JUST BUSINESS by Anna Zabo

JUST BUSINESS by Anna Zabo

 

Pages: 266

Date: June 16, 2015

Details: No. 2 Takeover

            Copy received through NetGalley

E-book

The blurb:

Justin White may not look like an up and coming corporate superstar, but his new boss knows he has the smarts, grit, and determination to succeed. Now he just has to convince his company’s CFO, Eli Ovadia. Unfortunately, Justin can’t seem to keep his cool around the domineering Eli—and soon he finds himself taking their heat from the boardroom into the bedroom….

Still haunted by a tragic accident that left him with a wounded leg and broken heart, Eli has a need to be in control. But his desire for Justin makes him want to lose that control—and push them both far beyond their limits. But will his need to dominate Justin drive him away—or will Eli find a way to be the man he needs for both of them?

My thoughts:

I appear to find myself in the middle of a fabulous reading streak. Every single book I’ve picked up recently has been outstanding and very special. Just Business is no exception – quite the opposite in fact. Just Business gave me everything I could possibly ask for in a story, and then some. When I saw this book came with a recommendation on GoodReads from L.A. Witt I had a feeling I was about to start reading something special, but I had no idea how very special the experience would turn out to be.

Justin and Eli *sighs*. Two men with pasts they would rather forget and memories they can’t stop from affecting their present. The moment they set eyes on each other a power struggle commences and the push and pull between them only gets stronger when Justin starts working for the company where Eli is the CFO. But a romance between colleagues is never a good idea. While Justin yearns to submit to Eli, the idea scares him as much as it excites him and Eli doesn’t do relationships – after all, he’s a despicable monster in his own eyes.

When Eli and Justin do come together it is a thing of beauty. They fit together as if they’d been created for each other. But Eli reminds Justin too much of the man who nearly destroyed him in the past, and when the flashback gets too powerful, Justin is gone.

I lost myself in this book. I fell for Justin as soon as he was introduced but Eli...Eli took my heart and played games with it. His inner torment, his love for Justin and his selflessness were both excruciating and a thing of beauty, especially because he can’t see himself as anything but a monster.

As anybody who follows my reviews knows, I don’t usually do well with angsty reads – and boy is this book angsty. And I didn’t help myself at all when I had to go out exactly when I reached the angst-summit. I did my shopping worrying about Eli and Justin, wondering how they were going to fix everything that needed to be fixed. I only mention this because it is very unusual for me to live in the stories I’m in the middle of reading while I’m away from the book.

The angst in this book worked for me because both men had good reasons for the struggles they were facing and because the balance between angst and togetherness was just about right (for me). I loved that I had no reason to doubt that these two men belonged together long before Eli and Justin came to the same conclusion, even while I worried about how it would all play out. It didn’t make me flinch any less when it all went wrong, but it gave me the courage necessary to continue until I reach their happy-ever-after.

Just Business is also an incredibly hot book. Eli and Justin are beautiful together. The BDSM scenes they share are as intense and exciting as their love making is. And I'll never look at a walking cane in quite the same way again after this book. The sex scenes in this book tell the reader as much about who Eli and Justin are as the rest of the story does. I loved how it was not ‘just’ about dominating and submitting – in those scenes as in the rest of the story it becomes perfectly clear there’s a lot more to these two men than what appears on the surface or even than they are giving themselves credit for.

This is the second Takeover title and I haven’t read the first one yet. I can’t say that was an issue at all. While it is quite possible somebody who has already read the first title will get more out of this book than I did, I can’t say I ever felt as if I missed out on anything. Having said that, I do now feel the need to read Takeover in the not too distant future. If Just Business sets the standard, I’ll be in for another treat.