a little girl. There has always been something in his haunted eyes that she couldn’t resist and now, when she’s certain he holds the key to solving a string of kidnappings, she’ll do anything to speak to him. Even if it means venturing deep into the seductive world of the Gilded Cuff, a luxurious BDSM club on Long Island’s Gold Coast and Emery’s personal playground.
From the moment Sophie enters his shadowy, sensual domain, Emery Lockwood knows this tantalizing new little sub was meant to belong to him. However, Sophie wants more from Emery than just pleasure . . . she wants his past. And that is something he isn’t willing to give-no matter who is asking. But every moment he spends with Sophie, Emery feels his control slipping and he knows it’s only a matter of time before he surrenders to her heart, body, and soul

My Thoughts

Thank you Netgalley for giving me the advance copy – apologies for taking FOREVER to get to reading it.  It was definitely worth the wait though – and i’ll tell you why.  Not only do we get what i’ve come to be used to the D/s tale of a billionaire man who’s taunted by his ghosts and therefore living in the BDSM lifestyle, but a reporter/journalist – who’s trying to get her story and therefore is on the hunt for said billionaire.  That’s what we have here with Emery and Sophie.  As we learn quickly – Emery was kidnapped at a young age with his twin and he’s made it out but his brother didn’t.  He’s been haunted by this his entire life.  Sophie has her own ghosts – her best friend was kidnapped right in front of her never to be seen from again.  So they share that similarity and where it goes, well that’s where this story takes us.

While i knew what we were going to get, i was curious how we were going to get there.  Knowing that Sophie doesn’t know anything about the lifestyle, we’d get a great education if the author does BDSM justice, and she does…although it’s very light on the pleasure/pain bits.  We see some spanking and a bit of cuffs/restraints, but besides that – we don’t really go too deep.  That’s ok though since the sceneing between these 2- as limited as it is, IT’S HOT!. Sophie isn’t really ready to submit and it’s not like Emery really needs her to.

Sophie’s motivation of course is her hunch that Emery’s kidnapper has other motivations.  that it was an inside job that wasn’t done to completion and that he’s still in danger.  Even though Emery has security watching him, Sohpie’s ability to find what’s been missed through being a GREAT journalist makes her think that she’s going to see what others missed and solve it.  What she doesn’t know though is that she’s putting herself right in the line of fire, and we know that it means that someone or someones will not make it out alive.

Throughout this story we’re given snippets of the headlines from when Emery was taken with his brother Fenn, and Emery begins to tell us about what happened.  I have my own thoughts that i know who’s behind it, and i wonder if we’ll get to find that out before the first installment of this series comes to completion.  I feel like there’s a lot of denial and greedy motivations going on, and it’s not for the ransom money that was never asked for.

Will Sophie discover who’s behind it all while still guarding her heart and emotions?  Will Emery be able to open up enough and relive the pain to give Sophie the information that she needs to solve the case and will Cody and Hans, Emery’s security be able to protect him if and when the time comes?  Well, suffice it to say, just when things seem like they are getting worse, they still get even further past that point.  another kidnapping followed by another one, followed by the identification of someone that hasn’t been seen for 25 years.  So all in all a great first intro to a series and i can’t wait to see where the next book takes us.  Enjoy!