The Russian's Acquisition by Dani Collins

 

I don't normally read a lot of these Harlequin books but sometimes my sister gets me romance novels and I end up with really random things I might not otherwise read. THE RUSSIAN'S ACQUISITION is a hi-LARIOUS romance published in 2014 but that reads like it was published in 1984. The heroine was the public arm candy slash secretary for the CEO of this business, and when he dies, her future is kind of suspended in limbo.

Because the new CEO is a Russian dude who hated her old boss. Also, old boss had the heroine sign an NDA so she couldn't tell everyone he was impotent, so like everyone else, Aleksy assumes that the heroine was his whore and he decides to punish her for it: by firing her without cause, insulting her half a dozen times, and evicting her out of her apartment, which he now owns. And he lets himself into it, startling her mid-pack, to threaten and insult her half a dozen more times.

When she tells him that she didn't ever sleep with the old boss, the hero is like, "You're just telling me that because you want me to fuck you." So he proceeds to insult her a couple dozen more times, this time, telling her how much she wants the D. He offers her money for sex, and when she points out that it will take time to show up in her account, he whisks her away on a sex vacation to France and then Russia, telling her that by the time they arrive via plane, the money will be there and she will be his.

The balls on this dude are pure brass. I mean, when he finds out that she was a virgin, his first thought is that she's trying to trick him into MARRIAGE. The heroine is like, who said anything about marriage? And he's like you whore, you're trying to trick me. And then he realizes his own illogic but consoles himself with the knowledge that all whores have to start somewhere (I am not kidding). Lmao, what a charmer. At least he's sort of good in bed, even if he apparently has sharp thumbtack nipples and eyebrows that "clash together like titans" (also they are "macho eyebrows").

After using a condom and pulling out and coming on her stomach, they through condoms to the winds (not literally, that's littering) and bareback it into the necessary third-act breakup, which leads us to a pregnant and sad heroine. BUT DON'T WORRY. He loved her all along and now she's no longer a blackmail mistress, no; she's been promoted to WIFE FOR LIFE.

This book was honestly so ridiculous. The guy was an asshole and the girl was kind of sad. She wasn't a doormat, just sad. When you learn about her life and how she never felt special, you can kind of see why the idea of a sex vacation and $100,000 virginity auction kind of made her feel like the pick-me she desperately wanted to be when she started shitting on how promiscuous and party-hardy her generation is (ma'am, I'm not sure you're actually twenty-three; are you sure you're not in your fifties?). But the book was so entertaining I couldn't put it down, so maybe I'm the fool here.

2.5 out of 5 stars